That's strange I could of sworn someone had posted recently in the thread....
1d20 with ability mod check, done.
That's why I take my car to a mechanic rather than try to fix it myself. It's also why I like to eat out from time to time. Occasionally, I'll attmpt a few home repairs, but usually I'll get a professional in.
And if I'm planning to enchant a sword, I need it to be Masterwork, and d20 with ability mod check won't quite cut it.
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Which is why they should be free. People who care to minmax even a little don't pick Profession or Craft or Perform.My only concern with this is that not every cares (not even a little) to minmax. That's the beauty of the game as it stands. It can appeal to a broad array of gaming personality types. No one should be forced out of the game.
Agreed.
I still like the idea of situational synergy bonuses based on professions and knowledges, especially since the static core synergy bonuses from 3.5 have now thankfully gone the way of the dodo.
Set a DC bonus for a given knowledge or profession (probably a ten), and every 5 you beat it by gives you a +1 synergy bonus on a related check. Or you could just give a flat +2 bonus in certain situations to cut down on rolling.
For example, a person with a profession: sailor might get some situational synergy bonuses to acrobatic balance checks while aboard a ship.
Knowledge: nature checks might give a situational synergy bonus to diplomacy rolls with a tribe of centaurs, or a heal bonus to cure a poison extracted from a woodland herb.
That makes professions and knowledge skills of far more value than just simple flavor splash.
Well it could possibly, as long as you didn't have a negative that is. ^^; That's craft though not profession.
Maybe something like Starting Occupations in d20 Modern.
I've wanted "background" feats ever since I read d20 Modern. I can't tell you how many books I've read where the big-time adventuring hero does something different, only to say something like "I wasn't always a Paladin, you know."
Sure, it could be explained by multi-classing, but it doesn't seem the same to me.
If we were to get rid of Profession skills (and I'm not saying we should... I've used it quite a bit), I would like to see a feat system to replace it. I would call it a background feat and give one for free at character creation.
An example would be:
Herbalist [Background]
You were apprenticed to a herbalist in your youth.
Benefit: You can work in the capacity of a herbalist. If you spend at least three days a week working you can make a profession check and earn money for your labor.
Special: If you have 5 ranks in Heal, you can replenish a healer's kit for 25 gp.
So, you'd still be able to make a profession skill check, and get some sort of synergy bonus to something else.
I can think of a lot more, mostly based on the PCs I've run over the years.
Obviously the big concern is that Craft and especially Profession, as written, are typically useless for adventurers. The fact that Paizo is now combining "useful" skills into super-skills makes Profession (butler) that much more useless. Matt Morris suggested some cool ideas for making Profession skills useful; I'd like to take that a step further, and also integrate Paizo's approach to skill combinations.
What if, instead of Craft (stonemasonry), you could take a Builder skill, that subsumed the old Craft (carpenter), Craft (stonemasonry), and Knowledge (architecture and engineering) skills, and maybe even rolled in the dwarf's stonecunning (dwarves would get a racial bonus, so that they're still naturally good at it). Your skill might also help with dungeon mapping issues (Player: "Did that side passage just take us in a big circle, or are we in a new wing now?" DM: "Roll a DC 10 Builder check"). Now the skill has useful in-game effects, and to my mind a lot more appeal.
Maybe Craft (weaponsmith) and Craft (armoror) get rolled together, and also give you bonuses when sundering weapons? I suspect that skill would suddenly be in high demand for people with the Improved Sunder feat.
A Fine Arts skill might include Craft (painting), Craft (sculpture), and all that "useless" stuff, but would also include the Forgery skill.
The Perform skill, because it has acting as a category, might get Disguise rolled into it for the acting part, and you'd learn new performance areas the way Linguistics gives you "free" languages.
I will be taking taxidermy, accounting, and Craft(Lawn Gnomes) rain or shine.
RAIN OR SHINE!
/thread
Obviously the big concern is that Craft and especially Profession, as written, are typically useless for adventurers. The fact that Paizo is now combining "useful" skills into super-skills makes Profession (butler) that much more useless. Matt Morris suggested some cool ideas for making Profession skills useful; I'd like to take that a step further, and also integrate Paizo's approach to skill combinations.
