The Combat Commentator and Fighter Fingerprints...

[St Fan]

(Or, “Wait, did he just use la Botte de Nevers?”)

A common feature of swashbuckling fiction, that has no current equivalent in the game (as far as I know) is for onlookers to identify the style, tricks and abilities of any fighter, and sometimes even who was their master, by mere observation.

I’ve been thinking for a while about implementing it through a skill as a homebrew, so tell me what you guys think of it.

First of all, rather than introduce a new knowledge skill, I’m rather thinking about expanding an already existing skill.

The best candidate for that, I guess, is Martial Lore, found in the Tome of Battle – Book of Nine Swords. It would still have its normal uses as described in this book, with the addition of the following.

First of all, the Martial Lore skill should be made of easier access to all martial-oriented classes and not just martial adepts. Thus, making it a class skill for any class or prestige class with a full-BAB advancement, plus Monk. (As well as Factotum and Human Paragon, of course.)

In addition to the identification of martial maneuvers, a Martial Lore check can...

• Identify any feat present in the fighter bonus feat list being seen in use (or its absence) by a humanoid (or close enough) creature. A character just having a feat cannot be guessed, it must actually be used in combat, and the onlooker must have a good view of the subject doing so. No action required, as with Spellcraft or Psicraft checks. How the feat was obtained (normal feat, bonus feat, fighter bonus feat, class feature, heroics or mirror move spell...) is irrelevant and cannot be determined.

The DC for such a martial lore check depends of the prerequisites of the feat, as follow:
- DC 10+number of separate prerequisites;
- DC 10+minimum Base Attack Bonus;
- DC 10+minimum Fighter level;
... whichever is higher.

Thus, basic proficiency in a weapon or a shield can be noted with a DC 10 (and that check should be allowed even to untrained characters).
Combat Expertise or Power Attack would need a DC 11 check (1 prerequisite entry each), but only if the wielder is actively diminishing his attack roll with the feat.
Weapon Specialization has a DC 14 check (minimum fighter level 4th); Grappling Block, a DC 16 (6 separate prerequisite entries); Robilar’s Gambit, a DC 22 (minimum BAB +12).

• Identify any martial art being demonstrated or directly used in a fight by a humanoid (or close enough) creature.

The DC for such a martial lore check is...
- DC 15 for the basic fighting styles of a monk (Cobra Strike, Denying Stance, Hand and Foot, Invisible Eye, Overwhelming Attack, Passive Way, Sleeping Tiger, etc.)
- DC 15+number of separate prerequisites or minimum BAB (as above) for more advanced martial arts (Axefury, Bladesong, Dance of Blades, Empty Hand Mastery, Mighty Works Mastery I or II, Foot and Fist Mastery, The Gentle Way Mastery, Hin Fist, Longfang, Meditation of War Mastery, Might of the Hand, Shadow Guard, Skullcracks, Stonegrind Wrestling, Storm of Blood, Talon Swarm, Tanglefoot, Temerad Mastery I or II, Twin Sword, Winterlight, Word Given Form, etc.)

• DC 15: Identify a skill trick (mostly movement) that is seen used in combat. Skill tricks usable out of combat or with no visible effects cannot be identified.
• DC 20: Identify a rarer feat or technique (not part of the fighter bonus feat list) that is seen used in combat, but still originated from the Prime Material Plane.
• DC 25: Identify a rarer feat or martial art that is seen used in combat, and originated from another plane (such as Neraph’s Throw, or Zerthi from the Monastery of Zerth’Ad’lun through the Planar Touchstone feat).
• DC 30: Recognize that a particular combatant had been trained by a specific master and/or monastery or martial art school, as long as they are relatively well-known and have a distinctive style. A master or school from a faraway land or another plane cannot be identified, although two combatants using the same unknown style can be noted.

[Cortillaen]

While not quite 3.5, Pf1's Recall Intrigues (https://www.d20pfsrd.com/skills/Knowledge/#recall_intrigues_knowledge) use for Knowledge skills might be of interest. It functions much like Spellcraft checks to identify spells being cast but for class features and feats being used.

[remetagross]

Oh my. La botte de Nevers. Or how a 16-year-old Swashbuckler gets entrapped by a dozen Warriors, and yet they are the ones fearing for their lives. Well done, Paul Féval.

Anyway. I like your subsystem a lot :) it adds flavour to the genre. If I might add a couple suggestions:

-A PC that knows a given feat / has been trained to a combat style by the same master automatically succeeds in identifying it.
-Knowledge (the Planes) gives a synergy bonus to identify extraplanar fighting styles.
-A Bardic Knowledge check could be allowed to replace the Martial Lore check altogether.

That said, while all this is cute, it doesn't really bring that much to the table when a PC is in the middle of a fight. Which means martial PCs will likely not spend their precious few skill points into Martial Lore for such a small return on investment. I think there could be two solutions there.

