Skill Advancement

[Dalin]

As others have said, there are diminishing returns. Moreover, it really depends on the feel of the campaign. For example, if you're a bunch of faux-medieval superheroes (i.e., dungeon fantasy characters), then it's fine to have a bow or rapier skill of 25+ so you can do ridiculous things like Legolas or Zoro. (In my current DF campaign, with five PCs in the 400 point range, the highest skill level is currently only 21.)

If the campaign is grittier, then it makes sense to impose a limit, like "No skills over __ without a GM-approved Unusual Background." Since that varies from game to game, and points don't really reflect anything in the "reality" of the game world, it makes sense to leave it to each table to determine.

Kromm has also pointed out in various places that true mastery is reflected as much by the breadth of skills as depth. A legendary swordmaster will have a high weapon skill, but also a slew of other support skills. Depending on the genre, a swordmaster might invest points in acrobatics, armoury, blind fighting, connoisseur, leadership, observation, psychology, tactics, strategy, etc.). This is in addition to the advantages, attributes, and secondary attributes that support the archetype.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by ericthered

One caution is that when you are moving from D&D stats to gurps stats, they look equivalent, but they're not. a 12 in gurps is about a 14 in D&D, and a 14 in gurps is about an 18.

It's also important to keep in mind that they track things a bit differently. Strength in DnD covers a mix of GURPS ST (aside from HP) as well as some of GURPS DX and HT (striking in melee combat, as well as a few skills IIRC), Dexterity covers a mix of GURPS DX (aside from striking in melee combat) and some HT (mainly its contribution to Basic Speed), Constitution covers GURPS HT and a touch of ST (HP), Wisdom roughly maps to both GURPS Per and Will (with a bit of IQ in the mix), Intelligence covers some of GURPS IQ (the intellectual bits) but also calls for more non-combat skills and languages, and Charisma covers some parts of GURPS IQ (the social skills) as well as Reaction Modifiers. As ericthered notes, generally speaking every +1 modifier for a DnD stat corresponds to a +1 to the stat itself in GURPS (DnD Str 11 is +0, so roughly GURPS ST 10; DnD Wis 17 is +3, so roughly GURPS Per 13 and Will 13).

Originally Posted by Dalin

As others have said, there are diminishing returns. Moreover, it really depends on the feel of the campaign. For example, if you're a bunch of faux-medieval superheroes (i.e., dungeon fantasy characters), then it's fine to have a bow or rapier skill of 25+ so you can do ridiculous things like Legolas or Zoro. (In my current DF campaign, with five PCs in the 400 point range, the highest skill level is currently only 21.)

If the campaign is grittier, then it makes sense to impose a limit, like "No skills over __ without a GM-approved Unusual Background." Since that varies from game to game, and points don't really reflect anything in the "reality" of the game world, it makes sense to leave it to each table to determine.

Kromm has also pointed out in various places that true mastery is reflected as much by the breadth of skills as depth. A legendary swordmaster will have a high weapon skill, but also a slew of other support skills. Depending on the genre, a swordmaster might invest points in acrobatics, armoury, blind fighting, connoisseur, leadership, observation, psychology, tactics, strategy, etc.). This is in addition to the advantages, attributes, and secondary attributes that support the archetype.

Advantages can also be useful here, although those often map a bit more closely to Feats and Class Features/Special Abilities. Charisma, Social Regard, Reputation, Appearance, etc can stand in for DnD Cha, and Weapon Master could stand in for DnD Str/Dex (depending on weapon) and/or Weapon Specialization. Techniques can also be useful to map to Feats (DF even has many Power-Ups, roughly comparable to DnD Feats, that are actually Techniques), although it's rare for getting more than 2 to be worthwhile compared to just buying up skill (but consider this for a Technique-heavy character).

[Celjabba]

Originally Posted by Emerikol

Do you know what the problems where? Again just curious.

I can understand a linear progression if you are determining difficulties and relative character strengths.

Among other things, you used to pay different costs depending how you got the attribute.

Player A buy DX 16 at creation : DX 16 cost him 80 cp
Player B buy DX 14 at creation and belong to a race with DX+2 : DX 16 cost him 45+20 cp
Player C belong to a race with DX+2 and purchased two professional template including DX+2 : DX 16 cost him 20+20+20

Also, attribute up to 13 were cheap for the return, and there was very little reason not to buy them - especially DX.

[Stormcrow]

Originally Posted by Celjabba

Player B buy DX 14 at creation and belong to a race with DX+2 : DX 16 cost him 45+20 cp

Strictly speaking, in the third edition, what we now call a racial template was very much a black box proposition: the cost was the cost, and how it ended up with what it gives you was the black box. Wanna be an elf? It costs 40 points. You get ST-1, DX+1, IQ+1, Combat Reflexes, Magical Aptitude 1 for "free." Never mind how that comes out to 40 points, being an elf is just an advantage you can add to your character sheet for 40 points. Mathematical precision wasn't really a concern.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

Strictly speaking, in the third edition, what we now call a racial template was very much a black box proposition: the cost was the cost, and how it ended up with what it gives you was the black box. Wanna be an elf? It costs 40 points. You get ST-1, DX+1, IQ+1, Combat Reflexes, Magical Aptitude 1 for "free." Never mind how that comes out to 40 points, being an elf is just an advantage you can add to your character sheet for 40 points. Mathematical precision wasn't really a concern.

That doesn't sound right. I wrote up several races for Weird War II, and my recollection is that I accounted for actual point costs.

[whswhs]

I have thought that if one of my next campaigns is GURPS, I might do a more drastic version of diminishing returns, with the cost per level of skill being 1, 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, and so on. That would make Talents a much more worthwhile investment.

[kenclary]

Originally Posted by whswhs

That doesn't sound right. I wrote up several races for Weird War II, and my recollection is that I accounted for actual point costs.

(Iirc) in 3e, the cost for a 'level' of an attribute varied, so "DX+2" or whatever wouldn't have a constant cost, yet templates were given constant costs.

[lugaid]

Originally Posted by whswhs

I have thought that if one of my next campaigns is GURPS, I might do a more drastic version of diminishing returns, with the cost per level of skill being 1, 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, and so on. That would make Talents a much more worthwhile investment.

It's a neat idea, but there's no reason to buy it past the 16-point level there, since increasing a stat will give the same benefit. For skills that are based on HT, you can stop at the 8-point level.

There are marginal cases, such as using skills with other stats, but for the most part those aren't really going to be worth the geometrically increasing cost, and in the best case will only extend it out to the 32-point level as raising all four stats only costs 60 points.

It's similar to the reason that there is never a good reason to buy more than 3 techniques that default to the same skill, since you can just raise the skill for 4 points, raising all of the defaults by 1, instead of raising 4 techniques at 1 point each.

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by kenclary

(Iirc) in 3e, the cost for a 'level' of an attribute varied, so "DX+2" or whatever wouldn't have a constant cost, yet templates were given constant costs.

The 3e template values were calculated assuming the stat mods were modifying a stat of 10. Once you bought a 13, then the racial +1 would take it to 14 -- normally a +15 point jump, but in the template, it only cost +10. So you saved 5 points.

[Boge]

I was thinking this a while back too. It is odd that you can go from +10 stat just as easily as +4 stat.

3rd edition was pretty extreme. I think a +1 point cost for the next level would probably have worked well. Like an easy skill would be 1 point for stat level, 2 points for +1, 3 points +2, 4 points +3, etc. I also think stat increases should be that way as well. 3rd edition made more sense that way to me.

But, it is what it is. Make a house rule and hope your players are on board, or just stick with the book rules. There will never be a 5th edition Gurps...very sad.