Webs.com is pretty easy to use. it comes with preset designs and artwork you can choose from and change at any time. I actually migrated there from a Yahoo Groups page because YG was too bland and awkward to manage.

Yeah, the GM advice and RP basics was for "noobs", but you might give it a read over to check for misinformation/bad advise, if you feel like it.

1)Attribute overlap and lack of utility outside combat are among the top reasons i'm reworking the system.

Not sure what you meant when you said Mind seems like more of a skill.

2)When a rule is optional, that pretty much means it sounds like a good idea to have but i haven't worked out all the ins and outs yet. I've seen a little of D&D's Attack of Opportunity, i'm not clear on all the details surrounding it, and i've heard some complaints regarding when AoO can be done or not. At the same time, i have played with some people who prefer not to get attacked when they run away from combat, so if i do implement AoO, it may just be as a reaction to a 1 rolled during Attack.

3)I had contemplated making more than just two tiers of Armor because of this. The first tier would be effective against unarmed only, the next tier would be effective against unarmed and slashing, the next tier would be effective against unarmed/slashing/piercing, and the final tier would be effective against all weapon types. This still puts bashing as the most favorable weapon type though.

I'm considering any of the following:
-lowering the amount of damage Blunt weapons can do
-making their Str requirement higher (enforcing Requirements as core, not optional)
-Making them strictly 2 handed
-Negating extra attack actions (some skills allow multiple attacks/turn, and hammers would be heavier, restricting their use to once/turn)
-making it so all armor types are 100% effective (of their current values) against all weapons
-changing some of the lower armors to have out of combat utility, such as stealth or something. (or invert it so that the higher armors have penalties to stealth and maybe spell casting)

The problem with trying to make heavy armor penalize spell casting is that i can think of no rationale for doing so. Spells in my system do not have "components" such as somatic or verbal. Wearing clumsy armor won't affect one's ability to cast a spell, because no spell requires fluidity of motion. There are a few that are cast with Dexterity, but i think it possibly unlikely that a dedicated spell caster would have very high Dex to begin with.

4)lol! I've seen The Gamers 2: Dorkness Rising. "how much experience for the peasant?" Though, in my defense, i believe it was stated in the rules that one does not need to actually kill anyone to gain Exp. Successful diplomacy, distraction, seduction, intimidation, persuasion, and other means of manipulation that end in removing a person or persons from being obstacles will result in the exact same amount of Exp reward.

Take an example from the text:
"Distraction Example
Player: Since Vivian could not seduce the guard, Bardoz creates an illusion of a charging bull in the street to cause a panic in the guard's direction. (rolls for spell check)
Moderator: (Rolls for guard's perception) The guard sees the charging bull and, (rolls for morale) panics and runs!"

This scenario would result in an Exp reward for the entire party, since they removed the guard from their path, even though they didn't kill him.

Even so, i would want to keep notes on how much exp to award per level of monster for GMs so that they may give an appropriate amount at the end of a quest or event. How much Exp is saving a princess worth? Donno. How much Exp is killing the level 10 evil dragon who took the princess worth? 100. That isn't to say that the Exp Reward must be related to kills, the GM could wait till the princess is safely home with the king before granting Exp, and the players would likely relate that to having completed a quest, but the amount of Exp for that quest would be decided by how many monsters of what level were slain/otherwise defeated or routed.

5)Convoluted in naming convention or convoluted in mechanic? I think BSJohnson also noted that Endurance/Vigor/Vitality seem to be synonyms, and to an extent that is what they are in practice, but different naming conventions would be clearer. I'm thinking of changing Vigor to Mana (or something along those lines, it used to be Spirit) Endurance used to be Health, and i'm really resisting changing Vitality because the only other word i can think of is Constitution... and i really don't want to have it look too much like the d20 system of WOTC, which it is starting to already... (it would be nice if i could sell the finished product as a PDF or something, and it would be nice if i didn't get sued...)

