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Isomenes
2008-11-13, 02:29 PM
One of the best things about 3E's skill system was that Intelligence factored heavily into one's selection of skills. And looking at 4E, I find the lack of this feature somewhat odd. Seems like it'd be an easy enough thing to house-rule that any character could have one extra trained skill at first level for every two or three points in his Int modifier (rounding down).

My question is, how broken would this be? Would it push skillful characters (Bard [preview], Rogue, Ranger) even farther beyond non-skilled ones, or would it open up the skill game a little more for those willing to invest the ability points? Or would it obviate the point of the skill system entirely?

Disregarding racial bonuses, Wizards would obviously benefit most from it, given that they have only six possible skills to train at first level, three slots to fill, and no reason not to maximize Int. (A Human Wizard with 20 Int could gain all but one.) Tactical Warlords, too, could easily come close to maxing out on trained skills, and a Human Fighter could with a spare 16. But is it a bad thing?

Hzurr
2008-11-13, 02:33 PM
In my group, we tried doing bonus languages, but since it seems that there aren't as many languages in 4E, this tends to be pretty strong (and it makes the linguist feat a bit useless).

What if rather than giving people new skills, you let them add skills to their skill list?

Human Paragon 3
2008-11-13, 02:35 PM
Maybe it could be the higher of INT or WIS for a bonus skill? That way, you need at least 1 good mental stat, but doesn't just give a huge benefit to wizards.

Zeful
2008-11-13, 02:39 PM
One of the best things about 3E's skill system was that Intelligence factored heavily into one's selection of skills. And looking at 4E, I find the lack of this feature somewhat odd. Seems like it'd be an easy enough thing to house-rule that any character could have one extra trained skill at first level for every two or three points in his Int modifier (rounding down).

My question is, how broken would this be? Would it push skillful characters (Bard [preview], Rogue, Ranger) even farther beyond non-skilled ones, or would it open up the skill game a little more for those willing to invest the ability points? Or would it obviate the point of the skill system entirely?

Disregarding racial bonuses, Wizards would obviously benefit most from it, given that they have only six possible skills to train at first level, three slots to fill, and no reason not to maximize Int. (A Human Wizard with 20 Int could gain all but one.) Tactical Warlords, too, could easily come close to maxing out on trained skills, and a Human Fighter could with a spare 16. But is it a bad thing?

It wouldn't be broken, but characters with high Int could have all their class skills trained, which for some classes invalidates the archetypal role of other classes. This can be bad for some people. I don't see what benefit this could have besides making one attribute slightly more important.

Starsinger
2008-11-13, 02:39 PM
Why is Int being a dump stat such a big deal?

Nerd-o-rama
2008-11-13, 02:41 PM
Really, so far in 4e, there are plenty of classes that can use high Int. More so than in 3e, really. Now, if you want people to stop using Int as a dump stat when minmaxing their Fighters/Paladins/Clerics...well, that's tricky, as 4e stat generation generally favors minmaxing (or rather, favors dependence on exactly 2 primary ability scores and 2 secondary, leaving the others to be dumped).

Isomenes
2008-11-13, 02:45 PM
In my group, we tried doing bonus languages, but since it seems that there aren't as many languages in 4E, this tends to be pretty strong (and it makes the linguist feat a bit useless).

What if rather than giving people new skills, you let them add skills to their skill list?

My group has always had a huge number of languages (no standard PHB languages, but rather regional and cultural), partly because of DM control and also to preserve the sense of the mysterious and foreign. We tend to have a regional Common that all players must speak, but it is by no means necessarily spoken world-wide or even culture-wide.

I like the notion of adding skills to the list rather than a trained skill slot, but this in particular seems to lend itself to abuse. When the Ranger multiclass feat is already somewhat optimal because of the access to Perception, it seems like a no-brainer if this were to be accessible through a decent Int. I would further condition this suggestion with a DM-written list of allowable skills to train, to preserve the skill system's class distinctions.

Isomenes
2008-11-13, 02:47 PM
Really, so far in 4e, there are plenty of classes that can use high Int. More so than in 3e, really. Now, if you want people to stop using Int as a dump stat when minmaxing their Fighters/Paladins/Clerics...well, that's tricky, as 4e stat generation generally favors minmaxing (or rather, favors dependence on exactly 2 primary ability scores and 2 secondary, leaving the others to be dumped).


