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Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Starting a new criminal empire building campaign this Sunday, and I'm helping players build their very first GURPS characters. It's going pretty smoothly, but I'm a bit at a loss when it comes to skills.

With how GURPS handles skills, I'm used to there being a lot of skill bloat (and much of that being fat) and skill malnutrition. In Case A, players get a whole butt-load of 1-point skills for cheap, falling into the "I want dis" mentality. In Case B on the other hand, players have a hard time determining how to properly spend points on skills in order to make a fully fleshed-out character experience.

Anyone have some advice or a guide for properly and realistically choosing skills for a character without putting too much meta into it?

ALSO:

Professional skills. When does one roll vs a pro skill, instead of a normal skill? Example: One of my characters wants to be a cop, so that's Pro: Law Enforcement. But how would that work? Would it replace or overlap with other skills? I think I know how to work with overlap (synergy bonuses are a nice method), but I could use a hard and fast guideline of when to use a Pro skill vs. a normal skill, if both are applicable in theory.

Thanks again, guys!

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by FF_Ninja (Post 2105370)

Anyone have some advice or a guide for properly and realistically choosing skills for a character without putting too much meta into it?

My advice would be to curate the skill list heavily. Go through the list, pick the skills you're sure will come up, figure out the context they'll come up in and their frequency, and present that to the players as the list to pick from. Let players buy a couple of skills not on this list for flavour if they want, but restrict that. Then, keep that list handy, and when running, make sure you're calling for rolls from the list, not off it. If the campaign changes direction so totally that a new skill is actually appropriate, feel free to add it to the list, but if it's just a matter of you forgot to include a skill that really should have been on there in the first place, it's better to just fudge it and use a skill that's already on the list.

So, for example, your criminal empire building list would probably contain skills like Savoir-Faire (Mafia), Finance, Criminology, Intimidation, various Guns skills, and so forth. If you find later that you forgot to add Accounting, you should really just let the characters with Finance roll that.

Quote:

Originally Posted by FF_Ninja

Professional skills. When does one roll vs a pro skill, instead of a normal skill? Example: One of my characters wants to be a cop, so that's Pro: Law Enforcement. But how would that work? Would it replace or overlap with other skills? I think I know how to work with overlap (synergy bonuses are a nice method), but I could use a hard and fast guideline of when to use a Pro skill vs. a normal skill, if both are applicable in theory.

Soldier is actually an excellent example of a Professional Skill, so I'd use it as a model. It can replace several other skills, if the other skills would be regularly used in the field, and would gain a +4 task difficulty modifier in regular use. So Soldier can be used to operate a radio (Electronics Operation (Communication)), drive a jeep across the base (Drive (Automobile)), hike over a prepared, known course (Hiking), and do basic drill and salute the right people (Savoir-Faire (Military)).

Similarly, I'd allow Professional Skill (Police Officer) to substitute for using the radio in your squad car, maintaining your service weapon (Armoury (Small Arms), perform an interrogation when you've got the perp in custody and evidence in hand (Interrogation), fill out the forms for arresting someone (Administration), or know how to properly arrest someone, with Miranda rights and so forth, so it holds up in court (Law (Police)).

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kelly Pedersen (Post 2105387)

My advice would be to curate the skill list heavily.

This^. Make the decisions simple for the players. Templates are a good example, and a good way to do it. Lists are just as useful. Either way, the more you guide them the better their PCs will be for your game. And as Kelly said, Professional Skills should be used if skill bloat is an issue. PS: Private Eye, PS:Mobster, etc. are just as useful for PC building as a list of skills like Streetwise, Shadowing, Detect Lies, etc. if the skill rolls are +4 TDM. They are like mini-Bang! skills.

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by FF_Ninja (Post 2105370)

Anyone have some advice or a guide for properly and realistically choosing skills for a character without putting too much meta into it?

I don't think there is one answer for this question because there are different schools in how to think about skills in GURPS.

