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BasicSkills

Page history last edited by Bruce Mason 13 years, 11 months ago

This page gathers together all the basic skills in RQ.

ReQuest::Skills::Common Skills

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Athletics (STR+DEX)

This broad skill covers a range of athletic activities useful to adventuring characters. It is most commonly used in combat when performing attacking maneuvers that require fast or complex movements. (Defensive maneuvers of that type usually use acrobatics). For Humans, Athletics includes the following actions:

  • Jump
    • A successful Athletics/Jump test allows a character to jump up to twice his own height horizontally or up to half his own height vertically, if he has at least five metres to run first. If he is making a standing jump, these distances are halved. Penalties for jumping Athletics tests can be accrued by trying to jump further. A cumulative –20% penalty is bestowed for every extra metre the character is trying to jump. A maximum of +1 metre can be added this way
    • A successful Athletics/Jump test will reduce falling damage by 1d6 or let the faller choose the location(s) damaged by the fall (both on a critical). This does not stack with any other skill that lets a user reduce falling damage.
  • Climb. Climbing caps all DEX-based skills while climbing. Given enough hand and footholds, a character can climb any climbable surface given enough time without the need for a test. Under normal circumstances, a character can climb or descend one quarter of their Movement as a Combat Action. A character can double the rate of his climb or descent by taking a –20% penalty on his Climb test.
  • Lift/push. Allows the character to life, move, tip etc more weight than usual. Note that the amount a character can normally affect this way is a function of its STR and SIZ. The athletics skill measures his ability to use his strength and coordination more effectively than normal.
  • Run. A character can use this action to increase his MOV rating by 1 for 1 Combat Round.
  • Swing. You can do the Tarzan thing. Often useful for swinging on chandeliers and so on.
  • Throw. You can throw things. 

 

Culture (INT*2)

Each character knows the basic facts about their own culture, history and traditions. It encompasses knowledge about appropriate ways to behave, the law of the land and local customs. Characters may know a little about neighbouring cultures but the cultures of far away peoples and places are advanced skills that must be learned separately.

 

Drive (DEX+POW)

In a fantasy milieu, many humans at some point have driven a horse and cart or equivalent. Vehicles such as chariots, stage coaches, dog sleds and so on will, however, be advanced skills to most characters.

 

Evade (DEX*2)

The Evade skill is used to avoid incoming objects that are swung or thrown at the character.  Evade can also be used as a resistance skill against certain types of magical attack that can be avoided by getting out of the way quickly.

 

Evaluate (INT+CHA)

The Evaluate skill enables the character to determine the value placed on something by others, effectively guessing its market value. Particularly common or obscure objects might give a bonus or penalty to the test but success will allow a character to guess the average monetary value of the object (normally guessing accurately to within 10% of its actual value). If trying to guess the value of an object to a different race or species (e.g. how much is that dung worth to a troll?) then the GM may use the lore (species) skill as a CAP or assign a negative modifier.

 

Insight (INT+POW)

This skill allows the user to accurately gauge the intentions of another person. When used across species, there should be a -20 to -80* modifier to reflect the alienness of the other and/or a lore(Species) skill can be used as a cap. Characters can specialise in other species Insight (Troll), Insight (Dragonewt) etc. An Insight test can be used to predict how the person would react under circumstances.

 

In most cases, people are happy to communicate their intentions so this test is not needed. It is only needed if the person is trying to keep its intentions guarded. It can be resisted with an Influence skill or Deceit skill (such as Disguise).

 

First Aid (INT+DEX)

A character may apply First Aid to itself, though there is a –10% penalty. First Aid requires the use of specialist materials. Characters with Survival skills may be able to find useful natural substitutes while in the wild. Without appropriate materials, any first aid skill will be either impossible or very difficult (-40%) at the GM's discretion. First Aid performed on a different species to the first aider will have a modifier of -20% to -80% depending on how different the other species is. A GM may rule that treating an alien species is either impossible or has a 50/50 chance of making the situation worse.

First Aid Actions

Treatment Effect Time Taken
Remove Impalement A successful First Aid test removes the impaling item without causing damage to the victim. Fumble: patient takes 1D3 damage to location and the item remains impaled. 1d4+1 combat Actions
Revive from Unconsciousness A successful First Aid test can revive a character from unconsciousness, though drugged patients may inflict a penalty on the First Aid test. Fumble: patient takes 1d3 damage to head. 1d4+1 Combat Actions
Treat Injury

A successful First Aid test on a location suffering from a minor injury will regain 1/2 of that location's normal Hit Points. On a critical success, all the location's HPs are regained. (HR)

A successful First Aid test on a location suffering from a serious injury will regain 1 Hit Point or, if a critical success half of that location's normal Hit Points. However, First Aid cannot turn a serious injury into a minor injury so it cannot increase the Hit Points of seriously injured location to above 0 HPs from below 0 HPs. (HR)

Both uses of First Aid can be only be attempted once per injury (regardless of whether it succeeds or fails) and must be attempted within 5 minutes of the injury. If another injury occurs, First Aid can be attempted again but it cannot regain more HPs than the new injury has inflicted.

In both cases, a fumble means that the patient takes 1d3 damage to the treated location.

