How mandatory is putting a few points in a grappling skill?

[Sorenant]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

The niche for Wrestling is to buy it up to Dex+2 and get the +2 ST bonus. Not everything can be resolved with straight Skill rolls.

With KYOS, that +2 ST bonus becomes even better.

Originally Posted by Varyon

Personally, I'd like for there to be a DX/Easy grappling skill for those who aren't dedicated grapplers to invest in, as a grappling equivalent to Brawling, but yeah, if you're not investing many points into it, Wrestling probably gives you more bang for your buck than Judo.

It never came up on my table but I see no problem in allowing Wrestling with optional specialization (Break free and resist takedowns) to make it an easy skill, like lessons learned from self-defense classes to escape people grappling you and legging it.

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by Plane

yeah just in terms of causality you have to have a "first teacher" who wasn't taught, that's where Wild Talent comes in

Suddenly I'm reminded of Ryan George's "The first guy to..." series, where someone suddenly comes up with a modern concept, whole cloth, and tries to explain it to someone who is completely unfamiliar with it.

Clearly there's a continuum of experimentation that leads from DX-punching to Brawling to Karate. GURPS elects not to consern itself with skills like Mostly Still Brawling But Just A Bit More Elaborate (DX/A Little Harder Than Average). Such transitional forms are best handled with the basic skill plus a Perk allowing some of the advanced skill's techniques.

[Sorenant]

I was revising the unarmed skills and noticed they have no defaults to each other.
Each skill might differ from each other but it's weird that a seasoned street fighter would be as good as a complete newbie if they tried branching into Boxing or Karate.
Of course, in practice I never saw a character with multiple striking or grappling skills but by RAW there are styles that requires it, like Smasha (Boxing and Brawling) and BJJ (Judo and Wrestling).
Shouldn't there be some sort of default or at least a perk to improve the main skill horizontally?

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Sorenant

It never came up on my table but I see no problem in allowing Wrestling with optional specialization (Break free and resist takedowns) to make it an easy skill, like lessons learned from self-defense classes to escape people grappling you and legging it.

I was meaning more a DX/E skill that substitutes for DX for unarmed grappling and perhaps allows access to a few things you can't do with DX alone (like choke holds and locks), maybe with up to a +1 to ST, as opposed to Wrestling's +2. That is, something like Brawling (which substitutes for DX for unarmed strikes, allows access to a few things you can't do with DX alone, like head butts and knee strikes, and gives up to a +1/die to damage as opposed to Boxing/Karate's +2/die), but for grappling rather than striking. It would also be a good skill for animals who favor grappling.