Talents & Martial Arts

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

He's going to want his best combat skills at DX+2 or more. Just one pt in other DX-based skills might well be enough. If that's still too much use Dabbler.

Yes, but why would we use Dabbler to represent a skill that the character canonically has trained in and is adequate at, even when using it Per-based and IQ-based?

Ser Barristan Selmy is described as someone with a gift for swordsmanship (and all other fighting, apparently) and he has trained it for all his life, but he still has other skills. His DX isn't just the basis for his fighting skills, so it makes little sense to artificially inflate it just because they are really high.

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

As to why custom Talents are bad it's not so much that they're "bad" as they are _whiny_. "I want a character who's good at a lot of DX-based Skills without having a high DX and I want it to be cheap too! So change the rules until I can get what I want!" irritates me.

Talents are official and in the rules. Asking for a character that mechanically conforms to the description given does not strike me as 'whiny', it strikes me as what players are supposed to do with the character creation system.

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

There's usually a better, simpler answer elsewhere in the rules.

Only if one is willing to represent someone really good at a given niche with something else than the canonical rules artifact to represent such characters.