Why is Int being a dump stat such a big deal?

I think my main focus is the preservation of an intrinsic bonus to skills for having better-than-average Int. (I suppose the title's a bit misleading.) It's intended more as a practical necessity of having high intelligence rather than a way to encourage/discourage stat dumps. I guess I just really like skillful characters :smallsmile:

its_all_ogre
2008-11-13, 02:52 PM
personally i think it depends on party composition.
with wizards, tac lords using it as a primary stat (i think the taclord benefits more from max int than str personally. well the party does anyway)
warlocks and bards alos benefit from it quite a lot too.
so really it is only the remaining ones that are short of it.

failing this, make people roleplay their intelligence scores.
it's a roleplaying game after all.

some people don't like this reminder, this may cause a stir, but if you're a paladin or fighter with an int of 8 then your tactics in a fight should be really limited in scope.

Nerd-o-rama
2008-11-13, 02:54 PM
Unless you have the Wisdom to come up with decent tactics intuitively, of course. Int is for planning, but Wis is for reacting.


I think my main focus is the preservation of an intrinsic bonus to skills for having better-than-average Int. (I suppose the title's a bit misleading.) It's intended more as a practical necessity of having high intelligence rather than a way to encourage/discourage stat dumps. I guess I just really like skillful characters :smallsmile:Yes, the title is misleading. I suppose your proposed system isn't too bad if you want everyone (or at least Wizards, Taclords, and Swordmages) to have a ton of skills. +1 trained skill/+2 int mod probably isn't gamebreaking. I don't think it's necessary, but if you want to, go ahead.

Galdor Miriel
2008-11-13, 02:58 PM
First a quick aside, as it is slightly relevant: In my 4E campaign I house ruled that int could be used for initiative, which made it still useful for some players, though we had no wizards. Our rolling system of rolling 4d6 -1 for each stat, three sets, then select your favourite, meant that dump stats were not really a problem however.

Now to the meat:

The thing to remember about skills is that now they are actually quite fun in game under 4e. My group really enjoyed skill challenges, and I found as a dm that it was really easy to to make a social, or combat situation evolve into one or out of one. The players use their imaginations and you try and weave a story thread based on a few rolls of the dice. If a player has too many trained skills then it makes those skill challenge decisions easy, and might make them less fun.

The overall way of understanding 4e that I have is not one in terms of balance of classes, its rather in terms of a narrative thread. In good fantasy literature the hero (or villain) upon whose actions the story hangs in balance is anything, warrior, thief, wizard, blessed with fey powers, filled with divine light etc. The new rules mean that your heros can make a story using any of the literature archetypes without sucking in comparison to the other people at the table. That is really cool. Its not that wizards suck now, no. Wizards are in fact in the 4E world incredibly powerful. Its just that people with other strengths can still challenge them and have a chance of winning, just like in all our favorite fantasy literature.

This view I have makes me want to analyse things in terms of how they affect story rather than power. And I think that playing around with skills will affect story quite a lot, so be careful.

Aahz
2008-11-13, 03:31 PM
One thing to note is that not all skills are mental: there's Athletics, Acrobats, Thievery, etc (just off the top of my head). Instead of awarding bonus skills for high Int, you could rule that if a player has a +3 or better bonus in a stat, she can choose to be trained in a single extra skill whose bonus comes from that stat (Athletics = Str, Acrobatics = Dex, etc.).

A high stat obviously already help any skill which uses that stat as a bonus, and it's likely that e.g. a high-Str character will already have a relevant skill like Athletics. But it would give nearly every character a single extra skill which will be relevant to the class.

mangosta71
2008-11-13, 03:41 PM
The way skills work in 4e, being trained in one skill over another washes out quite a bit as you reach the high levels. You're adding half your level to the roll, along with the stat modifier [which adds half your level again, in addition to (stat-10)/2] already. When you're adding 15 to your roll due to level and stat mods, another +5 doesn't make nearly as much difference as it does in the early levels.

Oracle_Hunter
2008-11-13, 03:49 PM
The way skills work in 4e, being trained in one skill over another washes out quite a bit as you reach the high levels. You're adding half your level to the roll, along with the stat modifier [which adds half your level again, in addition to (stat-10)/2] already. When you're adding 15 to your roll due to level and stat mods, another +5 doesn't make nearly as much difference as it does in the early levels.

