I don't like Awareness as a skill. It seems to be too close to Perception. And everything I have read on them has drawn too fine a distinction between the stat and the skill.

I have been out of the loop for awhile, if there has been any big changes in the last few months then I do know about them. However, if that isn't the case I was thinking about the following house rule for my games:

Perception is to be used for all situational/environmental awareness, both active and passive. Search will be used for actively investigating a scene, Scrutiny for all checks involving social awareness.

The Awareness Skill will be changed to a static bonus, +5 Perception per level, for all situational/environmental checks.

I'm looking for some feedback on that. What do people think? Too much of a bonus? Is there a better way of handling Awareness?

I don't really get it. So you replace Awareness-tests with a perception roll that gets a bonus depending on your "skill-replacement". How is this different from just using the skill as normal? Ok, the bonus is a bit lower, but what was the point of removing the skill if you just replace it with something that works in the same way?

Edit: Unless you are talking about Ranks when you write level. In this case I think the bonus is way high. Imagine ascended characters with this, they would all have 50+ in bonus. A bonus of 3 per Rank seems better, since that would give most people the same progression as if they had gotten the skill. Of course, that means everyone is about the same when it comes to such tests since they basically get the skill for free, which I personally find a bit boring.

Perception is the base characteristic, not the skill itself - awareness is what utilizes the characteristic. You would generally test perception if it falls outside of the scope of awareness; in the same sense that to use Logic someone would test Intelligence as opposed to test Logic. The advantages of using a skill as opposed to the characteristic is the skill gets the +10 and +20 bonuses which significantly increases the potency of the roll.

I think the OP is missing the fact that Skill Checks should only be made when failure can have consquences, or if only a really skilled or talented character would be able to do something others cannot. For example to read a book or a clean a gun wouldn't require a skill roll, but to decipher a hidden message in a book after breaking into an estate and hiding from guards would require a Literacy and or Logic check, and to unjam and re-assemble a rocket launcher whilst under fire from a hab block's defenders would require a Tech Use or Trade[Weaponsmith] check.

Basically, your player's characters are already meant to be the creme de la crop, the best of their chosen fields, and so constantly rolling for mundane tasks not only makes them seem less talented than they are due to failures, but also slows down the game with constant rolling.

One way to work around your dislike of Awareness as a skill, would be to set thresholds for spotting things, based on PER + bonuses from Awareness skill mastery, halving perception as normal if untrained. For example anyone in the party who beats 30 would be told that they notice the tree line up ahead moving despite no wind, anyone beating 50 would be told that they notice a glint of sunlight on something reflective up a nearby tree, and anyone beating 70 would be they told they can just about make out the outlines of some recidivists trying to hide in the trees. Of course you'd also have to factor in opposed Concealment and Move Silently rolls, or just make them static similar to my proposal for Awareness.

Kasatka said:

This is exactly why Awareness should remain a trainable basic skill. It has counterpoints that would need modification were one to change the mechanics.

-=Brother Praetus=-

Kasatka said:

I don't intend to increase the number of rolls. Just replace all Awareness rolls with Perception rolls.

I was hoping for a quick and simple fix to give the Perception stat a more direct function (e.g. you roll straight Strength to lift things or jump, straight Willpower for fear tests, etc, but there's no clear-cut place for a straight Perception roll). My trouble is, I don't see what falls outside the scope of Awareness that doesn't fall in the scope of Search or Scrutiny.

But based on what I'm seeing I haven't considered how much would need to be changed; so I'm probably fixing a very small issue with an unnecessarily complicated solution. Thanks for the feedback everyone.

Another way to look at the Perceptions related skills.

Awareness = Immediate
Search = Hidden
Scrutiny = Mundane

Thinking of these skills in this way may help alleviate your dislike of them.

I use Scrutiny for dealing with people and Search for examining an area. Awareness is Passive. When you feel tempted to use it, consider whether you are making a mountain out of a molehill (if so just tell them what there is to see) and/or rely on your players instincts to determine whether something is suspicious/strange etc.

If is still irritates you just build it into all the characters at the start of the campaign, i.e. "you all start with the Awareness skill". You are the GM after all.

What my idea was meant to tackle was that in the RAW you would almost never need to make a straight Perception roll. Since I proposed the above rule, I have come to think that it's not a bad thing to just use the three skills (Awareness, Search, Scrutiny) and forget rolling straight Perception. I think i'll just go with the RAW. But thanks all for the continued insight.

Yes... the Perception/Awareness debate.

The way I see it, Awareness is for something that's either really tiny or even unseen (kind of a Sherlock Holmes-level attunement to your surroundings), so I've no objection with the rule as stated. However, if there is something vital that needs to be found for the story to advance, a good house rule is to just roll base Perception, plus up to 30% depending on the character's level of Awareness.

Maybe that sees the best of both worlds, I don't know

I House ruled it so that Awareness is used to see IF something is noticed, and Per to see WHAT is noticed.

The awareness skill is the way I see it how alert and trained to notice things a character is, while the Per stat represents his physical abilities to do so.

Sometimes, if the situation calls for both, but then I just make the player roll a single roll.

Example: Volgar, the Guardsman is standing watch at night, with the rest of the party is sound asleep. He has a Per score of 40, and Awareness +10. A Moritat Assassin is trying to sneak up on him, under cover of darkness. Now, the assassin rolls for silent Move as normal, and for simplicity's sake, just makes the Test, without any successes. Now, it is Volgar's turn. He has a 50% change of noticing that Something is attempting to sneak up on him, and a 40% chance to see who it is. He rolls a 46, and he is alerted to the assassin's presensce in time, but it is to dark for him to see who it is (until the assassin gets closer or moves into the light, etc).