What if, instead of Craft (stonemasonry), you could take a Builder skill, that subsumed the old Craft (carpenter), Craft (stonemasonry), and Knowledge (architecture and engineering) skills, and maybe even rolled in the dwarf's stonecunning (dwarves would get a racial bonus, so that they're still naturally good at it). Your skill might also help with dungeon mapping issues (Player: "Did that side passage just take us in a big circle, or are we in a new wing now?" DM: "Roll a DC 10 Builder check"). Now the skill has useful in-game effects, and to my mind a lot more appeal.
Maybe Craft (weaponsmith) and Craft (armoror) get rolled together, and also give you bonuses when sundering weapons? I suspect that skill would suddenly be in high demand for people with the Improved Sunder feat.
A Fine Arts skill might include Craft (painting), Craft (sculpture), and all that "useless" stuff, but would also include the Forgery skill.
The Perform skill, because it has acting as a category, might get Disguise rolled into it for the acting part, and you'd learn new performance areas the way Linguistics gives you "free" languages.
I actually like this idea very much. However, it still doesn't address my "dabbling" concern.
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Honestly the more I think about it, I am a hardcore roleplayer, but I just don't get profession. It really is a useless skill, and really as a roleplayer if you want to say you were a lawyer, then you put ranks in bluff, diplomacy, sense motive, and gather information. That's a lawyer, maybe even knowledge (law) or (local) after all you don't need to have just the listed knowledges. So I guess what I'm saying is dump profession and the roleplayers like myself can put those skill points into the skills that make up the profession.
I actually like this idea very much. However, it still doesn't address my "dabbling" concern.
No, it doesn't. But dabbling is possible only by blatantly changing the nature of the Saga skills rules, and there's (hopefully) enough lobbying for that going on in other threads :)
Honestly the more I think about it, I am a hardcore roleplayer, but I just don't get profession. It really is a useless skill, and really as a roleplayer if you want to say you were a lawyer, then you put ranks in bluff, diplomacy, sense motive, and gather information. That's a lawyer, maybe even knowledge (law) or (local) after all you don't need to have just the listed knowledges. So I guess what I'm saying is dump profession and the roleplayers like myself can put those skill points into the skills that make up the profession.
but don't dare try to take away craft, perform, or knowledge skills from me.
Agreed, but look at what you have just said, then. You are saying (and correct me if I am misrepresenting you) that you can get rid of Professions (as “skills”) but the skills they represent – the skills that make up the profession – should be preserved. Tomatoes/tomahtoes. What you’ll end up with, then, is Craft (Weaponsmithing) rather than Profession (Weaponsmith). That is, unless you do some combing, as someone early suggested, and end up with Craft (blacksmithing) and ditch the professions Armorsmith, Weaponsmith and Blacksmith. Which still makes sense.
I actually like this idea very much. However, it still doesn't address my "dabbling" concern.No, it doesn't. But dabbling is possible only by blatantly changing the nature of the Saga skills rules, and there's (hopefully) enough lobbying for that going on in other threads :)
Fair enough. Thanks for that.
I have to say, I really can't wait to see the Beta.
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Agreed, but look at what you have just said, then. You are saying (and correct me if I am misrepresenting you) that you can get rid of Professions (as “skills”) but the skills they represent – the skills that make up the profession – should be preserved. Tomatoes/tomahtoes. What you’ll end up with, then, is Craft (Weaponsmithing) rather than Profession (Weaponsmith). That is, unless you do some combing, as someone early suggested, and end up with Craft (blacksmithing) and ditch the professions Armorsmith, Weaponsmith and Blacksmith. Which still makes sense.
