I couldn't disagree more with the idea that Profession skills aren't part of an involving game.
In my experience, the games where people invest points in skills like Profession have been the better games: A few points in Profession (Tax Collector) or Profession (Charcoal Burner) may never come up in play, but these are the fully-realized characters that take on lives of their own, almost tapping the player on the shoulder to tell them what to do.
It makes me think of something Robert Howard said about how he wrote. He imagined his tales as if the hero was dictating the adventures, reading over his shoulder and suggesting details.
(Yes, I know that's not consistent with the way Robert Howard actually wrote his stories, occasionally revising to fit a different hero. It's the idea he wanted to project, and it suits my point. Never let inconvenient facts get in the way of a good story.)
A game where the DM immerses the characters in his setting, letting them become more than simple sellswords: That's the game that I'll enjoy.
Why not leave them as skills? What's wrong with that? Oh that's right, give them to the characters for free so they can use skills for combat related things, because you're not supposed to use profession anyway.
MSRD: choosing a profession adds class skills.
Better than SRD skills and works fine for me.
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A game where the DM immerses the characters in his setting, letting them become more than simple sellswords: That's the game that I'll enjoy.
I agree 100%, but lack of Profession (Tailor) doesn't mean you cannot allow the characters to be something other than simple sellswords. You don't need to give them a few points in something to give them a background in that area.
One of my favorite characters I've played was a dwarven warrior who would knit to help him relax. His mother used to tell him the legends of various heroic dwarven warriors as she sat knitting by the hearth. As the oldest child in the clanhold, he would often help her in her knitting blankets for the other dwarven children. He didn't enjoy it a a child,but it was a small price to pay to hear the Sagas of Durgin Trollslayer.
This was in 2nd Edition AD&D. No "Knitting" NWP required. Just a little thought into the character. The knitting actually came up several times in play as well and it all worked fine without the need to use skill points on it.
But yes, there are different styles of play. Some like those sort of skills. Other don't. Different strokes and all.
No one's holding a repeating crossbow to my head and saying "TAKE SKILLS RELAVENT TO YOUR PARTY ROLE!".
Don't worry. WotC's taking care of that problem for you. In 4E, you'll be able to create exactly the character they think you should have.
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I wouldn't consider most of those as reviews. Nothing informative at all.
I've give the reviews 2 stars.
Who Reviews the, uh, ReviewMen?
Anywho, this is DangerDwarf and crosswiredmind and FabesMinis chance to publish a more pro-4E review. Show us what we've been missing.
Danger Dwarf walks the walk.
PEACE!
Although his passion for Danzig is worrisome.
Well, crap. Profession checks cant be made untrained, technically anyway. I like to take ranks in a Craft skill, but what are the odds of snagging Profession (butcher)? Oh noes!
I've had profession (prostitute) settle a diplomatic row.
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Just gonna play devil's advocate here...
Does anyone have an anecdote that actually addresses the offending quote? Several people have mentioned crafting, which I will admit is also very often useful in my campaigns (especially weapon and armor crafting). One person even mentioned having taken a few ranks in a profession for flavour. However, no-one has yet mentioned a profession check actually having a significant impact on their game. This doesn't have to be a combat or crunch impact, any impact would be fine.
Yes. The PC captain of a ship was able to use her Profession:Sailor in a skills test versus the captain of a pirate raider and upon winning the test was able to cut off his wind, thus making for an easy and effective slaughter of the marauders (reducing their maneuverability and gaining the upper hand in the sea skirmish). The captain, and the players do to her IMPACTFUL use of her PROFESSION had loads of fun kicking the crap out of the pirates.
In fact there was a resounding Cheer! when the player rolled so well.
im also gonna add here many times in the savage tide game im running a well rolled sailor, or navagtion skill has saved the party many times, in storms ,sea battles, and such. in fact profession has been used heavly in a few games i have ran .
Profession skills have been fairly important in several campaigns I've played in, although it's mostly "by proxy."
Case in point, the last campaign (which is currently on hold while the DM works and takes care of his very pregnant wife) had the groups bard "inherit" an inn by royal decree. Now, while the bard could make some money for the inn by performing there from time to time, but he has no knowledge of how to run the inn on a daily basis. Thus comes into play the npcs he hires to do just that. Their ranks in Profession: Innkeeper, cook, waitress, etc. determine how well the inn is run.
If he hires people who perform badly, the quality and reputation of the inn suffers (something that is most certainly of great importance to a bard).
Thus Profession, by proxy, has been a fairly important skill in that campaign. It provides a mechanic with which one can measure such successes or failures, instead of relying on DM fiat.
