Quote Originally Posted by icefractal View Post
So what would you consider an example of an RPG with a significantly better skill system? Because I'm thinking about those I've seen, and most I'd just call "fine" - they're unobjectionable, they work, but they're not some quantum leap over the D&D 3.x one.

Obviously some of this comes down to preference. Many people love player-defined skills / backgrounds, like 13A uses IIRC. But personally - I don't. I don't enjoy negotiating/begging/demanding when I'm just doing basic things like making skill rolls. So I'd much rather have it settled what my skills apply to rather than hash it out each time it comes up, and being able to decide "I'll take some ranks in Bluff" and know that's ok, vs worrying about "If I say that 'Secret Agent' includes being able to hack computers, is that too much?"
I understand people feeling that way, but I think that’s more a higher level of comfort with an existing system. 5e can have all sorts of problems with that—what is investigation versus perception, what is covered by arcana versus religion, history or nature, when do you need acrobatics versus athletics. If the DM is going to be a jerk, or even just has a very different understanding of the skill system, you will have problems.

Coming from the other side, I find it utterly aggravating when the skill system won’t let you cover all the competencies your character would have based on an utterly bog-standard genre backstory. I don’t play with many players where negotiating things out is an issue, though.

I’d also argue that the fiction first/justify proficiency with backstory/tags method is more helpful for new players to effectively realize their character concepts without requiring up front system mastery. For a more complex system you need something like GURPS templates, which work fine but are going to scare off most casual players.