Skills:- What types and how many?

[Autocrat]

Yeah, yet another one to pick you brains and preference sticks with!

OK, post apaoco', loads of variety for the technnology, potential goldmines of info for Characters to locate and learn...... so what do we let them learn?

Yep, SKills have driven me crazy..... what are the general groups people are accustomed to, what are those they prefer, and what works?

So far, I have Skills in the following general groups;

STANDARD - Those that almost anyone can learn.
ASPECT - Those that are specialised and unusual.
Applied - Those that are physical or require physical interaction.
Knowledge - Those that are intellectual and require no practical application
Communication - Those that deal with language, numbers, movement etc.


Within those, I can only think of the following groups;

Academic
Character
Clandestine
Combat
Social
Survival
Vehicle
Arcane Magic
Faith MAgic
Conjuration MAgic
Psionics
Mutagenics
Cybernetics
Bionics
Bio-genetics


So, have I missed in blindlingly obvious groups out?
I know that somethings that may be suggested will appear within the groups listed, yet I'd rather read what I have than not read what I haven't, so throw them in!

[Taina]

How about:

mechanical, repair, construction (plumbers, electricians, bridge builders, carpenters)

craft, smithing (to make cloth, pottery, glassware, horseshoes, bullets)

art, music and dance (entertainment)

sport and athletics

management, logistics

farming and animal husbandry

medical and nursing skills

Hope this helps.
Taina

[Ron Edwards]

Hi there,

Autocrat, you might get some more complete responses from a lot of experienced role-players here, if you could provide a different sort of information for us.

What are skills for in your game? How important do you think they are, relative to other things (attributes, possessions, whatever)? Who decides whether a character is using a given skill: GM or player?

And most importantly: do skills solve characters' problems, or do they set up problems? Imagine my character in a situation - can I make a skill roll and get out of it? Or is that option closed, and no matter what, I have to use a mutant power, to use a gadget, or to fight?

You see, the word "skill" doesn't mean the same thing across all RPG rules. It really doesn't. Even if you've played ten games and they all seem alike, it's quite possible that nine of them were imitations of the other - which means you've only played one "real" game.

So when you ask, "what skills should I have?" there's absolutely no way to answer sensibly. I cannot possibly know what you are asking about, until you tell me what skills as a game mechanic do for people during play. Let us know, though, and you'll get tons of help.

Best,
Ron

[Autocrat]

... Taina ...

Thank you, hadn't thought og Management or Logistics!
The real problem I'm facing is getting as many as possible to fit in the right places.  This leads to some specific skills appearing in several groups, (which is fine by me!), yet trying not to create archetypes of stereo-type the skill groups.

Still, any other ideas would be more than welcome, particularly along the llines of the Technology Skills like Demolitions, Mechanics, Repair..... I can't decide if I should have a Group for Mechanics, with Mechanical repair, then a group for Electronics with Electronic repair, or should it just be a group for Repair, Patch, Bodge-it, then a group for MEchanics, Eltronics, Eltrical, Masonry etc ????



... Ron Edwards ...

Is this any better?

Definition of Skill.
* Skills are bought using Character Points at Character Creation, and throught the Game as the Characters Improve.  All Skills have a Base Stat/Attribute, (such as Muscle or Reason).  The Skill Score, in units of 10% per level of Skill, are added to the Base State, modified by Task Difficulty, (be it an oppenents Defence Rating, the awkwardness of a Lock, the protocol of a computer's perimeter systems etc.), to generate a Target Number, which must be rolled equal to or less than to succeed.
.....Stat + Skill + Diff Mod = TN, Roll = or < to succeed......

* Skills are learned and used by Characters to perform various actions, ranging from attempting to recall or recite a poem, through to performing an attack, Juggling two chairs, driving a HGV, or any other such thing.  

* The Term skill also applies to aspected skills such as employing Psionic Powers, Arcane Spells, Conjuring an Entity, Praying for Faith Magic etc.

* Skills are organised in the following layout;

TITLE OF GROUP-------------------------Melee Weapons
....Main Group----------------------------Swords
.........Sub-Group-------------------------Small Swords
.............Individual Skill-----------------Short Sword

You can purchase either Individual Skills or the Sub-Group.
If you have an Individual skill, you can default to a related skill in the same sub-group, or you can default to a different sub-group in the same main-group, or default to stat, (each suffers a larger negative modifier!)

If that is what you wanted, does it help?
Any suggestions?


Still, any more ideas.... what do you normally find lacking or missing?

[Valamir]

TITLE OF GROUP-------------------------Melee Weapons
....Main Group----------------------------Swords
.........Sub-Group-------------------------Small Swords
.............Individual Skill-----------------Short Sword

You can purchase either Individual Skills or the Sub-Group.
If you have an Individual skill, you can default to a related skill in the same sub-group, or you can default to a different sub-group in the same main-group, or default to stat, (each suffers a larger negative modifier!)

If that is what you wanted, does it help?

