You''re not alone on that, Ingenu.

The more I think about it, the more I feel that skills should be treated like higher order attributes such as physical, social and mental attributes.

For example in the white wolf system, we have physica social and mental attributes. The pysical are broken into power (strength), speed/control (dexterity) and sustainability (stamina). The social and mental have simillar break downs.

I think what should be done is to have skills simply be based off of those attributes. If we had a graph, the core of the graph would be physical, mental, social and likely moral (willpower, courage, temperance...). From these would emerge skills pertaining to basic reasoning skills, then learning and teaching and then have those head into rotes and applied knowledges, such as melee, firearms, computers... You could have specialisations as well which would spring from the aforementioned rotes and knowledges.

Each of those skill categories could be broken down into sub sections, how much you know about the subject, how well you can concentrate on it, and how well you can apply what you know. I''m still iffy on the concentration business.

Then there is the time problem. I''ve had a system simillar to what Ingenu has. The issue could still be book keeping when you have fairly large groups.

I think most can agree with time for a person to commit an action is dependent upon the person, their state and what they''re employing. So if a person is employing a bastard sword, their is a certain amount of time it would require over a base line melee weapon to commit an action like thrust, swing and so on. THen there would be the effect of the person, how long would it take for them to manipulate the weapon. Lastly but finally, their is the state of the person, are they pinned, in some akward position... things of that nature. These three numbers should determine how fast a person can commit an action. You could add a latency time based on the person''s reflexes.

I think the easiest way for conducting combat is to have a running count, whic would act as a timer. The GM would count and as people''s time to act comes up the players and the GM use an interrupt system to call out an action. The players would have to know when to call and do the math, but that''s fine, me thinks.

To avoid really big numbers the count could be reset as needed. That would make it a bit like a round, but it''d be more a matter of conveinence than any formal round system.

In the end, the book keeping is still a bit high.

fodd3r, in current RPGs rules, skills are based upon one or more Traits/Attributes (Strength...), also in some modern systems, there''s a Skill Web, that is tree like.

One Skill depends upon another Skill or upon a Trait.
Parent Skill/Trait limits the maximum Skill value, or increase is cost when trying to raise it above the Parent Skill/Trait value.

For example in my system, trying to get a skill one rank higher costs in Character points, as many points as the rank you want to reach (you can only increase from one rank to the next obviously).
But if the rank you want to reach is higher than the rank of Trait/Skill you depend upon, the cost double.

Example:
Trait : Reflexes 4 (I''ve low values), Skill : Dodge 3.
Raising Dodge from 3 to 4 costs 4 character points (no xp, character points to use instead), but raising it later to 5 would cost 10 points...

About the time tracking and increasing values, that can indeed be a problem, and as you mentionned, a simple reset (setting a new 0) will solve the problem nicely. About book keeping... well PCs will most probably always use their weapon of choice, so the DM can know the time step (using the most simple version of the rules), and a bit of confidence/trust in the players is required.

About the per character ''speed'', I''m also thinking of using that to make it simple. The K.I.S.S. principle remains.

Another Skill related point, which also require the players to track but IMO is important, is that characters Skills/Traits cannot be raised if not used in game. Meaning you can''t become an excellent singer/swordman/whatever without practice from your character.
You don''t have the right to improve Skills/Traits you didn''t use.

-* So many things to do, so little time to spend. *-

you''ll have to forgive me if I missed it, but I noticed that you were talking about the Turn/Round problems.
Well, of course if you look at DnD you might be a bit dissapointed.
I would suggest you look at the White Wolf World of Darkness system,as used in Vampire : the Masquerade, and other games of the line.
Simply put it uses a stacked system to solve conflicts during the round. Slowest player/NPC goes first, *declaring* what he intends to do. That way the fastest player has an opportunity to act accordingly to what the other will do, effectively being given the chance to counter them.
My die hard DnD fanatics had a chance to test and were amazed at how smoothly it flowed. No one got to bicker or moan
Maybe you should give it a look ?

(and gee, go to roliste.org and look at ALL the systems that exist out there, man !)

Sancte Isidore ora pro nobis !

Have you bothered to read people''s post let alone mine? If you didn''t I mention white-wolf a number of times, but it''s not good enough.

Ingenu,

I understand the skill trait pairing.

But I don''t really agree with it. I think there should be a web that starts from a core and spans outward, the closest match furtherest from the center should be used to for skill checks.

I agree with the increasing difficulty in progression of things.

This can be an easy way of classifying new skills, since they would have a natural position in the web, rather than just hacking in a new skill and then later realising that it''s domain has too much in common with an existing skill.

Drewish,

I think you need to figure figure out what the crux of your game is going to be, will it be combat or some other aspect, such as politics or puzzle solving. Now I don''t mean what will it be exclusively but where will it lean? The D20 system is decent for combat based systems. It''s really geared towards such things.

I suggest you get your hands on the SRD 3.5 and have a look at modern d20. Using that strip out all the crap that you don''t want -- somethings might not fit into what you have in mind. Remember, that at some later date you might want to bring in something that you took out at first.

Once you''ve done that you''ll have a spare system, that won''t overwhelm you or the players that you''ll be play testing with. I''m guessing you''re going to build a world along with your "flava" of d20.

