Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

And should people with young dependents (especially babies) have to take it?

It would consist of various elements of Science: nutrition, Psychology, Diplomacy, possibly Bard (bed time stories) and similar stuff and would be used to keep the very young dependent alive, get them to sleep and, for older ones to get them to go along with what you're doing...

I'd make it an Easy skill, though, and possibly even default to IQ.

Any thoughts?

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

If it is important to the campaign (meaning it will affect the outcome of the story and the PCs ability to influence that outcome), sure, go for it. But that would be a very offbeat campaign...

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

It just seems to me that if the PC has taken a baby as a disadvantage (-36) then they should put a lot of effort into looking after it.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

My thoughts ? Come here closer so I can put my parenting hands around your neck ;) I think you just gave me the Berkserk Disadvantage when you evaluated it as an Easy skill :)

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Intimidation, Fast-Talk, Observation, Carpentry, Urban Survival...

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Sounds like an Expert Skill. Alternately you could just treat it as a professional skill.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

And some First Aid!

Mostly parenting is not learnt by intensive study or instruction but through having bit and pieces passed from friends and family, and usually it is based on a lot of 'common sense' stuff that people tend to pick up through life - so an Easy skill and also a pretty easy default, and also no really terrible results from a failed roll - except when looking after a newborn maybe.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Shouldn't that kind of thing be covered by the Housekeeping skill?

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

In my opinion it's definitely easier than, say, Administration or Architecture, both Average skills...

...but then of course, if we imagine that Parenting is actually Average or Hard (based on how tough it is to learn Animal Handling or Diplomacy) then we must assume that most parents have fairly low Parenting skill and that possibly society as we know it is the result of a lot of failled skill rolls!

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

That skill seems to cover mostly cleaning, cooking and minor repairs, rather than sucessfully influencing the behaviour of young ones, and looking after helpless babies.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

I am very efficient and fast when I am working on our home - I have some improved default or a couple of points in housekeeping - but when I'm dealing with my daughter, I'm far, far behind my wife... Also, I do not agree that it is an easy skill :)

Cheers

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

There already is a Parenting skill, at least in previous editions. It's called 'Professional skill: childrearing' (IQ/A). See the GURPS Car Warriors stats for 'Emily Caruthers' on p 32. [SJG 6402, 1987]

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Parenting is a skill, but most people have it at default.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Not necessarily - an infant dependant can be (and in many cases was historically and still is) left in the care of a wet nurse, nanny or indeed, spouse and still remain a liability as a target for enemies.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

I don't have the slightest problem with that thought... I actually consider it very realistic.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Concur. This is something that CAN be trained up, but most people don't bother. I'd say it is Hard or Average, but defaults to something favorable. I should note: I don't have kids (yet), but worked in child care for several years and that's what I'm basing my opinion on. Few parents take classes on developmental psychology or infant CPR or whatever and just sort of do whatever their parents did with them +/- what their partner's parents did with them.

Another way to look at it would be that most parents (beyond new parents) have one point in Childrearing and also a quirk-level delusion "I am a very skilled parent." ;)


Ben

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

I'm going to try to "reverse engineer" from the fact that there isn't a Child Care skill in the 4th edition rules...

This suggests that child care is treated as part of IQ (and Will and Perception and...). This is not to say that taking care of children is not hard work (trust me, fellow gamers, if you don't have children...being a parent is the hardest, best work you will ever do), but the actual tasks--heating up fish sticks in a toaster oven, telling a story, playing Candyland, changing diapers, handling basic discipline like time outs, fielding questions about why Mr. Squirrel had to die or why that lady over there is so fat, etc.--are mostly common sense things anyone can do without special training, education, etc.

Someone who is an "expert" (e.g., Jo in Supernanny, etc.) probably has an optional specialty of Teaching (Early Education) and/or Psychology (Child Behavior).

I suppose if you have to treat it as a skill, it would be a Professional Skill, with a default of IQ-5, but most tasks are routine (+4), so anyone can do them at IQ-1. Someone with one point of skill (IQ-2) would now be able to handle those routine tasks at skill+4 or IQ+2.

