DeadZone wrote:
I see the confusion. The Perform skill instructs you to choose a focci. the implication of this is that you can make perform checks with that focus. However, the Skill Foci section on page 107 says:
Quote:
A character with levels in a skill may make use of all of its Foci.
However, Speak Language has its own special section that says that each language is tracked separately. Perform does not. So I'd be inclined to let you use your perform ranks on any of the individual foci. (As ridiculous as it may sound to say that ranks in Perform(Dance) would carry over into Perform(Wind Instruments).)
A very interesting catch. Looking back at First Edition, it looks as though Perform foci should work exactly like the Trained Knowledge focus from Scholarship, with each "focus" being a specific field of study.
Scott, I'm not so sure I'd be so willing to treat them as standard foci, no more than I would let Scholarship (Biology) overlap with Scholarship (Politics). It would depend greatly on the character and the campaign. I think the special condition for Trained Knowledge should apply here too. It seems to be a much easier solution than disallowing any overlap whatsoever.
At least, that's what I'm going to do in my home game.
Tom