I'd disagree, since the DCs tend to scale. So, while at LV 20 it doesn't matter if you're trained or not when trying to scale a wall, it does matter for getting that super-secret knowledge from your History check.

As to the OP
If you must, then a new class skill for every +2 is probably fine, so long as you limit it to initial skill selection. At worst, this ensures Wizards will max their skill selection and pretty much everyone else will try to have an INT of 12. That's fine, if that's the game you want to run, but I don't see why you'd want to do it.

But, if you allow characters to learn new skills by bumping their INT, you have a problem. Wizards, Warlocks, and INT Lords will soon be trained in everything, while pretty much everyone else will be stagnant. I think that'll be a problem, because nobody else's skill selection will really matter for 75% of the skills.

Isomenes
2008-11-13, 03:49 PM
One thing to note is that not all skills are mental: there's Athletics, Acrobats, Thievery, etc (just off the top of my head). Instead of awarding bonus skills for high Int, you could rule that if a player has a +3 or better bonus in a stat, she can choose to be trained in a single extra skill whose bonus comes from that stat (Athletics = Str, Acrobatics = Dex, etc.).

A high stat obviously already help any skill which uses that stat as a bonus, and it's likely that e.g. a high-Str character will already have a relevant skill like Athletics. But it would give nearly every character a single extra skill which will be relevant to the class.

This strikes me as an excellent alternative for a more skilled game. I would use this in conjunction with Hzurr's extra skill idea as a way to limit its abuse instead of a DM-written list, but I would temper this idea by making the highest ability score the mandatory score from which to choose the extra skill. This reflects the use of Intelligence in improving a character's natural prowess. It also plays to a character's strengths in the way that the 3E class skill lists did, without penalizing low-Int players or making it a must-have.

Oracle_Hunter
2008-11-13, 03:53 PM
This strikes me as an excellent alternative for a more skilled game. I would use this in conjunction with Hzurr's extra skill idea as a way to limit its abuse instead of a DM-written list, but I would temper this idea by making the highest ability score the mandatory score from which to choose the extra skill. This reflects the use of Intelligence in improving a character's natural prowess. It also plays to a character's strengths in the way that the 3E class skill lists did, without penalizing low-Int players or making it a must-have.

Oh no, this is terrible! :smalleek:

All this means is that Skill Training is irrelevant. Most everyone will be trained in whatever they need, which means nobody will particularly care about Training. One of the best parts of 4E is that Training does mean more than raw natural ability; here raw talent will be synonymous with natural ability.

Isomenes
2008-11-13, 03:58 PM
If you must, then a new class skill for every +2 is probably fine, so long as you limit it to initial skill selection. At worst, this ensures Wizards will max their skill selection and pretty much everyone else will try to have an INT of 12. That's fine, if that's the game you want to run, but I don't see why you'd want to do it.

Yeah, it would only apply at first level; the problem you point out is exactly why I don't want to overhaul the training system entirely. As it is, you can retrain a skill within your class skills, so Hzurr's suggestion only broadens that pool slightly. But per RAW the only way to get training in a non-class skill is through the Skill Training feat, and I aim to keep it that way.

As to why, it's mostly a matter of enjoying skills as much as combat; I just want to encourage skill use, and this seems to be a neat way to do so without detracting from combat or other aspects of character creation.

Zeful
2008-11-13, 04:18 PM
The way skills work in 4e, being trained in one skill over another washes out quite a bit as you reach the high levels. You're adding half your level to the roll, along with the stat modifier [which adds half your level again, in addition to (stat-10)/2] already. When you're adding 15 to your roll due to level and stat mods, another +5 doesn't make nearly as much difference as it does in the early levels.

This is incorrect. Stat mods do not increase unless the relevant ability score does so as well. All skill and ability rolls receive a bonus equal to your level/2 rounded down.

Oracle_Hunter
2008-11-13, 04:33 PM
As to why, it's mostly a matter of enjoying skills as much as combat; I just want to encourage skill use, and this seems to be a neat way to do so without detracting from combat or other aspects of character creation.

But... if you want people to enjoy skills, wouldn't it be better for each character to have only a few skills, so that they can have areas where they shine? The more skills you let people train, the more characters will have overlapping skills, and the less they will care about who makes what roll.

When skills are scarce, it can matter whether you brought the Wizard along to detect magic. If everyone who can train Arcana, does train Arcana (because they can) it just doesn't matter.

