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Old 12-15-2018, 06:51 AM   #1
AlexanderHowl
 
Join Date: Feb 2016
Default Making Skills Matter Again

I am just sharing one of my ideas that I presented in another thread, as I wanted comments from the forum. I think that it addresses a lot of concerns about high attributes because it makes experience as important as aptitude. Please tell me what you think.

Experience Matters (House Rule):
1. For every relative skill level above the base relevant attribute, characters reduce their total penalties by one. For example, a character with Karate at DX+4 would ignore up to -4 in penalties. In the case of penalties to defenses, every two levels of relative skill above reduces defensive penalties by one.
2. For every relative skill level below the base relevant attribute, characters increase their total penalties by one, up to twice the base penalty for the roll. For example, a character with Spear at DX-5 would suffer an additional -5 in penalties if he or she was aiming for the throat of his or her enemy. In the case of penalties to defenses, every two levels of relative skill below increase defensive penalties by one.
3. Talents add to (and Antitalents subtract from) relative skill levels rather than modifying base attribute levels (before relative skill levels are determined) or base skill levels (after relative skill levels are determined). For example, a character with DX 12 would normally default to Erotic Art at DX-5 (base skill of 7) but, with Allure 4, he or she would have Erotic Art at DX-1 (base skill of 11). Bonuses from other advantages (and penalties from other disadvantages) modify base skill levels rather than relative skill levels.
4. Techniques modify relative skill levels. For example, a character with Karate at DX+6 would default Kicking to DX+4 for the purpose of these rules.

Last edited by AlexanderHowl; 12-15-2018 at 06:56 AM.
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Old 12-15-2018, 07:21 AM   #2
Andreas
 
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Default Re: Making Skills Matter Again

This would fail reality testing. Skilled people don't tend to perform as well under adverse conditions as they do when there aren't such problems.
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Old 12-15-2018, 08:11 AM   #3
Brandy
 
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Default Re: Making Skills Matter Again

Quote:
Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl View Post
Experience Matters (House Rule):
1. For every relative skill level above the base relevant attribute, characters reduce their total penalties by one. For example, a character with Karate at DX+4 would ignore up to -4 in penalties. In the case of penalties to defenses, every two levels of relative skill above reduces defensive penalties by one.
I like the thinking behind this one, but not the way you've constructed it. I would be looking at eliminating half of the penalty, not the full penalty.

Quote:
2. For every relative skill level below the base relevant attribute, characters increase their total penalties by one, up to twice the base penalty for the roll. For example, a character with Spear at DX-5 would suffer an additional -5 in penalties if he or she was aiming for the throat of his or her enemy. In the case of penalties to defenses, every two levels of relative skill below increase defensive penalties by one.
This one seems unneeded to me. I think there are better solutions for excessive defaults than this.

I think if I were inclined to do something like this, I'd be looking to imitate the feel of the Targeted Attack Technique. Perhaps, off the top of my head, allow characters to eliminate half of a specific kind of penalty of as much as (half of) their current attribute bonus; I'd also likely charge at least a perk for this, and cap the number of perks to the character's skill bonus. I'm probably going to change combat techniques into combat perks with a fixed effect level for the next game that I run, and this would fit nicely into that scheme.
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Old 12-15-2018, 08:17 AM   #4
SilvercatMoonpaw
 
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Default Re: Making Skills Matter Again

I still like my "synergy" idea I proposed on the last thread, where a separate skill related to the activity or penalty could help counteract the penalty and only the penalty. Attribute wouldn't add to the "helper skill" for determining how much penalty it reduces.

(This probably steps on the toes of Techniques.)
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Old 12-15-2018, 08:36 AM   #5
Donny Brook
 
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Default Re: Making Skills Matter Again

I once played in a game where the GM had us buy all skills off a base of 10, and then had Attributes give a modifier to the roll calculated at half the Attribute's value over or under 10. When we converted existing characters we ended up with blundering buffoons.

Last edited by Donny Brook; 12-15-2018 at 08:42 AM.
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Old 12-15-2018, 09:11 AM   #6
Plane
 
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Default Re: Making Skills Matter Again

Quote:
Originally Posted by Andreas View Post
This would fail reality testing. Skilled people don't tend to perform as well under adverse conditions as they do when there aren't such problems.
You do have the expansion of Evaluate in GURPS Martial Arts where it can remove defense penalties from Deceptive Attack or Feint, so maybe they mean like this but against all penalties?

I like the idea of halving penalties at best (like Targeted Attack) rather than being able to completely buy them off.
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Old 12-15-2018, 10:34 AM   #7
tbone
 
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Default Re: Making Skills Matter Again

Quote:
Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl View Post
1. For every relative skill level above the base relevant attribute, characters reduce their total penalties by one. For example, a character with Karate at DX+4 would ignore up to -4 in penalties. In the case of penalties to defenses, every two levels of relative skill above reduces defensive penalties by one.
It's an interesting idea, but I'd have to pass on it. My objection: normally-penalized tasks become "free". With a combat skill at DX+5, a shot to the torso, the vitals, a limb, or the head all face an equally zero penalty; there's no more tradeoff between difficulty and effect. Might as well make every shot a head shot; it's free.

So what else can be done to make skill purchases worth more relative to attribute purchases? There are the age-old suggestions to lower the cost of skills and/or boost the cost of attributes, of course. That messes with costs for every character, though, so I don't blame you for looking for looking into other ways.

So, without messing with main costs... Hm, there's an idea discussed very occasionally, that plays with costs but in a very minor area: buy up defaults from other skills at only 1 pt per level (i.e., get both Broadsword and Shortsword at the same level for only 2 pts). That makes lots of skills much cheaper, when defaults exist.