6)lol! hmmm... i think i named it that because i wanted to invoke the understanding that the characters actually had a knapsack to carry things in, but it could easily be renamed Inventory or Possessions.

7)That humans are best is likely no mere coincidence. They were the first race i completed, and thus i hadn't run out of ideas yet. Which ones seem particularly unbalanced? (bearing in mind i'm almost thinking of ruling out Traits in the next edition, unless people think they really add something to the system in which case i'll keep them in, but toned down)

8)yeah, if you could go into a bit more detail that would be helpful. I hadn't intentionally put combat skills in the common skill list. Are you referring to Athletics and Inspiration?

9)Innate skills are going away soon, they will be tied directly into the revised Attribute list. All the things you mention will be an Attribute check. First Aid was probably the wrong name. It's really nothing more than putting a band-aid on a kid's boo-boo. It's no substitute for actual medical attention and requires no formal training. My assumption was that any intelligent charater would know to bandage a bleed.

10)Again, poor naming. The thought behind it was that Eloquence was situational, and the kind of Eloquence one used would be dependent on the situation one was in. When going to see the King you'd need to behave respectfully and with civilized manners. When going to see a Barbarian Chieftain you'd need to behave stoic and respond to insult with insult, but balance it so you ignite their amusement and not their ire. Any suggestions on what to call this would be welcome.

11)meh heheh. Didn't know where else to put it.

12)no, you have to learn them separately, they each have their own Ranks.

13)Yes, i was trying to get all the basics for melee: Unarmed Monk Style, Brute Strength Rager, Defensive Sword & Board, Whirling Dual Wielder, Stealthy Back Stabber, Improvisational "why carry a sword when i can let my enemy carry it for me?" Kevin Sorbo style. Marksman was tacked on so rangers wouldn't feel left out. Funny you find it the best option. What made it seem so?

14)Illusion was the last group of spells to have been added, as such it is pathetically limited.

15)i'm assuming "titties" is good?

16)Agreed, Enchantment does seem to be pathetically short lived. I'm thinking of extending their duration to an hour/several hours/a day/etc... For the final Ranks maybe even allowing some kind of Permanence spell to cement the enchantment effects.

17)pretty much true. I've only run or played a couple games with undead, most of which happened before Exorcism made the list. It also works against "evil outsiders" which i have yet to introduce to my players. Also, some creatures, such as Skeletal Guards, are not classified as undead, rather they are magical automatons similar in nature to Golems. The difference between the two can be a nasty trick to play on your clerical types.

There was one session i ran where the Healing Paladin and Exorcist Cleric spent some time casting spells on a sleeping guy who wouldn't wake up, trying to determine if he was suffering from poison or disease. Neither spell worked, so they concluded it was a curse, but neither one had the ability to remove a curse yet.

18)But not everyone can use magic (1:1000 people can use magic, a statistic i may change to allow more freedom.) And if you don't pick up at least one magic rank at Level 1, it is assumed your character is a "muggle". Additionally, if you should happen to be in a party without a Healer (nobody made one, the healer left, he died, ran out of Vigor) then First Aid becomes useful in a pinch.

19)How so?

20)What would make it more inspiring?

Thanks again for taking the time to go over it!

i copied and pasted my post from earlier, the other one may still be awaiting moderator approval, so if it shows up here as a double post i'll delete it.

Webs.com is pretty easy to use. it comes with preset designs and artwork you can choose from and change at any time. I actually migrated there from a Yahoo Groups page because YG was too bland and awkward to manage.

Yeah, the GM advice and RP basics was for "noobs", but you might give it a read over to check for misinformation/bad advise, if you feel like it.

1)Attribute overlap and lack of utility outside combat are among the top reasons i'm reworking the system.

Not sure what you meant when you said Mind seems like more of a skill.

2)When a rule is optional, that pretty much means it sounds like a good idea to have but i haven't worked out all the ins and outs yet. I've seen a little of D&D's Attack of Opportunity, i'm not clear on all the details surrounding it, and i've heard some complaints regarding when AoO can be done or not. At the same time, i have played with some people who prefer not to get attacked when they run away from combat, so if i do implement AoO, it may just be as a reaction to a 1 rolled during Attack.