Isomenes
2008-11-13, 04:36 PM
Oh no, this is terrible! :smalleek:

All this means is that Skill Training is irrelevant. Most everyone will be trained in whatever they need, which means nobody will particularly care about Training. One of the best parts of 4E is that Training does mean more than raw natural ability; here raw talent will be synonymous with natural ability.

But only if the character's Int is 14 or greater (or 16, if one goes with the more conservative modifier), which is not always feasible or even desirable. And it represents an opportunity cost. For a Human Fighter (the smallest pool with the greatest number of trained skills), an Int of 14 would net them an additional class skill. But what would he give up in exchange for training this skill?

Even so, there's more to skills than just using the ones you're trained in. Adopting this house rule imples a certain skill consciousness on the part of the DM, I suppose, in that you will want to test your players even in skills they don't have training in. But I can't see that it would undermine skill training entirely unless the DM were asleep at the wheel.

Kurald Galain
2008-11-13, 04:37 PM
When you're adding 15 to your roll due to level and stat mods, another +5 doesn't make nearly as much difference as it does in the early levels.

Actually it does, because the difficulty also increases (roughly) with one point per two levels.

Oracle_Hunter
2008-11-13, 04:46 PM
But only if the character's Int is 14 or greater (or 16, if one goes with the more conservative modifier), which is not always feasible or even desirable. And it represents an opportunity cost. For a Human Fighter (the smallest pool with the greatest number of trained skills), an Int of 14 would net them an additional class skill. But what would he give up in exchange for training this skill?

Even so, there's more to skills than just using the ones you're trained in. Adopting this house rule imples a certain skill consciousness on the part of the DM, I suppose, in that you will want to test your players even in skills they don't have training in. But I can't see that it would undermine skill training entirely unless the DM were asleep at the wheel.

Note that my post quoted another post that referred to this plan:

One thing to note is that not all skills are mental: there's Athletics, Acrobats, Thievery, etc (just off the top of my head). Instead of awarding bonus skills for high Int, you could rule that if a player has a +3 or better bonus in a stat, she can choose to be trained in a single extra skill whose bonus comes from that stat (Athletics = Str, Acrobatics = Dex, etc.).

A high stat obviously already help any skill which uses that stat as a bonus, and it's likely that e.g. a high-Str character will already have a relevant skill like Athletics. But it would give nearly every character a single extra skill which will be relevant to the class.

Here, there is no opportunity cost. That is the problem. Allowing INT to give more skills just gives Wizards, Warlocks, and INT Warlords free power - if you're fine with giving an arbitrary boost to some classes and not others, then fine.

Yakk
2008-11-13, 05:11 PM
Education: You have 1 skill point per point of intelligence bonus. You may retrain these skill points by using a retrain.

For the purpose of stacking:
If you invest 1 skill point in a skill, it is an untyped bonus.
If you invest 2 to 3 points in a skill, it is a feat bonus.
If you invest 4 to 5 points in a skill, it is a skill bonus. You can used trained only uses of the skill with 4 to 5 points invested.
You are not allowed to invest 6+ points in a skill.

Kurald Galain
2008-11-13, 05:24 PM
Here, there is no opportunity cost. That is the problem. Allowing INT to give more skills just gives Wizards, Warlocks, and INT Warlords free power - if you're fine with giving an arbitrary boost to some classes and not others, then fine.

Well, yes, but that's easily remedied by giving e.g. wizards less skills. They now have four skills (plus Arcana), so simply give them two skills plus int bonus instead.

Starsinger
2008-11-13, 05:26 PM
But I like being able to play a dumb character who can still do things. That's one of the fundamental reasons I enjoy the divorce between skills and Intelligence. If I have an int of 8, in 3.5 that means I have less skill points than "average". In 4e that means I'm dumb and should stay away from Wizard, Warlock, and Warlord (tactical only).

Asbestos
2008-11-13, 05:52 PM
When skills are scarce, it can matter whether you brought the Wizard along to detect magic. If everyone who can train Arcana, does train Arcana (because they can) it just doesn't matter.

My Eldarin Taclord had almost as good an Arcana check as the party wizard... and I used it damn more effectively than that unimaginative punk. Not sure he ever even thought to do Arcana checks :smallsigh:

Also, under some of these suggestions Eldarin are totally nuts in terms of skills. More so than normal.