Some GMs prefer the PCs have few skills (5-10) at lower skill levels (12 being for their best skills) and do most things off of default. Other GMs prefer the PCs have more skills at higher levels.

Generally, I think, as a GM, you need to decide what you want the character sheet to look like. What you think of as bloat might be normal to me--or vice-versa. Once you know what you want the character sheet to look like (in terms of how many skills, what level, how high attributes are, etc), I think you should probably do 2 things: 1) determine how many starting cp are more likely to result in what you imagine and choose that amount and 2) tell your players what your norms are for the way you run campaigns.

If you don't want player have skills above a level 12 and want most skills off of default..tell them. If you imagine that most PCs will have at most 10cp in skills...tell them. If you only expect them to put points in adventure related skills...tell them. If on the other hand you expect them to put cp in skills that may never come up in game because it creates a well rounded character, tell them that.

Because GURPS can be so many things, I think it is really important to have a conversation with the players so they know what the expectations are in your particular way of running GURPS.

That said, all of that done, I don't curate the list of skills for my players. Rather I just have a conversation with them about their character concept. They tell me what sort of character they want to play, and I say...well, these skills seem to fit with that concept. If they do want to look at a list of skills, I let them look at the the GURPS Skill Categories PDF, which lists skills down by category, so if they are looking to be a Thief, they can just look over the Theif category. http://www.warehouse23.com/products/...ill-categories

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by FF_Ninja (Post 2105370)

With how GURPS handles skills, I'm used to there being a lot of skill bloat (and much of that being fat) and skill malnutrition. In Case A, players get a whole butt-load of 1-point skills for cheap, falling into the "I want dis" mentality. In Case B on the other hand, players have a hard time determining how to properly spend points on skills in order to make a fully fleshed-out character experience.

I'm not sure I understand the issue. Are you looking for a middle path between those cases?

Quote:

There's no reason two or more skills could not be chosen to roll against depending on what is happening. (E.g. You can roll Knot-Tying to tie knots, but if you don't have it or just prefer you can roll Climbing-3.) So there is no reason a professional skill might not apply in a situation already covered by another skill. In some genres and maybe in real life, police officers frequently identify vehicle makes, so you could roll against Professional Skill (Police) to do that, but you could also roll against Connoisseur (Automobiles).

Generally speaking, a professional skill can be rolled for anything you thing a professional in that category would have learned to do the job.

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by trooper6 (Post 2105410)

Just to illustrate, in my current fantasy campaign, the five player characters started out like this: number of skills ranging from 25 to 39, average 33; points in skills ranging from 48 to 88, average 70; highest skill costing 4, 8, 8, 8, and 16 points. You can see that the average is just over 2 points invested per skill, but there were quite a few skills with only 1 point invested to balance out the ones with 4 or more points invested.

Player characters were built on 200 points. They were designed to be adventurers who could sail off to unknown lands and have a reasonable chance of coming back.

I encourage players to take (a) the skills that are needed for their character's occupation or role, (b) skills that they would likely have picked up during their earlier lives as they describe them, and (c) a couple of skills for characterization. I also may note a few defaults that are likely to come up in play. In this campaign, four of the five PCs had some knowledge of Path/Book magic, which added to the length of their skill lists.

On the other hand, I've run a campaign where the PCs were 14-year-old boys who were starting to study magic at university. They were built on a budget of 75 points, which had to include at least Magery 0 and Legal Immunity 1, and usually included some Status and Wealth, not to mention buying up IQ a bit. So they didn't have a lot of skills.

Really, for me, it's a question of "what fits the narrative?"

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by whswhs (Post 2105425)

Really, for me, it's a question of "what fits the narrative?"

I want to agree with this very much. Not only are there GM styles, GM's may also adopt different styles based on what the specific campaign is.

So...there isn't just one answer.

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Collapsing some of the skills can help, but you'd need to make a list, or borrow someone else's list, of reduced skills.

