Skills... WoTC Blog Post

[Meophist]

Thinking...

If you get +2 the first time, and +1 on every level you decide to invest in a particular skill, by level 20, you're still going to be around +20 above somebody who hasn't invested in a skill. This can create quite a large difference between somebody who has invested and somebody who hasn't, which can cause problems if they want to make the math flatter.

It might be better if they limit the bonus gained from skills. Let's say one can't get any higher than +10. If one wants to still invest in the skill, maybe have the option to spend a level's worth of skills to "master" a skill they have +10 on. This could mean something different for each skill. For the Swim skill for instance, perhaps this could mean that they no longer have to make any more Swim checks, regardless of the conditions.

 

[Mattachine]

Yes, but we also don't want child-saftey D&D.

Like those games for Special Needs children (no offence), where everyone's a winner all the time!

I take offense, by the way. That was a pointless comment.

The post was saying that the game should not have options that seem fine but actually don't work out in-game. Sub-optimal options should be made clear, not prohibited.

The point was made clearly, and I agree with it.

 

[Steely_Dan]

I take offense, by the way. That was a pointless comment.

The post was saying that the game should not have options that seem fine but actually don't work out in-game. Sub-optimal options should be made clear, not prohibited.

The point was made clearly, and I agree with it.

Totally poignant, I work with people with disabilities in my job, it seems you're just hopping on the poster's bandwagon because someone has your point of view.

I am not advocating trap choices, just too many black & white views going on here.

 

[Ahnehnois]

and reasonably well-designed: Whoa, there. This is the part I don't agree with. I really dislike the idea that characters need to be "designed." I want chargen to work like this:

The Rules: What sort of a character do you want to play? What do you want to be good at?
The Player: I want to be a holy paladin who charges into battle on her trusty steed and skewers monsters on a lance.
The Rules: Okay then. Paladin class plus Mounted Warrior theme plus a lance. Here you go.

As opposed to:

The Rules: What sort of a character do you want to play? What do you want to be good at?
The Player: I want to be a holy paladin who charges into battle on her trusty steed and skewers monsters on a lance.
The Rules: Here are 3 classes, 8 skills, and 15 feats that might be appropriate to such a character. Out of those, there are four or five combinations that will be effective. The rest range from mediocre to pathetic.
The Player: Uh... which is which?
The Rules: Figure it out for yourself.

I got more than enough of the latter in 3E and 4E. I want as little of it as possible in D&DN.

Fair point. Redundant options are no good. Trap options are no good. Excessive options are no good. As veterans we tend to use what we like and ignore the rest, but for those who don't have that level of experience it is important that they are presented with clear, meaningful, and viable choices that do things that can be explained in common language and make sense.

I just don't want characters who obviously never fight to have combat abilities forced on them, or any of the variety of other unreasonable things that have been done in the name of "balance". But I figure I'm pretty much in agreement with your sentiment here.

 

[triqui]

I'm sorry but just because someone is dexterous doesn't mean they can dance well. Just because someone is smart, doesn't mean they know calculus. Training accounts for a heck of a lot more than natural talent (or a +2). I know it's abstract, and I'm not a simulationist, but my noble czar wizard is going to be better at the court dances than the street urchin rogue kid who is more dexterous, and the templar paladin who is more charismatic.

I much prefer the 3e method of skills (not to mention a zillion other rpg's that use skill ranks). I don't understand why they are trying to reinvent the wheel on skills. Use what works.

It wasn't that way in D&D 3e either. Not until your czar wizard went out of the palace and killed a few goblins, so he took extra levels and the ranks started to shine over ability. Maybe your Cha 10 czar wizard should have more ability dancing, talking to people and playing the flute than the Cha 18 templar paladin, but that wasn't the case in 3e either. You had *at best* rank 4 in dance, diplomacy and perform (flute) -and that's so if you max the three skills, which often is not the case-, while the Chaladin has +4 in the 3 skills, even if he had no training at all. If you really want your czar wizard to outshine the charisma paladin in 3e, then your wizard has to go down to the bog, get into the mud, and start killing kobolds, dire rats, swamp cocodriles, a few stirges and a goblin shaman. THEN your wizard can dance, talk and play the flute better than the paladin, not before.

In 3e, I made a soldier (fighter, level 1), who was part of the city Watch. I had max ranks for my level (2, cross class skill) and I even took Alertness. I had +4 spot, and +2 listen. The group dwarven wizard had +5 on both, with no ranks at all. Once we got to level 10, I was +7 to spot (maxed ranks) and +2 to listen (had no more skill ranks to spend). By that time, the Cleric wisdom was (with magic enhancers) +8.

 

[billd91]

In 3e, I made a soldier (fighter, level 1), who was part of the city Watch. I had max ranks for my level (2, cross class skill) and I even took Alertness. I had +4 spot, and +2 listen. The group dwarven wizard had +5 on both, with no ranks at all. Once we got to level 10, I was +7 to spot (maxed ranks) and +2 to listen (had no more skill ranks to spend). By that time, the Cleric wisdom was (with magic enhancers) +8.

3e's cross class skill ranks could be pretty expensive. I suppose that's one reason that house rules abound with respect to swapping in more or alternate skills to be class skills and reducing cross class skill costs (the route PF took).

