Quote from: Elliot WilenOn another tack, attribute + skill isn't the only way to consider the interaction. E.g. in Harnmaster skills are skills, but if you have high related attributes you'll start at a higher skill and progress faster.

It is for the purposes for which Kyle started this thread. He should have said "Assume Stat+Skill. What is the best balance between them?"

-clash

Quote from: Elliot WilenTrue, but mathematically, I think this just works out to the equivalent of having an intermediate quality, let's call it aptitude, between attributes and skills. Narrower than attributes, wider than skills, easier to raise than attributes, harder than skills.

I pointed more or less in this direction when I started a thread on skill growth by cluster.

And that is kind of what I did with Iridium Lite.

Bill

I've been thinking about this same matter recently, and here's my take on it:

At start: Attributes 70/ Skill 30

Experienced: 50/50

Mastery 30/70

So for the neophyte warrior, the Combat Rating is Str (3) + Dex (2) + Sword skill (2) = 7.

Once our neophyte becomes an seasoned warrior, his Combat Rating is Str (3) + Dex (2) + Sword skill (5) = 10.

The CR for a master swordsman is Str (3) + Dex (2) + Sword skill (9) = 14.

One other thing that I've experimented with that worked pretty well, but was a bit rigid in practice, was generating attributes based on skills.  That came from the question of whether a gymnast start out dextrous and learns gymnastics or becomes dextrous because they know gymnastics, thus the more dexterity skills a character had, the more dextrous they'd become, the more intelligence skills a character had, the intelligence they would become, and so on.  Not attribute + skill but another way to deal with the relationship between the two.

Yeah, that's what I'm talking about John.

Clash, you're right, unless Kyle's interested in looking at other models, the HM approach is a digression.

Quote from: Kyle AaronMy instinct is that talent is more important for amateurs, and skill more important for the experienced.

I am a firm believer in this idea actually. Most likely it stems out of the frustration at how other games handle it but none-the-less, it makes the most sense to me.

In the design that I have been fucking around with I have been essentially running with the fact that an average human (mediocre stats) that is highly skilled in an area (high skill total) should most often be better than an above average human (hero stats) who is skills light.

With that core idea in mind, it is a matter of making the numbers/mathematics/game mechanics work in your favour.

For the design I am working with, I average two stats and add the skill (in a vaguely old school Rolemaster way).

eg: Persuade: Stats are Charm and Logic.

Grand Vizier of Someplace is an average human but very skilled in Persuade. He has the ideal stat spread for average human, 3 in each stat. And his skill in Persuade is 7. Skill total: (3+3)/2 + 7 = 10

vs.

Dodgy Hero 1, he is a smart(arse) talky hero and has excellent stats, 5 and 5. But he hasn't focused on being smarmy, so isn't terribly skilled, 2. (5+5)/2 + 2 = 7.

Chances are the Grand Vizier is more persuading unless Dodgy Hero rolls well.

Incidentally I went down Haffrung's track of just adding the numbers together. But I found that this still made stat's overly important in our playtesting of the game. It became clear that it was a cheaper route to increase your stats instead of your skills thus players were spending their hard-earned in those areas. While I didn't want to limit the players in buffing their stat's (after all it is a Roleplaying Game where most of the time you want to play characters that are transcend the mundane), I felt it was moving too far away from that core idea that an average person could overwhelm a person who was not as skilled and that skills should be emphasised. Of course an average person against a hero who was similarly skilled would always lose out but I figured that was about fair.

... I just realised I am drivelling on a bit. Anyway I agree with your instinct and have gone as far as putting the framework together for my own game system around it. The weighting is very similar to what Haffrung has written out.

Quote from: jibbajibbaI think the best compromises I have seen are where the skill is made up of a base level formula from your attributes added to a skill points.

Yes, I forgot to mention in my original post that Harnmaster does that. Each skill averages three attributes, and you begin with a skill level as a multiple of that average. So of two warriors, one with Strength, Agility and Dexterity all 10, and the other with them all 12, both begin with Sword [5], but it works out to 50% for the first guy and 60% for the second.

Really I suppose that makes attributes and skills 50/50 in importance, since after that skills just improve 1% at a time.

Quote from: jibbajabbaNow I think it is useful to look at use of skills in reality. Take a skill like Computer Programming. Someone with zero training in Computer programming simply can not program zero chance.

