How would you go about fixing D&D's skills?

>>51701722
Which version and how's it broken?

There are so many different versions of the skill systems that this question is meaningless.

State your grievances and your goals and only then can we help you.

Well designed skill systems are focused. You assign skills not based on some arbitrary external division but based on how much each skill matters in the context of the game.

For this to apply to D&D, you'd need a definitive statement about what the game was meant to do, letting you tailor the skill list to that.

>>51701753
I was actually leaving it real open on purpose to see what everybody complained about or what common house rules popped up. I've noticed /tg/ tends to project their pet peeves onto vague posts.

I personally only have experience playing 3.5 and find that skill rolls are trivial in the 2 or 3 skills your character has invested in and everyone seems to be unclear about target rolls/DCs.

>>51701830
For 3.5 in particular, I'd recoomend switching to Fantasy Craft. Among numerous other overhauls to the fundamental 3.x mechanical skeleton, Fantasy Craft makes skills much more significant by:
>Condensing the skill list down dramatically (there are only 20 skills in total, 21 if you count Spellcasting, with no individually-ranked Knowledge skills or the like)
>Giving everyone more skill points (low skill classes get 4+Int skill points, and the point-buy formula incentivizes less minmaxed, more even stat spreads, so a 12 Int is quite feasible for any character, meaning you can easily max out 1/4 of the skills in the game)
>Providing even more flexibility with skills through the Origin system (you can't buy skills cross-class, but every class gets at least 8 class skills, covering a substantial chunk of the total available, plus you get 2 skills of your choice as Origin skills, which always count as class skills, and on top of that you get a Specialty -- basically a background/job -- that can often give additional Origin skills or even Paired Skills where for every rank in one skill you get a free rank in another, even if the second isn't a class/Origin skills
>Making skills more ubiquitously relevant (basically everything in combat that isn't a regular attack -- grappling, tripping, feinting, etc. -- is a skill check, and it's next to impossible to make a skill irrelevant through spells/magic items like it is in 3.PF

It actually takes a deliberate effort to make a character that DOESN'T have a nice, versatile suite of skills in Fantasy Craft. I've run campaigns for parties where everyone just set out to make characters geared for combat/dungeon-crawling, some even explicitly stating they didn't really pay much attention at all to skills because they're used to skills being worthless from long experience with 3.5, and still wound up with everyone in the party having something to contribute skill-wise in all manner of scenarios.

>>51701774
This. Completist mechanics really bug me.

Alternately, ditch the skill system entirely in favor of GM arbitration, old school D&D style. Admittedly, that approach can break down in some scenarios (ie, when the players and GM don't have a common point of reference). It can work quite well for dungeon crawls though--most of us can imagine the mechanics of rope, iron doors vs wood doors, what might break a sword, how a wolf is probably faster than a man, etc.

I don't think any game should have a skill list that can cover everything from carving a wooden spoon, to how far you can jump, to how effective your counterspells are.

>>51701962
That... actually is pretty helpful.

>>51701722

The d20 skill system sucks largely because the d20 itself is so swingy and there's no bell curve. 3d6 is much better.

>>51702644

Bell curves are not innately better to d20. They're just different.

If you're running a game with a more grounded tone, then bell curves provide consistency and reliability that fits with that. However, D&D is a heroic fantasy game. The dice system being very swingy is in theme, and thus is better in context for the style of game the system is designed for.

File: FantasyCraft___The_Battle_by_Inkthinker.jpg (1MB, 1600x989px) Image search: [Google]

1MB, 1600x989px

>>51702083

Switching to Fantasycraft in general is really helpful. If you can stomach 3.5/PF crunch, you can definitely stomach FC crunch and you'll be better off for it.

Play Fantasycraft.

>>51702667
>However, D&D is a heroic fantasy game. The dice system being very swingy is in theme, and thus is better in context for the style of game the system is designed for.

Heroic fantasy doesn't generally involve people who are otherwise well equipped to handle something being only 10% or 30% better than other people who want to try it.

If you really want to make things dramatic, adding "hero points" or other meta mechanics usually do a good job of smoothing over when the dice crap on you.

But what it really does is just allow your character to be competent/superior at something they should really already be competent/superior at.

>cool we defeated some goblins, I've never wielded more than 1 sword before but now I can dual wield perfectly

Remove skills on levelling up, actually remove levelling up altogether

Add training for skills, you can't dual wield until you've practiced with two weapons for a while. Your hit points don't increase until you do some endurance training

>>51701722
Take 4E skill system. Divorce your total number of trained skills from class by making it a fixed number for everyone, double that number, then introduce a trained level between untrained and trained without having to grab Jack of All Trades.. Done, because I hate every other edition's skill system intensely.

>>51701722
I've honestly never really had an issue with skills in D&D, mind you my DM never focused heavily on checks so that may be why

>>51702964
t. bethesda

>>51702964
>until you do some endurance training

You mean like, FIGHTING?

>>51701722
By going back to the roots and removing them entirely. People have been playing OD&D literally for decades, and have done just fine without a skill system.

>>51703745
Pretty much. The only characters who might need a skill system are NPCs, and they can be assigned abilities by the DM/dice anyway.

>>51702777
>Heroic fantasy doesn't generally involve people who are otherwise well equipped to handle something being only 10% or 30% better than other people who want to try it.
This may be true of 5e with its tight reins on bonuses, but in 3.x such a small margin only holds in the very earliest levels.

And even there, be careful how you're using percentages to describe things. A difference of 10-30 percentage points in chance of success is not the same as 10-30% better. For instance, the difference between someone who's good at something at level 1 in 3.x vs. someone with no real training is roughly a difference of at least 5 or so in the bonus (+0 for no ranks and no attribute bonus, +5 for max skill ranks at level 1 and a mere +1 attribute). For a DC 10 check (generally the lowest you'll ever see an actual DC, the easiest checks in the game) that's a 50% chance of success for the chump, 75% chance for the guy who's good at this. In this instance, the guy who's good at it is not 25% better than the chump (though his chance of success is 25 PERCENTAGE POINTS higher), but rather 50% better -- his chance of success is equal to the chump's x 1.5.

For somewhat tougher checks, a DC 15, the chump only has a 25% chance of success, while the well-trained guy gets it 50% of the time. The percentage point difference is the same, but now the competent one is 100% better than the chump (succeeds twice as often).

And if you pit the two head-to-head in an opposed skill check, the trained guy beats the chump 70% of the time.

And the disparity only grows greater as you go up in levels. Seems pleny dramatic to me.

>>51702964
>you can't dual wield until you've practiced with two weapons for a while

That's a pretty big catch 22 right there.

>Can't do X, unless you've already been doing X for a while.

...the fuck?