Birthright "demihuman" Races:

[Osprey]

Invisibility + Silence = Hide + Move Silently without spending a single
skill point in cross-class-skills.
bye
Michael

True, just spending 2 spell slots every time you cast them instead. A fair trade, IMO...the real difference is that the skills are permanent and reusable...boost them with a few minor magic items, and a good rogue (or ranger or bard) can be nigh-undetectable in most circumstances...again and again and again. But to each their own!

-Osprey

[teloft]

Silence has an efect around you. so sneeking upon somone speking, or past somone talking. and thay are sure to nitice thet theres something out of place when thay cant speak.

And you radiade magic for thows able to sence magic, you could as well wear a ligthspell on your torso.

h34r:

[ConjurerDragon]

teloft schrieb:

> This post was generated by the Birthright.net message forum.

> You can view the entire thread at:

> http://www.birthright.net/forums/ind...ST&f=36&t=2052

>

> teloft wrote:

> Silence has an efect around you. so sneeking upon somone speking, or past somone talking.

and thay are sure to nitice thet theres something out of place when

thay cant speak.

> And you radiade magic for thows able to sence magic, you could as well wear a ligthspell on

your torso.



Right, I forgot the changes in 3E - I rememberd the 2E silence which

only affected you and where there was a different "Silence 10´ radius"

which was similar to the new 3E version of Silence.

bye

Michael

[RaspK_FOG]

I believe this discussion should move on in a new thread, as it is highly out of context with this particular thread, but this is secondary to me now... Instead, I will try to defend a few inconsistencies I've noticed within the thread:

• Use Rope is one of those strange skills that seems too odd to keep, but has a very apparent reason to be there; those of you who know how to use a length of rope effectively, it is more obvious, but you have all heard of nautical knots and such stuff... Anyway, the skill is not like tying your shoe-laces, and I think it is a logical thing to keep.
• Survival was the skill that substituted Wilderness Lore even from 3e (&#33, making its appearance in Savage Species and other such products (Races of Faerun also had Survival instead of Wilderness Lore, something which confused for a little while until I noticed how it was used, and then things became clear in 3.5e and Savage Species).
• Heal is, in my opinion, the most redudant skill of them all! Since they came up with rules to make most Profession and Knowledge skills more than they already were (read supplements from WotC if you do not know what I spek of), I suppose that making it a Profession (healer) skill could be a fine adjustment...
• Profession (herbalist) should become able to produce some of the alchemical products able to be produced by Craft (alchemy), maybe with a higher DC. Oh well...
• Have you ever trued to see the difference of moving silently and hiding? Done both at the same time? Consider the differences and difficulties, and then tell me if it is logical to make them into one skill!
• Bards, for example, get Listen as a class skill but not Spot; the opposite does not apply, however, to Spot: those classes that have it as a class skill do have Listen as a class skill as well. Most people detect ruses by sound, not sight. It is only the real survivors with the best reflexes (not the save, OK?) that get Spot as a class skill.
• Knowledge (nature) and Survival? Don't misunderstand what I am going to say, but I found that ludicrous! Saving your butt and knowing the scientific name of this or that bird are very different things... Like the part in Lord of the Rings, where Gandalf scolds the Loremaster in the scene where Eowin, Faramir, and Meriadoc all are ill with the chill of the Nazgul, saying: "Then get someone with less lore (referring to the man's knowledge of names of herbs and their botanical classification) and more wisdom (referring to the elder people who had some athelas for their illnesses)!"
• Decipher Script has nothing to do with Knowledge directly; giving, though, a +2 synergy bonus for texts which are directly connected to the aforementioned kinds of Knowledge (like a +2 synergy bonus on Dexipher Sript checks concerning texts related to an appropriate Knowledge skill to which you have at least 5 ranks) is a very good idea in my opinion (being my own ^_^.
• Ability boosting spells (the good old Bull's Strength, Cat's Grace, and (Bear's) Endurance, along with the newer Fox's Cunning, Owl's Wisdom, and Eagle's Splendor) were all lasting 1 hour/level in 3e; thankfully, they cut them down, but I prefer them to be 10 minutes/level for my campaign. The 1 minute/level idea of 3.5e, while minimising the benefits of these spells (which were evened out by giving a solid +4 now), increased their effectiveness in combat and made any other use almost obsolete!
• Yep, the area silence always had a cool side-effect! :P
• As for the World of Darkness, it has both awesome and ridiculous points; like the all powerful 1 (which accounts to a botch 10% of the time&#33, while 0s are not as powerful as 1s... For that reason, in our campaigns, not only does an 0 account for one success, it also cannot be taken out by an 1. Effectively, 0s are like a point Willpower spent for one success.
• The worst point of the WoD is that it is so vague it gets fussy! :angry:

[kgauck]

----- Original Message -----

From: "RaspK_FOG" <brnetboard@BIRTHRIGHT.NET>

Sent: Friday, November 07, 2003 5:26 PM





> Heal is, in my opinion, the most redudant skill of them all; Since

> they came up with rules to make most Profession and Knowledge,

> I suppose that making it a Profession (healer) skill could be a fine

> adjustment...



