After more than 6 months of play testing, Skills has won out over Professions. The most common feedback regarding Professions was that it was great for simplicity and quick character creation, but over the course of several sessions, the limited number of choices for rolling became a bit redundant. I even tried a combination system that used both Professions and Skills, but compared to the rest of the rules, it felt like an unnecessary over-complication.
The process for determining just how the Skills would work was a lot of fun. I started with the rather massive list from the Fudge 10th Anniversary hardcover. The nice thing about this list is that it breaks the Skills into 8 categories, which I think makes it easier for new players to manage. The Fudge list is well over 120 Skills, so I knew I had to whittle it down to the essential Skills. I wanted to retain the idea of Skill Groups, so I created 6 Skills for each of the 8 Skill Groups, totaling 48 Skills in all.
Here's how they break down....
Having the Skills broken into groups has the added benefit of making character creation easier. I created "Skill Group Points". 1 Skill Group Point (SGP) is equal to 6 Skill Points. Depending on the Character Template you use (Tenderfoot, Adventurer or Legend), you get a number of SGP to put into the Skill Groups. The more SGP you put into a category, the more Skill Points you get to spend on Skills within that Skill Group.