This is why in some systems you have what I called in d4-d4 "anyone" and "specialist" traits. Anyone can pick up a sword and swing it; they will of course be nowhere near as good as someone with even a little training, but they can give it a go. But an untrained person will simply have no idea where to start with computer programming. So I said that some traits are "anyone" traits, everyone has a level of "ordinary" in them, and others are "specialist" traits, if you haven't trained, you simply have no idea where to start.

Quote from: jibbajabbaThe difference in real skill between competant and great in terms of the spectrum from none to great is actually small,

Yes, that seems to be true. But that little bit often makes a big difference in the end, it has a sort of multiplier effect. Just consider the different writing abilities of people on forums: setting aside personal taste for a moment, there are some people who write clearly and concisely and are a pleasure to read for pages, and there are others who you end up just scanning over. The absolute difference in ability is pretty small, but when it comes to reading them for hours, it really adds up.

I think the same's true of many skills. Over time, that one with higher ability will really stand out. For example, as a chef I'm good, quite competent - but I'm not great. If you have any single meal made by me and a great chef, you won't be able to tell the difference. But after many meals, the great chef is going to stand out clearly against me.

Quote from: jibbajabbaIn the same way i can give a competent coder a task, write an API to do x and they will deliver it in a week. A great programmer will stil take a week but the code might be faster, better error checking, self healing whatever ...

Then there is the topic of failure. Its usually quite hard to fail stuff. In a technical situation it usually just takes longer (if you are competant) or its new to you.

I think I handled this fairly well in "DAM Risk Dice". What I said was this: skill use is all Attribute + Skill, roll under total. Decide how many dice to roll, the number of dice tells us about your success.

Most systems require the GM to decide difficulty and perhaps the player gets to say how quickly they want the character to do it; the player rolls, and the GM tells them if they succeeded or failed. There'll usually be four levels of success:

• balls-up
• failure
• success
• triumph

and the GM then has to interpret it, saying how well or quickly it happened. I tried reversing that. I see people at work and in their hobbies, and the fact is that once you have a basic level of competence, you can do just about anything in that skill, what varies is how well and quickly you can do it.

So I set up a sort of bidding grid, you'd decide how many dice to roll. You need 1 die rolling under the attribute + skill just to do the task at all. So if you roll 1d6 under attr+skill, then you do a mediocre and slow job - probably spending a lot of time looking things up. So for example if I have average education but no computer skills, I can just google up how to do html and figure it out, and do a slow and mediocre job of making a web page.

But after that there are two bunches of three squares. The first bunch is how quickly you do the job: quickly, very quickly, and lightning. So you could roll 2d6 under attr+skill, and if you succeed do a mediocre job, but a quick one. Or 3d6 and a mediocre job but very quick, etc.

The second bunch is how well you do the job: good, excellent, awesome. So you could roll 2d6, and if you succeed you do a good job but a slow one. Or 3d6 and an excellent job but a slow one, and so on.

Combining the two, the player could roll 3d6 and their character do a good and quick job, a mediocre and very quick one, or an excellent and slow one. Same with 4 and 5d6.

The attributes and skills went from 2-12, by the way, giving you some idea of relative chances - an average person (attribute 7) with no particular skill (0) could about half the time do a good but slow job, or a mediocre but quick one. One who was professional (skill 7) could do a good and quick job reliably, though they'd sometimes stuff up.

The player would decide how many dice to roll; they could play it safe and go for something relatively slow and mediocre, or they could take risks trying to do it well and quickly.

I just figure that given time, an average person can achieve almost anything - it'll just take a long time and not be very impressive. A talented (high attribute) person will have a better chance, as will a well-skilled person. What's challenging is doing things well and quickly. And that's where the professionals and the talented get to shine.

Quote from: jibbajabbaFinally you have the idea of links skills. Skills exist in trees. A java coder can probably debug some C++ code. A guy who can pilot a MIg can probably keep a 747 in the air (may be not land it). If you can use a rapier you can certainly use a Small sword.

Yes, and for this either you have lots of skills with lots of defaults, or a few broad skills, perhaps with specialisations.

Quote from: John MorrowSimply adding attribute to skill creates all sorts of problems, especially dealing with min-maxing.  

