Skill Mastery

[AlexanderHowl]

I developed the following advantage inspired by Magery (RPM) that deals with Wildcard Skills. Please tell me what you think.

Skill Mastery [5 CP for Skill Mastery 0; +10 CP per +1 Skill Mastery]

Skill Mastery allows its practitioners to develop Wildcard Skills. Practitioners may develop Skill Mastery after character creation and may develop up to Skill Mastery 12 if they wish. The benefits of Skill Mastery are the following:

1. Practitioners may develop any Wildcard Skill, up to a maximum level of (Skill Mastery + 12) and may acquire the cinematic advantages of Gunslinger, Heroic Archer, Trained by a Master, and Weapon Master.

2. Practitioners gain a Energy Reserve (Wildcard Skill) equal to (Skill Mastery * 3), which they may only spend when using their Wildcard Skills (the energy reserve recharges one point every 10 minutes regardless of the level of activity of the practitioner).

3. Practitioners gain an additional pool of wildcard bonus points every session equal to (Skill Mastery) that they may use to augment any of their Wildcard Skills and each of their Wildcard Skills gains a pool of wildcard bonus points every session equal to ([character points spent]/12, rounded down).

Unlike other users of Wildcard Skills, practitioners of Skill Mastery may train the underlying normal skills of their Wildcard Skills. The Wildcard Skill becomes the default of the underlying normal skill, allowing them to improve the underlying normal skill through using the Improving Skills from Default rules (Basic, p. 173). For example, a character with DX 12 and Skill Mastery 2 may only have Sword! at a maximum level of 14 but, by using Sword! as their default, they may develop Broadsword-16 by spending an additional eight character points.

[ericthered]

I find wild card skills weak as it is.



But I also find that ER is a really nice thing to have, and this is a fair way to justify it.

[maximara]

Originally Posted by ericthered

I find wild card skills weak as it is.

I'm curious how you consider Wildcard skills weak.

[maximara]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

I developed the following advantage inspired by Magery (RPM) that deals with Wildcard Skills. Please tell me what you think.

Skill Mastery [5 CP for Skill Mastery 0; +10 CP per +1 Skill Mastery]

Skill Mastery allows its practitioners to develop Wildcard Skills. Practitioners may develop Skill Mastery after character creation and may develop up to Skill Mastery 12 if they wish. The benefits of Skill Mastery are the following:

1. Practitioners may develop any Wildcard Skill, up to a maximum level of (Skill Mastery + 12) and may acquire the cinematic advantages of Gunslinger, Heroic Archer, Trained by a Master, and Weapon Master.

2. Practitioners gain a Energy Reserve (Wildcard Skill) equal to (Skill Mastery * 3), which they may only spend when using their Wildcard Skills (the energy reserve recharges one point every 10 minutes regardless of the level of activity of the practitioner).

3. Practitioners gain an additional pool of wildcard bonus points every session equal to (Skill Mastery) that they may use to augment any of their Wildcard Skills and each of their Wildcard Skills gains a pool of wildcard bonus points every session equal to ([character points spent]/12, rounded down).

Unlike other users of Wildcard Skills, practitioners of Skill Mastery may train the underlying normal skills of their Wildcard Skills. The Wildcard Skill becomes the default of the underlying normal skill, allowing them to improve the underlying normal skill through using the Improving Skills from Default rules (Basic, p. 173). For example, a character with DX 12 and Skill Mastery 2 may only have Sword! at a maximum level of 14 but, by using Sword! as their default, they may develop Broadsword-16 by spending an additional eight character points.

I think a little trip to the GURPSwiki's listing on Wildcard Skills is in order as I'm not sure just what issue this is trying to address that a solution doesn't already exist for.

"If the GM hasn’t replaced all standard skills with wildcards (Ditching Standard Skills, pp. 22-23), then individual standard skills – even those included in wildcards – can be bought at their usual point cost."

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by maximara

I'm curious how you consider Wildcard skills weak.

They are expensive, raising skill quite slowly compared to normal skills or even talents. They are always Very Hard, which slaps additional penalties on skills that may be all average or easy. They don't benefit from talents. The only saving grace is the Wild Card Points, and those can deplete quickly if you're using them to make up for a difference in skill levels that's four or greater.


There are some wild card skills that are better than others. Combat Wildcards tend to be bad, with Guns! being the worst (all the skills are easy and default generously from each other), while wildcards covering broad swathes of hard skills like Inventor! can be competitive.

[AlexanderHowl]

Guns! is pretty weak. A DX 12 character can spend 24 CP on Guns!-12 or on Guns (Pistol)-19 (which gives them most Guns at 17 and the rest at 15).

[Imbicatus]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Guns! is pretty weak. A DX 12 character can spend 24 CP on Guns!-12 or on Guns (Pistol)-19 (which gives them most Guns at 17 and the rest at 15).

The only point in Guns! favor is that it also applies to any gun-fu exploits like karate using a gun as fist load, doing acrobatic stunts and such, and using armory to build/customize guns as needed if you are disarmed.

But that’s still a lot of points invested for some edge case perks.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by Imbicatus

But that’s still a lot of points invested for some edge case perks.

Depends on your interpretation. Thinking of Bang! skills as just compiling the things (or even as *including* all the things) covered by the skills listed under them is probably a mistake. It's a cinematic skill, so if you allow rolls against it to do stuff cinematic guns can - I shoot the lock off, I shoot the car to disable it, I shoot the grenade in flight to disarm it, I shoot him in the head, but just to knock him out with the graze.... - it's considerably fairer.

[Donny Brook]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

...
1. Practitioners may develop any Wildcard Skill, up to a maximum level of (Skill Mastery + 12) and may acquire the cinematic advantages of Gunslinger, Heroic Archer, Trained by a Master, and Weapon Master.

I don't really see a point to this, at least for my games. If I think Wildcard Skills or cinematic advantages fit my campaign, I allow them. If I don't think they fit, I would not allow an advantage that purports to allow them.

2. Practitioners gain a Energy Reserve (Wildcard Skill) equal to (Skill Mastery * 3), which they may only spend when using their Wildcard Skills (the energy reserve recharges one point every 10 minutes regardless of the level of activity of the practitioner).

In this regard, I question what is gained to build this into a portmanteau advantage rather than just make it available on a stand-alone basis.

3. Practitioners gain an additional pool of wildcard bonus points every session equal to (Skill Mastery) that they may use to augment any of their Wildcard Skills and each of their Wildcard Skills gains a pool of wildcard bonus points every session equal to ([character points spent]/12, rounded down).

Here I just don't know what you mean. What are the bonus points and what do they do? Are they modifiers on die rolls? I feel like I'm just missing something.

[AlexanderHowl]

Wildcard bonus points appear in MH. They substitute for character points when using cinematic options like Buying Success and Flesh Wounds in relation to the Wildcard Skill. You get one wildcard bonus point per session per 12 CP invested in a Wildcard Skill. They make Wildcard Skills worth purchasing, as they allow characters to manipulate reality to a certain extent.