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And for that matter, why are weapon proficiencies and saving throws not also rolled into skills? Or a general "proficiency" category, if that fits better?
At first glance, I thought "Hey, Perception has been separated out as its own thing. Good, so it will grow automatically like BAB and saves as it should, because it is so important to every character."
Except that goes for *everything* now. The +1/level system has obviated the reason for which Perception as a mere skill among others was problematic in the first place. Classic "two fixes applied to one problem" situation, there.
Generally, if you are determined to go with the +1/level mechanic, there are ways in which you could and should simplify things:
a.) The mechanics description should be changed to begin with the idea that a check is performed by 1d20 + character level, + modifiers for ability and proficiency (which are both fixed values independent of level.) That is clearer and for lack of a better term more honest than sneaking in the fact that your level is added to any check in the description of proficiency bonuses.
Alternatively, you could simply increase ability modifiers, which also figure into every check, by +1 every level. Whether you do this by increasing all ability *values* by 2 every level and keeping them meaningful or by ditching the 3-18 paradigm altogether and have ability bonuses be the only remaining stat is a matter of preference.
In this case, the description of a check would be: 1d20, +your ability modifier, +your proficiency modifier
b.) There is little need to distinguish between skills, weapon proficiencies, saving throws and perception if they all work according to the same "level check" paradigm. Even if you want to keep saving throws separate for nostalgia reasons, rolling weapons, armor, perception and skills back into the general category of "proficiency" would simplify and clarify things. I cannot see any rationale to keep them as separate things, but if there is one, I'd like to hear it.
Regards
Wulfhelm
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Skill increases being eaten by Perception, so that you're stuck with effectively only two skills to increase. Same reason it was a tax in 1E.
Skill increases being eaten by Perception, so that you're stuck with effectively only two skills to increase. Same reason it was a tax in 1E.
Nonsense. Skill increases work so differently in 2e that it literally can't be the same reason.
(Also, with the automatic increases you get things like 6th level rogue feats which require a 7th level class ability as a prerequisite, but that's a side note.)
It's not nonsense.
It is absolute and complete nonsense and also makes plain obvious that both of you have read only the thread title.
If perception was a skill, everyone and his mom would only raise 2 skills to legendary since one would be mandatory Perception.
Let us leave aside, for the moment, the fact that with rolling more things into skills, one would *obviously* also provide more increases...
... the only thing that would change is that all classes would have the opportunity to increase Perception, rather than a few select classes automatically doing so.
But even that would not *have* to change if you kept signature skills in any fashion.
Not that you strictly speaking need it. It is frustrating to see how people who argued that +1/level gives nonspecialized characters good basic competence in key areas now make a complete 180 and instead claim that +1/level is basically worthless and you *need* maximum proficiency for an increase in success rate which is less than the difference between class skill and non-class skill in PF1; or than the difference between a 3rd level and a 6th level character. I hate that I even feel compelled to answer to postings with so little rational thought put into them.
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because legendary perception would be a mandatory facet of the game, it would literally invalidate rogues, bards, and rangers in the stealth and perception departments and those are the 3 classes that actually should be legendary at perception and opening it to everyone else makes rogues obsolete.
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If we accept that Perception is Best Skill (and if it's now Initiative, that's a plausible claim), then it becomes the default optimal choice any time you get to select a skill to improve (by item or feat or whatever). Presumably this was Paizo's reasoning for making it a non-skill.
Whether this actually applies is going to change throughout the playtest, as the way skills work hasn't entirely settled down yet.
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With how universalized the PF2 proficiency system is, I understand the drive to unify the system of advancement for all things, but at that point you are pretty much done with classes. Especially with the end of signature skills, spell access and number of proficiencies would be the only things really separating classes, along with some vestigial class features that would hardly be enough to really separate classes, especially martial classes.
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Perception needs to stay separate from the skills because it is more important than any skill for combat purposes. This also applies to saving throws, armor and weapon proficiency. Rolling all these things into the same list of things to choose from would drown skills out.