That said, contrast that with a system based on just your stats. Since your soldier had no apparent Wisdom bonus, he couldn't compete with the cleric at all. Your case shows that, for one of the perception skills, he was competitive thanks to skill rank investment. I think that, at least, is a valuable developmental iteration in the game design - one that PF improved on significantly.

We'll have to wait and see what 5e does. If it's too stat based, it won't be a step forward compared to your 3e watchman case. I hope that's not the case. Rolling vs a stat is easy, but it puts a lot of pressure on getting the stats right up front - something 3e did a moderately good job of alleviating with the numerous ways you could improve your stats over time and invest skill points to work around stat deficiencies.

 

[triqui]

3e's cross class skill ranks could be pretty expensive. I suppose that's one reason that house rules abound with respect to swapping in more or alternate skills to be class skills and reducing cross class skill costs (the route PF took).

That said, contrast that with a system based on just your stats. Since your soldier had no apparent Wisdom bonus, he couldn't compete with the cleric at all. Your case shows that, for one of the perception skills, he was competitive thanks to skill rank investment. I think that, at least, is a valuable developmental iteration in the game design - one that PF improved on significantly.

Oh, I wasn't trying to imply that 5e apparent solution is better. I was just denying that 3e "solved" that problem. It didn't, except for medium to high level. Once you have level 10, and 13 ranks, yes, "training" matter more than "ability". In low levels, that's not true. A high ability outshines ranks, by far, in low levels. Especially when you try to be competent in several things at a time.

Your czar noble fighter, who like dancing (perform), falconry (handle animal), hunting boars (survival), heraldry (knowledge nobility) and bragging about his own feats (bluff), has, at level 1, probably 8-12 skill ranks, and -1 to +1 in the relevant ability scores. Assuming he also wants to learn to ride, and be somewhat competent in other "class skills", that means he will be able to put about 2 ranks in each. If you want to add "needed" skills, like spot, listen, sense motive, diplomacy. With -1 to +1 in the abilities, that means he'll have from -1 to +3, *at best*. A character that has the proper abilities, (let's say a sorcerer with decent wisdom and charisma) will out pace him by far, even if he has *zero* training in those skills.

The only way this noble fighter can learn about heraldry, falconry, ettiquette and dancing, is going out to kill kobolds, then ogres, then trolls, then hydras, until he has enough Base Attack Bonus and high Fortitude. Then you can properly dance, speak, and train hawks.

I guess what I'm trying to say: all game systems have arbitrary abstractions. One way, or another.

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

If you get +2 the first time, and +1 on every level you decide to invest in a particular skill, by level 20, you're still going to be around +20 above somebody who hasn't invested in a skill.

I don't think you'll get them that often, but we'll have to wait to see. And if you can pick up new skills at those decision points, the system would encourage you to choose new over redundant with a +2 over +1. And if DCs assume little redundant training, then you can spend up to +20 and just be REALLY REALLY good at jumping, but the redundant skill training probably became wasted resources quite a while back.

 

[howandwhy99]

Unlike Saving Throws, Ability Scores were randomly rolled. I don't believe they were ever meant to be either target numbers or modifiers, but rather numerical representations for the players to make judgements off of.

Ability Score rolls have been around a long, long time though, and originated as house rules. They aren't that bad of an idea, but I think you'll definitely want to drop their randomly rolled generation, if they are mean to be target numbers. I'm not quite sure a 3-18 variance for a d20 roll would have parity enough for most players. The odds stack up for and against too quickly. Perhaps a roll that is an inverted bell curve could work? Something that tends towards zero and a higher number? But then that's pretty swingy in its own right.

Overall I don't particularly care for skill systems and that's what this sounds like. Skills become the modifiers to the Ability Score checks rather than vice versa. Only 6 kinds of rolls might be called for, but players can suggest any one(?) of many modifiers (skills) to be added. This puts the bonuses in the players hands and that's a positive IMO.

Traits sound like bonus goods and unrolled abilities at 1st level. Unrolled abilities, like languages and Feats, add on to a characters sure-fire abilities. Skills as modifiers are pretty sure fire too. Nothing is left up to chance except the rolls already in place. The abilities unequivocally alter them or give what they state. I like this kind of thinking too.

What you're missing is variable pay outs. That's probably too random to really test out a core systemology, but I wouldn't want you to forget them. For the sake of example, recall Clerical Turning could be attempted all day long, but had 2d6 variable results for two different effects. Pretty crazy, right? But it is another sure-fire ability that allows growing effectiveness over the level progression and potential effectiveness across a wide swath of varying level challenge creatures. This kind of thing can really define a class though, so I would keep them rare and largely identifying.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I'm interested to see if the shift from skill checks to attribute checks will change this. I suspect that players who didn't have their pre-5E character jump over the pit because they had a poor Athletics/Jump skill will also have their D&D Next character not jump over the pit because they have a poor Strength skill.

This is a real risk of the system. Ideally, you'd like it set so that someone who didn't want a high stat (because they don't want the broad abilities of that stat), but did want something specific, can pick skills or other options to get there.

That is, if your otherwise uncharismatic fighter is a guy you see as being able to conduct banter and negotiations with his fellow nobles, then you'd like to be able to do that with some skills and a modest Cha. But at some point, if the players says he wants "naturally socially ackward Joe the Fighter" to be great at diplomacy, bluffing, leadership, etc., it just gets ridiculous. Somewhere shy of that is the line, and you'd like the system to push up pretty close to it without going over to far.