As the title says. There's a tooltip at the bottom of the skills list to create "custom" skills. What skills have you created for your campaigns or characters? Feel free to add your reasons or not.
I've put reminders in my players' skill lists so that they don't forget they have certain features that have an impact on skills that aren't so easily displayed and can sometimes be missed.
Like a Researcher skill that is there for the player that has the Sage background, with the description reminding her that even if she fails on an Intelligence check to obtain lore, she can still get other types of information that could be relevant.
Oh man, please tell me that you're going to multi-class a rogue assassin for your bard. With a high level proficiency bonus you could go from tooting your horn to Silent but Deadly.
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Much that once was is lost. Objects in Mirror Image are closer than they appear.
My DM let me add the Juggle skill after I got a nat 20 and juggled for a strait hour without messing up. The rest of the party are incredibly competent fighters and casters, but none of them NOT ONE can challenge my unperilled juggling ability.
One of the LitRpg novels I read has the 'over powered main character' with a ton of skills, all ranked.
Among her skills, she made it to "advanced" in two most other characters did not have: Walking, Eating. Eating let her eat a lot of food quickly (magic used up energy and she had to refuel).
Post apocalyptic fantasy realm, remnants of an advanced technological civilization, with many broken devices, artifacts and records, all entirely inscrutable. Spent ages developing a sciences skill and a technology skill to begin piecing together their world and its downfall, and getting their com poo terse back online.
Skills don't always match up with the abilities that are assigned to them by default for every situation. For instance, as DM, I might allow the big brutish character to make a Strength (Intimidation) check. That means I need to recalculate the skill score on the fly. The custom field allows me to do that and save it in case the character needs to call on it again.
Kind of a subject for me. I think the skill list is kind of short winded.
In my campaign I added a riding skill and I modified languages.
Riding. Level 1, chances are you came from nothing and had nothing. The chances that you have become proficient in riding a horse are pretty small.
My riding skill is a modified mash up of dexterity and charisma. I will give the level 1 one the benefit that they can sit on a mostly docile horse and ride it. But you are not going to charge into battle on that horse. Paladins if give a bonus as that was probably part of their training.
Languages. At level one I go on that you can only read and write in your native language with a high proficiency, and that is dependent on your intelligence.
Hey, I know I'm a little late to this discussion, but I probably won't be the last person looking up info on custom skills so I'll put some I plan on using for an upcoming sci-fi campaign.
"Mechanics"(INT), "Programming"(INT), "Piloting(Space)"(DEX), "Piloting(Planetary)"(DEX). Mechanics and Programming are different because I think a character could have the knowledge to fix a ship, but not hack a computer and vice versa. I know there is already vehicle proficiency for land and water but because of the setting, these will be more common checks, so I prefer them directly on the skills section.
One I plan on using in any setting is "Culture", it's sort of similar to the history skill. It encompasses pop culture as well as racial or regional cultures. My players will have the option to use either wisdom or charisma for this. For the pop culture aspect, this is due to either it being read knowledge that I consider wisdom rather than intelligence in this specific scenario, or knowledge gained from gossip. Honestly, It makes sense to me but if you like the idea of the skill and prefer it to only be intelligence, wisdom, or charisma do whatever you want.
I love the idea of making intelligence a little stronger and giving it more skills, although Dexterity already has enough utility the skills are a necessity. I would love to add another strength skill to make it a little stronger but I can't think of anything. However, I would definitely accept a player making a programming check to "hack" a computer using strength, and by hack, I obviously mean hit it and hope for the best. I think charisma and wisdom are strong enough to not need more skills, but I added the culture skill because I love the concept.
Additionally dndbeyond allows for you to tweak the base skills. I personally allow for Nature to be wisdom, Intimidation to be strength, Medicine to be Intelligence, and Religion to be wisdom. The fact that druids and rangers have a hard time knowing about nature, and Clerics have a hard time knowing about religion just doesn't make any sense to me. As for the other two, I just think they make sense.
