Should Musical Ability boost Connoisseur (Music)?

[johndallman]

Connoisseur skills don't get much use, but a campaign I'm playing in is in the third scenario (out of 50+) where Connoisseur (Music) would be useful, so I took a look at it.

All the skills it defaults to would be boosted by Musical Ability, and there's space for it in the Talent without pushing that into the next cost bracket, but I wondered if there was a reason for the omission?

[SCAR]

Originally Posted by johndallman

Connoisseur skills don't get much use, but a campaign I'm playing in is in the third scenario (out of 50+) where Connoisseur (Music) would be useful, so I took a look at it.

All the skills it defaults to would be boosted by Musical Ability, and there's space for it in the Talent without pushing that into the next cost bracket, but I wondered if there was a reason for the omission?

From Basic p185: [Connoisseur] represents an educated understanding of art and luxury items.

This would imply that Connoisseur is primarily a learnt knowledge skill rather than innate ability. - which is maybe why it was omitted?
It might also be a conversion from 3e issue, Musical Ability existed before, and it became a Talent - Connoisseur is a new skill in 4e, so it might have been missed.

Connoisseur (all specialties) is included in the Antiquary Talent and Connoisseur (Literature) in the Poet Talent - (both GURPS Horror/Power Ups 3: Talents).

So, I don't see why it shouldn't be covered by the Talent, it certainly fits thematically.

[Not another shrubbery]

It doesn't seem like a good fit to me. The Talent, as written, is more about performing or creating than assessing. If you feel otherwise, you're certainly free to add it in.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by johndallman

Connoisseur skills don't get much use, but a campaign I'm playing in is in the third scenario (out of 50+) where Connoisseur (Music) would be useful, so I took a look at it.

All the skills it defaults to would be boosted by Musical Ability, and there's space for it in the Talent without pushing that into the next cost bracket, but I wondered if there was a reason for the omission?

It seems to me that if a skill is included in a Talent, normally all versions of the skill are included. Musical Ability wouldn't benefit Connoisseur (Art) or (Fashion) or (Wine). So perhaps the skill was left out for that reason. I agree that having the Talent benefit Connoisseur (Music) makes sense; it would be a plausible thing to ask your GM to allow.

Bill Stoddard

[johndallman]

Hum ... some of the talents in PU3 include specific specialisations of Connoisseur. There's one (Antiquary) that includes them all, but refined appreciation is a core concept for that talent.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by johndallman

Hum ... some of the talents in PU3 include specific specialisations of Connoisseur. There's one (Antiquary) that includes them all, but refined appreciation is a core concept for that talent.

Are there any such cases in the Basic Set?

Bill Stoddard

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by johndallman

Connoisseur skills don't get much use, but a campaign I'm playing in is in the third scenario (out of 50+) where Connoisseur (Music) would be useful, so I took a look at it.

All the skills it defaults to would be boosted by Musical Ability, and there's space for it in the Talent without pushing that into the next cost bracket, but I wondered if there was a reason for the omission?

The reason may well be that Talents aren't meant to ever boost single mandatory specializations of Skills, as that can get real complexicated real fast.

That aside, thinking in Sagatafl terms, if Sagatafl had a Connoisseur skill, or an equvalent Appreciate Art skill (the later being more likely, because I rather dislike skill names I can't effortlessly spell), should it be based on the Musical Intelligence sub-Attribute of Intelligence, or on regular general Intelligence?

Here Sagatafl has a problem very similar to GURPS, of not liking things getting horribly complicated.

But if we ignore that (Sagatafl has a greater tolerance for complexity than GURPS), then yes I think that the answer is fairly obvious, that to the extent that Appreciate Art is based on Intelligence (and that extent should be fairly large for most Subjects of that Skill) then the Appreciate Art: Music version should be based on Musical Intelligence, either fully (100% Knack Weighting) or nearly so (75%).

Of course, I'm the kind of guy who's deeply unhappy that GURPS' Language Talent doesn't do anything for skills that are blatantly obviously langauge-centric, such as Poetry and Writing. Why call it Language Talent when it doesn't have anything to do with being good at language?

Back to GURPS, your point about defaults is good as well, supporting your hunch that the Talent should boost that Skill.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by whswhs

Are there any such cases in the Basic Set?

Not for Connoisseur, but Musical Ability does boost one specific skill specialisation: Group Performance (Conducting). The other specialisations are Choreography, Directing and Fight Choreography.

[Kromm]

Originally Posted by whswhs

Are there any such cases in the Basic Set?

By way of an example, Musical Ability itself aids Group Performance (Conducting) but not Group Performance in general; it's valuable to orchestra leaders, but not to film directors, fight choreographers, etc. Thus, there's precedent even in the Basic Set. "Skills with multiple specialties are considered to be one skill for this purpose" isn't meant to imply that knowing Foo (Bar) means knowing all specialties of Foo. All it means is that if a Talent encompasses Foo (Bar) and Foo (Baz), then those are considered one skill – Foo – when counting for a Talent. Some Talents might include all Foo specialties, others just (Bar) and (Baz), and still others only (Baz) . . . but in all three cases, Foo adds one to the skill count. GURPS Power-Ups 3: Talents explores this in detail on pp. 4-5; in particular, "If a skill has specialties (pp. B169-170), then no matter how many there are or how many the Talent affects (one, some, all), it counts as one skill."

More topically, since Musical Ability is somewhat underwhelming at just five skills, I'd be fine with tacking on Connoisseur (Music). It seems thematic and flavorful, and I can't see it breaking the game.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Peter Knutsen

TOf course, I'm the kind of guy who's deeply unhappy that GURPS' Language Talent doesn't do anything for skills that are blatantly obviously langauge-centric, such as Poetry and Writing. Why call it Language Talent when it doesn't have anything to do with being good at language?

Maybe it should be called Foreign Language Ability, since that's what it does? Handling languages as learnable advantages isn't entirely satisfactory, but neither was their treatment as skills in 3e and earlier.