D&D 5E Skills in 5E. Do we want them?

[kitsune9]

For games like D&D, Pathfinder, etc., I like small skill lists. Around 15-20 is my comfort range. Though, if I play in toolkit games like Hero System or GURPS, more's the better.

 

[Flobby]

I'll admit I haven' read every post in this thread but my understanding of the new system is not that they are proposing to do away with skill and just use abilities--but to sort of reverse the emphasis.

Right now you have a bunch of skills modified by abilities. Abilities are in the background and only come if you have to make a check for something that doesn't fit into a skill.

So instead of a skill list, just use ability checks, and for specialized applications and such use feats, themes and class abilites. So maybe a rogue could get a +5 (or whatever) to any check related to opening locks and sleight of hand. Or you could take a feat that makes you an expert climber, etc...

To me this sounds simpler, leaves more room for creativity, and actually allows for a more expensive skill list in the end since you are free to add anything (blacksmith theme/background? okay +X to any checks involving that subject, and so on).

Thats my take anyway.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

What is the point of playing a "role-playing game" if you absolutely hate role-playing and try to 'get away' with not doing it?

Well, not everyone enjoys ACTING. They enjoy taking on the role of the big, burly barbarian who hacks up his enemies, goes into rages and can make people do what he wants by threatening them....but they want to see the effects of that, not act out the exact words being said.

Still others just have no skills in acting. They freeze when put on the spot to say something, either because they are shy or because they are just timid.

So, when those players come to a game, they want to say "I threaten him with death if he doesn't do what I say, I roll 30 on Intimidate" and imagine that they are saying something much more eloquent, that they have a team of writers writing the dialogue of their character.

That's why then enjoy having skills for everything. They want to make the decisions for their character, but have the characters ability be what succeeds, not their own.

It's also the reason I hate skills because I like the stuff that comes out of the roleplaying aspect of the game.

 

[Reigan]

I would like characters to specialise with something akin to skill powers rather than getting ever higher skill levels.

 

[MortonStromgal]

I want to get to pick 2 background skills + X class skills to get a +5 to then get a skill focus feat for +2 every other level.

Alternatively I can live with pick X skills that go up 1 per level, all other skills go up 1/2 per level.

 

[keterys]

Alternatively I can live with pick X skills that go up 1 per level, all other skills go up 1/2 per level.

The d20 mechanic really doesn't support well things that separate by a lot over level - if possible we should try to avoid a case where you start, say, at 7 better at your chosen skill vs bad skill at 1st, and that turns into 17 different at 20th.

Unless you do want a lot of autofail, autosucceed, and d20 not much of an effect on things. Dunno.

 

[MortonStromgal]

Well at level 30 you would be +30 to class skills and +15 to all other skills... its a big difference but so is not having any points in a skill with 3.X, this gives you a +15 bump

 

[keterys]

True. And I'm saying that mathematically speaking, that's probably a design flaw, depending on your goal.

Number inflation was a problem throughout 3e and 4e, with the designers not really cognizant of how fragile a d20 truly is as they went about giving various bonuses, often based on level divided by a small # (ex: 2, 3, 5) of varying types. And that applies just as much to your base skill difference.

Especially if you can then get, say, an ability score (let's say one is 6, the other is 20), an item bonus, a theme bonus, feat bonus, a divine bonus, or whatever other type of bonus you want.

So it depends a lot on what you want out of the system, but keeping the d20 in mind from the beginning (and thusly not doing a 1/2 level spread unless it's very much on purpose) is a good thing.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

True. And I'm saying that mathematically speaking, that's probably a design flaw, depending on your goal.

Number inflation was a problem throughout 3e and 4e, with the designers not really cognizant of how fragile a d20 truly is as they went about giving various bonuses, often based on level divided by a small # (ex: 2, 3, 5) of varying types. And that applies just as much to your base skill difference.

Especially if you can then get, say, an ability score (let's say one is 6, the other is 20), an item bonus, a theme bonus, feat bonus, a divine bonus, or whatever other type of bonus you want.

So it depends a lot on what you want out of the system, but keeping the d20 in mind from the beginning (and thusly not doing a 1/2 level spread unless it's very much on purpose) is a good thing.

Well, the 3e system guaranteed you would have huge separations. The 4e system doesn't inherently. 1/2 level actually has nothing to do with it. It is stat boosts and willy-nilly stacking bonuses that IIRC the 4e designers claimed would not be larded into the game way back when, and then were.

So you could use the same system as 4e exactly, drop stat boosts, and allow nothing more than say 4 points total worth of bonuses that don't stack beyond Skill Training. That means the MAX difference at any level is 6 (stat bonus) + 5 (training) +4 (other stuff) = 15. That's a pretty wide range, but not outside a d20. If you assume a level+4 DC is intended to be a hard challenge even for an optimized character then L+4 Hard is a DC25+L and at-level Easy would be say DC8 (quite doable for someone with a total -1 modifier, but still iffy for that guy). That isn't far off from matching the existing DC table for 4e, though the progression past level 1 would be a bit flatter and diverge less.

Notice too that basically it is not really different from the '5e system' as it is now apparently configured. A guy with say a +10 (which you'd expect as about your best bonus at level 1) doesn't need to make a check on an easy task, needs a 3 on a medium task, and a 9 on a hard task. Untrained 8 stat needs 9, 14, and 20, so he's not really going to bother with a hard task unless he MUST.

Now just throw in the concept of "you can lower the difficulty by one with a good plan" and you're there (and really there's no reason that doesn't work in 4e, though it is more designed around SCs).

Finally throw on skill trick/knack/power stuff that lets you do extra tricks or say a feat that you can take to get some 'specialist' training that knocks certain tasks down a difficulty notch and you basically have what 5e is proposing.

There's not really a big issue with 4e's skill system and scaling in other words, except all the crap 4e dropped in for bonuses. If they'd used "drop the difficulty one class for doing X specific thing" instead, well, it would have been more stable etc.

 

[keterys]

1/2 level actually has nothing to do with it.

It does when one skill has +level and the other has +1/2 level, which is what I responded to

That means the MAX difference at any level is 6 (stat bonus) + 5 (training) +4 (other stuff) = 15. That's a pretty wide range, but not outside a d20.

It kinda is, actually.

Ie, let's say you're expected to need to roll a 6 to succeed with your good skill (75% chance, not bad). Now you need a 21 on the d20 to succeed with your bad skill. (Or you need a 15 to succeed with your bad skill, and a 0 on the d20 to succeed with your good skill, whatever)

Anyhow, I'd like skills to not be about chasing bonuses, however they work out. I'm good with "skilled folks do cooler stuff". Very good with it. Skill powers and all.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

It does when one skill has +level and the other has +1/2 level, which is what I responded to

It kinda is, actually.

Ie, let's say you're expected to need to roll a 6 to succeed with your good skill (75% chance, not bad). Now you need a 21 on the d20 to succeed with your bad skill. (Or you need a 15 to succeed with your bad skill, and a 0 on the d20 to succeed with your good skill, whatever)

Anyhow, I'd like skills to not be about chasing bonuses, however they work out. I'm good with "skilled folks do cooler stuff". Very good with it. Skill powers and all.

Well, Monte seems to be using some sort of hard cut-off, which has sort of the reverse problem, which is sometimes you just plain cannot do something. That can be rough. It is of course possible with skills, but there's not a lot of chance that one guy in the party is awesome and everyone else is totally incompetent. The same range of numbers THEORETICALLY comes up in combat in 4e, just nobody ever bothers to make a really low chance attack except a few corner cases.

"Special tricks" are a perfectly good concept. they can call them skills or whatever terminology makes people happy of course.