Skills: Remastered and Professions

 I have come to a finalized, or near finalized, skill system which answers some of the problems I had with the previous state of affairs.

In specific, it is less complex than the 2e system, though some complexity arises in how there are different categories of skills.  In total, there are class skills, and general skills, both may be gained at character creation/leveling up; class skills are specific to character archetype/class, whereas general skills are available to anyone.  The weapon/non-weapon proficiency system from 2e has been kept with alterations, where now the only skills that may be taken by this route are the general skills:

This list has been pared down to (what I felt were) the most useful/relevant/thematic skills, that fit within a D20 table.

Although somewhat unrealistic, reading/writing/speaking a language has been rolled into the Language, New entry.  If you want you could require two separate selections of the skill for both read/write and speaking of a given language.

These skills, being generally available are not intended to be particularly powerful, and should be treated as they are named: proficiency in a skill, and certainly not a determination of a character's ability to perform the action or not.  (You can still run over uneven ground even if you aren't good at it.)

It should be noted that I developed this system well before my recent discovery of  "Bohemian's Good At System", as I was searching through the OSR house rules wiki, which is startlingly similar, at least in some aspects.

Power Levels

I feel it is important to give a bit of context over the second section of this system, because it came about as a synthesis of two ideas, both aiming in a similar direction.  The first problem, a simpler problem, was how to effectively give a weight to class skills.  How to properly frame them in the minds of the players so as to give these skills importance but not suggest them as the first recourse to every problem.

The second problem was that of power levels, that of the characters to be precise.  I am of two minds on the matter, on one hand I like playing a weak character and rising through the ranks.  On the other, I like there to be ranks to rise through, a feeling of progress, of getting somewhere.  

Some stats: 5e fighter max/average hp at 10th level: 150/~75, way too high

AD&D fighter m/a hp at 10th: 129/~53, surprisingly close to the above

OSE: 101/~42, maximum still breaks 100

However one system stood out, because I had misread the rules, but nevertheless, stick out it did: Lion & Dragon.  In my reading of the rules I had skipped the crucial detail of rolling not just at first level, but at every level, on the class benefit table.  In fact you roll twice at first level, this too I had skipped.

This put the results staggeringly low at: 39/~23 BUT, the actual maximum is 119 (But being staggeringly hard to achieve in comparison to the other examples), whereas the actual average is 31.75 or 32.  Most interestingly, the minimum hp at 10th as a fighter is 19, compared to 5e's 15, AD&D's 12, and OSE's 11.

However, one gripe I have over the L&D system is that the presence of skills are hinted at, but never formally put to print.  Then, like a home-run ball into the stands-

Class Skills

Fighters, being of the Warrior archetype, roll twice on the warriors table at first level, and twice on the fighters table at first level, rolling once on both every level thereafter.







*Indicates character must be proficient.


Clerics, being of the Priest archetype, roll twice on the Priest and Cleric tables each at first level, and once on each table every level thereafter.











Thieves, being of the Rogue archetype, roll on the Rogue and Thief tables in much the same manner.



 





Wizards, being of the Magic-User archetype, roll on the Magic-User and Wizard tables.



 





The skills here are of a higher caliber than general skills, where the level of usefulness is able to be directly determined by comparing the skills presents to the non-skill entries on the same table.  So Weapon & Armor Upkeep is as useful as a +1 to THAC (To Hit Armor Class), and Blind Fighting is as good as half of an attack with a specific weapon.

Professions

The final bit of complication are professions, which are entirely separate from skills, and I feel round out the system.

Once again the entries selected here are the 20 which I felt most appropriate.

These exist to provide a base of knowledge which characters can draw from during play, which are not hyper-specific and provide a decent chunk of background material for a character while requiring practically no effort.






A final note

Innovation requires derivation and experimentation to be tempered in the the forge of play-testing.  Just as no plan survives the enemy, no rule can be called worthwhile until it has been proven so at the table.

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