What I am loving about 4e: The math & system equity

[Mr. Friendly]

Obviously 4e isn't out yet, but there is a great deal of info available; barring finding out something truly egregious about 4e, I am getting it.

One thing that really stands out to me though is the overall systemic simplification of the math and equity to everything. Changing the Core Mechanic from [(d20 + mods) vs. DC] to [(d20 + 1/2 level + mods) vs. DC] at first seems like more work, but really it looks as though they have overall reduced the numbers significantly. It also makes scaling so much better (in theory).

I say in theory, because we have yet to see the high levels, however I feel reasonable predictions can be made about the progression. It looks (to me at any rate) that various character concepts will be more viable under 4e than under previous editions.

Things also look much more interchangable and "plug and play" than in other editions. More balance betwixt the classes means that it will be easier to homebrew classes and powers.

One of the things I liked about 3e after I switched and was sold on it was the simplification of saves. The universality of everything was nice. 4e looks to be doing just that again, this time though they seem to be trying to do it right.

[Indon]

Personally, I very much disagree.

Now, I loved the standardization of saves from AD&D to 3'rd edition - it solved a lot of practical play problems, making it easier to select a save for when something unexpected happens - just pick how the player would avoid it and have them roll that.

This change in 4'th edition does not seem like it would solve any problems experienced during play (it employs an 'attackers roll all dice' change that you could even make in 3'rd edition, but I don't much care about that aspect one way or another). Instead, it is a function that, by making every character more similar in capabilities, seems to reduce the game impact of player choices. I can't say for sure, but I'm not particularly looking forward to a system in which a players' decisions about who his character is and what his character can do may mean less in mechanical terms.

[Mr. Friendly]

This change in 4'th edition does not seem like it would solve any problems experienced during play (it employs an 'attackers roll all dice' change that you could even make in 3'rd edition, but I don't much care about that aspect one way or another). Instead, it is a function that, by making every character more similar in capabilities, seems to reduce the game impact of player choices. I can't say for sure, but I'm not particularly looking forward to a system in which a players' decisions about who his character is and what his character can do may mean less in mechanical terms.

Well, it certainly seem to change things for the positive for people who want to play something other than a Wizard or Cleric and still be able to have some sort of meaningful impact on a combat.

I also don't see where they are making choices not have an interaction on mechanics. If Fighter A chooses Trip as a power and Fighter B chooses Toughness, their choices have already made a mechanical difference.

The powers all do different things, they have just been scaled to be more balanced against each other and against the encounter instead of some abstracted notion of balancing against a day.

[kamikasei]

Instead, it is a function that, by making every character more similar in capabilities, seems to reduce the game impact of player choices. I can't say for sure, but I'm not particularly looking forward to a system in which a players' decisions about who his character is and what his character can do may mean less in mechanical terms.

Can you explain what you mean by this?

I would think that a system where the vast majority of choices worked out to being about as powerful as each other, and had about as much to do in and out of combat, would be one where players had greater freedom to decide who their characters are and what they can do, because choosing to have certain abilities rather than others wouldn't leave you any less capable than your teammates.

Of course we can't know yet if 4e is such a system, but I am curious as to what it would look like to produce the consequence you fear.

[Xefas]

Well, it certainly seem to change things for the positive for people who want to play something other than a Wizard or Cleric and still be able to have some sort of meaningful impact on a combat.

Aw, gosh, I remember a time trying to explain to a DM running a one-shot at my local hobby shop (before Tome of Battle came out) that I wanted to be a 'swordsman'...but I wanted to use the Cleric class for it.

As in, I would only take buffing spells, and the fluff would be changed to stuff like "Assessing the Situation" (for stuff like Shield of Faith), "Entering an intense Focus" ala the Combat Focus feats in PHBII (for stuff like Bull's Strength), and giving helpful combat advice/morale boosts for when I cast buffs on allies.

He didn't quite understand, so I ended up just scrapping the swordsman idea and just playing a normal cleric because I didn't want to sit the whole game going "I move I attack, I move I attack, I move I attack".

Fourth Edition seems like a godsend in that regard. No more avoiding character concepts because I'd like to actually 'do' stuff.

[Indon]

Ah, I should clarify - I was commenting specifically on the fact that you add 1/2 level to most things. This significantly decreases the difference between, say, a crafty pickpocket and a brutish ogre's ability to snatch someone's coin purse. Or the difference between a trained soldier's and a frail, bookish wizard's chances to climb a wall.

That was what I was referring to as character options having less of a game impact, and it is a change which really is entirely independent from more overarching changes such as game balance, which I have distinctly different opinions about.

[SamTheCleric]

Ah, I should clarify - I was commenting specifically on the fact that you add 1/2 level to most things. This significantly decreases the difference between, say, a crafty pickpocket and a brutish ogre's ability to snatch someone's coin purse. Or the difference between a trained soldier's and a frail, bookish wizard's chances to climb a wall.

That was what I was referring to as character options having less of a game impact, and it is a change which really is entirely independent from more overarching changes such as game balance, which I have distinctly different opinions about.

Having used the same system in Star Wars Saga... I can honestly say that I enjoy it. Everyone is skilled, just some are slightly moreso than others.

[Talya]

Personally, I very much disagree.

Now, I loved the standardization of saves from AD&D to 3'rd edition - it solved a lot of practical play problems, making it easier to select a save for when something unexpected happens - just pick how the player would avoid it and have them roll that.

This change in 4'th edition does not seem like it would solve any problems experienced during play (it employs an 'attackers roll all dice' change that you could even make in 3'rd edition, but I don't much care about that aspect one way or another). Instead, it is a function that, by making every character more similar in capabilities, seems to reduce the game impact of player choices. I can't say for sure, but I'm not particularly looking forward to a system in which a players' decisions about who his character is and what his character can do may mean less in mechanical terms.

In a rare bit of praise for 4e, I'm going to disagree with you here, having played Star Wars Saga. Changing the saves to target numbers is ... not a bad thing. I don't think it simplifies anything, but it works fine. I also like the +1/2 level mechanic...with a caveat. Saga made a huge mistake in it...they had some things (Defenses, sometimes BAB) scale 1/1 with level, but other stats which opposed them scale at 1/2 with level. This leads to some very weird balance issues that change the entire balance of the game as you level up. If something scales 1/2 with level, it needs to only ever oppose other stats that scale 1/2 with level.)

[Mr. Friendly]

Ah, I should clarify - I was commenting specifically on the fact that you add 1/2 level to most things. This significantly decreases the difference between, say, a crafty pickpocket and a brutish ogre's ability to snatch someone's coin purse. Or the difference between a trained soldier's and a frail, bookish wizard's chances to climb a wall.

Well, not all classes will choose as many skills as others and not all classes get the same skills. I suspect that Thievery will be a Rogue only thing; as for Stealth and Athletics.. everyone can choose them as class skills - just because you want to play a bookish and frail wizard doesn't mean everyone should. To accomplish that, you need only have weak physical attributes and not choose athletics as a class skill. Sure, you still have a chance of doing it, but even at 30th level with a +1 from your stats, you would only have a +16 athletics. Certainly not enough to climb a wall with great ease. Where the trained soldier will no doubt have Athletics as a class skill and high physical stats.

[Indon]

To accomplish that, you need only have weak physical attributes and not choose athletics as a class skill. Sure, you still have a chance of doing it, but even at 30th level with a +1 from your stats, you would only have a +16 athletics. Certainly not enough to climb a wall with great ease. Where the trained soldier will no doubt have Athletics as a class skill and high physical stats.

Having a class skill is a static +5, and while you have a point with the stat association, that just shifts the lack of impact over slightly - while the rogue may eventually have a decent advantage in thievery over an ogre due to his high dex, he'll never be far ahead of anyone who uses Dex-based attacks. The Wizard will not be much better at identifying spells than an intelligence-based Rogue (if such a concept can be viable).

And things get stranger when you take into account that the game still has static difficulty checks - our bookish Wizard may be a bit worse than a trained soldier in athletics (still with a smaller distinction than in 3.5, or in most point-based systems such as World of Darkness or Exalted), but at level 30 he's at the point where he can reliably catch a boulder larger than he is as it rolls at him. Is he any stronger? Probably not - if 4.0 uses encumberance, level isn't likely to add to what you can carry, for instance. It's just... the change seems clearly aimed at making characters less distinct.

I guess that's to be expected, though, since for 4'th edition Wizards decided to get rid of non-combat character roles and use a solely combat-oriented role structure. Skills are bound to be marginalized to some degree in such a system.

[Mr. Friendly]

Having a class skill is a static +5, and while you have a point with the stat association, that just shifts the lack of impact over slightly - while the rogue may eventually have a decent advantage in thievery over an ogre due to his high dex, he'll never be far ahead of anyone who uses Dex-based attacks. The Wizard will not be much better at identifying spells than an intelligence-based Rogue (if such a concept can be viable).

That is however assuming that there are no miscellaneous bonuses or feats that certain classes get that others do not to make them better at certain skills. For example we have heard that Rogues exclusively will be able to use "Tumbling" to avoid attacks.


And things get stranger when you take into account that the game still has static difficulty checks - our bookish Wizard may be a bit worse than a trained soldier in athletics (still with a smaller distinction than in 3.5, or in most point-based systems such as World of Darkness or Exalted), but at level 30 he's at the point where he can reliably catch a boulder larger than he is as it rolls at him. Is he any stronger? Probably not - if 4.0 uses encumberance, level isn't likely to add to what you can carry, for instance. It's just... the change seems clearly aimed at making characters less distinct.

It has been stated, or perhaps it was simply on the posted pages from the PHB, that Skill Check DCs scale upwards with level. Also, there is something to be said in that, at level 30, the character is assumed to be a virtual demigod. I have no really problem pre-supposing that the 30th level wizard has "buff" spells that are "always" on or "inherant" that explain away his ability to keep up with the party a little better in certain aspects. We also don't know what sorts of DCs we are looking at, nor how much of a disparity in attributes there will be at high levels. In 3e a Fighter with 30 STR and a Wizard with 30 INT are miles apart in their abilities to use certain skills.