I hope this helps.

Mark

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

I used it in my Transhuman Space campaign, and one of the PCs sank a fair number of points in it over the course of the campaign, to help deal with his 11-year-old daughter. I made it a standard professional skill. But it wasn't focused on household tasks (there are already skills for that) or on diagnosis. Often it was used as an influence skill.

Bill Stoddard

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Expert skills are book knowledge types of thing. If there was ever a skill that is not reducible to book knowledge, it's parenting!

Bill Stoddard

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

I would rules wise related like an IQ version of Brawling. In the the way 'untrained' rules for it work. because like Brawling it is not truly untrained, but picked up by going thrown the process themselves. and like the Brawling skill can benefit from additional training.

and continuing the analogy 'parenting' relates to Psychology the way Brawling relates to Karate.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

I would buy that more if I didn't regularly see parents obviously not getting the basic discipline thing right.

Here's a couple of bits from my campaign:

"Gianni takes Constanza home, prepares dinner, and then talks with her about the memetic crisis. In the course of the evening, he gets in touch with Fred’s father and learns that Fred didn’t make it—his brain had been oxygen starved too long and he was flatlined. There was a small chance that he might be uploadable, but as the family is Traditionalist Catholic, that’s not an option. So Gianni has to break the news to Constanza, who is upset and angry, and wants to know why God didn’t protect Fred—a question Gianni can’t really answer."

"Early in the morning, not long after he drops Constanza off at her weekend playgroup, Gianni gets a call from the Montréal Child Welfare Agency. The caller, an SAI named Adrian, asks if Gianni wishes to view some video of his daughter’s recent activities. When he agrees, he gets to view images of his daughter talking, mildly flirtatiously, with a slightly older boy, and smoking a cigarette while she does so. Closer attention to the details shows that it’s his own brand, and it doesn’t look like her first cigarette.

Gianni is taken aback. Adrian assures him that the Child Welfare Agency does not plan to take further action; their role in such incidents is simply to notify the parents. Adrian is willing to refer Gianni to someone else in the agency if he feels a need for advice. Gianni thanks him, but isn’t interested. Instead he calls Blake, and asks her to explain to him why Constanza’s implant didn’t notify him. Blake suggests calling the implant privately and asking it.

. . .

Gianni talks with Constanza about her smoking; she apparently is expecting this, presumably because Terpsichore warned her earlier that weekend, and seems a bit ill at ease all day. She tells Gianni that she thought it looked cool, and one of the characters she played in a virtual realm smoked, and she wanted to do it in the real world; she pointed out that there are filter lungs like her father’s and nanotech lung scrubbers, so what was the problem? Gianni isn’t moved, and she finally backs down. She asks him to stop using Terpsichore to monitor what she does, because it makes her feel that he doesn’t trust her; he points out that his trusting her got him a call from the Child Welfare Department."

In both cases it was mainly an influence/psychology type of thing, and thus a specialized human relations skill. The physical tasks are mostly trivial by comparison, I think.

Bill Stoddard

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

This sounds like a really cool campaign.

I'm still not sure the actual conversations would require Professional Skill (Child Care) as opposed to simple IQ rolls. However, the way I set it up in my example, you could do it either way...not having the skill doesn't mean you'll totally foul up as a parent, because most tasks are routine, but having the skill would let you tackle difficult situations more easily. (If the parent does not take time to calm down and think things through, the flirting and cigarette thing might be at a penalty because it was a bit of a shock. But one could handle this either as a penalty to the IQ roll or as +0 skill task rather than a +4 routine skill task.)

Mark

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Actual that my point of mechanically treating it like the brawling skill. With no points in the skill throwing a punch default to DX, But if you put points into it you can do better.

if you don put points inot the parenting skill your rolling on IQ, but if you study/train you can get better than IQ

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

I seem to remember a thread some time back where someone suggested it was a specialty of Animal Handling.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Ideas.

