Author Topic: Why does Pilot use DEX?  (Read 346 times)

StevenO

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Why does Pilot use DEX?
« on: May 12, 2019, 01:33:06 pm »
The other day I saw something that gets me questioning "Why does the Pilot Skill use Dexterity as the governing ability score?"  While I'm not sure I'll do it or not but this has me wondering if a house rule changing it to INT would have things make a lot more sense.

The reason for this came after a reddit post where someone was asking about Autopilot for ships.  A possible "solution" for this was using a Droid Brain on the ship (I'm probably not the only one how has wanted to do something similar to give a ship a life of its own.) but it was mentioned that a Droid Brain couldn't make skill checks based on physical attributes.  With Pilot being DEX based it's clearly based on a physical attribute but why?

From a perspective purely of "game balance" it might be argued that having Pilot be governed by INT to go along with Mechanics and Use Computer would make a "pilot concept" far too focused on INT.  Maybe there is a little merit to that but aren't there plenty of other concepts that one can say are completely governed by a single stat?  Perhaps INT also giving trained skills pushes it over the top but your "non-pilot" Tech build is almost certainly going to be focused on INT, many Social characters only care about the CHA based skills, and who wants to count all the DEX heavy concepts that may not care much about the other abilities?  It seems to me that while there is some merit in a game balance argument there are also plenty of examples where it could be applied but isn't so I guess we need to look at other things to justify Pilot as a DEX skill.

Perhaps Pilot is based on DEX because RIDE is based on DEX.  Now I'm not so sure Ride should be all DEX based as knowing your mount (WIS) but using it to "stay in the saddle" when hit certainly is a DEX based application.  I guess the problem I have with Pilot being DEX because Ride is DEX is "what's the point in having both?"  I mean what is Riding if not using "pilot" on an organic vehicle assuming the creature is well trained; now that "well trained" animal being part of "Ride" as a DEX ability could be questioned but it is still what it is.  If we moved Pilot over to INT I could now see the application of the Ride Skill on something like a Speeder bikes where the operator is out in the open and could be knocked off; if you could "strap in" to a vehicle then why would it use DEX?

Now an argument against DEX for Pilot could be "why would a Pilot get to use his DEX to fly the ship but does NOT get to use his DEX to target his weapons?"  Having a pilot use his DEX on top of the ship's DEX (ship DEX makes perfect sense in this case) is a bit illogical as I don't think how you finesse the controls would have a bigger effect than simply knowing how your vehicle would perform.

What would be the consequences of moving Pilot from DEX to INT?  I guess it may change of few of the "good" pilot species while also allowing some rather immobile species (Hutts!) to actually exhibit some skill; should a species with a good DEX but poor INT really be better at operating something as complex as many vehicles than a species with a good INT but poor DEX?  I'm thinking many of us can think of people who seem to drive powered wheelchairs around pretty well despite having DEX scores that probably could be considered 2 or less.  What other things should see prereqs/requirement changed if Pilot changes skills and is this a big deal?  Maybe they don't all need to be changed either has having a "trained Pilot" prereq along with a DEX requirement could make sense for some things even if the DEX and Pilot aren't exactly related.
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Sparx MacGyver

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Re: Why does Pilot use DEX?
« Reply #1 on: May 12, 2019, 06:06:50 pm »
I could see the argument that you have to have quick reflexes for piloting. In case of things going sideways you need to react and do things swiftly. However, when we look at the uses of the Ride skill, all are for combat. There is no "handle animal" skill, or an equivalent. I suppose we could argue Kn. Life Sciences could be used for this, given it covers biology, botany and xenobiology. And I could also see Survival being used here, in fact, probably makes more sense than Knowledge, since to me, Knowledge would be more book smarts, vs Survival being actual application and in-field use.

That being said, I don't have a problem with Piloting being switched to Int. There's probably a few hiccups here and there, but I can't imagine it would really break anything.
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StevenO

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Re: Why does Pilot use DEX?
« Reply #2 on: May 12, 2019, 06:24:22 pm »
I also posted this over on the SWSE subreddit: 
from r/SagaEdition


There we have pretty much the same reasoning for Pilot being DEX based as it seems so many of the checks are reactionary based.  It is a good reason although then it's matching back up with Ride again which is part of the reason I think I have removed the Ride skill in my list of House rules.


