Teaching as a trade?

Amalia · Post by **Amalia** » Thu Mar 09, 2006 5:50 pm

I'm not sure whether I ought to put this in the skills, trades, or feats forum, but here goes:

Teachers around the realms charge for their services. It seems reasonable to me that a PC could do the same in order to help support himself, especially if said PC were able to teach to a reasonably high level. Does the teacher feat do anything to affect how high a character can train another, or only how early? My suggestion may already be in effect, but it doesn't seem so from the help files.

If that feat only affects how early one can teach, I think it would be neat to see an alternative feat (or an addition to the teacher feat) that allows a character to teach higher than other PC's can, perhaps even up to the level that non-quest teachers can teach skills or stats. Alternately, the ability to teach to higher levels could be added as a teaching trade. Since (at least from what I glean from the help file) it costs the teacher experience to teach as well as the student, I think this might be relatively safe from abuse, and would encourage more PC-PC interaction, especially considering that a lesson with a PC allows for a ton more RP than learning from an NPC does.

Zach · Post by **Zach** » Thu Mar 09, 2006 5:56 pm

maybe an improved teacher feat? because right now you can only teach at grandmaster... if i remember and with one feat point you can teach at master... then the next feat point you can teach at Expert... but if we have a thrid feat to this... Improved teacher... one would spend the 3 spell points to be able to make a living off of teaching... to a Journeyman or adept level?

Gwain · Post by **Gwain** » Thu Mar 09, 2006 7:39 pm

There is a teacher feat I believe that makes it possible to teach at the expert or adept level, I am unsure of the exact properties.

Zach · Post by **Zach** » Thu Mar 09, 2006 8:34 pm

Gwain wrote:There is a teacher feat I believe that makes it possible to teach at the expert or adept level, I am unsure of the exact properties.

there is a teacher feat that you can feat up twice... each time lets you teach sooner.... but he was asking for one that lets you teacher higher then you can at.
At present. I do not believe the teacher feat lets you teach better.

Hviti · Post by **Hviti** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 1:42 am

Kregor's last post in another thread had some suggestions which I think would go quite well with these...

Since the thread wasn't actually about teaching initially, I'll quote him, leaving the source as reference. Thanks for the ideas, Kregor.

Kregor wrote: Although I digress here.... I have gathered that the highest level a GM trainer seems to be able to teach another char is to apprentice. A bit odd, considering that other mob "masters" can train to journeyman often, and in very rare cases to adept or better.

Perhaps this could be remedied by an alteration on the Teacher feat, which presently allows a master or expert to train a skill to another char. In addition, alter it so a person with Teacher could train a GM skill to journeyman (for one point in Teacher) or adept (for two points in Teacher), this would go down for each rank lower in the skill the teacher is... in other words:

Code wrote: Teacher's skill w/o feat 1pt in feat 2pts in feat
Grandmaster Apprentice Journeyman Adept
Master N/A Apprentice Journeyman
Expert N/A Novice Apprentice

Additionally to above, perhaps an alteration to the teach command itself could allow teaching to Novice for a PC Master of a skill sans the teacher feat? I would think that to be called a "master" you would have some given ability to pass a limited amount of this skill to others.

Such would reflect an effort some characters would invest in passing on their skill to others, for whatever IC role. Also reflecting into PC to PC training the same diversity you can get from mob training. And IC RP training is, in my book, preferrable to mob training. Those who wished to spend precious feat points in the ability to teach could turn it into a trade, as I am certain many PCs would readily shell coin for decent training in many spells and skills.

Whoops, the Code: thing came out kinda odd looking. Anyway...

http://www.forgottenkingdoms.com/board/ ... ht=teacher
is the original source, if needed.

Amalia · Post by **Amalia** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 5:01 am

Ooh, thanks Hviti. That's exactly the sort of thing I was trying to suggest. I for one would be more than willing to get up to Grandmaster before teaching anything, but I'd like to be able to teach beyond apprentice if I really wanted to put in the time instructing the other character.

(PS: I'm not a he

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Lorion · Post by **Lorion** » Sat Mar 11, 2006 10:55 pm

I am not sure, but when I asked how the teacher feat works I got as a reply(this was a while ago though) that with the teacher feat you still need to be master to teach anything, because each feat point you can take in teacher will not lower the barrier by a whole level(from GM to master to expert to adept) but by 1/3 level(maybe you have noticed that usually your skill in whatever improves two times before it raises a level at the third time).
I know this has nothing to do with what Amalia suggests, but it was mentioned more than once and I thought I should point it out.
Besides this, I do like the idea that Amalia suggests, either as a separate feat or as an addition to the teacher feat. However, even if you are Grandmaster in some skill I don't think you should be able to train it higher than journeyman or *maybe* adept at once.