1d4+1 Combat Actions
Staunch bleeding

A successful First Aid test on an injured location will stop all bleeding in that location. If a patient is suffering from a major injury in the bleeding location then the location is stablised.

Fumble: patient takes 1d3 damage to location.

1d4+1 Combat Actions

 

The treat injury action can only be tried on each injury once regardless of whether it succeeds or fails. The other actions can be repeated as required but GM's may decide to impose cumulative penalties for repeated failures.

 

Realism. The First Aid rules presume a generic, Western understanding of medicine - something which particular cultures might not share nor to have learned. Consequently, you may wish to make some of the actions unavailable or only available as advanced skills.

 

Infection. It's not much fun to roleplay infection.

 

Influence (CHA*2)

Influence tests are normally opposed by the Perception, Persistence or another’s Influence skill and are modified by how much a character is trying to change an opponent’s mind. Various specialisms exist that allow characters to attempt more complex influence attempts. Each of these can be taken as an Advanced Skill in order to achieve greater successes.

  • Fast Talk label (deceit) Relies on speed. The fastest way to change someone's mind.
  • Oratory An appeal to the emotion: best skill for persuading crowds. Capped by the language used.
  • Seduce The best skill for keeping someone influenced for long periods of time. Seduction can be sexual but can also represent worming your way into someone's favour (think Wormtongue and Theoden).
  • Courtesy This is a skill of courtly influence. It shows "good breeding" and knowledge of the intricate schemes of the nobility. Anyone from a low social background (i.e. not a noble) has a vast minus at this skill.
  • Diplomacy Used for political reasons it represents the knowledge of which political pressure points can be manipulated to your own ends.
  • Debate label: (Reasoning). Used in academic debates where there is a focus on logic and rationality. It is an appeal to the intellect rather than the emotion.
  • Intimidate Used to bully (or resist bullying).

 

Language (INT+CHA)

In a fantasy milieu this only includes the spoken (or equivalent for non-human species) language. Reading and writing must be learned as the advanced skill of Literacy. Languages come in families so GM's may allow speakers of one language to understand speakers of a related language at a certain minus. Each language is, however, a separate skill.

 

Lore - Own Region (INT*2)

The Lore skill is used to refer to several different skills, each of which must be improved separately. The only basic Lore skill is Lore (Own Region). This skill is represents general knowledge about the flora, fauna, landscape and weather of the local area. 

 

Perception (INT+POW)

Perception skills are used to represent the senses of the character when detecting objects or other characters. Humans have two common perception skills that are often used by characters: Look and Listen. Characters can also use the perception base skill (INT+POW) for taste, touch and sniff but can't generally train them without specialist knowledge. Characters can specialise in a specific sense in order to gain greater benefits.

Specialisms may include for example, Look, Listen, Taste, Smell, Touch, Earthsense (but only usable by those who have the earthsense trait).

 

Persistence (POW*2)

This reflects a character's ability to concentrate under duress, to remain focused and so on. It is used as a measure of willpower and ability to resist certain types of magical attack.  

 

Resilience (CON*2)

This is a physical counterpart to Persistence. It represents a character's ability to endure pain, hardship, survive poison and some types of magical attack.

 

Ride (DEX+POW)

In a fantasy milieu most characters will have ridden a horse, donkey, mule etc at some point so Ride is considered to be a basic skill when referring to common riding animals. In some Nomadic cultures, other types of riding animals may be more common than hosrses. Similarly some species may ride different animals as basic skills. For example, trolls can ride beetles as part of their basic skill but horses are beyond them, the wasp riders of The Stormwalk Mountains ride - as the name suggest - giant wasps as a basic skill. On the other hand, dwarfs never ride so Ride is an advanced skill for them.

 

No skill check is needed while the user is riding a trained animal under normal circumstances. Ride skills can be used to bring a panicking animal under control or make it do something it otherwise would not want to. Ride cannot be used to force an animal to enter a battle of any type unless the animal is specially trained to do so.

 

Sing (CHA+POW)

A successful test with this skill will result in the audience being pleased by the character’s performance. Characters can specialise in different types of singing.

 

Sleight (DEX+CHA)

This skill is used to hide or take objects, without drawing attention. It is usually opposed by a Perception test if trying to avoid getting caught. Characters can specialise in pick-pocketing or hiding objects.

 

Stealth (DEX+INT)

A Stealth skill is used whenever a character attempts to personally evade detection by another character. This usually happens when a character either tries to move quietly past an enemy, hide from one or performs a combination of both. Stealth tests are opposed by the Perception skill and are modified according to the situation. Characters can specialise in either hide (the art of not being seen) and sneak (the art of not being heard). Characters with other senses can also specialise in being undetected by those senses (e.g. Stealth-Darksense.)

 

Swim (STR+CON)

 

Unarmed (STR+DEX)

This skill covers all unarmed combat from simple brawling to grapples to Marquess of Queensbury rules fisticuffs. Punches, kicks, head-butts and all other unarmed attacks do 1D3 points of damage. This skill can also be used to attack someone with whatever is at hand. An improvised weapon used in this way generally does 1D4 damage. Unarmed attacks have a size and reach based on the SIZ of the creature. Generally, each 20 SIZ is one step in size and reach. So a SIZ 46 creature is likely to have siz M and reach M.

 

 

 

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