Talk:Background-Based Skills (3.5e Variant Rule)

Items ?

Have you thought about how this works with items. Say I hav put 5 ranks into assasin bg, dex 18 at lvl4 and have a set of elven boots +10 to move silently. Now im sneaking up behind the goblin chieftan to sneak attak him. Do i get the boots bonus to the check? Wildmage ^Talk 22:05, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

Why wouldn't you? --Ghostwheel (talk) 05:51, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

Two reasons: Because background skill checks are not, as you have this worded, Move Silently checks; because items are not 1d20, HD, appropriate ability modifier or background points invested.--Ideasmith (talk) 11:50, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

For the first, I don't particularly like item bonuses to skills, but since enough people seem to, I'll leave it in. In the case of this game variant, just make the item or spell apply whenever you would make an appropriate kind of check for that item (sneaking with elven boots, jummping with boots of striding and springing, etc).

For the latter, neither does the SRD specifically call out items, so I don't see it as a big deal. --Ghostwheel (talk) 11:57, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

SRD has a spot for misc bonuses though. You don't have a place items could even added in, so it looks like they're not allowed. A line or two for clarity would be nice. - Tarkisflux ^Talk 14:27, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

Bah. Added :-P --Ghostwheel (talk) 17:51, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

Prerequisites

How does this interact with feat and prestige class skill rank prerequisites?--TheDarkWad (talk) 15:22, 17 August 2013 (UTC)

If you have even one point in a relevant background, count the skill rank as being equal to your HD + 3 for the purpose of prerequisites. --Ghostwheel (talk) 15:26, 17 August 2013 (UTC)