Greetings!  I have made some pretty fundamental changes to the way the skill sets work, so let me explain them.

First of all, each skill set now falls into different categories: there are general skills, things like knowledge and perception based, such as survival then there are weapons skills, which are pretty self-explanatory then there are specialiaty skills, which are skills that are exclusive in some way, such as your racial skills, the skill of sanguinism if you have the ash-plague, and so forth finally there are trade skills, which are essentially the skills of buying, selling, and making things.  You can only learn so many skillsets in a given category – for now I have set it at four for each category, but that is not a final number and it is exceedingly probable that it will change.

The second change is that of affinity.  Certain skillsets now can have either a strong, moderate, or weak affinity, either to magic, neutrality, or technology. Using skills of skillsets builds your affinity towards that skillset’s affinity.  Using skills from other skillsets which are of opposing affinity, will have their effect reduced.  Most skills at this point are neutral.  The skills of the sanguinism skillset all have varying magical affinities.  A few skills in the survival skillset have some small to moderate technology affinity.  It is possible to mix affinities in with this system as is now, but it will reduce your effectiveness.  The exact affects of affinity, and the mechanics of it all, are still under development, and may change.

SKILLS now breaks down skillsets by their category.  Also the individual SKILLS breakdowns, ie SKILLS SWORDS, will also print the level and circle of experience in that skillset.  The aesthetics of displays have changed (again, yes, I know!  I’m pretty dedicated to trying to get the aesthetics just right, especially to make sure they work with screen readers.)

There will be more coming, of course!  Stay tuned.

Maya\Rudha