[Basic] Skill of the week: Climbing

[Kromm]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

Trying to make the "equipment-operation skill" classification simultaneously cover skills for operating actual equipment and skills that involve the mental manipulation of models seems to eliminate any discriminatory power it could have.

I spent a decade in theoretical physics hearing that . . . "Oh, theory. Well that isn't the same science as actually doing experiments." No, it's exactly the same science – you can't separate the two. That's my point here; the tools of theory and experiment certainly differ, but they're all part of what GURPS would call the same science skill. At most, they differ by a familiarity penalty.

[vicky_molokh]

I'm slightly disappointed we went on a tangent of tools-and-sciences in a thread about Climbing while we still have such a curious bunch of questions to sort out:

Originally Posted by Mr_Sandman

By RAW, "Any failure means you fall." I think it's a common house-rule that failure means no progress and only critical failures result in falls.

I have a few questions about climbing.

How often do people here call for rolls and how do you assess fatigue, for climbs using the "Combat" column? The Basic Set says at least one FP, or double the FP cost determined by the adventure or GM. But it doesn't give any other guidance.

'Regular' climbs call for rolls every 5 minutes. But 5 minutes seems too a long a time frame to be meaningful for 'Combat' climbs. Also, since the movement is usually about 3 times faster on the 'Combat' column, using the same five-minute climb would let you get 3 times as far with the same success rate by climbing faster, which logically should penalize your success. However calling for a roll every second someone is climbing in 'Combat' mode doesn't make sense either, and would result an way to many falls. Dividing the time between rolls by three (rolls every 100 seconds) would make the distance covered between rolls the same in most cases. This is still too long to track or be meaningful in actual combat, but at least it removes the unintended benefit.

Does extra-effort work for climbing? It seems like using the 'Combat' column covers going faster but spending FP to do it, potentially at much lower cost than extra-effort - tripling speed, rather than increasing it by 5%. You could argue that the 'Combat' column is only available in actual combat situations or when fright checks or self-control rolls for appropriate disadvantages are failed, that would leave some space for extra-effort to be useful in other situations.

By the chart, Basic Move doesn't impact climbing speed at all. Should it, and by how much? Realistically do you think someone who can run twice as fast as an average person could climb any faster over 5 minutes? Or does a fast climber need to take "Enhanced Move (Climbing)"

[roguebfl]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Are there any IQ based skills that aren't TL in at least some degree?

For starters Acting, and not being /TL animal IQ 1-5 can use it too.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Kromm

I spent a decade in theoretical physics hearing that . . . "Oh, theory. Well that isn't the same science as actually doing experiments." No, it's exactly the same science – you can't separate the two. That's my point here; the tools of theory and experiment certainly differ, but they're all part of what GURPS would call the same science skill. At most, they differ by a familiarity penalty.

...What? I didn't say anything remotely like that. I criticized your stated method for determining whether a skill was /TL or not, I didn't dispute whether theoretical and lab science are the same.

Although I would say (and I am sitting in a laboratory right now, where I spend a sizable fraction of my waking hours) that the lab work skill set involves a lot of stuff not particularly based in theory, and theory is only needed to a very shallow level for much of it, though of course that changes when you go to trying to really interpret what you've got. It could easily and reasonably be split into different skills, if one wanted to. (Both those skills would be /TL, though for what I'd call different reasons.) Dunno if this is specific to my niche in biology, though I doubt it. I know a chem PhD student whose actual duties are largely about maintaining and repairing ultra-high-vacuum equipment.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by roguebfl

For starters Acting, and not being /TL animal IQ 1-5 can use it too.

Many real world animals lie which is a situational form of acting.
I had a cat that affected a limp after intentionally ramming my leg. My human level IQ noticed that she always limped with the same leg even if she rammed with her other side.
She was odd to say the least but not super intelligent all things considered.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

I'm slightly disappointed we went on a tangent of tools-and-sciences in a thread about Climbing while we still have such a curious bunch of questions to sort out:

If only to reduce otherwise inevitable deaths, I think climbing failures should be verified before falls. Unless PCs ignore inherent dangers of lacking safety gear and taking their time.

