Skill Points: Do you max out a few skills or spread them around?

[Crothian]

For the first time I'm playing a character with a low number of skill points. With few skill points comes few class skills and I've choosenb to start out with a few skills maxed to see how it goes.

How do you do it? Do you max out the useful class skills or do you find yourself trying to spread them out to all the useful skills? Do you max out skills at low levels and the spread them out at high levels, or possible spread them out at low levels and get them maxed at the high levels?

 

[Limper]

Focus if you can. Only spread them out on skills which you get good att. mods. to. And remember a level or two of Rogue will go a long way toward filling the gap, should a critical deficit show up.... also the Rogue abilities complement just about any Class.

Personaly having few skill points drives me nuts. If you can pull it off I'd love to here how you got around the handicap.

 

[Painfully]

I've tried it both ways and I think it's a matter of taste for most players. I would say that every character should have at least one or two stats at max though. I generally make sure all my characters have points in spot or listen even if I can only afford a few points, it can often mean the difference between a suprise round on your character or regular combat.

I prefer raising listen skill now since invisibility is such a low level spell.

If your DM let's you get away with it, I would recommend 1st level be rogue and then be generous with the skills you think are most important. Depending on your DM, decipher script and use magic device can come in very handy. Also, be mindful of which skills you think might become less useful as you gain magic items or spell abilities--don't overspend your points in skills that can be easily boosted with magic.

 

[Wikidogre]

I like to spread out the points to the most important skills that mke the character that i am playing. and i will add a few points to not so important skills to round that character out

 

[Weeble]

I like to focus, but it is also good to take Trained skills. That way you have a chance at doing more things, if not very well.

 

[Quickbeam]

I'm in agreement with Painfully on this one. In general, I tend to focus my skills when playing PC's with limited points to spend, and only invest in vital skills like Spot and Listen beyond those relevant to the character.

Also, heed the advice to not overspend points on skills which will inevitably be enhanced with magic items/spells at higher levels.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

I use a mixed strategy. I maximize character defining skills. Every character has at least one of these. Then I put a pretty good pile of points into logical adventuring skills, e.g. Spot, Listen, Ride. I find a couple points to put into an odd skill with a good stat modifier and/or a knowledge skill that fits the character.

I tend to play humans with 12+ Ints so far, so I have a decent number of points to spread around.

 

[starwolf]

Eucation Skill Points

In our campaign we also found that there just didn't seem to be enough skill points to properly define character concepts. The standard rules seem to encourage rather cokkie cutter stereotypes. So I present one of the House Rules from the Five Sultanates campaign:

In addition to the standard skill points awarded to a character at each level based on the character’s class, each character receives education skill points. Education skill points may only be spent on Craft, Knowledge, Perform, Profession, Speak Language, and Literacy skills. At each level a character receives 2 plus their Intelligence modifier in education skill points. At 1st level a character receives four times this number.


Please note that we also define Perform in a different fashion, as we found it rather silly that each rank of Perform added a different instrument or performance type to the characters repertoir. In our house you have to spend seperate points on each performance type, i.e. Lute is different than Drums or Singing or Dancing etc.

 

[Ace]

For the first time I'm playing a character with a low number of skill points. With few skill points comes few class skills and I've choosenb to start out with a few skills maxed to see how it goes.

How do you do it? Do you max out the useful class skills or do you find yourself trying to spread them out to all the useful skills? Do you max out skills at low levels and the spread them out at high levels, or possible spread them out at low levels and get them maxed at the high levels?

In the game I was in we gave 2 extra points per level to every class so I could aford to specialize.

In a regular rules game I tend to specialize in a few skills except for always putting points into spot, search and listen. IMO an adventurer without these skils is monster bait.

 

[Ace]

I'm in agreement with Painfully on this one. In general, I tend to focus my skills when playing PC's with limited points to spend, and only invest in vital skills like Spot and Listen beyond those relevant to the character.

Also, heed the advice to not overspend points on skills which will inevitably be enhanced with magic items/spells at higher levels.

Good point in a regular game however in the 3e games I have played in we have never seen skill or stat enhancing items (well 1 item that we were able to buy) The DM's are stills atuck in 2e mode and don't understand that in core 3e style magic is more or less technology and very common.

Ah well, the encounters are still fair and balanced so I can't complain, much