The reason Perception is bigger than any skill in combat is the same as in PF1, only more so. In PF1, people maxed out Perception because it determined whether or not you'd get a surprise round ahead of the opposition. In PF2, it now (in most cases) determines if you get an entire round of actions ahead of the opposition. This is a huge deal, especially if the combat isn't very long.
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If we accept that Perception is Best Skill (and if it's now Initiative, that's a plausible claim), then it becomes the default optimal choice any time you get to select a skill to improve (by item or feat or whatever). Presumably this was Paizo's reasoning for making it a non-skill.
Whether this actually applies is going to change throughout the playtest, as the way skills work hasn't entirely settled down yet.
Perception is a Broken Skill in any system that has it as a skill. look at Notice in Savage Worlds or Perception in D&D 4e and 5e. having to spend skill points on the ability to notice things was literally a skill tax and in 5e, entire choices were made in race and background to get free perception much like 4e.
Savage Worlds characters always spent at least 2 skill points on notice and skill points in Savage Worlds increased the die value from untrained to d4. d6. d8, d10 then d12 at the top with exploding dice, and it was always better to buy a d6 notice with 2 of your 15 starting skill points to ignore the -2 untrained penalty on not spending points on notice, because a d6 notice and your d6 wild die gave you 2 50% chances to notice most things and a decent chance of one of them exploding to spot an ambusher plus alertness was an edge that could be taken in Savage Worlds where +2 is extremely massive for even a legendary character because a thief with the edge only gets +2 to stealth and only inside an urban environment while alertness always applied.
even in other skill and advantage based systems, perception is not a skill in Chronicles of Darkness because it would just be another skill everybody would waste skill points maxing out and the Alertness Advantage Literally had a capped Rank for chargen in GURPS to prevent characters from cheaply piling on massive perception scores.
most RPGs usually either not make perception a skill at all or base perception on something else entirely because making perception a skill makes it mandatory for everyone. by virtue of it being the best skills and DCs modified to accomodate for the fact everyone in the group will max it out and roll it at every moment. expertise in Perception was Broken in 5e. especially for a cleric or druid with the prodigy feat.
With how universalized the PF2 proficiency system is, I understand the drive to unify the system of advancement for all things, but at that point you are pretty much done with classes. Especially with the end of signature skills, spell access and number of proficiencies would be the only things really separating classes, along with some vestigial class features that would hardly be enough to really separate classes, especially martial classes.
a.) Actually, the "end of signature skills" is one thing you could and in such a scenario should easily undo. This decision very much sounded to "oh, we noticed signature skills don't mean much at lower levels... so we'll just scrap the whole idea" (rather than trying to make it mean something at lower levels.)
b.) Classes would still be very much separated by class powers and class feats as well as the revived signature skills, if you opt for this route.
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With perception being a class ability rather than a skill it forces a certain party composition. While any class can get to expert with a feat, only 3 classes get to master proficiency, and only 2 get to legendry proficiency. Since there are hazards that require master or legendary proficiency to spot, a party without the ability to spot them is at aa severe disadvantage; hence virtually requiring a party to have members with these proficiencies.
These classes are fighter, ranger, and rogue. Fighter is the one that can only go to master proficiency. Another option is multiclassing into ranger, but that can only get you to master proficiency, and that only at 12th level.
Saying you have to have a fighter, ranger, or rogue in the party does not seem like that much of a restriction, but once you get to the highest levels (15+) that drops to ranger or rogue.
So by linking perception to class rather than leaving it a skill this system is limiting choices rather than fostering them. Players cannot seek multiple creative ways around the problem, they must do the approved thing.
So by linking perception to class rather than leaving it a skill this system is limiting choices rather than fostering them. Players cannot seek multiple creative ways around the problem, they must do the approved thing.
I had not even thought of that. That makes the current system even more problematic. If your party consists of a Barbarian, a Bard, a Cleric and an Alchemist: Tough luck if you want to spot that Poison Dart gallery.
the only problem I have with perception is that the cleric has it higher than the ranger and rouge. As a result, at low levels, the cleric is looking for traps and not a rouge or ranger
Except lots of traps require expert perception. The cleric has to spend a feat at 3rd level to get to expert while the rogue starts there.
