Skill System - Organizational help needed

[Egonblaidd]

I divide skills into Basic Skills and Advanced Skills.  Basically, each Basic Skill has a number of Advanced Skills associated with it (and conversely, each Advanced Skill is associated with one Basic Skill).  Only the Advanced Skills are used (for example, you would have to take an Architecture test or a Shipbuilding test, but never an Engineering test), but the level of the Basic Skill is added to the Advanced Skill for those tests.  As skills are used, both the Advanced Skill and the Basic Skill will progress, so using one skill enough will increase your proficiency in other Advanced Skills that share the same Basic Skill, though progression will be slower for the other skills.  So, each Advanced Skill is in a group with similar skills by way of the Basic Skills.  So far, I have 26 Basic Skills and 120 Advanced Skills.  Basically, I need a little help covering everything to make sure I haven't missed anything, and reorganizing how skills are grouped.  I don't know everything about everything, so I need input from others more knowledgeable than myself to make sure I properly represent all the skills.  Be aware that some of these skill (language skill, magic skill e.g. "the arts," religions, etc.) are setting-specific, but these should be apparent.  I'm sure I've left something out (in particular, I feel that knot-tying should be in there somewhere, but I can only think to put it under either Sailing or Textiles, also, Leatherworking, etc.).  My question has nothing to do with mechanics or implementation, but rather just whether or not I'm lacking skills or have skill improperly grouped.  My game is a medieval fantasy setting (what else is new?).  I'll probably come back to this thread later if I have more questions about my skills, which is likely.  So, here's all my skills thus far.  Advanced Skills are indented below their Basic Skill.  I apologize for the length, I put things in a table to save space.  If you have questions about what a skill does, ask away.

Acrobatics    Aerial Motion    Balance    Climbing Athletics    Conditioning    Running    Swimming Persuasion    Bluff    Charm    Disguise    Intimidate Ceramics    Brick Making    Porcelain    Pottery Combat    Chain Weapons    Fencing    Hand to Hand    Heavy Weapons    Improvised Weaponry    Polearms    Shields    Short Blades    Swords Engineering    Architecture    Electricity    Machines    Shipbuilding

Forestry    Botany    Hunting    Logging Glass Working    Glassblowing    Glass Color Linguistics    Achaean    Hadari    Malahir    Nostr    Peridan    Semptyrian    Sian    Vladsevian    Westerspeak    Wildlander Tribal Literacy    Achaean    Hadari    Malahir    Nostr    Peridan    Semptyrian    Sian    Vladsevian    Westerspeak Medicine    Disease    First Aid    Surgery

Metallurgy    Gem Cutting    Mining    Prospecting    Refining Missiles    Blowguns    Bows    Crossbows    Darts    Gunpowder    Siege    Sling    Throwing Music    Bagpipe    Brass    Composing    Flute    Harp    Keyboard    Lute    Violin    Voice Natural Philosophy    Alchemy    Astronomy    Biology    Geometry    Mathematics    Mechanics    Nature

Perception    Awareness    Search Sailing    Fishing    Navigation    Rowing Sleight of Hand    Cheat/Trick    Steal Smithing    Armor Smithing    Blacksmithing    Silver Smithing    Weapon Smithing Spiritual Arts    Arcane Art    Astral Art    Black Art    Dark Art    Holy Art    Inner Art Stealth    Hide    Lockpicking    Sneak Stone Working    Masonry    Quarrying    Sculpturing

Survival    Camp Sites    Orientation    Tracking Textiles    Braiding    Knitting    Weaving Theology    Achaean Pantheon    Astrology    Nostr Pantheon    Pantheism    Semptyrian Pantheon    The Way    The Word    Wildlander Tribal Religions Woodworking    Bow Making    Carpentry    Carving

[whiteknife]

You don't seem to have jump, dodge, or "roll away from stuff" under acrobatics.

Although I wonder if you really need all of these skills, it seems awfully complex. I mean, do all these things even come up in a game? I don't know anything about your game, so it could be some sort of game where everyone is a tradesman in a harsh frontier or something, but otherwise I don't know why you'd need to cover such things with skills, rather than just having them be things people can just do without rolling. In my opinion, even the 26 basic skills seem like a lot, although that's a bit more reasonable.

That being said, good luck on your game. Feel free to ignore me if you're of the opinion that more skills are better or if your game really does need that much focus on crafting and such tasks.

