Professions and Training
Over the course of our three year campaign, I homebrewed a wide variety of content for my players to enjoy. Among them were what I call the profession skills. The profession skills came about in my attempt to create quality of life features for my players to engage with as well as something other than just feats and attribute points that they could invest time into during their training time between major story arcs.
Training
Levels of Skill and How to Attain Them
Proficiency: You have a basic understanding of your tools or language, allowing you a small boon to interactions involving this tool or language.
Expertise: You have a greater understanding of your tools or language, allowing you to employ them with ease.
Mastery: You hold a mastery of your chosen tools or language, unraveling the secrets and nuance that lay hidden within every mystery.
In order to become proficient at a skill or with tools or weapons, you must spend a certain amount of time in training. Practicing alone will yield slow result, whereas practicing with someone proficient, or with an expert or master in the skill will yield far faster results.
Players may also train to attain feats to aid them in and out of combat, either by starting on a path through the practice of weapons, tools, instruments, or techniques associated with the feat, or by finding an appropriate teacher.
| Level of Skill | Investment Required |
| Proficiency | 120 hours under a tutor of proficient level, 80 hours under a tutor of expert level, or 40 hours of instruction by a master will provide a basic proficiency in a skill. |
| Expertise | 150 hours under a tutor of expert level, or 75 hours of instruction by a master will provide expertise in a skill. |
| Mastery | 200 hours under the tutelage of a master, and the completion of a quest to prove your worth as a master of your given craft are required to profess a mastery of a craft. |
| Feat Teacher | Training a full feat depends greatly on the quality of the teacher. |
| Self-Training (if Eligible) | 120 hours of training |
| Proficient Teacher | 100 hours of training |
| Expert Teacher | 80 hours of training |
| Master Teacher | 60 hours of training |
Physical Attributes can be trained to increase if certain training requirements are met. The skill must be trained at least four days a week, or training will be less effective.
Strength: Must spend a number of hours each week training with weapons or tools requiring strength to wield effectively. Number of hours spent training increases incrementally according to strength score and caps at 16.
Dexterity: Must spend a number of hours each week training agility and speed. Number of hours spent training increases incrementally according to dexterity score and caps at 16.
Constitution: Must spend a number of hours each week training stamina (running, jogging, sparring). Number of hours spent training increases incrementally according to constitution score and caps at 16.
| Ability Scores (Starting Score | Time Required |
|---|---|
| 4 | 5 hours spent to increase by one point |
| 5 | 10 hours spent to increase by one point |
| 6 | 20 hours spent to increase by one point |
| 7 | 40 hours spent to increase by one point |
| 8 | 60 hours spent to increase by one point |
| 9 | 80 hours spent to increase by one point |
| 10 | 100 hours spent to increase by one point |
| 11 | 120 hours spent to increase by one point |
| 12 | 140 hours spent to increase by one point |
| 13 | 160 hours spent to increase by one point |
| 14 | 180 hours spent to increase by one point |
| 15 | 200 hours spent to increase by one point |
Herbalism
Herbalism was a skill I developed to complement the skill set and skilling habits of the party’s cleric, Dusk, whose player loves to be as efficient with money and skilling as possible, no matter the game she plays. She always looks for the best way to make as much money and accrue as many resources as cheaply as possible while producing the most profit in the least amount of time with the least energy expended.
However, as is the way with the unpredictable nature of tabletop games, the way I had set up the skill to be used was not how it ended up being used in practice.
In practice, the cleric was more interested in spending her days gathering herbs (success determined by a d100) making healing potions than anything else, and the poison-making did not come into play. However, the bonuses at each level DID make it possible for the cleric to achieve a store of potions that truly was the deciding factor in many of their high-level encounters.
I allowed the players to use a potion as a free action, bonus action, or regular action, or all three if they were really hurting for health in the middle of a battle.
However, In future iterations, I will either be reducing the bonuses conferred by each level of mastery in Herbalism OR I will be reworking potions into my own system of health values to better balance effort and rewards for future players.
| Herbalism Level | Additional Perks |
|---|---|
| Level 1 | Make common healing potions +1 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 2 | Make common poisons +2 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 3 | Make uncommon healing potions Double common potions/poisons +3 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 4 | Make uncommon poisons +4 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 5 | Make rare healing potions Double uncommon potions/poisons +5 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 6 | Make rare poisons +6 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 7 | Make very rare healing potions Double rare potions/poisons +7 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 8 | Make very rare poisons +8 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 9 | Double very rare potions/poisons +9 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 10 | Make legendary potions/poisons +10 to successfully making a potion |
Cooking
Cooking was another skills that was created solely to make my best friend, who was playing the party cleric, very happy.
