All right, I'll ask again...

[fruitsoftheforest]

I know this is a bit rulesy for this forum - forgive me for not adding something obscure yet interesting about Gloranthlore - but I've a basic question about how characters improve their skills. The pp 94-95 say you need improvement rolls from adventures/story/session to undertake either practise or research. Fine. What about a scholar learning a language or a cobbler making shoes? How do these skills get improved? Does the cobbler have to go on a shoe-making adventure or just fit a bit of cobbling in while he's a-fightin' and a-plunderin' with his friends and then use the improvement rolls he "gains" to polish his skills?

It was simple under RQ2 and bearable under RQ3 but MRQ suggests to me that the improvement that comes from your players' characters locking themselves away and practising has been done away with. Me no like.

Any useful house rules out there?

 

[philreed]

Why must NPCs improve in the same way as PCs? A GM should simply adjust/improve NPC stats to suit his needs.

Thinking that PCs and NPCs must play by the same rules is something that continues to confuse me.

 

[Quire]

Maybe you didn't get an answer previously because this doesn't need house-ruling.

Phil's right for NPCs of course. But, if you have PC cobblers (I've heard that it happens from time to time), or indeed scholars, they might find this - from the rules - quite handy.

Practise & Research
Practising or researching a skill generally takes one day per 10% the character already possesses in the skill.

Practise
All skills may be learnt through practise, except for Lore skills. Note that in the case of Runecasting and Advanced skills, the skill must be initially learnt before it can be practised.

Research
The following skills can be increased through research: Craft, Engineering, Evaluate, First Aid, Healing, Language, Lore, Mechanisms and Runecasting. Note that in the case of Runecasting and Advanced skills, the skill must be initially learnt before it can be researched.

Characters may apply a +10 modifier to the improvement roll when attempting to learn the a skill through research. This is an addition to the roll, not the skill.

Mentors
A mentor must have a score in the skill being taught that is at least double his student’s score in that skill.

The mentor must be present with the student for the entire practising or research period. Before the student makes their improvement roll, the mentor makes a skill test for the taught skill.

If the mentor’s skill test is a failure, then the student makes their improvement roll as normal.

If the mentor’s skill test is a success, then the student makes their improvement roll and applies a positive modifier to the roll equal to the mentor’s critical success range with the skill. Note that this is an addition to the roll, not the skill. In addition, if the student’s improvement roll results in a gain of 1D4+1 points, this gain is instead increased to 1D6+1 points.

Learning New Advanced Skills
In order to learn a new Advanced skill, the character must either be able to research it (in that it is both researchable and the relevant research material is to hand) or they must be taught it by a mentor.

It costs two improvement rolls to attempt to learn a new Advanced skill. The character immediately gains the new Advanced skill at the base score determined by the appropriate Characteristics. The character may now increase the skill normally through practice or research.

This is lifted right from the SRD. Hope it helps.

Your question, though, could be read as: why can't you 'earn' an Improvement Roll just through practise or research? In which case, I'd always be happy to negotiate this as a/with the GM.

- Q

 

[Rurik]

I had to read that section a few times but I am pretty sure that you are correct in that you need the Improvement Point to spend to increase a skill by study.

I think the intent is that Skills you use during an adventure or can practice on your own can be counted as trained, and you can use an improvement roll on them as long as you used it regularly (such as weapon skills, or Riding if you rode for the whole adventure). Skills you did not use or that need study must be practiced or researched to use an Improvement Point.

I for one am probably going to give out close to 4 IP's or so most adventures, and give some improvement rolls away - If for example the party spends a winter in the wilderness on a mountain they are all going to get a 'free' improvement roll in survival (if you consider freezing your balls off all winter and drinking bark tea 'free').

It is pretty easy to rule around it - just say the study rules do NOT require an IP. That would pretty much work the way RQ 3 did. Just maybe cut back on points awarded through the game.

I mean, if you really hate the new experience system, just go back to putting checks next to skills as you make them. I may end up doing that, but I am going to try the system as is first.

 

[weasel_fierce]

I rather like the new system, but I also adore the BRP system. So nyeh. Not sure yet

 

[Licheking]

Practise & Research
Practising or researching a skill generally takes one day per 10% the character already possesses in the skill.

Practise
All skills may be learnt through practise, except for Lore skills. Note that in the case of Runecasting and Advanced skills, the skill must be initially learnt before it can be practised.

