The rp of many characters has them able to write at level 1. People write their cabal applications in most cases, although there are the rare few that where someone writes them, or they are drawn, or only done verbally etc.

But most people write, as per their rp, well before they get the pen skill.

It doesn't seem to me as if pen at level 1 would cause an imbalance, although I believe a certain explore area might be relevant to this query.

Can any imm give me their reasoning for making this a level 20 skill?

Likely to prevent a flood of stupid written objects from players with an interest to cause nuisance. Ranking a character up to 20 to do that is not attractive.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

What do you think about coding it so that when you use the pen skill on a piece of parchment, it attaches a 'rot' timer to the object, say 10 ticks/level? That would reduce any trash from using this skill.

Also, I don't think that anyone would really need this skill prior to 10th level. But if someone is playing a mute, it would suck to have zero communication until 20th level. I guess they could emote 'write x on a piece of paper' but since we have a skill that does that, why not lower it to 10th level?

The first 10 levels goes quickly enough that not being able to communicate wouldn't be too much of a hindrance, except for not being able to do quests, but pen wouldn't help you with that either.

Just an idea.

I think it stinks for characters who want to keep some sort of journal.

Or they could just tough it out. It's not like they're going to be playing a mage, so they should be able to solo rank to 20. Doing 'emote writes x on a piece of paper' is lame; if someone wants to play a mute they should deal with the consequences.