3)I had contemplated making more than just two tiers of Armor because of this. The first tier would be effective against unarmed only, the next tier would be effective against unarmed and slashing, the next tier would be effective against unarmed/slashing/piercing, and the final tier would be effective against all weapon types. This still puts bashing as the most favorable weapon type though.

I'm considering any of the following:
-lowering the amount of damage Blunt weapons can do
-making their Str requirement higher (enforcing Requirements as core, not optional)
-Making them strictly 2 handed
-Negating extra attack actions (some skills allow multiple attacks/turn, and hammers would be heavier, restricting their use to once/turn)
-making it so all armor types are 100% effective (of their current values) against all weapons
-changing some of the lower armors to have out of combat utility, such as stealth or something. (or invert it so that the higher armors have penalties to stealth and maybe spell casting)

The problem with trying to make heavy armor penalize spell casting is that i can think of no rationale for doing so. Spells in my system do not have "components" such as somatic or verbal. Wearing clumsy armor won't affect one's ability to cast a spell, because no spell requires fluidity of motion. There are a few that are cast with Dexterity, but i think it possibly unlikely that a dedicated spell caster would have very high Dex to begin with.

4)lol! I've seen The Gamers 2: Dorkness Rising. "how much experience for the peasant?" Though, in my defense, i believe it was stated in the rules that one does not need to actually kill anyone to gain Exp. Successful diplomacy, distraction, seduction, intimidation, persuasion, and other means of manipulation that end in removing a person or persons from being obstacles will result in the exact same amount of Exp reward.

Take an example from the text:
"Distraction Example
Player: Since Vivian could not seduce the guard, Bardoz creates an illusion of a charging bull in the street to cause a panic in the guard’s direction. (rolls for spell check)
Moderator: (Rolls for guard’s perception) The guard sees the charging bull and, (rolls for morale) panics and runs!"

This scenario would result in an Exp reward for the entire party, since they removed the guard from their path, even though they didn't kill him.

Even so, i would want to keep notes on how much exp to award per level of monster for GMs so that they may give an appropriate amount at the end of a quest or event. How much Exp is saving a princess worth? Donno. How much Exp is killing the level 10 evil dragon who took the princess worth? 100. That isn't to say that the Exp Reward must be related to kills, the GM could wait till the princess is safely home with the king before granting Exp, and the players would likely relate that to having completed a quest, but the amount of Exp for that quest would be decided by how many monsters of what level were slain/otherwise defeated or routed.

5)Convoluted in naming convention or convoluted in mechanic? I think BSJohnson also noted that Endurance/Vigor/Vitality seem to be synonyms, and to an extent that is what they are in practice, but different naming conventions would be clearer. I'm thinking of changing Vigor to Mana (or something along those lines, it used to be Spirit) Endurance used to be Health, and i'm really resisting changing Vitality because the only other word i can think of is Constitution... and i really don't want to have it look too much like the d20 system of WOTC, which it is starting to already... (it would be nice if i could sell the finished product as a PDF or something, and it would be nice if i didn't get sued...)

6)lol! hmmm... i think i named it that because i wanted to invoke the understanding that the characters actually had a knapsack to carry things in, but it could easily be renamed Inventory or Possessions.

7)That humans are best is likely no mere coincidence. They were the first race i completed, and thus i hadn't run out of ideas yet. Which ones seem particularly unbalanced? (bearing in mind i'm almost thinking of ruling out Traits in the next edition, unless people think they really add something to the system in which case i'll keep them in, but toned down)

8)yeah, if you could go into a bit more detail that would be helpful. I hadn't intentionally put combat skills in the common skill list. Are you referring to Athletics and Inspiration?

