Baldur's Gate : The Sword Coast Chronicles : NWN2 Persistent World

I have tried to find something relating to this but have so far been unable ... anyways!

The knowledge skills have been divided into 10 categories ... while i can understand this there are a few problems i see.

!. while i am all for RP builds ... ten is a staggering and unreal number of breakdowns ... you have to be a wizard with 30 intel to come close to utilizing any of it.

2. Bardic knowledge becomes all but useless.

3. -All- items that give knowledge skill points are automatically added to arcana ... and cannot be divided between the skills that you are trying to add points to.

4. IMO there should be a bonus when applying skill points to your char. in opposite proportion to say cross class skills?? ( you get 2 skill points for each skill point you take?)

The legend lore spell i see gives 10 points across the board ... which is nice. but still ... trying to divide skill points across a modest 3 different knowledge's ... an epic bard looks like an idiot


anyways .. those are my thoughts

paw wrote:!. while i am all for RP builds ... ten is a staggering and unreal number of breakdowns ... you have to be a wizard with 30 intel to come close to utilizing any of it.

The number of people with knowledge (even passing knowledge) of everything in the world are rare, indeed.

paw wrote:2. Bardic knowledge becomes all but useless.

Bardic Knowldege can be used in DM events as a chance to give knowledge of many different situations, as intended in PnP.

paw wrote:3. -All- items that give knowledge skill points are automatically added to arcana ... and cannot be divided between the skills that you are trying to add points to.

I believe Ras/D47 have this as a takeaway to address at a later date, but as of now, you're correct, there is no real way to get any bonuses from items to specific lore skills.

paw wrote:4. IMO there should be a bonus when applying skill points to your char. in opposite proportion to say cross class skills?? ( you get 2 skill points for each skill point you take?)

From a QC/Balance perspective I would be concerned that some would simply use this to put more points in Tumble, UMD, Spot/Listen, etc... However, perhaps if you elaborate on a plan to add skill points fairly and without allowing for 'power building' perhaps you can come up with an acceptable proposition.


In general, DM Golem and others have, in the past posted about the Lore skills and explained that, from a DC perspective that you really don't need to 'max' Lore to be really knowledgeable in it. For instance, If you had 15 points in a lore skill you would have approximately a 50% chance (not counting any modifiers) to know some of the most obscure minutia about the subject (DC: 25)... So really, if you are talking about having 3 lore skills you are really only 'losing' 12 skill points to have three at 15 vs. one at 33 and, frankly how fair was it for a Bard with 33 Lore skill to know EVERYTHING about Faerun, the planes, religion, etc.?

Just as an example, Liam, my epic bard, has full tumble, spellcraft, listen, perform, etc (all the "mechanically beneficial" skills plus some decently leveled extras like open lock, appraise, etc, and I still have 5/10 knowledge skills leveled to 15 (well one is 10 atm, but will be 15 next level).

Being well educated and well traveled is a part of his backstory, so I sacrificed some skills once lore got split to make that happen (he used to have full hide/ms too, for example). But I really didn't have to give up too much, and like it was mentioned earlier, Liam came away with a 50/50 shot of knowing the most obscure minutiae of 5 of 10 topics.

Point being, yes some things had to be shifted, and that is what the 100% RCR is for, but if you care about those skills you can prioritize them a bit more and make it happen.

A) Even with these knowledge skills, we still have less total skills than exist in PnP, and 10 extra levels that aren't used in most PnP campaigns already providing extra skillpoints for filling them out. The amount of points every class gets was designed from the start for this amount of skills.

B ) Maxing out skills is not essential, especially for knowledge skills (for which a DC of 30 is about the highest you should ever expect to get, making 20 ranks all you really need as you can then take 10 to hit 30 on every roll). It has been the case that some DMs have asked for rolls with absolutely atrocious DCs. That is the fault of the DM and not the number of skills, and as chad said above is something the staff is working on rectifying by encouraging DMs to give players reasonable DCs.

C) There already exists an in-game mechanism for increasing the number of skillpoints you get: Increasing your Intelligence score. If you feel you have too few skillpoints, then increase your Int.


I play a character with 10 int and I do not feel I am lacking in ability to put points into the skills I want. It has required some sacrifices, sure, but I don't feel obligated to optimize.

what i meant in item 4 was not to give bonus skills to be used anywhere ... but to just add an extra point or two to the knowledge skill you were taking.

oh .. i was also wrong about the spell legend lore ... it does not add knowledge at all ... it casts the spell 10 times declaring 10% each time ... but absolutely no advance in any knowledge at all.

and yes i agree also about the absurdity of the bards rolling 100 plus rolls and knowing everything ever written lol

chad878262 wrote:

paw wrote:3. -All- items that give knowledge skill points are automatically added to arcana ... and cannot be divided between the skills that you are trying to add points to.

I believe Ras/D47 have this as a takeaway to address at a later date, but as of now, you're correct, there is no real way to get any bonuses from items to specific lore skills.

Basically Arcana is the only one "flagged" as Lore at the moment so it's the only one that gets the bonuses from feats and spells. I belive that Chad is saying that there is a fix in the works that will enable feats and spells to be applied to all lore skills, not just Arcana.

I'm also pretty sure you can already claim use of Bardic Knowledge in DM events, since DMs will know this little mechanical quirk and be able to look past it.

only if we know to tell them?? which i guess i do now ... oh .. and bards skill song .. and greater heroism adds nothing either ... *shrugs*

It is a work in progress. It should be repaired by the time Crafting is enabled. Probably sooner.

On the verge of going off topic: which knowledge skill is used to identify items?

Lore: Arcana still works to ID stuff.