I think the reason that we should be wary about making everything a

knowledge, craft, or profession skill is that some classes have access to

all of one or more of those skill groups. Of the Professions, everyone

except Fighters and Barbarians gets access to all Profession skills. Heal

had been limited to those who cast divine spells.



> Profession (herbalist) should become able to produce some of the

> alchemical products able to be produced by Craft (alchemy), maybe

> with a higher DC. Oh well...



Herbalists deal with organic substances, alchemists with inorganic

substances. I prefer that all game effects which one can produce, the other

can produce by different means. The alchemist uses calx of daurite, the

herbalist uses thistle root extract, both achieve the same end.



> Have you ever trued to see the difference of moving silently and hiding?

> Done both at the same time? Consider the differences and difficulties, and

> then tell me if it is logical to make them into one skill



The real question here is this: should skill represent game effects (I am

concealed) or should they reflect how things are done.



> Knowledge (nature) and Survival? I found that ludicrous. Saving your

> butt and knowing the scientific name of this or that bird are very

different

> things



Some will argue that knowing things but being unable to practically apply

knowledge is a uselss skill. Certainly it is useless in the sense of being

unable to produce a practical result, but it is useful in reflecting that

some characters know about things but cannot do things. For example, many

rulers might have Knowedge (Art) but have no Craft skills, because they are

observers of art, not producers of it. If a player or DM is inclined to

represent extensive, but impractical knowledge they will see a value in the

knowledge skills that parallel practical skills. No doubt they will see the

value in combinations of practical skills and knowledge, and seek to

represent that. The survivalist may know how to select and gather edible

fickleberries. The herbalist may know how to prepare a poltice using

fickleberries. The scholar may know that three types of birds eat the

fickleberry here and the hardleberry in the Anuirean heartlands. The

problem with practical knowledge is that it often deals with the immediate

here and now, and pays little attention to what it cannot apply. What

berries might make a useful substitute in another location is of no use to

someone who as never been and does not plan to go to that location. Some

will chose to reflect this problem in the game, others will be content to

ignore it.



Kenneth Gauck

kgauck@mchsi.com

[RaspK_FOG]

Well, you got most out of Survival vs. Knowledge (nature), but you still went too far when you said it was useless in practical application... The difference is that Aragorn, for example, knew how to use the herb to help someone (Heal, the equivalent of Survival here), and the loremaster knew its many names but not of its true healing attribute against the taint of Shadow (Knowledge [nature]). Still, he might as well have failed his skill check :lol: .

[Mourn]

Survival was the skill that substituted Wilderness Lore even from 3e (&#33, making its appearance in Savage Species and other such products (Races of Faerun also had Survival instead of Wilderness Lore, something which confused for a little while until I noticed how it was used, and then things became clear in 3.5e and Savage Species).

Survival = Wilderness Lore + New Name.

Heal is, in my opinion, the most redudant skill of them all&#33; Since they came up with rules to make most Profession and Knowledge skills more than they already were (read supplements from WotC if you do not know what I spek of), I suppose that making it a Profession (healer) skill could be a fine adjustment...

However, there is no system for the various Profession and Knowledge skills to do anything other than make some money or identify a creature and its strengths/weaknesses.

Yeah, Heal could merely be a Profession (healer), just as Survival/Wilderness Lore could just be Profession (hunter) or something... they stated that back when they came out with 3rd Edition, but they made it a separate skill because they wanted to spell out specific things that you can do with the skill, since they were leaving Knowledge and Profession skills vague.

Have you ever trued to see the difference of moving silently and hiding? Done both at the same time? Consider the differences and difficulties, and then tell me if it is logical to make them into one skill&#33;

So, you&#39;re telling me that my ability to silently walk up to anyone without them hearing me is the same as my inability to hide myself in any effective manner? I don&#39;t think so, buddy. I can sneak around like a superninja, but I can&#39;t hide worth a damn... they are two very different, but connected skills.

