Making rangers out of dwarves

This post is a playtest for the ideas posted here about reconciling adventure-based advancement and GURPS skill learning. I didn't want all the dwarves to spend 200 hours working and all get a skill point at the same time. 

Here is the setup: Khazek Strongmoss, son of Erek is tasked to bring to operational readiness a guard-size unit of rangers. The quirk you may ask? The recruits are dwarves. The other quirk is that Khazek is a wet-nosed member of the Royal Family with no teaching experience. The timeline mostly impose an on the job training. How can a simulation geek GM should handle this situation? I could narrate and wave hands, or I can roll a bunch of dice. Guess what I chose? Let's specify that all that dice rolling was done using a script, no physical dice were harmed in testing this scenario.



Let's start with the beginning. Is Khazek a natural teacher? Teaching as a skill defaults to IQ-5, this is stiff and translates into a target of 6. Khazek rolls a 9. A success at default would have indicated a natural talent and a free character point into Teaching. No dice, Khazek can't halve the time for his pupils to learn things, but he can structure their time so that each hour in the field counts as one hour of learning time.

Second, Khazek selects 21 dwarves who volunteered for training after telling them that being a ranger was not for the faint of heart (and a hopeful promise of lots of orc encounters). We'll assume that all dwarves have a homogeneous DX 11, a Per 11, HT 11 and IQ 10. We are also assuming that each recruit has Soldier-12. One thing on his side, these dwarves are from the Ardacer Attack, a unit that is in fact combat capable in woodlands.

His lesson plan involves the following skills: Stealth (DX-5), Observation (Per-5), Tracking (Per-5) and Survival (woodland) (Per-5). These skills defaults to the values stated in the parentheses.  I creates an array of 21 dwarves and rolled each dwarves against their default for all skills to see who are naturally gifted.

On April 10th, Khazek take the recuits out and focus on Stealth and Survival. Khazek really dropped the ball about teaching, but the recruits got to experience a lot on their own. By the end of the day, Khazek note the most promising recruits.


Khazek is now at Teaching-6
Recruit 2 : Observation-10; Tracking-10
Recruit 4 : Survival-10
Recruit 5 : Stealth-11
Recruit 6 : Stealth-11
Recruit 7 : Survival-10
Recruit 11 : Tracking-10
Recruit 14 : Survival-10
Recruit 16 : Stealth-11
Recruit 17 : Observation-10


On April 11th, the focus is on Observation and survival skills. Khazek finally start to get a handle on communicating his skills. It still isn't effective, particularly with a group of 21 bumbling dwarves, but by the end of the day, recruit 1 is showing signs of "getting it".


Khazek is now at Teaching-10
Recruit 1 : Observation-10
Recruit 2 : Observation-10; Tracking-10
Recruit 4 : Survival-10
Recruit 5 : Stealth-11
Recruit 6 : Stealth-11
Recruit 7 : Survival-10
Recruit 11 : Tracking-10
Recruit 14 : Survival-10
Recruit 16 : Stealth-11
Recruit 17 : Observation-10; Survival-10


 April 12th, a lesson of Tracking and Survival again.

Khazek is now at Teaching-10
Recruit 1 : Observation-10; Survival-10
Recruit 2 : Observation-10; Tracking-10
Recruit 4 : Survival-10
Recruit 5 : Stealth-11
Recruit 6 : Stealth-11
Recruit 7 : Survival-10
Recruit 11 : Survival-10; Tracking-10
Recruit 14 : Survival-10
Recruit 16 : Stealth-11
Recruit 17 : Observation-10; Survival-10
Recruit 18 : Tracking-10

On April 13th, eve of the departure, Khazek takes the recruits into a 8 hours silent walk through nearby woodlands. His teaching skills are almost up to part, but not quite yet. The 21 recruits end the crash course with the same records as the previous day.


Khazek is getting close to reach Teaching-12, and double the odds of getting his recruits to acquire new skill levels. He looks back at his three guards of 7 dwarves. He must decide whether he will retain the best 7, 14 or keep them all.