Yes, I've seen it many times.

This really is the reason that so many systems make it harder to raise attributes than to raise skills. This leads to all sorts of strangeness, as you try to figure out how to justify why it's so hard to increase Strength - "can't I just pump some iron?" - while figuring out exactly how you'd raise your Charisma, for example. Plainly they're different things in terms of how easy they are to improve.

I think the problem is minimised if sometimes it'll be not Attr+Skill, but other times Skill+Skill, or Dis/Advantage+Skill. When I playtested a system like this, one player who'd pumped lots of points into his character's attributes got upset when I asked for a Skill+Skill roll. I'd explained it was a playtest so no-one should bother trying to minimax as rules would likely change, but if that's a person's nature they can't help it.

The minimaxing problem is halved if character generation is random roll, but still exists with character improvement.

Quote from: John MorrowWell, like I said, the House System does the opposite (it's harder to learn a skill once you exceed the governing attribute) as a substitute for combining the to together and I think that's a pretty nifty solution if the goal is to make them relate to each other.

House System? Can you point us to this?

Quote from: HaffrungI've been thinking about this same matter recently, and here's my take on it:

At start: Attributes 70/ Skill 30

Experienced: 50/50

Mastery 30/70

So essentially it's as I said earlier, that you'd have attributes be on a smaller range than skills. Attributes might be 0-5, and skills 0-15, or something.

Quote from: Kyle AaronThis really is the reason that so many systems make it harder to raise attributes than to raise skills. This leads to all sorts of strangeness, as you try to figure out how to justify why it's so hard to increase Strength - "can't I just pump some iron?" - while figuring out exactly how you'd raise your Charisma, for example. Plainly they're different things in terms of how easy they are to improve.

Sure, but if you make attributes hard to buy to keep them low, so they don't dominate, then they aren't really on the same scale as skills.  Ideally, if (for example) your attributes and skills are on a scale of 0 to 10, you'd want players to be able to dial both an attribute or skill up to 10 without breaking the system.  If you make attributes expensive to keep them low then the effective range of attributes might be, say, 3-7.  GURPS has/had this problem, with most characters having attributes in the 10-13 range because that's the sweet spot in cost.  But what that means is that most characters wind up in a range with a variance of 4 points on scale that should have a variance more like 15 points.  

Quote from: Kyle AaronI think the problem is minimised if sometimes it'll be not Attr+Skill, but other times Skill+Skill, or Dis/Advantage+Skill. When I playtested a system like this, one player who'd pumped lots of points into his character's attributes got upset when I asked for a Skill+Skill roll. I'd explained it was a playtest so no-one should bother trying to minimax as rules would likely change, but if that's a person's nature they can't help it.

That's an interesting solution, but the frustration that player wound up feeling might be a warning sign.

Quote from: Kyle AaronThe minimaxing problem is halved if character generation is random roll, but still exists with character improvement.

I think combining these two ideas could work out OK, though.  Random character generation solves a certain amount of min-maxing but can replace it with frustration if players can't get what they want.

Quote from: Kyle AaronHouse System? Can you point us to this?

That's the system that GDW used for Dark Conspiracy, the second edition of Twilight 2000, and Traveller: TNE.  I'm most familiar with the Dark Conspiracy variant so what I'm claiming may not be true for the others.

Quote from: Kyle AaronSo essentially it's as I said earlier, that you'd have attributes be on a smaller range than skills. Attributes might be 0-5, and skills 0-15, or something.

I think you are better off having attributes on a 0-15 range, skill training on a 0-10 range, and add 1/3rd of the attribute to the skill training (or alternately, 1/2 of a secondary skill) to the skill training to get skill roll in the 0-15 range.  That way, you could ask for an attribute roll or, as you mentioned earlier, a skill+attribute roll or a skill+skill roll, and all three could cover the full 0-15 scale.

Quote from: John MorrowSure, but if you make attributes hard to buy to keep them low, so they don't dominate, then they aren't really on the same scale as skills.  

Often you'll see point-buy systems where you've one pool of points to spend on attributes, and a separate pool for skills, with them not being convertable. So that's another way to do it, where they're effectively on the same scale, but attribute-concentrated minimaxing is prevented.