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Skill increases being eaten by Perception, so that you're stuck with effectively only two skills to increase. Same reason it was a tax in 1E.
A few thoughts:
1) I dislike the use of the word "tax" in this context and also how it's used in the phrase "feat tax." These are costs that one pays to get certain abilities, and they represent the choices that players need to make with their PF1e characters, something which I regard as a good thing. "Tax" appears to be used as a discursive tactic to cast these costs and choices in a negative light (and seems to come out of the use of this term in US political debate, but that's a totally separate conversation that inappropriate for this forum). We can debate whether certain costs in feats or skill points are too low or too high, but I'd prefer not to refer to these as "taxes."
2) I don't think that each and every PC automatically maxes out Perception. While many of my characters do this, others don't as there are more important uses for their scarce pool of skill points for other purposes. I think if one builds characters for combat-type encounters only, you'll have major weaknesses in non-combat situations and that's an appropriate cost to pay for combat optimization.
3) In the post which locked the "My biggest problem with +1 / level," Jason wrote "The game is a simulation of reality..." I think this is a very interesting statement, and I would argue that this perspective supports a system where skill points are limited and players have to make choices about their skill point allocation and accept that even their high-level characters may have significant weaknesses.
With perception being a class ability rather than a skill it forces a certain party composition. While any class can get to expert with a feat, only 3 classes get to master proficiency, and only 2 get to legendry proficiency. Since there are hazards that require master or legendary proficiency to spot, a party without the ability to spot them is at aa severe disadvantage; hence virtually requiring a party to have members with these proficiencies.
These classes are fighter, ranger, and rogue. Fighter is the one that can only go to master proficiency. Another option is multiclassing into ranger, but that can only get you to master proficiency, and that only at 12th level.
Saying you have to have a fighter, ranger, or rogue in the party does not seem like that much of a restriction, but once you get to the highest levels (15+) that drops to ranger or rogue.
So by linking perception to class rather than leaving it a skill this system is limiting choices rather than fostering them. Players cannot seek multiple creative ways around the problem, they must do the approved thing.
Actually, the opposite is true. Players need to find creative solutions when the default option isn't available (in this case, when there is no party ranger or rogue). Allowing everyone to just become master and then legendary in perception would make the default option next to mandatory, even allowing for pjrogers' valid counterpoint. This is precisely what stifles creativity.
More broadly, restricting the automatic progression of Perception to certain classes enhances class differentiation. That's a good thing overall, except for folks who'd rather have a classless system (ie not Pathfinder).
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To re-iterate what I've said on multiple occasions: Perception in PF1 was a skill tax. There was no, ever, reason not to max it. It's usefulness outpaced every other skill in the game and the fact that Appraise and Knowledge (nobility) were considered to be be equivalent was something of a joke.
Paizo did a very nice thing by rolling Spot/Search/Listen together, but by doing so they've created the uber-skill. Simply put, there was no reason ever not to max Perception for every character, because it was a life-saving skill, since not getting surprised in PF1 could mean the difference between winning the fight or getting your buttocks full of black testicles cast on a surprise round.
Not maxing out Perception simply meant that the player did not understand how the game works. And of course all of that hurt 2+Int skill point classes all the more.
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With perception being a class ability rather than a skill it forces a certain party composition. While any class can get to expert with a feat, only 3 classes get to master proficiency, and only 2 get to legendry proficiency. Since there are hazards that require master or legendary proficiency to spot, a party without the ability to spot them is at aa severe disadvantage; hence virtually requiring a party to have members with these proficiencies.
These classes are fighter, ranger, and rogue. Fighter is the one that can only go to master proficiency. Another option is multiclassing into ranger, but that can only get you to master proficiency, and that only at 12th level.
Saying you have to have a fighter, ranger, or rogue in the party does not seem like that much of a restriction, but once you get to the highest levels (15+) that drops to ranger or rogue.
So by linking perception to class rather than leaving it a skill this system is limiting choices rather than fostering them. Players cannot seek multiple creative ways around the problem, they must do the approved thing.
Actually, the opposite is true. Players need to find creative solutions when the default option isn't available (in this case, when there is no party ranger or rogue). Allowing everyone to just become master and then legendary in perception would make the default option next to mandatory, even allowing for pjrogers' valid counterpoint. This is precisely what stifles creativity.