Stealth could include Shadowing
Guns (Longarm) to include both Rifle and Shotgun
Sleight of Hand includes Pickpocket and Filch

I also often allow players to keep 3-5 pts reserved and unspent to spend on "oops, my character should know X" skills in the first few sessions. This helps reduce the pressure to get everything perfect, which is hard for a skill set on modern characters, and nearly impossible in higher tech settings.

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

GURPS Skill Categories is a free resource that I have found helpful. I also recommend GURPS Template Toolkit 1: Characters, even if you're not planning on using templates. One chapter of that pdf categorizes the skill list into "niches."

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dustin (Post 2105446)

[*]Stealth could include Shadowing

I split Shadowing between Stealth and Observation, and basically dump the skill entirely.

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by evileeyore (Post 2105467)

I split Shadowing between Stealth and Observation, and basically dump the skill entirely.

And I merge Observation, Search, and a few others together as a single skill called Investigation.

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by simply Nathan (Post 2105474)

And I merge Observation, Search, and a few others together as a single skill called Investigation.

There really is a big difference between watching people unobtrusively and noting the details (Observation), and tossing a room for the hidden stash (Search).

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by evileeyore (Post 2105479)

There really is a big difference between watching people unobtrusively and noting the details (Observation), and tossing a room for the hidden stash (Search).

Yes, and there are also big differences between Hiking, Cartography, and the Survival specialties, which I also merge into a single skill called Exploration. I also combine all the medical skills into a single skill called Medicine.

And every single one of my 30 skills is /Hard. Ten of them are combat skills, of which eight are melee combat.

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

This post is helpful. Thanks for your share!

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by simply Nathan (Post 2105563)

And every single one of my 30 skills is /Hard. Ten of them are combat skills, of which eight are melee combat.

Are these 30 skills posted anywhere, for the curious?

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by tbone (Post 2105579)

Are these 30 skills posted anywhere, for the curious?

Probably. It's easier for me to just post them again than to search the forums for where else I've posted them. I'm sure I've made some small tweaks to it since the last time I posted it anyway.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Combat Skills

Archery. Defaults to DX/2 or Throwing-4. Includes Bow, Crossbow, Blowpipe, Spear-Thrower, and Sling (of which Bow, Sling, and maybe Crossbow actually exist on my weapons table).
Flail. Defaults to DX/2, Hafted-2, or any other melee weapon at -4. Includes one-handed, two-handed, kusari, impossible 'chuck weapons, whip, etc.
Hafted. Defaults to DX/2, Flail-2, Sword-3, or any other melee weapon at -4. Any rigid melee weapon with the mass concentrated in the striking surface towards one end, whether one-handed, two-handed, or a polearm.
Knife. Defaults to DX/2, Unarmed-2, Sword-2, or any other melee skill at -4. Includes Knife, Main-Gauche, Shortsword, Jitte/Sai, Smallsword, and Sabre. Faces no penalties for off-hand use.
Shield. Defaults to DX/2. Includes Buckler and Cloak.
Spear. Defaults to DX/2, Sword-3, or any other melee weapon skill at -4. Includes Staff and several polearms; the way the quarterstaff's parry bonus works is integrated into the rest of the skill (only when you're holding a pole at its shortest reaches, basically, hindering its Sw damage) but still more potent on a staff itself than on other poles.
Sword. Defaults to DX/2, Knife-2, Spear-3, Hafted-3, or any other melee weapon at -4. Includes the usual suspects; Broadsword, Shortsword, Two-Handed Sword, Rapier, Sabre, Tonfa, Jitte/Sai (for the longer jitte at least), and so on. Sword-like polearms such as glaives and naginatas are also included.
Throwing. Defaults to DX-3, Archery-4, or specific different defaults from throwable melee weapons for those weapons only. Includes Bolas, all specialties of Thrown Weapon, Throwing, Dropping...basically anything Throwing Art would've covered, but without turning non-weapons into weapons. As this is the same difficulty as Throwing Art, a Perk, TBAM, or Weapon Master turn this skill into Throwing Art as appropriate.
Unarmed. Defaults to DX-3, Knife-2, or any other melee skill at -4. Combination of all unarmed striking skills, and would include grapples too if I used those.

