Is knowledge too weak?

[KageRyu]

[vanir]

clearly there's no shortage of creativity to generate useful knowledge skill rolls throughout an adventure, the only trick is getting the players into the habit of investing in them and using them, the GM subsequently making them useful and being creative is the easy part, whether you're more interactive with players about it or handle it in the classic D&D fashion of passing slips of paper to specific players depending on their rolls.

Some of the tricks we use in our game, based on lengthy discussion of RAW with knowledge skills, we started by linking some knowledge skills to other usable skills.

eg, according to RAW as a guide, for average Joe to construct a lightsabre he'd probably need some scholar: arcane technologies, then min 5D lightsabre repair, so he could then take (A) lightsabre engineering, finally get the die on that skill high enough to make the difficulty for constructing a lightsabre, which would turn out to be a lightfoil in the game (ie. a lightsabre constructed by non-Jedi). Though you can see where it all starts with some die in scholar: arcane technologies just to know where to start, and you'd want a good roll in that.

To make this more accessible to Jedi and tie it in with Jedi training, and earning the rank of Jedi Knight, we change the prerequisites for lightsabre construction, only for Jedi. You must have lightsabre combat and meditate. You must have min 5D in scholar: Jedi Lore. If you have those you can use the lightsabre repair skill to actually construct a lightsabre from scratch, using the force as a guide and your scholarly jedi training as a substitute for the dedicated engineering skill.

So scholar becomes useful, as a prerequisite, all our Jedi put CP into Jedi Lore for this reason at the least, they consider it mandatory for attaining master rank for the practical reason it lets them build lightsabres from scratch. It's one thing to tell players they can say some philosophical babble using scholar: Jedi Lore, quite another to say well now you can build your own lightsabres with it, assuming you can find the parts.

Similar to how we use Tactics skill. If specialised for the specific form of combat, eg. tactics: starfighters, you can substitute the tactics roll for an initiative roll in the opening round of any engagement with an enemy craft. Subsequent rounds will be ruled on a case by case basis but generally normal PER iniative after the first round until that craft is destroyed, then you can use tactics again for the opening round on another.
Once again just a useful way of using knowledge skills for the players as something very practical that helps them in a sense that is very worthy of spending character points in them. Our starfighter pilot PCs always put a lot of CP in tactics: starfighters now, and they have very good averages over time in combat because they're almost always winning initiative on the first round of combat with each new craft.

Once you get them in the habit of thinking this way, they start coming up with all sorts of ideas on how knowledge skills might benefit them when task solving during adventures. eg.,
Can I use an intimidation roll to get my enemy flatfooted and gain surprise due to distracting fear on an attack?
Can I combine military history skill with tactics skill to make an enemy commander believe he is being attacked by a much larger force than we really have?
Can I use bureacracy with con to get out of paying starport fees?
etc.

[garhkal]

Very true. Like at Origins, i allowed those who had value and rolled well enough on it, to up their bargain rolls, or those who had law enforcement, to augument their con rolls to pass security.
Having some of the knowledge skills (to steal a term from DND3.0) have a synergy with others.
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[KageRyu]

[Whill]

I use skill synergy too.

[garhkal]

I disagree with that. Maybe a first aid/medic KNOWLEDGE skill could let you know of WHAT to do/what is wrong, but i still feel the USE of that knowledge garnered is technical.
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Confucious sayeth, don't wash cat while drunk!

[ZzaphodD]

[Whill]

[Zarm R'keeg]

Well, to be fair- I would think that 90% of the medical skill involved in first aid is knowledge of the proper technique- the other 10% is just the manual dexterity needed to accomplish it. One could say this falls under Technical in the same way that, say, Droid Repair (knowledge of the systems, and the fine manipulation of components to accomplish it) is... but then, now that I think about it, that doesn't seem to make too much sense either, does it? Most of the Technical skills are essentially glorified knowledge rolls, just with a little bit of 'execution/application of knowledge' thrown in, aren't they? Interesting...
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Hard core OT, all the way!

[KageRyu]

Here are some Knowledge skill suggestions based off of gaps in the existing skills (originally created for basic D6 Fractured Realities (unpublished) core rules:

• Biological Sciences - This includes various sciences that are the study of living organisms and biology. Among the sciences (and each could be it's own specialization) are: Anatomy, Biology, Genetics, Xenobiology, Exobiology, Botany, Zoology... just to name a few.
• Physical Sciences - This would include a study of the physical world. Among the various sciences and specializations would be: Geology, Climatology, Meteorology, Physics, Oceanography, Mineralogy, Vulcanology, Astronomy, Astrophysics, Planetology, Stellar Mechanics, just to name a few.
• Psychological Sciences - A study of the mind and behavior. Among it's sciences and specializations would be: Psychology, psycotherapy, criminal psycology, parapsychology, Religious Studies, etc...
• Historical Sciences - Sciences and studies that involve aspects of history and the past. Among the sciences and specializations might be: History, Anthropology, Archaelogy, Paleontology, Evolutionary Biology
• Advanced Sciences - This would include scienses of a particularly advanced, unique, or specialized nature, that while they might be considered part of other sciences, would require additional, specialized study. Among the specializations are: Quantum Physics, Quantum Mechanics, Nuclear Physics, Temporal Physics*, Dimensional Physics*, Temporal Mechanics*, String Theory, Unified Field Theory, Hyperspace Mechanics*, etc...
*Depending on the technological advancement and nature of your campaign world, you may wish to restrict these to theoretical studies only. It would not do well in a non-time travel campaign to have a character with knowledge to build a time machine.
• Criminal Sciences - A study of the sciences as applied under the justice system and in use to investigate and prosecute criminal behaviour. It's sciences and specializations would include: Criminology, Criminal Psychology, Behavorial Profiling, Forensics, Forensic Pathology, Forensic Medicine, as some examples.

I have other knowledge skills not by the Star Wars book as well. While many of these may not seem imediately useful in a Star Wars setting, I have had characters request such skills from time to time. While technicly these may fall under the Scholar skill, I felt with all of the specializations, this potentially made Scholar too powerful, as a high Die Code in Scholar could effectively make a character knowledgable in too many fields. For this reason i created these seperate skill groups - and although still very broad, I feel the follow the patterns already established for skills in Star Wars with broad groups and specializations. While these skills could still do with some refinement, they were playtested and adjusted over several years. The list of Specializations under each science is by no means comprehensive.
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"There's a set way to gain new Force Points and it represents a very nice system, where you're rewarded for heroism, not for being a poor conductor to electricity." ~Jachra

[vanir]

[garhkal]

[KageRyu]

[KageRyu]