Talk:Training for Skills (3.5e Variant Rule)

Ratings

	Leziad is neutral on this article and rated it 2 of 4.
	I am wary.

	Foxwarrior likes this article and rated it 3 of 4.
	If skills were an important element of character power, this would be violating the very essential purpose of having levels and CRs (like LA buyoff). As they aren't, however, it's an amusing option.

	Ghostwheel opposes this article and rated it 0 of 4.
	Allows everyone to get on the skill river boat. Also makes skill points/level and the like fairly meaningless.

Don't forget that Training for Skills can never be as good as naturally gained skills. There's a cap yano. -- Eiji-kun (talk) 05:17, 16 October 2012 (UTC)

	Spanambula favors this article and rated it 4 of 4!
	This is great. Not just for meeting random skill rank qualifications for whatever feat or PrC, but just from the standpoint of building a more rounded character, and taking a lot of the sting out of 3.5's rigid skill structure.

Blocked Rating

Spazalicious Chaos likes this article and rated it 3 of 4.

Block Reason: This is a legacy rating from before our current ratings scale. While the reasons should be valid, it is not counted in the ratings on the article page because of the inaccurate scale.As a self recognized wiki pariah, recognize that my approval is not needed or likely even wanted. But I must say that this example of organic growth in charcter in an otherwise linear game was needed in the d20 system, not only to help us simulationists not hate the game as much, but also to cover one of the glaring holes that makes D&D a distinctly non-narrative game.

Aarnott is neutral on this article and rated it 2 of 4.

Flat exp costs can sometimes suck at low levels and be negligible at high levels. I'm not a fan of exp costs for anything though. The rule certainly isn't implemented poorly, although I question the actual exp cost for a skill point as being "worth it". Comparing directly to magic item prices, a +1 bonus to a skill costs (exactly) 100 exp more when going from a +12 skill boosting item to a +13 skill boosting item (13^2*100/25-12^2*100/25=100). Of course there is the extra gold cost for the item, and it is a competence bonus, not ranks, but the exp price does still seem a little steep for at least the first 5 ranks. Also, a clever player could probably use it to juggle many skills just below max ranks, but the fact that the ranks are not maxed probably means that isn't a terrible thing.

Wording. Is confusing.

I'm not sure what you're getting at here Eiji, "For every skill point you gain you spend 100 xp and 1 week in training every 7 points (minimum 1 week). You can gain a number of skill points equal to half your class level for a particular skill, buying the skill as a class skill or cross-class skill as appropriate". There's bad punctuation or something in there. Unfortunately, the example doesn't clear it up much for me.

So here's what I think it is, and you can tell me if I'm right or not. Is the rule supposed to be that you can spend a week training, and in that time can gain up to 7 skill points at the cost of 100xp each? - Tarkisflux ^Talk 07:42, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

You can get up to 1/2 your level in skill points. It takes 1 week per 7 points you learn. It costs 100xp per skill point.

Ergo, you are level 17, you can get 8 skill points in whatever skills... Balance, Craft, and Perform, it will cost 800xp each. Since that's 8x3=24 skill points, it will take 4 weeks. Does that help? -- Eiji-kun 07:50, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Sorta... Is the 1/2 level a hard cap per level? So if I'm level 2, I can only train for 1 skill point until I level up? And the week per 7 skill points thing, does it take a week if I only get 2 skill points in that week (for whatever reason), or just 1 per day (by straightforward division)? - Tarkisflux ^Talk 07:59, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

The 1/2 is a hard cap per level, though you're free to put any normal skill points from leveling into there. The time period is mostly arbitary, I could probably say "1 skill point per day" and it works out well. -- Eiji-kun 08:16, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Proposals for alternate version

To implement the coming ideas might change the idea so much that it's better as a separate version of the variant, so this is more of an exploration of alternative ways to work this concept into a campaign... If there's a better place to discuss such a thing, let me know.

1 - The cost is instead something like (Level) * (Number of skill points gained in this way)^2 * 25 xp. (Some number other than 25 would work.. it just feels right, here.) This way, the cost is more balanced between low and high levels, somewhat addressing Aarnott's concern, and there's a practical limit on how many skill points can be gained like this, potentially addressing Ghostwheel's concern with a bit more work.

2 - There's a hard limit on the number of skill points gained in this way, probably equal to the base number of skill points for a character's highest-level class. This would almost certainly address Ghostwheel's concern, and would be less likely to get out of hand should you have some particularly clever players.

3 - There's a soft limit on the number of skill points gained in this way, probably based on either intelligence score or class level. This would be for the total number of skill points that could be gained, not a number per skill as in the current description.

I like the concept... I'm just wary, like most of those above. --Maninorange (talk) 09:17, 25 August 2013 (UTC)