Research
The following skills can be increased through research: Craft, Engineering, Evaluate, First Aid, Healing, Language, Lore, Mechanisms and Runecasting. Note that in the case of Runecasting and Advanced skills, the skill must be initially learnt before it can be researched.

Characters may apply a +10 modifier to the improvement roll when attempting to learn the a skill through research. This is an addition to the roll, not the skill.

Mentors
A mentor must have a score in the skill being taught that is at least double his student’s score in that skill.

The mentor must be present with the student for the entire practising or research period. Before the student makes their improvement roll, the mentor makes a skill test for the taught skill.

If the mentor’s skill test is a failure, then the student makes their improvement roll as normal.

If the mentor’s skill test is a success, then the student makes their improvement roll and applies a positive modifier to the roll equal to the mentor’s critical success range with the skill. Note that this is an addition to the roll, not the skill. In addition, if the student’s improvement roll results in a gain of 1D4+1 points, this gain is instead increased to 1D6+1 points.

Personally i apply the Practice times as a rule for research and downtime. So if someone wanted to research a book which could improve their skill up to 50% and they had 23% in it, then it would take 3 days before they earned the first improvement roll towards their skill. Assuming the improvement roll is higher than the skill then they add 1d4+1, assuming a 3 points are added, then the skill would be 26% now and it would take another 3 days before they can have another improvement roll on that skill. Taking an average it would likely take about 43 days to improve up to the 50% given by the source, this includes a couple of failures and only gaining a +1% on the improvement roll.

I use this rule whether they are using Mentors/Teachers, Practicing or actually working or researching from Scrolls or books, which improve skills, like those which used to appear in old Runequest scenarios. The same rules can easily be applied to Attributes as well, but using 2 days per point of the attribute. So Strength of 12 trying to improve to 13 would take 24 days.

 

[fruitsoftheforest]

Thanks team... I like your approach Licheking. This makes a lot of sense to me.

 

[RuneRiter]

Practise & Research
Practising or researching a skill generally takes one day per 10% the character already possesses in the skill.

Practise
All skills may be learnt through practise, except for Lore skills. Note that in the case of Runecasting and Advanced skills, the skill must be initially learnt before it can be practised.

- Q

Crafts (Cobbler, Blacksmith, etc) are an advanced skill based on the INT characteristic (I actually think it should be INT+DEX as most crafts would require some dexterity. Imagine the Apprentice Blacksmiths lament: - Hammer, nail, hammer, nail, hammer, thumb).

Craft can be increased by use (practise) so the apprentice above who begins with a skill of 10% (INT=10) can, the day after, attempt an increase roll. Failing he now has a skill of 11%. Two days later (11/10=1.1) he attempts another skill increase roll, and fails giving him a skill of 12.

528 days later, having never succeeding in a skill increase roll, he attains 100% mastery.

I would suggest an alternative to the +D4+1/+1 skill impovement would be: If the advance roll is greater than the current skill then the increase is D4+1 points, otherwise if the roll is greater than or equal to 100-INT then the increase is 1 point, otherwise no increase.

Now I've got that off my chest I'd say that any skill that you use for 8 hours (+) per day for days at a time at the exclusion of any other would merit an improvement roll (as specified).

The Improvement Roll points (awarded during/after adventures) should be used on one of the skills that was used during the adventure. I don't see how a GM could allow a riding/driving skill increase if the character walked everywhere or spent all of his time on a boat.

 

[Deleriad]

I must admit that it took me a while to realise that you have to have Improvement Rolls in order to advance in skills, characteristics and so on. At first I didn't like it and went back to something RQ3 like. Then I had a change of heart.

Phil Reed asked: why do NPCs and PCs have to follow the same rules? Part of the answer to that is that that was the whole point of RQ; it was an early attempt at unifying mechanics. PCs learned the same way as NPCs but tended to live fast and often die young due to getting lots of experience rolls and losing many limbs.

The simplest way to preserve that sense of unification is to say that PCs tend to rack up improvement rolls because they face danger. NPCs tend to get IRs more slowly and as a result of repeated, non-stressful situations and occasional moments when something odd happens in their life.

In character generation, PCs tend to get+50% from their profession. I've been working on the basis that this represents an average of 3 years. They also get +100% of other stuff to represent the fact that they have a life.