Okay, I've been nice and quiet about all this 4th Ed related stuff for a while now, but it's reached the point like it's a wasp in my boxers and I have to vent the hate, so forgive me;
Previous posters hit the nail on the head with the condescending way 4th ed is being peddled about again- it's like they've learned nothing over the past few months and are blundering on with their "neato" system that's "so kewl" that if you don't have a gamesgasm you must be some kind of "loser" <cue "L" hand sign on forehead>. The enthusiasm is all well and good, but this feels like the drummed up fanaticism developed by a PR firm that's taken one too many seminars with Nickelodeon or Disney. I thumbed through Races and Classes and was all at once nonplussed, offended and irritated that WotC would sell such a vapid bit of spin to it's customers. Maybe that's why they folded Dragon when they did, so they could charge for this drek instead of integrating it into the magazine? The more I've read, the more I get the feeling they're selling me a boardless version of MB Games Heroquest with some shiny munchkinisms for the kiddies. Heroquest was a fine game, but it was no D&D. All these phase in books have the feel of polishing a turd- not that I think 4th ed will be as woeful as all that, but it seems to betray a fundemental lack of faith in their own product. Maybe all that painful evangelical anticipation from the Wizards Boards, in tandem with the Launch PR, have poisoned me.
Please gimme something to smile about- Shiny? Heathy? anyone? I'm not picky.
Here endth the rant
Please gimme something to smile about- Shiny? Heathy? anyone? I'm not picky.
Here endth the rant
I understand, your not alone!
Check out his "Diamonds - The Best Of Dio" Album, it will do for starters.D&Dio is just brilliant :-)
Stefan
It's funny how you get impressions of people online, and they are totally wrong.
I definitely never figured you for a guy who would be cognizant of RJ Dio.
And now for something completely OT:
Huh? What impression did you get, then? Just for the record: I´ve been listening to Hard&Heavy stuff for about 20 years now, mostly older stuff from the 70ies to the 90ies. Well, the Scorpions (the band) hail originally from a small town about 15 miles away from my home, and the Schenker brothers were even born here - talk about some influence :-)
CEO
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No wait, this sounds awesome. Instead of having to 'waste' points on relevant skills for my characters, I can just 'roleplay' them being sailors or whatever. I don't actually need to waste points on knowing anything about seamanship, I can just jot a line down saying, 'I'm a sailor.'
But I won't do that. It's not effective enough. If it doesn't affect combat or give me some sort of tactical advantage in an encounter, then it's not worth having in the game, after all.
Instead I'll jot down a line that says, "I'm the Emperor of Karribus, son of the God of War and have a thousand million loyal subjects." I'll even roleplay it! It's not like I need to actually waste points on having any sorts of skills that make me good at politics or administration, or any sort of Feat that lets me have those thousand million loyal subjects, or whatever. I say it, and it happens! Roleplay! So awesome!
And the Cleric will be a Faerie Princess, with a pet dragon named Cuddles and the ability to Craft anything of any value she wants out of Dreamstuff by reaching into her backpack and saying, 'I think I can, I think I can...' No skills, no feats, none of that pesky rules stuff. I'll just 'roleplay' it! We need the Dingus of Doozle to stop the evil overlord? Good thing Fayina can 'Craft' those, and doesn't have to use any sorts of rules to slow down the game! Dinguses of Doozle for everyone! And an Invulnerable Coat of Arnd for the Cleric, and the Axe of the Dwarvish Lords for Chompy the Half-Orc, who isn't technically a Dwarf, but he wrote down under 'Profession' "Scholar: Dwarves, counts as a Dwarf for using Dwarven items' so he can use it anyway, and he really roleplays being an honorary Dwarf so well...
The Rogue's 'Profession' line will read simply, "I'm Batman."
Now THAT was funny. Sarcastic as hell. But funny. :) Made my night.
-Lisa
Check out his "Diamonds - The Best Of Dio" Album, it will do for starters.D&Dio is just brilliant :-)
Stefan
It's funny how you get impressions of people online, and they are totally wrong.I definitely never figured you for a guy who would be cognizant of RJ Dio.
... Just for the record: I´ve been listening to Hard&Heavy stuff for about 20 years now, mostly older stuff from the 70ies to the 90ies. Well, the Scorpions (the band) hail originally from a small town about 15 miles away from my home, and the Schenker brothers were even born here - talk about some influence :-)
Killer, Steb-meister, that's totally killer.
I've got about 20 years of metal-heading under my belt too.
Hmm.
Not to stoke the fires or anything... but I DID just put in a bit in "Edge of Anarchy" where a key clue can be discovered by making a successful Profession (butcher) check...
