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Message: <blockquote data-quote="fuindordm" data-source="post: 2589597" data-attributes="member: 5435">Iron Heroes (Mike Mearls, Monte Cook) recently added a useful innovation to the D20 ruleset: the concept of Skill Groups.  Like many other gamers, I've been somewhat dissatisfied with the D&D implementation of skills.  When 3rd edition first came out, it was so much better than anything D&D had done before thatwe were blinded to the faults... but now we know that we can do better. Mike Mearls has shown us the way!The three main problems that I see with the D&D skill system are:1) The cost to invest in cross-class skills is prohibitive. Skill points are a scarce resource, and the double penalty of increased expense and limited ranks combine to make cross-class skills a painful choice for players. That's not to say that I've never seen players doing it anyway--and I've done it myself. ButI believe that players should be encouraged to diversify their portfolio beyond the archetype of their class, not strongly discouraged as they are now.2) The list of class skills for each class is somewhat arbitrary--it's easy to imagine characters whose primary abilities are best represented by one class but who would logically have a very different set of class skills. Examples include the seafaring fighter (marine), the court magician, the urban berserker, the savage bard, and so on.3) Most classes simply do not get enough skill points to fill all the roles they are supposed to play in the party.  While this has the advantage of  making Int much less of a dump stat, in practice even with a decent Int many characters are forced to make the choice between maxxing out their canonical skills and diversifying into the skills they really feel their character ought to have given their background.  If a player chooses the latter path, they suffer an in-game penalty for creating a character with  depth, which I find unfortunate. These three slightly different mechanical problems all combine to discourage reflecting a good background story in the skill selection, to the detriment of the game.  I feel that D&D would be a better game if characters had better backgrounds and more skills.  Skills are useful but not overpowering abilities that give players the opportunity to contribute even when their primary abilities can't come into play. Allowing players to max out their core skills while still diversifying according to their background will increase everyone's participation throughout the game, and therefore everyone's enjoyment as well. Having said that, I will point out that core D20 has already offered some fixes to these problems:1) Occupations--if characters can choose a starting occupation then they can add some background-appropriate skills to their list of class skills.2) Variant classes--quite a few of these are defined in Unearthed Arcana, and the PH suggests that the DM can work with the player to create their own.The very existence of these options implies that the choice of class skills for any given class is not a balancing factor, although the number of class skills might be.  Both of these options can ameliorate problem 2 (the fixed archetype) but neither addresses problems 1 and 3: the low number of skill pointsavailable and the high cost of spending them outside your set of class skills.Iron Heroes allows all characters to spend their points in all skills on a one-for-one basis, but defines skill groups--broadly related sets of skills that certain classes can purchase at a discount.  One skill point spent in a skill group (assuming your class gives you access) buys one rank in all the skills in that group.  This system strongly encourages players to max out any skill groups they have access to, and spend what's left on skills that they feel are appropriate to their character's background.  As you can imagine, Iron Heroes characters have lots of skills.However, the Iron Heroes character classes are almost all fighters of one kind or another.  One of the core values of D&D, and one of the things that makes it a great game, is the emphasis on teamwork.  It achieves this through the concept of niche protection, meaning that even at high levels each classshould have a unique role to play in the party, and should do it better than  any other member of the party.  In an all-fighter party, niche protection is not an issue.  In D&D, it still is--and the Iron Heroes system unchanged would make it too easy to devalue the roles of the ranger, bard, and rogue in the party.Still, I like the idea.  Here, then, is my proposal for implementing skill groups in D&D:First, the groups should be much smaller than in Iron Heroes. A skill group should have at most 3 skills.  