How to describe his abilities?

[JMISBEST]

A player in another GM's Campaign has created A Character with A +3 Edu DM and choose Medic /1 as 1 of his skills

What The GM wants to know is what is the approximate real-life equivalent of A Character with A +4 Medic DM, but A Medic Skill of only /1 and as she is a veteran player but only a 1st time DM of Traveller and all of her players are complete rookies she and they want both advise on how to roleplay this character and, out of curiosity what the real-life equivalent of the characters(a female Pc played by a male player) abilities are and being too busy converting Traveller scenarios and scenario ideas from 80's and 90's magazines to modern Traveller to help, but not wanting to disappoint a friend want your help or advise or both. Can you please help

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

That's a bit tough...

I would say it is someone with a LOT of book learning, but only some practical experience. They know how to do a heart transplant IN THEORY, but have never actually done one. A book worm or academic, not an actual surgeon.

Remember, many of the Medic checks will be DEX based, not EDU based, so that high EDU score won't really help. That goes back to someone that has the book memorized, but hasn't actually done a lot of hands-on work.

Don't forget that Medic-1 is likely someone with some experience, but not an expert. They ARE competent in this skill, but most of their expertise is theoretical.

Hope that helps!

 

[Condottiere]

Biology, human.

 

[steve98052]

I'd say that the Medic-1 side of things is a few years (two to four, depending on intensity) of medical practice, including combat or emergency medic, nursing, pharmacist, medical student far enough along to be doing procedures, and possibly a few other types of medical workers.

The education bonus -- the +3 means Education 15, right? -- means lots and lots of formal education or other learning, like they've read the book on everything they know anything about. With even Medic-0, such a character would be a walking medical encyclopedia. If they also have Engineering (Jump)-0, they know all the latest theory of Jump space (though even at TL15 the theory is mostly, "We know how to achieve Jump-6, but we're not sure why it works."), even if they only have basic skills in how to do actual repairs and maintenance. With Streetwise-0, they know just about everything published about criminal and gray economy for their home region, even if they're a novice at actually interacting with shady folks. And so forth.

 

[locarno24]

Exactly. Intelligence is figuring things out yourself, awareness, and mental ability. EDU is your general level of "background reading" - it's not tied to a single skill, so it implies the sort of "knows random facts about everything " individual who's a priceless asset in a pub quiz...

I'd agree on Medic-1. Skill tier 1 generally means basic professional training plus a couple of years experience. So you're not going to be discernably more skilled than any other junior doctor at any given practice, or when operating in a completely unknown environment, but they've applied their voracious appetite for learning to their career.


It basically boils down to how you use skill checks. Any skill can be used with any characteristic, depending on what you're trying to represent.

Medic+DEX - "surgeon's steady hands" - the act of trying to cut a growth from a blood vessel wall without actually piercing said wall with the blade.
Medic+INT - "diagnosis" - spotting a critical (but non-obvious) symptom on a chart, reacting to the unexpected behaviour of an unknown pathogen
Medic+EDU - "research and planning" - trying to match symptoms with known, possible causes, or trying to identify an existing medical procedure that could save someone

Obviously, whilst he is competent at all of them with Medic-1, he specialises in the latter.

 

[JMISBEST]

I forgot to mention that he always use The Edu stats DM due to a rules change so that depending on the situation any doctor, not just A Pc, always uses, depending on the siruation, the highest DM out of either Dex and Int, Dex and Edu or Int and Edu

 

[legozhodani]

How very convenient.

 

[Condottiere]

I'd be careful with using Education as a jack of all trades mental skill.

 

[hivemindx]

I consider the stat component of a skill check to be the character's raw talent and the skill part to be their training.

Someone with Medic 1 and an EDU DM+3 could be thought of as a person who came out of med school a far better doctor than the average student. They worked long hours, they finagled their way in to assisting in surgeries, they read the journal of exotic xeno pharmacology for fun. They are one of the interns on House. They may not be as good as an average student who has had 20 years experience but are probably not far off.