On Fencing: Getting the F parry comes in the form of buying a Perk for the appropriate skill. Knife-Fencing, Sword-Fencing, and Unarmed-Fencing are the most common but Spear-Fencing is not unheardof. This comes at a penalty of not being able to use Swing attacks, only tip-slashes, until you switch stances.

Fast-Draw is another Perk, specialized by skill, and doesn't care about reality checks. Just roll against the appropriate weapon skill, if you think there are serious penalties and need a base to roll against - usually you skip that part.

Quote:

Originally Posted by And the Rest

Acrobatics. DX-6 or Athletics-4. Includes its namesake, Aquabatics, Aerobatics, Running, Jumping, Climbing, etc.
Alchemy. No default. Also includes Herb Lore, Chemistry, and Pharmacy.
Artisanry. Defaults to IQ-6. The short version is it covers everything under the Artisan talent, Artist specialties, and Cooking - any building, crafting, or creative skill all in one place. NPCs or PCs using one or two such disciplines for background flavor are pointed to a Perk that gives IQ+0 competence in one specialty for [1].
Athletics. Defaults to HT-4 or Acrobatics-4. Includes the likes of Swimming, Hiking, Breath Control, and a bunch of others. I've considered dropping/merging it further!
Beast Lore. IQ-6 or Nature Lore-4. Covers the identification, training, riding, and veterinary care of all non-sapient animals. A Perk can be taken for something like Beast Lore(Equines) or Beast Lore(Canines) at attribute level, whether to shave three points off a build or to focus a character's flavor.
Combat Lore. IQ-5. It's Tactics, Strategy, Observation, Forward Observer, Soldier, Savoir-Faire(Military), etc. Considered calling it "Warcraft" but that'd mean a few too many W skills.
Deception. IQ-6, Persuasion-4, or Performance-4. The art of getting what you want through intentional misleading.
Exploration. PR-6 or Nature Lore-4. Includes Cartography, Hiking, Navigation, all Survival specialties, and probably a few other things.
Intimidation. WL-5. The art of getting what you want through a convincing show of force and willingness to do harm. (Should have a Performance and/or Deception default, maybe? Default roll would still be floated to Will).
Investigation. PR-6. This is the skill of looking for and finding stuff, whether that stuff is "hidden in plain sight", in a secret compartment, in a person's pockets, or whatever. Can also be used where Observation would normally be called for.
Lockpicking. DX-6. Per-based rolls can find traps, IQ-based rolls for puzzle-locks and traps, whatever. This is a skill of safely undoing mechanical and sometimes supernatural or metaphorical devices, whether those devices merely keep a barrier closed or cause harm upon activation.
Medicine. IQ-6. All healer-like stuff that isn't an actual healing spell goes here, including Pharmacy and Veterinary.
Merchant. IQ-5. Includes Finance, Accounting, and some other un-dungeony skills. Calls for Per-based rolls to spot or identify some treasures (knowing most gemstones is automatic with this skill), and Will-based rolls for haggling.
Nature Lore. IQ-6, Beast Lore-4, or Exploration-4. Includes Psychology and Physiology for all Animal, Plant, Hybrid, Slime, and Fairy entities as well as Naturalist.
Performance. IQ-6, Deception-4, or Persuasion-4. All entertainment skills, like Singing, Musical Instrument, Stage Combat, and so on. If you just want to sing or play an instrument or two, Perks have you covered even for doing it well.
Persuasion. IQ-6 or Deception-4. Includes Public Speaking, Diplomacy, Teaching, and and whatever else qualifies conditionally as attempting to sway another person to your line of thinking through means that are not coercive (Intimidation) or misleading (Deception). Using this skill in place of Deception doesn't mean you're right, it just means that you aren't disingenuous.
Religion. No default. Includes Theology, Religious Ritual, Exorcism, Physiology/Psychology/Hidden Lore for angels, demons, and dragons. Gives a default of -4 for Psychology of Elder Things.
Sleight of Hand. DX-6, Deception-4, or Performance-4. Includes Pickpocket, Filch, Sleight of Hand, and Holdout.
Stealth. DX-6. I could jokingly say that it's just the basic GURPS skill made a step harder for no reason other than skill difficulty standardization, but it technically includes Shadowing too. I doubt thieves will really be complaining, considering the generous defaults and mergers of so many other skills they'd normally take.
Wizardry. No default. Includes Occultism, Thaumatology, Research, whatever miscellaneous academic skills seem appropriate at the time, and Psychology/Physiology/Hidden Lore for Fairies, Elementals, and Dragons and gives a -4 default on the Physiology of Elder Things.