Some problems you''ll run into is hp and the in game consequences. This can be fixed by medling with the way people gain xp. I was thinking of quick fixes and the fastest on I got was as follows. You start off with full hit points of your class at the start -- if you''re going to have classes and levels at all -- then when a character levels, they''ll roll their hit die. That number plus the constitution modifier is added together and divide by 10 and finally added to the characters hp. This means that every level or so that character will gain 1 hp, for a dwarf with max con and perfect rolls, that''s about 32 points at level 20, IIRC. All in all, it makes the game MUCH deadlier. In game consequence of damage could be done by breaking the hp number as evenly as possible between 4 levels. Whenever the first level of hp is lost the player''s modifiers are temporarily reduced by 1. Then 2, 3, 4 and finally incapacitated. You might also run into a lack of stats. If you look at D&D it''s physical heavy. You might want to add a few things. Since you have str, dex, con, you could make analagous version of that for mental and social traits. This would make it a bit more white-wolf ish interms of stats break down, but they have an excellent on, so it doesn''t really make much of a difference. This will mean you''ll have to go through the skills and other rules to appropriately adjust various references to stats so that they use the most appropriate ones. If you want to go for the political game then I suggest you revise the wealth system as well, since it''s far too simplisitic and you probably want to introduce a reasonably detailed economic model.

fodder:

There already a system out there that does exactly what you describe its the shadowrun system. You might want to take a look at it.

skillweb: all skills are connected along the web to an attribute. If the character doesn''t have the required skill they can default to another skill or attribute along the web. Basically the back track from the required skill until they find a skill or attribute they do possess for each interveining skill along they way a +2 modifier is added to the difficulty.

there are also concentrations and specilizations, each skill can have concerntraion in a paticular aspect of that skill or a speiclization in specific application. Example Fireams can have concentraion in pistols and specilize in a particular pistol. How they work is thus at creation if you take a concentration you have +1 point for the concertaion and your skill is decreased by 1, specilizations are the same but +2/-2 and concerntarion being the base skill level.
example:
Firearms(starting) 4
concentration in pistols
Firearms 3 (pistols 5)
specilizing in ares predator
Firearms 2 (pistols 4) (predator 6)

when it comes to character advancement it cost less karma to raise a specilization and concerntration then a base skill.

bear in mind this from 2nd edition it changed in 3rd.

Also as a signed note the most unusal system I''ve seen was in the Bablyon 5 game. In it you had a skill rating in a skill then when you used that skill the GM would assign a difficulty number. Then you rolled 2 dice one the increase dice the other the decrease dice, the diffrence is then added to your skill raiting if the skill rating greater then the difficulty rating you succeed otherwise you fail.


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Writer, Programer, Cook, I''m a Jack of all Trades
Current Design project
Chaos Factor Design Document

TechnoGoth:

neat, to hear that about shadow run. GURPS has that as well, AFAIK, but that was a bit much.

The Babylon Project system was simple, not to mention the minor set back and bonus were nice touches. It added randomness but didn''t make it retardedly random.

Well I keep in mind the K.I.S.S. principle.

So the Skill web having only one (in fact some skills can have more than one parent but it''s rare) parent makes it easy.
It''s just about tradeoff, the rules are here to make everyone agree about the result of an action, I''m not sure they have to simulate reality, they just have to be believable.

About dices and checks, I don''t use the D&D system, in fact I use one of the revised "Legend of the Five Rings" rule.
You roll Skill number of dices (10 dices max), a 10 make you reroll the dice and add the result to the previous roll. For each dice rolled, you then have a value, you keep Trait number of dices, and add their results together, if you''re above the Difficulty Level you suceeded.
So it''s like your skill is capped by your trait, but still having great skill helps you, I like the idea.

There''s also another nice thing, the capability for a player to choose to raise the Difficulty Level by 5 points steps.
Each increase will make a better result (You can''t cut the mustaches of your ennemy without 4 or 5 increase), that is translated into bonus damage, bigger area of effect, faster spell casting...

It''s also used in the duel, something I really love.
Basically you have two characters facing, they can make a roll to learn about the skill in all 3 values required for dueling, (evaluating your ennemy), then they bet, each in turn choose to increase his Difficulty Level, or tells the other to strike.
So you have two characters facing, things heat up, and all of sudden, one draw his weapon and strikes the ennemy (or shoot...).

I really love it, and it''s much more stressing player wise than simply standing and rolling dices like a regular attack.


I wonder if Drewish still reads the thread... ^^


-* So many things to do, so little time to spend. *-

fodd3r : sorry about that, like I said "you''ll have to have to forgive me if I missed it"...
Usually most people who come and ask about this sort of things simply know DnD and have played only recent cRPGs so they havent a clue. I am glad to see you do It''s nice for a change !

White Wolf certainly isnt my favourite system, but I was happily surprised by how nicely it made the game flow during fights (as opposed to the fights my players were used to in DnD).
Actually, my favourite system is a free French RPG system called Simulacres. It was one of the first system I discovered that used the traits+skill+modifiers system, and I still love how flexible it is to this very day.
(I actually posted about it at length very recently so if you look up my latest posts I am sure you can read about it).

I''ll have to second Ingenu on the L5R system. the trick about choosing between increasing your skills or your trait in order to increase your chances is an interesting one.

One thing I loved about the Hawkmoon Stormbringer system was the way you improved your skills through criticals (be they failures or successes IIRC) : say you have 26% in a skill. You manage to do a critical. At the end of the session you could roll, and if you succeeded a roll at 74% (100% - current skill) you automatically improved (by a little amount, cant remember how much). The great thing compared to other systems that I know of was that this would make improving much more difficult at later stages. When you have 80%, you have only 20% of chances of improving. This nicely simulated a difficulty curve.

Anyway, lots of reading to do on this thread

Sancte Isidore ora pro nobis !

Since we''re all so opinionated.

How about we take all the things we like and see if we can come up with our own little system?