One thing to do then is to roughly calculate how many Improvement Rolls it would take to build a PC on average. Now starting PCs start with fairly low skills and you can maybe assume that 75% of early Improvement Rolls succeed and a success is an average of +3.5%, a failure is +1%. You could say then that 4 rolls net +11.5% in a skill. So a real rough rounding would say that one Improvement Roll is worth +3%. For argument's sake you could say that any profession which gives +5% to a skill equals 1 improvement roll, +10 = 3 rolls and +15 = 5 rolls. The higher the skill, the less on average an Improvement roll gives you.

Where I'm going with this is that you could roughly claim that in any given year, a person tends to generate the equivalent of 5 improvement rolls for their profession and 10 for their every day life. You could probably also say that most people simply aren't motivated enough to put more than 3 Improvement rolls to a single skill per year.

GMs with players who like a lot of maths could use Improvement Rolls in character generation rather than the straight add that exists presently. GMs could also use it to assess NPC strength. E.g. A grizzled 32 year old mercenary would have, say 14 years worth of Improvement rolls; a little spreadsheet stats would give an indication of the normal skill distribution you could expect.

The overall point is that you can use Improvement Rolls to abstract PCs and NPCs on the same playing field. PCs will generate more IRs because they live lives of danger. In addition, if you have a campaign with lots of down time passing, you can dole out downtime IRs that players can use to advance their characters. I would give them 1-2 a month.

 

[RosenMcStern]

Rurik & Deleriad, where did you get the impression that the Improvement roll you use while practicing a skill has to be one of the ones awarded by a GM at the end of an adventure? It seems rather clear to me that practicing / researching generates rolls, it does not "use them up"! Sure, the rules are not well written, but it is clear that the rule is "one day per 10% you have before you get a roll".

528 days later, having never succeeding in a skill increase roll, he attains 100% mastery.

Working as an apprentice does not mean you can achieve full dedication to practicing your craft. Your master is likely to be sending you around running errands instead of working at the forge with him. I would rule that all the time you devote to earning your living with your skill is not considered "practicing" it, just repeating the same old routines you already know without learning anything new - i.e. 0% increase.

The same goes if you are a soldier. 99% of the time you are running tedious patrols, not practicing swordsplay. Now if you have the money to live without working for some weeks and so practicing 8 hours a day that's another story.

 

[Utgardloki]

I've long used a variant of this idea for D&D games to assess how old NPCs are, given a character level. I think this can be a simple way to improve Runequest NPCs as the PCs improve.

Select NPCs have an "NPC stat" called Motivation. (NPC stats are stats that are rolled up for NPCs but not PCs.) Motivation determines how fast NPCs learn skills, so a highly motivated NPC will be younger than an NPC with the same level but lower motivation.

For runequest, it seems simple and right to consider an NPC's Motivation as the number of improvement rolls that NPC gets over the course of a game year. So if a cobbler has a Motivation of 12, he gets 12 improvement rolls a year, or one a month. Perhaps every other improvement roll is in cobbling, and the rest in other skills.

 

[Deleriad]

Rurik & Deleriad, where did you get the impression that the Improvement roll you use while practicing a skill has to be one of the ones awarded by a GM at the end of an adventure? It seems rather clear to me that practising / researching generates rolls, it does not "use them up"!

That's what I used to think and maybe it's what the rules are supposed to say but it doesn't appear to be what the rules say.
The rules state how you gain Improvement Rolls: through adventures
and
how you can spend IRs on research or practice.

As far as I can tell, if you gain 3 IRs from a session then you can't just spend them there and then. Instead you say that I'll spend 1IR on practising my sword skill. GM notes that your current skill is 76% so it'll take 8 days.

It does not seem to be the case that immediately after a session you can take 3IRs to improve sword skill three times straight away. Then go away and practice sword skill for 8 days in order to gain another IR from practice. Admittedly, the rulebook is far from clear in this case.

 

[badside bill]

It does not seem to be the case that immediately after a session you can take 3IRs to improve sword skill three times straight away. Then go away and practice sword skill for 8 days in order to gain another IR from practice. Admittedly, the rulebook is far from clear in this case

As i read it now it seems like you can. the only requirment for using improvementpoint on a skill is that you already knows it. allthough, i have to say it sounds strange to me.

when it comes to improving NPC`s skills i usually think of the setting the NPCs are in. if they join the adventurers on a quest, etc., they get the same conditions. if they don`t, i tend to think of what the NPC would do in the time when the adventurers was away and alter the NPC after my own imagination.