On Elder Things:
WIZARD: "I can tell you it has a thousand and one tentacles with each a hundred and thirty seven mouths and nine eyes on each tooth of those mouths, and that it has an aversion to quince, but I have no idea how something like that thinks."
PRIEST: "I can tell you it prefers to eat virgins and its own cultists, and that anyone who sacrifices a sapient to it has an equal chance of being rewarded with unholy powers or being eaten along with the sacrifice, and that in theological terms it counts as a mortal rather than a demon. Just a very powerful, very foreign mortal."
WARRIOR: "Don't sacrifice virgins to it and coat my sword in quince juice, got it."

Hidden Lore on Things is...very well hidden. Probably in another spatial dimension of which 3D beings cannot comprehend.

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

This would be nice released as a web page, or downloadable doc; I think a number of GMs would like this simplified approach.

I see at least one GURPS skills placed under more than one of the 30 Skills: Hiking, under both Athletics and Exploration. Is that intentional?

Also, do the categories of Expert Skills, Professional Skills, and all scientific skills go somewhere, or are they left out of the game?

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by tbone (Post 2105707)

This would be nice released as a web page, or downloadable doc; I think a number of GMs would like this simplified approach.

I have my current WIP as a Google Docs file. I'm also pretty sure that at some point I posted these skills and their defaults as their own thread on this forum; there used to be a default between Archery and Spear.

Quote:

Originally Posted by tbone (Post 2105707)

I see at least one GURPS skills placed under more than one of the 30 Skills: Hiking, under both Athletics and Exploration. Is that intentional?

Several skills are included in multiple other skills, and this is quite intentional. Another example is that both Knife and Sword include Shortsword, and how different polearms can be one or more of Spear, Sword, or Hafted weapons. Likewise Veterinary is both Beast Lore and Medical, so you simply roll against the higher of the two when relevant.

Quote:

Originally Posted by tbone (Post 2105707)

Also, do the categories of Expert Skills, Professional Skills, and all scientific skills go somewhere, or are they left out of the game?

I basically decided to just leave those out of the game, and if someone wanted Attribute-level competence in something off the books I'd only charge a Perk, and for an additional +2 after that would be a second Perk (allowing someone with an attribute of 10 to get a professional level for 2 points regardless of the skill's official difficulty).

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

I've also worked to reduce the skill list. I have a post with my house rules here on my blog.

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by ErhnamDJ (Post 2105712)

I've also worked to reduce the skill list. I have a post with my house rules here on my blog.

Yours was actually the inspiration for mine, followed by the proficiency list in D&D 5th Edition.

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by simply Nathan (Post 2105708)

So, I think this is obvious, but just to be sure: If you have both Knife skill and Sword skill, and you wanted to use a shortsword, you'd simply use the higher of Knife and Sword, right? (If "yes": Easy enough! Sounds good.)