"Parenting" is a far more complicated skill that, I humbly suggest, is not well understood.
One part is Diplomacy, to get people to do what you want.
One part is Leadership, to get others to follow you.
One part is Teaching, to instruct others. Assuming you have something to teach...
Varying parts of Fast Talk and Persuade, Suggest, Sway Emotions mixed in.

Animal Handling might be a starting point (no offense intended). But "Parenting" has far 'softer' goals than learning a trick, and a far smarter target.

I suggest no specific skill is warranted. Use skill relevant to the situation.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

That works. How is persuading a child to concentrate on working towards their goals and not screw up their life any different to doing the same with an employee, a member of your squad or any other person you have authority over? It's basically the same skill as you would use on an adult, it's just that when applied to a child the task difficulty modifier will be very favourable to you because you have significantly more familiarity with and control over a child than you would most adults.

This means that most people will be able to get by with default rolls, those with good social skills (or just good attributes to base their social skills off) will generally be slightly better parents than average, people with exceptionally bad social skills (whether from low attributes or disadvantages) will be worse than average at raising children and some parents could justify putting a couple of points into skills like Leadership or Teaching (or the Dabbler perk for such skills) simply from being parents.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Bardic influence is supernatural, my parents at least seemed pretty mundane.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

This is why I favor having Professional Skill: Parenting. My character was the one in whswhs's THS campaign with the daughter.

By basing it on good social skills, then James Bond makes the best parent ever...but an average frumpy person...not so much.

You make it PS: Parenting, and with the bonus to routine tasks most people do okay off of default...and then over time they learn that skill a bit through OJT. If PS: Housekeeping is a skill, then PS: Parenting is definitely kosher as a skill.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

If you want to decide whether Parenting or Childrearing is Easy, Average, Hard, or whatever, work backward.

Most people learn it as they go. How many hours of self-study does it take to get proficient at it? How many hours per day does one practice it?* After years of raising children, how good at it does the average person become? Do the math and work it out.

How often do you do roll against Parenting? Daily? Hourly? Weekly?

*Note: I'm not saying "how many hours a day are you a parent," because the answer is 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Obviously, you aren't actually using your parenting skills for all 24 hours: part of the time you are working, sleeping, shopping, cleaning, and whatnot. If everybody got 24 hours of credit for "Parenting self-study" every day, then every parent could put 21 character points per year into it (if they had 21 points to spend, of course). By the time the kid is 18, the parents could spend 394 points in Parenting. Frankly, most people just aren't that good at it.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Agreed on both counts. As the father of three (and one of those is disabled), caring for children and housekeeping are not the same thing (although there could be some limited overlap) and it is definately not an Easy skill.

Agreed here also. My wife and I actually discussed child rearing options as much as we could ahead of time and (based on everyone's comments about our children being exceptionally behaved and adjusted) I think it worked well. I also suspect that most parents -to-be in the modern world don't do this and that this leads to exactly what Lazlo_woodbine and walkir mention above.

I definately love this analogy!

Again I must agree, and the bit about James Bond is a very humorous way to illustrate the point. :)

Fish's observations also make a addition to this, IMO it is an Average or Hard skill personally, definately not something that would be considered Easy.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Perhaps it is a career skill, like crewman and soldier. Something like Parenting, IQ/A, default IQ-5, Psych-4, Leadership-3, Intimidation-3, etc
It allows you to do the stuff needed to get by... Some folk are talented, some are dedicatedly skillful, others are uncaring, un"educated" or simply inept (antitalent?).

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Okay, I've read through the whole thread. And while I have no children, I am from a family where 3-to-6 children is the norm, so I have a lot of baby-sitting experience and second-hand child-rearing tales. Think of me as an informed layman.

From a game perspective, the child-care itself relies on a lot of skills. The simplest approach is to look at the description for the Soldier skill

I think the Parenting skill would work the same. Although I think it would be Will/A or HT/A rather than IQ/A. A lot of parenting depends more on willingness to be a parent rather than thinking things through. (As a cousin of mine once said "If I thought this through, I wouldn't have six kids!")

EDIT: jacobmuller posted just as I did. But we seem to be thinking along the same lines.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Parenting is a skill with specialization by age.