[Luke]

I'd also like to know how skills work in your game. In what situation does one use Glass Color or Weaving? How do Linguistics work? What does having a Basic Linguistics do for me? What are the mechanics for language in your game? I've never been able to work out good language mechanics. Since RPGs are primarily verbal, making rules about verbal communication always dominates the game.

And to answer your question, there's no right amount of skills in your game. Players can't do "anything" in your world. They can only perform actions that have been provided for in the abilities and skills. You delineate their actions with your skill choices. You focus the game on certain aspects of your setting with the abilities available. So if you're designing a hack and slash adventure game, you've got too many skills. If you're designing a game about natural philosophers exploring a dangerous, monster-ridden frontier in which they must be able to play music, cast spells, discuss religion while making horseshoes, then you're good to go.

-L

[Egonblaidd]

I don't expect the players to be Glassblowing much, however I do want to have the option there in case they need to for some reason.  This is not just a hack 'n' slash RPG, it's about making tough moral choices in difficult situations.  There might be a rare case where the Glassblowing skill will give them an alternative to a less distasteful option.  The game is not just about combat.  The fact that one of the players has a skill in Glassblowing might suggest an adventure to the GM, perhaps a Baron wants the group to steal some glass artifact from some other nobleman, the Glassblower might opt to fashion an imitation instead.  Also, I want there to be skills for everything, so that they represent NPCs as well as the PCs.  Besides, economic crisis is pretty rampant in my world, it's one of the things that causes conflicts between people, whether at the individual level or at the national level.  Therefore, economic skills could be very important in dissolving a tense situation.  The same could be said of religious and linguistic skills.  I don't expect one character to have everything, in fact I'm kind of depending on it, so players would only worry about the skills that they have, which would probably only cover (random guess) 10 Basic Skills at most.

As for Linguistics, merely communicating would get a large bonus to success, and once it was high enough you would no longer need to roll just to talk.  At that point, rolls would be used more for things like composing poetry or deciphering a curious dialect (could also be very useful in public speaking, to gain a bonus to Charm tests).  Of course, most, if not all characters would start with at least one language that they spoke well enough that they didn't need to roll just to communicate, but if they go to another part of world then it becomes important.

As for dodging, I could see that going under Acrobatics, or I could see it being implicit in the Combat skill, I'm not sure how I'll deal with that yet.  Aerial Motion covers jumping, though, as well as midair dodging and other things like that.  I'll have to think about that some more.

But anyway, my RPG isn't just about combat.  For one thing, fights are going to be (hopefully) short and brutal, so combat is not something to look forward to, at least for most players (I guess there's always the group psychopath).  Rather, the players must draw on all the skills they have to find a solution to a problem that doesn't get them killed.  Also, morality is going to be a big thing in my RPG, so players also need to find an option that doesn't contradict their character's moral views.  This should get really interesting when the characters in a group have differing moral views that find themselves at odds with one another on occasion.  Anyway, I hope that gives you a better idea of what I'm trying to do.

[Luke]

I don't expect the players to be Glassblowing much, however I do want to have the option there in case they need to for some reason.  This is not just a hack 'n' slash RPG, it's about making tough moral choices in difficult situations.  There might be a rare case where the Glassblowing skill will give them an alternative to a less distasteful option.  The game is not just about combat. 

How? Mechanically, in your game, how is your game about making tough moral choices? What are the game mechanics that support these difficult decisions? What do the skill choices have to do with morality?

Linguistics now includes Poetry and Composition? Why aren't those separate skills? I know poets who have little facility in the field of linguistics and I know linguists who would make very poor poets.

Does Glass Coloring (I wasn't even talking about Glass Blowing) have the same mechanical weight as combat in your game? If not, why not?

And Egon, I hate to be the one to have to say this, but you can't have skills for everything. It's just not possible. Furthermore, you're not recreating the world as it exists. You're creating a fantastic place that exists according to your vision. And while your vision is vivid, it is not all encompassing. There are things that your vision includes -- moral choices -- and excludes -- hack and slash. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

Focus, man, focus. Focus on exactly what you want your game to do. I suspect that moral choices are more important to you than a Glass Coloring challenge.

You want the players to be morally at odds with one another. Do you have mechanics for mediating disputes at the table?

-L

[Egonblaidd]

I kind of hoped an explanation of my entire RPG mechanics wouldn't be necessary (actually, I suppose it's not, only certain parts), since it would be time consuming, but you're probably right that it does make a difference on how things are put together.  So here goes.