Knowledge (nature) and Survival? Don&#39;t misunderstand what I am going to say, but I found that ludicrous&#33; Saving your butt and knowing the scientific name of this or that bird are very different things... Like the part in Lord of the Rings, where Gandalf scolds the Loremaster in the scene where Eowin, Faramir, and Meriadoc all are ill with the chill of the Nazgul, saying: "Then get someone with less lore (referring to the man&#39;s knowledge of names of herbs and their botanical classification) and more wisdom (referring to the elder people who had some athelas for their illnesses)&#33;"

Ummmm... I don&#39;t really see your problem here. Obviously, they were using Knowledge (nature), which is Intelligence based, instead of Heal, which is Wisdom based. What does this have to do with Knowledge (nature), which is all kinds of knowledge of plants and animals, adding a bonus to Survival checks, which represent hunting, gathering, navigation through wilderness... all of which deal with plants and animals. The synergy bonus is very fitting.

Ability boosting spells (the good old Bull&#39;s Strength, Cat&#39;s Grace, and (Bear&#39;s) Endurance, along with the newer Fox&#39;s Cunning, Owl&#39;s Wisdom, and Eagle&#39;s Splendor) were all lasting 1 hour/level in 3e; thankfully, they cut them down, but I prefer them to be 10 minutes/level for my campaign. The 1 minute/level idea of 3.5e, while minimising the benefits of these spells (which were evened out by giving a solid +4 now), increased their effectiveness in combat and made any other use almost obsolete&#33;

Which is the purpose of the spells... you boost your Strength or spellcasting ability score for combat purposes... if you&#39;re interested in things like Diplomacy, you&#39;d probably want to go with something that boosted your skill check by a significant amount (like a Diplomacy-based version of the jump spell), not merely getting a +2 bonus on the check.

As for the World of Darkness, it has both awesome and ridiculous points; like the all powerful 1 (which accounts to a botch 10% of the time&#33, while 0s are not as powerful as 1s... For that reason, in our campaigns, not only does an 0 account for one success, it also cannot be taken out by an 1. Effectively, 0s are like a point Willpower spent for one success.

Wow, you&#39;re playing a version of WoD over 5 years old... amazing. Starting with Trinity, and later incorporated into the WoD Revised lines, 1s no longer removed successes. If no successes were rolled, and any of the dice came up as a 1, then it was a botch. So, if you roll two 1s and three successes, you still have three successes.

The worst point of the WoD is that it is so vague it gets fussy&#33;

Well, it&#39;s called the Storyteller System for a reason... the mechanics are as minimal and malleable and possible, so that they don&#39;t need to map out every eventual action that a person would attempt, like D&D. That&#39;s why the books contain a huge amount more story and setting than mechanics.

[geeman]

At 06:29 PM 11/7/2003 -0600, Kenneth Gauck wrote:



> > Profession (herbalist) should become able to produce some of the

> > alchemical products able to be produced by Craft (alchemy), maybe

> > with a higher DC. Oh well...

>

>Herbalists deal with organic substances, alchemists with inorganic

>substances. I prefer that all game effects which one can produce, the other

>can produce by different means. The alchemist uses calx of daurite, the

>herbalist uses thistle root extract, both achieve the same end.



That`s a valid reason to break up a pair of skills. In general, one

needn`t have two skills if one does, essentially, the same thing with them,

but if one has campaign theme reasons for splitting them up that`s all the

justification one needs. Take, for example, the Pilot skill in the Star

Wars D20 text. In that text Pilot works on boats, grav vehicles, tracked

vehicles, legged vehicles, wheeled vehicles, starships (with some

modifications) and just about anything that one can drive. In Star Wars

that makes sense because it`s a kind of gonzo fantasy/sci-fi setting in

which technology and characters interact seamlessly. In other D20 campaign

settings one might want to have a Drive skill for ground cars a Pilot skill

for aircraft, a Boating skill for watercraft and yet another for

spaceships. One might even want to break up those skills further into

specific categories. Drive; cars, trucks, tanks, motorcycles and Pilot;

small planes, helicopters, jetliners, etc. In D20 Modern, for instance,

there are more skills to handle operating vehicles than in Star Wars

because it better suits that particular setting`s dynamics. If one were to

play in a campaign using D20 Modern classes and rules, but that had a sort

of cartoonish/comic book quality a la Star Wars in which characters are

able to operate just about any vehicle without too much qualification it

would make sense to combine them.



3e/3.5 does this kind of thing in several places. In fact, 3e did it more

and 3.5 has now gone with several more generalist interpretations of

several things that used to be skills. If one really emphasized Innuendo

as something that went on a lot in a campaign (if one were playing "Mafia

D20" or something like that) then it would still make sense to have it be a

separate skill. The 3.5 authors have decided it doesn`t support the

fantasy RPG that D&D is meant to portray, so they`ve dropped it.



