Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 RustedKitsune Jul 11, 2014 16:25:11	I felt like the skills were a bit lacking in a few things (and I have no idea if some of my ideas are actually in the core books; hopefully they are), so here's my additions. In keeping with the DDN idea of More Options, these rules seek to expand the options available to players.   Sub-Proficient The idea behind subproficiency is to give players more choice, and a greater ability to define what their characters can do. Subproficiency comes in two levels, relative to the proficiency bonus: -1 and -2. This shows that the character has been trained in the proficiency, but not to the extent that they have been trained in their core proficiencies. You may not be subproficient in Armor, and it is up to the DM to allow or disallow subproficiency in Weapons. Optional: subprofiency in armor gives a penalty equal to the subprofiency to all rolls covered by not being proficient in Armor, including spellcasting. It takes 85 days to learn Proficiency-2 and 170 Days to learn Proficiency-1. Specialties What is a specialty? A particular area of competence within a proficiency that the character specializes in. Specialties come in two levels: General and Specific. Some "specialties" aren't really specialties at all, and are disallowed (as an example, Stealth with a Specialty in Darkness. Such a thing is blatent munchkinry and is banned). What makes a good specialty? A type of situation or task that represents a specific use of the skill; Stealth (Crowds) is a good one, showing that the character is trained in hiding amongst a crowd of people, as is History (Military), meaning that the character knows more of Military history than general history, and Athletics (Climbing). Specific Specialties build off of General Specialties, and represent even greater training in a very specific area of study. This will tend towards Knowledge type skills and Tool Proficiencies more than the active type skills. History (Military, Thay) is a good example, as is Medicine (Elves, Children). You may not have specialties in Armor or Weapons. Having a specialty gives you a bonus for that situation or task, but penalizes you outside of it, representing the atrophying of your general skill due to the specifity of your training. A General Specialty gives +1/-1, and a Specific Specialty gives you +2 when rolling for something that matches it, +1 when rolling for its base General Specialty, and -2 for the base skill. (Yes, a 1st level character can have a +4 in a specific situation, and +0 outside of it). Optional: Greater Specialties - A Greater Specialty is a Specialty that does not give a penalty to the base skill. This is represents additional training above the original training. It takes 85 days to learn a General Specialty, and 170 days to learn a Specific Specialty. Professional Proficiencies What is a Professional Proficiency? The equivilant to 3/3.5's Profession skills, much as Tool Proficiencies are the equivilant to Craft skills. As Tool Proficiencies cover the skills required to make things, Professional Proficiencies cover the skills required to provide a service; including common tasks and the general knowledge of that profession, unless that task or knowledge would be covered by an already existing Proficiency. However, sometimes an exception can be made, except for Weapon and Armor proficiencies. Examples: Soldier covers the common tasks of being a soldier - Marching in formation, making camp, entrenching, standing for hours, dodging higher authority and complaining. (Sorry, I had to make that joke). It does not cover wearing armor or using weapons, as those are already covered by existing proficiencies. Scribe covers writing neatly and fancifully, as well as proper forms of address and keeping your mouth shut (Note: technically the Scribe barely covers anything because the writing part is already covered by Calligrapher's Tools. Sometimes, an exception can be made). Accountant covers mathematics, budgeting, business law and ignoring the abuse hurled at beancounters (It might also give nightmares about cost-accountability reviews!). Learning a Professional Proficiency takes the same amount of time as any other proficiency. Optional: Cross-Trained Professions - Sometimes a player wants a specific type of profession that is seen as a combination of two others. As an example, a military Quartermaster can be seen as Soldier/Accoutant; they have to know the general tasks of the soldier, but must also know the tasks of the accountant. By combining the two, the character shows that they have training in both, but it has suffered for the degree of specialization and cross-training inherent to it. The Quartermaster shown above would have a slight penalty when forced to be a common soldier, and would be missing some of the knowledge used by civilian accountants. Cross-Trained Professions suffer a -1 penalty when used on their own outside of the context of their original training. Additional Uses For Proficiencies Proficiencies, whether they be Skill, Tool, Profession, Weapon, and Armor, have additional uses beyond just the basic tasks. Tool Proficiencies can be used to evaluate the worth of an object, and of the raw materials used in the crafting task; if it can be crafted using tools the character is proficient in, they can evalutate it. An example is Carpenter's and Mason's Tools, which can be used to evaluate a building for weak spots. Professional and Tool Proficiencies can be used to find fellow practicioners of the skill, to earn money during downtime as described in Practicing a Profession (Basic, pg 68), and Professions can evaluate the