What new skills would you add?

[bjjones37]

I do not remember where, but I seem to remember reading that the referee can add additional skills to the core set if he see fit. I also find it interesting that in the MGT2 core rule book, science(geology) is used as a skill in one of the examples (P.61), but is not included in the core skill list. I plan to use a revised skill list anyway when I code in my own computerized implementation of Traveller (it will make solo play a lot easier).

While there is a world of skills out there, not all of them seem relevant to Traveller for gaming purposes. So I would like to know what additional skills you would add to whatever version of Traveller you use. Also I would also like you to include what characteristic would modify the skill (I assume MGT is not the only one that allows that).

And if someone has already done this, just post me the link.

Thanks

For me Geology is a definite keeper.

Contributed Skill list (see below):

Construction
Sensors (CT)
Intrusion
Artisan ( )
Survival (CT)

 

[Supplement Four]

It's in the Traveller Book, for CT. I'm not sure if its in Book 1.

I typically don't add skills unless I need something specific, for an NPC, say. An example would be Sensors, since there is no Sensors skill in CT, but I'd only use this for someone using special or highly advanced sensors.

I try to make the skills in CT wide to cover a lot of ways to use the skill, so I don't usually need new skills.

 

[Enoki]

I've suggested in the past, a skill called Construction. This gives the player the ability to build shelter and other buildings using various materials including locally collected ones. Such shelters and other buildings have the advantage of being more durable and suited to local conditions than ones attempted without this skill.

For example, the party needs to bridge a ravine. A player with the construction skill could build a bridge or other appropriate means to cross with a much reduced chance of it failing in use.

In say, a survival scenario the construction skill allows the player to pick the proper location for a shelter and then design and construct it more quickly. The shelter would also provide more protection from the elements than one erected by players without this skill.

It also provides knowledge of how structures are made for purposes of knowing where systems are located and how their assembled. In this case, the party needs to restore power to a building. The construction skill means the player would know the likely location of power systems in the building and then recognize and be able to restore them more quickly than someone who lacks this skill.

It isn't electronic or mechanical as a skill. These are generally related to ship and vehicle systems. Nor is it combat engineer where the skill is in erecting basic fortifications, obstacles, and blowing stuff up.

 

[bjjones37]

I typically don't add skills unless I need something specific, for an NPC, say. An example would be Sensors, since there is no Sensors skill in CT, but I'd only use this for someone using special or highly advanced sensors.

You caught me off guard on that one. I looked through my CT Books and sure enough, no Sensors. I originally started with Megatraveller so just assumed that Sensors was common to CT also.

 

[Keklas Rekobah]

You caught me off guard on that one. I looked through my CT Books and sure enough, no Sensors. I originally started with Megatraveller so just assumed that Sensors was common to CT also.

I always rolled Sensors into Electronics or Mechanical, depending on the TL. Thermocouples and thermistors are electronic, for example, while bimetallic pointers and mercury thermometers are essentially mechanical.

Mongoose made Electronics a cascade skill, with communications, computers, remote operations, and sensors being the specialties. This makes sense to me, so it’s now what I go with at the higher TL’s.

Stealth covers “Hide in Shadows” and “Move Silently”, but what about “Intrusion”? Again, Electronics and Mechanical cover most breaking and entering situations, and DEX or STR checks cover other thieving skills, as well.

I propose “Artisan” as a cascade skill, falling somewhere between “Art” and “Profession”, and covering low-tech or self-taught skills like pottery and baking — “Cottage Crafts”, rather than true professions.

Griff strolled through the faire, noting the kegs of ale and cheese wheels alongside displays of pastries and pies. He followed a rasping sound and found what he was looking for: “Celia’s Custom Knives”.

“Belter Griff! Where’s my meteor?”, shouted the bladesmith.

He smiled and hefted the canvas bag from his shoulder to the table, where it landed with a resounding ‘clunk’.

“Twenty kilos!”, he said.

Celia up-ended the back and tossed it back. Griff caught it and draped it casually over his shoulder as she began appraising each lump.

“Hmm ... ten ... fifteen ... twenty-five ... forty ... uh-huh! Eight-five for the whole lot!”