Another classic idea, not involving costs at all, is to just find more areas to change the base attribute for skill rolls. Like using IQ, not DX, as the base to make or resist a Feint; that helps make skill matter more than DX. The downside: There are only so many reasonable changes like that to be made.

Beyond that... Well, I'm sure others will have better ideas!
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Old 12-15-2018, 12:50 PM   #8
SilvercatMoonpaw
 
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Default Re: Making Skills Matter Again

One idea proposed the last time we had this discussion was to adapt the rules for Hyper-competency from "Power-Ups: Wildcards":

The GM defines groups of skills. For every X points spent on skills in those groups the character gains a virtual character point that can only be spent on the functions listed under Influencing Success Rolls (p. B347) when using those skills.

So those with high attributes succeed more often on more skills, but those actually trained in skills have more direct control of the outcomes.
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Old 12-15-2018, 01:03 PM   #9
hal
 
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Default Re: Making Skills Matter Again

One of my "peeves" if you will, is the idea that someone who has NO actual experience with a skill (ie by default) can start off with "professional level" skill at all.

A stat 16 individual with a -4 default penalty, is functionally the same as a professional, and that just bothers me. Since I don't allow enough starting character points to permit easy attainable purchases of Stat 16, this rarely rears its ugly head in my campaigns. But it does rear its ugly head with talents of level 4 plus IQ 14 (for instance). Zero points into Tactics for such a character results in Tactics skill 12.

Now, as an experiment, I gave the character (in GURPS CHARACTER ASSISTANT) zero points in any of the skills that benefit from Natural Born War-Leader, and then did the same thing for another character in that I gave it IQ 14 without the talent, and put points towards the skill to reach the same skill level as would be attained by "default" with the talent. It took 5 character points to reach the same skill level as took 20 points to attain the same level of skill. Not cost efficient in and of itself, but it still grants the equivalent capabilities to someone whose IQ is a mere *cough* 18.

So, at what point does the Talent become cost effective (leaving aside the benefit of reaction bonuses)? A mere 1 point in each skill, is the same as if 12 points had been spent on the same skill set (per skill) to reach the same skill level. Cost of character with Talent and 1 point in each of 5 skills was 105 points. Cost of similar character with no talent, same skill set, same skill levels, 140 points.

As I've also pointed out to some individuals, just because you've been involved in computer operations for 10 years, doesn't mean your character now has the computer operation skill at obscene levels (based on the rules for On the Job experience). 10 x 52 = 520. At 1/4 learning rates for on the job training - ie, every 4 hours working equals 1 hour training - that amounts to 520 x 10 (assuming a 40 hr work week), or 5200 hours of training. Dividing by 200 due to it takes 200 hours of training to gain 1 character point) and our wonderful computer operator could in theory, gain a total of 26 points in computer operator skill. My house rule is "you can never gain through on the job training levels, higher than well trained". Most situations in life through routine work, tend to be, well, routine. You don't gain anything above routine knowledge that way. If management doesn't have you handling those things that they grant to experts, there is no amount of routine work that will let you learn how to do those things that only experts do.

In any event - making skills matter has been dealt with before where the base of the skill is attribute/2 and working your way up from that. Another method is to simply state that regardless of one's attributes, skills can never benefit through defaults, a value higher than 9 (or 10 or 11 or what ever you decide makes more sense).

When you look at the rules as written and ask yourself "What does it mean when one character who spends 1 point in a skill gains skill 10, and another character who spends 1 point in the same skill and gains a skill of 12" - how do you answer? Does it mean that the IQ 13 character learns skills at a faster rate than does an IQ 11 character? IF 1 character point equals 200 hours of instructed learning, then this is what happens in "time" where the first number is the IQ 11 person, the second number is the IQ 13 person for a Mental Average skill

Skill 12: 800/200 hrs
Skill 13: 1600/400 hrs
Skill 14: 2400/800 hrs
skill 15: 3200/1600 hrs
skill 16: 4000/2400 hrs
Skill 17: 4800/3200 hrs
Skill 18: 5600/4000 hrs


The ratio of learning between IQ 11 and IQ 13 in terms of hours becomes

Skill 12: 4 : 1
Skill 13: 4 : 1
Skill 14: 3 : 1
skill 15: 2 : 1
skill 16: 1.67 : 1
Skill 17: 1.5 : 1
Skill 18: 1.4 : 1

So, draw your own conclusions. GURPS treats IQ in its own unique manner. Trying to simulate real world things with GURPS will always labor under design constraints and what people expect in real life versus what GURPS delivers.

Use the rules as written, or modify it with your own house rules. It works out the same - try to simulate something with a given degree of fidelity to reality (ie, decide how much fidelity suits your desires). House rules come into being when the user of the RAW decides that they don't meet his desire of "fidelity" - else why build the house rule right?

;)
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Old 12-15-2018, 01:05 PM   #10
hal
 
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Default Re: Making Skills Matter Again

Quote:
Originally Posted by SilvercatMoonpaw View Post
One idea proposed the last time we had this discussion was to adapt the rules for Hyper-competency from "Power-Ups: Wildcards":

The GM defines groups of skills. For every X points spent on skills in those groups the character gains a virtual character point that can only be spent on the functions listed under Influencing Success Rolls (p. B347) when using those skills.

So those with high attributes succeed more often on more skills, but those actually trained in skills have more direct control of the outcomes.
Never a fan of "Wildcard" skills, I passed on buying the material. Interesting idea...

;)
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