Aahz
2008-11-13, 05:52 PM
Here, there is no opportunity cost. That is the problem. Allowing INT to give more skills just gives Wizards, Warlocks, and INT Warlords free power - if you're fine with giving an arbitrary boost to some classes and not others, then fine.

??? In my suggestion, the "relevant" stat for the skill (Dex for Acrobatics, Str for Athletics) determines whether or not you can train it as an "extra" skill. In other words, if you have a 16 Dex, you can train one extra Dex-based skill.

I admit this would lead to skill bloat and reduction in the value of skill training feats, but the OP didn't seem to be too concerned about that. But I think it would be pretty evenly fair to all classes, since almost everyone would have a 16 in some stat.

Oracle_Hunter
2008-11-13, 06:24 PM
But I like being able to play a dumb character who can still do things. That's one of the fundamental reasons I enjoy the divorce between skills and Intelligence. If I have an int of 8, in 3.5 that means I have less skill points than "average". In 4e that means I'm dumb and should stay away from Wizard, Warlock, and Warlord (tactical only).

Fortunately, you and I can keep playing 4E as normal. The OP just wanted to make some changes for his game, and see if they'd break it.

I think the moral of the story is that giving a free skill for INT is just going to make Wizards, most Warlocks, and INT Lords skill monkeys. This will make them extra-good at most skill challenges, while the other classes won't get any buff.

And if you allow +3 (stat) to make a skill accessible to a class, you're just going to make Wizards even better. They have a very small skill list, but all of them will put substantial points in their Implement Stat. Orb Wizards will get access to Insight & Heal, Wand Wizards will get Acrobatics, Stealth and Thievery, while Staff Wizards just get Endurance. Pretty much nobody else will be able to take advantage of these extra skill choices.

IMHO, giving players more trained skills reduces the pressure to specialize (and therefore make room for other characters to shine) but if you're going to do it, don't use a method that clearly benefits some classes over others.

DM Raven
2008-11-13, 07:43 PM
I don't think you should try to improve Int. In 4th edition, just about any ability score can be treated as a dump stat...and that's a good thing. I was amazed that they were able to make con a dump stat...never before in the history of D&D has con been a dump stat for ANY good build. Everyone needed con in the olden days of D&D. But in 4th, you can have a very low con and still be a very viable character build.

All the classes need good scores in several key abilities. And no ability score really shines above the rest in 4e. It all depends on what class you play and where you want your strengths to be. I think it would be interesting if they made class builds that played off strange stats...

KKL
2008-11-13, 07:54 PM
I don't think you should try to improve Int. In 4th edition, just about any ability score can be treated as a dump stat...and that's a good thing. I was amazed that they were able to make con a dump stat...never before in the history of D&D has con been a dump stat for ANY good build. Everyone needed con in the olden days of D&D. But in 4th, you can have a very low con and still be a very viable character build.

Con, being made a dump stat? I cry. Never have I heard the suggestion to have 8 con. 10/12 at the minimum? Sure. But 8? That's lunacy!

However, Int is a completely different matter. :3

Isomenes
2008-11-14, 06:45 AM
Fortunately, you and I can keep playing 4E as normal. The OP just wanted to make some changes for his game, and see if they'd break it.

I think the moral of the story is that giving a free skill for INT is just going to make Wizards, most Warlocks, and INT Lords skill monkeys. This will make them extra-good at most skill challenges, while the other classes won't get any buff.

I highly doubt it would make them skill monkeys, especially not if the bonus skill were still drawn from their class skill lists. The Int-based classes seem to have a more limited class skill list all around (Warlocks excepted), so the best a Wizard could do is be knowledgeable in more areas, perhaps, or be insightful. And honestly, I've never felt that multiple insight checks is a bad thing, as a player and as a DM.

MartinHarper
2008-11-14, 10:54 AM
If you change Int to make it give more trained skills, you should also change it so that it doesn't boost AC and Reflex defences.

Yakk
2008-11-14, 11:22 AM
If you change Int to make it give more trained skills, you should also change it so that it doesn't boost AC and Reflex defences.
Ideally, each stat should have something that it hurts if you set it low.

This should be on top of the "Defense" boost, as the other half of the pair can carry that slack.

Str: Your opportunity and basic melee attacks suck if it is low.
Con: You lose a few HP, and healing surges

Dex: You lose initiative.
Int: -

Wis: -
Cha: -

Ie: Int, Wis and Cha have no "secondary" effects that are isolated to them.