Morality: there are 12 different moral gauges that range from -10 (deficiency) to 10 (excess) and at character creation players will choose where their character falls on those scales.  One might value force as a means to promote justice, while another prefers peaceful solutions.  One might value life to the extreme of harming no living creature, another might have a certain disdain for life, especially human life.  And so on, for all 12 groups, including things like religion, materialism, and honesty.  When faced with a situation, the players must decide how to deal with it.  Do they try to negotiate, or attack while they have the element of surprise?  Do they commit a murder, or stand by and let an atrocity occur?  Do they lie and risk being found out later, or tell the truth and risk hostile treatment now?  Do they obey an immoral command, or defy their authority?  How they deal with a situation determines the morality of that situation (which will only involve a few of the moral groups in any one decision), and if this agrees with their moral standing they are rewarded with a Morality point that can be used for an automatic success in one resolution test related to that morality (i.e. a Justice point could be spent for an automatic hit in battle if the character tends more toward Violence, or for an automatic Charm if that character tends more toward Peace) (I'm still hammering out the details of this).  If it contradicts their morality, then their moral codes will change, and I might mandate a "guilt" penalty for a certain duration to follow.  So if the peaceful orator is forced to act violently in order to save his own life, his negative view of violence will lessen slightly.  Continued violent action will bring him to the point where he is much more open to force and less patient with peaceful attempts.
One thing to note: I do not expect the GM to come up with possible solutions to a problem, only the problem itself.  This is not a multiple choice problem.  It is the responsibility of the players to find the best solution, if one exists.

As far as the linguistics vs. poetry thing, that's why I created this thread.  What I was thinking was that characters with a higher education would start with a higher language skill than those with a low education to represent things like English and literature that they had studied, as well as a developed eloquence.  I guess I'm still trying to figure this out exactly, but it sounds like I'll need an extra skill for poetry.  In that case, what do I use high Linguistics skills for?

As far as Glass Coloring goes, I could imagine an adventure(?) where the group decides to help rebuild a town that has been destroyed, which includes the local church, complete with stained glass windows.  In this case, Glass Coloring could be a helpful skill here (for coloring the windows), while there may not be any combat during this adventure.  Now, I don't know if an adventure like that would actually be fun to the players, but I suspect it could be presented in a way that was fun, especially for those players who enjoy the economic aspect of strategy games rather than all out war.  It's just a fact that many RPGs have "crafting" skills that are often used to make a little cash (make and sell swords from all those lumps of iron you get so you can buy a crossbow), or even make your own gear.  Or maybe you're making something to use as a bribe, or gift, in order to get something you want from an NPC.  On some occasions you may need a particular item for a quest (example: this dragon can only be hurt by this certain kind of crystal, so your craftsman fashions a crossbow bolt with this crystal).  You may be able to find an NPC to craft things for you, but in certain situations you might not be able to.

I suppose originally my project started off as a fantasy Heartbreaker (in the sense that I wanted to make a "standard" fantasy RPG), but I've since done a lot to focus it and improve it (such as adding morality) in such a way that, while it still might classify as a fantasy Heartbreaker, it has some unique aspects to it.  And that's fine for me.  This is the first RPG I've designed, and a Heartbreaker isn't a bad way to get into the hobby.

[Luke]

Wow, a scored morality system. I love those questions. Giving them weight in an RPG is a perennial issue. I know my games try to give moral weight to a course of action, as do Lumpley/Vincent's and Paul Czege's.


Are all actions/skills rated on the morality system or does the GM arbitrarily assign the type of morality in play and the right way and wrong way to handle a situation?

Is the morality founded in the setting or is the morality transplanted from our own culture and mores into the game?


I've found similar difficulties with the language and education issues, especially when attempting to emulate creative skills. I've found the situation insoluble in this context.

Regarding Glass Coloring: Those are viable situations, but certainly not the only ones. Financial gain is one way to use a skill, but in the situation that you're discussing -- replacing the windows of a damaged church -- why exclude artistic endeavor? It's the same issue as Poetry. How do you create art in this system? How is art related to morality in this system?

But I want to poke at something deeper. Your game has a combat system. Does it have a "Glass Coloring System"? You're pushing for a deep skill list. Does each skill have its own micro system? If not, why not? Why, if you want a deep skill system, is combat featured over everything else?