Infant - Defaults to Vet, biology, Medicine etc
The simplest to take care of, but most delicate stage.

Child - Defaults to Animal Handling
Reasonably sturdy and Still fairly simple to take care of. Motor skills are still relatively poor as are Communication Skills

Teen - Defaults to Psychological Warfare/Interrogation/Espionage
Tempestuous and requiring signifigant time/money investment this is largely the 'Final Exam' of parenting


Adult - .....You'll know as soon as I do :)

Daughter = 18
Son = 17

Nymdok

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Parenting seems to follow the course of:

First child - everything is a threat. You 'safety'-blitz everything and everyone. When the child gets a bruise you scream for blood because they slipped and fell while running in the house and we wind up with plastic coated, rounded corner worlds. This is also the stage at which you dutifully record every first, even cutting a lock of hair off the baby and putting it in a scrapbook or something.

Second child - still a bit of the first, but now that you realize you can make more the safety thing isn't such a big issue. Some things about early life are recorded, but not much.

Third and beyond - When you see your kids running along the fence top or jumping from the roof into a pile of leaves you can be heard to shout, "Put some shoes on!" Nothing is recorded.

That's parenting in a nutshell... or at least from my experience. TV did most of my upbringing.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

The thing is that people who have good social skills generally still experience raising that first child as a new and challenging task. And lots of people acquire expertise in it who don't thereby become superb at dealing with more general social situations. I suppose you could model it as a bunch of optional specializations of things like Fast-Talk and Diplomacy, but I think it's easier to put it all together.

Bill Stoddard

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

That's the default rolls. . . .

Bill Stoddard

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

What if they are refugees taking care of someone in the middle of the wilderness? This would be very likely to come up in a game.

What if they are an elder sibling who has little to do with running the house but much to do with taking care of the young'uns?

What if they are a babysitter?

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Think about it as a modelling problem
A PC is interacting with an NPC is a multitude of different ways over a huge time span, at least 10 years.

Would you really want to model that with a single skill?

To save time and energy you might fudge it with a single roll, but would that feel right?

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

As I was reading, I think I had this thought. You could model it in a similar way to reading/writing; basically optional specialties. The default specialty for Fast Talk is (adults), say. And so parents need Fast Talk(children) and, later, Fast Talk(teenagers) or however you want to break it down. It default to the other specialties favorably, but that way, Mr. Bond still sucks at talking to an eight year old or whatever. Seems very complex.


Ben

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

If you take that approach I would give you a TDM that would off set or be worse than the bonus you would get for familiarity. While Children are individual people they are not mini adults

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

I like the idea of a Parenting skill along the lines of Soldier for much the similar reasons: it does not involve any terrible expertise in one area, but it does respresent a substantial amount of general knowledge can add up to a useful sum. Most people learn "good enough" skills in a wide variety of areas ranging from First Aid to nutrition for children to Psychology (Child). Similarly to Soldier, it usually consists of some basic training followed by tons of intense learning in field conditions.

A few tasks Parenting might relate to:
- Plan a week's worth of lunches.
- Prepare a child for a field trip.
- Deal with a tantrum.
- Deal with your child striking another child.
- Change a diaper.
- Determine who poured a pound of sugar into your kitchen floor.
- Operate a baby monitor, TV parental settings, or an electronic thermometer.
- Get a child into a bathbub.
- Get a child out of a bathtub.
- Try to horse-sense whether your child might have an emotional disturbance or learning disorder.

Supernanny would have something more like the Nanny! skill.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Consider that there also isn't a "fighting" skill or a "make music" skill in GURPS; in each case, there's a collection of related-but-different skills, and a trained fighter or music-maker needs to know a little bit of many members of the skill family.

I believe it's the same with child-rearing - there isn't a "child care" skill because there's a lot of skills that a child-care specialist needs to know. Many of them have already been mentioned, some haven't.

The list includes (but isn't limited to) Teaching, First Aid, Bard (to keep the youngster's attention), Expert Skill: Nutrition, Expert Skill: Hazardous Materials Handling (the skill used when "childproofing" the home), Observation ("where did the little... darling put the car keys this time?"), and Detect Lies...

