Okay, so, I've always had this problem with the Perform skill. Namely, that it can easily outPerform the other moneymaking skills (Craft & Profession). (Well, Craft can catch up, but it takes a while... a long while)
So, I wanted to brainstorm some ideas on the Perform issue. To start us off, here's the guts of the Perform description, straight from the SRD:
Perform (Cha)
...
Check
You can impress audiences with your talent and skill.Perform DC Performance
10 Routine performance. Trying to earn money by playing in public is essentially begging. You can earn 1d10 cp/day.
15 Enjoyable performance. In a prosperous city, you can earn 1d10 sp/day.
20 Great performance. In a prosperous city, you can earn 3d10 sp/day. In time, you may be invited to join a professional troupe and may develop a regional reputation.
25 Memorable performance. In a prosperous city, you can earn 1d6 gp/day. In time, you may come to the attention of noble patrons and develop a national reputation.
30 Extraordinary performance. In a prosperous city, you can earn 3d6 gp/day. In time, you may draw attention from distant potential patrons, or even from extraplanar beings.A masterwork musical instrument gives you a +2 circumstance bonus on Perform checks that involve its use.
See also: epic usages of Perform. (It can be used as Diplomacy to influence attitudes)
Action
Varies. Trying to earn money by playing in public requires anywhere from an evening’s work to a full day’s performance.Try Again
Yes. Retries are allowed, but they don’t negate previous failures, and an audience that has been unimpressed in the past is likely to be prejudiced against future performances. (Increase the DC by 2 for each previous failure.)
I'm having a hard time really seeing the issue. As a money maker Perform is a solid skill but it has few other uses. With craft you can actually make tools etc. if the need arises. Another issue is even with good perform skills you only earn a handful of GP a day. Big deal - a mid level adventurer earns a 1000 times that in a day. So its not like PCs are going to be desperate to improve their perform skill. I mean even if they are truely exceptional they will still have to perform for many many months to buy even a single mid-level scroll.
The gist of my argument is that there is little - no incentive to put any ranks into Profession unless you're going to sail a ship. Most adventurers probably spend a bit of downtime in town every now and then. With Perform, a low-level adventurer (say 5th level) can supplement his income with an extra 25-50 gold a week, while someone who actually *works* with skill in his Profession earns less than half with the same amount of ranks. On the other hand, I don't really want to increase the yield for Profession, since it is already miles away from the earnings of untrained laborers (which I don't want to mess with again, since that's pretty much a foundation thing).
Anyway, I came up with a couple of ideas.
Solution 1: Make Perform earn similar amounts to Profession. Say DC 10 or less gets you 1d3-1 cp per day, and anything above gets your your check result divided by 2 sp per day.
This is kind of a blah solution, and makes Perform seem a bit dull, which goes counter to the skill.
Solution 2: Limited performances. Say the character can make 1d8 profitable performances per week (up to 3 performances per day) in any particular community, plus or minus the community modifier. Anything more starts to bore the crowds.
and/or on top of #2: The character must establish him/herself by meeting 1d6 Perform DCs (1/night max, DC 10 + community modifer, with maybe a +2 for a tough crowd). In the mean time, he earns money as if he had gotten 1 category less on his Perform check.
I like this a little more, since it adds a bit of a role play to it (the character has to work the crowd).
Additionally, shouldn't the local economy (perhaps the available funds?) have an impact on how much the Perform check yields in any given location?
Thoughts?
TK
The gist of my argument is that there is little - no incentive to put any ranks into Profession unless you're going to sail a ship.
What? If what you are really trying to say is: "There is little reason to put ranks in Profession for stat block related bonuses" then, you have a point to flesh out. There are quite obvious reasons to put ranks in Profession that functionally do not provide stat block bonuses (although some do anyway):
1. A profession further defines a player character in terms of ROLE PLAYING that character. It is a guide for how a player approaches the thoughts and actions of their PC2. Professions give the DM more personal material to customize the game for the players. In short, they offer plot hook possibilities to construct adventures around.
If you are looking to splat up a PC, putting ranks in Profession probably isn't the way to go. If you have a desire to expand a PC's sphere of influence within an adventure or campaign, they can be as useful as the player and DM make them.
As ever,
ACE
The gist of my argument is that there is little - no incentive to put any ranks into Profession unless you're going to sail a ship. Most adventurers probably spend a bit of downtime in town every now and then. With Perform, a low-level adventurer (say 5th level) can supplement his income with an extra 25-50 gold a week, while someone who actually *works* with skill in his Profession earns less than half with the same amount of ranks. On the other hand, I don't really want to increase the yield for Profession, since it is already miles away from the earnings of untrained laborers (which I don't want to mess with again, since that's pretty much a foundation thing).
Your reasoning seems valid until you realize that the perform skill is basically an entertainment venue. The difference in pay for one performance can be explained in the same way that actors get way more pay than the sound guy does. Or even mediocre football players compaired to a bricklayer. Sure the bricklayer builds a work of art and someone gets to then live in it, but the potential of the craft in finite, while the potential for the performer is basically infinite with newer "works" of his craft happening as quickly as the player can roll the dice.