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

I'm in favor of restricting the players to GURPS Lite and perhaps one specialized skill, advantage, or disadvantage from the rest of the books. This was a lot easier to do in 3d edition, but it works to focus the players on core skills over esoterica.

On the other hand, we would be remiss if we didn't call your attention to this post from Kromm about the minimum skill set needed for an action campaign.

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Over the weekend, I helped my players draft their new characters. I scheduled a day for character drafting and curating, and the following day for actual campaign play. No one showed up until the day of; needless to say, there wasn't any actual campaign play. Handholding four people that are new to GURPS takes up inordinate amounts of time.

But I digress.

One character is an ATF agent. I gave him Pro: Law Enforcement, but I wasn't able to field questions well regarding its use. I realized that he didn't understand when I looked at his sheet and found he'd dumped his points into the pro skill and failed to purchase any other pertinent skills (Gun, Investigation, Driving, etc).

How do I explain (and understand, I guess), the overlap - where professional skills end and general skills begin? Are there synergy bonuses from your pro skill to skills he might use on the job? Is the pro skill able to replace certain skills entirely by itself (kind of a catch-all), or would that just make it a cheap, versatile (!) skill?

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by FF_Ninja (Post 2105770)

How do I explain (and understand, I guess), the overlap - where professional skills end and general skills begin?

The important thing to remember is that Professional Skills cover only the basics of how to do whatever job they cover. Again, Soldier is an example - it covers several skills, but only for tasks that would get a large bonus when you do them with the other skill. So if your ATF agent wants to actually be good at firing their gun in combat, going through paper trails where someone is actually trying to hide something, or driving their car in a chase, they'll have to put points in Guns (Pistol), Administration, or Driving (Automobile) respectively.

Quote:

Originally Posted by FF_Ninja

Are there synergy bonuses from your pro skill to skills he might use on the job?

It's probably a good idea to let Professional Skill act as a complementary skill to any roll where one of the skills it can stand in for would also work.

If you don't know how complementary skills work, it's pretty simple - to aid another character or yourself, a character proposes a complementary skill, a skill for which success could plausibly aid the main skill. If the GM accepts this, the player rolls the complementary skill (before the main skill is rolled), and if they succeed, they give a +1 bonus to the main skill, or +2 on a critical success. On a failure, however, they impose a -1 penalty, or a -2 on a critical failure.

So, for example, the ATF agent might be trying to get a warrant to search someone's home for weapons. You decide this requires a Law roll. The agent has Law-11, which is a bit low, so they want to help things along by ensuring that all their paperwork is perfectly in order, with all the "i"s dotted and the "t"s crossed, so to speak. This would normally be an Administration roll to complement the main Law roll, but you decide to allow Professional Skill (ATF Agent) to stand in for it, since filling out ATF-related paperwork is definitely within it's wheelhouse.

Quote:

Originally Posted by FF_Ninja

Is the pro skill able to replace certain skills entirely by itself (kind of a catch-all), or would that just make it a cheap, versatile (!) skill?

Generally, a professional skill cannot completely replace other skills, no. As you say, that's the realm of wildcard skills, not something as cheap as a regular average skill. However, the complementary bonuses I mentioned above can come in handy in a lot of circumstances, since Professional Skills do cover a lot of ground, even if it's not very deeply.

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

So, it can work synergistically if you role for it in tandem with the applicable skill - assuming there is overlap. Cool. That helps quite a bit. I'm having loads of other problems with my campaign and my players, but this sorts out at least one small problem I had. Thanks!

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

Quote:

Originally Posted by tbone (Post 2105731)

Yes, and a shortsword wielder who took Knife is worse at parries but faces no penalty for using his sword in the off-hand and gets a default for throwing daggers, while the shortsword wielder with Sword gets better defaults from his main skill to Spear and Hafted, a relative +1 to Parry, and a default for throwing a boomerang.

Re: Tips for avoiding skill bloat; Pro skills

To decrease the number of skills on the character sheets, I encourage them to use Wildcard! skills.