Skills & Training
Your stats say how strong, fast, or clever you are. Your skills say what you've actually learned to do. A character with 80 Strength but no Athletics still has to learn how to climb.
Skill proficiency
Skills are rated 1–100, and the rating IS the engine — every skill check rolls against it (see How Actions Resolve):
| Proficiency | Band | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| 1–10 | Novice | Basic competence. A coin-flip around Difficulty 1–10. |
| 11–25 | Trained | Reliable under pressure. A coin-flip around Difficulty 11–25. |
| 26–50 | Expert | Consistently effective. A coin-flip around Difficulty 26–50. |
| 51–75 | Master | Exceptional. A coin-flip around Difficulty 51–75. |
| 76–100 | Grandmaster | Near-superhuman. A coin-flip around Difficulty 76–100. |
How a check lands: Chance = 55 + (Skill − Difficulty) × 2, rolled 1–100 behind the scenes. Every skill point above a task's difficulty is worth about +2% on the roll — and once your skill is 25 or more above the difficulty, the task stops being a roll entirely. It succeeds automatically. The things that used to be gambles at the start of the game become the things you just do — that's what growing a skill should feel like.
General skills everyone can learn: Athletics, Acrobatics, Stealth, Perception, Investigation, Persuasion, Intimidation, Deception, Medicine, Survival, Tech (hacking, engineering, science), Piloting, Lore, Insight, Performance, Crafting. Ability skills belong to power users — Mutant Mastery, Nano Manipulation, Magic Proficiency, Psychic Focus, Elemental Control, Transformation, Summoning, Divine Channeling — and you only have them if your powers use them.
Growing skills
Skills grow through use. Each meaningful success grants skill XP; the cost to raise a skill is current proficiency × 10.
| Source | XP |
|---|---|
| Successful use in a meaningful situation | +1–3 |
| Critical success | +3–5 |
| Training (a week of downtime) | +5–10 |
| Teacher or mentor (a week) | +10–20 |
| Skill book / data chip | +5–15 (once) |
| Significant combat use | +2–5 |
Trivial uses — tasks 25+ skill points below yours, the ones you now succeed automatically — earn half or nothing. You learn by being tested. Once a task doesn't test you anymore, it stops teaching you.
Synergies: complementary skills at 25+ reinforce each other. Stealth + Acrobatics gives +5 to moving stealthily; Medicine + Science gives +5 to diagnosis; Persuasion + Insight gives +5 to reading what someone wants. Build your skill list like a kit — overlapping tools.
Training
Deliberate training is powerful but exhausting. You can train once per day — one skill, one stat, or one technique — and each session costs a level of exhaustion:
| Exhaustion | Cost |
|---|---|
| 1 | −10% to all physical actions |
| 2 | −20% to all actions, speed −25% |
| 3 | −30% to all actions, speed −50%, max HP −10% |
| 4+ | You're barely standing — and level 6 is death |
A long rest (8 hours) clears one level. Training a signature move costs 1 exhaustion; a finisher costs 2. Intense techniques can put you down for days — which is exactly why you can't grind your way to mastery overnight.
Mentors change the math: training with someone at skill 50+ (or ability 70+) gives +25% skill XP, +20% learning success, and −25% training time. Mentors want payment, favors, or apprentices who don't embarrass them. A good mentor is a relationship, not a vending machine.
Ability proficiency
Mutants and Nano-Enhanced have a quiet edge: every use of an ability makes it cheaper. The proficiency system tracks how often you use each power, and its cost shrinks — up to 60% off the base at true mastery. Wisdom speeds this up: at WIS 30+, proficiency gains are 50% more effective. Use your powers, learn your powers, and eventually your signature techniques cost a fraction of what they once did.
What to train
Ask what your character does when the world pushes back. A marksman trains Perception and Stealth so the shot happens on their terms. A fixer trains Persuasion and Insight so they never need the shot. A mutant trains Mutant Mastery so their power stops costing so much. Skills are the difference between having a number and being able to use it.