As a longtime player of The Elder Scrolls Online, one of the parts of the game I appreciate most was their crafting system and the variety of items that could be created by players. One of my favourite parts of this system is food and drink buffs, ways to increase a player’s stats for a prolonged period of time without having to commit resources to it in the middle of battle. Thus, the cooking skill was born for my table.
In the time since the creation of this profession skill, my players grew incredibly fond of the cheesy goat haunch, a recipe that I created that increases the number of actions that players are allowed to take per turn, effectively granting them the effects of Haste for the duration of the meal.
However, players would have to source their own ingredients, either by finding a well-stocked market for shopping or by being lucky in their hunting and gathering. It was actually their persistent hunting for mountain goats to make that particular recipe that resulted in the players rolling well enough to add multiple mounts to their party as part of random encounters.
I will include a link to my growing recipe list here.
| Cooking Level | Additional Perks |
|---|---|
| Level 1 | Ability to cook common recipes +1 to successfully cooking a meal |
| Level 2 | Ability to brew alcohol +2 to successfully cooking a meal |
| Level 3 | Ability to cook uncommon recipes +3 to successfully cooking a meal |
| Level 4 | Ability to make pet/mount snacks +4 to successfully cooking a meal |
| Level 5 | Ability to cook rare recipes +5 to successfully cooking a meal |
| Level 6 | Ability to effectively conceal poison in food +6 to successfully cooking a meal |
| Level 7 | Ability to cook very rare recipes +7 to successfully cooking a meal |
| Level 8 | Ability to work rare/exotic ingredients +8 to successfully cooking a meal |
| Level 9 | Ability to cook legendary recipes +9 to successfully cooking a meal |
| Level 10 | Ability to prepare a feast +10 to successfully cooking a meal Critical Failure no longer burns meals |
Mercantile
Mercantile was a skill developed for the the dwarven character in the party whose backstory tied him into one of the major merchant families in the dwarven city of Nol Turum.
Mercantile combines the best of speechcraft skills with the perks of being a better salesperson to allow players to haggle down the often rather inflated prices of everyday items in a tabletop fantasy setting. It also served as a way to reward players over the long term for investing in their relationships with merchants in the various cities and towns they’ve come to explore and establish their reputations in.
The party would become known primarily for their provisioning of rare ingredients, such as fire giant hearts and the various bits and pieces of young and adult dragons to the Moonstone Conclave and for their habit of cleaning out the herbal stock of every shop they came across so that the cleric could supplement her herb gathering during training periods with store-bought supplies of herbs.
And, with the proceeds from the dragons largely funding their adventures, this tactic worked suberbly well and bounty-hunting becames a significant part of the campaign.
| Mercantile Level | Additional Perks |
|---|---|
| Level 1 | 5% reduction in buying costs +1 to haggle for a better price |
| Level 2 | 5% increase in selling costs +2 to haggle for a better price |
| Level 3 | 10% reduction in buying costs +3 to haggle for a better price |
| Level 4 | 10% increase in selling costs +4 to haggle for a better price |
| Level 5 | 15% reduction in buying costs +5 to haggle for a better price |
| Level 6 | 15% increase in selling costs +6 to haggle for a better price |
| Level 7 | 20% reduction in buying costs +7 to haggle for a better price |
| Level 8 | 20% increase in selling costs +8 to haggle for a better price |
| Level 9 | 25% reduction in buying costs +9 to haggle for a better price |
| Level 10 | 25% reduction in buying costs +10 to haggle for a better price |
Enchanting
Enchanting, more than any other skill progression I worked on, was the bane of my existence and my proudest achievement throughout the three year campaign that saw its implementation. Once I had it properly developed and implemented, my players proceeded to abuse the system to the best of their ability.
This enchanting system was a hybridization of multiple enchanting systems that I had experienced before, including Skyrim and Wizard 101. What I ended up designing was an enchanting system for gems, where each gem in the world had different attributes that made it suitable for different enchantments. Diamonds for additional health, citrine for lightning damage, sunstone for radiant damage, fire agate for fire resistance, blue topaz for frost resistance, and so on.
Of course, I could not give it to my players for free, and so I gave the a cost in soul gems, which would help to push them out into the world and focus on their resources and on tactics in battle to maximize the value of each encounter. This worked spectacularly, with Atreya, the elven warlock, going on to specialize in enchanting and use the system to give the party more survivability, more flexibility in how they used their spell slots, and more damage output in melee.
Future iterations will see charge crystals replace soul gems as the mode of charging enchantments, but the gem and socketing system will remain in place with possibilities for future additions to the gem effect list.
The nature of the crystal charging system may include pre-charged crystals as rare items to be found only in ancient dungeons from civilizations where enchanting was more widely practiced, through charging using natural sources of energy like sunlight and moonlight, or through the efforts of the Moonstone Conclave to study the crystals and develop a method for charging them for enchantments themselves.