 

[RosenMcStern]

It does not seem to be the case that immediately after a session you can take 3IRs to improve sword skill three times straight away. Then go away and practice sword skill for 8 days in order to gain another IR from practice. Admittedly, the rulebook is far from clear in this case.

The paragraph about research clearly differentiates between the adventuring guy who is content with the extra experience he gains from adventuring and the researcher one, who likes to settle down for months and study. Note that if the rules were meant to be read as you read them, it would not be possible to research a skill for months: you would run out of IRs in a couple of weeks. A clarification is indeed needed, though.

Ah, the good old times when rules were written with the pedantic clarity of hex-based boardgame rules. They were boring, but they were non-ambiguous!

 

[Deleriad]

Ah, the good old times when rules were written with the pedantic clarity of hex-based boardgame rules. They were boring, but they were non-ambiguous!

Perhaps Mr Sprange could enlighten us.
Skill Improvement:
Do you need to have Improvement Rolls (IR) to spend in order to advance a skill or are Improvement Rolls a "bonus" that you get from adventuring?

Example: Rurik is 55% in Spear attack and wants to increase it. How many of the things below can he do:
# If he has 1 IR can he spend the IR and make the improvement roll immediately?
# If he has 1 IR does he have to practise for 6 days and then spend the IR to to make an improvement roll?
# If he doesn't have any IRs can he practise for 6 days and then make an Improvement roll?

 

[RuneRiter]

I agree that the apprentise theory requres a bit more work and you're right that the unfortunate would spend a lot of his time running errands but the reason he is there is to learn a trade so he has to be taught something. Whether he is trained for eight hours a day for two days or two hours a day for eight days he gets to make a "Skill Increase" roll. If he had to go on an adventure to earn the right to attempt an increase roll either the countryside would be swarming with apprentises looking for something to bash or there would be some very old apprentises.

I'm guessing a bit now because I haven't got the books to hand but in the earlier editions using a skill in an adventure allowed you a "Skill Increase" roll (for the skill) in the downtime after the adventure. In addition you were allowed to purchase training/research to allow you a subsequent "Skill Increase" roll. The limiting factor (to stop characters buying their way to 100%) was that you had to learn by experience (adventuring) between buying training/research.

It would be nice to get this sorted as I'm currently writing a NPC generator based on the character Culture and Profession tables in the Rulebook (with others to be added as I get the books). I've taken the stance that an 18 year old NPC would be created in the same way as a PC (although randomly) and would then get 1-3 oppurtunities to increase 1-3 skills per year (the 1st always going to his prime skill) with a chance to learn a new Advanced Skill, Weapon Skill, Magic Skill or even to increase a Characteristic.

 

[weasel_fierce]

To me, it seemed pretty clear that the practice / research rule was simply a way to "justify" spending an improvement roll on a skill you didnt use during play.

As far as NPC's ? Who says they dont have adventures or learn things. Maybe its slower than others, if they dont do much thats interesting, but the coppler making a large batch of extra fine shoes for a demanding noble is certainly on an adventure!

 

[atgxtg]

To me, it seemed pretty clear that the practice / research rule was simply a way to "justify" spending an improvement roll on a skill you didnt use during play.

As far as NPC's ? Who says they dont have adventures or learn things. Maybe its slower than others, if they dont do much thats interesting, but the coppler making a large batch of extra fine shoes for a demanding noble is certainly on an adventure!

Speaking of assumptions, why are you assuming that the cobbler is an NPC? The original post doesn't specify if the sample characters are PCs or NPCs. The part about a schlolar would be very important for a Gloranthan campaign, with Lhankor Mhy sages and such.

 

[weasel_fierce]

the talk above was about NPC's being different than PC's (which is pretty un-RQ in any event)

 

[Denalor]

Gee, I know I'm 2 years too late, but I can't seem to find the final ruling.
Has Deleriad's question ever been answered... officially?

Example: Rurik is 55% in Spear attack and wants to increase it. How many of the things below can he do:
# If he has 1 IR can he spend the IR and make the improvement roll immediately?
# If he has 1 IR does he have to practise for 6 days and then spend the IR to to make an improvement roll?
# If he doesn't have any IRs can he practise for 6 days and then make an Improvement roll?