products of their profession as well (Such as an Accountant looking for evidence of embezzlement in financial records, and an Architect making a guess to the most likely floor plan of a building). Profession and Tool Proficiencies also have attached knowledge, thus allowing a roll to determine to see if you know a particular thing within your area of expertise. Skill proficiencies can be used to help plan things as well; an Intelligence (Athletics) can determine the most efficient path to take while boucing around the rooftops ("parkour! parkour!" "Don't make me turn this adventuring party around!") Weapon and Armor proficiencies can be used to maintain equipment, evaluate its worth, and identify different kinds of weapons (eg "That's an Thayish Officer's spear, what is it doing here?") and armor ("A set of dwarvish plate? Why would that be hanging up in a tree?"). Optional Rule: Synchronized Proficiencies Much like Cross-Trained professions describe professional training that draws from two different professions, sometimes two proficiencies work together great in a situation. For example, look at parkour: it can easily be defined as a combination of Athletics and Acrobatics. You could make it a new skill, but do you apply dexterity or strength?  Myabe there is a better way... When a task can be accomplished or described better using a combination of two proficiencies, they are Synchronized Skills; this means that they add to each other to allow tasks greater than what they could do on their own. To keep a record of a Synchronized Skill, write down its task (Such as Parkour), and the Proficiency combination it is made of (STR-Athletics/DEX-Acrobatics). Determine the bonus by multiplying your Proficiency Bonus by 1.5 (in simple math terms, add 1/2 of your proficiency bonus to your proficiency bonus), dividing both ability score bonuses by 2, and adding the results together. If the the total is fractional, round Up. If one of the Proficiencies has no standard ability score, determine which one applies best, or treat it as neither proficiency having a standard ability score. If neither proficiency has a standard ability score used, then it is just equal to the character's proficiency bonus x1.5, and determine which ability is best for rolling the syncronized skill. Adding New Proficiencies Sometimes we notice that the skill system is lacking something (Notice my Professional Proficiencies), sometimes the way we made our setting demands that a new skill, tool, weapon, or armor be added to help define the world (and the PCs that are part of it). First, look at the situation that you feel requires a new proficiency, and note the paremeters. This helps you define what you need the proficiency to do, such as wielding a weapon, making something, performing a task, or knowing something. Second, take those paremeters and compare them to existing proficiencies. Can you logically expand a proficiency to include this type of task? If using the Synchronized Proficiencies Rule, could you define it as a combination of two Proficiencies? Third, if you need to create a new proficiency, make sure to define its type (Skill, Tool, Profession, Weapon, Armor), and what it covers. If it is a skill, determine the most common statistic it is rolled with. Fourth, make sure the new proficiency fills a gap in potential player capability, is not overpowered, and helps describe the world. Fifth, introduce it to the group. Here's an example: Constitution (Endurance). This skill covers being able to endure hard work and circumstances. This Proficiency applies when performing a forced march, holding your breath, resisting adverse enviromental conditions, lack of food and water, and lack of sleep. It does not cover any rolls having to do with surviving injury, poison, or disease. Notes on Training Times 250 days, at 1gp/day, seems a long time to gain a skill. I've looked at the general RL background of the developers: most are american, and grew up with the american educational system, which meets on 180 days over 36 weeks for one school year. If you forget the 180 days part, and just remember the 36 weeks part, then you would multiply 36 by 7 to figure out how long a training period is, then you get... 252 days, close enough to the 250 days figure they gave us. However, did they have to give us the equivilant of american college tuition prices too? "You're a true wizard now, here's the bill for 1000gp, you have until level 3 to pay it off." Thus, I offer my own homebrew training times, starting with my logic. Training can be considered as a half-course of study: 2 classes a week, for 36 weeks, with a realistic ideal of 1 hour spent doing coursework and study outside of class for evey hour spent in class (Really, 3 hours spent studying for every hour in class? My nation horrifies me sometimes. My homework for my DC engineering class was at most 30 minutes of homework for a class that met 2 days a week at 2.5 hours a class). At 5 hours a week per class, plus 5 hours of coursework and study per week per class, for two classes, we get 20 hours a week, spread over 5 days, gives us 4 hours a day. With two days off a week, we get 180 days of class, spread out over 252 days. With 4 hours a day being taken up by one course of study, the characer can also take another course of study. Interuppted training can be gone back to, as long as less than 3 weeks have been missed and the student took either a course textbook or practice tools with them on the adventure. Standard Training: 180 days of Class, spread out over 36 weeks. Cost varies between 1gp/week to 5gp/week. Success is automatic. Two Proficiencies may be studied at the same time. Intensive