Also, you didn't answer my previous question: Do you have have method of resolving moral disputes between the players.

[Egonblaidd]

I haven't quite worked out how individual actions will be rated for morality, and it would probably change situation by situation.  Therefore the best bet is probably to make it a GM and/or player call ("this is self defense, so I'm justified," "you had the chance to escape and didn't take it, you're not justified").  I'm not exactly sure what you're asking in your second question.  There's no "right" morality as far as the mechanics go, players can set their characters to whatever morality they want.  One could go all Selfish (no sense of Duty to authority) while another goes all Myrmidon (absolute sense of Duty to authority), and then each character would be required to act accordingly or risk their morality changing.  The in-game setting is certainly based off of real world history, so obviously certain moralities are going to do better in a social context (the death cultist probably won't have many friends).  But with this system there generally won't be a "right" way to deal with a situation.  The GM will present the problem and the players will try to find a solution that agrees with their morals.  Religion, however, will also play a role, especially for characters using holy magic.  They'll have to organize their morals around what their character believes, or their ability to use holy magic will degrade significantly.

Yes, I noticed that I was missing skills like painting, so I added a Visual Art Basic Skill with three Advanced Skills: Drawing, Painting, and Print Setting.  I haven't thought about how morality and art will mesh yet.  My guess is it will depend on what you are producing with your art (a scene depicting knights giving charitably to the poor, or a scene of the king being impaled by angry peasants, etc.) and why you are producing that art (solely to be creative, for financial gain, to promote social reform, for political protest, etc.).

No, there won't be a "Glass Coloring System," but I do think there will be an "Economy System" which will include the gathering of materials, the crafting of goods, buying and selling, constructing buildings, etc. as well as a "Social System" which will deal with human interactions like public speaking, diplomacy, etc. (they might actually be merged into one system, I'm not sure yet).  It's true, I don't expect the players to be running a business, but neither do I expect them to join the army (though that could make for an interesting campaign).  Combat, however, is important because generally violence is always a possible solution.  Also, I only have two combat related Basic Skills, Combat (melee) and Missiles (ranged), while I have many more other skills.

I'm not sure I entirely understand what you mean by resolving moral disputes between players.  If the group psychopath wants to kill the evil baron, but the rest of the group wants to negotiate, then either the psychopath can leave the group and do his own thing, in which case the rest of the party may try and stop him, or he can agree to go along with negotiations, but swear that at the first sign of trouble he's going to gut the baron.  Is that what you meant?  The players don't have to agree, and they won't necessarily receive the same moral treatment (for example, one character might beat some secret info out of an NPC while a more peaceful character stands by with a disapproving look on his face, the one is acting violently while the other, though he's not stopping the violent action, expresses a strong disapproval of it and does not participate).  If this isn't what you meant then could you give an example?

Also, I've added a Husbandry skill that includes things like Animal Handling and Riding, and I'm trying to work on a Farming skill, but so far the only subskill I have is Cultivation.  What are some other farming related skills?  And where would a Poetry skill fit in?

[Luke]

Combat, however, is important because generally violence is always a possible solution.  Also, I only have two combat related Basic Skills, Combat (melee) and Missiles (ranged), while I have many more other skills.

And I suspect that those two skills have an extensive, detailed subsystem attached to them while NONE of the other skills have anything more than a handful of difficulty ratings attached to them.

Anyway, I've derailed this thread enough. I hope I've given you some food for thought about your game.

Good luck,
-L

[Egonblaidd]

I'd like to see how my system holds up under playtesting before I start rewriting the skill system.  Also, as I've said, I intend to write rules regarding item crafting and such, which should work nearly universally for all crafting skills, and there will probably be a detailed section for each crafting skill.  I just haven't gotten around to writing it yet.

Anyway, I still need help filling out and organizing my skills.

[JoyWriter]

What is the difference between organising your skill list and rewriting it?

I'm scratching my head trying to explain what I mean, but basically what your looking for here might be called an objective ontology of action, in-other-words a layer by layer categorisation of all actions someone can do (excluding eating and other biological functions) that are "right" in some universal way. It would have properties that move down the layers, from the properties of action in general to the most specified version.

Now one problem with this view is that if some structure like that could be constructed, it would probably have multiple inheritance. This means that instead of being in discrete categories, each action would be in more than one, say based on it's energetic-ness or the attitude with which it was done, or the parts of the body it uses.