Ah well in other threads I have been an advocate of conjoining skills, and I think craft (metalwork/blacksmith)is an appropriate skill. And as opposed to profesion which will only allow you to make money, a craft skill actually lets you make money or have a nifty item. So I don't feel it is tomatoes/tomahtoes. A craft skill, even one as unnecessary as basket weaving still has more uses than a profession (weaver)
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What does the Profession skill represent? In my mind, it represents everything a person with a given job knows and can do. Profession (baker) = everything a baker knows and can do. Profession (herbalist) = everything an herbalist knows and can do. The argument about a farmer with ranks in Profession (farmer) who can’t identify a cow because he doesn’t have Knowledge (livestock) may be valid according to the RAW, but it’s silly. For 95% of the people in the world, a few ranks in Profession is all they need. And I don’t really think it is worth it to spell out the specifics of what each Profession encompasses beyond that “everything a __ knows and can do” definition. Most of the little sub-skills of a baker would be useless to a PC except to build his or her story. Sure, being able to identify a mystery powder or bake poison into a cake could have a benefit, but nobody is going to power game by taking a bunch of ranks in a Profession (butcher), so leave it vague. If you want to discourage players from taking too many Profession skills, or represent the time commitment it takes to learn a trade, make Profession a cross-class skill for everyone except Experts (that would also create a nice divide between Commoner blacksmiths and Expert blacksmiths).
Now, for a few special people, those rare folk who belong to character classes, it is worth it to disaggregate their skills and define them a little more. We could have Profession (cleric) or Profession (rogue), but that wouldn’t be as much fun because players want their cleric to be a little different from other clerics, and varying skills is one way to do that. The first split would seem to be knowledge versus practical skills. We already have this with a couple of classes; instead of Profession (wizard) we have Knowledge (arcane) and Spellcraft, instead of Profession (cleric) we have Knowledge (religion) and Spellcraft. For most classes, that is probably enough. One implication of this might be to go back through the core classes and make sure they all have an applicable Knowledge skill and an applied skill. For example, maybe we could to create Knowledge (tactics) and Soldiering that deals with maintaining armor and weapons, pitching tents, marching, setting up a watch, etc. Skill monkeys like rogues and bards could get a Knowledge like (underworld) or (history) and then have a variety of applied skill choices to create different “builds” – thieves, hustlers, thugs, acrobats, entertainers, loremasters, etc. Rogues and bards need a lot of choices, which is why almost half of the skills on the list are geared toward them.
Then there are some skills that would be useful to any adventures – Climb, Diplomacy, Jump, Ride, Swim, etc. The thing is, unlike the skills described above, these aren’t really job-related skills for anyone except treasure hunters. And getting back to the regular folk, sure, in addition to their ranks in their Profession, some commoners and experts might have a few ranks in these skills or some Knowledge skills, but not many. One issue that could potentially come up is overlap. If Profession (sailor) really includes everything a sailor knows and can do, shouldn’t he already be able to swim? I’d argue yes and let a person with Profession (sailor) use those ranks to make a Swim check. I’m not afraid of allowing several different skills to be used to make the same skill check. So what if 7 different Profession skills allow you to identify plants? Want to tie someone up? Well, someone with Profession (teamster) would certainly know how to tie a mean knot, as would someone with Profession (rope-maker) or (sailor). Failing that, go with the adventurer skill Survival. Multiple paths to the same skill check. What does it hurt? Players want to try weird things with their Profession ranks? Make them explain why and then the DM decides (she can even add the old +/-2 depending on how reasonable she thinks the explanation was). Again, nobody is going to powergame via Profession. So for me, it would be enough to come up with a list of 50+ medieval jobs, call them all Professions, and let players who want to try to make them useful run with it.
Then there’s Craft. What to do with Craft? If Profession is everything a __ knows and can do, what is left for Craft? Two things. #1 – things that most other folks of that profession can’t do (note: this probably has very little to do with PCs). Any blacksmith can make nails or horseshoes, but casting bells was actually an unusual skill. In-game, that would be Profession (blacksmith) with Craft (bells). Any baker can bake bread but only a select few can make a wedding cake; Profession (baker) Craft (wedding cakes). You get the idea. #2, however, has everything to do with PCs. The truth is that most professionals wouldn’t need to take Craft because the ability to craft most things is already built right into their Profession skills. But PCs (usually) aren’t professionals, and being able to craft stuff isn’t built into any of their skills. A PC wants to be able to make ropes without taking the expensive, cross-class skill of Profession (rope-maker), take Craft (rope). I see Craft as a class skill for most classes, not because it is something every class knows, but because it is so narrow. With Craft (rope), you can do one thing – make a rope. Okay, two – fix a rope. Whereas Profession (rope-maker) comes with the crafty skills but also knowledge of how to tie knots, identifying fibers and their properties, maybe where certain style of rope or knots come from, and maybe a little business skill. But both skills can make a rope and I’m okay with that. Most fighters aren’t going to run around forging their own weapons, so why waste time on Profession (weaponsmith), but Craft (sword) or (blade) might be very useful in case your favorite sword breaks or falls in acid or just gets dull. So in my mind, Craft is mostly going to be a narrow, little slice of Profession that is useful to adventures.