Sorry, James, that's not fun. You'll have to change it. (Maybe WotC can help!)
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Why didn't they take out these profession skills earlier! That way my bard wouldn't be responsible for the death of a whole team by claiming he was a great sailor! (and then going out with a bunch of scrooges that didn't want to hire a crew, consequently got caught in a storm and then telling the whole group that he technically was right since being in a bath with a little wooden boat would make him captain because there was no one around and pulling and when you let a bath drain you do have a whirlwind, a tiny one but it is one!)
Bluff, that is where the problem lays! Bluff skills should go
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Hmm.
Not to stoke the fires or anything... but I DID just put in a bit in "Edge of Anarchy" where a key clue can be discovered by making a successful Profession (butcher) check...
I hope its not that critical a clue or you may find the email box stuffed by frustrated players asking why. There was an LG mod that required Profession: Barrister for the party to succeed. The mod writer was a lawyer and felt the need to include his own profession.
According to the triad no party ever successfully completed that mod.
Unless the campaign is set up to include the use of certain professions it will will dumb luck to have chosen the right one to uncover the right bit of info.
Hmm.
Not to stoke the fires or anything... but I DID just put in a bit in "Edge of Anarchy" where a key clue can be discovered by making a successful Profession (butcher) check...
Mr Jacobs, allow me to say, that if my ranks in Profession (butcher) go unused I will fill your inbox with angry and strongly-worded e-mails asking why. [/joke]
In my opinion, as long as there's a bit at the beginning about DM's suggesting their player's take a few ranks in Profession, I see nothing wrong with this. If they take the bait and put some ranks into some varied professions, they get the clue. If not, oh well. I'm sure that the game won't come to a grinding halt if they don't get the one, lone clue that JJ's talking about.
CWM, just out of morbid curiousity, what module are you talking about? If it hinges that heavily on one skill check, then that's a problem with the writer, not the skill system, IMO. That'd be like me writing a mod that required a successful Knowledge (postal service) roll to get to the BBEG. If you don't make it, end the game now.
Crosswiredmind:
What about my point regarding the need for successful Profession (siege engineer) checks *required* to reload a catapult with any speed?
I'm not sure I'd require my PCs to have taken profession (siege engineer) in order for them to use a catapult. I'd probably just, you know, let them do it if they wanted to.
This is part of the problem I see with the profession skills. A lot of the time the essential assumption underlying a profession skill is that if PC A has it then PCs B, C, and D are not allowed to do whatever PC A has spent points on. In some cases thats fine and all but in many cases it amounts to the DM saying no - you can't do that to players suggestions.
As to crafting - I'm surprised by all the crafters on the thread, making a sword or a set of armour takes friggen eons by RAW. I had a player pick these skills up early on in my campaign and he pretty much retired the character a few sessions later when it was realized that it would take actual months to make armour. At this point its far quicker to go to the kobolds cave - kill the kobolds, take their stuff and buy some armour. Making anything in D&D is kind of insane - possibly realistic, I'm not the kind of person that would actually craft a sword, but wow what a lot of down time. Making anything means putting the rest of the players on ice for long periods of time while you craft, or, alternatively, not going on the adventure becuase your staying back at base to work on your longsword.
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Hmm.
Not to stoke the fires or anything... but I DID just put in a bit in "Edge of Anarchy" where a key clue can be discovered by making a successful Profession (butcher) check...
I hope its not that critical a clue or you may find the email box stuffed by frustrated players asking why. There was an LG mod that required Profession: Barrister for the party to succeed. The mod writer was a lawyer and felt the need to include his own profession.
According to the triad no party ever successfully completed that mod.
Unless the campaign is set up to include the use of certain professions it will will dumb luck to have chosen the right one to uncover the right bit of info.
Boy did the Triad drop the ball on THAT one!!!
NEVER require an obscure skill, power or item in an adventure unless you make bloody well sure the party can acquire it in the adventure or that there's some way around needing it.
Heck, something very much like that was in the Living City Writer's Guidelines...
I don't think "can be" means what you think it means.
MSRD: choosing a profession adds class skills.
Better than SRD skills and works fine for me.
However, d20 Modern/MSRD still has a profession skill. It is used differently though. I prefer to call professions in the MSRD as backgrounds, it makes more sense with how they work in the game.
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CWM, just out of morbid curiousity, what module are you talking about? If it hinges that heavily on one skill check, then that's a problem with the writer, not the skill system, IMO. That'd be like me writing a mod that required a successful Knowledge (postal service) roll to get to the BBEG. If you don't make it, end the game now.
