What's the highest skill level you've ever had for a PC or NPC?

[AlexanderHowl]

Look at Space, penalties regularly exceed -12.

[Phantasm]

Bow at 30, for a 1000 pt super-archer loaded with imbuements.

[johndallman]

Knife-57, on an NPC who's approximately 6,000 years old. The PCs realised almost immediately on meeting her that fighting would be a bad idea.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by johndallman

Knife-57, on an NPC who's approximately 6,000 years old. The PCs realised almost immediately on meeting her that fighting would be a bad idea.

Is this NPC someone who's spent her entire 6,000 year existence training Knife skill, looking for new challenges and innovating in the field of how to disembowel humans with sharp edges?

How did she find worthy sparring partners?

I've got so many questions...

[(E)]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Is this NPC someone who's spent her entire 6,000 year existence training Knife skill, looking for new challenges and innovating in the field of how to disembowel humans with sharp edges?

How did she find worthy sparring partners?

I've got so many questions...

I had one campaign where a PC was playing an elf who was almost the first martial artist that would have gone in a similar direction.

In another game set in the world of game of thrones the top combatants had skills in the mid twenties. With the best having a skill of 27 and a desire to keep that fact a secret. Support skills came into the fore at that point, notably acting which was used as to feint in the climactic duel of that campaign.

Typical skills where in the low teens however.

[awesomenessofme1]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Is this NPC someone who's spent her entire 6,000 year existence training Knife skill, looking for new challenges and innovating in the field of how to disembowel humans with sharp edges?

How did she find worthy sparring partners?

I've got so many questions...

Technically, according to a strict reading of the rules, it would take less than 40,000 hours to reach that level (4*50*200). You could do that in about 20 years with no more effort than a full-time job. Even with the 2:1 ratio of points earned from Self-Teaching, 40 years might as well be a blip. She'd need to keep training to keep her skills up, but 6000 years is a long time to practice.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by awesomenessofme1

Technically, according to a strict reading of the rules, it would take less than 40,000 hours to reach that level (4*50*200). You could do that in about 20 years with no more effort than a full-time job. Even with the 2:1 ratio of points earned from Self-Teaching, 40 years might as well be a blip. She'd need to keep training to keep her skills up, but 6000 years is a long time to practice.

Well, yes, but the 200 hours per point is a guideline and from a plausibility standpoint, the higher the relative skill level goes, the harder it is to find challenges, learn new things and continue to improve.

[DangerousThing]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Well, yes, but the 200 hours per point is a guideline and from a plausibility standpoint, the higher the relative skill level goes, the harder it is to find challenges, learn new things and continue to improve.

In the comics and some fantasy books the truly skilled practice against multiple opponents at once. But yes, even the immortals in my games probably don't get above 30 in a weapon skill, unless they were the god of swords or some such.

[mr beer]

In 4e I think about 30 in combat skills for extreme threats e.g. avatar of Lloth, hellacious NPCs etc.

In 3e I don't remember but basically ridiculously high spell skills, like 60+, because I used house rules that a) allowed a skill penalty to speed up casting and b) skills > 16 provided a bonus to the Rule of 16. So it was advantageous for mages to have one crazy high killer spell skill. Also, mental skills were cheaper at 2 points per level.

[Agemegos]

Originally Posted by johndallman

Knife-57, on an NPC who's approximately 6,000 years old. The PCs realised almost immediately on meeting her that fighting would be a bad idea.

Doesn't even care about the penalty for not actually having a knife.