Amalia · Post by **Amalia** » Sun Mar 12, 2006 5:02 am

I definitely agree that teaching ought to take time, and that levels beyond Adept probably need to be learned in large part through practice. Although, it is possible to learn up to a pretty decent level (I think Journeyman is the highest I've found) all at once with an NPC trainer, and I don't know if doing so is considered bad RP or not-- especially if it's a skill like ride, where (from real life experience) one does not generally fall off a horse just riding at a walk at all, even on one's first day.

Regardless, I do agree that nobody who's not an absolute guru at an ability should be able to train beyond Adept. Maybe beyond that point, Training could give a character bonuses to the chance to advance rather than automatically advancing them?

Lorion · Post by **Lorion** » Sun Mar 12, 2006 11:25 am

Yeah I'd love to see something like this, but unfortunately I have not a real idea how it could work, so I didn't write it before. Maybe some command that lowers your attack and whatever else checks you get(I'm not really an expert at how this game works), but lets another character gain more experience?
ok i know that was pretty confusing, so i'll do an example: Characters A and B are grouped and ride through Faerun. A is grandmaster at ride, while B is only adept. Now A types something like "teach ride". he gets slightly worse chances to attack, to make saving throws etc, because he is putting part of his attention to teaching B how to ride properly, but for that, whenever B gets experience in riding/has a chance to improve(again, i don't really know how this works) he actually gains a bonus from A teaching him. If C would also be part of that group he could get such a bonus as well.
I didnt really think much about this, and I am sure my proposal has flaws, but I imagined something among these lines, the ability to teach, but teach over a time. Oh and of course it encourages grouping

Hviti · Post by **Hviti** » Sun Mar 12, 2006 2:21 pm

Ooo, I especially like that idea for skills, Lorion...I'm trying to figure out which ones it would be most applicable too and which ought to be only teachable by a straight out command.

I like this idea of synergy...in most fantasy series I've read all the guys who are new to fighting end up training with that one old, hard-faced guy along their journeys, and he's still dissatisfied with the results and says they aren't master swordsmen (even though they always do just fine in combat anyway). Er, at any rate, I would think if you were grouped with, say, a master pathfinder and you watched him and he was actively telling you, "I'm using that rock, or that branch," it would make perfect sense for your skill to go up.

This would apply to pretty much all skills in fighting (though I can see where a GMed out fighter could train a massive group in a somewhat abusive manner, so that might have to be looked at)
The only things I could see which would be less possibility to be trained and ought to be still used with a straight out command would be spells and skills like ignite which aren't used over a period of time/journey. Those aren't necessarily going to be used very often over a distance, so I would suspect a wizard would show an apprentice a couple of times how to go through the moves for magic missile, then ask him to repeat, rather than have him follow him to Berdusk and watch a few magic missiles in the heat of battle against a bandit (though that might be good for teaching concentration).

Argentia · Post by **Argentia** » Mon Mar 13, 2006 2:44 am

I would like to comment that I would like it very much if teach could teach higher than it currently can. I was teaching somebody today, as I am a GM in said skill, but could only teach up to inept.

My reasons for this are because a PC is no different than an NPC; if anything they are more skilled in their respective field. Because of this, a PC should be more than able to adequately teach someone a skill, or more likely, a weapon. Though perhaps not a trade, as those are not even taught above inept through quests by NPCs. They are difficult to teach and even more difficult to master.
Another reason I am in support of teach teaching to higher skill levels is an OOC reason. When you learn from an NPC, you type "learn cook" x 10. When you learn from a PC, it is RPed out. Sadly, right now it is much easier and more rewarding to learn from an NPC. There is a little insentive to go to a PC who teaches very little, as opposed to an NPC who teach you to apprentice. By raising the level a PC can teach to, it promotes fun RPs of master-student relationships.

In general, I am not saying lower the level NPCs teach to, that would require far too much work. Rather, just raise the level a PC can teach to. I would like to see apprentice level, but that might be asking too much.

I'm looking forward to any feedback.(Especially if that feedback is an approval by the imms.

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