Now if you want to keep a set of discrete basic skills that become advanced skills, without "knot tying" turning up in sailing and textiles, or using a bow on an animal turning up in bow and hunting, then you have to make a decision. You can't stick with an "always right" system, you have to make one that is right for you. For example, perhaps using a bow on a person is different, because they share your species, or perhaps hunting is resolved in a roll because it is not the main focus: You don't want to actually track down a dear and kill it in-fiction, just have Lock walk out of the jungle with his boar.

This is how many games treat many skills, and what Luke was trying to get at. The actions that you want to happen real-time are split up, and the actions that happen off camera are lumped together. But in other games, whether you focus on glassworking or combat, it still uses the one basic skill, but more narration is involved. Or perhaps your artistic style is itself a skill, and learning the style of the master who made the cathedral window is a task in itself.

So the reason he kept going back to your design intentions is that if you use that to decide these answers, it becomes its own world, with it's own internal "action ontology" echoing it's other elements. This way the themes of what interest you are built into every fibre of the design.

Now to take it another way, you could say "this is an rpg, and rpgs have big skill lists, what skills will people complain about if I don't stick them on the page?" Now this is just gruntwork, you look through every rpg book you can find and look for a skill that isn't on your list, and add it. This is not a job it is easy to involve people in, as it is close to attacking a thesaurus for verbs! In that case you could talk to a programmer about automating the process.

But if you want to explore what your skill list means, how it effects decisions people make, what it says about your world, how it's detail should be focused given your design interests, or how it's existing structure could tell you something about your interests, well I for one would be interested in helping out!

[JoyWriter]

Oh the confusion of multiple threads!
http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=27714.0
Never mind Egonblaidd, seems like you got to most of my ideas before me!

[Egonblaidd]

Yeah, I suppose what I'm going for is a focus on the details, rather than the general situation.  Because of the way the morality system functions, it's important to resolve a situation, therefore a single resolution for that situation (you enter combat, roll to see if you win) is not really that interesting.  We care about the results, but to see the results immediately after making the decision kills the suspense.  Rather, each situation is a myriad of details, each of which has to be resolved individually.  If a detail cannot be resolved then an alternate path must be found, or the method being used to resolve the situation must be dropped in favor of a different approach.  Obviously, this is most apparent in combat, as we go through round-by-round in order to achieve victory.  As long as the battle remains uncertain, there is a sense of suspense that makes it more worth it when the final resolution is known, especially if there are setbacks but an eventual victory.  This could also be true in a social or economical encounter.  Merchant A wants item X, and for whatever reason you are determined to get it.  First you might try crafting X, failing that you might try to buy X, but if X is not available for purchase you might have to choose between stealing X from someone else or letting merchant A down.  Hence, everything needs to be detailed.  A single situation should not be resolved with one dice roll.  I guess the point is to shift the players' attention away from the overarching situation and how it relates to their morality, the thing that is really important, to the details involved in resolving that situation.  Sooner or later, one of the players is going to say "What are we doing?  This isn't right."  And the players will realize that they've gotten caught up in the grittiness of the world and been blinded to the morality of their actions.  I suppose the tactic is to draw the players attention to the major aspect of the game by distracting them from it while still letting it affect them.

By the way, I'm now up to 34 Basic Skills (skill groups) and 146 Advanced Skills (subskills), and I recently added Agriculture, Husbandry, Literary Art, Leadership, History, Law, and Business (I think that's all of the new additions) and reworked Sailing (I put Ropework under Textiles).  I've found that one way to find out which skills I'm missing is to whip up background templates (packs of skills for character generation, not a class system) and trying to find a skill for a template that I don't have.  The History, Law, and Business were prompted when I was working on a "Student" template, since it struck me that those should be skills that would be available to a student, and yet were lacking from my repertoire.  One thing I'm wondering, these "Basic Skills" are supposed to be groups that contain skills that work on the same principles.  For example, mathematics, geometry, and mechanics, or hiding and sneaking.  I'm getting a distinct feeling that (a) some skills don't belong in their current group (such as Lockpicking under Stealth), or possibly any of the current groups, and (b) that some skills should belong to multiple groups (such as Sculpturing, currently under Stone Working, but could also be under Visual Art).  Would it be too chaotic to have some skills in no groups and some skills in multiple groups?  It seems like that could necessitate a reworking of my system.  You know, it might make more sense to put Lockpicking under Engineering.

