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Nad
2009-04-21, 10:39 AM
Hi all,

I'm enjoying 4e simplicity in combat, it's nice, keeps things flowing well and my players adore it.

But we all miss skills. In our opinion, the 4e skill set is soft and instead of going back to 3.5 and trying to mix it in, I'm thinking about using the Shadowrun skill set.

I was hoping someone out there could offer me some feedback on not using the 4e skill set and how you changed it up... I'm trying to figure out a way to give skill points and keep the balance while offering a large selection of abilities.

Thanks!

NPCMook
2009-04-21, 06:20 PM
Backgrounds, use Backgrounds

Asbestos
2009-04-21, 06:24 PM
Backgrounds, use Backgrounds

Well... what backgrounds? The Scales of War backgrounds, the FR backgrounds, or the much less powerful generic backgrounds from the PHB2?

NPCMook
2009-04-21, 06:33 PM
Doesn't matter which, though the PHB 2 Backgrounds are underpowered compared to the rest. It seems like he wants his players to pick and choose what skills they get, so backgrounds is the best way to go without having to houserule stuff... unless you use the PHB 2 backgrounds then you have to houserule them to be on par with FR and SoW

Asbestos
2009-04-21, 07:26 PM
Doesn't matter which, though the PHB 2 Backgrounds are underpowered compared to the rest. It seems like he wants his players to pick and choose what skills they get, so backgrounds is the best way to go without having to houserule stuff... unless you use the PHB 2 backgrounds then you have to houserule them to be on par with FR and SoW

One could argue that the FR and SoW ones are a bit much. How many PCs are born under bad (or good) signs exactly?

NPCMook
2009-04-21, 08:06 PM
Those aren't all that powerful, the Gladiator background(I think) lets you make 4 death saving throws vs the normal 3, and I believe there's a PP that allows you to make an additional one bumping you up to 5 death Saving throws.

Born under an Bad Sign/Auspicious Birth merely lets me use my main stat for my starting HP, while healing surges are still Con mod based.

One could argue that the PHB 2 Backgrounds are more balanced than the FR and SoW backgrounds, since those usually give you a +1 and adds two skills to your class list, or gives you a +2 to one skill you add to your class list, or give you a +2 to a skill, add it to your class list and allow you an extra language(I think there's like only 2 of these)

Colmarr
2009-04-21, 11:12 PM
I know from personal experience that the FR Cormyr background gives Insight as a class skill, +2 to Insight checks, and +2 to saving throws against fear.

That's strictly better than an "insight" background prepared using PHB2, but it must be said that the ability to pick a skill of your choosing might easily make up the difference.

Of course, I'm not sure how any of this addresses the OP's request :smallconfused:

NPCMook
2009-04-22, 09:25 AM
I know from personal experience that the FR Cormyr background gives Insight as a class skill, +2 to Insight checks, and +2 to saving throws against fear.

That's strictly better than an "insight" background prepared using PHB2, but it must be said that the ability to pick a skill of your choosing might easily make up the difference.

Of course, I'm not sure how any of this addresses the OP's request :smallconfused:

From what I can gather the OP wants his players to just pick and choose what they want their character's skills are. Usually only 1 or 2 skills just aren't in the class list that you may want to take, Backgrounds fix the issue with giving you access to extra skills to take, the only thing is now you have to actually follow that Background