I am needing a list of Generic Modern Skills!!!!

[Andrithgreen]

Does anyone know where I can find a generic list of Modern Skills.  I am developing currently developing an RPG that allows my players to Time Travel, however, most of the skills that I need, need to be modern, since the majority of the setting takes place in the distant future!

[Josh Roby]

Wow.  Welcome to the Forge, Andrithgreen.  Do you have a real name we can call you by?

Can you tell us a little bit about the game, so we have context to answer?  By your implicit assumption that said context isn't necessary, I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest you're making some pretty vast assumptions about what constitutes an RPG.  Also, what are your publishing plans for said game?  Copying a list from another source, while not technically illegal, is pretty weak sauce, but if this is merely for your personal use, it's par for the course.

[dindenver]

Hi!
  I made a custom char gen system for CP2020. The full list of skills appears at the end of it
http://www.mvlan.net/~davidm/NuYork2020Skills.DOC
  Good luck

[Adam Dray]

I recommend a Google search that includes the term "list of skills" or "skill list" (quoted) plus one or two likely skill names like "boating" or "science" or "medicine." Here are five or six links.

Of course, if you use freeform traits, you don't need a skill list at all and players can write down anything that's interesting to them. For more information, see the definition of Trait in John Kirk's Design Patterns of Successful Role-Playing Games.

[Andrithgreen]

Let me introduce myself.  My name is Andrew and I am a Graphic Artist in St. Louis MO.  I have been playing and GM'ing, various RPG's for several years now. Pardon me not being clearer, as I am a little frustrated  at a moment. Part of my work was literally just washed away! (Over filled bath tub and an air duct! ) 

I have spent the last 4 years (on and off) developing my Role Playing Game, titled "Zero Time". 
. Characters can be from the past, "present" and future.  Most choose the future.   For the most part. I was able to piece together a lot of the skills that I have spent developing by using some left over character sheets from previous versions of the game (it was originally a 6 sided system converted to a 20 sided!).   The good thing is I still have most information on my computer. (Character Sheets, Maps, Scripts, notes).  However all the reminants of my guide and the backup disks were soaked and damaged!)  Now I am sitting here trying to rack my brain of some of the more generic ones like (soak, lifting, jumping, dodge...etc).  As I am the middle of preping for the final part of this Epic Campaign for New Years.

[Nathan P.]

Hi there Andrew,

I was facing the exact same problem when I first started writing Timestream, a more "cinematic" style time travel game that I released at the end of the summer. I ended up deciding to focus more on who the characters knew and cared about and what their goals were then the actual "stuff" they could do, and boiled down the stuff to broad "arenas" that describe a kind of thing, rather than the thing itself. So there's Athletics (could be Olympic javelin, could be swimming, could be zero-g gymnastics), Manipulation (could be convincing patter, could be bribery, could be powers of illusion), etc. Once players have identified the what of what they want to do, they choose how to do it from their Arenas. You can see a character sheet here to see a little more about what I mean.

Obviously, this is one take, but I wanted to present it as an alternative to making tons of lists, and dividing those lists into time periods.

Also, are you looking to publish your game? I ask because thats part of the mission statement of the Forge, to help people independently publish. If so, are you looking for other kinds of feedback about it?

Hope that helps.

[joepub]

I have a game set in near future,


And what I did was create "backgrounds" instead of skill lists.

I found skill lists to be cumbersome and a bit limiting.
So when someone takes a background in Mountaineer, they gain "skills" of a mountaineer (climb, use rope, survival, etc, etc) without actually checking off boxes on an extensive skill list.


Just somethign to think about. And it saves you from having to re-do all teh work.
If you want to see how this works in my game: http://www.fluffydevil.com/pointofcollapse/forum/viewtopic.php?t=9.

Cheers Andrew.

[Andrithgreen]

Thank you, these are some great suggestions!!!  A friend of mine recommended this site.  He told me, if you got a quesiton, you will get tons of answers and ideals!!

The way I am writing this, is in a campaign style.  Right now the characters are set in the year 2230, several years after the nations of the world convereged into one.  So far, I am treating this as a jumping off point, for my players.  Basically they are given a time line of the campaings events, and they can go and track down things and choose to alter them.  (One player actually went back a prevented the assination of Kennedy!)  For the most part, I have the timeline worked out.  The entire timeline.  From begining to end. I figured the only way to have characters enjoy playing, and not be "de-railed"!  So there is this mechanic that is what is suppose to be, and then the players can interact with that.  They can even change an outcome in history if they like!

[joepub]

I have a question about this... (sorry if it's getting off the thread topic)...


If I go back and kill the instigators of the Vietnam war, does that mean I've changed the ENTIRE stream of history after that point?


Or, does the world they exist in already take into account that Kennedy was saved from assassination?


Could someone go back in time, plant a virus in monkeys that killed off primates and destroyed the human race?




How does that whole wormhole work?

[Andrithgreen]

Well, you could use a fluid world.  Things that are suppose to happen, happen.  So if you prevented someone from being killed doesn't mean that later on they weren't killed in a car accident, or died of disease.... The other way I look at it is that there is one main timeline, if a character makes a change, they shift into an alternate dimension.  Another way is the jigsaw theory is that no matter what... when the galaxy ends, everything will end up the way it was suppose to.

[joepub]

I think maybe we should open up a new thread for this....


call it "[Zero Time] Time Travel Philosophy in RPGs" or something to that effect. Just because we aren't talking skills at this point.


But, I'm just a rook,n00b, etc here, so that might not be necessary. But i think it sorta is.