What would help, I think, is if you explained why you want the system to work like this?  What are you trying to accomplish by this arrangement of nested default skills?  What's the goal?  Without knowing your goals I can't really offer any suggestions that you'd find usefull.

I'm guessing your goal isn't realism, because nested skills like this are about as unrealistic a way of portraying how people learn as I can think of.  I'm reasonably certain that the number of people on this forum who actually train to fight with swords would find nothing in this break down remotely similiar to how they train.

I'm guessing your goal isn't so that you'll always know what the player should roll depending on what he's doing, because that goal is much easier met by being broader than by drilling down.

The only thing I can see in this system is that it represents player choices and enforces consequences for those choices.

Did the player pick the right skill at character creation to help him out now?  Did the player learn how to master the complicated skill tier system so that he knows what combination of skills gives him access to the most abilities at the best defaults?  This system seems hugely geared towards that idea.  There will clearly be skills that it is mechanically foolish to purchase (because they could have been easily defaulted to from something else) and others that are mechanically foolish not to purchase (because the give access to abilities that aren't easily defaulted to from something else and/or give access to a bunch of new things that can be defaulted to.  

This has the appearance of a system whose primary purpose is to judge how well the player mastered the system...to reward them with good character effectiveness when they demonstrate such mastery; and to punish them with reduced effectiveness when they don't.

Is that, in fact, your design goal?  If not, then I'd really question what you have because that seems to be what it will, in fact, do.

Hense the questions on what you're trying to accomplish.

[Shreyas Sampat]

In a word, no.

You just gave mechanics when Ron asked specifically for meaning; you're passing each other in the dark. I'll try to clarify.

How restrictive do you intend skill use to be? In d20, there are some problems that can be solved by exactly one skill (unlocking doors, for instance), some by many (getting past a guard: Move Silently and Hide, or will you try to schmooze past him with Socialize?), some by none (you are inside a bubble of force); very few problems are resolvable in D20 by the application of every skill. Generally, the use of a skill is a binary thing: Does it work, or no? A skill in d20 is roughly "a body of applied knowledge".

Alyria specifically allows you to use any stat against any other stat in a conflict; they are all universally applicable. There is a range of results, ranging from "complete success, with cascading benefits" to "not only do you lose the conflict, but a complication arises! you will be having a harder time in the future". A stat in Alyria isn't meant to encompass a body of applied knowledge; it is an approach to tackling problems.

Which are you meaning?

[M. J. Young]

Given what your design goals seem to be (extrapolated from your several threads), I could probably identify scores, possibly hundreds, of skills you would want to consider. I could start by copying about two hundred pages out of the center of Multiverser.

Let me suggest that you get a copy of Multiverser. That way you can sort through them at your leisure, and see what works for you. At the same time, let me suggest that you do the research of acquiring and perusing copies of other skill-based games--Star Frontiers, GURPS, I'm sure you know some of the others. See what skills other game designers thought to include, and build on that. Look at various incarnations of D&D--OAD&D had skill-like non-weapon proficiencies detailed in Oriental Adventures, Dungeoneer's Survival Guide, and Wilderness Survival Guide; 3E has feats. (I don't recall what 2E had in this regard, but it did have non-weapon proficiencies--some of these crept up in some of the sourcebooks.)

By looking at games that attempt to do what you're attempting to do, or something like it, you can see both what they did that you're missing and where they missed something that matters to you (and if they didn't, why are you designing a game to do what's already been done?).

As Multiverser puts it, just about anything your character can learn to do is a skill, from crawling on his belly to designing a time/space machine. There's too much ground in there for a forum post to cover.

--M. J. Young

[Autocrat]

OK then, in order.......

... Valamir ...

I'll try not to bite  (LOL).... right, I take those views as caustic and on the aggressive, without cause!

* Firstly, that skill system appears in several over games, to one extent or another, including Shadowrun with its base skills and Specialisations, and also in Alternacy with its broad and tight groups, (note it's the same in AD&D with the alternate rules for weapons!).

*Secondly, realism is 1) a matter of perspective, 2) a matter of preferrence, 3) a matter of belief.  On the one hand I'm whined at for being to detailed, the next told that I'm not being realistic enough?!?

*Third, no the system does not reward or punish for knowing the system itself, no more so than anything else in life... so long as you know the ropes, things are OK, if your'e knew, then things might get a little quirky.  The basis of the defaulting, (which is an optional rule!!!), permits those that haven't got the exact skill to have a slight chance if they having something related or associated with it, much like in real life when you don't know how to do one thing, you can possibly think of something else and go from there!


As to Characters being better off with broarder choices than more defined choices, not likely!  It's simply a matter of cost.  To purchase a specific skill costs X, to get the group costs you more than X, (in fact, it costs you the Base cost of every Skill in that group, less 2 - just for bulk purchase reduction :) ).

