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The title pretty much says it all. Spellcraft in its current incarnation is terribly clunky and artificial. Spell identification, regardless of stationary effects or active casting, should just be Knowledge Arcane or Knowledge Religion checks. Arcane and Divine magic should be decidedly different in style and effect, and one skill should not cover identifying both.
An element of concentration is implied within so many different skill checks that it's conceptually tied to character level, not caster level or Will save. Just make it a level check: think of it as a function of combat/stress comfort + spellcasting comfort.
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I agree with this, the seperation of spellcraft and arcana is kind of lost on me. The way concentration is rolled in with spellcraft doesn't make a lot of sense to me, but I don't really feel it warrants its own skill since casters pretty much have to take it and it's completely useless for anyone else, so making it a function of level and leaving it at that seems pretty common sensical to me. Lastly I've always found it weird that spellcraft made you equally good at identifying spells being cast by all types of magic and I think the seperation into the appropriate knowledge skills makes more sense to me. I just can't see that most clerics would be able to identify what a wizard is casting or vice versa without special training rather than the general spellcraft ability every caster and their mother has.
Lastly I've always found it weird that spellcraft made you equally good at identifying spells being cast by all types of magic and I think the seperation into the appropriate knowledge skills makes more sense to me. I just can't see that most clerics would be able to identify what a wizard is casting or vice versa without special training rather than the general spellcraft ability every caster and their mother has.
I felt the same way and was wondering why spellcraft wasn't divided into two forms, one arcane and one divine. Thanks for pointing out that it already is, under the names Knowledge (arcane) and Knowledge (religion). This just makes so much sense.
An element of concentration is implied within so many different skill checks that it's conceptually tied to character level, not caster level or Will save. Just make it a level check: think of it as a function of combat/stress comfort + spellcasting comfort.
I prefer caster level, although part of me will miss the skill (I kind of liked deciding how good to make it, and usually neglected it in favor of other skills.) In any case, a bigger problem seems to be the check DC: 10 + damage + spell level. At higher levels, the spell level becomes inconsequential compared to the damage, which makes many checks impossible all by itself, whether you use character level or a maxed skill level. I think spell level should play a much bigger role, so that an experienced caster can succeed at low level spells even if the damage is above 30. The spell level should be the dominant factor in determining your "comfort" level. A fix might be something like
10 + (2 x spell level) + ((2 x damage) / caster level)
Say a 10th level caster takes 20 damage while casting a 4th level spell. The DC would be 10 + (2 x 4) + ((2 x 20) / 10) = 10 + 8 + 4 = 22. Compare that to DC = 10 + 20 + 4 = 34. The first is roughly 50/50, the second is impossible. Since 20 damage is reasonable for a 10th level character, I think it calls for a check with reasonable odds.
If someone else has a simpler formula that accomplishes the same goal, great. A slightly more complicated formula works better at higher levels in the sense that it doesn't go too far to negate the effect of damage:
10 + (2 x spell level) + (damage / ((2 + caster level) / 3))
In the previous example, the second formula produces a DC = 10 + (2 x 4) + (20 / ((2 + 10) / 3)) = 10 + 8 + 5 = 23. At 20th level, damage would be divided by 7 rather than 10. Also, the second formula avoids making the damage effect even worse for first level characters.
One of the problems currently in PF with knowledge arcane, nature and religion is there is no in game nor a meta game reason for a wizard, druiid or cleric to put more than one rank in their field of knowledge. Focusing on the cleric for a moment, in the past putting 5 ranks in K(R)got them a +2 bonus to turn checks. Now there is no reason to put any ranks beyond one to have a chance at at knowledge checks. Pathfinder RPG needs to borrow a page from Kindom of Kalamar where there are requirements to advance in the church hierarchy one of which is a minimum rank in K(R). Kingdom of Kalamar uses a lot of meta game rules in the form of organizational requirements to encourage certain character behavior. As an example if you want to be an instructor at the College of Wizardry you need a certain number of ranks in K(A) and knowledge of certain spells. This gains you access to spells and laboratory time to work on your equipment.
Right now I expect the Bard to be the knowledge guy due to Bardic Knowledge.
Doug
Kingdom of Kalamar uses a lot of meta game rules in the form of organizational requirements to encourage certain character behavior. As an example if you want to be an instructor at the College of Wizardry you need a certain number of ranks in K(A) and knowledge of certain spells. This gains you access to spells and laboratory time to work on your equipment.
I like this idea if it can be done in some campaign-neutral way. I think many would complain, however, if ranks in a skill are required to make use of basic class features. If the skill only assists you, then more details would be welcome. This is another way to "beef up Knowledge: Arcane & Religion" in addition to rolling Spellcraft into them.