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This is one of the primary skills for bards and bards are charisma based. It is the skill named for their type of casting. Several of their abilities get better if they have sufficient ranks in occultism.
Medicine and religion are wisdom based because those are key skills for clerics. Nature is wisdom based because that is a key skill for druids. So why is a key bard skill not based on their primary stat?
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Yeah, skills should not be attributed based on who uses them, but on what they thematically are.
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Yeah, skills should not be attributed based on who uses them, but on what they thematically are.
agree!
All "knowledge" skills should fall under int under current explanation of 6 abilities.
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What does Occultism actually do?
If you wrote down 20 tasks, would we all conclude which of those were Arcana and which Occultism?
I know symmetry in design is nice, but I also like the clear design Starfinder got by putting Spellcraft and Knowledge Arcana (and Planes) into Mysticism.
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Spontaneous Casters don't need to understand what they do. Any Prepared Occult caster (possibly the Witch?) will almost certainly be Int-based, fitting the pattern of prepared casters based on Int or Wis as appropriate to type of magic.
But yeah, the reason it's Int-based is because it makes more sense that way. All knowledge-type skills are Int or Wis, and are so for a reason (both have connotations of memory, among other things), while Charisma makes absolutely no sense at all.
The distinction between Arcana and Occultism could stand to be clearer, I'll grant, but that's a problem better solved by increasing their distinctiveness than by removing one of them.
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I feel like most of the time a skill being based on Int is inconvenient for all but 2 classes (the Intelligence based ones), since Intelligence does very little for a Bard (who should know Occultism) or a Fighter (who could stand to know about crafting) or a Rogue (who might want to know something about Society), etc.
But "taking things away from Intelligence" is not the solution to "Intelligence is an unappealing stat because it doesn't do much."
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"You have a great deal of knowledge about ancient philosophies, esoteric lore, obscure mysticism, and supernatural creatures."
Because this has NOTHING to do with charisma.
It could pass as wisdom, but it certanly would make no sense based on CHA.
And we don't know about any future plans for occult based spellcasters. At present, all spellcasters using the occult spell list are charisma based, but we have no idea whether that might change later on.
The other three lists already have multiple spellcasting attributes available.
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This CHA idea is poppy-cock, and I think Religion should be INT based,
if anything Clerics should have ability to use WIS ONLY FOR THEIR OWN DEITY/CHURCH (to represent dedication, etc).
Clerics who want to know tons of facts about ALL religions and aligned planes and undead should actually be smart (INT).
Medicine/WIS I have seen decent argument this isnt modern scientific medicine, it is more intuitive, so that's OK.
I mean, given that it's the mechanics which are changing and less so the setting given that there are places far from the Inner Sea (Vudra, Hermea, Zi Ha, etc.) in which Psychic magic and all sort of things from PF1 books with "Occult" in the title are more common than they are on the Avistani mainland, it's likely that there are going to be some Int-based classes coming for which Occultism is an important skill.
It's just that it is difficult to add more skills where it's simple to add more classes, and the Bard is much more appropriate for the Core book than the Spiritualist, the Occultist, or the Psychic.
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I remember a meme that says something like:
Intelligence tells you a tomato is a fruit
Wisdom is knowing not to put a tomato in a fruit salad
Charisma is being able to sell a tomato based fruit saladA lot of understanding religious doctrine is knowing how to interpret it, not just knowing what it says on the surface. It requires perspective. It makes perfect sense to me that that falls under wisdom.
But why would occultism fall under charisma? If anything, most rl esoterica requires both intelligence and wisdom to understand. But I can't see how your ability to communicate with others and your general force of personality would fit.
Charisma makes sense. That's how you get so many conspiracy theory videos on Youtube.
It's all about the chem-trails baby.
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Charisma makes sense. That's how you get so many conspiracy theory videos on Youtube.
It's all about the chem-trails baby.
However, Pathfinder presents a world in which you can actually predict the future with a deck of cards if you know what you are doing, so it's more important to know what you're doing than to be able to convince someone that Harrowing is a thing that works.
