Talk:Balanced Skills (3.5e Variant Rule)

Graphs

Me likey the graphs. I think graphs for a fixed pool of dice (like 4, 8, and 12 or whatever) and your chances of hitting varying numbers of successes might also be helpful for seeing how the system scales. Any chance you could whip those up since it looks like you've already got the numbers sorted? - TarkisFlux 00:04, January 11, 2010 (UTC)

Sure, though it's a pain since I'm using OpenOffice's crappy graph-maker. That said, before I do that, let me link you here, where you can check it out yourself if you like; the % you want to look at is next to the heading "Cumulative Probability: P(X > 1)". Let me know if that's good enough, or if you still want the graphs. --Ghostwheel 00:11, January 11, 2010 (UTC)

Nah, I can figure them out easily enough, I just figured that the alternate graphs would help complete the big picture with these and help others better see how a specific pool achieves different targets. Don't do it if it's a pain in the ass though, I'll just excel it (which is not a pain in the ass), put them up later, and let you know when they're done so you can link them in if you want. - TarkisFlux 00:51, January 11, 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll be happy to put 'em up. So what do you think overall now that we have a graphical representation and actual numbers? :-D --Ghostwheel 00:58, January 11, 2010 (UTC)

And it's here. I haven't looked at the numbers very closely to make sure that they're where they're supposed to be, so I don't have much to add overall yet. - TarkisFlux 01:23, January 11, 2010 (UTC)

Aight, lemme know what you think when ya get a chance to look at 'em. --Ghostwheel 01:37, January 11, 2010 (UTC)

While the rules are statistically sound, I would like to propose a couple of limitations to keep things in with the flavor of certain skills. First of all, only characters with the trapfinding ability can detect traps requiring more than two successes. This could be extended to disabling traps with as well, especially magical traps. Also, a character should only be able to get one success at most for a Knowledge check unless he/she has trained in the skill. These skills represent in depth study and understanding of concepts, something hard to pick up by just watching fellow adventurers.--SiraLinari 03:37, January 15, 2010 (UTC)

Sure, I could see that--I'll add it as one of the suggestions. --Ghostwheel 08:19, January 15, 2010 (UTC)

DC

Changing every DC up to 24 to a requirement of a single success is quite major. For lower level characters, that corresponds to all difficulties from easy to very hard. I think this system has a far lower resolution of difficulties. A lot of feats increase some DC by only one, are those useless in your system? And what should happen to opposed skill checks in this system? -- Iferius 18:06, January 15, 2010 (UTC)

Could you give an example of feats that increase the DCs by one? Since you said "a lot", could you mention... say, three feats?

Spell Focus, Psionic Endowment, [psionic augments], Fist of Heavens, Arcane Consumption.. Very well, there aren't a lot of feats (about one per book), but Spell Focus for instance is not exactly a silly, discardable feat. --Iferius 15:00, January 18, 2010 (UTC)

At least the first two, and perhaps the last two (don't remember them off-hand) are completely horrible examples--notice that they're for DCs of saves, not skill checks. This variant governs skill checks, not saves. --Ghostwheel 15:09, January 18, 2010 (UTC)

After having looked up the last two (in BoED and PHB2 respectively), I stand by the above statement just as strongly. Those all have to do with the DCs of abilities, not skills, would be unaffected by this system, and have nothing to do with it. For a good example of a feat that would lose power under this system, you'd need to go to Stealthy or Alertness instead--but then again, virtually no one takes those feats anyway, though I'll add a caveat for them anyway. --Ghostwheel 19:17, January 18, 2010 (UTC)

That said, it's true that it's a single success required for all the DCs of fairly low-level characters; however, most characters can do DC 15-20 stuff with a masterwork tool (50 gp, +2 to the skill) on top of their usual ability scores--and a +3 magical item costs only 900 gp over that. The people who actually want a good chance of success are going to have higher modifiers, since only once you hit +10 mod before level 5 are you going to reliably (~80% of the time) succeed on a task that requires a single success.

So it works--just from a different point of view, allowing more characters to be less useless while still allowing a character to shine if they invest in a specific skill.--Ghostwheel 13:50, January 16, 2010 (UTC)

I do not agree. There should be a difference in difficulty in hearing people talking next to you while you are distracted(DC 15) and hearing a cat stalk through a door(DC 24). --Iferius 15:00, January 18, 2010 (UTC)

So grant people an extra two dice to hear someone talk if you feel it's unfair and desperately want to use the system. If it really irks you, you can always say that things with a DC of 20 or higher require two successes--the system's very flexible that way. The thing is, people by level 5 can get +10 to +15 to skill modifier just from ranks, ability modifiers, and magical items, and those people are going to be able to do the first one under the original system without any trouble, and not have too much difficulty with the second (being able to take 10 for the most part). That said, if you still see it as a problem, do you have any constructive suggestions that might be used to fix the problem under the framework presented in the variant? Would a good "fix" to your concerns be lowering the DCs appropriate successes, so that 10-19 required one success, 20-29 two success, 30-39 three successes, and so forth? --Ghostwheel 15:09, January 18, 2010 (UTC)

I agree, it is very flexible. But since I can't see a way to fix what I see as a problem at lower levels (this should work perfectly at higher ones), I wouldn't use it. I am trying to tell you constructively why I wouldn't do so, but I don't have any solutions at the ready that don't require heavy DM involvement.

On second thought, maybe I do. How about changing the dice below DC20? Rolling a D4 instead of a D6? And a D3 below DC 15, and a D2 below DC10? You can still require a single success which scales with greater skill, and the rest of the system can go unchanged. --Iferius 08:37, January 19, 2010 (UTC)