Skills and skill levels for building an army, intelligence service, bureaucracy

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Polydamas

Psychology (Applied) with the main job skill as an assisting roll (probably Soldier for soldiers, PS (Clerk) or Administration for bureaucrats, Armoury for swordsmiths). I see Administration as for dealing with bureaucracies, Intelligence Analysis as long-term and based on diverse sources, and Leadership and Politics as driving your personal relationships with individuals rather than what they do when you aren't around. Leadership might make someone work harder and more carefully, but not change their competence and personality.

Hmmm... that seems to make Psychology (Applied) more important for historical conquerors than most of their other skills. Having Psychology (Applied) at -18 would allow you to almost unerringly pick good tacticians, trainers, tax collectors, administrators, bureaucrats, etc. By contrast, being good at Tactics, Administration or Accounting only makes a difference of +1/-1, with +2/-2 on a critical. In fact, by electing not to roll against the supporting skill, you could even select the best people without knowing a single thing about their area of expertise, which seems to be rather odd.

I'd want skill in the field you are selecting for competence in to matter more than that. Psychology (Applied) might be very good for estimating whether someone is trustworthy in personality, but it should not be able to tell you whether he has any skill at his job.