Complementary skills and higher TNs, It don't work right Options

[Lilt]

It strikes me that the current rules make complementary skills all-but useless when it comes to tns of 6+. meaning that, for example, the perception specialisation of stealth helps you to spot poorly hidden people, but not well hidden people.

What do people think of either adding 1/2 the complementary skill to the base skill or using the complemenary skill to provide TN minuses?

[Sphynx]

Forgive my non-canon belief here, but here's how I see Complimentary skills.

Complimentary skills are for style/fleshout/etc. They make a character more rounded out (which is why you don't see Active skills for Exotic Cooking). They're not intended to provide a real 'mechanics' bonus, and the current rules for Complimentary dice does just that. It gives just enough of a bonus that you can gain some minor bonus, but mostly just express your character into numbers. In our game, we never spend karma on knowledges, or roll knowledge skills. We just get told to add 1 to a knowledge as long as it doesn't take that knowledge over X (Determined by GM).

So, no, I don't like the suggested ruling, as it turns complimentary skills (primarily knowledges) into active skill, which isn't the perceived intent of the skills.

Sphynx

[Siege]

I already do the first -- just cause it's simpler. As of yet, I haven't had a problem and I find it streamlines game play. Although I haven't had a chance to implement it into a standard game.

As to the second, I like the mechanical structure _but_ the logic doesn't work well. If you want to knock down target numbers, I'd advocate the idea of spending karma to do so -- it makes more sense than using the comp skill.

Just my two shells.

-Siege

[Ol' Scratch]

Alternatively, you could keep it at a static target number of 4, but limit the amount of successes you can gain to as many as you gain with the default skill. So if the actual TN is like 12 or something, chances are you might score a single success on the main test. So when you go to roll your Complimentary Skill of 6, even if you get successes (for a total of +3), you only get to add one success to the roll.

Just an idea. Not sure how it'd work in practice.

[Siege]

The problem I have with that is: why?

Why would the the TN for the comp skill be fixed when the TN for the primary skill could be astronomical?

I'll grant that as a game mechanic it works just fine, but the logical reason behind it just doesn't fly for me.

If anything, the comp skill would have a higher TN because it doesn't directly relate to the problem at hand.

-Siege

[Ol' Scratch]

Because the Complimentary Skill is just providing knowledge; you're not actively trying to shoot that impossible-to-make shot with it, you're not actively using it to fast talk your way past the guard, and you're not using it to plant that bomb in just the right spot. Instead, you know what you need to do to make that shot, you know what to say to get past the guard, and you know what to look for when planting that bomb.

Knowing what you need to do is a lot easier than actually doing it.

[Siege]

[Dende]

That is like asking someone...let's say a professor of Children's literature...a 6 or 7 in knowing about it, only a 2 in writing themselves, if that... Sure knowing how to write it helps, but experience in writing it yourself works better.

Another example...I am phenomal with math and geometry, in pool I can find angles like nothing, but i can't hit them for shit. Whereas if I could hit them well but didn't know where they were I would have a whole nother problem.

More accurately in terms of game mechanics...you have physics/geometry/trig skills at 4 and a pistols of 2. you get to roll a complementry well, and probably can find the line between 8 guys, some boxes, and your mother, to hit a spellcaster hiding in the back... but if you only have a pistols of 2, how well can you actually hit that line?

[Siege]

[Ol' Scratch]

[Dende]

I also have to point out something...
Not always is it easier to know how to do something than to do it. Can you tell me bit by bit how your computer processes data? I doubt many can here...but how many can install their own harddrive, or build their own computer? probably dozens.
Depending on how detailed you get, knowing and doing are seperate, not always easier or harder, but are often totally unrelated at an in depth layer.

[Ol' Scratch]

What does that have to do with anything? I don't remember suggesting, even remotely, that people without a Complimentary Skill (let alone a Background Skill which I don't normally allow as Complimentary Skills; see below) are incompetent sods. For example, a person with Computers B/R 3 shouldn't have any trouble installing most components. They're just not as good at installing it as the guy with Computers B/R 3 and Hardware Installation 6 or Computer Engineering 6 is. At best, the latter will just shave a little time off the process (since that's about all extra successes do in such situations). To me that makes a lot of sense. The latter doesn't need to keep referencing his manual or spend as much time troubleshooting or finding the right connectors/slots/whatever.

Also, even if the active skills TN is lower than 4, the Complimentary Skill is always stuck at 4 with this proposal. So while a task may be a snap (TN 2), the Complimentary Skill is still being done with a 4 if you even bother rolling it.

Regarding Background Skills, in my mind they just represent a different aspect of Active Skills. Background: Pistols just means you know what the different types of pistols are on sight, what their specifications are, how much you can expect to sell one for, who the manufacturer is, and all that jazz. It doesn't help at all when trying to make a really tricky shot, though.

[Zazen]

The explanation "it's easier to know than to do" breaks down when you consider the use of a knowledge skill with another skill complimentary to it. In that case it becomes "easier to know something else than to know the primary thing", which doesn't make much sense to me.

[Siege]