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It's all about the chem-trail baby.
Pretty sure you missed a comma.
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Yeah, skills should not be attributed based on who uses them, but on what they thematically are.
That boat sailed when nature and religion were moved to be wisdom based.
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Yeah, skills should not be attributed based on who uses them, but on what they thematically are.That boat sailed when nature and religion were moved to be wisdom based.
Not necessarily. Wisdom has always had a connotation of memory, which makes it a decent choice for a 'knowledge' type skill. Charisma has no earthly reason to be used for any such skill whatsoever.
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Not necessarily. Wisdom has always had a connotation of memory, which makes it a decent choice for a 'knowledge' type skill. Charisma has no earthly reason to be used for any such skill whatsoever.Yeah, skills should not be attributed based on who uses them, but on what they thematically are.That boat sailed when nature and religion were moved to be wisdom based.
Not in this edition:
"Wisdom measures your character’s common sense, awareness, and intuition.""Intelligence measures how well your character can learn and reason."
Memory is much more a subset of ability to learn than intuition or common sense.
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Charisma is being able to sell a tomato based fruit salad
But isn't that just salsa?
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I prefer the idea of Cha running occultism. partially due toc lass things..
but mostly?Arcana is the science of magic.
Occultism is the gut instinct of magic.researching and creaeting a summon circle is arcana to me.
but "winging it" and accidentally summoning one (hell look at 90% of the Sueprnatural episodes for examples) is occultism.I like the idea that Cha is occult magic, because it "goes by feel" its instinct, not study nor wisdom.
In this example you would recommend that Occult be based on Wisdom as that is what determines your gut instincts. The only two arguments that can be made for Charisma are.
I'm actually good with Intelligence for Occultism / Arcana and Wisdom for Religion / Nature. The only exception to this is that I think Recall Knowledge checks should allow you to substitute your Intelligence modifier if it's higher than your Wisdom.
Just to give it a little more bang for its buck.
Intelligence is extremely lacklustre atm as a stat. I agree there.
All recall knowledge rolls should be able to be done with it at least. (as well as medicine...)
It seems like given that there are now so few things which add to skill rolls, it wouldn't be a problem to decouple skills from attributes so that different applications of a skill would key off of different attributes.
So I could see recalling knowledge about anything being an Intelligence-based roll, so to remember how a famous thief pulled off a heist, or the name of that one famous mountain climber of yore could be an Int+thievery or Int+athletics roll.
Charisma is being able to sell a tomato based fruit saladBut isn't that just salsa?
Only if you also consider jalapeno and onion fruits.
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Only if you also consider jalapeno and onion fruits.Charisma is being able to sell a tomato based fruit saladBut isn't that just salsa?
Jalapenos are peppers, peppers are fruits.
(Here's how you can check: does it have seeds?)
Only if you also consider jalapeno and onion fruits.Charisma is being able to sell a tomato based fruit saladBut isn't that just salsa?Jalapenos are peppers, peppers are fruits.
(Here's how you can check: does it have seeds?)
Green beans could be called fruit if that's your measure.
I mean, "vegetable" is not a botanical term, but fruit is. In the context of botany "fruit" means something different from what it means in the culinary field (though chiles are much more "fruity" than tomatoes there). In Botany green beans are fruit, as are cucumbers, avocadoes, corn, olives, squash, etc. and absolutely nothing is a vegetable, unless the department is ordering out for lunch.
So all we're seeing is "words mean different things in different contexts". Which is fine when everyone understands what the context is and what the word means in that context.
Intelligence is extremely lacklustre atm as a stat. I agree there.
All recall knowledge rolls should be able to be done with it at least. (as well as medicine...)
It seems like given that there are now so few things which add to skill rolls, it wouldn't be a problem to decouple skills from attributes so that different applications of a skill would key off of different attributes.