Please try to be constructive... sa people keep saying, they don't understand my system as I haven't put enough information dow.... yet you seemed to have leapt to a vast plethora of presumptions without knowing anything of purchasing costs, the exponential increse of multiple levels etc.???  MAke a little more sense now?
Sorry if it seems a violent reply, just getting sick of being one of the only ones that people seem to bi~~~ at.... must be my after shave :)


... Shreyas Sampat ...
Ok, that makes sense..... what would you say  to a system that has skills for certain instances and specific uses, yet also permitted different skills for different performances?
i.e. getting past a door could be done with lock picking, breaching or kicking it down..... getting past the guard can be done with hiding, sneaking, charm, seduction, distraction, violence, intimidation, spells, psionics or what ever else the players/characters can come up with.  Each skill is related to a Stat, so they can use different means and different stats.
Sound fair enough?
What I don't understand is what you said about the game using stats against each other... how would being charming help in the middle of a battle, (please don't say anything about shmoozing out of it LOL).
Interested it hearing how that works!


... M. J. Young ...

Hmmm ..... research....Shadowrun, D&D, AD&D 2/3, Battletech, BESM, Gurps/Murps, Fudge, Marvel Heroes, WOD -VM/WA, Cyberpunk2020, Pulp, .... infact, I think I ripped and sorted through over 22 different systems, covering over 14 different styles of play, mechanics, genres etc......... yet I was asking for what you peoples like and want... what the big groups and names are that you all like to see etc.

At present, I have over 530 specific, 114 sub groups, 43 main groups and about 12 Title groups of skills compiled.
Yet I know that I won't have though up, researched or borrowed everything that people will want... I think that is the mistake that so many people make... so I thought I'd ask.
Stupid of me really!




OK, I have got to ask.................

..

..
WHAT THE HELL IS IT WITH ME AND WHAT I'M DOING THAT SEEMS TO RESULT IN THE MAJORITY OF RESULTANT POSTS BEING NEGATIVE, CAUSTIC, OFFENSIVE OR JUST PLAIN DEGRADING ??????????????????????????????seriously, please tell me, or send it in a message or what ever!
Is it the language I use, the way I type, what?  It's not like you can see my hair, or smell my after shave, and none of you are family, so whats the flamming excuse?

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Autocrat,

Actually, my call is that you identify the people who you consider to be treating you unfairly to me, through private message - even if the person is me.

You'll get some justice then. I'm a pretty stern dude when I put that hat on, towards my own posts as well as anyone else's.

Best,
Ron

[Valamir]

Please try to be constructive...

I am trying to be constructive.  You have to understand something about the Forge.  This isn't a site where people just hang out and talk for shits and grins.  If people are taking the time to respond to you its because they are trying to be constructive.  If we're posting its because we see some value in contributing, not because we have nothing better to do than give you grief.

I'll try not to bite (LOL).... right, I take those views as caustic and on the aggressive, without cause!

Not at all.  But I will ask you one thing.  You've come to a site where there are a number of professional published game designers, and many people who've spent months and years thinking hard and critically about this hobby.  This isn't a site where a bunch of folks are just hanging and ranting to each other.  There is some serious analysis on the nature of gaming that goes on here.  

So yes, I do believe that qualifies a a good many of us as pretty knowledgeable folks on the subject.  When you have a sizeable number of knowledgeable folks taking the time out of their day to all give you a fairly similiar message about your design and design goals...is it possible, are you willing to concede...that maybe, just maybe...we have a point?

Are you willing to entertain the idea that perhaps instead of leaping to the defensive at the first sign of criticism you might want to actually try to hear what's being said and take time to really think about your design and some of the suggestions being made?

Because honestly...if you aren't willing to do that...I don't know that there's much more to say.  But on the theory that you are open for this sort of dialogue, I'll try again.

* Firstly, that skill system appears in several over games, to one extent or another, including Shadowrun with its base skills and Specialisations, and also in Alternacy with its broad and tight groups, (note it's the same in AD&D with the alternate rules for weapons!).

True, to a point.  Few games try to go 4 layers deep with the idea.

But the fact that the system is one that has been used in different variations many times leaves me puzzled by your closing comment of

yet you seemed to have leapt to a vast plethora of presumptions without knowing anything of purchasing costs, the exponential increse of multiple levels etc.??? MAke a little more sense now?

It is precisely because this system has been used a number of times that I can draw certain conclusions about it.  Your comments about purchasing costs and exponential increases make my point even stronger.  In fact, I'd pretty much guessed you'd have something like that...because that's how these things typically work.

*Secondly, realism is 1) a matter of perspective, 2) a matter of preferrence, 3) a matter of belief. On the one hand I'm whined at for being to detailed, the next told that I'm not being realistic enough?!?

See, this is where I have to ask if you are actually hearing what is being said.  *I* don't give a rats butt how realistic your system is or isn't.  *you* should.  You should be able to say with certainty "yes it is important to me to model reality as closely as I can within the confines of abstract game mechanics", or "no I don't really care about realism, I'm trying instead to get a system that accomplishes...X" (whatever X is). Or something in the middle.

Yet instead of answering the question, you go on the defensive.  I can say with a fair degree of conviction, that if your goal is to model realism, your nested skill systems doesn't support that goal.  If your goal is not to model realism, than that fact doesn't really matter.  *you* need to be clear what your goals are, and if you really want our help *you* need to convey those goals to us.

