Knowledge Skills

This thought has been in my mind a while ever since I read a post about spending karma. The comment was raised of course you will be tougher after getting 50 points of karma I man what are you going to spend the karma on knowledge skills.

And that got me thinking. Why not spending it on knowledge some of my players have and I really feel I should make half the knowledge skills they have more useful in my games.

You have two street sams with the same ware and skills with one exception in skills.

One sammi we will call him Alpha has

Pistols 8

His only combat skill (prolly not but just for this example)

The other which we will call Beta has

Pistols 6
Vampire Lore 6 (this is a knowledge skill)

Now who should be the best at taking out a small group of vampires. Now I think its Beta, of course in my game I aren’t so sure it would be him.

So do people think it should be Beta and if so what can be done to give him the advantage I think he deserves.

No, I'd say that first player wouldn't know how to kill them,
but second one COULD know.

First one would be shooting till out of ammo, but second one would be using some vulnerabilities of vampires to really get them.

But I would substitute Knowledge vampires to Knowledge paracritters or something along those lines. Knowledge vampires is too specific and rarely usable.

Parabiology: Biology for magical sentient races.
Parazoology: Biology for magical critters.
Paravirology: magical viruses.

Remember HMHVV infected beings aren't really a new race, they are the victims of a virus.

GM can add "Vampire Lore" complimentary dice to lower the TN 'cause the character know more about vampires ; where to hit, how they act, they move, etc.

Knowledge Skill are very useful. I as a GM call for knowledge skill tests all the time. It really helps define what the characters know and what they don't as opposed to what the player might know, especially in the case of rules and stat lawyers!

Whenever I'm playing I'm constantly stopping myself saying more than I should because I know lots about the game (at least, i think i do), and glancing at my sheet looking for these skills really helps with that.

Don't get me wrong, I don't use it all the time, especially if its common IC knowledge. Eg, what's an insect spirit? Well, EVERYone would know about bug city. unless they had a specific relevant skill they might not know a lot, but they'll certainly know they kidnap people and that they took over downtown chicago for years before Ares gave them a kicking. But the character with the specialist skill could know about flesh forms and true forms, queens and mothers, nests and hives, etc.

But they can be added as complementary dice - not to reduce the target number as someone said above, but against the same target number, with every 2 successes adding to the main test so long as the main test gets at least one. all my players have one set of different coloured dice so they can just lump it in with the main test in one roll and compare easily in situations where they use them. And remember - ANY skill can be used as complementary, so long as it fits the situation and the GM deems it an appropriate time for other knowledge to have an impact. And the ability to add as complementaries is really cool. Never mind the roleplay aspects of it. Spend Karma on your Rockerys (Alpine) skill (I had a character do this in one of my games). the background skill isn't that expensive, karma wise, and if he ever wanted to run a sideline business (as he did!) then it is useful. It was also surprisingly useful when working out where things are hidden in that particular form of sculpted landscapes at corp facilities.

The whole point about them is to be creative. and that means in choosing what they are used for and how they apply as well, imho.

But if my players have run into something and have a need to know its vulnerabilities I have the character with the skill make a check to see if they know it. If they already definately know it then yeah, if it was relevant to shoot it in a particular place I'd let them have the skill, because they might be more able to recognise that spot in a live specimen. As always, just my thoughts, usual disclaimers apply...