9)Innate skills are going away soon, they will be tied directly into the revised Attribute list. All the things you mention will be an Attribute check. First Aid was probably the wrong name. It's really nothing more than putting a band-aid on a kid's boo-boo. It's no substitute for actual medical attention and requires no formal training. My assumption was that any intelligent charater would know to bandage a bleed.

10)Again, poor naming. The thought behind it was that Eloquence was situational, and the kind of Eloquence one used would be dependent on the situation one was in. When going to see the King you'd need to behave respectfully and with civilized manners. When going to see a Barbarian Chieftain you'd need to behave stoic and respond to insult with insult, but balance it so you ignite their amusement and not their ire. Any suggestions on what to call this would be welcome.

11)meh heheh. Didn't know where else to put it.

12)no, you have to learn them separately, they each have their own Ranks.

13)Yes, i was trying to get all the basics for melee: Unarmed Monk Style, Brute Strength Rager, Defensive Sword & Board, Whirling Dual Wielder, Stealthy Back Stabber, Improvisational "why carry a sword when i can let my enemy carry it for me?" Kevin Sorbo style. Marksman was tacked on so rangers wouldn't feel left out. Funny you find it the best option. What made it seem so?

14)Illusion was the last group of spells to have been added, as such it is pathetically limited.

15)i'm assuming "titties" is good?

16)Agreed, Enchantment does seem to be pathetically short lived. I'm thinking of extending their duration to an hour/several hours/a day/etc... For the final Ranks maybe even allowing some kind of Permanence spell to cement the enchantment effects.

17)pretty much true. I've only run or played a couple games with undead, most of which happened before Exorcism made the list. It also works against "evil outsiders" which i have yet to introduce to my players. Also, some creatures, such as Skeletal Guards, are not classified as undead, rather they are magical automatons similar in nature to Golems. The difference between the two can be a nasty trick to play on your clerical types.

There was one session i ran where the Healing Paladin and Exorcist Cleric spent some time casting spells on a sleeping guy who wouldn't wake up, trying to determine if he was suffering from poison or disease. Neither spell worked, so they concluded it was a curse, but neither one had the ability to remove a curse yet.

18)But not everyone can use magic (1:1000 people can use magic, a statistic i may change to allow more freedom.) And if you don't pick up at least one magic rank at Level 1, it is assumed your character is a "muggle". Additionally, if you should happen to be in a party without a Healer (nobody made one, the healer left, he died, ran out of Vigor) then First Aid becomes useful in a pinch.

19)How so?

20)What would make it more inspiring?

Thanks again for taking the time to go over it!

1) If I recall Mind is your attribute for focusing on one thing and blocking out distractions. That's like 3e's concentration skill.

5) In naming. It felt like you listed the same thing 3 times and then assigned them different meanings.

18) Rareness does not effect your adventurers. Rareness of magic in the setting may be interesting but 1/1000 considering people rank in the billions population wise isn't all that rare of a trait on the grand scheme of things. What's more is it doesn't effect players who are all special snowflakes unless magic is strait jacketed by the rules from them.

19) Synergy allows you to cast the same spell as an ally. If the entire group has synergy then that means that different people in the group can ascend different ranks in various magic fields and synergize to gain the benefits. Because summoning is such sweet sweet titties in this game I can zerg rush any enemy troop with my team of synchronized casters.

20) I'd like (and I realize this doesn't actually happen in most games) different weapons to have different "feels". The list "feels" barren like there could be more. It may just be my imagination but that's the feeling I walked away with.

Since you're changing a bunch of stuff I'll wait to see the next edition and give it another read.

1) aaahhhh, gotcha. It also works as the primary spell casting/potency modifier though, so it doesn't serve a single purpose. That being said i've yet to actually see someone use it for concentration. That's more my fault, as i've not put any PC in that situation.

5) gotcha. I'm thinking of keeping Endurance, but i was also thinking of taking out the innate Toughness traits and using that label for the character's health, as it represents the kind of health i'm trying to convey. It isn't blood, life, health, or fatigue; it's pain tolerance. Vitality may keep. Vigor may be replaced with Spirit or Mana or Fervor... Inner Flame?

