[Basic] Skills of the week: Bicycling, Driving and Piloting

[Otaku]

Originally Posted by RyanW

The important thing to remember is that typical is not a synonym of average.

I double checked on dictionary.com and while it isn't a synonym... it is the second definition listed:

Originally Posted by dictionary.com

2. a typical amount, rate, degree, etc.; norm.

While my English is disappointingly inaccurate far too often, I do make some effort to communicate correctly. I'd make a joke about using my native tongue of gibberish but... well... being an RPG board people might think I was serious. ;)

[Gold & Appel Inc]

Take it as novelty, character study, point-squeezing practice, a source of colorful characters to "power up" to the point level of your next campaign, or what-have-you, The Lowballa Thread is completely awesome and my all-time favorite thread here (other than the unintelligent, "Nobody Has Erotic Art!" and, "What Does Average Mean!?" arguments around its start, which should be skipped entirely), and I recommend it to everyone.

[johndallman]

It's taken me far too long to realise that Equipment Bond definitely should be usable with vehicles.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by johndallman

It's taken me far too long to realise that Equipment Bond definitely should be usable with vehicles.

Oh, absolutely. I just wrote up a character for my fantasy campaign and gave him Equipment Bond for the penteconter he commands. . . .

Bill Stoddard

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by Not

How many skill points are equivalent to a standard deviation then?

What makes you think it's meaningful - i.e. that the distribution is in any way smooth enough that knowing what one deviation is tells you anything about where to find anything else.

Still, for those numbers, a normal distribution with mean 25 and deviation 50 doesn't work too badly: 6.7% at -50 or less, 6.7% at 100 or more, beginning adventurers at 250 will be about 1 person in 1000 - the most impressive people in their town but not unbelievable yet. Six in 1000 are worse off than the most severe version of Terminally Ill, which if all of them were due to people who were going to die this month would mean life expectancy was about 14 years, but then there are all those people who are in bad enough shape we say death would be a mercy but who don't die.... Seems close enough.

[RogerBW]

Resurrecting this thread to consider specifically the (Half-Track) specialisation. Per RAW, this is Driving (Tracked)-2 or other Driving-4.

As I understand it, the primary reason for the invention of the half-track was that it got you most of the benefits of a tracked vehicle, but it could be driven by people who hadn't been trained in Driving (Tracked). (I'm thinking here of machines like the Sd.Kfz. 251, the classic "Hanomag" of WWII.)

I therefore find myself distinctly inclined to give it a more generous default, maybe adding (Wheeled)-2 to make it look more like a familiarity penalty.

Anyone with experience of driving the things who'd like to weigh in?