“One-twenty ... and that bolo over there.”

And the haggling got under way...

 

[bjjones37]

Would blacksmith or glassblowing fall under your definition of Artisan? Glassblowing could be using for making primitive batteries and blacksmith could produce bladed weapons.

 

[Keklas Rekobah]

Would blacksmith or glassblowing fall under your definition of Artisan? Glassblowing could be using for making primitive batteries and blacksmith could produce bladed weapons.

That seems about right. However, if it was a factory that makes glass bottles, or a stamping plant that mass-produces horse shoes, then the people that run and maintain the assembly lines would be considered blue-collar professionals, IMHO.

 

[Timerover51]

I was surprised that the later editions of Classic: the 1981 Edition, Starter Traveller, and The Traveller Book, never added the Survival Skill. I have that as a default skill for the first term of Scouts, rather than Pilot, along with adding it to the skills table. I do like the Vehicle Cascade Skill in the Traveller Book, with the Aircraft and Watercraft options. I tend to like things that float.

 

[bjjones37]

That seems about right. However, if it was a factory that makes glass bottles, or a stamping plant that mass-produces horse shoes, then the people that run and maintain the assembly lines would be considered blue-collar professionals, IMHO.

I was thinking more in terms of a scout who went to survey a moon for mineral resources and met with an unfortunate accident, perhaps that freak chance of a nickel-iron meteor striking his ship at just the wrong place and wrong time. Now his comm gear is damaged by a surge from his also damaged power system. He manages to land on the TL4 sparsely populated planet where his drive refuses a restart. He manages to repair his comm gear with spares but has no way to power it. So if he could locate some bauxite and silical sand and rig up some kind of glassblowing outfit with a torch (which hopefully the locals can provide), he might be able to put together a leyden jar which, with some graphite or charcoal to provide a measure of impedance matching, could provide enough power to enable him to get a message out to his companion who is prospecting a moon the next planet over.

"I am endeavoring, Ma'am, to construct a mnemonic circuit out of stone knives and bearskins."

 

[kilemall]

I pulled a bunch of skills from MgT1E/CE, squished them into doing double duty with the idea of wider skills not specific picky skills.

Probably the most iconic one would be making Gunnery do the same as various starship weapon takes, ground artillery, missiles, and direct fire vehicle/heavy weapons. Pretty sure no one else does that.

With big wide skills I have the familiarity part- where maybe with their Engineering they have not worked with say a BIG ship drive system because they are familiar with small ship drives, but can learn in weeks or months rather then years.

I also added an additional Education table, based on INT 8+ rather then EDU 8+, to give all those CT players a set of skills that could be useful to them and more flavor and variety. Example, Recon is useful for military types- but also scouts, scientists and criminals., and replaces Hunting skill. Instruction is also very universal.


A link to the CT chargen sheet is here in the file library-

http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showthread.php?t=37543



I also made up my own knowledge bits, where you take one EDU point and can make them be knowledge about a variety of topics, at the expense of general knowledge EDU normally stands for (skipped history class to listen to jazz).

This was to give characters knowledge that defines them uniquely, perhaps their hobbies or what they studied in college, without being full skills. VERY open-ended, and an invitation for players to create their own.

The more specific the knowledge, the more it multiplied that knowledge skill and the more useless it is outside the specific realm.

EDU would split into four 'kskills' per point converted (I'm gathering that's a thing in some later versions), so one EDU might become

Flower arranging-1
Jazz music-1
Mechanical Engineering-1
History-1

Remember, these are interests and stuidies, not skills. So I would probably rule that Mechanical Engineeering-1 is studying without practical experience or ability not Mechanical, so unskilled -4 DM plus ME-1 for a -3.

They could get specific, so for every specific aspect add one, and not allow for much knowledge outside it.

21st century jazz music-2
21st century Alpha Centauri jazz music-3
21st century Alpha Centauri postwar jazz music-4

 

[Enoki]

Now, another thing I think would be a good, reasonably simple change, would be to group skills into two distinct sets:

Those that take intellect and education and those that are physical needing dexterity and strength.

This would mean if you had a character that was long on the later and short on the former, the character could still choose physical skills and end up with more of them.

