Hacking 2e: Skills and the Nonweapon Proficiency System – Part 7 (Coda)

Surprise. The write-up on alignment is taking a bit longer than I anticipated, life is being life, and I really like the idea of having 7 parts (a la Rod) over just 6. So, consider this a coda to the preceding series.

The rules laid out in the prior post detail a division of use: passive and active. Active is boilerplate and unsurprising; if a skill would come into play, and the task has a chance of failure for one so trained, then an Ability check occurs without penalty or restriction. Passive is seemingly simpler, in that it gives the character auto-success features, but I think it’s the more interesting function of these skills. Whereas active use may be more exciting and even dramatic, the passive use guarantees a more open and reactive world, while cementing a given character’s identity.

Let me explain through two other games.

Hacking 2e: Skills and the Nonweapon Proficiency System – Part 6 (Final Skill List)

I’ve spent the past 5 weeks looking at all of 2e’s varied skill systems, mostly focusing on the Nonweapon Proficiencies. I have tried to rein in overpowered skills, boost weak ones, and cut the fat wherever possible. This has resulted in a list of five Rogue-only skills, three universal skills, an optional background skill system, and ten optional NWP-derived ability skills. These are in addition to skills provided by demihumans and by specific classes.

I’ve already reviewed the demihuman skills, though the following rules will require that I adjust those skills. The Rogue skills and class skills are a matter for another post. Today, I shall hammer out universal, background, and ability skills.

Hacking 2e: Skills and the Nonweapon Proficiency System – Part 5 (Roguish Skills and Survival)

Last time, I threw most of the reviewed Nonweapon Proficiencies over the side of the ship. For this final review of the NWPs, we’ll look at Thief-adjacent NWPs and the Survival skills.

Hacking 2e: Skills and the Nonweapon Proficiency System – Part 4 (Feats and Riding)

Last entry, I pared down a few more Nonweapon Proficiencies into Animal Handling, Performance, Direction Sense, and Healing. I only got halfway through the list of feat-like NWPs, so let’s finish those off first.

My numbering has gone sideways due to this split. Part of this is Part 2 of Part 3, and starts at 3.6. Forgive me.

Hacking 2e: Skills and the Nonweapon Proficiency System – Part 3 (Animals, Art, and Feats)

The last post established the background feature – allowing the Secondary Skills system to directly interface with Nonweapon Proficiencies – and tossing all the other ‘career’ NWPs. I also took skills related to knowledge, scrapped language/literacy NWPs, condensed the list, and bundled it under a general Knowledge skill. I pulled Religion out of the pile to remain a separate skill.

Let’s move on to the animal stuff.

Hacking 2e: Skills and the Nonweapon Proficiency System – Part 2 (Background and Knowledge)

Last time I opined about the varied skills systems in AD&D 2e and discussed how to bundle them into a single system. The takeaway was that every check outside of Ability Checks and Saving Throws could be considered a Skill Check, broken up into universal skills, class/demihuman skills, and selectable skills. The latter will be my focus for this post, as I work to modify the Nonweapon Proficiencies to function properly in this hack.

Hacking 2e: Skills and the Nonweapon Proficiency System – Part 1

Skills are often paraded as a dividing line between old-school play and the modern implementation of D&D. 2nd Edition sits on this line, providing an optional system of skills that encompass everything from trade skills and areas of study to proto-3e feats. These skills were titled ‘Nonweapon Proficiencies’, as they were the non-weapon version of the weapon proficiencies, though the only conclusion I can make as to why they weren’t just called ‘skills’ is likely because a) they didn’t want a skill system even thought they made one anyway, and b) they didn’t want to conflate it with the skill system they already had in the Thief class.

Well, let’s ruin that completely by smashing them into one system.