One last thing I would suggest would be adding custom skills for tools or whatever the pcs use consistently. For example, thieves' tools might be a good addition to your rouge. You have to add an ability score to the custom ability for it to work otherwise it displays as 0, which for that may be dexterity. However, if you don't want an ability score associated I found that adding whatever ability score you want and adding a "misc bonus" to 0 it out, either negative or positive depending on the bonus they receive from that score. This is so it would just be a proficiency bonus your seeing from the tool. Personally, for cosmetic purposes, I like to add intelligence to things like woodcarvers tools and then 0 it out so it's just the proficiency bonus. I think it looks better than seeing say charisma or dexterity next to something like Mason's tools.
Sorry if this was long, but I think I was at least full of substance. Even If no one uses any of these I think it shows a good example of situations when custom skill would be useful or what you should think of when considering adding a custom skill. I just hope this helps someone as I have found extremely few resources on this topic.
Our group used to always come up with a custom skill for each of our characters, which was a fun way to set them apart. From what I can remember, we've done:
Cooking (now covered by tools)
Engineering (now generally covered by tinker's tools)
Mathematics
Meditation
Chemistry
Card Tricks
Toy Making
Storytelling
Heraldry
Ropework (mostly knots)
"Witchdoctoring" (I guess alchemical supplies now?)
Some of the ones I've had depend on the context, but here's a few:
Business (INT). I came up with this one because I'm trying to think where appraisal fits in. Intelligence? Wisdom? You can persuade (Charisma, CHA) someone to reduce the price of an item you're purchasing, or insist that it's worth more, but I like the idea of a skill that's better suited to a world that might not accept haggling. This could also be part of the Culture skill below, where your understanding of how a specific village or city does things helps. This is more about the nitty-gritty and the admin side of the Culture skill, perhaps.
Crafting(INT). I say crafting is Intelligence-based, but that's more about reading, understanding and building to schematics or blueprints. Wisdom (WIS) could be for rudimentary traps, lifts, rafts, and other things that can be made in a pinch. Or perhaps even Dexterity (DEX) to determine how quickly you can do it. Were I may change the change the criteria to "roll a [ability score]," and if they're particularly geared towards crafting I'd let them add their proficiency bonus to it.
Culture (INT). Culture is more about current affairs rather than history and lore, but without getting bogged down in skills that's what I would use. It's about dress, rumours, social politics and what's happening right now. Alternatively it could be the urban 'Nature' skill. I say Intelligence because of the ability to read newspapers and understand people on soap-boxes, but it could also be Wisdom. WIS might determine how well you know where to find that information (especially that which doesn't want to be found), and discern how reliable it is or whether or not it should be taken at face value. Charisma might determine how likely you are to get information of any sort, but your information might lead you into a trap and people might take notice of your asking questions.
Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap (WIS). This one's nice and simple: criminal knowledge and how to apply it. A rogue is likely to have this one automatically, but it depends on if you're That Kind of Rogue™. Knowledge that every chunky desperado with larcenous intent should have. It's an alternative (or perhaps an additional aid) to the Criminal/Spy or Smuggler background, for when the Culture skill won't cut through the cleanliness of the place you're in.
In thinking about these, and seeing other skills people have had in other games, I can appreciate how difficult it can be to come up with skills that don't overlap. You can only have so many proficiencies without feats and sub-classes, and I've no doubt that some of mine wouldn't work when they can only be governed by one single ability score (even with alternate rules, some may be a stretch.)
Personally I think the more skills the better, but I wholeheartedly appreciate that too many can become bloated or stretched thin.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Zero is the most important number in D&D: Session Zero sets the boundaries and the tone; Rule Zero dictates the Dungeon Master (DM) is the final arbiter; and Zero D&D is better than Bad D&D.
"Let us speak plainly now, and in earnest, for words mean little without the weight of conviction."
For my rogue, I added Disarm Traps and Open Locks as skills to represent my usage of thieves' tools for either action.
For my artificer, I added each of 4 tools/supplies for easy reference. I copied info from Xanathar's Guide into the notes and description for each as easy reference for how to use them.
Not in 5e: but way back in 3.5 edition I made an entire Star Wars conversion that included overhauling all the skills to be more science-fantasy appropriate. IE: Engineering (Int), Slicing (Int, Star Wars slang for hacking), etc.