Training: Welcome to boot camp. At 12 hours a day, 6 days a week, this 10 week course will teach you a single profession, with some attendent skills, which you hope has percolated through your tired brain. Make an Intelligence roll against DC 13 and hope you don't have to repeat... As this is typically military only, the cost is shouldered by the nation providing the training. Sub-Proficiency Training: As the Standard Training, but taking 12/24 weeks, depending on the level of subproficiency desired. Optional - Weapons and Armor Training: This is where things get complicated. -Armor Training: It takes a 12 week course to become proficient in one type of armor (Type being the specific form of armor you want to wear, such as leather, chainmail, or Plate), and a 24 week course to become proficient in 3 types of armor from the same weight class (Light, Medium, or Heavy), with full proficiency in the entire class taking a full 36 week course (Exception: Light armor takes only a 24 week course). You must have full proficiency in a lighter weight class to become proficient in a heavier armor. Armor training technically takes 8 hours a day, due to practice and familarization time, but most of this is wearing the armor and thus another course of study may be taken in conjunction with it. -Weapon Training: Because some weapons share basics, training times for groups of similar weapons are reduced to 3/4 of the training time. Weapon courses take a full 8 hours a day (or equivilant over time) due to practice requirements --Simple Weapons: It takes a 24 week course to become proficient in all simple weapons, and 2 weeks to become proficient in a single weapon. --Martial Weapons: Time per Weapon is 4 weeks. One cannot take a single course to become proficient in all martial weapons, but multiple courses centered around groups of similar weapons instead. Exotic Weapons: (Not yet introduced, but they will be there...) Time per Weapon is 12 weeks. You cannot train in groups of exotic weapons, unless the DM rules that you may based on them coming from the same culture and their being grouped together there. BONUS: Tying It Together In Custom Backgrounds We already have rules for Custom Backgrounds, but how does all this come together with those rules? Custom Backgrounds are more thematic, and rely on the player and DM making sure that the choices are appropriate. Let's review the basic rules for them; 2 Skills, 2 Tools or Languages, 1 Feature, and The Standard Personality Package (2 Personality Traits, 1 Ideal, 1 Bond, 1 Flaw), for a total of 4 proficiencies and a Feature. So how does these homebrew rules effect them? My modifications include backgrounds having a total of 6 Proficiencies Step 1: Determine Background Concept. This should be 1 to 2 words. I'll be using two examples here; a Soldier and an Alchemist. Step 2: Determine 1-2 Required Tools/Professions. What does your concept require in order to function? A Soldier requires Profession (Soldier), while an Alchemist requires Tool (Alchemist's Supplies), and can benefit from Tool (Herbalism Kit). Step 3: 1-2 Required Skills. What does your concept need to do, in terms of skills? A Soldier requires Endurance (see above), while an Alchemist does not require other skills, but does benefit from Intelligence (Arcana) and Intelligence (Nature) to help identify ingredients. Step 4: 2-4 Extra Proficiencies. This where the DM overwatch comes in; there should be logical reasons for the Proficiencies you choose. Weapon and Armor Proficiencies are Per Weapon or Type of Armor. A Soldier needs armor and a weapon - our common soldier is trained in Leather Armor and the Glaive; at 4 proficiencies, the player can choose two more to personalize the soldier's career. The Alchemist has pretty much everything covered, but we can make the ruling that the protective equipment used by alchemists is close enough to either padded or leather armor (player's choice) to give proficiency. Step 5: Feature. The feature is a thematic roleplaying bonus, and should be determined by the DM and the player together. They should not give a mechanical bonus, but may modify downtime mechanics. The example Soldier has the benefit of their Military Rank, as already shown in the Basic rules, while the Alchemist decides to go with Volume Production; When making three or more of the same alchemical item, they reduce the cost to produce of each item by 5gp. Optional Rule: A player might not want a Feature, preferring instead to gain more proficiencies. They should have a reason as to why their character doesn't have a feature; a Soldier could have deserted and cannot pull rank, or an alchemist might have been kicked out of their course before learning or figuiring out a production secret. If even an alternative feature cannot be found that helps describe what the character is capable of, then allow them to take 2 additional proficiencies. Step 6: Standard Personality Package. 2 Personality Traits, 1 Ideal, 1 Bond, and 1 Flaw. Optional - Step 7: Subproficiencies/Specialties. If you allow sub-proficiencies or Specialties in your game, let players take some. I suggest 2 subproficiencies of -1 and 1 of -2, with 1 general Specialty. TL;DR - Somebody said something about the skill system.
#2 kill_the_wiz_first Jul 11, 2014 16:29:54	That's a lot to digest but I like where it's going.   "You're a true wizard now, here's the bill for 1000gp, you have until level 3 to pay it off."
#3 LupusRegalis Jul 11, 2014 20:37:55	Love it, RustedKitsune.  Definitely worth putting in front of my group.
#4 RustedKitsune Jul 11, 2014 21:21:51	Things you like, don't like? If anybody has a group to play test it, please tell me the results.