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Message: <blockquote data-quote="SHARK" data-source="post: 3690862" data-attributes="member: 1131">Greetings!Good points, Irda! Hey--I love that *special sailor* article, too! Damn, that bastard has balls of steel...fighting a shark barehanded??? That's courage, I'll tell ya brother!You know, as I read your comments, it makes me think about when I make up some NPC's, or when my players talk about backgrounds and stuff for making up some new characters.In the Marines, I was always somewhat astonished--even amazed--as I mentioned earlier, at the wide range of talents that many of my fellow Marines--most of whom were 18 or 19 years old--some were even 17, like myself--possessed in spades.One Marine I knew got special dispensation from the higher command to participate with the Marine's Bronc/Bull riding team in the summer. This man also was a good musician--he made money performing at bars and stuff doing gigs with his guitar, and singing country music.Another Marine that was a friend of mine--he was an excellent shot, so good that he was on the sniper team. This guy was an expert mechanic, as well. His father owned a auto-Body shop and he had been working on tearing cars apart and rebuilding them since he was 10 or 12 years old. I can't think of anything mechanically this guy couldn't do when it came to automobiles.Another Marine had traveled all over Europe with his family, as his father was a Marine Embassy guard. This Marine--in addition to the martial skills that we all were trained in--was fluent in German, French, and Russian, besides English, and he knew some Italian as well. This leatherneck was a medievalist, had traveled all over there to the castles, and was a layman scholar in medieval history. This bastard also had taken four years of fencing lessons, and collected all kinds of medieval weapons. Naturally, he was a font of knowledge about medieval weaponry, forging techniques, and so on.I also was friends with a Marine that had lived in the Phillipines, Okinawa, Japan and Korea, as his father was also a Marine. This man was graceful, charming, in absolute great condition, and was an expert in martial arts--but in addition to being a part-time martial arts instructor, this guy was highly skilled in knife and axe throwing. He was fluent in English, of course, but also Japanese and Tagalog.Now, I have also read numerous sources in ancient history where they discuss different young legionnaires--being fluent in different languages; being experts in woodcraft and hunting; being highly skilled in carpentry and blacksmithing; or being skilled in history, rhetoric and philosophy--as well as some being skilled fishermen and so on.As Irda Ranger discusses--sometimes when I think of an 18 year old--and 1st level characters, and the assumptions in the RAW, I don't think the RAW 1st level soldier looks anything like the examples I gave above. The same guidelines and assumptions would have them all be 1st level warriors/fighters though, having never before been trained as a Fighter, for example. And, like some members have mentioned, a RAW 1st level Fighter looks fine when you think of a real-world example of some snot-nosed kid who's just out of high school, knows nothing, never been anywhere, never done 'nothin, and just worked at MacDonalds flipping hamburgers. That kind of medieval or ancient equivalent also existed, which is true. Just like it does today. But as I mentioned, not every 18 year old is the same. Some are vastly different, and the skill-set and such given by a 1st level Fighter RAW, often can leave a lot to be desired when crafting a character, whether that character is an NPC or a player character.Great discussion Irda! There's some very good ideas and approaches mentioned by several people here. Good stuff!Semper Fidelis,SHARK</blockquote>

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