More broadly, restricting the automatic progression of Perception to certain classes enhances class differentiation. That's a good thing overall, except for folks who'd rather have a classless system (ie not Pathfinder).
There is no creative solution to hazards being undetectable by most people. Either you have the one or two options to detect them or you do not.
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I'm surprised no one has mentioned that Perception is now effectively your default initiative. So there's like absolutely 0 reason not to skill increase it if it was still a skill. Like imagine if in PF1 you could put skill ranks in Initiative. Yeah that'd totally not be the default choice that everyone skilled up.
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Not maxing out Perception simply meant that the player did not understand how the game works. And of course all of that hurt 2+Int skill point classes all the more.
So in your games, *all* characters had Alertness and Skill Focus (Perception) as well?
I'm surprised no one has mentioned that Perception is now effectively your default initiative. So there's like absolutely 0 reason not to skill increase it if it was still a skill. Like imagine if in PF1 you could put skill ranks in Initiative. Yeah that'd totally not be the default choice that everyone skilled up.
Actually, there is a very good reason, namely that numerically, a skill increase is a piddly +1, which in itself is countered, even on the same level, by ability priorities, by items or by various other bonuses. It is of course completely dwarfed by the +1/level bonus.
Skill increases are pretty much only worth it for the access to gated activities they allow, and perception is the same. Except that there is, as it is now, no element of choice and building involved, since there are basically only two types of Perception requisites...
a.) "If you are a Master in Perception, which we happen to know you are since this is a class feat for a level in this class at which you automatically become a Master in Perception, but hey you know we have a book to fill..."
b.) "If you are a Master in Perception, which you can't be since this is a level 6 feat and you gain Master in Perception at level 7... whoopsie..."
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Not maxing out Perception simply meant that the player did not understand how the game works. And of course all of that hurt 2+Int skill point classes all the more.So in your games, *all* characters had Alertness and Skill Focus (Perception) as well?
Of course not, but they all have maximum ranks in Perception. Alertness and Skill Focus are competing against feats that are vastly superior in boosting your PCs characteristics, skill points in Perception are competing against skills which are inferior in their usefulness. You pick Power Attack (or Natural Spell. Or Spell Focus) over Alertness just as you pick Perception over Appraise.
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I've never played in a game where a character hadn't put a skill rank in perception every level. I've played PF1e a lot. So yeah. Perception is the best skill in that game by far.
Perception is a Broken Skill in any system that has it as a skill. look at Notice in Savage Worlds or Perception in D&D 4e and 5e. having to spend skill points on the ability to notice things was literally a skill tax and in 5e, entire choices were made in race and background to get free perception much like 4e.
Savage Worlds characters always spent at least 2 skill points on notice and skill points in Savage Worlds increased the die value from untrained to d4. d6. d8, d10 then d12 at the top with exploding dice, and it was always better to buy a d6 notice with 2 of your 15 starting skill points to ignore the -2 untrained penalty on not spending points on notice, because a d6 notice and your d6 wild die gave you 2 50% chances to notice most things and a decent chance of one of them exploding to spot an ambusher plus alertness was an edge that could be taken in Savage Worlds where +2 is extremely massive for even a legendary character because a thief with the edge only gets +2 to stealth and only inside an urban environment while alertness always applied.
I need to address a couple things here.
There are no skill points in 5e, you either have a skill or don't, and proficiency bonus only goes from +2 to +6, so the difference between untrained and trained is not massive, assuming the same Wisdom score.
There were no backgrounds in 4e, the skills increased automatically as you level, and being trained gives you an initial bonus, there is a 5 point difference between trained and untrained, but again the gap isn't massive like it can be in PF1.
In Savage Worlds this was not my experience at all. I have only seen people choose skills that fit their character idea, and none of them were a "skill tax", but more of something special their character could do. I don't think this game plays like d&d, nor is it meant to.
I think people who make this argument are just overusing Perception. The assumption in 5e is that you either notice something, or you don't, otherwise let the dice decide. You don't roll perception everytime you turn a corner!