[roguebfl]

This post from Kromm is also relevent to this thread 8)

Originally Posted by Kromm

Many fairly generic perks from GURPS Power-Ups 2 could be adapted to the cause:

• Attribute Substitution, notably "Climbing based on Per" for characters who are good at finding safer paths.
• Better (Gear) for expensive or cutting-edge climbing equipment.
• Compact Frame for negotiating narrow chimneys.
• Equipment Bond for any piece of climbing gear, from a trusty rope to a fancy piolet.
• Focused (Task) for the Climbing skill, usually to the detriment of Per rolls to spot dangers such as ice weasels.
• No Nuisance Rolls for those with Climbing at 16+ who want to avoid rolls for unchallenging climbs.
• Purpose, if it's something like "Climb this specific mountain" and the player is willing to spend the point on it.
• Skill Adaptation such as "Mountain climbing defaults to Survival (Mountain)," which isn't useful for general climbing.
• Standard Operating Procedures related to things like always securing a safety line.

Techniques are trickier, because GURPS doesn't split up climbing tasks all that much. Still, you might find these ones implied by GURPS Action 3 to be of some use:

• Rapelling
• Rope Up
• Scaling

Running Climb, Skidding, Sliding, and Spinning are more marginal, but I could see them coming into play.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Mr_Sandman

'Regular' climbs call for rolls every 5 minutes. But 5 minutes seems too a long a time frame to be meaningful for 'Combat' climbs. Also, since the movement is usually about 3 times faster on the 'Combat' column, using the same five-minute climb would let you get 3 times as far with the same success rate by climbing faster, which logically should penalize your success. However calling for a roll every second someone is climbing in 'Combat' mode doesn't make sense either, and would result an way to many falls. Dividing the time between rolls by three (rolls every 100 seconds) would make the distance covered between rolls the same in most cases. This is still too long to track or be meaningful in actual combat, but at least it removes the unintended benefit.

Really the fast climbing should probably be less-than-equal in terms of safety, as you suggest yourself. Maybe make it roll per minute, or even worse than that, though probably not a roll every second.

If using RAW, of course, it's straightforward enough. Active tactical combat climbs will have the one roll for the start of the climb and that will usually be all.

Originally Posted by Mr_Sandman

Does extra-effort work for climbing? It seems like using the 'Combat' column covers going faster but spending FP to do it, potentially at much lower cost than extra-effort - tripling speed, rather than increasing it by 5%. You could argue that the 'Combat' column is only available in actual combat situations or when fright checks or self-control rolls for appropriate disadvantages are failed, that would leave some space for extra-effort to be useful in other situations.

Extra effort for movement is applied to running. I'd suggest that 'non-combat' climbing is more analogous to walking. If you use Extra Effort, I'd pile it on top of combat-rate climbing.

This seems to diverge somewhat from RAW given that combat climbing is supposed to absolutely require emotional justification. I can't help it, I am unable to buy that sort of constraint.

Originally Posted by Mr_Sandman

By the chart, Basic Move doesn't impact climbing speed at all. Should it, and by how much? Realistically do you think someone who can run twice as fast as an average person could climb any faster over 5 minutes? Or does a fast climber need to take "Enhanced Move (Climbing)"

Basic Move probably shouldn't. Any connection between ability to run across mostly flat surfaces and ability to clamber up things is very distant.

However, I don't like Enhanced Move (Climbing) either. The dynamics of Enhanced Move (acceleration over multiple turns) don't fit climbing at all well. The mechanic of multiplying the existing rates is sort of nice, given so many different rates, but...

There should be a way to buy faster climbing. Actually, there is one, but the Super Climb mechanic makes way less sense than Enhanced Move (Climbing) would.

[Kallatari]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

If only to reduce otherwise inevitable deaths, I think climbing failures should be verified before falls. Unless PCs ignore inherent dangers of lacking safety gear and taking their time.

In my house rules, instead of climbing being binary success = climb and failure = fall, I've ruled that if a climb is easy enough to receive a bonus to your skill roll, a failure works like this instead:

failure < bonus = climb halfway, then get stuck unable to proceed. You can look for another path (takes 1 minute) and try again at a cumulative -1.

failure >= bonus = fall upon reaching halfway.

critical failure is always a fall.

If the climb is difficult enough for a penalty (or no bonus), then it works just as it does now, with any failure resulting in a fall.

With an unskilled climber (DX-5 default, so skill of 5) climbing an average tree (+5), you're therefore rolling against a 10. So on a roll of 10 or less, you make it to the top, on a roll of 11 to 14, you make it halfway up, and on a 15 or more you fall. While I certainly don't have any real-life tree climbing accident statistics, it just sounds like these effects are much more "realistic." (And let's not forget +5 is an average tree.. easy to climb trees are probably +7 or so, while more difficult trees might only be +2 or +3).

[Flyndaran]

I always found plain ropes to be the easiest things to climb. I bet knotted ropes are downright trivial for anyone capable of using their arms and legs fully.
Trees seem infinitely variable in difficulty.