[Egonblaidd]

Just an update for any who want to review my skillset thus far.  I've made some improvements and such, but I have yet to playtest it, so I'm still waiting on other people to help me with that in order to perfect it.  Anyway, I'm currently at 34 skill groups and 145 subskills.
Issues I'm thinking about:  Do I need a skill for taking care of equipment, like weapons and armor?  Should Lockpicking be under Engineering?  Agriculture, History, Law, and Leadership seem somewhat lacking, how can I improve them?  Some skills seem like they should be in multiple groups, like Sculpturing should be under both Stone Working and Visual Art.  Are some of my skills redundant or addressing tasks that require no skill?  Hopefully some of these issues should get resolved through playtesting, but no harm in thinking ahead.

Acrobatics    Aerial Motion    Balance    Climbing    Dodge Agriculture    Botany    Cultivation Athletics    Conditioning    Running    Swimming Business    Evaluate    Haggle    Management Ceramics    Brick Making    Porcelain    Pottery Combat    Chain Weapons    Fencing    Hand to Hand    Heavy Weapons    Improvised Weaponry    Polearms    Shields    Short Blades    Swords Engineering    Architecture    Electricity    Machines    Shipbuilding

Glass Working    Glassblowing    Glass Color History    Archeology    Eastern History    Middle Eastern History    Western History Husbandry    Animal Handling    Breeding    Riding Law    Eastern Law    Hadari Law    Western Law Leadership    Public Speaking    Rally Linguistics    Achaean    Hadari    Malahir    Nostr    Peridan    Semptyrian    Sian    Slevic    Westerspeak    Wildlander Tribal Literacy    Hadari Script    Malahir Script    Semptyrian Ideography    Sian Logography    Western Script

Literary Art    Drama    Poetry    Prose Leatherworking    Leather Crafting    Skinning    Tanning Medicine    Disease    First Aid    Surgery Metallurgy    Gem Cutting    Mining    Prospecting    Refining Missiles    Blowguns    Bows    Crossbows    Darts    Gunpowder    Siege    Sling    Throwing Music    Brass    Composing    Flute    Harp    Keyboard    Lute    Pipes    Violin    Voice

Natural Philosophy    Alchemy    Astronomy    Biology    Geometry    Gnosticism    Mathematics    Mechanics    Nature Perception    Awareness    Intuition    Search Persuasion    Bluff    Charm    Disguise    Intimidate Sailing    Ship Handling    Navigation    Marine Weather Sleight of Hand    Cheat/Trick    Steal Smithing    Armor Smithing    Blacksmithing    Silver Smithing    Weapon Smithing Spiritual Arts    Arcane Art    Astral Art    Black Art    Holy Art    Inner Art

Stealth    Hide    Lockpicking    Sneak Stone Working    Masonry    Quarrying    Sculpturing Survival    Camp Sites    Fishing    Orientation    Tracking Textiles    Braiding    Knitting    Ropework    Weaving Theology    Achaean Pantheon    Astrology    Nostr Pantheon    Pantheism    Semptyrian Pantheon    The Way    The Word    Wildlander Tribal Religions Visual Art    Drawing    Painting    Printmaking Woodworking    Bow Making    Carpentry    Carving    Logging

[Ayyavazi]

Hey there, Egon.

So, I want to ask you a question: How accessible do you want your game to be to new players?

As it stands, the skillset alone is daunting to me, and I'm a fairly experienced gamer. I like traditional fantasy RPGs, which seems to be what your game is shaping up to be. But the skill list is almost unwieldy, and a new gamer would look at this and say one thing, "Too complicated." By new gamer, I mean someone who hasn't played a single rpg yet.

But, the problem is not without a solution. Make your skill set useable at the group level as well as the individual level. That is, a group can play your game one of two ways: either use your 34 groups for everything, or use your 145 sub-skills for everything. As long as the mechanics are simply built, you can do this without any more than a paragraph explaining the difference between the two. So say your mechanic were like D&D, roll d20 and add rank, modifiers and such. A skill set like yours can have ranks in either groups or individual skills. Then, if the group is playing with skill groups only, they use their group rank. If they are playing with the individual skills, they get more skill points per level, and use their individual skill ranks. That would only take a small chart and a paragraph to explain, and makes the game 111 times simpler for new players.

Hope design is going well,

--Norm