I know I’ve proposed very little rule-wise (Profession as cross-class for everyone except Experts, Craft as a class skill for everyone, skill overlaps are okay). My goal here was to try to put these two confusing skills in perspective and explain how they are different from one another. I think having a clear understanding of what Profession and Craft represent is essential for developing solid rules and mechanics for the Pathfinder version of these skills and all the item creation rules that build on them.
"Will anyone take profession now?"
I honestly wasn't aware anybody was taking it before.
Which is why they should be free. People who care to minmax even a little don't pick Profession or Craft or Perform.My only concern with this is that not every cares (not even a little) to minmax. That's the beauty of the game as it stands. It can appeal to a broad array of gaming personality types. No one should be forced out of the game.
Right, which is why people should get Craft, Perform, and Profession for free. Give everyone four or five, so that roleplayers can get their jollies and minmaxers can just say "hey, I'm an ex-soldier so I just know some soldier stuff" and not even assign those skills.
That way everyone gets what they want and people aren't making substandard characters with wasted skill slots that annoy the other players who need them to be capable adventurers with real abilities. As a player, you should never be in a situation where other players are asking why you took "Craft: swordsmithing" instead of a skill useful to the whole party like Gather Information, or at least a skill that helps yourself like Tumble.
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Which is why they should be free. People who care to minmax even a little don't pick Profession or Craft or Perform.
I don't mind maxing out a few traits on a character, but I always, if I can, try to add knowledge and craft skills. Even if they are just flavor in the long run. Your premise is faulty.
Your assumption that the skills you don't pick should be free sounds to me like someone who is arguing that they want certain character traits but they don't want to make any sacrifices in order to have the character they want.
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As a player, you should never be in a situation where other players are asking why you took "Craft: swordsmithing" instead of a skill useful to the whole party like Gather Information, or at least a skill that helps yourself like Tumble.
Very true. And if, as a player, you find yourself in a situation where another player is second-guessing your character design, you should probably put a hand in his face and say, 'Get down!'
All three of the characters in my current game have taken one or more Craft skills. Both casters have Craft (alchemy) so that they can make Alchemical Fire, etc. for cheap, and both the Fighter and the Druid have Craft (armor) and Craft (weapons) so they can make their own gear (which the Druid does for RP reasons, and the Fighter did because he's a min-maxer who wanted better gear than he could afford).
Craft (alchemy) has also benefitted the entire party. From poison antidotes to fire to acid to an amazing use of a Tanglefoot Bag to save the entire party.
But if some hypothetical min-maxer who utterly failed to recognized the utility of these skills had peeked at their character sheets and talked them into taking Gather Information or Tumble ranks, they'd have been far less successful.
Mosaic, all of that is why I'm really leaning toward 'combining' Profession and Craft as a single skill. Mechanically Craft does everything Profession does (1/2 Check = GP/Week) plus the actual crafting rules.
Right now there is no difference between Profession(Weaponsmith) and Craft(Weaponsmithing), well actually the Craft(Weaponsmithing) is better since you can actually make items by the rules.
This kind of lead me to the thought of just merging Craft and Profession. Although it's not much of a merger, since Craft would just subsume the currently non-crafting professions. Call the new skill Trade.
If something like Lordzack's synergy suggestion gets used it would be of great benefit to Craft/Profession. An idea would be to allow Players to aid their own skills with a related Craft/Profession, at increasing bonuses based on the check. For example a Professional Mountain climber, Profession(Mount Climber) could get a +2 to his climb check with a roll of 10+ on his profession, perhaps a +4 with a 20+, +6 with 30+.
