Skill for building musical instrument?

[JazzJedi]

Originally Posted by malloyd

One approach to doing that within the RAW I sometimes use is Unique Techniques. Don't think a Carpenter has a chance of making a violin? Call Violin-Making a unique technique of Carpentry. Now you have to spend a point on the Unique Technique perk to attempt it at all, the GM can set the default at anything appropriate so even skilled carpenters can't automatically become expert violin-makers with 200 hours of training. And yet as a technique it's not horribly expensive to buy it up to full skill (or potentially beyond) like an entirely separate skill would be, and because it is a technique Violin-maker-guy automatically has at least some level of competence with any other carpentry task that *isn't* weird enough to be a Unique Technique.

My grandfather was a carpenter for 30 years and when he retired at age 55, he became a luthier as a retirement project. He was making violins, cellos, basses, and violas and while there was a bit of a learning curve, his carpentry skills were essential. He's been a luthier for 20 years now and makes more money selling his instruments than he ever did as a carpenter. He knows absolutely nothing about non-wooden instruments, and has very little knowledge about woodwind instruments like clarinet or oboe. So Luthier should default to Carpenter at -3 or so, in my opinion. Maybe -4. He learned Luthier in about a year to a professional level.

As for brass and woodwind, these should be separate skills. I've worked in an instrument repair shop doing routine maintenance on brass instruments (my specialty) and woodwinds, and there is virtually no overlap in skill as far I am concerned. I know dozens of instrument techs, and most specialize in either percussion, piano, woodwind, brass, or luthier.

[Vaevictis Asmadi]

I'm also interested in the answer to this question.

Would treating Luthier and Reedmaker/Woodwinds as Artist specialties make sense? Then they would be Hard. I could see Luthier (at -3 or -4) and Reedmaker (at -2?) defaulting to both Artist (Woodworking) and Carpentry, but not being optional specialties of an Easy skill.

Natural horns (valveless), metal percussion, and mbiras could be Professional Skills with defaults to Smith-4 or so. Valved horns, and woodwinds with lots of fiddly keys, seem like Mechanic to me.

How challenging is making a drum? It seems to me (with no experience) that it would be easier than other types of instruments. Carpentry and Leatherworking are Easy, and Woodworking is Hard.


On second thought, it seems like all non-electric musical instruments should be the same type of skill, not scattered among Artist, Professional Skill, and Mechanic. Making each type a Professional Skill with optional specialties seems the most straightforward:

Bellfounder for bells, cymbals, gongs, and singing bowls
Horn-Maker for metal brass; harder Techniques for valved brass
Luthier for stringed instruments; harder Techniques for things like pianos and harpsichords
Metal Ideophones for mbiras, metallophones, jaw harps, and tuning forks (any suggestions for a better name?)
Ocarina-Maker for ceramic aerophones
Percussion-Maker for any non-metal percussion
Reedmaker for reeds and non-metal, non-ceramic aerophones; easier Technique for bullroarers, harder Techniques for keyed woodwinds
Sax-Maker for saxophones and other metal woodwinds