So I could see recalling knowledge about anything being an Intelligence-based roll, so to remember how a famous thief pulled off a heist, or the name of that one famous mountain climber of yore could be an Int+thievery or Int+athletics roll.
That could be fun.
Currently skill rolls explicitly can be rolled with other stats, but it's not necessarily always noticed and is very GM fiat. I'd be more than up for making it more clear (in a similar vein, I'd appreciate it being more clear with regards to improvised skill uses being a thing. It seems to happen during the adventures already, and while it notes that the GM can call for atypical checks, the layout makes it feel like it isn't really a thing)
BTW, is ID'ing "alchemical creatures" still under Arcana skill or did Errata change that?
IMHO this is part of reason why Alchemy should be it's own named skill, even if it also functions like Craft (and could count as that for any relevant purpose). Crafting is perhaps inseparably tied to Alchemy, but IMHO it needs to be own skill if it also will serve as Knowledge check, saying "or when using Craft(Alchemy) to Recall Knowledge" is just too awkard.
If a non-Alchemist wants to invest in it they should be equally able to craft & recognize Alchemical items and creatures. It should possible for Alchemist to be well versed in Alchemy and recognizing that, yet have no interest or ability in Arcane items, effects and associated creatures. There is alot more Arcane-affiliated creatures than Alchemical ones, and Arcane magic isn't as inherently tied to crafting like Alchemy, so it's plausible for Arcane/Divine magical crafting to require 2nd skill while Alchemy doesn't.
The current set up and nomenclature just rubs me wrong.
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I can definitely see an argument for Cha-based occultism, and I really like Wisdom based Religion and Nature. There are a number of reasons for it, something skills have uses in scenarios where using Wisdom makes a lot of sense, and I kind like wizards being worse than clerics when it comes to Religion.
Wizards can be worse than Clerics dealing with CLERIC'S OWN RELIGION,
while also having INT advantage re: unrelated religions or planar stuff not related to Cleric's religion.
That also makes a Cleric with good INT have relevant distinction for those types of checks.
I'm not a fan of moving several identifying skills to Wisdom. I can see the logic behind moving it to classes that have it as their main stat, so Wizards don't dominate everything, but it loses flavour. You can intuitively feel like this monster is weak to X, or strong against Y. But how does studying religious texts help know what a zombie is?
Point of this is, I can sort of see the logic. But Charisma doesn't at all. Wisdom still has a flavour of logic, deducing stuff from context clues. Charisma has nothing to do with knowledge. "I'm very confident about myself, so I know what this weird, extraplanar thing I've never seen before is."
Intelligence is knowing a Tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is knowing that you don't put tomatoes in a fruit salad.
Charisma is being able to convince someone that ketchup is a fruit smoothie.
As has been proposed multiple times by multiple people, one good way to buff Intelligence would be if you could start with up to your Int bonus in Expert proficiencies.
Another good way would be if becoming trained in a skill or advancing in a skill immediately gave you a skill feat for that skill, so Int giving you more skills also meant more skill feats.
Another good way (which would also help Wisdom and Charisma) is if casters could actually use their primary stat on their attack rolls with spells and cantrips. If this means TAC has to disappear from the game that's no great loss, TAC is already conceptually weird and almost meaningless with how it's been handled in PF2.
As has been proposed multiple times by multiple people, one good way to buff Intelligence would be if you could start with up to your Int bonus in Expert proficiencies.
Maybe weird idea, but what about INT bonus to everything, instead of just INT-based skills. It's book learning, like knowing what a creature is, but also in applying that knowledge in practical situations(though that sounds Wisdom-y), such as using social cues against people for Deception, knowing which buttons to push for Intimidation, textbook knowledge for Medicine, and so on. Practically every skill can get a bonus for "I read that in a book somewhere." As said, it can tread on Wisdom's turf slightly, but that could make INT more valuable. Want to better at skills? Get smart.
Now that I've typed that out, sounds like Wizards get to be great at everything again, because they read "How to Talk to People 101," as well as "Pickpocketing for Dummies." But there must be a middle ground.