Character Skills and skill points

Each character has a set of skills that they can bring to bear on appropriate situation. A new character can spend up to 10 points on the following general skills and their specialisations. If a character wants to spend a point on a specialisation then they must have spent at least 1 point in the general skill that specialisation belongs to. A new character can spend up to 2 points in any one general skill or specialialisation - gaining experience means they can spend more on any one skill. 

• Administration (intelligence)
• Law
• Accounting
• Management
• Athletics (agility & strength)
• Running
• Swimming
• Climbing
• Throwing (coordination)
• Computers (intelligence)
• Security Hacking
• Data Search
• AI Programming
• Driving (coordination)
• Bikes
• Wheeled
• Tracked
• Hover
• Interpersonal (charisma)
• Persuasion
• Intimidation
• Leadership
• Languages (intelligence)
• Manual Labour
• Mining & Drilling
• Construction
• Farming & Gardening
• Mechanics (intelligence & coordination)
• Electronic Engineering
• Mechanical Engineering
• Medicine (intelligence)
• First Aid
• Pathology
• Pharmacy
• Melee (strength & agility)
• Brawling (strength)
• Fencing (agility)
• Martial Arts (agility)
• Science (intelligence)
• Geology
• Xenobiology
• Physics
• Shooting (coordination)
• Ballistic Pistol
• Energy Pistol
• Automatic Rifle
• Sniper Rifle
• Energy Rifle
• Ballistic Heavy Weapon
• Energy Heavy Weapon
• Sneakiness (coordination & agility)
• Stealth (agility)
• Sleight of hand (coordination)
• Escapology (agility)

For example, Vlobb gets to spend 10 skill points, and he goes for the following:

Shooting (1)

    Ballistic Pistol (1)

    Energy Pistol (1)

Athletics (1)

Driving (2)

    Wheeled (2)

    Hover (2)

This list is not immutable - other skills may be added by the GM. 

A skill point spent on a general skill will give the character +1 to ability checks within that general skill, while a skill point spent on a specialisation will give +2 to ability checks but only for situations covered by that specialisation. 

So for our example character Vlobb has 1 skill point in Shooting and 1 point in Ballistic Pistol, He finds himself in a firefight and he is armed with both a ballistic pistol and also an automatic rifle. When shooting with the rifle he gets +1 to ability checks (from the 1 skill point in Shooting) but when using the ballistic pistol he gets +3 (+1 from the skill point in Shooting and +2 from the ballistic pistol specialisation)

Although player characters generally start with 10 skill points to spend, NPCs may have fewer or more skill points. PCs may be awarded skill points as rewards for certain achievements. 

At the GM's discretion different situations may require at least some knowledge of a skill in order to succeed whereas with others the skill may help but is not required. For example, if Vlobb is driving a vehicle that then suffers a mechanical breakdown, he has no skill points in even the general skill of Mechanics. He therefore has no chance of fixing the vehicle. He then decides to run. Nearly all human characters can run but having the running skill would improve his speed and endurance. Vlobb is not practiced in this skill so although he can run short distances, it is not very far or fast.