For example, brawling doesn't require much, if any intelligence or education. In fact, those are probably detriments... However, if your character is really strong and dexterous, then taking more brawling makes sense.

Using blades and swords is mostly a physical skill, same thing. Why limit a character by intelligence and education when it comes to these sort of physical skills?

This would make more characters usable and more useful when rolled up.

 

[Supplement Four]

You caught me off guard on that one. I looked through my CT Books and sure enough, no Sensors. I originally started with Megatraveller so just assumed that Sensors was common to CT also.

CT has a different stance on Sensors than in MT. In CT, the stance is that everything is easy to see in space. Energy signatures from ships are easy to detect long before combat range. Plua, most ships are constantly broadcasting with transponders, saying, "Here I Am, and This Is Who I Am." You see a ship without a transponder, then be very, very wary.

So, in CT, the default is to have every possible ship located--in the entire system.

Now, there are some places to hide, but hiding in space is not easy. You can hide within the atmosphere of a gas giant. You can anchor to an asteroid. You can park your ship behind a planet, keeping the planet between you and the target. You can sink your ship into a world's magnetic sphere.

The problem is that anyone who lives and works in space will know here to be cautious just like a river boat captain knows where he can stray from the channel and where he can't.

Given the long length of detection, and the problem of matching vectors, a Sensors skill is not really needed.

There are time when a ship may be detected, and it may also detect a Corsair attempting to match its vector. By the ship combat rules, and the 1000 second game turns, it may take hours bofore the attacking Corsair can match speed and direction with a target ship.

And, all this can be watched by the main world's starport, millions of km away--and there's not a damn thing the starport can do about it. Even if a Naval ship is close, the difference in speed may make the encounter over, and the Corsair escaped, by the time the Navy can match vectors to help out the targeted vessel.

So, you see, a Sensors skill in CT really isn't needed. It's just assumed that all bogeys are seen.

And, in those special occasions when a sensors roll is needed, I just roll the Navigation skill, since I figure that Navigating is about working with charts and sensor information--the Navigation skill doubles as Sensors skill.

 

[flykiller]

While there is a world of skills out there, not all of them seem relevant to Traveller for gaming purposes.

... what? traveller is a setting that spans any conceivable world and tech level. any skill at all can be relevant to the game. one of my characters has bass guitar 2 and beer brewing 1.

Navigation skill doubles as Sensors skill.

't's how I see it - navigation == sensors, at least for civilians. the navy might separate them out, but that's getting fairly subtle.

 

[kilemall]

Hmm, along those lines, I always figured Electronics was the CT sensor skill, Navigation and Gunnery were backups and good for their arenas and -1 otherwise. Also has the advantage of having those officers sit at sensor/bridge duty and have something to do outside their jump/shooting responsibilities.

As for CT' s stance on sensors, I would agree that it didn't have a roll- you were either in range or not. But the detection distances were 2 LS max, max tracking and thus engagement range 3 LS, with a long range percentage drop of -5 at 500000 km.

NOT the entire system, just the transit space between a planet and jump diameter.

Just thought we should set the record straight about what the system is, regardless of what tweaks we put on it.

 

[mike wightman]

I am against skills bloat.

The Edu stat represents scientific knowledge, geography and history etc - stuff you learn in school.

Skills are something you pick up in the real world and can be really broad IMHO.

If you want to go the route of specialist skills in individual arts, sciences, construction, operation, environment etc then you are going to need:
more skill points
different character generation.

 

[Timerover51]

I was thinking more in terms of a scout who went to survey a moon for mineral resources and met with an unfortunate accident, perhaps that freak chance of a nickel-iron meteor striking his ship at just the wrong place and wrong time. Now his comm gear is damaged by a surge from his also damaged power system. He manages to land on the TL4 sparsely populated planet where his drive refuses a restart. He manages to repair his comm gear with spares but has no way to power it. So if he could locate some bauxite and silical sand and rig up some kind of glassblowing outfit with a torch (which hopefully the locals can provide), he might be able to put together a leyden jar which, with some graphite or charcoal to provide a measure of impedance matching, could provide enough power to enable him to get a message out to his companion who is prospecting a moon the next planet over.