If *we* know what your goals are than we can help identify whether your mechanics are meeting those goals or not.  Otherwise the discussion becomes meaningless mechanical masturbating.

*Third, no the system does not reward or punish for knowing the system itself, no more so than anything else in life... so long as you know the ropes, things are OK, if your'e knew, then things might get a little quirky. The basis of the defaulting, (which is an optional rule!!!), permits those that haven't got the exact skill to have a slight chance if they having something related or associated with it, much like in real life when you don't know how to do one thing, you can possibly think of something else and go from there!

Yes, yes it does.  It very definitely does.  That's not a bad thing.  LOTS of games do that.  Hell, talk to any hardcore Hero fan and they'll tell you point black that one of the greatest appeals of the system is when players flex their mastery muscles by manipulating it.  This is such a common type of play that its embedded as one of the 5 cornerstone elements of roleplaying...Exploration of System...in Ron's essays.

Once again, you leap to the defensive against criticism that isn't there.  I'm not telling you its bad to do this.  But I'm definitely telling you that you need to be aware that this is, in fact, what you are doing, and you need to be sure that its what you want.

Now pretend you said: "yes, that's what I'm going for.  Players should be able to directly effect their character's effectiveness through their knowledge of the char gen system.  A good player should be able to design a character that is notably more effective for the same number of points than a newbie could"

I would have said.  "A fine goal.  Not my cup of tea, but I know guys like Mike Holmes and even Ron Edwards in past lives eat that sort of thing up"  After which I might have asked "given that as a goal, why is your system better at accomplishing it than Hero?"


However, instead of saying this you come back with "no that's not the goal at all".  To which I can only respond..."and this is why we keep asking what your goals for the game are.  I'm left only able to conclude that, like an contractor who started to build a house without a blue print, you've started to build a game with no clear plan for what the game is for or why you're building it.

You say that you don't want a system that overtly rewards players for mastery of the game mechanics, yet from all appearances, that's exactly what you've got so far.  

You need a goal.  You need a mission statement that summarizes succinctly and directly why the heck you are spending your valuable time on this project.  You need a vision of what this game is FOR.

Without that, and to date, despite being asked for it several times you haven't offered it, there is little concrete advice we can give you.

As to Characters being better off with broarder choices than more defined choices, not likely! It's simply a matter of cost. To purchase a specific skill costs X, to get the group costs you more than X, (in fact, it costs you the Base cost of every Skill in that group, less 2 - just for bulk purchase reduction :) ).

Bringing perfect mathematical balance to a multi layered skill system with multiple attributes and multiple interactions is a holy grail that has NEVER been achieved.  If you think you're about to uncover the secret to make it possible, I applaud your ambition, but I hope you'll forgive me for being skeptical.

Its a fact that certain skills will be used more frequently than others in a game.  This becomes MORE true the more skills you have.  The actual value of any given skill in terms of how many points it should be worth is thus directly in proportion to both a) the frequency at which the skill will be called upon, and b) the importance and impact it has when it is called upon.

Unless you're going to suggest that you've found the magic formulae for exactly pricing every single skill in exact proportion to its in game value you have a situation where a skillful player can learn what skills are bargains (because they're more valuable in the game than the points you are charging) and which are not (because they're less valuable in the game than the points you are charging).

Thus your game has become one that rewards the masterful player for making good character design choices, and punishes newbies who don't know the best combination of skills to get.  Whether you want it to or not...that's the situation you have.

When you add multiple nested skill levels, broad vs narrow skill groups, skills so narrow as to be virtually useless being priced along side of skills so broad as to be invaluable, skills interacting with multiple attributes, and so on...you've magnified the issue by making it that much harder to become masterful, increasing the gulf between skillful player and non skillful.

This is not a new issue.  There are plenty of veteran Champions GMs who will take their newbie player's super hero concepts and design the character for them because they KNOW that newbie will not grok the system well enough to create a useful character where a veteran who knows the tricks can do so easily.

This, however, is a reality of complex skill systems period.  And its one you'd best be prepared to deal with in your design goals, either by treating it as a problem to be fixxed/avoided or as a feature to be embraced.


This is as constructive as it gets my friend.  If you'd prefer I not respond further to your posts, let me know and I'll avoid wasting both our times in the future.

[Ole]

Ralph Mazza makes some excellent points, most important of them is that you should state some design goals. Whats is your vision for the game? What are you trying to accomplish with it? How should it be played?

It seems to me that the system you are designing is not unlike CORPS, atleast when it comes to skill structure. Take a look at the nutshell edition.

[clehrich]

Hi, Autocrat,

Not to wade in where angels fear to tread or anything, but I think what Ralph's getting at, with lots of types of examples, and also Shreyas in a different way, is this idea that System Does Matter.

See, let's take the system you're working on, with "over 530 specific, 114 sub groups, 43 main groups and about 12 Title groups of skills compiled," as you say.

Now let's take, on the opposite extreme, a game with no skills at all, only a couple of Traits or something that cover everything.

