[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Gnome

Other people are allowed to have opinions on what's fun and what isn't without it being badwrongfunism.

Sure. But the words "point crock" bring a negative association. You aren't saying "I think that way is unfun" you're saying "Doing it that way is wrong".

The problem with custom Talents that perfectly match a character's skill list is that it messes with balance between characters and forces decisions into a narrower band.

How?

By doing so you're literally opening up the playing field. Instead of every Survivor having First Aid, Knot-Tying, Naturalist, Scrounging, and Survival; that might describe one, but the next one might have First Aid, Naturalist, Navigation, Survival, and Tracking!

Literally broadened the field!

Forest Guardian is an example of a Talent that can potentially produce this problem. If I'm making a DF Scout, I'm stabbing myself in the foot by not making him a Wood Elf with max levels of Forest Guardian.

Really? I'm partial to Halfling Scouts myself. And I keep thinking longingly about an Ogre Scout*... and Troll makes for an excellent Scout.

This creates less variety among characters...

You literally just described playing with Templates.

I think this is what I mean when I describe a "point crock." A build that's so much better than rival options that everyone will want to use it.

Except you're whiteboarding. I've never seen this happen. Even with Combat Reflexes. Yes, an large number of combat oriented PCs end up with it, but I've two combat centric Characters and I'm not considering it for either (okay, I'm considering it solely for the +6 to mental stun recovery, but at 15 points it's a tough one to save for when so many other things are 4 or less points at a time. Also when Resistant to Stun +8 costs only 8 points and benefits physical stun).

Some "point crock" advantages, like Combat Reflexes, are ok because they do less to pigeonhole or define the character.

+4 to a group of skills is neither 'pigeonhole' nor 'definition'.

Now, as GM I suppose you could just say "yes" and allow everyone to invent Talents as they see fit. If everyone gets the point crock it's no longer a point crock!

Then why are you arguing against what I'm saying. That is exactly what I'm saying.

Except the 'point crock' nonsense.

But some character types will benefit a lot more from this type of point crock than others, and so I think you still might get complaints...

Not once have I gotten a complaint. Everyone benefits equally.

Okay, I suppose the Character whose build precludes ever having skills might not benefit... but I've also never seen that Character.

And there are drawbacks to bumping up skills using Talents, but that mostly falls onto combat skills. I've been trying to think of ways to get the same desire to get to "Attribute +2" with non-combat skills but I'm been coming up pretty dry so far.



* ST 27 Longbow? Yeah, that person in the back knows what I'm talking about.