1. Give every martial class a bonus to Martial Lore check equal to, I don't know, the number of [fighter] bonus feats they possess. This way, even a single skill point into the skill will provide greater returns as the PC progresses.
2. Give more mechanical bonuses on a successful check. For example, a successful Martial Lore check to identify a creature in the process of a fight could reveal, in addition to this and that feat being displayed, the same amount of information as obtained from the relevant Knowledge check -10 (only the bits that pertain to combat and survival). Because from the way the creature fights, a canny observer can make informed guesses about its strong and weak points. It gives more incentive to martial classes to invest in Martial Lore as the poor man's identiier.

[rel]

An issue with this idea is a martial character in 3.5 tends to be specialised towards doing the exact same thing round after round. So once you've seen their attack, you already know a lot of what they're capable of and don't really need a skill check to figure it out.
That agile looking knave with the spiked chain that just tripped you? I get the feeling they're going to try the same thing again next round. burly two handed sworder that just executed an unreasonably damaging charge? Probably going to try lining another one up next round.

[St Fan]

Oh my. La botte de Nevers. Or how a 16-year-old Swashbuckler gets entrapped by a dozen Warriors, and yet they are the ones fearing for their lives. Well done, Paul Féval.


Yeah, although I probably had more the film adaptation (https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Film/LeBossu1959) in mind when I mentioned this.



Anyway. I like your subsystem a lot :) it adds flavour to the genre. If I might add a couple suggestions:

-A PC that knows a given feat / has been trained to a combat style by the same master automatically succeeds in identifying it.
-Knowledge (the Planes) gives a synergy bonus to identify extraplanar fighting styles.
-A Bardic Knowledge check could be allowed to replace the Martial Lore check altogether.


All good suggestions.
My first idea about knowing the given feat or combat style would be a circumstance bonus, but on second thought an automatic success makes more sense.

I thought about Bardic Knowledge as a possible substitute only afterward. Though probably with a penalty if the bard has no martial training otherwise.



That said, while all this is cute, it doesn't really bring that much to the table when a PC is in the middle of a fight. Which means martial PCs will likely not spend their precious few skill points into Martial Lore for such a small return on investment. I think there could be two solutions there.


Well, it is certainly more for flavor than anything, and I doubt more than one character in a group would ever put ranks in it. Although this is just a reminder of the more general problem, that most martial classes have way too little skill ranks (except for monks and rangers).



1. Give every martial class a bonus to Martial Lore check equal to, I don't know, the number of [fighter] bonus feats they possess. This way, even a single skill point into the skill will provide greater returns as the PC progresses.


Well, there is precedent, like the perform [weapon drill] skill receiving bonus from some specific feats. And recompensing making a skill trained is always good. Not sure if the number of fighter bonus feats is the best way to do it, although single-class fighters being considered notoriously weak, that's always a perk. Would be probably a competence bonus, but only to identify other fighter bonus feats. (And basic weapon or armor proficiency wouldn't count.)



2. Give more mechanical bonuses on a successful check. For example, a successful Martial Lore check to identify a creature in the process of a fight could reveal, in addition to this and that feat being displayed, the same amount of information as obtained from the relevant Knowledge check -10 (only the bits that pertain to combat and survival). Because from the way the creature fights, a canny observer can make informed guesses about its strong and weak points. It gives more incentive to martial classes to invest in Martial Lore as the poor man's identifier.

Not too sure about this one; Martial Lore seems to me rather independent of creature types, and not so much overlapping with the verious Knowledge skills.



An issue with this idea is a martial character in 3.5 tends to be specialised towards doing the exact same thing round after round. So once you've seen their attack, you already know a lot of what they're capable of and don't really need a skill check to figure it out.
That agile looking knave with the spiked chain that just tripped you? I get the feeling they're going to try the same thing again next round. burly two handed sworder that just executed an unreasonably damaging charge? Probably going to try lining another one up next round.


It is true that straightforward combatants are easy to figure out, and you don't need a skill for picking a counter tactic.

The skill is mostly valuable in a more complex gaming style, probably oriented toward swashbuckling (there's a Dragon magazine article entirely about such campaigns) or Wuxia-style martial arts. It may come into prominence against martial artists using a variety of techniques that may end up confusing, and even look like magic use. In this case, making heads or tails of what's going on can help a lot in establishing a strategy.

Example:
Commentator 1: What the hell is going on? How come they can't touch her? Has she somehow enspelled them?
Commentator 2: It's not a spell... she's using Word Given Form! An obscure, esoteric martial art usually only known to Truenamers... they just can't pinpoint her exact position.
Commentator 1: But they are two against one... doesn't Word Given Form only work on one opponent at a time?
Commentator 2: True, but... she's combining it with Temerad Mastery! An elven martial art geared toward dodging multiple opponents... that's impressively effective.

[remetagross]

Yeah, I guess it depends on the flavour of your campaign. That example dialogue you've put at the end is quite awesome; I think it could be a really neat thing to have some NPCs perform this on-site commentary to analyze the strategy used by the martial PCs. This'll be very flattering to them.

[Troacctid]

You could also consider allowing Assess Opponent checks (determining a foe's CR relative to your own) to be made with Martial Lore instead of or in addition to Sense Motive.