Which skills are worh raising really high?

[khorboth]

Assuming a fairly high point-value game, which skills do we think are worth investing lots of points in?

Generally speaking, we see diminishing returns after the 12-14 range unless there are frequently large negative modifiers. So, I was trying to figure out what skills might be worth the extra juice to put skills up to 25 or 30 or higher.

Ritual Magic seems like the most obvious choice. If we're using that magic system, many spells have prerequisite count of 10 and getting skill to 20 has real benefits.

Weapon skills can also clearly benefit. In melee, there are options and there's your parry. In ranged combat, there's range.

So, what else is worth having a skill of 25+‽

[naloth]

Any skill the GM will let you use effectively can be worthwhile:

- Some rules allow artificer skills to produce suburb (even magical) items.
- Engineering skills can allow you to improvise all sorts of things
- Science skills can turn you into a Sherlock Homes type.
- 'Face' skills can let you manipulate others
- Stealth skills will let you win without others seeing you
- Superior tactics and strategy can give you overwhelming advantages or let you avoid combat altogether.
- Survival will let you live comfortably where others die.
- Holdout will let you bring weapons (combat advantage) where none are allowed.
- Savior Faire will help you out maneuver others in proper company.
- Gaming skills are a good fall back for resolving disputes without fighting.
- Entertaining, cooking, and cleaning skills help with getting you into places without fighting.

[Fred Brackin]

Youi've left out Skills which get roled in active contests v. npcs. Observation v. Stealth is just one example.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

Youi've left out Skills which get roled in active contests v. npcs. Observation v. Stealth is just one example.

Provided there's no real limit on what sort of Advantages one can pick up (and in a campaign where buying skill 40 or whatever is A-OK, I'd expect that to be the case), I suspect at some point just grabbing something like Detect (Living Things) is better for countering Stealth than just having Observation sky-high. Of course, if there's relatively free reign to grab Advantages (with some GM oversight, of course, so you don't just have That One Guy making broken Advantages like M.U.N.C.H.K.I.N. or whatever), eventually a stealthy character is better off grabbing a few instances of Obscure 10 (Defensive, Stealthy, Extended), rendering said character literally impossible to see/hear/smell/detect/whatever (although personally, I feel Obscure 10 being a hard stop is inappropriate, but that is a huge digression here).

Originally Posted by RGTraynor

The concept of Skill-40 being "not enough" for just about anything short of "Let's see if I can hit that mountaintop there on the horizon with an arrow" boggles my mind.

To be fair, that would also require a rather sizable ST and a bow capable of making use of it (or a magic bow with markedly improved range, or an Imbuement with similar effect, or whatever).


For my own $0.02, I'd echo others that have said combat skill. However, I personally feel ridiculous skill would be kind of boring. For melee, I'd be inclined to cap skill somewhere in the low 20's, or perhaps just something like DX+10 (but allow purchase of Tech! if you need to go higher). For ranged, I'm rather inclined to make use of (at least some variation of) Tactical Shooting's "Minute of Arc" rules, which cap what one's effective skill can be anyway, depending on your weapon.

[johndallman]

If you can have DX and/or IQ of 16+, or suitable Talents, it becomes worthwhile taking many skills to 16 because it doesn't cost huge amounts, your rate of critical failures decreases significantly, and your rate of critical successes increases. That applies to any skill where failures can be dangerous, such as Explosives.

Stealth is often rolled as a contest, so getting that quite high has major returns in safety for an infiltrator. Camouflage is similar, as are all the Influence skills (and their Techniques).

Under Action's cinematic rules, Physician can be used at -10 for instant First Aid, which makes skill in the 20s the key ability for medics.

[awesomenessofme1]

I would say spells under normal Magic would also definitely qualify. There are a lot of spells that cost 3+ energy that would be incredibly powerful to have indefinitely.

[khorboth]

Originally Posted by awesomenessofme1

I would say spells under normal Magic would also definitely qualify. There are a lot of spells that cost 3+ energy that would be incredibly powerful to have indefinitely.

Excellent point. And don't forget the time reductions as well.

[WingedKagouti]

If it's not super expensive, Diplomacy is worth getting to 20 for the automatic +2 to any reaction roll.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by WingedKagouti

If it's not super expensive, Diplomacy is worth getting to 20 for the automatic +2 to any reaction roll.

But if that's all you want it for, +2 Charisma is likely to be much cheaper. However, Diplomacy is a hugely useful influence skill - you can use it in almost any situation where influence can be used at all, and it's rather safer than other influence skills. If you have the points to counter it being harder than the others it's absolutely worth the investment, even without that 'free' +2 to reactions.

[Donny Brook]

Originally Posted by WingedKagouti

If it's not super expensive, Diplomacy is worth getting to 20 for the automatic +2 to any reaction roll.

I have hated that ridiculous rule since forever. It's banned in my games and most of my group does as well.