Right now there is no difference between Profession(Weaponsmith) and Craft(Weaponsmithing), well actually the Craft(Weaponsmithing) is better since you can actually make items by the rules.
Technically, there is no "Profession (Weaponsmith)." Per the SRD, any skill that enables you to actually make something is a Craft skill, not a Profession skill. Profession skills allow you to competently perform services, not create goods.
Outside of that minor point, calling them both "Trade" would eliminate a lot of needless confusion, and makes perfect sense to me.
If something like Lordzack's synergy suggestion gets used it would be of great benefit to Craft/Profession. An idea would be to allow Players to aid their own skills with a related Craft/Profession, at increasing bonuses based on the check. For example a Professional Mountain climber, Profession(Mount Climber) could get a +2 to his climb check with a roll of 10+ on his profession, perhaps a +4 with a 20+, +6 with 30+.
Better yet, eliminate the Skill Focus feat and grant a +3 synergy bonus to anybody who takes five ranks (or is proficient, depending on what the revised Skill set looks like) in a Trade with a corresponding non-Trade skill.
Of course, some skills don't work so well as Trades. Are there to be professional swimmers, fliers, perceivers, spellcrafters and magic device users?
The others work adequately...
Acrobatics = Trade (acrobat)
Appraise = Trade (appraiser)
Climb = Trade (sherpa)
Deception = Trade (actor)
Diplomacy = Trade (diplomat)
Disable Device = Trade (mechanic)
Disguise = Trade (costumer)
Escape Artist = Trade (escape artist)
Handle Animal = Trade (husbandry)
Heal = Trade (physic)
Intimidate = Trade (bravo)
Knowledge (x) = Trade (sage: x)
Linguistics = Trade (linguist)
Perform (x) = Trade (performer: x)
Ride = Trade (equestrian)
Stealth = Trade (spy)
Theft = Trade (thief)
One should not be allowed to take a trade that grants a synergy bonus unless one has five ranks in the related skill. In addition, I would change some of the NPC classes -- Commoner and Expert -- so that they could take five ranks in a Skill at first level. That way you can have tradesmen with appropriate synergy bonuses without arbitrarily making a lot of 2nd and 3rd level commoners.
A 1st level commoner with a +2 ability bonus in their Trade would thus have a +10 on their Trade checks, meaning that most low-level characters would be hard-pressed to top them. A character would have to actually concentrate on being a better smith than the common-folk, which is something I would prefer.
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Mosaic, all of that is why I'm really leaning toward 'combining' Profession and Craft as a single skill. Mechanically Craft does everything Profession does (1/2 Check = GP/Week) plus the actual crafting rules.
Right now there is no difference between Profession(Weaponsmith) and Craft(Weaponsmithing), well actually the Craft(Weaponsmithing) is better since you can actually make items by the rules.
This kind of lead me to the thought of just merging Craft and Profession. Although it's not much of a merger, since Craft would just subsume the currently non-crafting professions. Call the new skill Trade.
I totally get that, currently, Craft is probably better than Profession. I guess I was just trying to justify the existence of separate skills in a revised skills list by rolling Craft into Profession mostly for NPCs and keeping Craft as an adventurer-friendly Profession-lite. As I said before, I don't have any problem with overlapping skills. In my mind, Profession (weaponsmith) could make most weapons plus have some knowledge about weaponry, while Craft would be more limited, maybe to weapon groups like Craft (bows and arrows) or Craft (blades). It's my attempt to distinguish between what a professional know and what an adventurer who dabbles knows. But maybe that is way more nuance than anybody cares about. Or maybe the expertise of a professional is simply reflected in him having more ranks than an adventurer; I've often though that one of the class features of the expert class should be an exception to the level+3 cap on skill ranks, maybe set it at level+5 or something so a 2nd-level expert can always be better at blacksmithing than a 2nd-level fighter with blacksmithing skills.