Setting everything else equal for the purpose of discussion, the point is that the two systems will play differently.  In your game, when people want to do things, they have a specific skill to check and see how good at it they are.  In a Skill-less game, when people want to do things, they explain what they're doing and give some indication of which Trait it should fall under (or the GM does this for them, or both).

The end-result is quite different.  Let's suppose, for the moment, that there are no special combat bonuses or whatever, just for simplicity's sake.  My character, Dave, is pointing a gun at some thug's head, from a medium distance.  I say, "Buddy, I'm holding a .44 Magnum revolver here, and it's loaded, and I've warned you once already.  I pull the trigger and blow his head clean off."

In your system, I now roll the appropriate weapon skill.

In a Trait system, I roll against (let's say) Physique.

Now in the latter case, there's minimal difference between what I just did and if I were using a crossbow.  In your system, there's a big difference.  In your system, it might be that if I were using a heavy pistol, that would be different from a light one, purely from the standpoint of me firing the thing (let's say one-handed).  In the Trait system, again, there's no mechanical difference at all.

The point being that the two systems produce quite different effects, and one way to look at it is that they emphasize different things.  The Trait system doesn't emphasize weapon information.  Your system does.

So is this good or bad?  Well, without further information, there's no way to know.

Let's suppose we were playing classic old AD&D (which I happen to like, incidentally -- this isn't a slap).  Suppose we decided that weapon information suddenly didn't matter a wet goddamn.  What would be the fun of all that fighting?  I mean, it's much more fun in AD&D to have different people with different weapons, and to work out their reaches and strike speeds, and their different damages, and all that.  If you take all that away, what's the point?  What's the difference, really, between a Fighter and a Paladin if they both "hit things with blades" and the damage is equivalent?  Boooring.  See, AD&D is about kicking ass and taking names, with cool weapons and very complicated rules.  If I take away all the mechanics that make this interesting, the game sucks on toast.

Let's suppose instead that we're playing a game where all the real power has to do with the spells people cast, and that being stabbed with a sword or a butter-knife just isn't relevant.  So now we're going to have some elaborate system for magic use, but maybe we'll strip down the melee combat stuff to a bare minimum.  This emphasizes what's important in this game, and tosses aside what isn't.  By making melee combat boring, and making spell-use interesting, I encourage everyone to have fun with spell-casting and not to waste time on swords.  To make the example really extreme, suppose all the important characters are physically inviolable, and can only be challenged by magic.  Why bother with a regular combat system at all?  It's boring -- there's no risk.  So just have a system that says, "If you hit someone in melee combat, with a weapon or otherwise, roll Athletics to see if you hit, and Strength to see how much damage."  End of combat system.  Followed by 150 pages about exactly how to build the universe's most complicated spells.

Here's yet another, different kind of example.  Suppose damage is going to be determined entirely by the player, on both ends.  That is, if the PC hits some thug, the player determines damage; if the thug hits the PC, the player determines damage.  Now clearly, the intricate details don't matter much here; the point is to give the player guidelines by which to make such damage-determination fun and interesting.  Check out InSpectres for something sort of like this.  You'll notice that in such systems, skills tend to be a very small component, as do weapon stats and such.  The point is for the player to say, "Uh oh, he really hosed me there.  Okay, I take the shot in the shoulder, and fall tumbling down the stairs backwards.  I'm still conscious, but badly winded and in pain, and I can hear him slowly clumping down the stairs.  Heeelp!  Guys!  Heelp!"  And so on.  Again, the different type of system emphasizes a totally different effect.

Okay, so that's one way of looking at why System Does Matter: emphasis.

Now what Ralph's saying about your game could be compared to AD&D or Hero (again, I love 'em both).  Because of the elaborate intricacies of all those nested skills, calculated against things like range, speed, weight, encumbrance, and damage, it's going to turn out that there are pros and cons of different weapons (just to stick to combat for the nonce).  The player who just says, "I'm taking nunchaku because they're cool" may be making a big mistake: it could turn out that these will be weak weapons for his particular character, or even in the game generally.  The player who says, "I'm going to work out exactly how to get maximum damage for the following types of situations that I think will come up, and then I'll work to make sure that every combat situation is like this" will kick ass and take names.  In that sense, the intricate nested system encourages system-mastery as a real goal and emphasis.

Let's compare that to the pure Trait system.  There's nothing to calculate anyway.  So the guy who thinks "Nunchaku are cool" is making the right choice: he goes with what's cool and interesting, regardless of power.

See how the structure of skills changes the way characters are designed as well as how they're played?

So, coming all the way around, here's what we gotta know:

1. What do you see these characters actually doing?  Exploring, fighting, talking trash politics?  You may say that you want them to be able to do anything they want to do, but the system is going to dictate what sorts of things they're likely to find rewarding.  See the Sticky post in Indie Design which talks about imagining an actual play session.  Do this, and see what you come up with as the cool kind of play you and your players like.

