[Basic] Skill of the week: History

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by dripton

The GM makes rolls where the player won't know immediately if her character succeeded or failed. Which means the players don't always know when I roll against something like History. Which means I probably need to give more hints.

I don't roll for my players; if their characters fail a roll, I expect them just to roleplay the ignorance. But if I did, I would deal with this sort of thing by saying, "Tony, does Sangmu have History? OK, what's her IQ?" That way the player knows I'm checking that area of knowledge.

[smurf]

Originally Posted by Not

You're making the case for History as an Expert Skill.

How so? I'm just saying that the real life skill is more nuanced than presented.

Otherwise I would have a skill sheet looking like this:

Antquity economics
Medieval economics
Medieval England
Crusades
Reformation
17th century England
18th century UK
19th century UK
20th century UK
1st Republic France
2nd Republic France
3rd Republic France
4th Republic France
5th Republic France
German History - since unification
Italian History - since unification
20th century Russia
20th century USA
Revolts and Revolutions
20th Century Middle East
World War 1
World War 2
National Liberation Movements
Etc

It kind of gets unwieldy

[Phil Masters]

Originally Posted by Not

You're making the case for History as an Expert Skill.

Expert Skill (General History). Substitutes for any History skill covering periods, topics, and regions which you might have read books or articles about, but only in broad outline, and you have no training in historical research or analysis methods.

A bit of a fudge, but probably a reasonable representation of fairly common broad-but-shallow amateur history-geek done-the-pop-hist-reading.

[RogerBW]

Originally Posted by Phil Masters

Expert Skill (General History). Substitutes for any History skill covering periods, topics, and regions which you might have read books or articles about, but only in broad outline, and you have no training in historical research or analysis methods.

That is certainly something I'm likely to allow in my games in future. (Perhaps add "heard about at school".)

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Phil Masters

Expert Skill (General History). Substitutes for any History skill covering periods, topics, and regions which you might have read books or articles about, but only in broad outline, and you have no training in historical research or analysis methods.

A bit of a fudge, but probably a reasonable representation of fairly common broad-but-shallow amateur history-geek done-the-pop-hist-reading.

That sounds more like Hobby Skill (History). I'd expect an Expert Skill to cover research and analysis methods, even if the Expert Skill was a broad and shallow treatment of it's material.

[Ashtagon]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

That sounds more like Hobby Skill (History). I'd expect an Expert Skill to cover research and analysis methods, even if the Expert Skill was a broad and shallow treatment of it's material.

I'd expect the only difference to be whether it was Easy, Average, Hard, or very Hard.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Ashtagon

I'd expect the only difference to be whether it was Easy, Average, Hard, or very Hard.

Expert Skill is Hard. Hobby Skill is Easy.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by smurf

How so? I'm just saying that the real life skill is more nuanced than presented.

Otherwise I would have a skill sheet looking like this:
<snip>
Etc

It kind of gets unwieldy

If I were GM I'd combine a few of those but generally speaking, by the RAW that's what your character sheet should look like.

Perhaps that's why the skill has never really come up in one of my games. also why (like Law) History with its' nigh infinite number of potential specialties is a prime candidate for a Bang! Skill.

[Þorkell]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

That sounds more like Hobby Skill (History). I'd expect an Expert Skill to cover research and analysis methods, even if the Expert Skill was a broad and shallow treatment of it's material.

IOW the actual History skill.

[Phil Masters]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

That sounds more like Hobby Skill (History). I'd expect an Expert Skill to cover research and analysis methods, even if the Expert Skill was a broad and shallow treatment of it's material.

Expert Skills "never provide the ability to do practical tasks", by definition. Research and analysis are the "practical task" part of a professional historian's work, as opposed to the simple accumulation of facts.