18) this is true, it doesn't have much of an effect on the players/adventurers. However, humans rank in the billions on Earth, that is not necessarily true of Terrabia. Here, we are the dominant species. There, we are just one of 5 (not counting Revenants and Halfbreeds) species vying for dominance. Bring into play any cataclysm that might wipe out 1/3-1/2 of the human populous... But it is as you said, it's not a very drastic ratio depending on the human population size, something that hasn't been stated previously as i hadn't worked it out yet. So far there's only been one semi-explored continent revealed, and that is more of a frontier land, so there are fewer humans than might be normally expected.

19) aaaahhhhhh, gotcha. However, i think you missed one important factor.

"Cast the same spell as an ally once per round, during your ally's turn at the same target. If either of you succeed, the effect of the spells are combined. You must know the spell, regardless of rank, in order to synergize."

I see this may not have been written clearly, some wording i'll have to revise. What it means is that you have to know the same spell that your ally is casting, not just Synergy. So, if you are casting a fireball spell, and i have Synergy AND Fireball, we can cast together. If i have Synergy but NOT Fireball, we cannot synergize our casting.

The theory being that to have picked up Sorcery Rank 1 to get the Synergy spell you would have used a Skill point that could have been used elsewhere.

Perhaps Synergy should be pushed back to Rank 3 or 4. This way the cost of getting Synergy would be more pronounced and "zerg rushing" would be a thing of advanced spell casters, not something a group of novices would be able to pull off. By the time a group of advanced spell casters got into a situation where mass conjuring would be actually useful and not just overkill would likely be in the midst of a heated battle, likely a war, not a small adventure or scuffle that novices might get into. Furthermore, the world's flavor has wizards compared to nuclear warheads. Not a fair comparison till you take Synergy into consideration.

But i do concede this is too OP for Rank 1, and may need to be pushed back, even as far as Rank 5.

20) Interesting. I did try to give them different feels, perhaps i'm not reading you correctly. To me swords were the weapon of choice if you want a finely honed blade designed for accuracy, axes are designed for raw power (Crit multipliers stack like crazy), and hammers are designed to ignore armor, thus being more consistent. Though, within these groups is a decided lack of variety. I think Swords have the best variety, with most other weapons just being "this weapon does more than that weapon".

Part of what contributed to the barren feeling may be the small size of the weapon list. I've seen D&D's list, and CRPG's and MMORPG's weapon lists, they are generally huge and varied, if in name only. My general thought, though it hasn't yet been stated, was that what was included in that list were general basics that could be applied to any weapon type of similar characteristics. One character might have a European feel while another has an Asian feel, they might even have weapons with different names (Longsword/Katana), but so long as the general size and use of the weapon are the same or comparable, they would share the same stats (1d10 Dmg, +1 Atk, may be held with one or two hands, may be dual wielded).

I did have a wider variety of weapon names (Cinquedea, Bastard Sword, Executioner's Axe) but found them to be nothing more than weapon bloat in practice, so i paired down and decided to let things that were similar enough just fall into general categories.

I can see how that might come across as bland.

The second edition is nowhere near ready for release. In fact, there are some technical computer issues that need resolving before i can produce any kind of pdf (i've uninstalled some software, to be reinstalled pending a hard drive formatting). If i did release anything, it would have to be Word documents, or wiki pages...

Right now i'm focusing on revising the absolute core mechanics of the system to their absolute simplest form. Primary reasons for this are the 6 Attributes serving more than combat functionality, and friends and family of mine who, for one reason or another, are not able to fully comprehend the system in its current state.

I'll try to see if i can put up a rules-light version of the 2nd edition somewhere by tomorrow maybe. But it will be very light...

19) I did miss that part. I uess it's back to doing circle magic for big effects.