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Well, maybe. James Bond is pretty good at socially manipulating adults, and probably would be able to somewhat apply that ability to children.

But I'm fairly sure parenting is not just about being able to talk children into doing what you want. Bond isn't noted for his ability to understand or care for others, is he?

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Bond has Callous, he just hides it well with his social skills.

And, yes, I'd hate to see him act as a babysitter.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Back in the 3e world, there is "Mythic Babysitting" in GURPS All-star Jam 2004. I did a quick skim and didn't see a parenting skill, but it does mention Professional Skill (Babysitting; M/A).

Still available in both dead tree and enslaved electron models.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Plus, for a good few years the child doesn't have what we think of as social skills. I know a couple of HR professionals with scads of training in reading and manipulating adults who came completely unstuck when faced with small children.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Several people have mentioned this and, besides social skills, I think this is a good example of a skill that would be way different for an audience of kids than an audience of adults. I can enthrall a group of three-year-olds pretty well... I'm not certain you want me reading a book to you. It wouldn't be offensive, but probably uninspiring.

I think I like the Soldiering-style "Parenting" skill for a couple of reasons:
1) It's simple (unlike specialties or new, separate skills)
2) It's specific (unlike Bard or Psychology as generalizations)
3) It's general (This isn't a contradiction, I mean in the sense that if you didn't take Hazardous Materials Handling, you can still child-proof some Clorox).
4) It fits easily into the background of a non-parenting-focused campaign.

If your campaign is all about being a parent complete with modeling the fatigue from missed sleep because of your new born and such, then maybe you should, indeed, look into inventing a suite of separate related skills to handle all the different tasks a parent is often required to do. However, if your campaign is about anything besides that, I'd think a Parenting skill will give you something to roll against without getting terribly in the way and let the role play get on.


Ben

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Pretty much, yes. In my Transhuman Space campaign, I used Parenting rolls to represent spotting what was going on with the kid and influencing her actions, more than for anything else. This meant that a character who wasn't all that brilliant at social behavior generally and didn't have a big repertoire of skills could learn to do this one thing through experience.

Bill Stoddard

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

I agree with OneSeventeen's logic. Parenting is a tiny toe-dip in the shallow end of a vast number of skills, just as is Soldier.

A parent knows how to child-proof a home, moving dangerous toxic agents out of reach (eg, bleach, antifreeze, lye, etc) without needing to know the actual chemical nature of those agents — and without necessarily knowing how to identify, store, or dispose of other toxic substances (eg, spent nuclear fuel rods, nerve gas). A parent learns how to teach a small child (to speak, to ride a bicycle, to tie his shoes, to dress himself, to be polite, and so forth) but isn't necessarily qualified to be a teacher in a public-school setting (eg, History, Music, Calculus, Biology, Chemistry, etc).

The trouble with Parenting as a skill is trying to determine its precise effects. How often do you roll? What happens if you fail, what happens if you fail critically? What modifiers apply? On what stat do you base it?

As for that last, there are a few possibilities. An IQ-based skill seems to cover the broad strokes of parental knowledge and strength of character, but it leaves out non-human races who teach (and learn) through instinct and perception. A Will-based skill seems appropriate for discipline. A Per-based skill might be more appropriate for animals.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Like other professional skills, it is IQ based, and like other GURPS skills in general you can always float to other bases if the situation calls for it.

And determining the precise effects for Professional Skill: Parenting is the same as Professional Skill: Soldier, or any other number of broader GURPS skills. A lot of that has to do with GM style. Some GM's make players roll all the time for things...other GM's rarely. Some GMs use TDMs extensively...other GMs not so often. Failure and Crit Fails depend on the situation and what you are doing.

I think a number of GURPS skills are a bit loose and should be so. It allows for different play styles and for flexibility in situations.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Yes, I think Parenting is something that requires skill, and no, I don't agree that it is Easy. Judging from the number of people who seem to be terrible, incompetent parents who feed their children garbage, or never discipline them, or else discipline infants by shaking them to death, or let their children wander into traffic, or leave poisonous chemicals within easy reach, or just leave their children in front of the TV 24/7, it is a skill that people need to learn from other adults.

