Using Skills

There are many different skills that may be learnt, these include most of the abilities of each class. Only the special classes where a character must serve a specific god have abilities which cannot be learnt elsewhere.

Although most people within the land follow an apprenticeship graduating to be a tradesman or master in one profession there will always be characters who fall outside the normal rules, those who for one reason or another had multiple masters from different professions and even more rarely those whose master themselves was proficient in many things. Due to the nature of adventurers it is inevitable that more than their fair share come from these backgrounds; often it is this impetus that leads them to the adventuring life and eventually if they survive to teach others.

Your skill ability

The skills are based upon an attribute such as agility to which your training level and any secondary attribute bonus is added. This total becomes your current skill.

Skills Checks

Whenever a skill needs to be used a skill attempt must be made to determine how well you performed that particular time. The skill attempt result is your base ability plus a random modifier. If the performance is equal to or above the difficulty then the attempted action was successful.

A skill modifier is generated by rolling a 2d8 and adding your skill level and the appropriate primary attribute plus 1/2 any secondary attribute). Ssecondary attributes only count as half value rounded down (not towards zero so -0.5 gets rounded down to -1).

2d8 + attributes

The difficulty of any attempt is decided by the DM at the time according to the conditions and the skill being used.

Characters may use a hero point to roll an additional die (d10).

Planning

If you have a few minutes to spend planning out an action then you can make a planning check with the skill you will be using but using your intelligence instead of the normal skill. The success level is the bonus / negative to your skill attempt.

Thus you would figure out the best route up a cliff or how to approach a dangerous trap that you know exists. It normally only applies to one action of a single character, unlike the tactics skill which can give bonuses to eveybody.

Fumbles / Bodges

If all 1s are rolled that is a bodge, automatically fails and something minorly bad will occur, no hero points may be used to affect a bodge

In addition there is a chance that the character might fumble causing something more serious to happen. This might be anything from automatically losing the next initiative to tripping backwards over a cliff. The chance of a major bodge is reduced as expertise is increased.

Roll your lower than your skill level + skill attribute on a d10 to avoid a major disaster.

Note :

If unskilled then only 1 die is rolled and a bodge occurs on a 1. If a hero point is used then all 3 dice (or 2 if unskilled) must be a 1 for a bodge. If a bodge does occur when a hero point is used then the HP is not consumed.

Flukes

If a Double 8 is rolled that is a fluke and an additional d8-1 may be rolled and added. Keep rolling as long as you roll another 8.

Exhaustion

Exhausted characters only roll 1d8 instead of 2d8 for skill checks.

Unskilled

Many skills require you to have had some form of basic training before an attempt can be made; These cannot be used without at least Level 1 in the skill.

Actions for skills which do not require training may be attempted by untrained characters using only 1d8.

Some weapon skills bear a resemblance to other skills you may already know, even untrainied you may use the skill bonus of the related skill but roll only 1d8.

Difficulty

An apprentice will have a skill level of 1-3, a journeyman 4-6 and a master 7+.

The chance of performing a task is based upon its difficulty for an apprentice of level 1 with a primary attribute of 1

Difficulty	Target roll (2d8)	% success
No brainer	3	98
Easy	9	77
General	11	56
50 / 50	12	44
Tricky	14	23
Formidible	17	5
Ridiculous	19	1
Impossible	21	0

Certain skills require a success level to be generated, this is the amount by which a target roll was exceeded or failed.

Difficulty Modifiers

Situation	Skill Modifier
Rain / Ice	-2
Dark/Gloomy	-2
Lighted	-4
Blind	-6
Higher ground	+1
Hasted	+2
Slowed	-2
Stunned	no attempt

 

Multiple actions

Characters may attempt to perform multiple actions in a round typically striking an opponent. in these cases then they are not taking the best opportunity in the round but trying to get in a quick blow early and follow up with a second later. This causes them to suffer a penalty on the skill but gain a better chance of striking first.

Roll an initiative die for each action

Each skill action is at -3 for every additional action in the round

e.g.

2 actions : Both are taken at -3 skill level

3 actions : All are taken at -6 skill level

Any hero points used apply to one roll only. If a bodge is rolled no more actions may be attempted that round regardless of how many had alrady been attempted.

Multiple people / tries

Multiple tries

If an action is attempted multiple times there is a bonus to the number skill result generated.

The number of tries to get a +4 bonus is randomised (to prevent chartacters knowing how long something will take).

Ron tries to pick a lock, he has time for 4 attempts and a skill of +2. Unfortunately the DM rolls (d8+3 = 5) so the 4 attempts only count as a +2 bonus. His total skill roll is 2+2=4. After this point he gives up as the gurads are due back.

Adding helpers

Adding helpers is like having multiple tries at a task, each helper counts as an additional attempt.

There will be a limit to the number that can help depending upon the activity. All characters whose own skill is not within two points of yours act as a single additional helper between them.

It will also depend upon the task, two thick fighters combined do not have the intelligence of a mage, they are just two fighters without a clue.

Combined strength tasks

Attempting to move heavy objects or similar tasks is different. In that case the first extra character adds +2 plus their strength bonus to the strongest character, each additional character take a -1 penalty to their help

example

Characters of strength 3,2,2,1

Total strength when lifting a portcullis is

Character 1 = 3

Character 2 = 2 + 2

Character 3 = 1 + 2

Character 4 = 0 + 1

Total strength = 3+2+2+1+2+0+1 = 11

This is not a normal skill check but simply a check of the combined strength against the difficulty. A random factor is introduced by running a straight 2d8 check against a difficulty of 9 and adding the success level to the roll.

Speeding up tasks

If characters split up a task to perform it more quickly (such as search for secret doors) then the skill to use is randomly selected from a character with a bonus of +1 as there is probably some overlap or the better characters help the weaker ones.

e.g.

Fred, George and Ron search for secret doors, their Spot scores are 1, 1, 2. There is one secret door to be found. George is the character in the correct location so his current skill is 1 +1 =2 as he benefits from his brothers' help