I guess that's to be expected, though, since for 4'th edition Wizards decided to get rid of non-combat character roles and use a solely combat-oriented role structure. Skills are bound to be marginalized to some degree in such a system.

I do not believe they have gotten rid of non-combat roles or gone to a solely combat based structure. This was shown at the D&DXP where the chacters in one adventure had to use their skills to avoid being seen and interact with NPCs. That was a non-combat skill challenge. All it has done though is taken what may have been a purely non-combat character and given him the ability to fight and taken the pure combat character and given him the ability to participate with the party in non-combat situations.

I like to view it as this:

In 3e you had a choice to make (typically); either have your cake (make a really effective non-combat character) or eat your cake (make a really effective combat character); so in this sense, 4e is letting you have your cake and eat it too.

The amount of combat or what a character does are up to the DMs and Players of respective groups. If the Diplomacy and non-combat skill and social rules like up to their billing, then 4e will be demonstrably superior to 1e/2e's dismal skill rules and also superior to 3e's improved, but seriously flawed skill rules.

[Indon]

That is however assuming that there are no miscellaneous bonuses or feats that certain classes get that others do not to make them better at certain skills. For example we have heard that Rogues exclusively will be able to use "Tumbling" to avoid attacks.
That points to tumbling being a power, not a skill at all, if you ask me.



It has been stated, or perhaps it was simply on the posted pages from the PHB, that Skill Check DCs scale upwards with level.
So will higher-level versions of that rolling-rock trap be inexplicably more powerful than the one we've seen?


We also don't know what sorts of DCs we are looking at, nor how much of a disparity in attributes there will be at high levels. In 3e a Fighter with 30 STR and a Wizard with 30 INT are miles apart in their abilities to use certain skills.
Which is why my attitude towards this is dread, and not outright negativity. If indeed we see the same stat variance for characters as we saw in 3.5 (with magic items and inherent bonuses, that is), it might not be so bad. But signs point to those factors being reduced/eliminated, and we don't know if there'll be anything replacing them.



I do not believe they have gotten rid of non-combat roles or gone to a solely combat based structure.
You're confusing a non-combat role with a non-combat capability. A party's "skill monkey" was the guy who may not have been as effective in combat as the other members, but who had greatly increased non-combat capabilities in his area of specialization to make up for it, similar to how Strikers have less health than Defenders, but do more damage to make up for it, or how Controllers are soft and don't neccessarily do much damage, but have more powerful utility abilities. That's what a role is, and noncombat roles have been marginalized by reducing the difference between being skilled and not being skilled.


In 3e you had a choice to make (typically); either have your cake (make a really effective non-combat character) or eat your cake (make a really effective combat character); so in this sense, 4e is letting you have your cake and eat it too.
I view it as, in 3e you had a choice to make - in 4e you don't. We're both saying the same thing, really, but we both want different things from our games, which makes our reactions different.

[Tren]

That points to tumbling being a power, not a skill at all, if you ask me.

They've stated, and now I can't remember where for the life of me, that rogues will be able to use their skills (not powers) to greater effect than other classes, such as using acrobatics to "tumble". I think they talk about it in last months podcast.

[Vortling]

Tumble was clearly laid out as a per encounter power as per the rogue preview. They do talk about rogues being able to use skills to greater effect than other classes in Races and Classes and in several previews, but we've yet to see anything supporting those statements.

That said, my worry is that the skill system itself will marginalize skills. The difference between the rogue's six trained skills and the wizard's two trained skills becomes very small if all skill encounters are set up similar to the one seen at DDXP. I'm hoping there's a way to set up skill encounters to let people with trained skills shine. I'll be sad if a wizard can take Arcana and History as trained skills and be just as effective as the rogue in every skill encounter due to the player's ability to justify using those skills.

[Marius]

Having a class skill is a static +5, and while you have a point with the stat association, that just shifts the lack of impact over slightly - while the rogue may eventually have a decent advantage in thievery over an ogre due to his high dex, he'll never be far ahead of anyone who uses Dex-based attacks. The Wizard will not be much better at identifying spells than an intelligence-based Rogue (if such a concept can be viable).

And things get stranger when you take into account that the game still has static difficulty checks - our bookish Wizard may be a bit worse than a trained soldier in athletics (still with a smaller distinction than in 3.5, or in most point-based systems such as World of Darkness or Exalted), but at level 30 he's at the point where he can reliably catch a boulder larger than he is as it rolls at him. Is he any stronger? Probably not - if 4.0 uses encumberance, level isn't likely to add to what you can carry, for instance. It's just... the change seems clearly aimed at making characters less distinct.

I guess that's to be expected, though, since for 4'th edition Wizards decided to get rid of non-combat character roles and use a solely combat-oriented role structure. Skills are bound to be marginalized to some degree in such a system.

I don't know if the skill system will work just like SW: Saga but in Saga you can't use many skill options if you aren't trained in that skill. So even if the wizard has +16 in athletics he may not be able to catch the boulder.

[Indon]

I don't know if the skill system will work just like SW: Saga but in Saga you can't use many skill options if you aren't trained in that skill. So even if the wizard has +16 in athletics he may not be able to catch the boulder.

Hmm. These 'skill options' sound promising. I don't think the demo at DDXP used them, but they might have been using a simplified version of the system.

[Mr. Friendly]

So will higher-level versions of that rolling-rock trap be inexplicably more powerful than the one we've seen?

To a certain extent, yes I think so. Perhaps the first (low-level) rock trap was just a boulder that relies on gravity and inertia to do the deed; the 30th level version is an adamantium spere filled with dark matter launched like a pinball with energy created by tossing a fire and water elemental into a small room and the resulting explosion of energy sending it hurtling forward.


Which is why my attitude towards this is dread, and not outright negativity. If indeed we see the same stat variance for characters as we saw in 3.5 (with magic items and inherent bonuses, that is), it might not be so bad. But signs point to those factors being reduced/eliminated, and we don't know if there'll be anything replacing them.

Is it really such a big deal that the Wizard has a reasonable chance to succeed at the same thing as the fighter though? Gandalf was no slouch, nor are most wizards in fiction, really. Why should using arcane power de facto cause you to be a feeble book worm? Continuing this point after:


You're confusing a non-combat role with a non-combat capability. A party's "skill monkey" was the guy who may not have been as effective in combat as the other members, but who had greatly increased non-combat capabilities in his area of specialization to make up for it, similar to how Strikers have less health than Defenders, but do more damage to make up for it, or how Controllers are soft and don't neccessarily do much damage, but have more powerful utility abilities. That's what a role is, and noncombat roles have been marginalized by reducing the difference between being skilled and not being skilled.

I'm afraid I just don't see your point on this one. It essntially sounds, to my reading of it, that you feel that certain players should only be allowed to participate in certain aspects of the game. If every party needs a fighter, a skill monkey, a healer and a mage then the fighter, healer and mage get to shine and be effective in combat but twiddle their thumbs out of combat and the skill-monkey gets to do all sorts of non-combat actions, but sucks in combat, then you are creating situations where players are just sitting there, bored. This, in my games at least, inevitably leads to out-of-character cross talk, meta-gaming and such.

I see this change as a good thing, if not a great thing, since it means that the combat roles define what a PC does in the limited context of battle, but leaves an open world of possibilities out of combat for genuine creativity and roleplaying.

Going back to the previous points though, why does knowing the square root of 100 make someone less effective at scaling a wall? Why does knowing how to scale that wall really well make you less effective at sticking the sharp end of your sword into someone?


I view it as, in 3e you had a choice to make - in 4e you don't. We're both saying the same thing, really, but we both want different things from our games, which makes our reactions different.

So it's just a glass half-empty vs. glass half-full thing? I mean, being honest here though, can't you as a DM or a player either force or choose a character to be less effective at things or reduced skills? It seems to me that it is easier to reduce the skills than to try and use a much weaker system and try to scale it upwards.

*shrug*

[Talya]

Skill-equity is usually good. There's no reason a level 20 fighter should utterly suck at spot checks all the time. The "trained or untrained" thing works very well in Saga edition. A +5 from training (and a subsequent +5 from focus) is more than enough to differentiate you from someone untrained.

[Indon]

I'm afraid I just don't see your point on this one. It essntially sounds, to my reading of it, that you feel that certain players should only be allowed to participate in certain aspects of the game.
Roles aren't like that at all. 4'th edition, for instance, has the controller role - they aren't as good at damage as strikers. But that doesn't mean the controller isn't participating in combat unless he's knocking people out with Sleep - he can particpate just fine casting his Magic Missile, which only does damage.

Similarly, the skill monkey participates in combat just fine... but shines in his specialty outside of combat.



Going back to the previous points though, why does knowing the square root of 100 make someone less effective at scaling a wall? Why does knowing how to scale that wall really well make you less effective at sticking the sharp end of your sword into someone?
Why doesn't being really good at Football make you better at Basketball?



So it's just a glass half-empty vs. glass half-full thing? I mean, being honest here though, can't you as a DM or a player either force or choose a character to be less effective at things or reduced skills? It seems to me that it is easier to reduce the skills than to try and use a much weaker system and try to scale it upwards.

As far as houseruling goes, it's generally easier to go from more complex to less complex - and without a doubt, 3.5's skill system is more complex. It would be relatively easy to houserule into 4.0's skill system - instead of getting X+Int Mod skill points, you get (1/2 X)+Int Mod trained skills. Everyone gets half level to skills, training is a flat +5.

This is assuming 4'th edition does not have anything like these mythical 'skill options' I just heard about, though - things may be quite different if a system similar to Complete Scoundrel's skill tricks are a part of core.

[Werewindlefr]

Skill-equity is usually good. There's no reason a level 20 fighter should utterly suck at spot checks all the time. The "trained or untrained" thing works very well in Saga edition. A +5 from training (and a subsequent +5 from focus) is more than enough to differentiate you from someone untrained.
This is what I strongly disagree with - and this is the point
that might keep me from playing 4e: I don't see why being good at swinging a sword means a warrior:
-Can't be bluffed easily
-Knows quite a lot about history and geography
-Can swim...