While it's probably too much work to be worth the hassle this does get me wondering if certain Skills shouldn't have certain aspects of a given skill governed by other ability scores instead of the one score currently listed.  Looking through the skill descriptions in the SECR I guess I'm less inclined but then if you start looking at other things which may ask you to "roll a X check" not all of those may be as clear.
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Sparx MacGyver

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Re: Why does Pilot use DEX?
« Reply #3 on: May 12, 2019, 08:11:58 pm »
There probably is something worth splitting some uses of skills, although I'd agree it's probably not worth the effort with how little it would fix for skills, and with the larger amounts of feats/talents/etc., that might need adjusting to go with it.

It is interesting that you've brought up something I've never really considered before.
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StevenO

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Re: Why does Pilot use DEX?
« Reply #4 on: May 12, 2019, 09:32:42 pm »
...

It is interesting that you've brought up something I've never really considered before.

I really only considered it after thinking on statements that a Droid Brain couldn't use "physical skills" when Pilot is a physical skill.  For that matter a droid making an Endurance check to recharge shields (granted a "vehicle" would still use mechanics - perhaps some confusion there) which is CON based would hit that as well.

Now when it comes to "unintended consequences" it would take some investigation to find the fallout.  I know one reddit suggestion would have Pilot be WIS based but there the consequence is immediately apparent with the synergy to Starship Tactics; I'm maybe not a big fan of those "variable power" feats to begin with (like how WIS 14 equivalent to taking Force Training x3 for a WIS 10 character.)
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fairytalejedi

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Re: Why does Pilot use DEX?
« Reply #5 on: May 13, 2019, 05:39:18 am »
In the James Bond rpg, many skills use the average of two ability scores. For example, Piloting is (Dexterity + Perception)/2.

Something similar could be done in d20 based games. So for example, your base stat for Pilot could be (DEX+INT)/2 meaning that someone with Dex 16, Int 12 would have a base ability score of 14 (+2) to add to his skill ranks in Pilot.

However, in Star Wars specifically, I think there's a good argument for just using DEX as the ability score associated with the Pilot skill. I think the only time we ever see a main character piloting a capital ship in the movies is Anakin. Other wise, capital ships simply have a crew skill bonus that could theoretically come more from INT than DEX, since the bonus itself is all that really matters. With vehicles that PCs are likely to be flying, from speeder bikes up to light freighters, the movies definitely present them as DEX based. Flying the Falcon is not like flying the Enterprise.
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MERC_1

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Re: Why does Pilot use DEX?
« Reply #6 on: May 13, 2019, 11:03:03 am »
I really only considered it after thinking on statements that a Droid Brain couldn't use "physical skills" when Pilot is a physical skill.  For that matter a droid making an Endurance check to recharge shields (granted a "vehicle" would still use mechanics - perhaps some confusion there) which is CON based would hit that as well.
I see your intent, but the problem is probably not with the Pilot skill but with the limited rules o droid brains. So, why not fix those instead?

On a capital ship I could even see Cha as the stat for Pilot, as it is more about controlling the crew then the ship itself! But if you are sitting at the helm it is mostly Dex or Int. I don't think that SAGA need a separate skill or stat for larger ships though as that would be more like Star Wars D6. But I could see a chain of feats for controlling larger ships, with a penalty on each opperation of -5 if you don not have the right feat. The penalty could even stack if you lack several feats, shoving that not every bantha herder can drive a Star Destroyer...

Controlling a smaler ship is mostly about eye-hand-coordination and that falls square in the middle of Dex.

StevenO

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Re: Why does Pilot use DEX?
« Reply #7 on: May 13, 2019, 01:47:21 pm »
...
I see your intent, but the problem is probably not with the Pilot skill but with the limited rules o droid brains. So, why not fix those instead?
...

Believe it or not I did consider that as well after typing this up and probably is the better "solution" if the main reason for moving Pilot from DEX would be so a droid brain could use it.  I know this came from a different conversation but before that I'd generally figure a Droid Brain might be able to use those "physical abilities" at time but would just have a null modifier with them.  The droid brain has DEX (-) so it doesn't have any modifiers to a Pilot check just like any droid with its CON (-) still seems to be able to roll Endurance to recharge shields if it has them.
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