Hoihe wrote:
Fun fact. 0 in a social skill is called being average. 1 in a social skill means you actually either received training from a mentor, studied source material to teach yourself or went out of your way to obtain a skill without training, to the point that it is now considered trained.
The average Adept working as an actual chancellor in some noble's court won't surpass level 3, level 5 if they have a lot of experience. Level 5 is 3 + 5 + charisma. An actual professional will have at most 10 points in a social skill (if they were born awfully suave)!
Okay, you say, let's double their levels since BGTSCC and not P&P. That makes our senior professional diplomat level 10, with 3 + 10 charisma. Let's assume 12 base charisma, with +2 points in charisma and a +1 magical item, and they have 16 diplomacy. This dude is the top of his craft in the commoner world. A PC will surpass them, sure, but again - the normal amount of diplomacy a random joe has is 0. If you so much as have a single point in it means you have an education of sorts.
This is not true. Social skills are not considered 'trained only'. You are comparing these to rogue skills like open lock, or find trap, which have a segment that says 'trained: yes', meaning it is only acquired on actual training, which social skills are not considered to be since they are well, social, and not limited to ONLY particular roles, and any character with a charisma (even of 12, +1 modifier, which 12 is also within normative commoner values). This means a level 1 commoner with no social skill invested and 12 charisma would benefit from a +1 to a roll, possibly receiving a roll of 21.
In some instances, commoner being a class it does not get any social skills to invest points into. However, in certain handbooks, there a plenty of other classes to represent 'basic' jobs of NPCs, such as a shopkeep, merchant, noble, farmer, trapper, guard etc etc so on and so forth. These classes do sometimes permit social skills as investing skills, but social skills are not required to be 'trained' in order to be invested into, although it would be more likely to be seen on an NPC 'courier', or a 'messenger' sent as a dignitary, it need not specifically be a high level noble to have a considerable skill. NPC's can be retired adventurers, and not all characters with high stats TO be adventurers would have taken to the profession, it is perfectly plausible and acceptable to see an NPC with 18 charisma that ended up in the local militia as a low level guard soldier due to being conscripted at a young age during a time of war. Even a level 1 in perform cross classed could represent military drilling cadence, which would be obtained through drilling (thus training), or reflective of a persons natural ability to lead, leading to them becoming an inspiration and leader to their men as they became a level 5 sergeant, with some amount of diplomacy required when reporting up the chain of command or issuing orders. Simple example that could easily provide (perhaps with a badge and a banner bearer in tow to increase morale) 5 ranks +4 charisma +4 skill check from banner bearer to be a minimum of 13 in a social skill on a sergeant in command of 10 low level soldiers, leading to 'leadership' rolls of 14-33. Un-buffed with magic, at level 5.
A senior professional diplomat would have a much higher skill than this. They spend their time specifically being a diplomat, every single day, as their profession. They may not have the HD or the feats a well rounded adventurer would, but that doesn't mean Mr Bard PC is going to walk into a noble house, roll a diplomacy of 80 and PWN everyone inside. Quite the contrary. However, Mr Bard would exceed at a multitude of adventuring scenarios outside of this specialty and be able to take a hit or three, senior pro diplomat would fold if the wind blows too hard. This doesn't mean they suck at what they do, quite the contrary.
NPC classes also enjoy certain feats that are specifically available only the commoner classes, and could easily enjoy a feat such as 'professional dignitary' that would lend them considerable bonuses to their diplomacy skill because it's what they specialize in, and we as adventuring PC's do not.
This also does not mean that the average commoner has a skill of 0, by any means. There would be plenty of level 1 commoners with 12-14 charisma or wisdom (again, 12 to 14 slightly above), who would easily enjoy a skill of 1-2 in any of the social skills without a single point invested. Are they going to be wheelin' and dealin the great world at large? No. This does not mean they don't know how to lie, tell a large tale, repeat a rumor, or figure out if the travelling merchant is trying to swindle them. Quite the contrary.
