What's the point with Skill Tricks?

[Felon]

Many of these Skill Tricks have a prerequsite of 12 ranks (+2 more for the Trick), and with 14 ranks in a skill, shouldn't you be able to Stand up immediately (Tumble), notice an Invisible enemy (Spot), Quickly escape from bonds (Escape Arist) or Pick a lock as a Swift action (Open Locks)?

Complete Adventurer offers up a lot of options for using skills faster in exchange for a substantial penalty. But a 6th level character can get a lot of use out of skills using skill tricks that he wouldn't get out of a skill check that requires a DC 25, 30, or higher check that he probably will fail.

With skill tricks, he still pays a price, but he can get around that catch-22 where doing something cool requires waiting to attain a level that, let's face it, many characters never attain. Even more of a catch-22, even when they do attain it, the skill check in question is largely moot, or at least very unimpressive. A DC 35 Tumble check will plant you back on your feet as a free action, but big deal! So can that 1st-level stand spell from the PHB II. There are no high-level D&D characters making Climb or Jump checks unless they just never got around to picking up a magic item that grants flight, teleportation, spiderclimb, etc.

 

[BryonD]

Many of these Skill Tricks have a prerequsite of 12 ranks (+2 more for the Trick), and with 14 ranks in a skill, shouldn't you be able to Stand up immediately (Tumble), notice an Invisible enemy (Spot), Quickly escape from bonds (Escape Arist) or Pick a lock as a Swift action (Open Locks)?

Just to clarify the language here....
The tricks do not count as "ranks", right?
Meaning A) they don't help you qualify for PClasses or Feat with Skill Rank requirements and B) you can buy them even if you have maxed out a skill. Honestly it would seem really odd to require that a character be 2 ranks below max in order to know a trick.

Reading the book it seems clear to me that they do not count as ranks and a 2nd level character could buy a 5 rank prereq trick so long as he had the ranks and 2 more points to spare. But the OP language was a bit more vague and I don't see explicit language in the book.

So, I'm asking what I think is a dumb question just to be certain of the intent.