Here it is:
First, base Will save on the highest of the bonuses between Int, Wis and Cha.
Next, assign bonus skill ranks/level on the following formula:
Int: bonus skill ranks in Int-based skills only
Wis: bonus skill ranks in Wis-based skills only
Cha: bonus skill ranks in Cha-based skills only
Dex: bonus skill ranks in Dex-based skills only
Str: bonus skill ranks in Str-based skills, as well as Acrobatics, Intimidate, and Ride
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What does this accomplish?
1) it gives the PCs more skill ranks, overall, which I think is generally a good thing. Low-Int PCs (especially Fighters and Sorcerers) often feel shockingly incompetent going by standard rules.
2) it advantages martial classes in terms of Will saves, giving them more freedom to seek out maybe a high Int or Cha score for flavor (or other) reasons without having to grind their teeth and worry so much about being dominated AGAIN.
3) it gets rid of the "my Wizard is a better swimmer/climber/rider/etc. than your fighter" scenario, which I think almost everyone agrees is silly. The classes end up being pretty much automatically good at what they're supposed to be good at, with some number of skill ranks to spread around on other stuff.
4) it helps MAD classes somewhat, and they generally needed help.
5) it makes Int, Wis and Cha all of roughly equal value, as opposed to the current situation where Cha is so often an absolute dump stat, even when the player doesn't really want to play another smelly curmudgeon.
6) It makes Con slightly weaker relative to the other stats, which is probably a good thing because Con is probably the "strongest" stat, overall, in the game.
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I think this is a pretty good idea and will probably try it with my tabletop group. What do you all think? Are there any major problems with this that I am overlooking (besides the fact that Str has nothing much to do with riding a horse)?
You just buff Wizard by helping them to have a huge Will Save. Wizards only need Spellcraft/Knowledge Arcana anyway, so you just help them. You also help Sorcerers in the same way.
The skill system must be redone by scratch to really work.
You just buff Wizard by helping them to have a huge Will Save. Wizards only need Spellcraft/Knowledge Arcana anyway, so you just help them. You also help Sorcerers in the same way.
The skill system must be redone by scratch to really work.
Wizards and Sorcerers already have Will as a strong save. This gives them a small buff to that save, but it is rare for those classes to fail Will saves, anyway, so the difference is minor. It is a major nerf, however, to the Wizard's selection of skills, and I don't agree with you, at all, that Wizards only need two skills.
Wizards end up being much more "bookish" in such a system, rather than having the option of simply being good at everything.
All in all, your "idea" doesn't fix anything, it only makes some things way worse. And this isn't anything that is in need of balancing either, compared to other things in the system.
100% agreed.
Here it is:
First, base Will save on the highest of the bonuses between Int, Wis and Cha.
Drop this part entirely. The this just makes ALL non-martials have amazing WILL saves, while most martials will still have low WILL saves because most martials don't invest in any of these ability scores.
As the other posters have said, this causes big problems and it doesn't really improve skill balance in any meaningful way.
Next, assign bonus skill ranks/level on the following formula:
Int: bonus skill ranks in Int-based skills only
Wis: bonus skill ranks in Wis-based skills only
Cha: bonus skill ranks in Cha-based skills only
Dex: bonus skill ranks in Dex-based skills only
Str: bonus skill ranks in Str-based skills, as well as Acrobatics, Intimidate, and Ride
Wait, does this mean everyone gets tons of skill ranks?
Fighter:
STR: 19
DEX: 14
CON: 16
INT: 7
WIS: 14
CHA: 5
He will get 2 ranks for anything (Fighter) + 4 ranks for STR skills, 2 ranks for DEX skills, and 2 ranks for WIS skills for a total of 10 skill ranks per level?
That's 9 more ranks per level than this guy should have by RAW.
It is nice that can have a great Perception and Will save, but he could have had that anyway with this stat array.
Rogue:
STR: 12
DEX: 18
CON: 12
INT: 16
WIS: 5
CHA: 14
He will get 8 ranks for anything (Rogue) + 1 rank for STR skill, 4 ranks for DEX skills, 3 ranks for INT skills, and 2 ranks for CHA skills for a total of 18 skill ranks per level?
That's 7 more ranks per level than this guy should have by RAW.
And since I dumped WIS I will use INT for my WILL save, netting me +6 to my WILL save. Nice. Way too nice, actually.
Wizard:
STR: 7
DEX: 18
CON: 14
INT: 20
WIS: 7
CHA: 5
He will get 2 ranks for anything (Wizard) + 4 ranks for DEX skills and 5 ranks for INT skills for a total of 11 skill ranks per level?
That's 4 more ranks per level than this guy should have by RAW. This isn't too far-fetched.
And since I dumped WIS I will use INT for my WILL save, netting me +7 to my WILL save. Nice. Way too nice, actually.
What does this accomplish?