The Dex/Int impact on AC only applies to light armor. The classes who use light armor all have one (and almost never 2) of Int or Dex that are "primary attack" attributes. Heavy armor is given increased AC to make up for this different, to keep AC of the various classes roughly in-line (thus preventing auto-hit and auto-miss fests).

Heavy Armor classes generally have no "core attack" use for Int or Dex, and often don't even use them as secondary stats.

Except, of course, for the uses listed above.

MartinHarper
2008-11-14, 11:56 AM
Int, Wis and Cha have no "secondary" effects that are isolated to them.

They have the secondary effects of skill bonuses, and they have more skills assigned to them than Str/Dex/Con.

Str: Athletics
Dex: Acrobatics, Stealth, Thievery
Con: Endurance
Int: Arcana, History, Religion
Wis: Dungeoneering, Heal, Insight, Nature, Perception
Cha: Bluff, Diplomacy, Intimidate, Streetwise.

I think Int compares well to the other stats, with the possible exception of Dex.


The classes who use light armor all have one (and almost never 2) of Int or Dex that are "primary attack" attributes.

Except the Barbarian.

Oracle_Hunter
2008-11-14, 12:42 PM
I highly doubt it would make them skill monkeys, especially not if the bonus skill were still drawn from their class skill lists. The Int-based classes seem to have a more limited class skill list all around (Warlocks excepted), so the best a Wizard could do is be knowledgeable in more areas, perhaps, or be insightful. And honestly, I've never felt that multiple insight checks is a bad thing, as a player and as a DM.

No?

Wizards have 7 potential skills (including Arcana) and pick 4 (one must be Arcana). At INT of 18, Wizards get 2 bonus skills at +2, or 1 bonus skill at +3; a Human Wizard (already a good combination) will be trained in Arcana, Diplomacy, Dungeoneering, History, Insight, Nature, and Religion. Or they'll know all but one.

INT Lords have 6 potential skills, and choose 4. A Tiefling INT Lord with INT 16 will know 5 of the following: Athletics, Diplomacy, Endurance, Heal, History, and Intimidate. A human INT Lord would know all of them.

Warlocks have 8 potential skills, and choose 4. They can pick from: Arcana, Bluff, History, Insight, Intimidate, Religion, Streetwise, Thievery. A Human Warlock would choose 6 of those, while most others would choose 5.

These are all good, useful skills that it can be hard to choose between. Giving INT-classes free skills removes that hard choice, and gives them everything they'd ever want.

Meanwhile, everyone else is just going to have their regular "pick 4" since throwing at least a 14 into INT for one more skill just isn't worth it in 4E if you're not going to otherwise use INT. If you drop the INT requirement down to 12, then the Illuminati will get even more skills.

It's not going to break the game, no, but it does give INT-classes free Skill Training without really giving anyone else anything.

Samurai Jill
2008-11-14, 01:44 PM
One of the best things about 3E's skill system was that Intelligence factored heavily into one's selection of skills. And looking at 4E, I find the lack of this feature somewhat odd. Seems like it'd be an easy enough thing to house-rule that any character could have one extra trained skill at first level for every two or three points in his Int modifier (rounding down).
That's not a bug, it's a feature. It makes no sense that skills like Climb, Jump or Swim would be primarily dependant on 'book smarts', as people typically define D&D 'intelligence'.

Yakk
2008-11-14, 02:20 PM
Education: You have 1 skill point per point of intelligence bonus. You may retrain these skill points by using a retrain.

For the purpose of stacking:
If you invest 1 skill point in a skill, it is an untyped bonus.
If you invest 2 to 3 points in a skill, it is a feat bonus.
If you invest 4 to 5 points in a skill, it is a skill bonus. You are allowed to use trained only uses of the skill.
6+ is not allowed.

So any opinions on this variant?

It lets people with high INT get a small amount of additional boosts to skills.

A 20 int wizard can either get a +1 bonus to 5 skills, or one additional full-trained skill. And having 12 int becomes nice, because you can bump one of your skills up by +1.

Oracle_Hunter
2008-11-14, 02:22 PM
So any opinions on this variant?

It lets people with high INT get a small amount of additional boosts to skills.