20It's just a minor thing. I've seen it so much in games (both video and Table Top) that I'm really used to +1s and minor abilities being the only difference between weapons. I uess that combined with the small list just "felt" wrong to me, I don't know.

 In either case I'm sure that everythin will change when you're ready to release the second one, so none of the points I brought up are set in stone. In the various iterations of my game I've cut a lot of shit out such that I cannot use the document I do have from 7 months ago because the game I'm making has changed so much. I would not be surprised to see everythin revamped before I get another look.

#2: attacks of opportunity - D&D 1E/2E gave a free attack if you break off from melee with someone, unless you move at 1/3 speed, although this free attack isn't explicitly named. D&D 3E gives AoOs any time you leave a square within the reach of an attacker, which means ever running past someone provokes such an attack and exact positioning is fairly critical; it also gives these free attacks on someone who leaves an opening due to using a missile weapon, casting a spell - unless they 'Combat Cast', making a Concentration skill check - sheathe a weapon, reload a crossbow, perform a coup de grace, or use a trip, grapple, disarm, sunder or unarmed attack without the appropriate feat.
 
#3: lowering damage for blunt is probably feasible. STR requirements being higher still leaves the blunt weapon better. Reducing extra-attacks for these also makes some sense, I think. Another thing you could do was reduce accuracy for them e.g. no DEX modifier if you're using a club.
 
#5: part of my problem was not being able to remember which was the CON and which was the hit points, particularly with 2 of the 3 being V-words...
if you're going to have big stat increases with level anyway, perhaps you could just remove the Endurance stat and just keep the Vitality.

@MGuy

Thanks for your input all the same. It helps me not make the same mistakes in the next version.

I know what you mean, it feels like i'm changing my game once every 6 months or so, for the past 6 years...

@BSJohnson

2)Oy!... :jaw-dropping:That's too much. Think i'll keep it to Crit misses for my game, and maybe leaving melee.

3)Hm? Having a higher Str Requirement leaves blunt better? It would mean you'd have to be capable of dealing more damage, but if i did that AND lowered the random damage for Blunt it might even out with the other weapons and made them less usable by weaker characters. I'll have to think on this.

5)Exactly, which is why i'm rethinking the names. 2 out of 3 similar things both starting with Vi is not good.

I have thought off and on about just leaving the Endurance increase as the Vitality, but i ran into several problems with it, mostly balancing issues.

It's similar to Hit Points/Constitution. Damage is dealt to your HP, but Con gives a little boost. Also, Con is for poison, disease, etc...

If Vitality is allowed to get too high it could break the mechanic (which is based on d20, not d100) If i were doing d100, stats could get much higher, "but d100 is for pretentious gas bags!!!:rant::nono::jaw-dropping::idunno::rolleyes::huhsign::banghead:"

lol, i dunno, just don't like d100 mechanics that i've seen, and i've probably not seen enough of them.

But i'm not going with big stat increases per level, as you said. Just 1 point per level to put where you want. If you start out with 7 Vitality, by the time you reach Level 10 you'll only have 16 Vit, and have been getting slaughtered the entire way if there were no other boosts, so i separate them some.

hmm... Nobody's commented on the relationship between End/Vig/Skill.

I too hate d100s! I thought I was the only one  Hard to get margins of success and the modifiers are fiddly.

By blunt being better, I mean that if someone has the STR anyway, the blunt would still be the best choice. In your system with its ready stat raises, you may have people throwing away their swords after levelling up to take up the Way of the Hammer

lol, the Way of the Hammer!

I should almost make that a philosophy or guild in game.

Anyway, i haven't quite gotten all the rules up as i had hoped to have by today, but it IS in a wiki, so i can add easily as i go.

http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaign/amalgam-rps-2nd-ed/wikis/main-page

I need to see if my webs account supports wiki building like OP does, because i find it so easy to use.

UPDATE: I've got most of the rules for Character Creation, Attributes, Races, Backstory, Traits, Skills, Spells, and Combat up.

It's written a bit hastily, but hopefully i don't contradict myself too much.