Strength - Swimming (more so holding breath, and fighting against currents), force (pulling, pushing and tearing things apart)
dexterity - Accuracy (throwing things like darts and other small out of combat items), Escape (the ability to escape ropes, locks and others of the sorts)
intelligence - Mechanics (ability to build, and engineer), (ability to understand writing, recognize handwriting, reading lips and other things if the sorts), maths (it’s just mathematics and measurements)
wisdom - mental strength (how tough it is to break you or make you upset), (your ability to find peace through meditation, if that makes sense)
Charisma - Bargaining (ability to make deals, similar to persuasion but a bit different, more so relating to selling and business), impersonating (ability to pose as others), non-performing arts (things like drawing, and writing)
constitution - endurance (how long you are able to go through tough tasks), immunity (how much you are able to resist things like sickness, and disease)
survival (a new section rather than part of wis.) - cooking (the ability to cook food, and make good meals), scavenging (The ability to search and hunt for food and resources), nature (moved from int. to survival), craft (the ability to build and craft things)
As the title says. There's a tooltip at the bottom of the skills list to create "custom" skills. What skills have you created for your campaigns or characters? Feel free to add your reasons or not.
I've put reminders in my players' skill lists so that they don't forget they have certain features that have an impact on skills that aren't so easily displayed and can sometimes be missed.
Like a Researcher skill that is there for the player that has the Sage background, with the description reminding her that even if she fails on an Intelligence check to obtain lore, she can still get other types of information that could be relevant.
Flatulence
My Bard can fart for AoE and can use it like an instrument. Good for irritating people and for clearing an area so he can get up to no good.
Oh man, please tell me that you're going to multi-class a rogue assassin for your bard. With a high level proficiency bonus you could go from tooting your horn to Silent but Deadly.
Much that once was is lost.
Objects in Mirror Image are closer than they appear.
Crafting, using Intelligence. Might be more appropriate as a tool proficiency though.
My DM let me add the Juggle skill after I got a nat 20 and juggled for a strait hour without messing up. The rest of the party are incredibly competent fighters and casters, but none of them NOT ONE can challenge my unperilled juggling ability.
One of the LitRpg novels I read has the 'over powered main character' with a ton of skills, all ranked.
Among her skills, she made it to "advanced" in two most other characters did not have: Walking, Eating. Eating let her eat a lot of food quickly (magic used up energy and she had to refuel).
Post apocalyptic fantasy realm, remnants of an advanced technological civilization, with many broken devices, artifacts and records, all entirely inscrutable. Spent ages developing a sciences skill and a technology skill to begin piecing together their world and its downfall, and getting their com poo terse back online.
Skills don't always match up with the abilities that are assigned to them by default for every situation. For instance, as DM, I might allow the big brutish character to make a Strength (Intimidation) check. That means I need to recalculate the skill score on the fly. The custom field allows me to do that and save it in case the character needs to call on it again.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
Constitution (Endurance)
I just think it's nice to have a Con based skill
Kind of a subject for me. I think the skill list is kind of short winded.
In my campaign I added a riding skill and I modified languages.
Riding. Level 1, chances are you came from nothing and had nothing. The chances that you have become proficient in riding a horse are pretty small.
My riding skill is a modified mash up of dexterity and charisma. I will give the level 1 one the benefit that they can sit on a mostly docile horse and ride it. But you are not going to charge into battle on that horse. Paladins if give a bonus as that was probably part of their training.
Languages. At level one I go on that you can only read and write in your native language with a high proficiency, and that is dependent on your intelligence.
.
Hey, I know I'm a little late to this discussion, but I probably won't be the last person looking up info on custom skills so I'll put some I plan on using for an upcoming sci-fi campaign.
"Mechanics"(INT), "Programming"(INT), "Piloting(Space)"(DEX), "Piloting(Planetary)"(DEX). Mechanics and Programming are different because I think a character could have the knowledge to fix a ship, but not hack a computer and vice versa. I know there is already vehicle proficiency for land and water but because of the setting, these will be more common checks, so I prefer them directly on the skills section.
One I plan on using in any setting is "Culture", it's sort of similar to the history skill. It encompasses pop culture as well as racial or regional cultures. My players will have the option to use either wisdom or charisma for this. For the pop culture aspect, this is due to either it being read knowledge that I consider wisdom rather than intelligence in this specific scenario, or knowledge gained from gossip. Honestly, It makes sense to me but if you like the idea of the skill and prefer it to only be intelligence, wisdom, or charisma do whatever you want.
