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

[Ferrous]

I voted for 3.5/Pathfinder. However I prefer the Pathfinder version as the +3 proficiency means it does not matter if you choose to be a Rogue at 1st level or 10th you still gain the benefit.

The actual list for D&D 4th edition is great, I prefer a general Athletics skill than climb, ride and swim.

 

[Mokona]

I desire long lists of skill specializations but no skill points. A narrow gap between the bonus for skilled and unskilled party members.

 

[The Shadow]

If even one of them gets away without roleplaying, they will all try to get away with it. You don't know how many times I've said "Tell me the reasons I should help you" and some player stared at me for a good 5 minutes saying "Umm....I...umm....well, I can't come up with anything, but my character is very smart. He comes up with something even if I can't. I rolled a 35 for diplomacy. A 35! There's no way that fails."

I have one player who absolutely hates roleplaying more than a sentence or two with NPCs. He is the one that turned it into a joke.

I mean no offense by this, truly. But I really have to wonder which planet your players are from!

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?

I play RPG's because I enjoy the heck out of roleplaying. The idea that someone would go to the effort it takes to play D&D (or any other RPG) and not enjoy what I see the game as fundamentally being about is extremely alien to me.

On topic, I'm rather taken with what we've heard about skills thus far. It has the potential to be done badly, but I look forward to what they come up with.

 

[Sunseeker]

A little shorter than the Pathfinder list, a little longer than the 4e list, with the ability to put points in any skill like Pathfinder/3.x. Did NOT like being unable to put points into other abilities that weren't class/race/background/ect..

 

[Consonant Dude]

I don't want any skill list but I'm all for getting an ability check bonus if your theme makes sense. Let the DM and players decide if it makes sense.

Merchant theme? Roll a charisma check to haggle, get a +3 bonus.

Don't clutter the sheet with skills and feats and special stuff cause too much special is not special at all.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

No skills or having 4e style skills = no sale.

Simple math in my case. It was one of the many choking points that I had with 4e, and with Castles & Crusades, for that matter.

Not that it matters, my hopes are kind of low at this point regarding 5e. I will hope to be wrong, but then one of the joys about being a pessimist is that most surprises tend to be nice things....

The Auld Grump

 

[dnlas]

I like Mote Cook's idea in "legends and lore".

But I don't think it can use in Diplomacy Bluff Intimidate and Knowledge skill

 

[Mengu]

I think skills are very important. They tell me what my character does when he is not fighting, which for our regular play style is a lot more than combat. So I appreciate a solid skill system. Let's assume I'm a monk. I want to be able to differentiate between several monks I might play. I could be a monk librarian, faithful of Oghma. I could be a disobedient orphan monk who spent more time on the streets than in the temple. I could be a disciplined imperial monk trained to watch over and teach the emperor's kids. In combat, these monks may be identical. But I would like to be able to build my monk with skills that reflect what kind of background he has. And I don't particularly care for a "canned" skill set I may or may not like. I'm looking for granular customization.

When I'm in the DM chair, I want to be able to impact scenarios based on the skill set of a group. An entire group who coordinated to have stealth and ranged attacks should be able to us this to their advantage. A couple con artist characters should be able to bluff their way out of a few jams. A bookworm conspiracy theorist should be able to decipher coded enemy messages. I inject this stuff into my games, based on how the characters have chosen their skill sets.

I would definitely like to see a set of skills. I don't mind 3.5/pathfinder, or 4.0. I can manipulate either one to my liking. I do not like being told, here is your background/theme, and this is what you can do.

I would also like lesser impact of stat on a skill, and greater impact of training. Otherwise, it is very easy to get into situations where the wizard without training is better than the cleric at religion, and the warlock has better coincidental endurance than the trained paladin. Skill system should not be something to min-max to be meaningful, it should be meaningful without system mastery. Currently in 4e, a rogue trained in Dungeoneering, or a Runepriest trained in Thievery are pretty futile attempts at skill mastery, particularly at high levels where stats easily surpass the +5 provided by skill training, and with a low, non-increasing stat, in order to keep up with skill DC's you need a ridiculous amount of investment.

I don't think there is a perfect (or even great) skill system out there for D&D in any version. As such I'd be up for something new and fresh, though sadly, D&DN seems more about old and grungy than new and fresh.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

(snip good stuff) ... The best part is that the combat class offers virtually nothing to noncombat and the noncombat class offers virtually nothing to combat, making all combinations equally valid, equal in power.

What you have outlined is roughly my preference, with one caveat: I'd make the combat and non-combat tracks completely independent of each other--that is, silos. You could perhaps level in each one like some of the early D&D multi-classing. So if you wanted to be a 1st level fighter, 4th level wilderness guy, you could. Or vice versa. This also implies that within each silo you could use either 3E or 4E style multiclassing (or some hybrid). Now you can be 4th level fighter, 2nd level wilderness guy/1st level noble. Getting that next level of combat stuff is effectively getting to 5th level combat, and whether you branch out or bump up wilderness/noble stuff, you are buying the 4th level of the non-combat stuff.

Just like the building blocks of (combat) classes can be shared (i.e. weapons, spells, etc.), the non-combat classes can be built out of shared elements (i.e. sneak skill, diplomacy, etc.), but also like regular classes, the class provides a place to put in special abilities that not just anyone can get.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

The other problem was that the skills weren't broad enough.

I'd really like to see skill trees. You take your first five ranks (or thereabouts) in general academic knowledge, and then from there on out you have to specialize, taking specific ranks for History, Arcana, Geography, etc. You take your first give ranks in acrobatics, and then specialize in Tumble or Balance. You take your first five in influence, and then specialize in Bluff or Diplo or Intimidate. It would allow for a lot more detail and robustness without clogging the character sheet, and it would make the game easy for beginners at 1st level while retaining the detail for more advanced players as they move up the ladder. It would allow a concrete list of general skills, while making it easy for DM's to make up subspecialties of them as needed. That's modularity in practice.

I think our preferences are sufficiently different that we will rarely agree. So I need to call this one out as something that I really like!

In particular, I'd like to see something like you proposed applied as much based on utility as anything else. In other words, for skills that are relatively niche, compensate by not having many specialties and/or delaying the level at which the specialties occur. So you get the whole thing for your character resources. For skills that are valuable, use the specialties to divide them up and make them cost more to comprehensively get.

Using that, you could steal a leaf from Dragon Quest, for things like craft skills. Have a "Mechanic" broad skill that allows most crafting (outside of whatever crafting was inherent in other skills), but then use the specialties to distinguish different crafters. In fact, that is how DQ did it.

What I don't want is goofy overlap, especially in "Professions". If we have a "Heal" skill, let them specialize into making potions, or let Alchemy skill do it, or even require both. But let's not have PS: Healer as a skill. (A theme or other game element is another story, especially if it gives access to Heal and Alchemy skills.)