I mean, sure, after 20 levels of adventuring, you get to learn a trick or two in some of those areas. But that's the player's responsibility, after all.
Not to mention the fact that having ranks that you could buy allowed for a much greater diversity of skills; the kind of difference between a good NBA player and the very best, for instance. 4e doesn't seem to give the tools to modelize such a difference easily.

I might houserule skill points, of course. But it's not going to be easy, not to mention that modifying D&D 4e character management software (DM Genie 4e, for instance) is probably just going to be impossible.

[Mr. Friendly]

Roles aren't like that at all. 4'th edition, for instance, has the controller role - they aren't as good at damage as strikers. But that doesn't mean the controller isn't participating in combat unless he's knocking people out with Sleep - he can particpate just fine casting his Magic Missile, which only does damage.

Similarly, the skill monkey participates in combat just fine... but shines in his specialty outside of combat.

Right, but again, in a 4 man group, the skill monkey is typically one person; one person who gets to do the non-combat stuff. If each class has differing things they are skilled in.. doesn't this just mean that everyone gets to shine equally well both in and out of combat? Further, doesn't this mean that we don't have to base balace around some nebulous concept about how well the character does in or out of combat?


Why doesn't being really good at Football make you better at Basketball?

Why doesn't it? Playing Football you build up muscle, stay in good shape and follow the fundementals of teamwork. So long as you have a basic outline of the rules, the football player is going to be better than the total novice. Isn't he?

[Person_Man]

I agree.

Look at the Assassin, for example. You can enter the Assassin at level 6. Their death attack has a Save DC of 10+Assassin level+Int. Once you get to ECL 15, it stops scaling, and it becomes much less useful. And if for some reason you want to leave Assassin before ECL 15, your death attack essentially becomes useless. This problem exists throughout 3.5, most prominently among casters. If you want to be a Fighter 5/Wizard 1, the spells you get from Wizard are pretty useless, and your BAB as a Fighter is nerfed. So people have to bend over backwards and be a Fighter 1/Wizard 4/Abjurant Champion 5/Whatever X in order to be effective, rather then just playing what they want to play.

From what I've seen, 4th ed fixes this. At each level of every class, you get at least one new ability. The abilities all work in the same way:

d20 +1/2 character level + Relevant Stat

vs. AC, Fort Save, Will Save, Ref Save, or an enemy's d20 +1/2 character level + their Relevant Stat.

So if you are fighting someone of the same level with the same stats, you generally have a 50% chance of success. The only ways to improve this are by being higher level, having higher stats, or taking certain feats/races/class abilities that grant minor static bonuses (Weapon Focus, Iron Will, etc) which are now worth something, since I haven't seen any scaled bonuses.

So in theory, you can now multi-class or take whatever race you like without worrying so much about whether the mechanics will work. Though obviously some combos will still be more optimal then others.

But this is pretty much just based what they've made public and the 1st level games people have played at conventions. We'll have to wait and see if it actually works in high level games in real life.

[Starbuck_II]

This is what I strongly disagree with - and this is the point
that might keep me from playing 4e: I don't see why being good at swinging a sword means a warrior:
-Can't be bluffed easily
-Knows quite a lot about history and geography
-Can swim...

I mean, sure, after 20 levels of adventuring, you get to learn a trick or two in some of those areas. But that's the player's responsibility, after all.
Not to mention the fact that having ranks that you could buy allowed for a much greater diversity of skills; the kind of difference between a good NBA player and the very best, for instance. 4e doesn't seem to give the tools to modelize such a difference easily.

I might houserule skill points, of course. But it's not going to be easy, not to mention that modifying D&D 4e character management software (DM Genie 4e, for instance) is probably just going to be impossible.

Um, I'm pretty sure the character not the player is the one who adventureed for 20 levels. He is the one living in that fantasy world.

So, that does mean the warrior should be improving even if the player sucks at defense versus bluff.

[Mr. Friendly]

This is what I strongly disagree with - and this is the point
that might keep me from playing 4e: I don't see why being good at swinging a sword means a warrior:
-Can't be bluffed easily
-Knows quite a lot about history and geography
-Can swim...

I mean, sure, after 20 levels of adventuring, you get to learn a trick or two in some of those areas. But that's the player's responsibility, after all.

So character skills should not improve, instead the player should just metagame. Ok.


Not to mention the fact that having ranks that you could buy allowed for a much greater diversity of skills; the kind of difference between a good NBA player and the very best, for instance. 4e doesn't seem to give the tools to modelize such a difference easily.

Except in 4e the difference between the NBA player and the novice is: The NBA player will be trained (+5) take the Focus feat (+5) and most likely have a higher score in the relevant stat. So we will say a 30th level Novice basketball player (a wizard) vs. an NBA Fighter:

Novice [1 (attrib)+1/2 level] = 16 + 1d20
NBA [3 (attrib)+1/2 level +5 (trained) +5 (focus)] = 28 + 1d20

Statistically the NBA fighter is going to whoop the Wizard all day long. In actual practice, the Wizard may get lucky and get a few baskets from 3 point land, but that's just it - luck. The Novice cannot win consistantly. If the NBA guy just takes 10 (assuming such a thing still exists in 4e), the Novice cannot even win on a 20.


I might houserule skill points, of course. But it's not going to be easy, not to mention that modifying D&D 4e character management software (DM Genie 4e, for instance) is probably just going to be impossible.

Why not just use 3e's skill points if it is such a good system?

[Indon]

Right, but again, in a 4 man group, the skill monkey is typically one person; one person who gets to do the non-combat stuff. If each class has differing things they are skilled in.. doesn't this just mean that everyone gets to shine equally well both in and out of combat?

Yes - nobody gets the choice to be better at one or the other. Everyone's the same.


Further, doesn't this mean that we don't have to base balace around some nebulous concept about how well the character does in or out of combat?

If your concept of balance is "everyone contributes", and not "everyone is the same", then things such as noncombat specialization aren't at all problematic.



Why doesn't it? Playing Football you build up muscle, stay in good shape and follow the fundementals of teamwork. So long as you have a basic outline of the rules, the football player is going to be better than the total novice. Isn't he?

Because football is best played by wide people and basketball is best played by tall people, they require totally different muscle memory, and even different mindsets (for example, compare football and basketball in regards to player contact). Being a veteran of one sport can even impede you in another, because you have to overcome any applicable instinct from the old sport for the new one.

[EvilElitest]

I do not believe they have gotten rid of non-combat roles or gone to a solely combat based structure. This was shown at the D&DXP where the chacters in one adventure had to use their skills to avoid being seen and interact with NPCs. That was a non-combat skill challenge. All it has done though is taken what may have been a purely non-combat character and given him the ability to fight and taken the pure combat character and given him the ability to participate with the party in non-combat situations.

It is worth pointing out however that in the preview books the designers have admitted reluctance to spend time on non combat creatures/people/skills, particularly with good monsters, they've admitted reluctance to stating them because they didn't feel like the players would fight them (which its rather silly to think, but thats another situation)
from
EE

[Mr. Friendly]

Yes - nobody gets the choice to be better at one or the other. Everyone's the same.

Demonstrably untrue. If you take feats related to learning more skills or being better at skills, then you are better out of combat than the chacter who instead used his feats on improving his combat abilities. Further diversity comes in choices of skills.


If your concept of balance is "everyone contributes", and not "everyone is the same", then things such as noncombat specialization aren't at all problematic.

Again, I have pretty clearly shown that everyone is not the same, just that everyone has a chance of succeeding. Some characters can *choose* to specialize further and become better at the fields that interest them.

This helps alleviate the problem of "useless" characters, like the Fighter who can cut a beholder in half, but because he has a low wisdom and listen isn't a class skill, cannot hear his friend talking quitely a few feet away. (hyperbole, but you know what I mean) It also gets rid of the character who is super-fantastic out of combat, but cannot do anything at all in combat. You can still make that character if you want; the onus is on you though to have reason why he doesn't fight or to assign him crappy combat stats.

Essentially, the system doesn't screw the player over anymore. Now the player has to do that all on his own if they want to, because they have a certain concept in mind.



Because football is best played by wide people and basketball is best played by tall people, they require totally different muscle memory, and even different mindsets (for example, compare football and basketball in regards to player contact). Being a veteran of one sport can even impede you in another, because you have to overcome any applicable instinct from the old sport for the new one.

These gentlemen (http://www.baseball-reference.com/bullpen/Category:NFL_Players) would disagree with you...

So then your contention is that my previous contention (that a football player would be better at basketball than someone who has played neither) is false? I would vehemently disagree with you. The underlying fundamentals of having played team sports will make the non-novice better than the novice.

But perhaps we should move this sports discussion over to a different foum. :smallbiggrin: We are moving pretty far afield from D&D at this point.

[Starsinger]

If your concept of balance is "everyone contributes", and not "everyone is the same", then things such as noncombat specialization aren't at all problematic.

Except noncombat specialization leads to things like Rogue niche protection, which as far as I can figure out is why so many classes have 2+int mod skill points. While the rogue can participate in combat, how often does the Fighter participate in skill rolls outside of combat? How often does the sorcerer who spent 3 of his skills on stuff he needs get to participate in skill rolls outside of combat? I say skill rolls because anyone can role play, and that is not a valid excuse for the lack of non combat things found in a lot of classes.

Why can't everyone be viable inside and outside of combat?

Edit:
Why doesn't being really good at Football make you better at Basketball? Why doesn't killing mindflayers make you better at killing dragons? Oh wait.. it does.

[Indon]

Demonstrably untrue. If you take feats related to learning more skills or being better at skills, then you are better out of combat than the chacter who instead used his feats on improving his combat abilities. Further diversity comes in choices of skills.
All things which other systems have in addition to the choices players already have.

I did not mean to imply that all choice has been removed - as I originally said, player choice is now simply less significant in its' impact.



You can still make that character if you want; the onus is on you though to have reason why he doesn't fight or to assign him crappy combat stats.
Well, you can, but just like all the other choices, not to the same degree. All your characters will all have D20 + 1/2 Level + Applicable Stat to everything they do, and even intentional anti-optimization will only have a fraction of the impact it would have in another game (like D&D 3.5).


Essentially, the system doesn't screw the player over anymore. Now the player has to do that all on his own if they want to, because they have a certain concept in mind.
Or in other words, the system doesn't give players weaknesses or strengths of any real significance.


