fatal

Chapter 8: Skills
Different from abilities, skills are options that
the character may select, acquire, and increase during
the game. Many skills may be attempted by all
characters, regardless of their abilities and occupation.
Other skills, however, may be attempted only
by those who have trained in them, have a sufficient
ability score, or belong to a particular occupation.
For instance, the sub-ability of Language
indicates how many languages it is possible for a
character to learn, limited only by Intelligence.
Though the character in question may be highly intelligent
and able to learn many languages, they may
have never had the opportunity or the desire to fully
explore this intellectual resource, so they only know
1 language, though they could learn more in the future.
Most skills may be attempted by all characters,
though some have prerequisites. For example,
any character is capable of attempting to seduce
someone, even if they are not a whore by occupation
and their sub-ability scores are low in Bodily
Attractiveness, as well as Facial, Vocal, Kinetic, or
Rhetorical Charisma. Granted, chances may be slim
if these sub-abilities are low, but any character may
always at least attempt Seduction. A prerequisite may
exist, which may be either a minimum ability or subability
score, or it may be another skill altogether
that must be known prior to learning the skill desired
currently.
Many skills have a Learning Curve (LC),
which is a modifier to skill checks when skills must
be learned in order to be performed without penalty.
This number is subtracted from skill checks
while the skill is being learned. It is not always a
constant, but often varies according to each skill.
Any player who invests at least 5 Skill Points (see
below) upon creating the character may ignore the
LC for that skill. For example, if a character has
high Strength and Spatial sub-abilities, then they are
likely to be talented at the Blacksmithing skill. However,
if the player did not invest 5 Skill Points in
Blacksmithing when the character was created, then
whenever they first attempt Blacksmithing, there will
be a LC, and the skill description must be observed
to understand how it applies to Blacksmithing.
Chapter 8: Skills
313