07-12-2018, 07:42 AM | #41 | |
GURPS Line Editor
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Montréal, Québec
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Re: Minimum Skill Count
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It seems likely that today's society is still guilty of objectifying women more often than it does men . . . but stating that every woman requires Sex Appeal contributes to that objectification in its own small way. It's part of the problem, not part of the solution. Anyway, Sex Appeal isn't physical appearance, but a form of implicit bribery – just one where the implication is a service rather than goods. Sex Appeal is affected by Appearance, but that's a one-way street; Sex Appeal in no way helps raise effective Appearance. In fact, because it's generally inappropriate (see my comments upthread), it will often be at -1 to -10 and thus fail, resulting in a "Bad" reaction. That's the average reaction for someone with -6 in reaction penalties . . . like, say, Appearance (Horrific). In rules terms, then, going around using Sex Appeal is likely to have exactly the opposite effect of increased Appearance.
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Sean "Dr. Kromm" Punch <kromm@sjgames.com> GURPS Line Editor, Steve Jackson Games My DreamWidth [Just GURPS News] |
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07-12-2018, 07:49 AM | #42 | |
Hero of Democracy
Join Date: Mar 2012
Location: far from the ocean
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Re: Minimum Skill Count
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Its useful if they give you an address for the museum. Conversely, if you're handed a map in the desert and told to find an arch not marked on it or given coordinates to you're just as lost. In both cases you can figure out where you are on the map, and in both cases you're the victim of a map maker or sadist who didn't give you the tools you needed. And modern GPS tools cut right through both problems.
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Be helpful, not pedantic Worlds Beyond Earth -- my blog Check out the PbP forum! If you don't see a game you'd like, ask me about making one! |
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07-12-2018, 07:57 AM | #43 | |
Join Date: Aug 2007
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Re: Minimum Skill Count
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You've still got a lot of "If you do spoemthing that means you ahve a skill that covers it." going on and IMHO that greatly over-inflates the Skill list for ordinary people. PCs may have many unusual Skills but you don't justify that by saying that many ordinary people have such Skills.
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Fred Brackin |
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07-12-2018, 08:01 AM | #44 |
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: Lawrence, KS
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Re: Minimum Skill Count
One economist advanced the joking proposal that we pass a "height tax": There's a strong correlation between height and annual income, and it's really hard to evade a tax of so many dollars per year per inch of height. . . .
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Bill Stoddard I don't think we're in Oz any more. |
07-12-2018, 08:03 AM | #45 |
Join Date: Feb 2016
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Re: Minimum Skill Count
While it does suck to be a college students (I have done it more than once), I never had to dumpster dive for food, and I have never known any of my friends who were that bad off. When my friends needed help, I would give them a place to stay (even if it was just a couch) and food until they got back on their feet, and they did the same for me when I needed help. Of course, not everyone has good friends, but I would say that dumpster diving is still an exception rather than the rule.
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07-12-2018, 08:07 AM | #46 |
GURPS Line Editor
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Montréal, Québec
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Re: Minimum Skill Count
Exactly. Urban Survival is for most purposes the professional skill of living as a homeless person in a city. If you have a fixed address (room, apartment, house) and do something other than "be homeless" with the majority of your day, you generally won't have Urban Survival. There are exceptions; urban explorers, traceurs, those who fight and/or engage in espionage in built-up areas, and the like sometimes have this skill for identifying physically safe and dangerous areas, and for "feeling out" new cities. If all you're doing is Dumpster diving, though, that's practically the defining use of Scrounging in a modern urban setting.
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Sean "Dr. Kromm" Punch <kromm@sjgames.com> GURPS Line Editor, Steve Jackson Games My DreamWidth [Just GURPS News] |
07-12-2018, 08:17 AM | #47 | |
GURPS Line Editor
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Montréal, Québec
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Re: Minimum Skill Count
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Sean "Dr. Kromm" Punch <kromm@sjgames.com> GURPS Line Editor, Steve Jackson Games My DreamWidth [Just GURPS News] |
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07-12-2018, 08:17 AM | #48 | |
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: Lawrence, KS
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Re: Minimum Skill Count
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Somehow this doesn't add up. * Are students who haven't enough money for food not qualifying for full financial aid? * Is the provision for room and board insufficient to pay anyone's actual costs of room and board? If so, why hasn't it been changed? * Are there a lot of college students who have no idea how to manage their money? Are they perhaps buying expensive things that they think are essential, and then not having money for actual necessities? Of course, UC Riverside's student loan program is going to result in a lot of graduates starting their careers with a nontrivial debt; in effect, it encourages students to buy a higher present standard of living at the expense of their future selves. That in itself isn't necessarily an optimal way to do things. On the other hand, given that it exists, those reports about literally starving students suggest that something's being managed poorly.
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Bill Stoddard I don't think we're in Oz any more. Last edited by whswhs; 07-12-2018 at 08:22 AM. |
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07-12-2018, 08:29 AM | #49 |
Join Date: Feb 2016
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Re: Minimum Skill Count
As a graduate student, I needed loans to pay for my living expenses, even with an assistantship and a tuition stipend (and I shared an apartment with two roommates, had a 10 year old Civic, and did not allow myself more than $100 a month for luxuries). In my experience, financial aid only seems to account for 60% of the expenses of attending college at a public university (when you include living expenses) and, even with assistantship, I think that it only gets up to 80%.
The problem is that public financing for the US college system has lagged behind inflation in the education system for forty years. Now, that would be fine if a college education actually gave what society claimed, but the majority of college graduates seem to only realize the economic benefits of their college degree after 10-30 years. It is why I often tell younger people now to develop a trade before going to college, so they can work part-time for a decent salary while going to school part-time after they get their licensing. |
07-12-2018, 08:37 AM | #50 | |
GURPS Line Editor
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Montréal, Québec
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Re: Minimum Skill Count
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Here in Montréal, for instance, you need $1,500/month or around $18,000/year to get by at a marginal level; that's our municipal poverty line. Only the most prestigious fellowships beat that (barely: $21,000); even the highest levels of student aid are at around just 50% of that amount (~$8,500). All of which ignores the fact that to live at a marginal level, you can't reside anywhere near the universities (all of which are in expensive areas), meaning significant time and money wasted getting to and from. To bring it on topic: University students might well need One-Task Wonder (Accounting defaults to full IQ for my personal finances) or similar, though probably not a skill. Scrounging is common, though.
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Sean "Dr. Kromm" Punch <kromm@sjgames.com> GURPS Line Editor, Steve Jackson Games My DreamWidth [Just GURPS News] |
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