Altering Class Skills

[Keirine, Human Rogue]

Per the APG, you can have an unlimited number of class archetypes so long as they don't alter the same class feature. A question came up recently in a Facebook Pathfinder group I'm in regarding the modification of a class's skills. For example, let's say I wanted to make a combination Snakebite Striker/Steel-Breaker brawler. Both archetypes alter the Brawler class skills, and therefore could be considered overlapping. However, Snakebite Striker trades out Intimidate for Bluff and Stealth, while Steel-Breaker trades out Knowledge(Dungeoneering) for Knowledge(Engineering), which would not be an overlap.

Is it enough to simply say that the class skills are altered thus changing the same class feature, or do we need to look at the individual skills to see if there is any overlap?

I understand that in a home game mileage may vary, but the question was asked in a PFS group, so I'm curious if there's any thought one way or the other.

[Imbicatus]

For PFS I always take the more strict RAW option. Both archetypes modify class skills, so they can't be combined.

For a home game I would allow it though.

[Nefreet]

There's a broader debate as to whether or not a class's skills are a class feature. This is often a question that comes up when calculating the cost and time needed for retraining an archetype.

The question of individual skills being swapped out just adds more complexity to the question.

I agree that, for PFS, it is likely safer to go with the more conservative approach.

[Ms. Pleiades]

Agreed with Imbicatus, but I wouldn't allow it at my homegame table either. The class features being altered are "Class Skills" not "Intimidate Class Skill" and "Knowledge Dungeoneering Class Skill" individually.

[claudekennilol]

You can take both. Class skills are not a class feature.

Archetypes, prd, APG wrote:

A character can take more than one archetype and garner additional alternate class features, but none of the alternate class features can replace or alter the same class feature from the base class as the other alternate feature [referring to the before mentioned class feature]. For example, a warpriest could not be both a champion of fate and a disenchanter, because both archetypes replace the channel energy class feature with something else.

Now if you look at any class it lists the following (not copying/pasting or quoting because it's obviously huge).

Class Skills: ...

Then the level table

Then "Class Features" and lists everything under the special column from the table.

Skills are not under the Class Features section described in any of the character entry. I don't know how you'd handle two archetypes that replaced the same skill, but since skills aren't class features it's still legal. But yours doesn't even have that problem so there's no problem.