Future iterations, however, will use a magic power system rather than a spell slot system, but with adaptable enchantments for cross-compatibility with other tabletop systems.
| Enchanting Level | Additional Perks |
|---|---|
| Level 1 | – Ability to charge small soul gems. – Ability to learn and place elemental damage and resistance enchantments by taking apart magical items (destroying them in the process). – You can learn 1 enchantment per item disassembled/studied. |
| Level 2 | – Ability to create your own portable enchanting table for enchanting. – Place level 1 spell slot enchantments. – Ability to use two points of soul gems to power an enchantment |
| Level 3 | – Ability to learn and place non-elemental (force, radiant, necrotic) damage and resistance enchantments by taking apart magical items. – Place level 2 spell slot enchantments. |
| Level 4 | – Ability to charge medium soul gems. – Ability to learn and place attribute enchantments (STR/DEX/CON/INT/WIS/CHA). – Place level 3 spell slot enchantments. – Ability to use 3 points of soul gems to cast an enchantment. |
| Level 5 | – Ability to learn two enchantments from a single item. – Place level 4 spell slot enchantments. |
| Level 6 | – Ability to charge large soul gems. – Place level 5 spell slot enchantments. – Ability to use 5 points of soul gems to cast an enchantment |
| Level 7 | – Ability to learn and place special effect enchantments. – Place level 6 spell slot enchantments |
| Level 8 | – Ability to charge huge soul gems. – Place level 7 spell slot enchantments |
| Level 9 | – Place level 8 spell slot enchantments. – Ability to use 5 points of soul gems to cast an enchantment |
| Level 10 | – Ability to charge gargantuan soul gems. – Place level 9 spell slot enchantments. |
Alchemy
Alchemy, sadly, was a profession skill that never quite got the development that it deserved. The player for whom this system was designed was…inconsistent in their attendance, and eventually disappeared from the table entirely, leaving the skill underdeveloped and unfinished.
My approach in designing these skills has always been to put player utility first. Does this system feel right? Is it too powerful? Not powerful enough? Does it bring enough utility to the table to make it worth investing in-game training time into instead of pursuing things like proficiencies or feats? Does it have a place among other, potentially more useful skills or does it fall short?
The alchemy skill was meant to be the companion to the herbalism skill. Where herbalism deals with healing potions and poisons, alchemy was meant to deal with more magical types of potions, the sorts of potions that grant effects more akin to spells than granting life or death.
Future iterations will require a redesign from the ground up to give it a proper place among the more established profession skills.
| Alchemy Level | Additional Perks |
|---|---|
| Level 1 | Make common potions +1 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 2 | +2 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 3 | Make uncommon potions +3 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 4 | +4 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 5 | Make rare potions +5 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 6 | +6 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 7 | Make very rare potions +7 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 8 | +8 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 9 | +9 to successfully making a potion |
| Level 10 | Make legendary potions +10 to successfully making a potion |
Tinkering and Blacksmithing
These two skill lines also suffered from the absence of the player who had invested time and backstory into them.
The idea behind tinkering actually provided part of the base for the enchanting skill.
In tinkering, there was a correlation between skill level and the ability to place more sockets onto a item in order to make it hold more enchantments. The higher the skill level, the more likely a tinkerer would be to successfully construct extra sockets on an item, with difficulty increasing if the tinkerer were adding new sockets to an item that already had them. After all, it’s easier to plan out three sockets on an item that has none, rather than try to add an extra socket to an item that already accounts for two. There’s less working around other elements on a fresh item.
The blacksmithing skill was meant to be straightforward. Higher levels meant weapons, armours, and items of greater complexity, with complex embossing higher on the skill tree that would result in more valuable and customized pieces. The highest levels would imbue arcane proficiency into a blacksmith’s skill set and allow the smith to achieve a level of proficiency such that magical items could be repaired or enhanced without destroying the balance of the enchantment placed upon them.
Further development will be required to decide whether to keep tinkering or add its features to blacksmithing, as well as to decide what extra effects there will be in the blacksmithing skill tree.
| Tinkering/Blacksmithing Level | Additional Perks |
|---|---|
| Level 1 | +1 to successfully making a skill check |
| Level 2 | +2 to successfully making a skill check |
| Level 3 | +3 to successfully making a skill check |
| Level 4 | +4 to successfully making a skill check |
| Level 5 | +5 to successfully making a skill check |
| Level 6 | +6 to successfully making a skill check |
| Level 7 | +7 to successfully making a skill check |
| Level 8 | +8 to successfully making a skill check |
| Level 9 | +9 to successfully making a skill check |
| Level 10 | +10 to successfully making a skill check |