The thing is, people tend to use what amounts to a campaign theme argument

for two skills Sneak (Hide and Move Silently) and two skills for the

opposing skill (Spot and Listen) but in practise there`s very little

connection to campaign themes. That is, the specific processes of

listening and looking are not tied to the concepts of fantasy

role-playing. The reality is that combining the two skills will work

perfectly fine. All I`m suggesting is that people experiment with it and

see if their campaigns really need four skills where two would work. Just

try it and see what happens. Trust me, it`s not going to throw off

balance, send the theme of the campaign spinning off out of control or

otherwise ruin your game. It hasn`t had that effect IMC nor in the play of

thousands of other gamers who play RPGs that don`t use four skills to

reflect those two things. In fact, in a fantasy based campaign like BR (or

any other D&D setting, really) one might find it doesn`t have any negative

consequences at all, and reducing the skills to more general descriptions

might actually wind up being an aid to role-playing.



I make the same suggestion for Wilderness Lore (Survival) and Knowledge,

nature. Just try combining them and see what happens.



> > Have you ever trued to see the difference of moving silently and hiding?

> > Done both at the same time? Consider the differences and difficulties, and

> > then tell me if it is logical to make them into one skill

>

>The real question here is this: should skill represent game effects (I am

>concealed) or should they reflect how things are done.



There are a couple of other things that should probably be considered

too. Most often (not always, of course, but often enough that it`s

something of a standard) characters who have one skill also have the

other. Barbarians and bards are the only classes that have Listen but not

Spot. It`s been argued that that is the result of purposeful use of the

skill system, and has great significance game mechanically, thematically,

etc. I think that`s an over-statement and an argument made after the fact

to justify the existing rules set. There`s no real logical reason why

barbarians and bards shouldn`t have Spot. They aren`t particularly less

observant than druids, rangers or rogues. In fact, they have thematic and

game mechanical connections to those classes. Making Spot a cross-class

skill for bards and barbarians is completely arbitrary. Sure, one can come

up with post hoc justifications for the situation, but those justifications

are pretty meaningless if examined objectively. Spot isn`t thematically or

game mechanically counter to the concept of barbarians or bards any more

than Swim is counter to the concepts of goodness, justice and fair play is

for paladins.



So why don`t barbarians and bards have Spot, and why don`t paladins have

Swim as class skills? Well, it`s not for reasons of balance or theme,

particularly. It has more to do with pre-3e rules regarding how those

character classes worked rather than anything to do with post-3e issues

that are often touted as the reasoning behind those decisions. In fact,

I`m confident that there really was very little reasoning that went into

those decisions. It was simply a continuation of some very old ideas, some

of which don`t really make a lot of sense in the updated version of the rules.



What`s more important, however, is that we not let those 3e/3.5 decisions

take control over BR dynamics. In BR we should go ahead and give a paladin

of Nesirie Swim as a class skill despite the 3e/3.5 making that a cross

class skill for its more generalist paladin class. While we`re at it

paladins of Cuirecaen might have Intimidate rather than Diplomacy as a

class skill. Those are campaign based decisions for the skill system that

make sense.



Gary

[irdeggman]

Originally posted by geeman@Nov 8 2003, 07:51 AM

What`s more important, however, is that we not let those 3e/3.5 decisions

take control over BR dynamics. In BR we should go ahead and give a paladin

of Nesirie Swim as a class skill despite the 3e/3.5 making that a cross

class skill for its more generalist paladin class. While we`re at it

paladins of Cuirecaen might have Intimidate rather than Diplomacy as a

class skill. Those are campaign based decisions for the skill system that

make sense.



Gary

Ahhh finally something that ties this whole lengthy discussion into into BR and is not just a complaint over the core rule set.

And the original thread topic was demi-human races and not skills/feats and training or combining them. Talk about thread hijacking.

[geeman]

At 02:17 AM 11/8/2003 +0100, RaspK_FOG wrote:



> Well, you got most out of Survival vs. Knowledge (nature), but you

> still went too far when you said it was useless in practical

> application... The difference is that Aragorn, for example, knew how to

> use the herb to help someone (Heal, the equivalent of Survival here), and

> the loremaster knew its many names but not of its true healing attribute

> against the taint of Shadow (Knowledge [nature]). Still, he might as well

> have failed his skill check :lol: .



Rather than the difference between two skills I think that may have been

more like the difference between what would be in D&D the Healing skill and

healing magic. As in, "This wound is beyond my skill... he needs elven

(magical) healing."



In the case of Wilderness Lore (Survival) and Knowledge, Nature there are a

few differences, but what I`m getting at is that in the absence of a

particularly scholarly campaign setting there`s no need to have two skills

for what amounts to the same function. Sometimes I even see specific tasks

described as using either of these skills, which is a pretty good

indication that they could be combined without too much difficulty.



Gary