Characteristics and Skill Advancement
===== CHARACTERISTICS and SKILL ADVANCEMENT SYSTEM =====
Due to the stretched-out gaming time of PbP games, a modification of the Characteristics and Skill advancement rules needs to be made.
Since nothing much happens during Jump time, that's generally the ideal time to do the studying and training. As computer memory became virtually unlimited, all that additional space got filled with various bells and whistles to facilitate that studying, including training simulations.
You can study or train for two skills at a time, provided one is physically-oriented (STR, DEX, END), and one is mentally-oriented (INT, EDU). It generally takes one week of study and training per skill rank you are training for to progress to that next rank.
NOTE #1: SOC cannot be increased via this method.
NOTE #2: Jack-of-All-Trades skill also cannot be raised by this method; it can only be improved through a Career.
Picking up a new skill at Rank-0 requires 2 weeks of training.
2 weeks of training are required to raise a skill from rank-0 to rank-1,
2 weeks of training are required to raise a skill from rank-1 to rank-2,
3 weeks of training are required to raise a skill from rank-2 to rank-3, etc.
Even in the Traveller universe, there's a limit to how much information and knowledge you can stuff into your brainpan. And some characters just have an inherent limitation on what they can learn.
The maximum # of actual skills you can learn is equal to INT x 2, + 1/2 EDU--0-rank skills don't count towards this limit.
The maximum number of Skill Ranks for all skills is 3 times INT + EDU.
Advancing Attributes works the same way: 8 weeks to raise Str-7 to Str-8, etc.
This is assuming you are doing your training during downtime, whether that is during jump transits or taking a vacation on a planet. Otherwise, it takes two weeks of training to equal one week of downtime training.
In other words, you aren't 'busy' 24 hours a day. Without going into details about how and when you train (study while sitting in the loo taking care of your other business, study session with a friend/crew mate, etc.), you can always manage to fit in a few minutes here and there to study, exercise, and do related training (practice field stripping a gun, isometrics, etc.).
A good way to keep track of your training is to use a decimal notation.
Training to raise Pilot skill from Rank-2 to Rank-3 requires 3 weeks of training, so after the first week, you'd have Pilot-2.1 and after the second week, it'd be Pilot-2.2, and finally after the third week, it'd now be Pilot-3.
Unless something else is going on during a Jump, you can study two separate skills at the same time, or study one skill and train one Characteristic, but you can only raise one Attribute at a time.
SPECIALIZATIONS (CASCADE SKILLS)
For Specializations, it's the base skill that matters for advancing a specialization that you don't have. Thus, if you have Engineering (J-Drive)-2 and Engineering (M-Drive)-1, and you want to learn Engineering (Power Plant), you'd start by developing it as Engineering-0 (rather than Engineering-3). You'd wind up with Engineering (Power Plant)-1.
DOWNTIME TRAINING
If everyone agrees to take the time and opportunity to study/train outside of Jump, you can do that. For the most part, nothing much else will happen while you are doing so on a planet, for instance. It will require the expenditure of credits at the rate of 100Cr per Rank training as it will involve a more hands-on approach, extra research, real-time training and distractions, all-night parties, etc.
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:14, Mon 10 Apr 2023.