It doesn't seem very neat to me, though. It feels a bit like telling your kid they have to spend $1 of their pocket money on saving, $1 on sweets, and so on. I prefer more indirect incentives, for example with the specialist/anyone traits, okay yes you can max out your attributes and be a good all-rounder, but you're still going to be hopeless as a physician, computer programmer, mechanic, blacksmith and so on.

But that kind of specialist/anyone trait split only works if you've a lot of narrowly-defined traits.

Quote from: John MorrowBut what that means is that most characters wind up in a range with a variance of 4 points on scale that should have a variance more like 15 points.  

That's true, and it's something we see in a lot of point-buy systems, that there are effectively only about five attribute levels unless you're on a superheroic scale.

Which is why I've long looked at the idea of having just five attribute levels - but that'd be another thread.

Quote from: John MorrowThat's an interesting solution, but the frustration that player wound up feeling might be a warning sign.

Not really. It's just that he ignored me when I said, "this is a playtest, things will change, so don't try to minimax."

But players do that. Like when I ran a modern-day espionage campaign, and said, "this will be like Bourne Identity, Ronin or Man On Fire" - and one player went ahead and created a non-violent investigative character and expected it to be like Spooks. Which it could have been, had the player taken the lead.

So that really is a separate issue, the issue that we have in us certain ideas of what will be a really great game for us, and we project those ideas onto the description someone else gives. That's a human nature thing rather than a game mechanics or setting thing.

Quote from: John MorrowI think combining these two ideas could work out OK, though.  Random character generation solves a certain amount of min-maxing but can replace it with frustration if players can't get what they want.

There are traditionally two compromises for that: random roll but with some swapping around, and letting them improve the stuff later relatively easily. I like the first better.

The other idea is to have attributes derive from skills; if you have a lot of skills relying on agility, then you'll get a high agility. I don't know of any game that does it mechanically, like, "for every 5 points of agility skills, you get 1 point in agility" or whatever, Fudge just mentions it as something to consider.

The problem with that would be simulating raw uneducated talent, and few characters would get high strength or health/constitution, since few skills rely on them entirely.

Quote from: Kyle AaronSo that really is a separate issue, the issue that we have in us certain ideas of what will be a really great game for us, and we project those ideas onto the description someone else gives. That's a human nature thing rather than a game mechanics or setting thing.

Sure, but you can get a smoother game if you take those quirks of human nature into account, though that can certainly go overboard, too (the problem created by trying to create an idiot-proof system).

Quote from: Kyle AaronThe other idea is to have attributes derive from skills; if you have a lot of skills relying on agility, then you'll get a high agility. I don't know of any game that does it mechanically, like, "for every 5 points of agility skills, you get 1 point in agility" or whatever, Fudge just mentions it as something to consider.

My group has run with homebrew rules that do it.  It worked reasonably well but the characters can be a bit predictable (e.g., physical characters will have high physical attributes, mental characters will have high mental attributes, etc.).  I've considered using that approach again from time to time.

Quote from: Kyle AaronThe problem with that would be simulating raw uneducated talent, and few characters would get high strength or health/constitution, since few skills rely on them entirely.

What we did was have three attributes that were dependent on skills and three that weren't.  It doesn't have to be an all or nothing approach.  And while it doesn't simulate a total novice's raw uneducated talent (which as I mentioned earlier, I don't think is all that "realistic" in many cases), what it can simulate is a character who has a lot of physical skills doing something physical that they don't have the skill for, per se.  For example, the professional athlete recruited to be a secret agent using their athletic skills as a baseline for hand-to-hand combat.

Quote from: Kyle AaronI think the problem is minimised if sometimes it'll be not Attr+Skill, but other times Skill+Skill, or Dis/Advantage+Skill.

This is something I've been toying with as well.  Basically, what I have is something like Omni (Talislanta, etc.) or Waste World, but with skill scores replacing the base attributes and re-rolls replacing the skills.

Skills are static (-5 to +5. Attributes are fluid (1-10).

As a base, the mechanic is roll skill and add any modifiers (talent/advantage/whatever). If you fail, you can burn point(s) from an attribute to reroll.

You could decouple them. In Icar, attributes only count when the skill is first taken, after that, they are ignored. If you have the skill, you use that. If you don't, you use the attribute with a suitable modifier.