It should probably have an IQ default.

Is it worthwhile using it as a Skill in GURPS? Only if it is important to the campaign. It might be interesting to have a campaign lasting many in-game years in which PCs are required to raise into responsible adulthood the willful, semi-divine or super-powered children who will be necessary to save humanity from some prophesied disaster.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

I like the idea of a Parenting skill that works like Soldier.

I'd say that in many situations, you'd roll the higher of Parenting or (appropriate skill). So if you have high Psychology or Intimidation skills, you can use those when appropriate, but they won't make you a super-parent. Likewise, Parenting should probably take penalties for the age of the subject; teens are notoriously difficult to deal with, and Parenting skill ought to be all-but-useless on adults.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Easy doesn't mean it's a picnic, just that it's something human beings tend to pick up with a certain level of natural readiness. I'm going to be optimistic and say most people have the capacity to learn Parenting pretty well using their common sense and instincts.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Most parents don't learn generic parenting. They learn parenting (their kids) a very limited form.
Dealing with my severe anxiety and complete social incompetence did not train my mom for my brother's promisuity and complete lack of common sense. Neither trained for my youngest brother's superb manipulation skills, or his near lack of empathy.
My mom would be completely untrained for dealing with girls.
Dealing with a specific group of people shouldn't fall under one single skill, in my opinion.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Most parents probably simply do what their parents did, with some consciously chosen differences. That's not a skill, but more like rote repetition.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Not that is a skill, the follows a sertial tradition. That like saying some that someone learning Karate does not have a skill because they jut doing what the senssei did, because they did not learn Kung-fu

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

I adopted it for my Transhuman Space campaign because one of the PCs had an eleven-year-old daughter, and we kept running into questions where it made sense to have such a skill. That's generally true of any Professional Skill.

Bill

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

True: but there are exceptions for skills that cross wide boundaries of individual ability. Sex Appeal and Erotic Art, for instance; also Musical Composition and Musical Instrument.

I make this argument because if Parenting were one skill, it would be very easy to become good at it over 18 years — I've already pointed out how quickly those hours of self-study stack up — whereas if it were two skills, based on two different stats, not quite so much.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

But not so quick when you consider it is not so much self study in most cases, but on the job training.

and those exaction you gave are on another stat because that the primary state those skills uses. And with parenting most usages are IQ--deftly not HT. HT bases skill are endurance type physical skills, parenting is primarily metal based

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

I didn't give IQ and HT as an example, I gave IQ and Will. I can see the possibility for a parent with a high Will but a low IQ having good disciplinary skills but poor in other tasks.

Furthermore, as I said, an IQ-only skill doesn't take into account the universal nature of parenting. What about a family of dogs, who have IQ under 6?

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

I have an 8-month old who's just starting to get mobile...endurance is definitely used...Especially with teething and 3am bottle feedings involved...

I am a proponent of using Professional Skill: Parenting, as well.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Discipline is only a small part of it. and your example still work exactly the way you saying you want to example to run, when one of the time Will is more import you float it to Will. rhe reas of the time they not as good becuase it back at IQ.

the same way when you need to do maintenance on you gun you float you guns skill to IQ eve though most of the other usages are DX

Actually it does take to take into acco u low IQ. it to a TL skill. ans Dog parrent is far less compex

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Well no more endice than many other jobs lot Police and Soldier, that long job hourst where fitness help 8)

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Raising a dog is of course different from raising a person. People vary far more in the means by which they live.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

In my experience it's Physical (Strength) Hard and requires specialization for each child. I think for mothers the stat might be Health but fatherhood seems to be primarily about lifting and carrying.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Fatherhood is not that different from motherhood (with the major exceptions of not birthing and not breastfeeding, naturally). (I am speaking on this as the father of three...)