A 20 int wizard can either get a +1 bonus to 5 skills, or one additional full-trained skill. And having 12 int becomes nice, because you can bump one of your skills up by +1.

I didn't really understand what this meant. Are you giving pseudo-training for INT or something? :smallconfused:

IMHO anything that requires complicated bonus-tracking in 4E is probably a step in the wrong direction.

Yakk
2008-11-14, 02:39 PM
You get a pool of points equal to your INT bonus.

You can spend them on:
1 point for a +1 untyped bonus to a skill
2 or 3 points for a +2 or +3 FEAT bonus to a skill.
4 or 5 points on a +4 or +5 SKILL, and you can do actions that require training in that skill.

This makes having 20 int grant you a whole additional trained skill, or multiple smaller bonuses. Someone with 12 int gets a single skill with +1 untyped.

Instead of granting a trained skill for each +1 bonus, I granted about 1/5th of that.

Which makes int useful, skill-wise, but not overwealming.

Oracle_Hunter
2008-11-14, 02:47 PM
You get a pool of points equal to your INT bonus.

You can spend them on:
1 point for a +1 untyped bonus to a skill
2 or 3 points for a +2 or +3 FEAT bonus to a skill.
4 or 5 points on a +4 or +5 SKILL, and you can do actions that require training in that skill.

This makes having 20 int grant you a whole additional trained skill, or multiple smaller bonuses. Someone with 12 int gets a single skill with +1 untyped.

Instead of granting a trained skill for each +1 bonus, I granted about 1/5th of that.

Which makes int useful, skill-wise, but not overwealming.

I guess it works, though that's more bookkeeping than I'd like to do for 4E characters. But I can't see how it's worse than any other suggestion... though I don't know if it's much better.

It might be simpler to say you can pay 5 points to get Skill Training, 3 points to get Skill Focus, and 1-2 points for +1 or +2 to any skill of you're choice. That way you can just buy Feats for most of the points. You'd need to forbid retraining of these "INT Feats" of course.

Yakk
2008-11-14, 03:28 PM
I'd limit the "untyped" to +1 -- they really are the most powerful use of these points. :-)

Heck, you could limit the entire system to +1 bonuses. As in "for each point of int bonus, you get a +1 knowledge bonus to 1 skill".

Artanis
2008-11-14, 04:21 PM
Ideally, each stat should have something that it hurts if you set it low.

This should be on top of the "Defense" boost, as the other half of the pair can carry that slack.

Str: Your opportunity and basic melee attacks suck if it is low.
Con: You lose a few HP, and healing surges

Dex: You lose initiative.
Int: -

Wis: -
Cha: -

Ie: Int, Wis and Cha have no "secondary" effects that are isolated to them.

The Dex/Int impact on AC only applies to light armor. The classes who use light armor all have one (and almost never 2) of Int or Dex that are "primary attack" attributes. Heavy armor is given increased AC to make up for this different, to keep AC of the various classes roughly in-line (thus preventing auto-hit and auto-miss fests).

Heavy Armor classes generally have no "core attack" use for Int or Dex, and often don't even use them as secondary stats.

Except, of course, for the uses listed above.
OK, if we're looking at things on the same level as Strength's "makes OAs suck, which you wouldn't be using anyways if you were a class/build that doesn't use Strength":

WIS: Sucky Perception. You know, the skill that lets you see the guy about to stick a knife in your back? The skill that lets you see that lurker sneaking off to hide, meaning he can't use Stealth to regain CA and stick a knife in your back again? The skill that lets you notice a trap before the automated repeating crossbow fills you full of flaming and/or poisoned bolts? A low-WIS character is going to regret those sorts of things a LOT more than a Wizard is going to regret being even more impotent when he tries to whack somebody with his staff.

CHA: Unsurprisingly, is tied to pretty much every even remotely social skill check. DM decides to give you a skill challenge that actually involves talking? Yeah, that low-CHA Fighter is going to be about as useful as a low-STR Fighter would be in combat (read: useless).

INT: Nearly every single ritual is tied to Arcana, and thus to INT. You want to perform a PHB ritual with low INT? Better hope it's one of the eight that can use WIS, and not one of the forty-one that are nothing but INT (not to mention the two WIS rituals that can also use INT).

Those things seem like a lot worse things to lose than simply "make OAs suck less".

Samurai Jill
2008-11-14, 04:25 PM
So any opinions on this variant?

