If you choose to put one of your trained skills into a signature skill at first level does it become Expert?
If you choose to put one of your trained skills into a signature skill at first level does it become Expert?
No, being a signature skill isn't a boost to proficiency, it's a boost to proficiency cap. Putting training into a signature skill just means your future proficiency can go up to legendary, whereas putting training into a non-signature skill limits your future proficiency to expert (unless a feat or something makes it a signature skill for you later).
So can you double down on a skill at first level to make it expert or does it not work that way?
Also I think the devs should think about changing signature skills to work that way. Having your signature skills start at Expert at 1st level and having moving them up to Master hard capped at 7th makes signature skills much more important to your skills in general. Or would that be too broken? Cause it doesn't seem so to me.
No you can't double down, at first level you pick skills you are "trained" in. What your saying about expert skills doesn't seem that broken to me either.
The design intention looks to be to keep access to expert and higher proficiency skills carefully gated behind level-based gains that come via the class Skill Increases.
You get the first of these at level 3, and then at 5, 7 etc, so they come pretty frequently. Meaning you can become expert in an already trained skill at level 3.
There's also skill feats: which you get at levels 2, 4 etc. Each is a way to get 'better' at a specific skill.
Meanwhile proficiency in things like armour, weapon and cast spell are entirely level+class based. Eg: wizards get 'expert spellcaster' at level 12 and 'master spellcaster' at level 16. Fighters get 'heavy armor expertise' at level 11. Etc. Players have no way to modify this it seems.
There is room for exceptions to everything being just 'trained' at level 1. Monks get expert proficiency Unarmored Defence at level 1, for example. So we might see more of this.
One interesting change is that 'perception' is no longer a skill, so you can't put skill increases into it. At least as far as i can work out so far.