Spending a skill point in a group still gets you one rank per skill.Second, if your class has access to a skill group then all the skills in that group are class skills.Third, ranks in cross-class skills cost one skill point each, but still have a maximum of (3+level)/2 to enforce the concept of niche protection.Fourth, synergy skill pairs should not be part of the same group.The D&D skill groups are:Acrobatics: Balance, TumbleAthletics: Climb, Jump, SwimCavalier: Handle Animal, RideDeception: Bluff, DisguiseInfluence: Diplomacy, IntimidateMechanic: Open Lock, Disable DeviceMedicine: Craft: Alchemy, HealingMerchant: Appraise, Knowledge: Geography, Sense MotiveMystic: Concentration, Knowledge: by magic (Arcana/Nature/Religion), SpellcraftPerception: Listen, SpotPickpocket: Escape Artist, Sleight of HandPreacher: Diplomacy, Knowledge: Religion, Perform: OratoryScribe: Decipher Script, ForgeryStealth: Hide, Move SilentlyStreetwise: Gather Information, Knowledge: Local, Sense MotiveWilderness: Handle Animal, Knowlege: Nature, SurvivalTwo skills, Diplomacy and Sense Motive, appear in two groups. Some skills appear in no groups: Craft/Profession/Perform, Search (see below), Speak Language, and Use Magic Device.  In my campaign, Alchemy includes the ability to make medicines from natural resources--if you don't do this, then Heal need not be part of a skill group either.The Search skill could probably be scrapped altogether.  If you're not searching for anything specific, Spot can be used instead; if you are looking for something that you're an expert in, use that skill instead.  3.5 already set a precedent, allowing the use of Survival to search for tracks.  Disable Device could be used to search for mechanical traps, Spellcraft could be used to search for magical traps, Appraise could be used to search for valuables in a room full of junk, Knowledge: Engineering could be used to search for secretdoors, and so on.The classes have access to the following groups in addition to their usual list of class skills:Barbarian: Athletics, Cavalier, Perception, WildernessBard: Acrobatics, Deception, Influence, Merchant, Mystic, Preacher, StreetwiseCleric: Medicine, Mystic, Preacher, ScribeDruid: Athletics, Medicine, Mystic, WildernessFighter: Athletics, CavalierMonk: Acrobatics, Athletics, Perception, Scribe, StealthPaladin: Athletics, Cavalier, Influence, Mystic, PreacherRanger: Athletics, Cavalier, Medicine, Perception, Stealth, WildernessRogue: Acrobatics, Athletics, Deception, Mechanic, Merchant, Perception,Pickpocket, Scribe, Stealth, StreetwiseSorcerer: Deception, Influence, MysticWizard: Mystic, ScribeI think I would find this system perfectly acceptable.  I have some concern that the ranger, rogue, and bard will wind up with too many skills; the rogue in particular is at least doubling his skill selection and should never need to invest in Intelligence.  On the other hand, I think the rogue is  an underpowered class, and would it really be so bad if it became the undisputed skill master of the game?If you find people are getting too many skills under this system,  consider changing the base skill points for the class as follows:Cleric, Fighter, Paladin, Sorcerer, Wizard: 2Barbarian, Druid, Monk: 3Bard, Ranger: 4  (They got a skill boost of 2 points in 3.5 in recognition of the fact that they had too many core skills; under this system they no longer need that boost.)Rogue: 6One might also argue that instead of adding skill groups to the system, you  could simply increase the number of skill points that each class gets--say to 4/level for the Cleric, Fighter, Paladin, Sorcerer, and Wizard; 6/level for the Barbarian, Druid, and Monk; 8/level for the Bard and Ranger, and 12/level for the rogue.  While this is simpler, it doesn't solve the problem of cross-class skills being far too expensive--players will just get more core skills than they had previously.  I think the skill groups system will encourage players to stay in their archetype to a great extent, but also to diversify their portfolio.For example, if I want to play a con-artist rogue then I might pick the following skill groups: Deception, Merchant, Perception, Pickpocket, Scribe, Stealth, Streetwise, and use my last skill point in Diplomacy.  I could then keep the following skills maxxed out: Appraise, Bluff, Decipher Script, Disguise, Diplomacy, Escape Artist, Forgery, Gather Information, Hide, Knowledge: Geography and Local, Listen,  Move Silently, Sense Motive, Sleight of Hand, Spot. Is such a character overpowered?Your thoughts and comments will be appreciated.Cheers,Ben</blockquote>

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