Good afternoon, All,
For those of you who have experience with prior versions of Traveller, most systems have had some form of a Universal Task System to describe tasks easily using difficulty ratings. Indeed, one company that produced Traveller supplements, BITS, created a generic task system that translated easily enough to all known published Traveller systems at the time. It was useful for defining tasks so that they could be usable in CT, MT, TNE, T4, and GT editions of Traveller, thus giving their adventures a much more universal appeal.
The PDF for this can be found here:
BITS Generic Task System
I don't know how many of you might feel about the recommendation to create a similar Task System for use in T20. However, if I were to make a recommendation in regards to using them, I'd probably suggest a system that remains somewhat compatible with the BITS generic task system. The skills would remain as they are defined in T20, but the target DCs would change to reflect the general difficulty of undertaking such a task, instead of what's defined as the DC under the skill description.
The following is based on the closest descriptor from the Skills section of the table in the THB. I'm not sure if I like the values, though, because they're not a consistent transition (ten points difference between each of the first three classifications, then five points difference per classification after that.) However, given the nature of the skills system for T20, they probably will work well.
</font><blockquote>code:</font><hr /><pre style="font-size:x-small; font-family: monospace;">Table: Skill DC Based On Difficulty
Task is... Check is...
Easy DC 5
Average DC 15
Difficult DC 25
Formidable DC 30
Staggering DC 35
Impossible DC 40
Hopeless DC 45</pre>[/QUOTE]Looking at the average T20 character of 5th to 9th level, that's 8 to 12 skill ranks for a class skill or 4 to 6 skill ranks for a cross-class skill. In addition, the character has perhaps a +3 ability score modifier (assuming a 16 or 17 in the stat, for a character's stronger stat.) That gives us a range of +11 to +15 on skill checks for class skills (average +13) and +7 to +9 for cross-class skills (average +8). For untrained skills, that's just a +3 on a skill check.
That would give the average character the following minimums rolls: Unskilled 4 (not even Easy tasks, but that's still a failure on a 1 in 20), Cross-class 9 (Easy tasks automatic, fails Average tasks on a six or less), and Class skills 14 (Easy tasks automatic, fails Average tasks only on a natural one.)
The average character would get the following when Taking Ten, or on an average roll of 10 on a d20: Unskilled 13 (Easy tasks are automatic), Cross-class 18 (Average Tasks are automatic), and Class skills 23 (Average Tasks are automatic.)
The average character would get the following when Taking Twenty, or on a natural 20 on a d20: Unskilled 23 (accomplishes Average tasks, but not Difficult ones), Cross-class 28 (accomplishes Difficult tasks but not Formidable ones), and Class skills 33 (accomplishes Formidable tasks but not Staggering tasks.)
Taking Skill Focus as a feat thus opens up the possibility of accomplishing one task difficulty higher for the average character. Extremely focused characters will be rewarded with higher levels of ability, of course, but for the most part, most tasks will fall in the range of Easy to Formidable, with an emphasis on Average and Difficult.
Modifying Task Difficulty Levels
* Rushing a task can increase its difficulty by one level.
* Taking one's time can decrease the difficulty by one level.
* Trying to perform a task without the proper tools, if necessary, increase difficulty by one level.
An alternate to the above Table is to start with a base DC of 10 for Easy tasks, and increase the DC by five for every step up in difficulty. This results in a higher Easy task DC, but all tasks that are Difficult or higher drop in DC by five points from what's listed above. This works well with the Take Ten rule, but deviates from the descriptors printed in the THB, and opens up tasks of one more difficulty level higher.
What are your thoughts?
-Flynn
For those of you who have experience with prior versions of Traveller, most systems have had some form of a Universal Task System to describe tasks easily using difficulty ratings. Indeed, one company that produced Traveller supplements, BITS, created a generic task system that translated easily enough to all known published Traveller systems at the time. It was useful for defining tasks so that they could be usable in CT, MT, TNE, T4, and GT editions of Traveller, thus giving their adventures a much more universal appeal.
The PDF for this can be found here:
BITS Generic Task System
I don't know how many of you might feel about the recommendation to create a similar Task System for use in T20. However, if I were to make a recommendation in regards to using them, I'd probably suggest a system that remains somewhat compatible with the BITS generic task system. The skills would remain as they are defined in T20, but the target DCs would change to reflect the general difficulty of undertaking such a task, instead of what's defined as the DC under the skill description.
The following is based on the closest descriptor from the Skills section of the table in the THB. I'm not sure if I like the values, though, because they're not a consistent transition (ten points difference between each of the first three classifications, then five points difference per classification after that.) However, given the nature of the skills system for T20, they probably will work well.
</font><blockquote>code:</font><hr /><pre style="font-size:x-small; font-family: monospace;">Table: Skill DC Based On Difficulty
Task is... Check is...
Easy DC 5
Average DC 15
Difficult DC 25
Formidable DC 30
Staggering DC 35
Impossible DC 40
Hopeless DC 45</pre>[/QUOTE]Looking at the average T20 character of 5th to 9th level, that's 8 to 12 skill ranks for a class skill or 4 to 6 skill ranks for a cross-class skill. In addition, the character has perhaps a +3 ability score modifier (assuming a 16 or 17 in the stat, for a character's stronger stat.) That gives us a range of +11 to +15 on skill checks for class skills (average +13) and +7 to +9 for cross-class skills (average +8). For untrained skills, that's just a +3 on a skill check.
That would give the average character the following minimums rolls: Unskilled 4 (not even Easy tasks, but that's still a failure on a 1 in 20), Cross-class 9 (Easy tasks automatic, fails Average tasks on a six or less), and Class skills 14 (Easy tasks automatic, fails Average tasks only on a natural one.)
The average character would get the following when Taking Ten, or on an average roll of 10 on a d20: Unskilled 13 (Easy tasks are automatic), Cross-class 18 (Average Tasks are automatic), and Class skills 23 (Average Tasks are automatic.)
The average character would get the following when Taking Twenty, or on a natural 20 on a d20: Unskilled 23 (accomplishes Average tasks, but not Difficult ones), Cross-class 28 (accomplishes Difficult tasks but not Formidable ones), and Class skills 33 (accomplishes Formidable tasks but not Staggering tasks.)
Taking Skill Focus as a feat thus opens up the possibility of accomplishing one task difficulty higher for the average character. Extremely focused characters will be rewarded with higher levels of ability, of course, but for the most part, most tasks will fall in the range of Easy to Formidable, with an emphasis on Average and Difficult.
Modifying Task Difficulty Levels
* Rushing a task can increase its difficulty by one level.
* Taking one's time can decrease the difficulty by one level.
* Trying to perform a task without the proper tools, if necessary, increase difficulty by one level.
An alternate to the above Table is to start with a base DC of 10 for Easy tasks, and increase the DC by five for every step up in difficulty. This results in a higher Easy task DC, but all tasks that are Difficult or higher drop in DC by five points from what's listed above. This works well with the Take Ten rule, but deviates from the descriptors printed in the THB, and opens up tasks of one more difficulty level higher.
What are your thoughts?
-Flynn
