Test Page 2
Just going to throw some words on the page, and we'll see what sticks.
Tonight, we are discussing the thorny issue of skills, once again.
Overview and History
Once upon a time, we used the standard skill system. That... mostly worked.
Then I said "screw this noise," and made several attempts at fixing it. Expanding the skill list, moving to a PF-style skill system, consolidating the skill list, adding default skills... we did a lot of weirdness to this particular subsystem.
Then I encountered the idea of scaling feats, where the benefits of the feat scaled to something like your BAB. So Cleave gave you a bunch of different benefits, all based on your BAB. And I said... huh, that's kind of like how skills work. And then I found an alternate skill system in which you got discrete abilities at various skill ranks, and I said... huh, that looks kind of like feats.
So my thought process was - what if you switched the concepts of skills and feats?
Of course, many feats in d20 are defunct, because we let martials have nice things. So feats now are primarily about customization of your abilities or expanding into other classes, rather than ... whatever the hell they were for before. They cover generic improvements that anybody might want, and almost class-specific abilities but are useful for multiple classes, so allow some customization.
Which leaves... skills. Skills as feats, to be more precise. But just like how many combat feats got turned into martial powers, so, too, will these "skills-as-feats" be turned into powers. Just for another type of class, one which Trinity has always been sorely lacking in: the skill monkey.
We're going to try to cover all the ground, here. All of it. But we have to do some shit, first, like figure out how some basic subsystems work, and how classes fulfill those roles.
I'm also working on expanding the Expert class list. Right now, we have:
- Thief
- Mediator
- Explorer
I am contemplating adding the following:
- Scholar (for knowledge skills)
- Merchant (for interacting with economy)
- Harvester (for resource gathering skills)
- Noble (for leadership skills)
- Artisan (for crafting skills)
- Less solid, but... reckoner? for computer-y skills? You'll see why in a minute.
There, of course, must be nine. I'm not sure what the ninth is, but maybe it'll come to me.
I'm thinking this whole deal may very well replace the "background skill" stuff, which... nobody seems to really care about? So this will put some limelight on that.
Experts and Minigames
So, here's the deal. There's a ton of shit you can do in an RPG, and all of our classes that are actually written right now do one of two things: kill dudes with swords, or kill dudes with magic (for varying flavors of magic).
We need to represent the rest of the world, and - indeed - the rest of what you can do in a game.
How do we make this shit matter? We turn them into minigames. That term isn't meant to be insulting, because we already have one, and it's called combat.
So the goal here is that for each expert class, there is a minigame that it gives a fuck about. These minigames need to be relatively fast and painless, so that if only one person at the table cares, not everyone else is bored to tears. However, all classes also need abilities that can contribute to an adventuring party, in at least some way.
There should also be abilities for each class that allow them to straight-up ignore their class's specific minigame, so that if a player (or even group) decides they don't give a damn, they aren't obligated to deal with it. Likewise, these minigames need to be accessible to everyone: just because a thief is the sneaky asshole doesn't mean that the mage shouldn't be able to do it, they will just not be awesome at it. Deal with it.
Classes, Minigames, and Whatever
| ||
|---|---|---|
| Class | Minigame | Description |
| Thief | Stealth | Sneak around and be all undetectable and such. |
| Mediator | Social | Make friends, influence people. |
| Explorer | Exploration | Find your way both overland and in dungeon environments. |
| Scholar | Research | Gather specific information from libraries and other knowledge sources. |
| Merchant | Business | Manage a business, allowing you to make profits, expand your mercantile empire, etc. |
| Harvester | Gathering | Farming, fishing, hunting, oil drilling - this minigame deals with raw resource acquisition and refining. |
| Noble | Leadership | Minion handling, maybe the mass combat system goes here (if we figure that one out). |
| Artisan | Crafting | Making stuff. |
| Reckoner | Hacking | Gaining access to information systems that you shouldn't. Might also involve decrypting languages or codes or whatever. |
Exploration Redesign: The Percolating
Links!
Melan's analysis on dungeon layout
Alexandrian analysis on jacquaying dungeons
And don't forget to get reacquainted with Journey exploration mechanics; not everything is there, though, and certainly not the bits about hexes having "exploration points" that are reduced as you travel through the hex, which is the important bit (among others, but that's the truly important concept).