The power of various skills is largely up to how the DM runs their games. I think the whole perception is OP thing is largely overblown.
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Of course not, but they all have maximum ranks in Perception. Alertness and Skill Focus are competing against feats that are vastly superior in boosting your PCs characteristics, skill points in Perception are competing against skills which are inferior in their usefulness. You pick Power Attack (or Natural Spell. Or Spell Focus) over Alertness just as you pick Perception over Appraise.
Actually, (maybe it was our differences in playstyle / inintentional house rules) but very few people in our parties are maxed for perception; usually only one or two are hyper-specialized in it, to notice details in searches, or to keep our party from being 100% surprised by ambushes, which rarely happen anyway. Usually, it's init that is maxed, with Improved Init feat and the Reactionary trait being as common as backpacks, rations, and tindertwigs. :)
Alertness and Skill Focus are competing against feats that are vastly superior in boosting your PCs characteristics,
Bonus food for thought: Have you ever had any character take Skill Focus in any skill *other* than Perception?
If so, could you explain, rationally, how it is possible that Perception is the single most important skill for every character, but still players choose to spend a resource on boosting other skills when they could be boosting Perception with it?
There is no creative solution to hazards being undetectable by most people. Either you have the one or two options to detect them or you do not.
There is a creative solution to everything, unless folks facing the problem aren't creative enough. Note I'm not saying, a solution that works...
In the case of traps that are too hard to detect, if the group realizes this is a weakness of theirs, they will take steps to make sure the problem doesn't kill them. They'll have protective spells up, they'll use divination, they'll send some expendable minion ahead, they'll hire a mercenary rogue, whatever. Worst case, there's always the old "Cleric's Feather Fall".
Alertness and Skill Focus are competing against feats that are vastly superior in boosting your PCs characteristics,Bonus food for thought: Have you ever had any character take Skill Focus in any skill *other* than Perception?
If so, could you explain, rationally, how it is possible that Perception is the single most important skill for every character, but still players choose to spend a resource on boosting other skills when they could be boosting Perception with it?
I've seen Skill Focus as a pre-requisite to get the Eldritch Heritage Feat and on Craft (Alchemy). This almost always comes as a result of picking Half-Elf since it's free. I've also seen it on Acrobatics but it was for a gimmick (getting the highest jump).
Boosting perception is strong, but pretty boring. Feats are valuable!
I think that there is also a psychological component to why perception is considered to be so vital. It's a fear of missing out. Ignoring traps for the moment, people usually hate feeling like they have missed out on something and perception disproportionately helps counter that feeling. I have had a group once tear a chair to pieces just because they thought it had some secret in it. So often if they are faced with a choice of either taking perception or feeling like they will be not experiencing the entire adventure, they will choose the former, so they made it compete with class features instead of skill choices.
I think that there is also a psychological component to why perception is considered to be so vital. It's a fear of missing out. Ignoring traps for the moment, people usually hate feeling like they have missed out on something and perception disproportionately helps counter that feeling. I have had a group once tear a chair to pieces just because they thought it had some secret in it. So often if they are faced with a choice of either taking perception or feeling like they will be not experiencing the entire adventure, they will choose the former, so they made it compete with class features instead of skill choices.
I know what you are talking about, but I have just enough faith in players that I think that after playing a character through 15 levels, they are not going to think that forgoing +1 bonus when they already have +20 perception will lead to them missing out on much.
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I think around 1/3 of characters in the last 20 PF1 campaigns I've been part of (running 16 of those) have maxed Perception. Generally there's 1 specialist to handle Kitmehsu's situation of not wanting to miss anything, and then 0-2 others who had enough skill ranks to 'max it anyway.'
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Personally I have a completely different opinion as to why Perception isn't a skill:
It's so that it can have its own place of prominence on the character sheet instead of being listed with the skills. :P
I despised having perception as a skill, let alone a Class skill. This is a welcome change.
I would actually want a small pool of (Class specific non class feats) instead of general feats.
This might seem weird... But we are going the feat the whole way route, so i would rather see a feat that increases your perception for a rogue instead of rogue just getting it. And some classes like cleric getting the same feat but it can only take them to expert while fighters get it to master. Fighters can maybe can get all weapons to legendary or they can instead get one to legendary and get maybe get an extra skill feat?
