Level Up - Abilities, Skills, Talents

[LHWong]

Do we know how many points a character receives on a level up to distribute for skills, abilities and talents?

 

A search on the forum has not yielded anything on this.

[Enduin]

Talents on Even levels and Abilities on Odd levels. So 6 of each since the level cap is 12. But apparently some Talents can be gained via quest and NPC interactions, so you'll likely end up with more than 6. As for Skill points I think you gain 6 every level. 

[Suhiir]

Is there a max level for skills?

In theory even if you put 66 (1+2+3+4 ... +11 = 66) of your total of 72 skill points into a single skill you could get level 11 (not including free skill levels fron class/race/background).

So is 10 the max level for skills or is it open-ended?

[Diogenes]

When you start with skill bonuses they don't increase the amount of points you need to advance the skill. So for example you could make a Chanter with the Aristocrat background who would start with 4 in Lore but only need 1 skill point to boost that to 5.

[Suhiir]

When you start with skill bonuses they don't increase the amount of points you need to advance the skill. So for example you could make a Chanter with the Aristocrat background who would start with 4 in Lore but only need 1 skill point to boost that to 5.

Didn't know that.

Nice!

[Luckmann]

Yeah, it actually makes a huge difference. I made a post a couple of months ago that went through skills on lvlup and such, the theoretical "maximum".

But the fact that Bonus to Skills from Classes and Backgrounds do not count towards the cost of raising them is a huge modifier at higher levels. In that way, modifiers to skills are worth way more than the modifiers to Attributes on creation (since if you don't want that +Resolve for being human, you can just dump it and assign it somewhere else) unless you're specifically min-maxing (such as wanting the absolutely highest score in a specific attribute).
 
Edit: Found my post: http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/70192-skills/?p=1563726
 
 
 

The maximum level is fairly easy to calculate.

The +Skill from Background and Class doesn't add to the total for purposes of calculating skill costs, and skill costs are always the same as the current skill level (minus the modifiers from things like class and background).

That means that if we assume +4 to a Skill from Class (Let's say Wizard, for +2 Lore) and Background (Say, Aristocrat, +2 Lore), that means:

1st rank costs 1.
2nd rank costs 2.
3rd rank costs 3.
4th rank costs 4.
...etc.
 
You get 6 skill points per level, except level 1 (for some reason, but fair enough, given the + from Background and Class) and there's 12 levels.

That means a total of 66 Skill Points.

Meaning that if you chuck all of that (every single point) into a single skill, that's a skill level of 11, at an exact cost of 66.
 
+4 from Class and Background, that's an effective skill level of 15.
 
To answer your second question, we have no bloody clue. However, I would expect that based on the above math, it'd be unlikely to see any checks over 10. But that's just me. For my sake, I think it'd be amazing if they actually made a few checks here and there all the way up to 15, to reward those that will inevitably effectively gimp themselves by pouring everything they can into a single skill. Like schooling the hell out of someone with Lore or steal the declaration of independence with Stealth.
 
Edit: Also, as a completely separate note on Skills and Backgrounds... why on Earth are there 6 (!) different Backgrounds that give +2 Lore (Aristocrat, Artist, Clergyman, Mystic, Philospher, Scholar) a single one that gives +2 Survival (Colonist) and none for the other Skills (Stealth, Athletics, Mechanics).
 
Now, from a mechanical standpoint, it's only really relevant for min-maxing, and honestly I think it's probably better to start with a mixed bag of skills, because it'll likely be relevant longer (A difference between 1 and 3 likely matters more than a difference between 8 and 9 or more). But it is a really odd discrepancy.

Edit 2: And just to chime in, yes, you receive Abilities every odd (1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11) level and talents every even (2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12) level. Note that not everyone gets "Abilities", for some you simply get more spells to cast, or a new spell-level to utilize.

I still wish we'd get at least 1 Talent (perhaps restricted to Utility?) on Creation, and got some Skill Points to spend, to help flesh out a starting character concept, but such is life.

Edited March 17, 2015 by Luckmann

[Veevoir]

 

 

Edit: Also, as a completely separate note on Skills and Backgrounds... why on Earth are there 6 (!) different Backgrounds that give +2 Lore (Aristocrat, Artist, Clergyman, Mystic, Philospher, Scholar) a single one that gives +2 Survival (Colonist) and none for the other Skills (Stealth, Athletics, Mechanics).

 

This is also still very relevant. Suprised the numbers weren't changed/balanced (while eg. culture bonuses were in v480)

[Bazy]

 

 

 

Edit: Also, as a completely separate note on Skills and Backgrounds... why on Earth are there 6 (!) different Backgrounds that give +2 Lore (Aristocrat, Artist, Clergyman, Mystic, Philospher, Scholar) a single one that gives +2 Survival (Colonist) and none for the other Skills (Stealth, Athletics, Mechanics).

This is also still very relevant. Suprised the numbers weren't changed/balanced (while eg. culture bonuses were in v480)

 

Good question. I feel this is something that would take about 30 minutes to implement. On the other hand... MODS!