But perhaps we should move this sports discussion over to a different foum. :smallbiggrin: We are moving pretty far afield from D&D at this point.

Agreed, it was a rather off-topic comparison. A better one would have been, "Why doesn't being a skilled engineer make you a better fisherman?" since football and sports actually have something to do with each other while various skills don't necessarily.


Except noncombat specialization leads to things like Rogue niche protection, which as far as I can figure out is why so many classes have 2+int mod skill points.
Niche protection is equally hazardous in or out of combat specialization - it's just that 3.x wasn't built on a strict class role model, so the Rogue saw his niche to be practically the only one to get protection.

A system built with the assumption that everyone has a class role doesn't need that - the Rogue could be better than everyone else (always making the big, cool high-stakes checks that bring in extra successes in the skill check sections) while everyone else can still contribute, and he can contribute in combat.

[Mr. Friendly]

All things which other systems have in addition to the choices players already have.

I did not mean to imply that all choice has been removed - as I originally said, player choice is now simply less significant in its' impact.

I still do not see it. If I didn't choose Skill X as a class skill, then I cannot have Focus in Skill X, therefore I will never be as good at Skill X as someone who did. That seems to be a fairly significant series of choices that have meaningful impact on character development and capability.


Well, you can, but just like all the other choices, not to the same degree. All your characters will all have D20 + 1/2 Level + Applicable Stat to everything they do, and even intentional anti-optimization will only have a fraction of the impact it would have in another game (like D&D 3.5).

As I demonstrated in the Novice vs. Expert comparison above, the Expert is going to have nearly twice the chance of success as the novice.

Isn't it better to have a system that allows the Expert to defeat the Novice without making it impossible to for the Novice to participate or have a minimal chance of succeeding at a routine task?


Or in other words, the system doesn't give players weaknesses or strengths of any real significance.

If you want to spin it sound very negative, sure. On the other hand, the more important question is why do you want the system to have built-in flaws and strengths for *YOUR* character? Shouldn't those be choices you make? Shouldn't you get those Strengths and weaknesses through roleplaying, character development and advancement and choices?


Agreed, it was a rather off-topic comparison. A better one would have been, "Why doesn't being a skilled engineer make you a better fisherman?" since football and sports actually have something to do with each other while various skills don't necessarily.

Well it is D&D, so really the question is why does being able to kill a demon in a fistfight make you a better engineer and/or fisherman? If you were trying to frame it in the context that the Engineer was the character class and that it made no sense for him to be a good fisherman, maybe when he isn't engineering, he likes to fish on weekends? Perhaps as he becomes a better engineer he spends less time at the office and has more time to fish?

[Werewindlefr]

So character skills should not improve, instead the player should just metagame. Ok.
Either you misunderstood, or I wasn't very clear:

A level 20 fighter who has never seen the sea and never tried to swim shouldn't have skill ranks in swim. In general, during adventure and while gaining experience, the character will learn new things, but he won't necessarily learn everything. Instead of giving 1/2 level in every skill, which just doesn't make sense, it should be up to the player to be sensible and take skill ranks in the appropriate skills; appropriate as in, relating to things he might have learned while adventuring. If his character traveled a lot, a few points in geography or knowledge: local is appropriate. A few points in Herbalism or forgery isn't (well, not necessarily at least).

In other words, instead of having all skills raise automatically, maybe it's better -at least for us "simulationists/immersionists"- to trust that the player will put skill ranks where it makes sense.

[Rutee]

Except noncombat specialization leads to things like Rogue niche protection, which as far as I can figure out is why so many classes have 2+int mod skill points. While the rogue can participate in combat, how often does the Fighter participate in skill rolls outside of combat? How often does the sorcerer who spent 3 of his skills on stuff he needs get to participate in skill rolls outside of combat? I say skill rolls because anyone can role play, and that is not a valid excuse for the lack of non combat things found in a lot of classes.

Non-Combat specialization is valid in a game with a stronger focus on things that aren't combat. That's just not, you know, DnD. If you're going to make beating people up the primary focus of the game (And it is, people. I don't care how you play the game; We're discussing system tilt), everyone needs to be good at beating people up.

As to "Does it make sense for people to get good at everything", not in real life. But it's cinematic.

[Indon]

As I demonstrated in the Novice vs. Expert comparison above, the Expert is going to have nearly twice the chance of success as the novice.

Isn't it better to have a system that allows the Expert to defeat the Novice without making it impossible to for the Novice to participate or have a minimal chance of succeeding at a routine task?
The multi-success skill challenge system allows anyone to contribute to a skill challenge no matter how good any one person is at skills - so why not let the people who specialize in skills do so awesomely?



If you want to spin it sound very negative, sure. On the other hand, the more important question is why do you want the system to have built-in flaws and strengths for *YOUR* character? Shouldn't those be choices you make? Shouldn't you get those Strengths and weaknesses through roleplaying, character development and advancement and choices?
I like to see synergy between my game and the system I use to play it.



Well it is D&D, so really the question is why does being able to kill a demon in a fistfight make you a better engineer and/or fisherman? If you were trying to frame it in the context that the Engineer was the character class and that it made no sense for him to be a good fisherman, maybe when he isn't engineering, he likes to fish on weekends? Perhaps as he becomes a better engineer he spends less time at the office and has more time to fish?

True, but now we have people learning to kill demons in fistfights while apparently studying everything in their spare time, including how to be better at things not involving skill at all, but purely innate attributes (but only some things - as I noted, level is unlikely to have an impact on how much you can carry, even while it increases what you can do with your strength).

[Dervag]

Ah, I should clarify - I was commenting specifically on the fact that you add 1/2 level to most things. This significantly decreases the difference between, say, a crafty pickpocket and a brutish ogre's ability to snatch someone's coin purse. Or the difference between a trained soldier's and a frail, bookish wizard's chances to climb a wall.Not if they're the same level it won't.

I'm not sure this will fix the bugs, but it won't suppress ability differences within a group of equal-leveled characters. The hulking ogre will still be a much worse pickpocket than the canny thief. The only difference is that the ogre might stand a chance of picking the pocket of a first level guard... at tenth level.

So it definitely reduces the inviolable walls between character classes (like how in 1st Edition only thieves could really hide according to the rules). But it doesn't suppress ability differences except when two competing players are of radically different levels.

Now, other decisions the designers make could suppress that difference, but level scaling won't do it alone as long as DMs aren't throwing the same challenges at 20th level PCs that they do at 1st level PCs.


You're confusing a non-combat role with a non-combat capability. A party's "skill monkey" was the guy who may not have been as effective in combat as the other members, but who had greatly increased non-combat capabilities in his area of specialization to make up for it, similar to how Strikers have less health than Defenders, but do more damage to make up for it, or how Controllers are soft and don't neccessarily do much damage, but have more powerful utility abilities. That's what a role is, and noncombat roles have been marginalized by reducing the difference between being skilled and not being skilled.The skill-monkey role was an arbitrary invention imposed by the nature of the 3rd Edition system. In both real life and fantasy, some of the most effective warriors have also been competent diplomats and persuaders. In real life and in most fantasy literature there is no absolute line between "combat skilled" and "noncombat skilled" people. Our favorite fantasy characters are usually ones who can win a fight and persuade a guard to let him past without resorting to "Thog smash." Or who could hurl mystic fire at her enemies and climb a mountain.

3rd Edition seems to make it hard to play that kind of character. It's a little better than earlier additions about segregating character abilities tightly by class, but the practical issues created by the skill system still make it very hard for a lot of classes to branch out. The only classes that seem to be able to branch out much are the casters, which is a major source of the imbalance in favor of casters. Casters can control noncombat situations as thoroughly as they do combat situations and do well in both areas; other characters typically cannot.


I view it as, in 3e you had a choice to make - in 4e you don't. We're both saying the same thing, really, but we both want different things from our games, which makes our reactions different.I think what going to change is that in 3rd Edition you decide what your character will be the only person in the party who can even contemplate doing something, whereas in 4th Edition you will be able to decide what categories of things you will specialize in.


Why doesn't being really good at Football make you better at Basketball?To an extent, it does.

*I assume you mean American football; I could make the same argument with reference to the sport of soccer that everyone else in the world calls football.

I mean, the linebackers whose job is mostly to charge straight forward aren't going to make excellent basketball players. But an NFL quarterback, or any other excellent football player, would make a pretty good basketball player, because they're in great physical condition and they have a considerable amount of practice at being agile and doing precision throwing. They might need some retraining to get their football instincts out of the way, but that's an arbitrary factor imposed by the very narrow rules of each game.

It would be ridiculous to claim that a star quarterback couldn't beat, say, me at basketball, as if their vastly superior physical fitness and competitive training would afford them no advantage over a geeky person in poor condition. But that's the kind of situation implied when 20th level wizards in 3rd Edition find themselves unable to escape from physical traps any better than a low level commoner could.

The argument behind it is not unreasonable, but high degrees of skill segregation by class artificially limit gameplay by forcing many player characters to be physically unable to perform the kind of heroic feat the player would like to be able to accomplish. My great fighter can't swing from chandeliers. Why? Because he isn't a swashbuckler or a rogue. Is that right? I mean, I could always have designed him as a swashbuckler or a rogue. But if I do, he'll suck with certain types of weapons and in heavy armor. What if I want a guy who can wear armor, but can also swing from chandeliers- not at the same time, of course?

What if I want a wizard who can talk people into following him into battle without having to bewitch them?

What if I want a cat burglar who fights fiercely and effectively when cornered?

All these things are perfectly valid fantasy archetypes, but none of them are possible when skills are highly segregated. 3rd Edition helped to remove some of the barriers in the path of that kind of play, and it looks like 4th Edition will remove some more. It may remove too many and make the game world flat, so that all characters do the same things- but I really doubt it.


This is assuming 4'th edition does not have anything like these mythical 'skill options' I just heard about, though - things may be quite different if a system similar to Complete Scoundrel's skill tricks are a part of core.I'm betting they will be, because the game designers aren't going to want to eliminate the idea that not all PC classes are equal at doing all things.