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Of course it is — but if a dog's Parenting skill is IQ based, with an IQ as low as 5, it's going to fail constantly.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Except it is an easier task than raising human kids then there will be a TDM bonus. They will fail constantly to raising human kids you are right. Peter Pan aside dogs make bad nannies

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Not everyone develops this skill. Some people just depend on their defaults and try to skate by. But I think the majority of parents probably acquire a point or two over the course of 18 years and have at least some observations to offer the next generation.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Well, we haven't had a dog president yet have we now?

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

That would depend on the arrangements. In a Waltons style family the father is the Papa Wolf and the mother is the Caretaker(to use TV tropes language) and each plays second fiddle on the other's turf. Mommy would handle housework making clothes and cooking while daddy would teach his boys how to chop wood, pound fenceposts, shoot a gun, and beat-up someone who is picking on his little brother.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Right... you are describing fatherhood (i.e. one man's approach... or many men's approach) vs Fatherhood (what is allowed/able to be). I didn't mean to imply (nor do I think that I did) that any given approach described wasn't fatherhood, just that it wasn't the end all/be all.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Now using Parenting as Influence Skill (Minors) the following situational modifiers (from easy to hard):

• Your Kid (your younger family member)
• Your Kid's friends (or Students for Teachers and club members for Youth group leaders)
• Random minor

Which level would you use +0 for? [hence the other levels would be -n or +n relative to it]

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

I think I'd go with the second. Your kids is routine almost by definition, but kids that aren't yours but are your responsibility, that's not part of an ordinary day for most people, but is something that could pop up in lots of adventure stories, and the +0 level is supposed to be for an adventuring activity.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Pro Skill: Parenting TL

I'll argue TL based on diapers. Do they exist? How do you put them on? What do you do after removing? For older kids, net usage is a good example of a modern issue. Education to toilet training vary by TL.

Fair to say most people are defaulting or using minimal skill. This is okay, as mostly activities are:
Routine: +4
Extreme individual familiarity : +2?
Recognized sense of duty and or mutual loyalty: +2?
Multiple children: -1 per

Most people roll vs 13 for their own kids.
People who have dedicated time or study to the skill roll against 17.
People with larger household probably leverage older kids as assistants to mitigate the load.

I'd argue that neglect or disassociation sacrifices familiarity, and other tragic circumstances can eliminate the loyalty bonus.

Importantly, some parenting tasks are limited by the parent's skill. A parent with a Parenting skill of 20, but no skill in Housekeeping or Accounting, would fail at teaching a child about handling money. Of course, with a skill of 20, they'd probably find someone who could teach such an important life lesson.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

The Netherlands Government is really considering a test for people who want to become parents. They see how many families have failed in teaching their kids morale, etiquette, hospitality and other important abilities needed for living in a free, democratic community.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

Some people are better at it then others. There is a reason so many teenage parents think it necessary to outsource to adopters and it is not in all cases just because they are to slothful to do the work.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

The vast majority of parents simply parent the way their parents parented them. It takes effort and education to break any cycle they wish broken.

Or of course personal problems and "flaws" can add new screw ups to the mix like addictions, or external cultural influences.

My grandfather was racist, sexist, homophobic, and not kind to animals. My father wanted to be the opposite, so bought us boy and girl toys, pets, and spoke kindly of many strangers.

But honestly, what even counts as a Parenting success versus critical failure would be very subjective.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

that was much like I was thinking, but I wasn't sure if the zero level would still require some familiarity with the minor in question or it was less a matter that you know the minor or wither the minor see you as a position of somewhat authority, as a Peer's Parent, a Teacher or a Group Leader, hence putting the random minor as the baseline and the getting bonus for both familiarity and/or for authority figure. [not that the authority alone is enough hence the skill]

But that still leaves the question of magnitude of the various modifiers.

Where a counter argument is while tech helps, making it a TL skill bars it from those with a racial IQ of 6 or less.

Re: Should there be a 'parenting' skill?
 

And I'd argue that there is no evidence that any species with a racial IQ of 6 or less has ever successfully taught their children about Internet usage and the limits thereof. Or used diapers, either.