What? If what you are really trying to say is: "There is little reason to put ranks in Profession for stat block related bonuses" then, you have a point to flesh out. There are quite obvious reasons to put ranks in Profession that functionally do not provide stat block bonuses (although some do anyway):
1. A profession further defines a player character in terms of ROLE PLAYING that character. It is a guide for how a player approaches the thoughts and actions of their PC
2. Professions give the DM more personal material to customize the game for the players. In short, they offer plot hook possibilities to construct adventures around.
As ever,
ACE
I don't find these reasons obvious at all, and neither provides stat block bonuses. If I wanted to play a salty sea dog in a role playing sense, then I would just craft up his character traits to include them. My players feel much the same way - if there is no "real" reason to put ranks in something, then there are other skills that do help that need those ranks.
One problem is that the PC's are adventurers, not craftsmen. If they wanted to make a safe living making horseshoes and nails and tools and armor, weapons, books, etc., then they wouldn't be risking their lives daily by adventuring. If you wanted to make profession into something that players would take to help them define their characters, it has to be made important for them, throughout the game, for them to do so. And not just in the "how much money will I make this week" sense, either.
I give synergy bonuses to any profession skill with ranks at graduated levels. 5 ranks: +2, 10 ranks: +4, etc. which are added to any roll that has to deal with the profession (and I interpret loosely). Same with the Craft Skill. That way, if a bard had 5 ranks in Profession (Minstrel), 5 ranks in Craft (ballad), a masterwork Lute, and 5 ranks in perform, he could expect a +11 to his roll to wow the crowd. If the little piggy Fighter had 5 ranks in Profession (stonecutting), 5 ranks in Craft (stonework), 5 ranks in Profession (engineering), 5 in knowledge (engineering), and masterwork stoneworkers tools, he could expect to get a +13 to build his house out of bricks so the wolf couldn't get him.
Will either of these break the game - hardly! And that's because players just don't do stuff that often that creates the need to winter in a town while broke and find something to do for the next 3 months until the passes thaw.
I don't find these reasons obvious at all, and neither provides stat block bonuses. If I wanted to play a salty sea dog in a role playing sense, then I would just craft up his character traits to include them. My players feel much the same way - if there is no "real" reason to put ranks in something, then there are other skills that do help that need those ranks.
Heh, look at the difference in what you are saying and what I am here Celric... You are saying that a "real" reason for taking a skill is equivilant to stacking a +x somewhere to a dice roll. Why is that?
If a salty sea dog is already proficient in sailing, navigation, astrology, etc. from the get go in a campaign then that's perfectally fine; then there is no need to spend skill points in those areas at all and this conversation is moot. Not only that, but there is no need to encourage adding skill points here by drawing up house rules to give bonuses for those skills.
If, however, to call yourself a salty sea dog you need to be proficient in those skills, then a player needs to put some ranks in those skills and will be rewarded by the DM in game for being a salty sea dog. This won't appear anywhere on a character sheet with a +3 to salty seadogsmanship...rather, the PC is investing in salty sea dog contacts, reputation, community status, etc.
You are right about PCs being heroes or antiheroes in the sense that while putting 30 ranks in stonecutting will make them a master stonecutter, it won't help make a tumble or spot check with a +x to a dice roll.
As ever,
ACE
Heh, look at the difference in what you are saying and what I am here Celric... You are saying that a "real" reason for taking a skill is equivilant to stacking a +x somewhere to a dice roll. Why is that?
If a salty sea dog is already proficient in sailing, navigation, astrology, etc. from the get go in a campaign then that's perfectally fine; then there is no need to spend skill points in those areas at all and this conversation is moot. Not only that, but there is no need to encourage adding skill points here by drawing up house rules to give bonuses for those skills.
If, however, to call yourself a salty sea dog you need to be proficient in those skills, then a player needs to put some ranks in those skills and will be rewarded by the DM in game for being a salty sea dog. This won't appear anywhere on a character sheet with a +3 to salty seadogsmanship...rather, the PC is investing in salty sea dog contacts, reputation, community status, etc.
You are right about PCs being heroes or antiheroes in the sense that while putting 30 ranks in stonecutting will make them a master stonecutter, it won't help make a tumble or spot check with a +x to a dice roll.
As ever,
ACE
No, no. You misunderstand me, my friend. I agree that taking skills to flesh out a character and give him the game mechanics to support his character traits is a Good and Wise Thing (tm), and should be encouraged.
However, I know that some players out there (mine included) just don't look at the character sheet that way. They invision a character that is a swarthy theif, raised in the temple but escaping at every opportunity to look for a half remembered sister that might have been sold into slavery while he was still very young. So their character sheets will have stuff like Escape artist, Hide, Move Silently, Gather Info, Search, Bluff and maybe even Open Locks and Disable devices - but more than likely will have no ranks in Knowledge (religion), or Craft (bookbinding), or profession (scribe) - all of which will be much more likely acquired at the temple.
So I have the feeling that if I (as DM) fail to make the profession skills very important by telling the players that these skills will be very important, then they will just not get taken over those skills that will allow the characters to actually survive.
The failing might be mine (as the DM) to make these skills truely necessary, but if the sheets didn't have them listed at all, I seriously doubt that some players would even notice, let alone miss them.
Sounds like you may just have to put your foot down then. Sometimes as a DM, you just have to do it. If that's their background then they should have the more "well rounded" skills too.Anyone growing up in a monestary would have learned some knowledge of the faith, at the least.
A good thing is that it's a great plot hook for characters. Maybe they'll realise that a little bit of Knowledge is a good thing.