[Basic] Skill of the week: Observation

[Boomerang]

Is Observation skill supposed to be for vision based rolls only?

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Boomerang

Is Observation skill supposed to be for vision based rolls only?

Shouldn't be. The bit in the modifiers that goes "Acute Senses (p. 35), as appropriate" certainly suggests that Vision is not the only appropriate sense.

The description is pretty vision-centric, but GURPS Basic is very human-centric and vision is by far the primary sense humans use for that kind of thing

[Daigoro]

Originally Posted by Phil Masters

The movie I always remember when discussing Observation skill is Ronin. Robert de Niro puts on a textbook demonstration of passive and augmented Observation when setting up the operation.

The scene where he knocks over a metal bollard to gauge the bodyguards' reactions? How would one GURPS that out? Straight Observation rolls? Use Tactics, Streetwise, Intel Analysis or something else as a Complementary Roll, or as a "concept" roll?

BTW- Props to the OP, johndallman, you've kept this Skill of the Week series trucking along for 2 years it seems, and you're already into the O's. I admit I thought it would peter out before now, so good work, chap!

ETA: Looking through the stats on that list of threads, the topics with the most replies were Artillery/Forward Observer, a good, wargamey skill, but then Cooking, Connoisseur, Linguistics and Housekeeping! Perhaps GURPS' focus on combat is misplaced...

[whswhs]

I tend to think of Observation as the skill of noticing things without other people realizing that you're looking. If you just want to obviously look, you roll Per to spot things; if you want to look without being obvious, you roll Observation, and then a critical failure means you were obvious.

Further, Per is largely passive; you look over the scene and maybe something jumps out at you. Observation is active and directed; you look over the scene and you have an idea of what's where, and you aren't distracted by the things that jump out at you from noticing the things that you really care about.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by whswhs

Further, Per is largely passive; you look over the scene and maybe something jumps out at you. Observation is active and directed

As Holmes said to Watson "You see, but you do not observe."

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Daigoro

ETA: Looking through the stats on that list of threads, the topics with the most replies were Artillery/Forward Observer, a good, wargamey skill, but then Cooking, Connoisseur, Linguistics and Housekeeping! Perhaps GURPS' focus on combat is misplaced...

I am not covering actual combat skills. They get plenty of discussion already, and I don't have much to add to them.

[Phil Masters]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

The distinction seems difficult to me, really. Any of the things Observation lets you see should also be possible to see with an appropriate sensory check. And there are other skills that could be used to make sure you're unobtrusive about it.

So what do you actually need Observation for? I don't know.

Observation is being organised and efficient about using Per (the way that unarmed combat skills are being organised and efficient about using DX to punch people). You want to watch the bank from the cafe opposite? Fine, but without Observation, you're prone to looking rather obvious as you drink your coffee; with it, you're a shopper dawdling over the newspaper, and yet you see just as much. Make a Per roll and you can say there are "a bunch of guards" in the bank; make an Observation roll and you can say how many and how their duty roster system seems to work.

Originally Posted by Daigoro

The scene where he knocks over a metal bollard to gauge the bodyguards' reactions? How would one GURPS that out? Straight Observation rolls? Use Tactics, Streetwise, Intel Analysis or something else as a Complementary Roll, or as a "concept" roll?

I'd just treat the trick with the metal sign simply as the special effect on a good Observation roll. (Though he may well be using Tactics or Soldier as a complementary skill.) He gets a good assessment of the guard team's responses, but he still just looks like a clumsy tourist. And he comes back from the morning's work with a clear idea of what his team are up against.

[Curmudgeon]

Not to derail the conversation but regarding the earlier discussions about Forward Observer/Gunner skills suggesting that a separate skill was needed for the Fire Direction Center/Command Post (FDC/CP), there was a problem articulating what the FDC/CP did that the Observation Post (OP) didn't. I missed the Observation skill, but reading it in response to this thread, I think I can now articulate the difference. The OP uses Observation skill, not Forward Observer skill as GURPS defines it. This is true of OPs manned by actual artillerymen and is even more so the case for FOOs (Forward Observation Officers), (who are not actually artillery, but have received up to sixteen hours instruction on the subject [mostly about what needs to be reported and how to format it).

Forward Observer skill is then the skill used by the FDC/CP (which is closer to reality) and Gunner (Artillery) is used to lay the gun. Thank you, you've helped me sort the problem and its solution out in my own mind.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by whswhs

I tend to think of Observation as the skill of noticing things without other people realizing that you're looking. If you just want to obviously look, you roll Per to spot things; if you want to look without being obvious, you roll Observation, and then a critical failure means you were obvious.

Further, Per is largely passive; you look over the scene and maybe something jumps out at you. Observation is active and directed; you look over the scene and you have an idea of what's where, and you aren't distracted by the things that jump out at you from noticing the things that you really care about.

Exactly as I see it.

[Railstar]

I find it useful because it makes a good point about judging distances at a glance – the difference between Per & Observation is the difference between “you see a group of enemies heading that way” and “you see around X enemies Y distance away, moving Z fast.”

Jason Bourne is probably a great example of really high Observation combined with numerous SOP Perks; the first thing he does when he enters a room is check the exits and the sight-lines, meaning he knows where is exposed, where he will have cover, where trouble is most likely to come from (assuming no inconsiderate swine blasts a new entrance through the wall).

If a sniper bullet goes through the window, and the sniper is hidden, then Observation would be the skill of spotting the good positions to shoot from.

A pirate (using Seamanship as a complementary skill) could take a quick look at a ship and see that it is a little too low in the water, implying it is more heavily armed than it is supposed to be (cannons are really heavy). Or using Observation they might see the ship bristling with cannons and yet it is too high in the water, because they are Quaker Guns – wooden logs painted black as decoy weapons.

These are all combat-related examples, but I mostly take it for military characters. Another use I found for it was when stowed away on an unfamiliar ship where we did not speak the same language as the crew and there was no obvious uniforms; we used it to figure out who the captain was based on how the group interacted with each other, it probably overlapped with Body Language, although seeing who was directing the others in a crisis meant we could identify the leader.