Alertness and Skill Focus are competing against feats that are vastly superior in boosting your PCs characteristics,Bonus food for thought: Have you ever had any character take Skill Focus in any skill *other* than Perception?
If so, could you explain, rationally, how it is possible that Perception is the single most important skill for every character, but still players choose to spend a resource on boosting other skills when they could be boosting Perception with it?
Eldridge heritage is the reason.
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IME, people only pump perception in 1e if they have spare points or they've already put something into all the useful class skills. Provided that someone (or better, sometwo) in the party has maxed it, that's probably enough. It's more likely to be useful for a cleric to put his minimal allocation into Spellcraft, Knowledge-Religion and maybe Sense Motive. Likewise a sorcerer is going to pump Spellcraft, K-A and perhaps Intimidation.
But in any case, the effect of pumping skills in 1e is so grossly different that the effect in 2e, once you get past Untrained. That +1 to +3 isn't really very substantial compared to the +19 equivalent in 1e. And while it is often used for initiative, the theory is that other skills can specifically be used for it. OTOH it does now subsume Sense Motive, so it's arguably 2 good PF1 skills.
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It never made sense to me that Perception was a skill in the first place, rather than something like a saving throw.
Like- "you have good reflexes" and "you are perceptive" are similar in a way that is distinct from "you know a lot about nature" or "you can swim well."
If there were floating increases in proficiency that could be applied to reflex, will, fortitude, or perception I'd be fine with that. But I don't like perception competing with skills.
It never made sense to me that Perception was a skill in the first place, rather than something like a saving throw.
Like- "you have good reflexes" and "you are perceptive" are similar in a way that is distinct from "you know a lot about nature" or "you can swim well."
If there were floating increases in proficiency that could be applied to reflex, will, fortitude, or perception I'd be fine with that. But I don't like perception competing with skills.
One might say the same about Stealth.
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Alertness and Skill Focus are competing against feats that are vastly superior in boosting your PCs characteristics,Bonus food for thought: Have you ever had any character take Skill Focus in any skill *other* than Perception?
If so, could you explain, rationally, how it is possible that Perception is the single most important skill for every character, but still players choose to spend a resource on boosting other skills when they could be boosting Perception with it?
No, nobody takes any Skill Focus, because it's a very weak feat compared to other feats you can take. Apart from having to take it as a PrC/feat tree requirement or getting it for free as a half-elf, there is no reason to pick Skill Focus because you have things like Power Attack, Augment Summoning, Natural Spell or Improved Initiative.
Boosting your Perception is important, but not at expense of denying yourself other critical elements of character advancement.
Alertness and Skill Focus are competing against feats that are vastly superior in boosting your PCs characteristics,Bonus food for thought: Have you ever had any character take Skill Focus in any skill *other* than Perception?
If so, could you explain, rationally, how it is possible that Perception is the single most important skill for every character, but still players choose to spend a resource on boosting other skills when they could be boosting Perception with it?
No, nobody takes any Skill Focus, because it's a very weak feat compared to other feats you can take. Apart from having to take it as a PrC/feat tree requirement or getting it for free as a half-elf, there is no reason to pick Skill Focus because you have things like Power Attack, Augment Summoning, Natural Spell or Improved Initiative.
Boosting your Perception is important, but not at expense of denying yourself other critical elements of character advancement.
The reason why i love different types of feats. When one feat gives you +X damage and the other one gives you +2 perception it's hard to get the +2 perception one. But when one gives you +2 perception and the other +1 on a save you can make a decent choice.
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Bonus food for thought: Have you ever had any character take Skill Focus in any skill *other* than Perception?If so, could you explain, rationally, how it is possible that Perception is the single most important skill for every character, but still players choose to spend a resource on boosting other skills when they could be boosting Perception with it?
I have seen Skill Focus (Use Magic Device) and could see myself picking it. I agree Perception is the uber skill because it is rolled the most, but I like UMD more, due to subjective fancy towards the skill and the vast expansion of options it brings.