2. What kinds of play activities are going to be fun, and which ones will be hand-waved past?  Is combat going to be something that's a blast, or is it going to be boring and irrelevant so we can get to the nice love scenes?  This is something to watch out for, actually: you're going to want to say, "I want everything to be fun."  This never works, I'm afraid.  You have to prioritize, to choose what the focus of the game is and then build to suit.  Don't think, either, that any particular choice is a good or bad choice.  You want the ultimate min-max system?  Sounds dandy.  You want the ultimate free-form explore-a-moral-issue system?  Great.  It's all good.  But you gotta choose.

3. You say that the characters will dig into various technologies, things to locate and learn.  Is figuring things out a big deal?  Is this puzzle-solving?  Are these things, once figured out, things that have significant mechanical effects or are they intellectually stimulating?  Do you imagine long, complicated debates about the nature of technology and so on, or do you want them to figure out what a thing is so they can fix it or sell it right quick?

4. And so on.

Sorry this initial conversation has seemed to go awry for you.  I hope this post clarifies a bit what some of the responses are about, and why we're all asking for clarification.  Furthermore, I hope I've clarified why it's not a question of whether your system "works" or not -- it's a question of what it works for, and whether that's what you want.

Chris Lehrich

[M. J. Young]

It occurs to me that there is another important point hidden here; Ron brushed on it (I think that was in this thread), and Ralph touched it again, but it hasn't really been stated.

Autocrat seems to be attempting to do a survey of gamer preferences, to see what the ordinary gamer likes in his games.

With all due respect to Autocrat, to the Forge, and to RPGnet, go ask this question at RPGnet. You're much more likely to get responses from ordinary gamers. The people here are freaks; we tip the scales in all the wrong direction. Everyone who is here is here for a reason very like one of these:

[*]Trying to design a game[*]Being interested in cutting edge theory of games[*]Trying to keep informed about new games targeted at fringe interests and/or out-of-mainstream gamers[*]Offering to help budding game designers with such expertise as had been acquired in the process of having done it.[/list:u]The typical survey questions aimed at us are going to produce atypical results. Looked at another way, if every gamer rolled 3d6 to determine his gaming interests, all the threes and eighteens are here, and everyone else is somewhere else. We're the people who find questions like, "what's your favorite kind of elf?" incredibly useless wastes of our hard-to-justify online time expenditures. (I'm not saying that your questions are so useless as that; the point is that the people here are not interested in the sort of surface questions about what people's preferences are, and rather are dedicated to understanding how to design games that truly effectively do what the designer intends.)

So if you're taking a survey of gamers to get some sort of idea of what gamers like, this isn't really a very good group for that.

On the other hand, maybe that wasn't your intention. Maybe what you were trying to ask might have been better stated thus:

I'm building a game that is extremely skill-intensive; I've got a list of five hundred thirty skills at this point, organized in a tiered array four levels deep, but I'm wondering if I've missed something glaringly obvious. I would greatly appreciate it if people could look at my list which  is [insert link here]here and tell me whether there's something I've overlooked.[/list:u]
See, that's an entirely different question. It tells us up front that you're committed to a very detailed approach to skills, and focuses the question on the detail of the skill lists for such a system. The question you asked,

Skills:- What types and how many?

sounds like you're asking whether a detailed skill system is the right approach at all, not what the details should be.

You'll find that once we understand what you're trying to do we're very helpful. It's just frustrating when we keep asking what you're trying to do and we don't understand your answer.

--M. J. Young

[Autocrat]

OK, I'll try it again, but thank you any way for taking the time to try and explain things.

I don't want to explain the system, because that happens is people shout me down!
Yes, you have given negatives towards my posts, rather than ask questions, you provided statements against my system.
Further, is someone assuming that I have no intent as to publish, or even take this seriously?


still... here I go.....I will try to be concise for you all.


INTENT.
  General intent is to be flexible and mutable to suit the needs and wants of players.  Players are meant to beable to play a varity of Genres, timeperiods and settings whithout altering the rules and mechanics, yet they can alter the levels of detail and resolution methods as they wish.
 The INI system is meant to provide rules and mechanics that facilitate  simplicity and ease, whilst offering a number of different settings without changing the mechanics.  Thus, when Players have larned how to perform one check, then they have learned how to do all of them, the mechanics stay the same.
  Further, the rules are varied and flexible, offering choices as to how detailed the play can get, ranging from very broad, general and loose through to macroscopic, detailed and specfic, covering both the Character Stats, Skills to choose and the detail of items, weapons, armour, vehicles etc.
  Also the actual mechanics and resoloution systems are mutable, offering several different ways of playing and resolvoing, opening up potential for prefence of style, as some like %, whilst others prefer multiple die, and some prefer comparison and no rolling!
 
STATS....
  The stats can range from 3 broad labels, (BODY/MIND/SOUL), through to very detailed and fairly specific stats, totaling 21 primary Stats, (7 of each).  This means that different levels of detail for ability can be used.  It also offers a way of saving time por for siple ease of use to generalise if that is what is wanted!
  The Stats form the Base for checks and task resolution.
  The Stats are possibly the most costly part of a Character to improve, as a single Stat is likely to influence a large number of skills.


