Trimming the Fat

[RPGnet Columns]

Post originally by Jeb Boyt at 2004-11-28 10:44:18
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Great suggestion, and particularly useful for Gurps 3d where the rules sprawled across multiple books and compendiums as well as dozens of sourcebooks.

FFG's Redline d20 mini-campaign offers a great example of this by streamlining and consolidating the d20 skill list: Appraise and Diplomacy are combined into Barter; Chatter combines elements of Bluff, Diplomacy, and Gather Information; and Balance, Climb, and Jump are combined into Clamber. Several setting specific skills and knowledges are also added, such as Build/Repair (Simple and Complex) and Knowledge (Lay of the Land, Olden, and Tech).

Jeb

[RPGnet Columns]

Post originally by Eric Christian Berg at 2004-11-29 07:27:52
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I'd really love for somebody to feed all the skills, advantages, and disadvantages in GURPS 4e into a database and throw a simple tool in front of it to allow people to generate custom skill lists. With the tags (Exotic, Supernatural, Cinematic) it is easy to trim off large swaths and then you can fine-tune by hand.

I'd do it myself, I really would, but I don't have the time. It is exactly the sort of stupid book-keeping exercise I generally love to do. :)

Eric Christian Berg

[RPGnet Columns]

Post originally by Bob the Fighter at 2004-11-30 08:53:12
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Say you're playing a game in which, like the article suggests, players are encouraged to act rather than to roll social skill checks. Given that, would it make sense to take out the game's social skills and reduce the total points (or what have you) proportionately? i'm thinking about taking out reasoning stats too (not knowledge though).
i figure these changes will keep people from feeling like they have to approximate what their (to use D&D parlance) Charisma, Wisdom, and Intelligence scores mean. It's reasonably okay to have scores in Strength and other physical-type stats, since calling someone "strong" isn't necessarily specific enough for those of us who like to roll dice now and again.
thoughts?

[RPGnet Columns]

Post originally by Eric Christian Berg at 2004-11-30 12:28:30
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I have toyed with removing all social and mental stats from a game, since the player is really the determiner of these when you have a game heavy in role-play. It really isn't possible to role-play a person smarter, wittier, or more clever than yourself. You can fake it using various tricks (which I use all the time, as a storyteller), but you are pretty much restricted to your own capabilities.

[RPGnet Columns]

Post originally by waltc at 2004-11-30 13:50:04
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Hmmm, sounds like another column idea for me :)

Walt