Jack Jericho
First Post
ime?
insight, heal, and history
insight, heal, and history
What Skills are Underused?
- Thread starter the Jester
- Start date
Lord Zardoz
Explorer
The least used skills are going to have two traits in common.
- Those that the player either cannot use on his own initiative (ie: Because he thinks using it is a good idea, not the combat order), or can only do so very rarely.
- Those that the DM has the least reason or occasion to create a use for.
The second point is key. The DM may not be the sort who will create a skill challenge around finding a particular person in a city. But he probably wont prevent one of the PC's from using Gather info to find out if the npc has been around in town. Bluff, Stealth, and Thievery are all skills that you can build a character concept around, even in games where the DM may not do much with NPC's.
A skill like history is going to be very difficult for a player to try to find a use for, except in some Npc interactions and some skill challenges based on non physical skills. Endurance is even harder to find reasonable uses for as a PC with no control over the situation. If your DM never creates situations that may tax a player physically over time, it may never come into play.
Of course, PHB skill based utility powers can make some skills surprisingly handy.
END COMMUNCATION
- Those that the player either cannot use on his own initiative (ie: Because he thinks using it is a good idea, not the combat order), or can only do so very rarely.
- Those that the DM has the least reason or occasion to create a use for.
The second point is key. The DM may not be the sort who will create a skill challenge around finding a particular person in a city. But he probably wont prevent one of the PC's from using Gather info to find out if the npc has been around in town. Bluff, Stealth, and Thievery are all skills that you can build a character concept around, even in games where the DM may not do much with NPC's.
A skill like history is going to be very difficult for a player to try to find a use for, except in some Npc interactions and some skill challenges based on non physical skills. Endurance is even harder to find reasonable uses for as a PC with no control over the situation. If your DM never creates situations that may tax a player physically over time, it may never come into play.
Of course, PHB skill based utility powers can make some skills surprisingly handy.
END COMMUNCATION
Dice4Hire
First Post
It is also good for unfun things like diseases.
whitehairboy
First Post
I've seen some skills and wondered how they can be used in a situation. I'd leave it up to the players to find a way that would allow a particular skill to be used- even in unorhtodox settings. As a DM, I would remain flexible enough to see how a certain skill... might... be appropriate. A quick reminder about skills, trained or not, could keep players from forgetting what they have on their character sheets.
But I echo the replies of everyone else when they say streetwise. Time for a city encounter!
But I echo the replies of everyone else when they say streetwise. Time for a city encounter!
Saeviomagy
Adventurer
Streetwise tends not to be usable because for some reason most published scenarios, IF they include a settlement close to the adventure site at all, populate that settlement with 5 people, none of whom have a clue about anything except for the one that is actually a bad guy in disguise, who is obviously not going to tell the PCs what is going on, and have passing traffic of maybe one person who happens to live right where the dungeon is and can point the PCs right at it, who comes into town to adopt orphans every month (or whatever).
Basically most of the places that adventures happen are ridiculously underpopulated and under-trafficked, and it's a miracle that they don't just disappear off the map, eaten by a single low-level monster before the adventurers manage to travel to them.
If you fix that, then streetwise becomes a lot more useful.
Basically most of the places that adventures happen are ridiculously underpopulated and under-trafficked, and it's a miracle that they don't just disappear off the map, eaten by a single low-level monster before the adventurers manage to travel to them.
If you fix that, then streetwise becomes a lot more useful.
