Reducing the number of weapon skills

[Anthony]

I suggest:

Melee Weapons: DX/H
Covers use of all melee weapons. Optional Speciality: any one weapon type.
Ranged Weapons: DX/VH
Covers use of all ranged weapons. Optional Speciality: any one weapon type.
Unarmed Combat: DX/VH
Covers unarmed combat. Optional Speciality: grappling, slams, striking.

[Anders]

Originally Posted by Anthony

I suggest:

Melee Weapons: DX/H
Covers use of all melee weapons. Optional Speciality: any one weapon type.
Ranged Weapons: DX/VH
Covers use of all ranged weapons. Optional Speciality: any one weapon type.
Unarmed Combat: DX/VH
Covers unarmed combat. Optional Speciality: grappling, slams, striking.

That's a little too radical for my taste, although I could certain see them as Wildcard skills.

[smurf]

You could use exclamation skills like Sword!?

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by smurf

You could use exclamation skills like Sword!?

Wildcard skills are based on the presumption that regular skills are properly priced, which is mostly false; there's a fundamental problem when training more than 2% of all skills is worse than raising attributes, and deleting 90% of them would be a good start.

[AlexanderHowl]

That is due to the benefits that come from taking skills. I find that reducing specific skill penalties by one for every 4 CP invested in a skill (and specific technique penalties by one for every 1 CP invested in a technique) tends to encourage people to purchase skills (defaults are not considered penalties). That way, a character with DX 10 who spends 44 CP on Karate receives a much better result than a character with DX 18 who spends 12 CP on Karate.

[Gnome]

I already have a problem with weapon skills being very cheap to raise as opposed to DX, where a fighter with DX 10 and Broadsword-25 can easily defeat almost any opponent, despite spending "only" 60 points for the privilege of being the greatest. Capping points allowed in one skill or requiring UB above a certain level can fix this, and there are other fixes as well, but in my mind making a more general skill for the same cost exacerbates this issue. Part of the problem might come from the fact that skill gives you better attacks, better defenses, and even the potential to do more damage (by targeting locations), so there's really a lot in that one package of melee weapon skill. Further separating these components would be a more radical change...

Perhaps there is room for something in between a basic GURPS skill and a Bang! skill? Like a "highly general" skill that costs double instead of triple?

[Anders]

Originally Posted by Gnome

I already have a problem with weapon skills being very cheap to raise as opposed to DX, where a fighter with DX 10 and Broadsword-25 can easily defeat almost any opponent, despite spending "only" 60 points for the privilege of being the greatest. Capping points allowed in one skill or requiring UB above a certain level can fix this, and there are other fixes as well, but in my mind making a more general skill for the same cost exacerbates this issue. Part of the problem might come from the fact that skill gives you better attacks, better defenses, and even the potential to do more damage (by targeting locations), so there's really a lot in that one package of melee weapon skill. Further separating these components would be a more radical change..

I mean, if you want to separate the components - feel free. An old Swedish RPG had separate skills for attacking and parrying, to reflect whether your style was offensive or defensive. It was an interesting idea.

And I would not allow a person to buy up a skill to DX+15, unless I was running an over-the-top campaign.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Gnome

I already have a problem with weapon skills being very cheap to raise as opposed to DX..

While this is true, reducing the number of melee weapon skills won't change that -- people already only pick a single melee weapon skill to focus on, because raising multiple redundant melee weapon skills is almost completely useless.

[Anders]

Originally Posted by Anthony

While this is true, reducing the number of melee weapon skills won't change that -- people already only pick a single melee weapon skill to focus on, because raising multiple redundant melee weapon skills is almost completely useless.

This is my experience as well. They then build a monstrous combo-weapon that will allow them to deal cr, cut and impaling damage. :)

[kirbwarrior]

Originally Posted by Gnome

Part of the problem might come from the fact that skill gives you better attacks, better defenses, and even the potential to do more damage (by targeting locations), so there's really a lot in that one package of melee weapon skill.

Remember to add 'if they have the right tool' to all of this. They have to have a (say) sword to be able to attack and parry with, they have to be facing enemies that get in melee and have weapons that can be parried, and if they have only one weapon skill they can't easily upgrade to whatever treasure they find in dungeons or stores. No amount of Broadsword is going to matter against bow-wielding birds. Without the right expensive advantages, you can't parry with arrows or bullets. And unarmed skills have even worse range with further limitations (Brawling and Boxing have poor parry options, Karate is affected by encumbrance, grappling is just a difficult and long affair).

If one skill is enough to dominate, then I'd assume the GM is letting it. Is that broadsword user going to have a ready blade when the batlord crashes a fancy dance? Is the user going to be able to fight off diffuse enemies? Will they see the traps in between them and the ogre? And this is all assuming that dealing lethal damage is even the goal!

The literal one skill I see easily abused in my campaigns at high levels is Stealth. And because I'm almost entirely under control of what situations can be solved with or even need Stealth, I don't have an issue with it. Every other skill has limitations of some kind built into them.

On topic, I think it's fine. I could see bumping them all a difficulty level and letting the RAW skills become specialties. And on the note of Bang! skills I think the weapon ones are also pretty bad. Sword! just doesn't cover that much compared to other ones. And is pretty poor compared to Weapon Talent [15] which is itself poor compared to DX [20].