Rules you ignore/alter.

[Tyneras]

I think there is a tendency toward skill level bloat, and a habit of ignoring skill decay. I've very likely lost all but a single point, or all points, in a lot of skills I used to have. I'd guess most college students lose half or more of their college skill points a few years into the workforce. I'm absolutely sure I've lost my area knowledge for all but 2 of the places I've lived.

Additionally, I think there's a tendency towards skill bloat due to GURPS modeling a dice roll against a static number. Even with TDMs, people fail certain skill checks orders of magnitude less often than even a skill of 18 would imply. In Pyramid #3/65 p.34 the article This One Goes To Eleven. It takes the idea that the dice always roll 11. If you have DX 9, 1 point in Driving and a TDM of +4, you will never fail until you run into circumstances hit you with an extra -2 (rainstorm), and even then if you slow down (Take Extra Time) you can probably squeak by. This is a much better, IMO, way of modeling how most people behave. Stack up TDMs, Extra Time and Equipment bonuses and most people can operate from default successfully.

[kirbwarrior]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

because default means that you have not tried enough to get good at something and I am good enough at all of those

That could easily be multiple Dabbler (which should be expanded to be able to affect skills with no default). And if you have all of those skills listed at 12 or even just 10, you are exceptional. Being better than default definitely is impressive, but often that's all it is with real life people.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Plane

What you describe is average for our world because we suck. Ours is a pampered reality lacking the demons/dragons which humans in the majority of other GURPS dimensions are constantly battling, causing them to either improve their attributes to survive or get weeded out by natural selection.

Natural selection has not weeded out physical weakness here like it has in the majority of other GURPS realities. We have No Mana everywhere which protects us from mages accidentally summoning demons every time they light a cigarette and then having them wipe out all our elderly/sedentary.

This is not remotely how either natural selection or most fantasy settings work.

[AlexanderHowl]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

This is not remotely how either natural selection or most fantasy settings work.

I have to agree. Humans spent nearly 2 million years dealing with the megafauna of the Ice Age, plus a half dozen supervolcanic eruptions that annihilated 99% of the humans alive at the time, so our ancestors went through a pretty severe selection process. It was not that long ago that famine, plague, and war were also major selectors for survival. Now, I know that while the vast majority of people in the developed world burn more calories watching cat videos than they do exercising, the residents of the developing world face their own selection processes.

Anyway, most characters are kind of unexceptional before they reach 200 CP. Even a character with a 12 in ST, DX, IQ, and HT is not that great when you think about it, as they will fail 25% of their attribute rolls. Even if they have their professional skills at 14, they will probably critically fail their job rolls every 51 months, meaning that they would need a minimum skill of 16 to actually have a decently long career. As for default, anyone who does Games at default is going to lose, and the majority of people are competitive enough to learn enough so that they have a chance at wining (or else they literally stop playing).

[Plane]

Originally Posted by Tyneras

I think there is a tendency toward skill level bloat, and a habit of ignoring skill decay. I've very likely lost all but a single point, or all points, in a lot of skills I used to have.

You know... when I think of Skill Decay, rather than dropping 1 point to default, the death echos of our perks should probably go through "Dabbler Decomposition" process.

Also: if we don't even use skills at default occasionally, maybe they should degrade into varying degrees of partial incompetent as seen in Anti-Talents?

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

This is not remotely how either natural selection or most fantasy settings work.

Natural selection works differently in different settings.

I'm not really sure it's a known of how the majority of fantasy settings in the GURPS multiverse operate?

Maybe in 90% of them demons appear on an hourly basis due to dabbling hedge mages spamming "Reverie of Ruin 15" every five seconds "testing their courage" addicted to fear and paranoid about their deaths.

If we view age (failed HT rolls lowering attributes) as pulling down the "average attribute", then these hourly demons hiding in every other closet or sewerpipe could ambush and battle vulnerable low-attribute elderly and eating, resulting in in the average primary attribute level going up.

[kirbwarrior]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Even if they have their professional skills at 14, they will probably critically fail their job rolls every 51 months, meaning that they would need a minimum skill of 16 to actually have a decently long career.

Which fits what I've seen. Having a decently long career is uncommon and is rare if we ignore jobs you get 'stuck' in. People lose their job for the dumbest reasons all the time and a critical failure isn't even that bad (then again, the idea of critical giving a 10% raise is very optimistic). But considering that a critical success and critical failure are about equally common even with skill 12, I think in the long run it balances out.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Even if they have their professional skills at 14, they will probably critically fail their job rolls every 51 months, meaning that they would need a minimum skill of 16 to actually have a decently long career.

Or routine job rolls are made at +4? A lot of skill level bloat comes from not giving routine tasks an appropriate bonus.

[kirbwarrior]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Or routine job rolls are made at +4? A lot of skill level bloat comes from not giving routine tasks an appropriate bonus.

There's a lot of game rules average people abuse that aren't necessary normally in roleplaying. Dabbler, common TDMs, taking extra time, etc. And as Kromm has said in the past, real life people are far likely to spend cp on impulse buys to minimize disasters while PCs want to continually improve despite disasters. Even just five cp is likely enough to have a boring life due to lack of giant problems.

[AlexanderHowl]

Monthly job rolls are abstractions of hundreds of job related rolls made throughout a month, so any single roll likely benefits from massive bonuses, so the aggregate will just be against the base skill. It was not that long ago that Americans had reasonable expectations od staying with the same career and employer throughout their life and there is a lot of the developed world where that is still the expected outcome. As a professional academic, I hope to stay at my current job until I retire in 20+ years, and I hope that I will continue to improve. Impulse buys are also not realistic for normal people, as normal people literally cannot distort reality.

[kirbwarrior]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Impulse buys are also not realistic for normal people, as normal people literally cannot distort reality.

I often see Impulse Buys as the player doing something, not the character. Normal people don't know they happened to avoid a terrible accident or know the boss was intending on firing them instead of their employee.