It lets people with high INT get a small amount of additional boosts to skills.

A 20 int wizard can either get a +1 bonus to 5 skills, or one additional full-trained skill. And having 12 int becomes nice, because you can bump one of your skills up by +1.
Well, while we're offering feedback, it looks reasonable enough to me.

RPGuru1331
2008-11-14, 04:28 PM
OK, if we're looking at things on the same level as Strength's "makes OAs suck, which you wouldn't be using anyways if you were a class/build that doesn't use Strength":

WIS: Sucky Perception. You know, the skill that lets you see the guy about to stick a knife in your back? The skill that lets you see that lurker sneaking off to hide, meaning he can't use Stealth to regain CA and stick a knife in your back again? The skill that lets you notice a trap before the automated repeating crossbow fills you full of flaming and/or poisoned bolts? A low-WIS character is going to regret those sorts of things a LOT more than a Wizard is going to regret being even more impotent when he tries to whack somebody with his staff.

CHA: Unsurprisingly, is tied to pretty much every even remotely social skill check. DM decides to give you a skill challenge that actually involves talking? Yeah, that low-CHA Fighter is going to be about as useful as a low-STR Fighter would be in combat (read: useless).

INT: Nearly every single ritual is tied to Arcana, and thus to INT. You want to perform a PHB ritual with low INT? Better hope it's one of the eight that can use WIS, and not one of the forty-one that are nothing but INT (not to mention the two WIS rituals that can also use INT).

Those things seem like a lot worse things to lose than simply "make OAs suck less".

I would argue that when not directly opposed, lower skills are less important, because they make a difference in degree, rather then a binary pass/fail. So while I actually think Cha/Wis holds in your examples, Int does not, since many of the rolled rituals roll for degree more then they do for failure (Even if there is the possibility of failure). Of course, I'm going off memory, as I don't have the book on hand.

Kaliban
2008-11-14, 05:35 PM
One of the best things about 3E's skill system was that Intelligence factored heavily into one's selection of skills. And looking at 4E, I find the lack of this feature somewhat odd. Seems like it'd be an easy enough thing to house-rule that any character could have one extra trained skill at first level for every two or three points in his Int modifier (rounding down).

My question is, how broken would this be? Would it push skillful characters (Bard [preview], Rogue, Ranger) even farther beyond non-skilled ones, or would it open up the skill game a little more for those willing to invest the ability points? Or would it obviate the point of the skill system entirely?

Disregarding racial bonuses, Wizards would obviously benefit most from it, given that they have only six possible skills to train at first level, three slots to fill, and no reason not to maximize Int. (A Human Wizard with 20 Int could gain all but one.) Tactical Warlords, too, could easily come close to maxing out on trained skills, and a Human Fighter could with a spare 16. But is it a bad thing?

Rather than giving high intelligence characters more skills, I suggest using a "point of interest" system.

For each point of bonus in intelligence, the character can choose a restricted domain of knowledge, and recieve a +2 untyped bonus when making skill or abilities rolls relative to this "point of interest".

A point of interest in "gemstone" would give a bonus for evaluating gems, bargaining, knowing the history of a given gem or its physical/magical properties, finding fake gems or counterfeiting...

A POI:"Ghouls" would give bonuses to the knowledge rolls, diplomacy or bluff rolls or other involving ghouls - or a bonus to track them, hear them.

And so on.
Keeping the bonus out of combat situation and limit the extension of each "domain" to a page of the MM, or a region in your campaign, or some "adjective - name" basic description.

And the 14 int dwarven fighter may have an interest in "dwarven jewelry" and "chromatic dragons".
Or in "illithid reproduction" and "ballerina dancing", if he so chooses.:smallbiggrin:

There was a similar system, if I remember correctly, in the old Cliffhanger RPG.

Artanis
2008-11-14, 06:24 PM
I would argue that when not directly opposed, lower skills are less important, because they make a difference in degree, rather then a binary pass/fail. So while I actually think Cha/Wis holds in your examples, Int does not, since many of the rolled rituals roll for degree more then they do for failure (Even if there is the possibility of failure). Of course, I'm going off memory, as I don't have the book on hand.
Yeah, the INT example is pretty weak, especially compared to the WIS one. But I was mostly trying to show that the mental stats did have secondary effects that were at least as powerful as Yakk's "dumping STR makes your OAs suck" :smalltongue: