Skill question...Expert vs. Connoisseur

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Phil Masters

I don't know if Magic has rules for this, but raising a corpse to action after twelve years presumably doesn't even give you a zombie so much as a skeleton, right?

(Roll vs. Forensics to assess the preservative quality of the soil, I guess. Geology is a complementary skill.)

Expert Skill (Climatology) would help in knowing if the climate would yield a mummy or a skely after that length of time, where as Connoisseur (Undead) would let you know how much the local Necromancers would pay for it and if it's even worth digging up.

[Phil Masters]

Originally Posted by jason taylor

Maybe connoisseur can be defined as, "a geek that DOES get invited to parties?"

That’s traditionally the definition of “wonk”. (Well, “a nerd who gets dates”.) But it’s not so much that a connoisseur is always a geek, as that a geek needs to be a connoisseur (of the right sort of subject-matter) to have geek cred.

I suspect the best one-sentence definition of Connoisseur skill might be “What you’ve got to have to write a well-regarded regular magazine column about the form.”

Originally Posted by jason taylor

But fine ales? That certainly seems like a knowledge one one expect of a British gentleman. James Bond seemed more of a cocktail man perhaps, but it is perfectly possible to construct a gentleman detective that likes ale.

In the modern period, certainly. But in the 19th century, well, a gentleman landowner might sup a pint with his tenants at the end of a hard-working day, and be regarded as a good, open-minded fellow for that, but if he showed real technical knowledge of different types and labels, I think he’d be classed as a little eccentric. Even today, in the UK at least, real ale connoisseurs have a bit of an image as beardy types with a lot of extra padding round the waist. Inspector Morse just about got away with it, but he was less of a real ale geek than an opera geek, was more failed academic than gentlemanly, and still rated as eccentric.

If I was creating a gentlemanly character who knew his drinks, I’d probably default to wine for the gourmet, cocktails for the bon vivant, and whisky for the country type. Though that is just a default. Also, beer connoisseurship almost died in the mid-20th century UK, between the consolidation of the big breweries and the rise of the real ale movement.