Skills / Techniques for a Police Sketch Artist

[JCurwen3]

What skills does a police sketch artist have / use?

Artist (Drawing) seems pretty important. But there's more to it - the directed questions regarding the appearance of the subject, capturing the appearance of a person they've never seen just from the descriptions of a witness / victim that may have (or think they have) a potentially hazy memory.

So how would you handle a situation where a sketch artist does their magic and sketches a fairly accurate image of a subject? What skills (and techniques) are involved, and how many rolls along the way?

[cosmicfish]

Originally Posted by JCurwen3

What skills does a police sketch artist have / use?

Artist (Drawing) seems pretty important. But there's more to it - the directed questions regarding the appearance of the subject, capturing the appearance of a person they've never seen just from the descriptions of a witness / victim that may have (or think they have) a potentially hazy memory.

So how would you handle a situation where a sketch artist does their magic and sketches a fairly accurate image of a subject? What skills (and techniques) are involved, and how many rolls along the way?

Sounds like Artist (Drawing) and Professional Skill (Sketch Artist) to me. Roll on the latter to get the correct inputs from the witness, the on the former to produce a good likeness from those inputs. I would also consider using a Technique like Get Description (Interrogation) to allow someone who already has Interrogation to get the details, perhaps while someone else does the sketching. Using both allows you to have cops who can get descriptions but can't sketch alongside artists who can go start to finish with the sketches but have no broad ability to interrogate. Can't think of any other skills that would seem appropriate to this highly specific task.

Either way, 2 rolls per sketch.

[Gollum]

I fully do agree with Cosmicfish. I would just add an optional specialization for Artist (Drawing). It's more easy than the general Artist (Drawing) skill because you don't have to be good at drawing anything; you just have to draw things you did hundreds of times and finally know by heart: this kind of face, this kind of eyes, this kind of nose, etc.

[quarkstomper]

Obvious he would have... (heh heh) ... Quick Draw.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Gollum

I fully do agree with Cosmicfish. I would just add an optional specialization for Artist (Drawing). It's more easy than the general Artist (Drawing) skill because you don't have to be good at drawing anything; you just have to draw things you did hundreds of times and finally know by heart: this kind of face, this kind of eyes, this kind of nose, etc.

Why wouldn't it make sense to make it a technique based on Artist (Drawing)?

Bill Stoddard

[CoyoteGestalt]

The Efficient (Artist (Drawing)) perk would probably be of use, too.

[gilbertocarlos]

Seems just like artillery and observation, since you need to rely on descriptions, the base is:
Roll against Profession(Sketch-artist)-10.
Roll Drawing with the margin of failure above.

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by cosmicfish

Sounds like Artist (Drawing) and Professional Skill (Sketch Artist) to me. Roll on the latter to get the correct inputs from the witness, the on the former to produce a good likeness from those inputs.

How would racial or sexual biases of the sketcher affect the Profesional Skill roll, causing him to be less able to ask leading questions and potentially polluting the victim's memory?

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by Gollum

I fully do agree with Cosmicfish. I would just add an optional specialization for Artist (Drawing). It's more easy than the general Artist (Drawing) skill because you don't have to be good at drawing anything; you just have to draw things you did hundreds of times and finally know by heart: this kind of face, this kind of eyes, this kind of nose, etc.

I think a Technique off Artist (Drawing might make more sense.

[cosmicfish]

Originally Posted by Peter Knutsen

How would racial or sexual biases of the sketcher affect the Profesional Skill roll, causing him to be less able to ask leading questions and potentially polluting the victim's memory?

How would they affect any other skill roll?