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Message: <blockquote data-quote="evildmguy" data-source="post: 5318386" data-attributes="member: 6092">Coming late to this as well but it's been a fascinating read, so thanks to all who have participated!  For myself:  1E: Secondary skills were an okay idea but too random.  If they had broken up the charts by class, race or even geography (town vs wilderness) it would have been better.  I never understood why my fighter/mage inland city elf had a secondary skill of sailor.  It didn't fit but that was the roll so I had to keep it.  2E:  NWPs were good but like many others, I had the problems they had and a few more.  The descriptions were not very good and hid things, such as the sneaky -6 to Tracking if you weren't a Ranger.  The first time I pointed that out to a player, he was pissed.  (He was the rules lawyer and it was merely one more thing to argue about.)  Like others, as the DM, I wanted to have heroes with above average ability scores, but then they were experts at NWPs as well.  Pluses and minuses in having the skilled blacksmith but one NWP later and the characters could do it all themselves.  3E:  I didn't mind the skill system of 3E to a point.  But, as others have pointed out, there are still the potential of "wonky" results or having to "fudge" things.  That's fine but it does seem weird at times.  What got to me was how DCs kept going up to scale with levels but that creates other issues.  I do think the system went overboard in trying to define all of the craft, profession and knowledge skills.  4E:  Again better to a point.  DCs still scale but there is better advice about how to use them.  I think said advice is needed but there is good advice about not letting characters do things they haven't done before.  That's probably why the skills have been reduced to those skills needed adventuring and not worrying about the others.  (TSR/WotC skill systems)Alternity:  This was the big strength for me of the Alternity system.  A character's ability in a skill was based on talent (ability score) AND experience (skill rank).  Further, rank benefits showed why ranks in a skill helped offset talent.  (In other words, the 13 DEX, 3 ranks in pistol had the same numbers as the 10 DEX 6 ranks in terms of hitting but the character with 6 ranks has more options due to his experience (ranks) in the skill.)  Further, while it makes it complicated, skill costs came into play to make it more expensive to learn combat/adventuring skills while "background" skills were cheaper.  Whether or not that was intended is another question.  As KamikazeMidget (I think it was KMK) pointed out, skills/NWPs are only as needed as what the group is going to use them.  And this opens the argument of when to play DND versus another game system.  DND handles heroic fantasy very well.  As long as the game is about going on quests to stop the orc horde or the rampaging dragon, DND is a really great and fun system to use.  It's when the group wants to create their own magic item, be diplomats to a foreign dignitary, or barter with the king for their pay that DND doesn't handle it so well.  Sometimes that's bad but most of the time it doesn't matter.  Just a few more coppers.  edg</blockquote>

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