SKILLS...
  The Skills are variable, permitting play to use General, Broad, Specif and Tailored Skills.  The skills are arranged into groups, sub-groups and individual skill groups, thus.....

.Swords
.....Small Swords
.........Short Sword
.........Machette
......Long Swords
.........Sabre
.........Cutlass
.........Scimitar

  Players get to choose at what level of detail they want to play, so General - Swords means that all swords have the same details such as Damage etc., whilst going for Spcific - Sabre meanse that the Sabre has Stats that are likely to differ slightly from the Cutlass and Scimitar, and possible differ greatly from the Short sword!.
  Defaulting in skills is optional, yet permits Characters the ability or chance to perform a task they aren't trained or skilled in.  For example, by Defaulting to Related, the Character Skilled in Sabre would beable to Default to Cutlass without to much of a penalty.  If they Defaulted to Associated, they could use the Short Sword with a slightly higher penalty.  They could Default to General for an even larger penalty, so they could use the two handed sword, or the could Default to Stat, and use their base Attack Score with a penalty to use any weapon they are unskilled in.  This is intended to allow characters that slight chance of success, no matter what, (and it is likelt to be slight unless the original skill is very high!).

RESOLUTION.
Different people prefer different methods, for little reason other than aesthetics.  Others prefer different system for ease of use or the speed of resolving  situations.  Htus I intend to offer different system mechancis for resolutions, including the basic D100 and Multiple Die, plus Criticals, Degree's of Success and Auto Success/Falure to save rolling at all!



  It is NOT UNIVERSAL as to cover ALL options and emulate ALL games, it is designed to be flexible, easy to use and adjustable to suit preferrences and needs.
 It is meant to cover the general aspects of RPG's such as Combat, MNagic, Psionics, Mutation, Augmentation (Cyber, Bionic, Bio), Vehicles, Survival, Character Improvement, Social Interraction, Clandestine, Academic and Knowledge.
  With any luck, this means that settings can pay specific attention to what is important, and either not include, or generalise what is irrelevant, thus a Combat Game based in the Renaissance could have relevant skills in Combat-Weapons/Tactics/Warefare/Fighting Styles, maintain detail in the Arts and Crafts, Social Interaction and Academic,etc., whilst reducing info and detail avilable on things like Vehicles, Clandestine, Survival etc. as these would be less important.  Further, if the game is based on Physical and Mental things, then the detail of Spiritiual stats could be reduced, to the single SOUL stat.


Is that better, or have I missed the point again?

i do apologise for all of this, yet I am getting tired of being put down and slapped... not just you lot, but almost every one, because people see and read what they want too.  Several of you have accused and querried as to whether I am fdoing this, yet have not mentioned that you might be as well.  It may just be that I am creting something that no one believes in or likes, and that would be it, or maybe it's the words are use, they words you use and the intent behind them differ?
Still, thank you for trying and replying any way!

[M. J. Young]

So then the question is, have you missed any general categories of skills which exist in the real world or in other game worlds? For the sake of being as complete as possible, has something been left out?

Of course, the answer to that question depends very much on what you consider skills, and how you want to divide them.

Multiverser divides all skills into four categories: technological, psionic, magic, and body.

Magic skills are divided into holy and arcane; holy are divided into three groups (comparable but not equivalent to alignment).

Each of the four broad categories is divided into fifteen levels; each level is identified by basic principles. Thus tech level 1 includes fire, leatherwork, and pottery; tech level 9 is electricity and synthetics; tech level 14 is energy fields, star drives, and matter transmission. Similarly, bod level 3 is running, bod level 8 flight, and bod level 13 morphing. For psionics, telepathies are level 1, physical forces level 10, and alterations and time manipulations level 14; while magic has level 2 curatives, level 8 illusions, and level 12 telekinetics and teleportives. Within each level there will be subcategories, by intensities, which represent greater understanding and application of the core principles.

But there are other ways skills could be parsed.

In college, most subjects landed in hard sciences, social (or soft) sciences, liberal arts, fine arts, or business.

In most fields, skills divide into the theoretical and the applied--that is, a  medical researcher is more on the theoretical end while a registered nurse is at the applied end.

How elastic are your categories? That's part of the question, isn't it? I could name skills for which I don't see the category, only to have you say, "well, that's part of this".

But let me name a few categories I don't readily see.