This is what I strongly disagree with - and this is the point
that might keep me from playing 4e: I don't see why being good at swinging a sword means a warrior:
-Can't be bluffed easily
-Knows quite a lot about history and geography
-Can swim...

I mean, sure, after 20 levels of adventuring, you get to learn a trick or two in some of those areas. But that's the player's responsibility, after all.But in 3rd Edition, a player who tries to make his mighty warrior even mildly resistant to bluffing and mildly informed about geography compared to other classes of the same level will have to make serious sacrifices to the mightiness of his warrior. If he wants somebody that the party's master diplomat can fool only some of the time, he has to build his character into a pretty formidable diplomat (say, get his Sense Motive modifier up to within about 4 points of the diplomat's Bluff modifier). And that isn't happening unless the warrior makes mechanical choices that seriously handicap his fighting abilities, like taking non-fighter class levels and putting effectively all his skill points into social skills.


Not to mention the fact that having ranks that you could buy allowed for a much greater diversity of skills; the kind of difference between a good NBA player and the very best, for instance. 4e doesn't seem to give the tools to modelize such a difference easily.I think that's mostly because you haven't seen the whole system in its fully developed form.


I might houserule skill points, of course. But it's not going to be easy, not to mention that modifying D&D 4e character management software (DM Genie 4e, for instance) is probably just going to be impossible.I really don't think they're going to force you to use the software.


Yes - nobody gets the choice to be better at one or the other. Everyone's the same.Do you really think the game designers are going to suppress all differences in ability between players?

I think they're just going to change the advantage conferred by specialization from "utterly crippling to the nonspecialist, no matter how hard the nonspecialist tries, unless the nonspecialist becomes a specialist" to "obvious and large, but surmountable with luck and careful effort."

[fendrin]

Yes - nobody gets the choice to be better at one or the other. Everyone's the same.
Garbage. If I choose to take focus feats to improve my out of combat skills and you take feats to improve your sword swinging, am I just as good as you in combat, and are you just as good as me as out of combat? No.

In 3 and 3.5 you HAD to specialize in out of combat to keep up with the rising DCs (because high ECL traps were harder to disarm... not so different from 4e). That meant that that the rogue (or analogue) wasn't specializing in combat. Given that the fighter types typically were specializing in combat, the rogue/analogue rapidly falls behind in combat to the point of being useless (assuming that the fighter types are challenged).


If your concept of balance is "everyone contributes", and not "everyone is the same", then things such as noncombat specialization aren't at all problematic.
The problem with them is that in 3.5 while the rogue spends a few minutes of real-time dealing with a corridor full of traps, the rest of the players are bored. Then in a long combat, the rogue/analogue can't even effectively hit the opponent, because the oppnent's AC is set to challenge the fighter type, who is head and shoulders above the rogue/analogue in to-hit.

Seriously, in 3e you had to be a specialist to remain effective. That is why generalists such as the bard and monk are considered inferior (speaking core only, here... anything can be done with enough splatbooks).

[Douglas]

The multi-success skill challenge system allows anyone to contribute to a skill challenge no matter how good any one person is at skills - so why not let the people who specialize in skills do so awesomely?
Let's take a look at how that kind of thing works in 3e:
Ok, so your level 30 rogue with max ranks, skill focus, and a high ability score modifier has +45 or so in the skill. He considers a DC 30 check to be pathetically easy and gets his "totally awesome" success of beating the DC by a huge margin without even trying. Meanwhile, the entire rest of the party has no ranks and no focus in this skill. With anything less than a 30 in the ability score, no one else can meet this "pathetically easy" DC even on a natural 20. The rogue succeeds awesomely, everybody else automatically fails.

Now take 4e:
Your level 30 rogue with focus has ability modifier + 15 (level) + 5 (class skill) + 5 (focus) = 25 + ability bonus. Let's say his relevant ability score is 30. He has a +35 bonus on this check. He considers a DC 30 check to be pathetically easy, can't fail it, and gets his "totally awesome" success of beating the DC by a huge margin (though not quite so huge as the 3e rogue) with no difficulty. Meanwhile, the rest of the party has 15 + ability modifier on the check. Let's say everybody else has 20 in the relevant ability score. The rest of the party has a +20 bonus on the check, and has approximately a 50% chance of success. The rogue still gets to shine by getting his extreme success but the rest of the party is now actually able to contribute.

I know which scenario I prefer.

[Duelpersonality]

The multi-success skill challenge system allows anyone to contribute to a skill challenge no matter how good any one person is at skills - so why not let the people who specialize in skills do so awesomely?

They still do, especially if the SW:SE skill system or something like it is in place. Even though every 10th level character will have a +5 level bonus to, let's say, Arcane, they will only be able to do some very basic stuff with that knowledge. "Oh, that's a black dragon, it can melt us into glowing green pools of ooze." Whereas the wizard, who has training in Arcane, will be able to tell you the weakness of the black dragon, where it came from and what flavor of ice cream it likes, on top of what the gestures the little kobold following it around mean ("They mean DUCK!"). This is not just a difference in the DC, but a difference in the way skills work when you are trained vs. untrained. The same thing applies to all skills. At high levels, the diffence of +5 to the skill for training won't make much difference in the DCs that can be hit with regularity, but what the skill can be used for will differentiate the characters that chose to focus on that (or multiple) skill(s).


True, but now we have people learning to kill demons in fistfights while apparently studying everything in their spare time, including how to be better at things not involving skill at all, but purely innate attributes (but only some things - as I noted, level is unlikely to have an impact on how much you can carry, even while it increases what you can do with your strength).

The examples you're using are using ordinary people. PCs are not ordinary people. It may seem counter-intuitive to think that bashing in orc skulls is going to make you recognize the mind flayer any better than some schmo off the farm, but remember that you're traveling to places that normal people will never go (and survive, at any rate). You're also travelling with wizards, warlocks, thieves, spies and those blessed by the gods. Some of that knowledge is going to get passed around. Not all of it, certainly, unless you invest your time into studying with those people to gain a greater portion of their skill.

I appologize for the use of second person. I got carried away.

[Mr. Friendly]

A level 20 fighter who has never seen the sea and never tried to swim shouldn't have skill ranks in swim. In general, during adventure and while gaining experience, the character will learn new things, but he won't necessarily learn everything. Instead of giving 1/2 level in every skill, which just doesn't make sense, it should be up to the player to be sensible and take skill ranks in the appropriate skills; appropriate as in, relating to things he might have learned while adventuring. If his character traveled a lot, a few points in geography or knowledge: local is appropriate. A few points in Herbalism or forgery isn't (well, not necessarily at least).

Except now we are discussing a model of skill selection more like CoC/Chaosium. D&D does not now, nor has it ever, modelled a skill system based upon the characters actual experiences.

If we are using 3e's SP system as a baseline model, that fighter will get 2 SP/LVL and if he is, say, a mounted warrior, will be spending half his SP on Ride and the other half on maybe something else. The 3e paradigm of class/cross-class creates a fighter who can never be stealthy, never have Knowledge, in short never do much of anything. The fighter is punished to protect the Rogue's niche as a skill monkey and the Rogue yet still has more tactical options than the fighter.

I suppose it is totally unrealistic though to believe that a fighter who has been travelling with a wizard, a cleric and a rogue for 20 levels would ever learn anything at all from watching them do things. (snark)


In other words, instead of having all skills raise automatically, maybe it's better -at least for us "simulationists/immersionists"- to trust that the player will put skill ranks where it makes sense.

In other words, it is better to punish everyone who plays D&D, not all of whom are simulationists, instead of trusting simulationists to restrain themselves and limit their abilities as dictated by circumstance and the whim of their DM.


The multi-success skill challenge system allows anyone to contribute to a skill challenge no matter how good any one person is at skills - so why not let the people who specialize in skills do so awesomely?

I guess that doing something twice as well as someone isn't "awesome" enough for you. I suppose that it isn't enough that one person succeed awesomely and the other person barely succeed. I suppose it is better that one person succeed super-hyper-ultra-amazingly awesome and the other fail utterly, if they are even allowed to try at all.


I like to see synergy between my game and the system I use to play it.

Except of course, your D&D game and my D&D game are not the same. Just because you think that all wizards should be feeble bookworms should not impact my wizards. If I want wizards that are tough and able to climb a wall, I should be able to make that character.

You say you want synergy, but I think we agree that not everyone is playing the same D&D game - so shouldn't the system itself be neutral? Why impose fake thematic restrictions on a character when a player can self-impose those restrictions as is desired, or the DM can impose those restrictions?


True, but now we have people learning to kill demons in fistfights while apparently studying everything in their spare time, including how to be better at things not involving skill at all, but purely innate attributes (but only some things - as I noted, level is unlikely to have an impact on how much you can carry, even while it increases what you can do with your strength).

I don't see that this is any different that 3e though. There are easy enough situations that come up in 3e where one party member has training in a skill and yet has a lower net score than an untrained character who has racial, synergy and attribute bonuses.

[Douglas]

One of the fundamental rules of any game based around rolling dice, so basic it is hardly ever stated, is that the dice roll should matter. For that to happen, the difference between the DC and the character's bonus must be in the range of 2-20, preferably near the middle of that range. In particular, this must be true for the entire party, excepting characters that truly don't care about that particular kind of roll. This range can be extended somewhat by giving extra benefits for beating the DC by a large margin, effectively giving the specialized characters a different DC, but that doesn't change the basic principle.

3.x broke this rule thoroughly. Any given character's bonus for any given roll is fixed within a very narrow margin at low levels, far smaller than the 18 point difference theoretically allowed by the size of the d20; at high levels, on the other hand, a character's bonus varies drastically depending on class, specialization, and degree of optimization, and the range of variation is vastly greater than a mere 20 points. Any DC that poses any challenge at all for an optimized character specialized in it is completely unbeatable for anyone who is either not focused in it or is not optimized as much.

4e appears to be making a deliberate effort to conform to this rule. The limit on bonus variation needs to apply at all levels, therefore 4e made bonuses that scale with level independent of character class. Instead, you get one-time bonuses that kick in immediately, setting the specialist and non-specialist apart from the beginning, and the gap remains the same as you level up. This makes such things as the multi-success group skill challenges actually possible. This would also allow untrained characters to have a chance of succeeding at some things they shouldn't be able to do (brain surgery?), but that can be dealt with easily simply by dictating that such things require training.

