I just noticed an errata.  The Fop (lure of power) is only listed with 4 skills, but there is nothing balancing this aspect.  In my house rules, I'm just going to allow the player to choose a skill.

Any other suggestions?

jh

not sure this is an errata, i think i saw some careers with less than 5 skills. some of the heroic for example…

Can't remember what the 4 are but howabout Charm, Education, Guile, Intuition, Ride?

nephtys said:

I agree with this. There is no balancing factor. He's the Fop. 

 I wouldn't be so quick to assume it's a mistake.  I did some quick checking and most basic careers seem to have 15 items between skills and possible advances (which I hadn't noticed before).  I did find just a few that deviate from this, notably the Miner with 16, and the Troll Slayer with 14.  I'm content to think this is the simply the price you pay for playing an annoying fop until I hear otherwise.

 No, I miscounted on the Miner.  I think I subconsciously added a comma between nature and lore as they're on separate lines.  I still doubt that the Fop's in error, though I could be wrong.  

nephtys said:

I agree, they don't have to have 5 skills. It's a noble career after all, they don't need to be skilled (especially not since this particular career is a Fop).

BTW, I agree with everyone who said it probably isn't an errata. But I think I would probably also houserule and give them a 5th, unless their career ability is particularly good (which is probably the balancing factor for the Trollslayer).

phild said:

IIRC, once per session they can disengage out of turn for free. Circumstantially, it can be really good, but I don't think the skill is missing to balance it.

 About the FOP's career hability, free disengage once per session I was wondering whether it is usefull at all or not….if the fop's player is being attacked, would the disengage avoid the attack somehow? At most it will force the attacker to engage again, isn't it?

Paligru said:

Not if the Fop is engaged with an ally. Enemy engages the group, and then the Fop disengages. The enemy would have to disengage the group he is in and then re-engage the Fop. 

Sorry to bump an old thread but I am curious if there has been an update on what the 5th skill is supposed to be. I can't see a good reason to not have one.

DevoutBadger said:

Not heard anything about it, but it could also balance the fact that it's a basic career which is also a noble, I'm not certain, but there are quite few basic noble careers around. Pistolier is the only other one I can think of, but I'm not certain if there are any others or not.

If you are staring out with a noble career when creating a character and choose to spend creation points to become affluent, then you start as a noble (you are a born noble son/daugher). That gives several advantages, such as +1 fortune die on most Charm or Guile checks, gaining 1g per month as a stipend from lands/titles, increased shame threshold (+1 per noble career) and the option to not roll social initiative, instead gaining the noble rank as social initiative. You also get some disadvantages (mainly that you suffer more stress if you're shamed by your betters).

Not starting out as a noble means that you are not noble born and recive less of the bonuses and your noble rank (which is not equal to beeing a real noble) is calculated as a lower one when calculating shame threshold, social initiative etc. And the charm/guile bonuses dissapear entirely.

These rules can be found on page 26-28 in the Lure of Power. A really important point is that there is a distinction between beeing an actual noble, and having careers with the noble trait are very different things. Having the noble trait just means that you are a bit more accepted in noble circles due to heroic deeds for example.

This might balance the Fop and make it a bit more interesting?

I would agree with that assessment, however the other noble tagged basic careers, Pistoleer, Courtier (I believe) and  Dilitante (retconned in with Lure of Power) don't have similar restictions.

Think I will email FFG. Until then I guess it will just be up to the GM.

The whole thing about the fop is that he's a useless … fop. Four career skills is part of that.

Doc, the Weasel said:

Agreed, useless but still a noble.