[*]Sports[*]Acrobatics[*]Mechanics[*]Electricity and Electronics[*]Nanites[*]Life support systems/spaceship systems[*]Mind/machine interface[*]Parasitism and Symbiosis[*]Regeneration[*]Morphing[*]Non-physicality[/list:u]

Let me also suggest that your list of "categories" mixes different types of categories together, and in do doing expresses something of a narrow vision for the game. If you'll permit me:

[*]Academic is extremely broad. Does it mean "skills which involve theoretical knowledge of a subject"? Does it mean "skills which relate to manipulation of information"? Does it specifically exclude practical applications, or include these? Is teaching nursing practice and academic skill, or something else?[*]Character--I'm not sure what that means. It apparently does not mean social skills, as that is another category. I'll have to pass on this.[*]Clandestine would obviously include stealth and ambush skills, plus such skills as eavesdropping, standard thief skills--but would it also include technology skills, such as bugging and surveillance?[*]Combat also cuts across boundaries in unexpected ways. I would expect it to include weapon use, but also martial arts; I'm tempted to put tactics here, but they're theoretical--and ambush, which is already listed under Clandestine, is clearly tactical. Also, I'm unclear what to do with such skills as combat driving--is that combat, or vehicular? Note the distinction in the nature of these skills: combat would seem to be based on the skill's purpose, while vehicle is addressing the skill's accoutrements. My impression is that these categories cross each other precisely because I'm asking whether Apples are Seeds or Food--the category Seeds and the category Food ask entirely different questions about the objects included within them (the first is whether a life form produces these for reproducing itself, the second whether a life form consumes these for nutrition). So, too, combat crosses lines with many other categories because it is about the use of the skill, not its nature.[*]Social skills are probably a more focused sort of category; I can live with that.[*]Survival skills can be confusing. In Multiverser, our survival skills are described in essence as a convenience for the game, a single skill listing (e.g., Survival: Arctic) which means that the character has a variety of different skills which can be used collectively to keep him alive. For example, building a shelter is a survival skill; it is not different in kind from building a house, really--it's just that building a house is done in one situation, and building a shelter in another. Again, this is something that cuts across other categories--stalking and tracking are certainly survival skills, but they're clearly also Clandestine skills.[*]Vehicle has been discussed with combat. I find it a very broad category even so. Presumably it includes horse-drawn carriages and TARDISes in one category--which is certainly valid. What I wonder, though, is does it include horseback riding, or is that something different?[*]Arcane Magic--now, this reveals something about your design prerogatives. I divide magic into sixteen levels and eleven intensities per level, and I fill most of those slots, and I declare that arcane and holy magic may do the same things but be different skills. I've got as many magic skills as I have technological ones; I divide them into as many categories. In limiting magic to "arcane", "faith", "conjuration", and (if we stretch it) "psionics" you suggest that these are less important in your game, precisely because they are each a single category as compared with technology or body based skills.[*]Faith Magic brings out another conflict--how is it that magic is not combat? But we've covered that with vehicles.[*]Conjuration Magic confuses me. Perhaps I don't understand what you mean by "arcane", because this seems to be a subcategory of both "arcane" and "faith" magic. Perhaps, though, that's the point--you don't need "arcane" and "faith" as categories, but rather conjuration, abjuration, divination, necromantic, animation, illusion, evocation, and others. Again, this is a matter of how you want to divide things. You can have faith magic divination and arcane magic divination, so the question is which distinction is more important?[*]Psionics is good, but again there are as many categories of psionics as there are of magic, from telepathies to telekinetics to psionic attacks and defenses to remote viewing to precognition and retrocognition--there are a lot out there. How much do you want to cover? If you say "just 'psionics' is sufficient" you're inherently saying that mental powers are not as important in play as others. If you divide them into subgroups, that's going to put more emphasis on them.[*]Mutagenics, in my understanding, is a very narrow category of biological and biochemical agents capable of creating mutations in organisms. If that's what you mean, that's a very small skill set indeed. If you mean something else, I apologize for my failure to understand.[*]Cybernetics has to do with computers and robotics, generally? I probably would have separated these (in fact, I did, and also separated AI from them), but I can see an argument for combining them. What I don't see is all the lower technologies that support these, from the fundamental machines (wheel, lever, wedge, incline, pulley) to water power, pressure systems, explosives, electicals, and electronics. Are these part of this category, or are they simply not skills? Is it assumed that any character in the game can use a sword, create a bomb, or build a blowtorch?[*]Bionics--and here I wonder why, not having separated robotics, computers, and artificial intelligence, you do separate prosthetics. Maybe I don't understand what you're after here.[*]Bio-genetics is good, succinct but broad enough to be a general category. There are, however, a great long list of other sciences and technologies equally worthy of coverage that aren't mentioned.[/list:u]
I do not intend any of this to be a slam. I'm trying to help you focus your understanding of what you mean when you say "group" of skills. These "groups" are like that famed list of different kinds of animals (which I can't find at the moment) in which the categories are neither inclusive nor exclusive--many animals fit in multiple categories, and many fit in none. If you're trying to create a skill taxonomy, you need to focus on what aspect of a skill puts it into a particular category--how it works? what it does? when it's used? what it's for? where it draws power? why it works? why you use it? You can't really have a list of categories of skills until you know what it is that puts a skill in one category to the exclusion of any other. For Multiverser, the primary division is the primary source of power (laws of the material universe, inner power of the creature, supernatural energy, physical prowess) with the next break based on identification of core principles of how it works (e.g., fire, curative, acrobatic) and the next break on the complexity of application of that principle.

I do hope this has helped.

--M. J. Young