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Message: <blockquote data-quote="77IM" data-source="post: 6972214" data-attributes="member: 12377">Re-introducing skill ranks seems like a very shallow and artificial-feeling way to achieve this.I think a better approach would be to add more (and better) skill feats. For example, Stealth has Skulker feat, Deception has Actor feat, Athletics has Athlete feat, etc. Most of these feats are weak, but you could improve them in various ways. (For example, let those feats grant proficiency in the relevant skill, or Expertise if you are already proficient.) In fact, you could come up with a system of "half-feat" skill improvements, where a character can give up 1 or 2 points of ASI to get a skill special ability.I like feats for two reasons: <ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">It's qualitative instead of quantitative. Increasing skill ranks to increase your bonus (quantitative improvement) is boring; it doesn't really change anything, unless the increase is massive (Expertise). Getting a whole new cool ability (qualitative improvement) is interesting.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Players who don't give a crap can just ignore this subsystem altogether.</li> </ul>The simplest solution here is to charge variable amounts for skills. Initial brainstorm: Perception costs 2 skill picks; Athletics and Stealth cost 1.5 skill picks; History, Insight, Medicine, Nature, Performance, and Religion cost half a skill pick; you can also get a tool or language proficiency for half a skill pick if you want.I like variable costs better than splitting skills into multiple skills because it isolates the complexity to character-creation time. During game play, nobody wants to manage Hide and Move Silently as two separate things, but doing a smidge more math during chargen isn't so bad.</blockquote>

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