[Holocron Coder]

To continue the nonplayer vs novice vs expert example with skills, here is how it would conceivably work in SW:SE, and, supposedly, 4E.

Nonplayer: Level 10 [anyclass]. 12 Dex, untrained Sports
Novice: Level 10 Sportsman. 16 Dex, trained Sports
Expert: Level 10 Sportsman. 18 Dex, trained and focused Sports

The nonplayer has a +6 to his Sports. Novice +13. Expert +19.

Since he's untrained, the nonplayer can only shoot 2-pointers, 3-pointers, free-throws, and maybe dunk (with a good Jump check).

The novice, since he's trained, can do all of those, plus lay-ups, special dunks, cross-over dribbling, etc. And do it better.

The expert, trained and focused, can do all of those, and pretty much in his sleep. He'll walk all over the nonplayer and be moderately challenged by other Sports players.

Think of it as you vs college basketball player vs Michael Jordan.


In another example, the Wizard acrobatics vs the Fighter acrobatics. Say that climbing belongs in acrobatics (somehow...). Or it's its own skill, whichever. Short of the wizard being frail (6-9 Str), he should be able to climb a simple, rough wall (DC10), right? In 3E, he only has a 50% chance of success with 10-11Str. I can honestly claim I have no skills in climbing, but I know I can climb a basic wall with footholds, etc.

Now, the trained fighter can not only climb it in his sleep, but also climb sheer cliffs in the rain during a thunderstorm while fighting off harpies. Obviously, the fighter is better at it, but the Wizard isn't almost guaranteed to fail climb checks, as he is now.

[Mr. Friendly]

In another example, the Wizard acrobatics vs the Fighter acrobatics. Say that climbing belongs in acrobatics (somehow...). Or it's its own skill, whichever. Short of the wizard being frail (6-9 Str), he should be able to climb a simple, rough wall (DC10), right? In 3E, he only has a 50% chance of success with 10-11Str. I can honestly claim I have no skills in climbing, but I know I can climb a basic wall with footholds, etc.

I believe Climb falls under the Athletics Skill.

From the Scalegloom Appendix, C/P from the PHB Lite compiled by Verys Arkon over at ENWorld:


STRENGTH (STR):
• Athletics* (climb, swim, jump)
CONSTITUTION (CON):
• Endurance (stave off ill effects and push
beyond normal physical limits)
DEXTERITY (DEX):
• Acrobatics* (balance, escape from grab or
restraints, and (if you’re trained) to reduce
your damage when you fall)
• Stealth* (hide, move silently)
• Thievery (disable traps, open locks, pick
pockets, sleight of hand).
INTELLIGENCE (INT):
• Arcana (if trained, can detect magical effects)
• History (events, legends, customs, traditions)
• Nature (survival, travel through the
wilderness, natural hazards).
• Religion
WISDOM (WIS):
• Dungeoneering.
• Heal (first aid, stabilize a dying character,
grant a saving throw, or treat disease)
• Insight (discern intent, body language,
motives, attitudes, and truthfulness)
• Perception (notice clues, spot imminent
dangers, locate hidden objects)
CHARISMA (CHA):
• Bluff
• Diplomacy
• Intimidate
• Streetwise (get to know the lay of the land in
an urban setting)

[Indon]

Isn't it better to have a system that allows the Expert to defeat the Novice without making it impossible to for the Novice to participate or have a minimal chance of succeeding at a routine task?

Then make the DC for basic tasks lower - you accomplish the same thing as you describe without needing to decrease the relative impact of player options for their character.


As to "Does it make sense for people to get good at everything", not in real life. But it's cinematic.

We've both played systems in which characters are not neccessarily good at everything, which are designed to be cinematic. I don't think it's particularly cinematic to have everyone good at everything, If anything I think it's rather uncinematic because it makes being good at something mean less.


So it definitely reduces the inviolable walls between character classes (like how in 1st Edition only thieves could really hide according to the rules).


The skill-monkey role was an arbitrary invention imposed by the nature of the 3rd Edition system.
By your own words, the skill-specialist is an old role in D&D. It is by no means limited to 3'rd edition and in fact if anything granted more versatility to most classes.


But in 3rd Edition, a player who tries to make his mighty warrior even mildly resistant to bluffing and mildly informed about geography compared to other classes of the same level will have to make serious sacrifices to the mightiness of his warrior.
Fixable by merely increasing the number of skill points many classes get.


I think they're just going to change the advantage conferred by specialization from "utterly crippling to the nonspecialist, no matter how hard the nonspecialist tries, unless the nonspecialist becomes a specialist" to "obvious and large, but surmountable with luck and careful effort."

It looks like they're changing the advantage from, "crippling to the nonspecialist, difficult for someone who mildly focuses (and any numbers of degrees of focus are supported by a skill point system), and significant for the specialist," to "okay chance of getting one success for the nonspecialist, good chance of getting one success for the mildly focused, and good chance of getting two successes for the specialist."

Barring a skill trick system or somesuch, that's about what it'll amount to.


Garbage. If I choose to take focus feats to improve my out of combat skills and you take feats to improve your sword swinging, am I just as good as you in combat, and are you just as good as me as out of combat? No.
As you even point out, the difference is smaller than in 3.5. You apparently found it crippling while I never did, though - mostly since in my games a Fighter-type's vastly superior to-hit is converted into damage to compete with the higher-initial damage Rogue's attack.

And generalists are in fact the most powerful character classes in 3.X - what do you think the Druid is? (and most other spellcasters, but the Druid is the one most clearly intended to be a generalist, rather than spellcasting making them generalists)


Now take 4e:
Your level 30 rogue with focus has ability modifier + 15 (level) + 5 (class skill) + 5 (focus) = 25 + ability bonus. Let's say his relevant ability score is 30. He has a +35 bonus on this check. He considers a DC 30 check to be pathetically easy, can't fail it, and gets his "totally awesome" success of beating the DC by a huge margin (though not quite so huge as the 3e rogue) with no difficulty. Meanwhile, the rest of the party has 15 + ability modifier on the check. Let's say everybody else has 20 in the relevant ability score. The rest of the party has a +20 bonus on the check, and has approximately a 50% chance of success. The rogue still gets to shine by getting his extreme success but the rest of the party is now actually able to contribute.

I know which scenario I prefer.

Your 4e scenario would be no different for a more significant margin between the Rogue and everyone else (and assumes 3e-style stat scaling, for which we've seen no evidence particularly since there's no longer any such thing as +stat items)... except that the Rogue could reasonably bid for a higher DC to do better.


They still do, especially if the SW:SE skill system or something like it is in place... This is not just a difference in the DC, but a difference in the way skills work when you are trained vs. untrained.

As I said earlier, things might be different if this is how skills work - but from what we've seen of the game so far, no mention of this system has been made.


I suppose it is totally unrealistic though to believe that a fighter who has been travelling with a wizard, a cleric and a rogue for 20 levels would ever learn anything at all from watching them do things. (snark)
And we certainly couldn't fix that entire portion of the system with minimal to no downside by tweaking skill points by class.


I guess that doing something twice as well as someone isn't "awesome" enough for you. I suppose that it isn't enough that one person succeed awesomely and the other person barely succeed. I suppose it is better that one person succeed super-hyper-ultra-amazingly awesome and the other fail utterly, if they are even allowed to try at all.
Not everyone knows how to do everything, and knowing how to do something doesn't matter as much when everyone can do it. It's that simple. And yes, when I'm level 30 in this supposedly epic game I should expect to do miraculous things in my field that nobody else outside of that field can have a chance of accomplishing.

In 3'rd edition, there's an epic Climb DC for, essentially, walking on ceilings. If I make a character who gets good at climbing, I should eventually be able to do that sort of thing - and the non-climbing Wizard should have no chance to, ever, short of magic.


You say you want synergy, but I think we agree that not everyone is playing the same D&D game - so shouldn't the system itself be neutral? Why impose fake thematic restrictions on a character when a player can self-impose those restrictions as is desired, or the DM can impose those restrictions?
'neutral' does not mean 'mechanically generic'. A setting-neutral system if anything should model the fact that often, people have zero training in something and can't do it, literally, to save their lives.


One of the fundamental rules of any game based around rolling dice, so basic it is hardly ever stated, is that the dice roll should matter.
Which 4'th edition does,


This range can be extended somewhat by giving extra benefits for beating the DC by a large margin, effectively giving the specialized characters a different DC, but that doesn't change the basic principle.
By offering this.


3.x broke this rule thoroughly.
Only for some skills - DC scaling from skill to skill was inconsistent, but skills such as Jump scaled linearly with DC.


4e appears to be making a deliberate effort to conform to this rule. The limit on bonus variation needs to apply at all levels, therefore 4e made bonuses that scale with level independent of character class.

Except that this isn't taking into account that 4'th edition, because of its' variable DC system, can support higher variation than what, to our knowledge, exists in the system. The multi-success group skill challenges are possible in third edition, theoretically, using variable DC's (it'd be an ugly system, admittedly, due to the aforementioned inconsistent DC-scaling between skills).

Whew. Okay. Sorry about Giganto-post, but lots of people replied.

Mind that I'm not saying the 3'rd edition skill system is perfect. Far from it - skill points by level are pretty well screwed up, and individual skill difficulties scale inconsistently. But these are problems with the system's specific implementation - they are not problems with the nature of the system.

[Rutee]

By your own words, the skill-specialist is an old role in D&D. It is by no means limited to 3'rd edition and in fact if anything granted more versatility to most classes.

I think you're mistaking the idea of a Hide skill with that of Hide as a class feature. Which is what it was in 1e. There was no such thing as skills.

Your post is tl;dr. Cut down on the Wall of Quotes and stick to larger summaries.

[fendrin]

Then make the DC for basic tasks lower - you accomplish the same thing as you describe without needing to decrease the relative impact of player options for their character.
If you then include linear scaling (as you touted Jump having) you end up with a lot of ridiculousness. For instance, I want a game where a jump expert can't pull a superman (the original, before he could fly) and leap an eighth of a mile, solely based on a skill check.


