Superior Experience

[AlexanderHowl]

If a character is only good at one skill (and some thematically related skills), then a 5 CP/level talent is probably more appropriate than high attributes or a massive amount of points invested in skills. Of course, you would probably want to use one of the optional rules that increases maximum Talent level to 10. In that case, a DX 10 character with Natural Swordsman 10 would have an effective DX 20 for the purpose of using swords.

[Aldric]

Btw, isn't a talent the only way to be good at a specific skill and not at the same time decent at all the other skills that may default from the first one?

[RyanW]

A post from Kromm a while back that seems apropos:

Originally Posted by Kromm

I think the disconnect in that particular case comes from the idea that "200 hours = 1 point" is a hard conversion. It really, really, REALLY isn't. It's just a number we threw out there to let GMs keep improvement during downtime to a sensible level.

Someone might have a skill at DX+10 for any number of reasons, including study, sure, but also a natural aptitude for that one skill, or any combination of things. The character sheet doesn't distinguish whether a given skill level was arrived at by aptitude, training (or which kind), magical wishes, or ultra-tech sleep-teaching. It just says "this level costs this many points."

I think the idea that real people might have single-skill aptitudes is often ignored, but it's essentially why Fourth Edition did away with the idea that age limits points in skills.

I'd say that "number of hours of study in real life" is useful only for setting minima; e.g., if somebody has 400 hours of formal training in a skill, they won't have less than 2 points in it. However, they probably chose to pursue that training because it interested them, and it's likely that interest reflects an aptitude. I'd never say, "No, he can't have DX+10 because he only put in 400 hours." For all we know he has a natural gift that gives him +8 and makes those 400 hours count as more like 2,000 hours.

[Tomsdad]

Given superior experience (skill) costs at most 4CP per point and superior talent (stat or talent) costs more CP than that per +1 bonus. I think the system already weighs superior experience higher in terms of CP per bonus.

[Celjabba]

Originally Posted by Aldric

Btw, isn't a talent the only way to be good at a specific skill and not at the same time decent at all the other skills that may default from the first one?

Remenber that when defaulting skill A from skill B, you don't get decent in A, you use B in ways that emulate A.
Not the same thing, especially regarding familiarities, ...

Otherwise, a Quirk (doesn't get default from skill A) is probably valid.

[Aldric]

Originally Posted by Celjabba

Remenber that when defaulting skill A from skill B, you don't get decent in A, you use B in ways that emulate A.
Not the same thing, especially regarding familiarities, ...

Otherwise, a Quirk (doesn't get default from skill A) is probably valid.

Ok, but the way I understand talents, say you have DX 12 and Broadsword at DX+5 for a total of 17, you also have Shortsword at 15. But if you got to Broadsword 17 with a talent that doesn't also affect short swords, your default would be lower.
But ofc I may have gotten talents wrong...

I'm also unclear on the idea of improving talents during play, but that's a different issue.

[Anders]

Originally Posted by Aldric

Ok, but the way I understand talents, say you have DX 12 and Broadsword at DX+5 for a total of 17, you also have Shortsword at 15. But if you got to Broadsword 17 with a talent that doesn't also affect short swords, your default would be lower.
But ofc I may have gotten talents wrong...

No, that's correct.

[Maz]

You could have contest be against experience, ie. rolling at Stat 10 + skill modifier. The rules suggest this for job-skills where experience is more important than actual skill.

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I also feel ignoring -1 penalty per 4 CP is too good.



I would instead suggest you give free bonus Technique-points per CP in a skill. It could be 1 bonus per 4 CP or 1 per 2 CP og whatever you think is balanced.


Lets say you get 1 Technique-point per 2 CP.

So someone with DX:16 and Broadsword (2) = 16, would have skill 16 and a single technique-point (not enough for any hard techniques)

Where someone with DX:11 and Broadsword (12) = 15, might only have skill 15. But would then also have 6 Technique points. This could buy them Targeted attack, or Feint, or something similar. This way the "experienced" person would not be just better than the natural talent, but might be better in specific fields/at specific tasks, where they have more experience. This would also mean that less than full level CP in a skill (say 6 pts og 10 pts) still makes a difference.

[aesir23]

I agree with everyone saying "more points in a skill doesn't necessarily means more experience," but there is one way in RAW where it plays out like it does--using skills with other attributes.

[Aldric]

Originally Posted by aesir23

I agree with everyone saying "more points in a skill doesn't necessarily means more experience," but there is one way in RAW where it plays out like it does--using skills with other attributes.

What do you mean? If you make a character with a skill at Attribute+5 and say that all invested CP are natural talent and not training, those CPs work the same regardless of the attribute used.
It works the same if you use a Talent to represent natural talent and CPs for experience.
The only case where it doesn't work is if you want to use only a raw stat to represent natural talent in a skill, but that already has issues where the character has higher defaults.