Hmmm. It was way back - year 2 or 3 Keoland Regional Mod ... can't remember the name. I agree that it was bad mod writing (though I know the guy fairly well and I think he was just trying rattle some cages). It involved arguing a case and if the PCs lost they missed out on some important plot points. The DC was set up such that you had to have the right mix of skills including diplomacy (which most of my characters take but that isn't very common) and profession barrister.
You hit the nail on the head with the predictability factor and not to have key plot choices tied to one skill check - especially a skill that is fairly esoteric.
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CWM, just out of morbid curiousity, what module are you talking about? If it hinges that heavily on one skill check, then that's a problem with the writer, not the skill system, IMO. That'd be like me writing a mod that required a successful Knowledge (postal service) roll to get to the BBEG. If you don't make it, end the game now.
I tried posting this yesterday morning but my posts kept getting eaten.
We have played nothing but published Mods for the last two years or more and we have never tried to min/max characters, optimize skills nor have we ever tried balancing our parties and we've never had any problem with finishing any of them.
Half the time we had no rogue and too many fighters. Never seems to matter.
Of course as DM, I would like to think I am intelligent enough to pick good modules and make any changes I deem appropriate (not that I've ever had to change encounters because of party makeup.)
I hope its not that critical a clueHmm.
Not to stoke the fires or anything... but I DID just put in a bit in "Edge of Anarchy" where a key clue can be discovered by making a successful Profession (butcher) check...
Call it a hunch, I imagine that you will be able to find the key with a simple search check, but be able to find it with the Prof(butch) check at a lower DC.
Please gimme something to smile about- Shiny? Heathy? anyone? I'm not picky.
Paizo is still making 3.5 products, at least for a while.
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Boy did the Triad drop the ball on THAT one!!!
NEVER require an obscure skill, power or item in an adventure unless you make bloody well sure the party can acquire it in the adventure or that there's some way around needing it.
Heck, something very much like that was in the Living City Writer's Guidelines...
There is something exactly like that in the current LG Writer's Guidelines precisely because of too many situations like that, or needing Track (the big one), to complete an adventure.
Any situation that requires a specialized skill must have another way to continue the adventure.Some of us do learn from mistakes. ;)
Oh, and unless I am confusing the time frame, the Triad member who did that also learned, and does not let such things pass any more. The rule had to be inserted for all the authors who refused to accept it as a problem.
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I don't think "can be" means what you think it means.Hmm.
Not to stoke the fires or anything... but I DID just put in a bit in "Edge of Anarchy" where a key clue can be discovered by making a successful Profession (butcher) check...
I hope its not that critical a clue or you may find the email box stuffed by frustrated players asking why. There was an LG mod that required Profession: Barrister for the party to succeed. The mod writer was a lawyer and felt the need to include his own profession.
According to the triad no party ever successfully completed that mod.
Unless the campaign is set up to include the use of certain professions it will will dumb luck to have chosen the right one to uncover the right bit of info.
Boy did the Triad drop the ball on THAT one!!!
NEVER require an obscure skill, power or item in an adventure unless you make bloody well sure the party can acquire it in the adventure or that there's some way around needing it.
Heck, something very much like that was in the Living City Writer's Guidelines...This is the problem with replying to a reply...
You're right RE the Butcher check - however, I was commenting on the apparently botched Living Greyhawk module.
I love throwing "bones" like giving PCs a bonus for having an obscure skill (which it sounds like is the case with the Profession[Butcher] thing). Making a key point of the adventure hinge upon it (like the Living Greyhawk mod), however, is BAD design.
Ah. So it turns out that I'm the one who doesn't know what he's talking about.
That happens with alarming frequency.
Required Clickage
Most disturbing :|
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The thing that still amazes me is that they are trying to tell you what "fun" is, as if it were some universal truth.
The arrogance of their statement regarding the profession skill amazes me.
I don't understand how you can have a marketing campaign which is insulting to anyone who likes various aspects of the game they way this campaign is going. Why would you want to (potentially) insult your customers?
It's like saying, "your homebrew sucks - use our game worlds to ensure more fun."
It's a slap in the face. I seem to recall a great many fun game nights using 3.x game rules, in my homebrew campaign. I guess that wasn't "fun," at least according to WotC.
I feared when WotC bought out TSR all those years ago, and I swore that no good would come of this!
Well, whatever. I'll stick to my delusional version of "fun," and WotC can alienate myself, my family, and friends with 4e.
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The thing that still amazes me is that they are trying to tell you what "fun" is, as if it were some universal truth.
The arrogance of their statement regarding the profession skill amazes me.
You right about the arrogance. Sadly, you can see it all over - People trying to tell you what is and isn't fun. Hopefully, WotC will get over it.