Other thoughts-
* If they decide to combine Profession and Craft, "Trade" might be a good name so as to distinguish it from what came before. I once toyed with the idea of a skill called Trade that represented lower-skill, on-the-job-training jobs like Trade (chambermaid) or Trade (laborer), while Profession would be reserved for jobs that required formal schooling, Profession (lawyer) or Profession (astrologer). But that is way too complicated for just dealing with NPCs.
* I still think Profession (or your Trade skill) should be cross-class for most people except Experts, again to ensure they are the best at it. It allows an expert baker to be better than a commoner baker.
* Some will argue for a finite list of Profession/Craft skills, but why? Maybe it would help to describe the most common ones in detail, but I see no reason to try to close the list. Anyone who take the weird ones is mostly going to do it for role-playing reasons anyway. Let people tell their stories.
* I really like the idea of letting people use Profession/Craft/Trade and Knowledge skill checks as part of a synergy check. It makes both skills a lot more useful and rewards role-players without penalizing people who keep their skills system simple.
So instead of X number of languages, have (X or more) picks that go into Perform, Craft/Prof/Trade, and Languages? And then have more picks as the character levels up?
Which is why they should be free. People who care to minmax even a little don't pick Profession or Craft or Perform. After they get all the things they need to function in their class, they'll cross-class a useful skill like Spot or a new ability like UMD.Give people four or five Professions or Crafts or Perform Skills for free, then see how much it doesn't change your game. Its just fun roleplaying stuff, and trying to price it the same as something as essential to the game like the new Perception skill or Use Magic Device is just illogical on first principles.
You forgot those who actually play bards, since you have to have perform to use any of the bardic song abilities.
And thats one of the many reasons that bard's suck. No other class needs a skill just to make a basic class feature work, and making bards pay for it is just a tax on their skills (I'm not counting Wizards, since I've never seen a counterspell).
One of the goals of good game design is to minimize potential min-maxing so that the people that want to RP or who make organic characters don't get shafted.
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And thats one of the many reasons that bard's suck. No other class needs a skill just to make a basic class feature work,
'Cept Rogues (Trapfinding's pretty dire if you don't take the Search and Disable Device skills, after all). And those people you aren't counting, since you don't use counterspelling.
I'm fine with Bards having a skill-based class ability, so long as it isn't straightjacketed to playing the banjo and could be expanded to providing religious inspiration (for a temple 'bard') or tactical advice (for a student of war) or general encouragement (for some young noble), and not just song and dance.
I had just started playing around with the idea of combining Craft and Profession.
Very early stages, nothing definite yet, but the basic premise was that every couple of levels in Profession you possessed, would give you some skill levels in two Crafts and/or Skills. For example,
Profession (Apothecary): Craft Alchemy + Heal
Profession (Huntsman): Survival + Craft Bowmaking
Profession (Locksmith): Disable Device + Open Lock
Profession (Scribe):Decipher Script + Forgery
Profession (Sailor): Balance + Climb
You would gain skill levels in these Skills/Crafts half as fast as whatever is normal for the system you are using because Profession still gives you other benefits not necessarily represented just by Skills & Crafts. A sailor would know knot tying, how to raise and lower sails, and alot of other things about shipboard life that a character with the Balance + Climb skills would not.
So for 3.5 you would only get 1 skill point in the 2 skills/crafts for every 4 levels you had in Profession. A system where the skills have been condensed may allow you to gain 1 skill point for every 2 or 3 levels in Profession.
Too much complication for most probably, just something I was messing around with for myself.
*Edit* Oops, sorry. Somehow I missed a whole page plus alot of other posts when I was reading this thread. I think I changed pages when I wasn't looking. Anyway, this thread was in response to Anry and Troy Paceilli's response to Dorje's post:
*edit* You know thinking about there is a KISS answer to boost both Craft and Profession. Why not just merge them into a single skill?
And thats one of the many reasons that bard's suck. No other class needs a skill just to make a basic class feature work,'Cept Rogues (Trapfinding's pretty dire if you don't take the Search and Disable Device skills, after all). And those people you aren't counting, since you don't use counterspelling.
I had actually forgotten about that. Strange how that happens with a class that gets eight skills and every incentive to make Int their highest stat (for Search and Disable Device).
Meh.