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Message: <blockquote data-quote="koga305" data-source="post: 6817677" data-attributes="member: 6747640">I have been running a game set in the Nentir Vale for the past 2.5 years, and I've noticed that there is a definite imbalance of skills in terms of their regular use. Here are some of the "best" skills in our game:Athletics. This one comes up a lot. The PCs will inevitably have to do a lot of climbing and jumping to navigate wilderness environments and dungeons.Investigation. My game has a lot of dungeon exploration and with that comes searching. This one is actually more used than Perception, which contradicts the common wisdom.History/Religion. Because of the Nentir Vale's long history, with the ruins of multiple empires scattered about, figuring out lore can help a lot with decision-making. With a cleric, paladin, and shadow monk (who has a direct relationship with the Raven Queen) in our game, we tend to see gods and their lore come up a lot as well.Insight. This skill is sometimes used as the straightforward "figure out if they're lying" check, but is just as commonly used to get a read on what NPCs are thinking or gauge a crowd.By contrast, I'd say there are a few skills that I almost never see used.Acrobatics. Athletics stands out as just better; there's never been a need for balancing or tumbling in my game.Deception. Because the Nentir Vale has few large power structures, there's rarely a need to trick someone that's too powerful to fight. My players are usually comfortable being honest with their allies and openly hostile toward their enemies.Sleight of Hand. Nobody's ever needed to steal something, and that's most of what this skill is good for.Nature/Survival. I tend to handwave these kinds of things as a DM, and figuring out lore doesn't tend to help very often. This got to the point where a Druid/Ranger substitute character neglected to take the Survival skill and actually got the party lost once.What skills are used the most in your game, and which are almost never used?</blockquote>

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