1) it gives the PCs more skill ranks, overall, which I think is generally a good thing. Low-Int PCs (especially Fighters and Sorcerers) often feel shockingly incompetent going by standard rules.
Well, you definitely did that.
2) it advantages martial classes in terms of Will saves, giving them more freedom to seek out maybe a high Int or Cha score for flavor (or other) reasons without having to grind their teeth and worry so much about being dominated AGAIN.
Nope.
In my examples, fighter was exactly the same, rogue was way better, and wizard was the big winner on WILL saves. So it really advantages the caster classes the most.
Completely opposite of what your second point claims.
3) it gets rid of the "my Wizard is a better swimmer/climber/rider/etc. than your fighter" scenario, which I think almost everyone agrees is silly. The classes end up being pretty much automatically good at what they're supposed to be good at, with some number of skill ranks to spread around on other stuff.
Reasonable. Although it does limit characters from branching out to try to be good at something they want to but isn't iconic for them.
4) it helps MAD classes somewhat, and they generally needed help.
Fair enough.
5) it makes Int, Wis and Cha all of roughly equal value, as opposed to the current situation where Cha is so often an absolute dump stat, even when the player doesn't really want to play another smelly curmudgeon.
I'm not sure this is a good thing as the primary beneficiaries are the casters.
6) It makes Con slightly weaker relative to the other stats, which is probably a good thing because Con is probably the "strongest" stat, overall, in the game.
Maybe. I think DEX is king, but that's just a matter of opinion.
I think this is a pretty good idea and will probably try it with my tabletop group. What do you all think? Are there any major problems with this that I am overlooking (besides the fact that Str has nothing much to do with riding a horse)?
The major problem of turning all casters into invulnerable towers of iron WILL is the giant glaring problem of your post.
The smaller, less glaring problem is that this seems to be too many skill ranks. With this many ranks, everyone will basically have all the skills. In fact, some might have too many. For example, even with adding three skills to the STR list, every fighter will have a STR of 20 or higher either right at start or soon after. Once that fighter gets to 22, he will have to throw away a rank because he won't have anywhere to put it (6 bonus ranks but only 5 STR-based skills).
A final slightly-glaring problem is that this is tedious bookkeeping. I didn't enjoy thinking about which skills I can apply these ranks from STR, which skills I can apply these ranks from DEX, etc. This just makes character advancement feel more like a chore.
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An alternative might be to just give some bonus skill points to the classes you feel need them. Edit a few classes, give them a non-tedious way to be more versatile without having to limit them from branching out of their iconic roles, without giving them way too many ranks, and definitely without turning the casters into invulnerable gods of WILL saves.
A better way to derive the Will save bonus might be an average of the three mental stats, rounded to the nearest whole number. This would slow the roll of SAD casters, especially if they want to dump secondary mental stats. It would also not incentivize any one mental stat over any other for the martial classes, and thereby (in theory) promote greater secondary stat diversity. Yeah, I think that would be a real improvement.
As far as giving out extra skill ranks...maybe handing out extra ranks in physical/mental skills (two broad categories rather than the five narrow ones I originally proposed) based on the average of the physical/mental stat bonuses would also work? Hmmm...have to think about that one some more, but it makes a certain amount of sense. Essentially, all PCs would end up roughly the same number of bonus skill ranks per level, but these would be unevenly divided between the physical/mental skills based on where the characters are statistically strongest.
So a character like this:
Fighter:
STR: 19
DEX: 14
CON: 16
INT: 7
WIS: 14
CHA: 5
...would get (4+2+3)/3 = 3 bonus physical skill ranks per level and (2-2-3)/3 = -1 bonus mental skill rank per level (ie. you take a rank away from the class base ranks). While a character like this:
Wizard:
STR: 7
DEX: 18
CON: 14
INT: 20
WIS: 7
CHA: 5
...would get (4+2-2)/3 = 1 bonus physical skill rank per level and (5-2-3)/3 = 0 bonus mental skill ranks per level.
One thing I like about this system is that it punishes stat-dumping. It does sort of fix the problem of grossly disproportional bonus skill ranks favoring Int, but it doesn't fix the problem of too few skills, per se. I guess you'd probably just have to adjust the base skill ranks for a few classes (like the 2/level classes) up address that issue.
First, base Will save on the highest of the bonuses between Int, Wis and Cha.
Or you could steal an idea from 13th Age and use the middle of the three stats. Doing that would reward those who have at least two of these stats at above average values and penalize those who dump any two of the mental stats.
First, base Will save on the highest of the bonuses between Int, Wis and Cha.Or you could steal an idea from 13th Age and use the middle of the three stats. Doing that would reward those who have at least two of these stats at above average values and penalize those who dump any two of the mental stats.
Yeah...on further consideration, using the median or the mean of the three mental stats is probably the best way to go. I'm not sure which I prefer. Thanks for the suggestion; I hadn't realized 13th Age uses that system.