[Harald387]

At Skill-14, I can roll to hit you with 90% effectiveness and parry with 50% effectiveness. Trying to do anything difficult - "hit you in the vitals"; "rapid strike, even with Weapon Master"; "deceptive attack to reduce defenses" - is, well, difficult.

At Skill-18, I can roll to hit you with 98% effectiveness and parry with just better than 75% effectiveness. I can afford to take a 2-4 point penalty without tanking my chance to hit below safe thresholds: deceptive attack, strike to the vitals or limbs, or rapid strike (if I'm a Weapon Master).

At Skill-22, I'm still getting 98% hit chance, but more options open up: hitting the face (-5) is easy, reducing the opponent's defense by 3 (Deceptive Attack for -6) can make a difference, and even if I'm not a weapon master, Rapid Strike and Dual Weapon attack are attractive options.

Higher levels of skill allow combining more things: A Skill-26 Weapon Master has the same 98% chance to hit with "Rapid Strike: two attacks to the neck, using deceptive attack for -4 to hit and -2 to defense" as that skill-14 guy from the first example, whose only option without taking penalties is to swing for the torso (or a random hit location).