"I am endeavoring, Ma'am, to construct a mnemonic circuit out of stone knives and bearskins."

Under the example you give, you actually should have no problems getting electricity to power the coms. Tech Level 4 would put it at about Earth between 1850 and 1900 or so, when electricity was known and batteries were being used for telegraph communication, and by 1900 you have fairly large power plants supplying power for electric lighting and industry. Now, at Tech Level 3 or lower, you may have some problems. Glassblowing should not be one of them, as that would be a Tech Level 1 skill, while charcoal would be a common fuel. At least as long as the ecology is carbon-based with an oxygen atmosphere.

 

[coliver988]

I am against skills bloat.

The Edu stat represents scientific knowledge, geography and history etc - stuff you learn in school.

Skills are something you pick up in the real world and can be really broad IMHO.

If you want to go the route of specialist skills in individual arts, sciences, construction, operation, environment etc then you are going to need:
more skill points
different character generation.

I lean this way as well. As previously mentioned, skills are things you are good at, not the only things you can do. There may be a hefty negative DM but players can try to do anything. Last game the Scout had all of 1 term and a couple of skills. Still a fun play. And on one of the G+ posts there is an interesting thread about a similar thing, and the player really played the heck out of a character that had all of 2-3 skills. It is all in the play, not the stats and skills listed on your character sheets. Those are just guides.

 

[Supplement Four]

Hmm, along those lines, I always figured Electronics was the CT sensor skill, Navigation and Gunnery were backups and good for their arenas and -1 otherwise.

I can definitely see using Electronics for Sensors. I don't know why, but I tend to think of the Electronics skill as more of a repair skill. If you read the skill, though, it definitely covers operations as well as repair.

By the same token, I could see Electronics as a Computer skill, too, but, of course, Computer has its own skill.

I like the part in the Electronics skill about having EDU or INT minimums for certain uses. That, right there, is giving the Ref the idea to use Electronics for Sensors, but have an EDU minimum.

For example, Electronics can be used for Sensors if EDU is 9+ (or if INT B+). That'd be a good ruling. Without the EDU or the INT requirement, Electronics can't be used.

To extend the rule, you could say that every level of Electronics skill lowers the minimums. If a character has, say, Electronics-3, then to use it for Sensors requires EDU 7+ or INT 9+.

Man, there's such cool things buried in CT. Stuff that makes the Ref and players creative like this.

I love this friggin' game.

As for CT' s stance on sensors, I would agree that it didn't have a roll- you were either in range or not. But the detection distances were 2 LS max, max tracking and thus engagement range 3 LS, with a long range percentage drop of -5 at 500000 km.

To be super specific, the Detection rules in the game are:

Commercial vessels detect other ships out to 1.5 light seconds.

Military vessels detect other ships, as you say, out to 2 LS.

Target Silent Running = Half detection range.

Once detected, a ship can be tracked out to 3 LS, as you say.

NOT the entire system, just the transit space between a planet and jump diameter.

I assume a vessel is using a transponder, so it is loud and able to be detected from ranges greater than the above.

Maybe that's just an assumption on my part and not quite the letter of the rules.

Just thought we should set the record straight about what the system is, regardless of what tweaks we put on it.

Absolutely!

 

[McPerth]

One thing I'll never tire to emphatize is the relation that should be kept among skill variety and the number of skills a carácter is suposed to have.

If you add skills, they each represent less broad ones, so, to keep the same level of knowledge, characters should have more.

To give you an example I've already used many times, in CT Engineering is a simple skill, and having an Engineer 2 character gives you a skill level 2 in every engineering need on your ship. In MgT, Engineering is 5 different skills, so (but as one is electronics in CT, I'll see as 4 different skills for this example), to have level 2 for all your engineering needs you need 8 levels of engineering skill (in a single character or several ones).

 

[bjjones37]

... what? traveller is a setting that spans any conceivable world and tech level. any skill at all can be relevant to the game. one of my characters has bass guitar 2 and beer brewing 1.



't's how I see it - navigation == sensors, at least for civilians. the navy might separate them out, but that's getting fairly subtle.

Bass guitar might be fun but the other one would probably interfere with my travelling!