So, normally this game really doesn't need a detailed skill list, nor countless numerical stats for all kinds of things a character can do.
Also, the PCs' Advantages tend to cover what little is needed in that vein - and even more elementary than that, we can usually make do with clever employing of some Basic Moves, or just letting the fiction guide us in our judgment calls.
But...
some players have expressed a certain feeling of being somewhat at a loss "when looking at my char sheet for clues for what my character could possibly try to do in [any given] situation"...
Because sure, especially as a player new to the system you can get the impression that, yes, you get your basic attributes, and they're kinda sorta supposed to tell you about your character's overall strengths and weaknesses. But if you're not yet very well trained in reading those Attributes and the attached Basic Moves for the full wealth of what actions they can represent in the game - well, then you might be missing a certain 'middle ground', namely the area between "those three extra-special thing you get to be able to do" and "just the basic Attributes and Moves".
Thinking about how to help those kind of players find into their groove with the game more easily, I remembered something I did almost two years ago now, when adapting An Echo From the Past to the new 4th edition ruleset.
See, the original premade PCs for that scenario, from 1st edition Kult, had a shitload of skills with various numerical values, as they would. Naturally, when adapting things to K:DL, I sought to identify the two or three most essential aspects of these characters' abilities and turned selected appropriate Advantages to represent those. But I was left with a lot of additinal info, which somehow would've felt wrong to just omit, and so I decided to add the boxes you can see above and below to each of their sheets.
(pictured are excerpts from Mats' and Marcus' sheets. The full scenario including premade PCs is available for free at https://kultdivinitylost.com/resources/)
Some of my players who come from more traditional gaming backgrounds have commented that these "skill boxes" have rather helped them gauge their characters and get into their roles a little bit better and quicker than in RAW K:DL sessions they had for comparison.
The observation has stuck with me in some corner of my brain and now recently I've gotten to thinking...
So Here's A Little Homebrew System
Adding quick and easy "areas of general competence" like that to your PC sheets:
Look at your Active Attributes. The four of them that have positive values attached (+1 or better) you can pick skills for. For each of those Attributes choose one or more skills that fit the areas of life covered by that Attribute, and the number of skills you may select is equal to the modifier you have in the respective Attribute.
For example, Coolness +1 will allow you to choose one (1) Coolness-based or Coolness-appropriate area of general competece.
Intuition +3 will allow you to select three (3) areas of competence that seem fitting to your character being able to read persons very well, act empathetic with people, lead them on, or otherwise understand what makes them tick.
If you're playing with standard starting characters, your positive Active Attributes of +1, +1, +2, and +3 will give you seven (7) slots to fill in the beginning. At your GM's discretion, you might be asked/allowed to add more later, for example when you increase your Attributes through advancements.
Note that the characters in Echo do not precisely conform to these guidelines, since I just made them up, but those PCs were written a couple years ago! Upon a second look, however, I seem to intuitively have arranged things so that it largely makes sense after all. The PCs sheets in there could be adapted to this newly minted homebrew system with minimal effort, in fact.
You can make up the names for the areas of competence (vulgo: skills) yourself. Try to stick to a middleground between specific and general - just like most trad games tend to have them. WoD, CoC, D&D etc all make for okay sources of inspiration there. Ideally, they'll be a bit less specific than Advantages, but a bit more so than Basic Moves.
(So don't port over 'Perception' from D&D because that's already an Attribute in K:DL. But Stealth, Acrobatics, Lore: _______, Sense Motive, or whatever might be just fine. Probably don't take something like Use Magic Item though, since that feels like it would be a whole Advantage all of its own in K:DL)
Examples:
A junior police detective who turned into The Avenger after the death of his brother at the hands of an organized crime ring led by corrupt state attourney. He has Perception +3, Violence +2, Coolness +1, Reason +1, and his Advantages are Instinct, Intimidating, and Survival Instincts.
He might go for being skilled in the areas of:
Sharp ears, Search, Assess Group Dynamics, Handguns, Grappling, Move Silently, Police Procedures.
A trader of antique books and trinkets who became The Occultist after stumbling onto an unsettling undercurrent of Hidden Truths gleaned in artifacts from a number of apparently unrelated ancient cultures. She has Reason +3, Intuition +2, Soul +1, Charisma +1, and her Advantages are Crafty, Occult Library, and Thirst for Knowledge.
She might choose to be competent in:
Research Rarities, Appraise, Identify Ancient Languages, Sense Buyer's Interests, Leading Questions, Meditation, Haggling.
GMs may wonder how to handle these areas of competence mechanically in their games.
- Most simply, let it influence your decisions on when to require a dice roll for some action a player announces, and when not to. In areas the PCs are competent in, they should more often succeed without needing to roll.
- When in doubt, consider allowing the character to take a +1 to their roll in cases where they are competent but you still deem it necessary to ask the dice for input as well.
- Additionally, you can encourage players to add a greater amount of input to the communally created fiction of the game.
Someone who plays a character that has Lore: Ancient Religions may welcome opportunities to tell the group some nifty details about that stuff every now and then.
Someone who is adept at messing with Security Systems can share their ideas about how these might work in a situation like the one at hand, what might be necessary to circumvent or disable them, and what risks it might entail to attempt doing so.
- Finally, make it a habit to be more forthcoming with information when telling the players about their characters' observations in the world, when these observations revolve around their areas of competence.
Someone who is explicitly adept at conducting Obductions should probably get told more details about a mutilated corpse the group is examining, than someone whose best skill in that vein is First Aid.
Someone competent at Reading Body Language might gain easy insights on most people, but could be fooled by a competent actor, or when a conversation happens without the ability to see the other person (e.g. in a phone call or voice chat, confession booth, another inmate heard only through the airvents from another cell in the mental facility's high-security tract...)
At first glance this may seem like a lot of additional minutiae to track, but I wager you won't need to worry too much about it. Most likely, you'll practically never have to think of those 'skills' yourself - the players will remind you of them when they feel they're needed.
A typical request may sound something like
"Yo, so it says here that my guy is good at _______, maybe that can help us here?",
or maybe
"I wrote down I'm trained in _______, so I might want to use that to..."
You'll have to make a judgment call then, but you'll do so in the sweet glow of the player already being invested in the scene, since they're looking for creative uses to apply their character's capabilities to the horrifying problems you put before them.
And isn't that exactly what we're wanting them to do?
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