As you even point out, the difference is smaller than in 3.5. You apparently found it crippling while I never did, though - mostly since in my games a Fighter-type's vastly superior to-hit is converted into damage to compete with the higher-initial damage Rogue's attack.
I don't think 'I can use 3 points of PA and still hit on anything but a nat 1' is a challenge. Judicious use of PA makes for much more effective fighter-types, who then need harder targets... meanwhile, the rogue/analogue is using his feats on skills instead of combat, and thus falls behind.

Regardless, you have not addressed the issue of what the other players do while the skill-monkey character is doing their out of combat stuff. In my opinion that is a much harder problem to solve than adjusting to-hit ratios.

And generalists are in fact the most powerful character classes in 3.X - what do you think the Druid is? (and most other spellcasters, but the Druid is the one most clearly intended to be a generalist, rather than spellcasting making them generalists)[/QUOTE]
please, let's leave the spellcasters out of this. They are beyond generalists. They are generalists who are (or can be) better than a specialist at the specialist's specialty. It reminds me of a song from Annie Get Your Gun...
Anything you can do I can do better;
I can do anything better than you.

[ChazFox]

As a fairly recent arrival to 3.5 (started this year), and only just having been introduced to Complete Adventurer, I'm really not sure what to make of this whole 3e vs 3.5 vs 4e comparison thing.

It's true, nobody's purely a skillmonkey, but I prefer to play the assistant in a game, hence why I now love the Scout class :P The sessions I've taken part in so far have a slight favour to roleplaying over roll playing, and so I actually enjoy playing the cowardly second-fiddle to the rest of the bold brave adventurers, being fairly weak combat wise, but being a valuable asset to the party through spying on the enemy well before. After all, things are a little boring if everyone's the big brave hero, right? :P

I'm unsure as of yet whether I wish to adapt to 4e (On one hand I want to buy the core set to find out what's changed from 3.5, but on the other hand I get the feeling my campaign buddies aren't going to be moving from 3.5, and since they're the only people I've ever played DnD with (It's like almost nobody in my area has heard of it) I'm not sure if I want to spend money. Major debate, right?

Anyway, in closing, I'm just one confused newbie to the DnD games who doesn't know whether it's worth spending his shinies on a new system he doesn't know much about, while still trying to get used to the current system.

[fendrin]

ChazFox-

Though I cannot prove it, I strongly believe that if you want to play a skill-focussed rogue, you can. Spend your feats on improving your skills, and you will still be much better than your comrades at your skills.

And nothing will ever keep you from playing your character as a coward if you want to.

On the other hand, if you are not sure your gaming crew is going to swap, you may as well wait and skim the books before you buy them. You can bet that there will be 4e play reports on these forums [see my sig...], so you can get a lot of info about actual changes that way.

[ChazFox]

The problem with "skimming" the books is that when the books are released, I won't be able to skim them. Primarily because my general area (I'm talking Aberdeenshire through to the Highlands here) has apparently never heard of DnD, and so I'd have to purchase the books through Amazon or the like. Unless they're deciding to give those books a "Look Inside" feature, I doubt I'll be able to check through a book to check rules and stuff without actually ordering them.

The wonders of living in north-east Scotland, eh?

EDIT: Ooh, while I'm still posting here, I might as well ask. Does anyone know if those mysterious wizards that live off the coast if you catch my drift... (Sorry, been reading through the entire plot of OotS so far and I'm addicted.)

Anyway, does anyone have any idea if WotC plan to bring back the likes of Scouts, Ninja and classes introduced in 3.5's supplements in 4e? I know there's a slim chance of that question being answered, but I've found myself to absolutely love the idea behind a scout class: A mostly noncombatant class which helps the rest of the party out by going ahead of the group and looking for threats, all the while remaining unseen, but who can deal a bit of damage where it's needed, especially when running circles around the enemy. :D

[Arakune]

To an extent, it does.

*I assume you mean American football; I could make the same argument with reference to the sport of soccer that is called football but only in U.S.A people insist in calling 'soccer' even if the name is self explanatory.


Fixed for you.

You get a good physical build, reflexes and stamina. You are not going to out perform someone in your first try (unless you are some kind of genius, but then that's simply not fair) but can become as good or even better than a regular player.

[Reel On, Love]

Your post is tl;dr.

http://lolcat.com/pics/tldr.jpg

[MeklorIlavator]

EDIT: Ooh, while I'm still posting here, I might as well ask. Does anyone know if those mysterious wizards that live off the coast if you catch my drift... (Sorry, been reading through the entire plot of OotS so far and I'm addicted.)

Anyway, does anyone have any idea if WotC plan to bring back the likes of Scouts, Ninja and classes introduced in 3.5's supplements in 4e? I know there's a slim chance of that question being answered, but I've found myself to absolutely love the idea behind a scout class: A mostly noncombatant class which helps the rest of the party out by going ahead of the group and looking for threats, all the while remaining unseen, but who can deal a bit of damage where it's needed, especially when running circles around the enemy. :D

I think the scout got added to the ranger as a "power" set path, but i could be wrong about that.\



Edit:
What does "tl;dr" mean?

[tyckspoon]

EDIT: Ooh, while I'm still posting here, I might as well ask. Does anyone know if those mysterious wizards that live off the coast if you catch my drift... (Sorry, been reading through the entire plot of OotS so far and I'm addicted.)

Anyway, does anyone have any idea if WotC plan to bring back the likes of Scouts, Ninja and classes introduced in 3.5's supplements in 4e? I know there's a slim chance of that question being answered, but I've found myself to absolutely love the idea behind a scout class: A mostly noncombatant class which helps the rest of the party out by going ahead of the group and looking for threats, all the while remaining unseen, but who can deal a bit of damage where it's needed, especially when running circles around the enemy. :D

It's certain to happen eventually thanks to WotC's never-satiated need for more stuff to print and sell, although it may be in the form of new talent selections for existing classes rather than completely new classes. It may also happen in the first book- it's been said that the 4E base classes have 'killed and looted' certain ideas from some of the 3.5 splat classes, so you might find the flavor you want in the 4E Rogue or Ranger.

[ChazFox]

What does "tl;dr" mean?

It means "Too long; Didn't read". ^^

[Dervag]

By your own words, the skill-specialist is an old role in D&D. It is by no means limited to 3'rd edition and in fact if anything granted more versatility to most classes.I disagree. In core 1st and 2nd Edition there was almost no character customizability. Two characters of equal level and equal ability scores would be effectively identical except for equipment. All special character abilities were class features. Thieves could hide and pick locks, no one else could. No one else really had any out-of-combat specialization other than "I cast these kinds of spells."

This had the effect of forcing everyone to roleplay nondungeon events because there was no mechanism for them, for better or for worse.

3rd Edition freed things up some with its wide use of skills. But then it went and made "can use lots of skills" the primary class feature of certain classes. For all intents and purposes that's the only selling point of the rogue and bard that make them preferable to another character class for any purpose.

But to make that work they had to artificially restrict skill access by non-skillmonkey classes through a combination of cross-classing and point per level restrictions. Which made non-skillmonkey classes almost useless out of combat (unless they had useful spells).

And sure, you can nominally fix that by increasing the number of skill points available to non-skillmonkey classes. But that has exactly the effect you originally criticized: it decreases the gap in ability between the specialist and the novice to the point where the novice has a pretty good chance of being able to do the specialist's job, because the novice has enough skill points to be an effective "junior skillmonkey."

Put simply, the issue is the gap between the novice (or the Xth level nonspecialist) and the Xth level specialist. If the gap between the X level specialist and the X level nonspecialist is wide, you get a party where only one person can actually do things like negotiate, because against level-appropriate negotiation challenges he's the only one with the modifier to do the job. If the gap is nonexistent there's no incentive to specialize. Making the gap be 5 or 10 points on a d20 die roll actually sounds about right to me. That way, a nonspecialist can at least hope to duplicate the feats that a specialist of equal level performs routinely, with luck. Which is dramatically appropriate for a very wide range of things.


And generalists are in fact the most powerful character classes in 3.X - what do you think the Druid is? (and most other spellcasters, but the Druid is the one most clearly intended to be a generalist, rather than spellcasting making them generalists)This is slightly misleading. Casters are generalists because their magic lets them duplicate the abilities of specialists by breaking the laws of physics. Noncasters, or casters who don't have the right spell handy, can't do that.

Which gives you wizards who (unlike Gandalf or most of the other archetypal wizards of fiction) can't convince anyone to do anything they don't want to do without actively bewitching them.


Not everyone knows how to do everything, and knowing how to do something doesn't matter as much when everyone can do it. It's that simple. And yes, when I'm level 30 in this supposedly epic game I should expect to do miraculous things in my field that nobody else outside of that field can have a chance of accomplishing.

In 3'rd edition, there's an epic Climb DC for, essentially, walking on ceilings. If I make a character who gets good at climbing, I should eventually be able to do that sort of thing - and the non-climbing Wizard should have no chance to, ever, short of magic.Reasonable. But you're really going to need magic of your own to accomplish that anyway- the DC is high enough that a guy without magical enhancements to his ability scores and his Climb check won't be able to do it even at 30th level.

So your climb specialization is partly the result of your superior climbing equipment. It's entirely possible that if a very fit human being with lots of experience dealing with the strange, magical, and legendary donned your legendary Gauntlets of Clambering and Boots of Finding Footholds, he might be able to climb at least the walls, if not the ceiling. Even though he isn't a hyperspecialized climber.

That is by no means inappropriate for most people's games.

[Indon]

I think you're mistaking the idea of a Hide skill with that of Hide as a class feature. Which is what it was in 1e. There was no such thing as skills.

Recieving more skills is a class feature geared towards out-of-combat situations - just like thief abilities in previous versions.


If you then include linear scaling (as you touted Jump having) you end up with a lot of ridiculousness. For instance, I want a game where a jump expert can't pull a superman (the original, before he could fly) and leap an eighth of a mile, solely based on a skill check.
By the time this happens your jump expert is epic level anyway - there are certain expectations in this range and 'ability to do what they do to a ridiculous degree' is one of them, is it not?