In the combat skill section i have marked out a few things, rather than deleting them. This way people can see what i had there and decide if they should be in or not. My reasons for wanting them out were because most of the combat skills had to do with special attacks and "burst" damage (doing lots of damage all at once, an MMO thing), and i'm trying to tear down the walls between "Special" attacks and "Ordinary" attacks so that players can do whatever they want in combat whether there's a skill that outlines the details of it or not.

Some things i did leave in that i felt would be the result of training, and therefore a reasonable skill to expect, rather than some special effect.

hey, it's been a while since i last posted, i was taking a hiatus to enjoy Guild Wars 2 and we're in the middle of a move/job transition.

I'm currently working on ideas for the Attributes and their interaction with specific skills.

Rather than have a list of skills arbitrarily assigned to an Attribute, i thought it might be good to actually show a comprehensive list of skills on the character sheet below the Attribute it is related to.

Problem is i've kinda run out of ideas for some, and keep running into variations on a theme, particularly with Perception.

Here's how it looks so far:

Vitality Disease Resistance, Poison Resistance, Exposure Resistance (hot deserts, frozen wastes), Recovery (from near death or regeneration from resting/spells/potions), and Toughness. Because i'm trying to pair down the amount of number crunching, i'm thinking of making Toughness be additional Endurance or something...

Strength Lift, Swim, Climb, Smithing, Intimidate.

Dexterity Dodge (may take that one out), Grapple, Stealth (rename to Concealment because i want to include hiding items as well as general sneakiness), Crafting (bows, clothes, houses, baskets), Balance.

Perception I want each one to have a list of 5 skills, but right now the best i have are: Search, Read (recognizing difficult handwriting, reading from a distance, etc.) and ESP (detect magic essentially).

Mind Persuasion, Focus, Learning (ease with which your character learns new talents), Solving (riddles, puzzles, translations), Design (like smithing and crafting, but with pen and ink, for spell crafting or blueprints, mapping, etc.)

Wisdom Wits (replacing Cunning), Morale (so you don't go running like a mad man at the first sign of monsters), Soothe (because HP is really just Endurance, and Damage is really just pain. Replaces First Aid.), Composure (for impressing people), Intuition (to detect someone's motives, sense a possible ambush, etc.)

As you may see, some things overlap, and i don't want this to happen, so i'm looking for any insight or good ideas to add to the list, and pair down from there.

Do you think 5 skills per Attribute is too much? How about 3?

Vitality Constitution (Poison/Disease/Exposure), Toughness (bonus Endurance), Recovery.

Strength Athletics (swim/climb/lift), Smithing, Intimidate.

Dexterity Subtlety (balance/stealth), Grapple, Crafting.

Perception Search, Read, ESP.

Mind Persuasion, Learning, Focus. (leave actual solving and design up to the player).

Wisdom Wits, Composure (morale/soothing), Intuition.

This seems rather complete and all encompassing.

Now, how it would work is, you use the Attribute as the base score for anything you do, but depending on what you do, you add your skill to it.

If i want to search a room for clues, i'd use Perception+Search, roll = or < for success.

If i want to rally my allies against an undead assault, i'd use Wisdom+Composure.

If i want to craft an item, i'd use Dexterity+Crafting, roll+Difficulty of the recipe/instructions = or < my score.

Lifting a heavy boulder that covers our only escape means: Strength+Athletics, roll+Difficulty by weight (some arbitrary number).

EDIT: The one problem i have with it now, is that i didn't want any of these derivative skills to be directly related to combat, and Toughness seems to be. Any suggestions for a replacement?

EDIT: Something that occurred to me is that unhealthy people generally are not very attractive. Skin disorders, pallid flesh, sunken cheeks, hair like straw, glazed eyes, very ill looking. They may not actually be ill, but their lack of a healthy lifestyle will show. So, perhaps instead of Toughness, Attraction (like charisma, but only physical) might be a "skill" of sorts, or perhaps call it Charm.