I love the idea of making intelligence a little stronger and giving it more skills, although Dexterity already has enough utility the skills are a necessity. I would love to add another strength skill to make it a little stronger but I can't think of anything. However, I would definitely accept a player making a programming check to "hack" a computer using strength, and by hack, I obviously mean hit it and hope for the best. I think charisma and wisdom are strong enough to not need more skills, but I added the culture skill because I love the concept.
Additionally dndbeyond allows for you to tweak the base skills. I personally allow for Nature to be wisdom, Intimidation to be strength, Medicine to be Intelligence, and Religion to be wisdom. The fact that druids and rangers have a hard time knowing about nature, and Clerics have a hard time knowing about religion just doesn't make any sense to me. As for the other two, I just think they make sense.
One last thing I would suggest would be adding custom skills for tools or whatever the pcs use consistently. For example, thieves' tools might be a good addition to your rouge. You have to add an ability score to the custom ability for it to work otherwise it displays as 0, which for that may be dexterity. However, if you don't want an ability score associated I found that adding whatever ability score you want and adding a "misc bonus" to 0 it out, either negative or positive depending on the bonus they receive from that score. This is so it would just be a proficiency bonus your seeing from the tool. Personally, for cosmetic purposes, I like to add intelligence to things like woodcarvers tools and then 0 it out so it's just the proficiency bonus. I think it looks better than seeing say charisma or dexterity next to something like Mason's tools.
Sorry if this was long, but I think I was at least full of substance. Even If no one uses any of these I think it shows a good example of situations when custom skill would be useful or what you should think of when considering adding a custom skill. I just hope this helps someone as I have found extremely few resources on this topic.
Our group used to always come up with a custom skill for each of our characters, which was a fun way to set them apart. From what I can remember, we've done:
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
I use
Mathematics
Potion making.
Engineering
Non-performing arts.
My homebrew content: Monsters, subclasses, Magic items, Feats, spells, races, backgrounds
Lots of good information here, thanks sm!
Some of the ones I've had depend on the context, but here's a few:
In thinking about these, and seeing other skills people have had in other games, I can appreciate how difficult it can be to come up with skills that don't overlap. You can only have so many proficiencies without feats and sub-classes, and I've no doubt that some of mine wouldn't work when they can only be governed by one single ability score (even with alternate rules, some may be a stretch.)
Personally I think the more skills the better, but I wholeheartedly appreciate that too many can become bloated or stretched thin.
Zero is the most important number in D&D: Session Zero sets the boundaries and the tone; Rule Zero dictates the Dungeon Master (DM) is the final arbiter; and Zero D&D is better than Bad D&D.
"Let us speak plainly now, and in earnest, for words mean little without the weight of conviction."
- The Assemblage of Houses, World of Warcraft
For my rogue, I added Disarm Traps and Open Locks as skills to represent my usage of thieves' tools for either action.
For my artificer, I added each of 4 tools/supplies for easy reference. I copied info from Xanathar's Guide into the notes and description for each as easy reference for how to use them.
Not in 5e: but way back in 3.5 edition I made an entire Star Wars conversion that included overhauling all the skills to be more science-fantasy appropriate. IE: Engineering (Int), Slicing (Int, Star Wars slang for hacking), etc.
Strength - Swimming (more so holding breath, and fighting against currents), force (pulling, pushing and tearing things apart)
dexterity - Accuracy (throwing things like darts and other small out of combat items), Escape (the ability to escape ropes, locks and others of the sorts)
intelligence - Mechanics (ability to build, and engineer), (ability to understand writing, recognize handwriting, reading lips and other things if the sorts), maths (it’s just mathematics and measurements)
wisdom - mental strength (how tough it is to break you or make you upset), (your ability to find peace through meditation, if that makes sense)
Charisma - Bargaining (ability to make deals, similar to persuasion but a bit different, more so relating to selling and business), impersonating (ability to pose as others), non-performing arts (things like drawing, and writing)
constitution - endurance (how long you are able to go through tough tasks), immunity (how much you are able to resist things like sickness, and disease)
survival (a new section rather than part of wis.) - cooking (the ability to cook food, and make good meals), scavenging (The ability to search and hunt for food and resources), nature (moved from int. to survival), craft (the ability to build and craft things)
I rather like the endurance skill idea; it's one I've had in the past.