Well I can't speak for the other guilds... but in the Healers we make a great effort to give IC training, so people get to roleplay learning the skills, not just turn up for the vouchers. It's my favorite part about the guild and I find it a lot of fun. So much so that I am now one of the people giving the IC lessons for certain skills.

It does more then skip them up 1 prebook, it takes away the time they would have spent rping and interacting with others to gain that 1 skill. We do a Roleplaying hobby, what your suggesting is taking away from your next characters interactions and growing for the sake of what you refer to as a gateway skill. I am in charge of training in the guild I run with others and there is no skill I dont take the time to do IC training with, the same is said for most NPC's, Ive had some of my favourite IC moments doing training to gain a skill (ask me IC sometime about learning immune to mute).

I have a character with well over 300 OSP's spent on him over the years (ive been at this hobby too long) and when he dies I'll be sorry but I dont want to then be handed 50 osp's worth of skills free cause that takes away from my growth and RP as that character when he arrives and thats taking away from the character as a whole I feel.

Just my personal opinion (I hope this makes sense im working nights and i dont always make sense when sleep deprived)

thing is Bren, many T1 skills are a kind of entry level to a profession, after all it's pretty hard to play any kind of crafter without the relevant craft skill and nothing in the base CP's suggest any kind of scholar. While I agree that a warrior doesn't need +1 armour, Shield Mastery or Quick repair and a would be mage doesn't need +4 spell cards; a Smith does need some sort of smithing skill!

I do think 50OSP is a bit much for new characters but it is now the benchmark we work with (30 seems a much better number to me.) At the end of the day there is nothing that would (or could) force a new characters player to spend the OSP so the option to start as a fresh faced newbie will always remain, giving ALL new characters a few OSP to spend helps differentiate a character and gives some very strong features to base role-play on... a win win as far as I am concerned.

Alot of this thread isnt just about giving but rebating a % spent on yoour last one giving for every death with i agree be bad. Also retirement is a bit point for several people.

Personally if it wasn't for the large and worryingly growing feeling of not wanting to do risk things and lose your os's is bad for the system, this "could" help fix that, thats my big hope.

They've said before on this forum that they don't do that and have no plans to do it in the future.


Look, from where I'm standing having starting characters (not just new players, but all starting characters) begin with a small number of OSPs (10-30) from which they could buy from a very restricted skill list to give their character background some depth and individuality would be a good thing.

Currently you can't play a herbalist who has Herb Lore, an alchemist who can make anything at all, a smith who can make anything at all, a wizard who can scribe scrolls, a scout who can Track, a thief who can Locate items, a scholar who's actually a Scholar of something...

It'd be nice if there was some way to differentiate your character from all the other 16-pointers out there and to give them a low-level mechanical skill that can be useful to their faction and guilds. I realise making your character unique is a function of roleplay, but in some cases there are capabilities that some character concepts would need to have but that are solely in the domain of OSs. Also, the variety of OSs gives much greater scope for individualisation than the CS system.

I'd second that proposal. Maybe lower it to 30 OSPs so as not to overshadow the new player offer, but otherwise yes, that's a good idea.

You can play a crafter without the skills it's true but... you are a crafter of below apprentice ability with exactly the same real world effectiveness of the untrained. Now some people might find this fun and others might not, doesn't realy matter though because any results are basically subjective and don't harm anyone elses fun.
That is, to be blunt, exactly what the point at stake is here: Would the extra abilities that someone gets from a refund of OSP previously spent ditract from anyone elses fun? Will it add or detract from theirs?

My answer to the first would be a resounding NO. How could someones new character having a few extra perks (like any new Player character would) hurt your fun?
The second is more complex but very easily solved. If you think the extra skills bought with a refund will make you enjoy things then bully for you and have fun spending/using them. If not.... don't, its not like anyone is making you spend (or even claim) them.


Oh and for the record: I have missed about 3 years since the Drum Hill days and have only ever spent OSP in the last 3 years. I have spent well over a hundred and have many more in reserve. Of those skills not a one has been bought in pre-book and i have had to chase the training vouchers for each. Everyone of my skills adds new abilities and options for my character and those things make the game more fun for me... Would I spend any refund? damn right I would. every aditional skill adds depth to my character and i enjoy that depth.

Do skills add depth to a character? I'm not sure. They add skills, and abilities, certainly, and no doubt they can contribute to roleplay, but I think we've all known characters with skills spilling from every orifice who were about as deep as a puddle, and likewise, we've known one hit wonders of no discernable power who were amongst the most memorable and influential characters in the field.

The purpose of the OSP offers seen so far seems to have been to attract new players to the game, and I don't think many people will dispute that that is a reasonable aim. What then, would be the purpose of giving existing players the opportunity to use OSPs at Character Creation?

I don't think it will help to retain players - if you enjoy the game, you're going to play it whether you get some Occupational Skills when your character dies or not.

I don't think it will help address an inbalance between characters of new players with skills, and characters of old players without skills because I don't think any such inbalance exists. As has been said many times already in this debate, the experience of an existing player more than helps to address any advantage skills may give new ones (and whether such skills give an advantage is open to debate).

I don't think the facts that people enjoy using skills, and that the use of them can contribute to the role playing experience necessarily suggests that they should be available at character creation. Frankly, particularly for players who aren't new to the LT and so know how the system works, low level OSs are not tricky to come by in play, and if anything it is the role play route to obtaining skills that should be encouraged.

All in all, I don't see that there's a need for players to be able to spend OSPs on the creation of new characters following the death/retiral/plot related disappearance of the existing one. If giving out a few cheap skills helps encourage new players, great, but by the time you lose your first character you shouldn't then need the same sort of encouragement to create another one. The OS system, like all of the rules, should exist to facilitate and support the IC action - it shouldn't be made any easier to use the system to obtain skills without any roleplay or IC action whatsoever.

(Alternatively, if people are determined that exisiting players should be able to obtain Occupational Skills on the creation of a new character, here's an idea:
Any person creating a new character following the death of their previous one may present, either verbally or in writing, a character background, which, for the sake of the sanity of the GOD staff should not be more than 250 words in length. The GOD staff member may, at their discretion, then allocate up to three skills of their choosing to the character (assuming the player has enough OSPs to cover them), or allocate one skill for free. The choice of skills is purely down to the member of staff, their decision is final and no debates will be entered into. So take your chance, you may come out with High Magic, you may emerge with Porphyria, or you might end up with Conceal Item, General Knowledge and an Income skill. People get skills which some think helps them enjoy things and it's based on something more IC than what people plan OOC).

I may have been being just a tiny bit facetious. Still, it would at least give the poor unfortunates on GOD duty something entertaining to do - thinking up an appropriate response for the nine hundredth survivor of a massacred family wielding their father's sword ;)

Do new people really care about OSPs?

If I was enticing someone new to the hobby I would show them pictures and videos of awesome fights, not tell them they get extra experience points for joining. It's experienced people who care about OSPs.

I do agree that it's annoying not being able to play certain types of characters skills until you get the osps. If a new player wanted to play a learned scholar they would have to wait until they got the OSPs or the player became knowledgeable enough. (Experienced players playing new characters who somehow know everything about edreja annoys me).