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kentma57
2008-11-17, 09:20 PM
So I need to build a character tomorow and all I have left to do is pick skills. My character considers himself a bit of a chef and I am trying to pick skills that will alow him to skin animals, preserve the meat(or other things I want to eat), and cook it well.
Right but my character has a bit of an unusual interest it food, and will is probably going to try and snack on at least half the things we fight(especialy if they are new to him); So I am thinking knowledge (anatomy) and survival to help with actualy retrieving the meat, but from there I an not so sure...

Sstoopidtallkid
2008-11-17, 09:25 PM
Survival and Handle Animal for getting the raw material, Craft:Food, Craft:Alchemy, and Profession:Chef for the actual cooking, and Bluff and Disguise to make other people eat it.

Charlie Kemek
2008-11-17, 09:31 PM
Classic answer: screw all those cooking skills, just get prestidigitation! now you can make rocks taste like the best food evar!

real answer: if you want to be able to poison someone, Craft (poison-making). Profession (Chef) is probably a must. Swim if you want fish, and maybe a few other craft and some other skills, depending on what you want to cook. if you were to choose a few cantrips to help, I would have prestidigitation, ray of frost (to freeze food), and mage hand (to add coolness, flip food with this).

Curmudgeon
2008-11-17, 09:31 PM
Knowledge (Anatomy) isn't a real skill. You would need to train each Knowledge skill for each type of creature. For instance, Knowledge (Dungeoneering) would allow you to know about the inner workings of aberrations and oozes.

kentma57
2008-11-17, 09:41 PM
Knowledge (Anatomy) isn't a real skill. You would need to train each Knowledge skill for each type of creature. For instance, Knowledge (Dungeoneering) would allow you to know about the inner workings of aberrations and oozes.

Knowledge skills are very general I can talk my DM into any reasonable knowledge skills. And what does Knowledge (Dungeoneering) have to do with an ooze/aberrations.

Starbuck_II
2008-11-17, 09:46 PM
Classic answer: screw all those cooking skills, just get prestidigitation! now you can make rocks taste like the best food evar!


That reminds me of a story where I ate cheese cake flavored dirt. It was rather gritty and chewy.

Meat Shield
2008-11-17, 09:51 PM
Profession(Tanner) or Profession(Taxidermist) could also work for you, as well as Craft(Leatherworker)

kentma57
2008-11-17, 10:48 PM
Profession(Tanner) or Profession(Taxidermist) could also work for you, as well as Craft(Leatherworker)

I'm sure I would eat that stuff...

Recaiden
2008-11-17, 11:36 PM
Profession(chef) and Survival should be all the skills you need.
Knowledge (dungeoneering) is used for dungeon creatus like oozes, nature for plants, arcana for a bunch of things, and the planes for outsiders and elementals. You may however, just get an item of detect poison and purify food and water to make sure nothing you eat will kill you.

Curmudgeon
2008-11-18, 02:20 AM
Knowledge skills are very general I can talk my DM into any reasonable knowledge skills. And what does Knowledge (Dungeoneering) have to do with an ooze/aberrations. Check the skill description (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/skills/knowledge.htm). That's the particular Knowledge skill designated for those types of creatures:

Knowledge (Int; Trained Only)

Like the Craft and Profession skills, Knowledge actually encompasses a number of unrelated skills. Knowledge represents a study of some body of lore, possibly an academic or even scientific discipline.

Below are listed typical fields of study. Arcana (ancient mysteries, magic traditions, arcane symbols, cryptic phrases, constructs, dragons, magical beasts)
Architecture and engineering (buildings, aqueducts, bridges, fortifications)
Dungeoneering (aberrations, caverns, oozes, spelunking)
Geography (lands, terrain, climate, people)
History (royalty, wars, colonies, migrations, founding of cities)
Local (legends, personalities, inhabitants, laws, customs, traditions, humanoids)
Nature (animals, fey, giants, monstrous humanoids, plants, seasons and cycles, weather, vermin)
Nobility and royalty (lineages, heraldry, family trees, mottoes, personalities)
Religion (gods and goddesses, mythic history, ecclesiastic tradition, holy symbols, undead)
The planes (the Inner Planes, the Outer Planes, the Astral Plane, the Ethereal Plane, outsiders, elementals, magic related to the planes) Six of the Knowledge skills relate to various creature types, covering (I think) everything in the D&D bestiary.

kentma57
2008-11-18, 07:12 AM
Check the skill description (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/skills/knowledge.htm). That's the particular Knowledge skill designated for those types of creatures:
Six of the Knowledge skills relate to various creature types, covering (I think) everything in the D&D bestiary.

The more you know.

Devils_Advocate
2008-11-18, 11:54 PM
Check the skill description (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/skills/knowledge.htm).
NO U! :smalltongue: It specifically says that it's presenting "typical fields of study", not an exhaustive list. A given Knowledge skill just represents a body of related knowledge. New Knowledge skills may be introduced, e.g. Knowledge(psionics). A DM might decide that some special esoteric mystical thing in his campaing, understood by few, warrants its own knowledge skill. Like the draconic prophesy in Eberron, say.

The actual skill description is better used as a guideline, really. C'mon, clearly Knowledge(dungeoneering) ought to cover things that live underground, not particular creature types. A bunch of knowledge will clearly fall into more than one field, and that's fine, too. A church's magical traditions really should fall under both Knowledge(arcana) and Knowledge(religion). Possibly at different DCs.

So you could totally have a character with Knowledge(mathematics), if you wanted to for some reason. It's even a class skill for Wizards, Bards, and anyone else with Knowledge (all skills, taken individually) on their class list.

On the other hand, before you make up a Craft, Knowledge, Profession, or Perform skill for something, it's a good idea to look at the existing skills and see if it's already covered. Don't give someone Perform(acrobatics) when there are already Tumble and Balance skills. Appraise is already basically Knowledge(valuables), so it's inappropriate to add that in. Instead of Knowledge(Chemistry), it's probably simpler to give your guy Craft(alchemy). Profession is so generic that it can be stretched to cover anything you could do for a living, but a lot of skills you can get paid for using are already there. As a rule of thumb, Profession covers knowing the tricks of a trade, not being good at specific physical acts, like tying knots, fixing locks, riding horses, etc.

Case in point: A character with max ranks in Survival and probably knows plenty about acquiring food from the wild and preserving it. If you also want him to know a bunch about anatomy ([Far Side]"Take a good look at this thing. We don't know what it is, but it's the only part of a buffalo we don't use."[/Far Side]), give him max ranks in Heal, too. Knowledge(nature) covers knowledge of wilds animals' habits, diets, habitats, etc. Those are all you really need for this. If you want him to be a really good cook, you can give him ranks in Craft(food) or maybe Profession(chef), but unless he actually is a professional chef, that's probably unnecessary.

Just... don't go overboard, y'know? That can result in not just wasting a bunch of perfectly good skill points, but giving a character inappropriate flavor. If this guy is a hunter who has never needed to deal with tamed animals before, he shouldn't have Handle Animal. If he's eager to dice up and cook all sorts of exotic creatures because he hasn't encountered them yet, then he shouldn't have preexisting knowledge of all sort of crazy magical beasts, monstrous humanoids, aberrations, and so on.

kentma57, what class is this character?

kentma57
2008-11-23, 07:44 AM
kentma57, what class is this character?

Cleric, but I have already built and submited him.