I don't think 'I can use 3 points of PA and still hit on anything but a nat 1' is a challenge. Judicious use of PA makes for much more effective fighter-types, who then need harder targets... meanwhile, the rogue/analogue is using his feats on skills instead of combat, and thus falls behind.
A Fighter needs to use more than 3 points of PA to even out the damage difference between him and the most poorly-optimized rogue at high levels.

Meanwhile, the rogue can use a combination of some feats and some magic items on skills, allowing him to do crazy skill-things while still taking some combat-oriented skills and having plenty of combat-oriented magic items.

I think you're dramatically overstating the distinction in combat effectiveness between a rogue and a fighter, put simply.


Regardless, you have not addressed the issue of what the other players do while the skill-monkey character is doing their out of combat stuff. In my opinion that is a much harder problem to solve than adjusting to-hit ratios.
4'th edition's multi-success-oriented skill model largely solves it - now just like a defender or controller can contribute damage in combat if their special abilities aren't called for, a combatant character can contribute in a non-combat situation... though unlike the striker, who gets to be best at damage, there is no skill specialist.

It would be easy to implement in 4'th edition if the skill system were different - give a class damage in-line with a Fighter, leadership skills comparable to the Paladin, and defensive and control abilities comparable to the Warlord, then give the class an actual skill advantage over combat-role classes.

I say 'if the skill system were different' because with the existing framework you would have to houserule any significant skill advantage over the other classes - how useful is giving more trained skills when all a player has to do is justify the use of a skill for a situation? "Yes, I play the skill-class, we have the class ability of not needing to make up a creative excuse to use one of two trained skills when out of combat. Isn't that neat?"


please, let's leave the spellcasters out of this. They are beyond generalists.

A Druid without spellcasting is still more powerful than many non-spellcasters - because the Druid was designed to be a generalist.


All special character abilities were class features. Thieves could hide and pick locks, no one else could. No one else really had any out-of-combat specialization other than "I cast these kinds of spells."
How is that at all disagreeing? Having a unique class ability for out-of-combat capabilities is most definitely out-of-combat specialization, like being a Wizard makes you a magic specialist.


And sure, you can nominally fix that by increasing the number of skill points available to non-skillmonkey classes. But that has exactly the effect you originally criticized:


But to make that work they had to artificially restrict skill access by non-skillmonkey classes through a combination of cross-classing and point per level restrictions.




Making the gap be 5 or 10 points on a d20 die roll actually sounds about right to me. That way, a nonspecialist can at least hope to duplicate the feats that a specialist of equal level performs routinely, with luck. Which is dramatically appropriate for a very wide range of things.
It's not a bad thing in terms of drama (unless, say, you're running a genre like horror), but it is a bad thing in terms of cinematic impact - the specialist is good, but he's not that good. And he never can or will be.

Increasing the gap is both possible in the existing 4'th edition framework (of 'upping the ante' skill DC checks), and, within that same framework, a good thing with no downside.


So your climb specialization is partly the result of your superior climbing equipment.
An excellent point... except 4'th edition is getting rid of the concept of the 'required' magic item other than your weapon and armor. If you've looked at the sample magic items in the module documentation for D&D XP, you'd note that the non-primary magic items give incidental bonuses - which in fact increases the burden of the system to distinguish characters based on their own stats - like skills.

Things are looking like 4'th edition will simply be unable to support epic skills, and epic skill users.

[Werewindlefr]

Things are looking like 4'th edition will simply be unable to support epic skills, and epic skill users.

I think it's less worrying than the fact that it's unable to support amateur skill users at high level. In such a system, the paladins from Azure city wouldn't need Haley to tell them about the shell game con; they'd have enough sense-motive.
In other words, in such a system, as long as you're reasonable high-level, you're better than low-level specialists.

[Rutee]

Actually, the Paladins would still be total schlubs about it because their leader is only 8th level

That aside, it's not really worrying. It's more cinematic and telling of traditional heroic fantasy when the characters aven't hyper-focused and only posessing of, on average, one or two things they can do. It's a problem, perhaps, for the dungeoncrawl fantasy, but not 'normal' stuff.

[MeklorIlavator]

I think it's less worrying than the fact that it's unable to support amateur skill users at high level. In such a system, the paladins from Azure city wouldn't need Haley to tell them about the shell game con; they'd have enough sense-motive.
In other words, in such a system, as long as you're reasonable high-level, you're better than low-level specialists.
I'd say that your example is flawed, as the paladins were lower level than the group. Also, this is a problem with many rpg's, especially level based ones such as DnD. Skills done in this manner often have illogical sections(kill enough, and even without practice, you cna play the piano better). And, to tell the truth, I think that 3.5 didn't do such a great job at this either, as do to the limit in the number of skill points one has, you really can't be average in something yet still be effective. In fact, depending on how skill options/skill focus works, the new system may be better at it.

[Artanis]

People also seem to be forgetting stat modifiers.

Even if the +5 or +10 from Training/Focus isn't enough, a character designed around a certain skillset is going to have even MORE of an advantage over characters that aren't specialized there due to stat modifiers. For example, a Wizard wouldn't just have a 10 higher Arcana check than a Fighter, he'd have a check that's 14 or 15 higher due to the Wizard's high INT.

Now, this means that at level 30, when that Fighter has +15 on an Arcana check, the Wizard would have double that at around +30ish. When you look at it in that light...the differences don't seem so small anymore, do they? :smallwink:

[Indon]

Now, this means that at level 30, when that Fighter has +15 on an Arcana check, the Wizard would have double that at around +30ish. When you look at it in that light...the differences don't seem so small anymore, do they? :smallwink:

Well if we assume +1 to a stat every 4 levels and no magic items, a Fighter who dumped his int (so it's 8, 'cause there's no way to get a bigger penalty anymore) and a Wizard who started with 18, by level 30 the Wizard will indeed have a whopping 25 Int, for a bonus of +7 - trained and specialized this gives the Wizard a whopping 17 points more than the Fighter.

Of course, if we compare this to 3'rd edition, in which the Fighter also has 8 int, the Wizard starts with 16, then gains a +4 int bonus, a +4 inherent int bonus, +5 from stats, and puts ranks into the skill, the Fighter has a -1 to it - because he's never studied the arcane. Meanwhile, the Wizard has 23 from ranks, and +9 from stats, for a 31.

So yes, it's about half as big, that's pretty small. Now, that's not necessarily bad... but we aren't done yet.

The Fighter, when he uses his Knowledge: Arcana, is going to go for the basic challenge - probably about DC 20-25, which gives a high chance of contributing one success and a smaller chance of subtracting a success.

The Wizard, with his training, mastery, and vastly superior intelligence, is going to go for the advanced challenge - probably about DC 40, which gives a good chance of contributing two successes, and a small chance of subtracting two successes.

Oh, but our Fighter and Wizard aren't traveling alone - they have a Rogue and a Paladin with them.

So if the party is presented with an intricate, complex arcane riddle which they must overcome to progress, you know what happens (assuming people succeed, of course)?

Wizard successes contributed per attempt: 2
Non-Wizard successes contributed per attempt: 3

Doesn't seem so big anymore, does it?

[ColdBrew]

the specialist is good, but he's not that good
BOOOOO!

Shame on you for paraphrasing that horrible quote...

[Matthew]

I think you're mistaking the idea of a Hide skill with that of Hide as a class feature. Which is what it was in 1e. There was no such thing as skills.

I tried to stop myself writing this post, but it turns out I really am this pedantic... AD&D had something called 'Secondary Skills' that were basically analogous to D20 Professions/Crafts. Characters either had one or two of these skills or didn't, though, which is to say there was no real mechanic for using them in the game. Later on (1985 or so), Non Weapon Proficiencies were introduced, which were more like a skill system.

Still, I don't think any of that relates to your point...

[tyckspoon]

Wizard successes contributed per attempt: 2
Non-Wizard successes contributed per attempt: 3

Doesn't seem so big anymore, does it?

So the Wizard is doing almost as much work on the puzzle as the entire rest of his party working together? Yeah, that actually does sound like the Wizard has a really big edge in that particular skill to me. If the comments people have made about Saga's distinction of trained and untrained uses of skills holds for 4E, it's also possible that the Wizard will be the only member of the party who can meaningfully contribute on solving a 'complex arcane puzzle'. Everybody else's successes could just be them successfully carrying out the Wizard's instructions on how to do something with the puzzle.

[Indon]

So the Wizard is doing almost as much work on the puzzle as the entire rest of his party working together?
Consider that in the scope of the game, this is what the Wizard has dedicated his life to, and that mechanically, he's about as optimized as he can be, that we know.

And then three guys who just kinda picked things up along the way outdo him.

Edit: Oh, yeah, and the Wizard is of superhuman intelligence and the guys don't at all have to be above-average in intelligence.


If the comments people have made about Saga's distinction of trained and untrained uses of skills holds for 4E, it's also possible that the Wizard will be the only member of the party who can meaningfully contribute on solving a 'complex arcane puzzle'.

Now that might be the case, and we can only hope.

[Scintillatus]

It is clearly the case. Skills "untrained" allow a character to perform tasks that keep him alive and allow him to contribute moderately; skills "trained" allow a character to perform tasks that greatly aid him and allow him to excel.

If they're going to use Saga's system, why would they leave out that crucial part? For the sake of your argument, I don't think.

[horseboy]

The wonders of living in north-east Scotland, eh?:smallconfused: :smallconfused: :smallconfused: :smallconfused:
Oh, that's right, "America is a place where 100 years is 'old'; Europe is a place where 100 miles is 'far'."

Well, they did say they were going to do an SRD a couple months after the books are out, so, if your pals aren't in a hurry to swap, you've got time to wait.


Personally I understand why mechanically they did the new skill system, I'm just not too crazy about the limit of character customization it lends itself too.

[fendrin]

Personally I understand why mechanically they did the new skill system, I'm just not too crazy about the limit of character customization it lends itself too.

I don't really think it's that big of a deal, really. In my experience, most characters would have a few skills maxed out, and then maybe one or two with a couple points for flavor or PrC/feat prerequisites.