How valuable is Burglary?

[Ophidimancer]

So I was looking over the Burglary Skill and Casing can basically be done with Investigation, Infiltration can basically be done with Stealth, leaving Lockpicking as really the only unique Trapping in this Skill.  Have you guys found Burglary to be that useful or do you find that other Skills just make up for it?

[admiralducksauce]

One of the PCs in my campaign is a thief, so yeah, he makes heavy use of Burglary, but otherwise, nah, it's not all that useful in most cases. It's like Survival a bit - if you're playing an outdoorsman or recon guy or mountain man, you'll have it, but in a city you probably won't see it used.

[EdgeOfDreams]

I agree with admiralducksauce - Burglary, like Survival and a couple other skills (Drive, anyone?) is very very useful in the right situations, but it is up to the player to create a character who is likely to get into those situations, and up to the GM to give the player what he wants. As a GM, I look at a character's skills and consider that that's what that player is going to want to focus on, so I need to give him the opportunities to do so.

Personally, in a game as urban as Dresden Files, I'd take Burglary looooong before I'd take Survival.

[JDK002]

I agree with admiralducksauce - Burglary, like Survival and a couple other skills (Drive, anyone?) is very very useful in the right situations, but it is up to the player to create a character who is likely to get into those situations, and up to the GM to give the player what he wants. As a GM, I look at a character's skills and consider that that's what that player is going to want to focus on, so I need to give him the opportunities to do so.

Personally, in a game as urban as Dresden Files, I'd take Burglary looooong before I'd take Survival.

Agreed.  Once in awhile I'll intentionally put my players in certain situations where even having 1 or 2 points in a specialty skill would make the scene much easier, as a reminder that having such a skill on the back burner is never a bad idea.

Another way to make skills like that more important is to hike up the difficulty of a roll a step or two when they try and use a different skill for it.  Like if someone wants to use Investigation when Burglary would obviously be the best choice.  Sort of a way of saying they can use the other skill, but the trade off is they may end up needing to use a Fate Point.  It's not something I would do very often though, as it's a really transparent method.

[admiralducksauce]

Another way to make skills like that more important is to hike up the difficulty of a roll a step or two when they try and use a different skill for it.  Like if someone wants to use Investigation when Burglary would obviously be the best choice.  Sort of a way of saying they can use the other skill, but the trade off is they may end up needing to use a Fate Point.  It's not something I would do very often though, as it's a really transparent method.

I've done similar to this before, too. I don't want to just flat-out deny someone a chance to try something, especially if it's one of those edge cases where the other skill almost does fit or where you get a slight disconnect between what the player understands the skills to be and what the GM sees them as covering. Stunts are there so you CAN mix and match skill trappings, so what I do is keep the difficulty the same but require a FP (for effect) to simulate a swapping-trapping Stunt.

[Sanctaphrax]

People tend to ignore Burglary, in my experience. I don't think I've ever played or GMed for a character who was good at it.

I do the increased difficulty thing with Alertness and Investigation sometimes.

[UmbraLux]

Have you guys found Burglary to be that useful or do you find that other Skills just make up for it?

Any (every) skill's value depends on how relevant it is to the game - how often it get used for a meaningful effect.  Guns won't be much use in a purely political game just as Burglary won't be much use if breaking in by stealth isn't an option the group chooses.

As for potential trapping duplication, that just gives you a bit of choice for character building.  A professional locksmith probably has Lockpicking and not Burglary while a professional thief would swap the choice.  When trappings overlap you'll often want to take one skill and a stunt instead of two skills - i.e. Burglary and Cat-Burglar instead of Lockpicking and Stealth.  Neither choice is wrong, it's just a question of what fits your character.

[Ophidimancer]

Personally I would probably give Burglary a Pickpocket or Sleight of Hand Trapping by default to buff it up a bit.

[admiralducksauce]

Personally I would probably give Burglary a Pickpocket or Sleight of Hand Trapping by default to buff it up a bit.

I would too. My player in question has Burglary and Deceit at equal ranks, though, so it hasn't come up.

[Ophidimancer]

I would too. My player in question has Burglary and Deceit at equal ranks, though, so it hasn't come up.

Oh yeah, I'd probably take away all physical type Stunts from Deceit and put them in Burglary.

[UmbraLux]

The book's split probably represents life a bit better.  Historically at least thieves tended to specialize.  Judging by crime stats that stays fairly true today - for that matter, pickpocketing is rare in the US. 

[Tedronai]

I'm given to understand that burglars also (have) tend(ed) to specialize even so far as the types of buildings they will target, such as one burglar or group of burglars targetting jewelry stores, while another targets banks, and yet another targets appartment buildings.
I still wouldn't demand three different skills to represent that specialization.  That's the role of stunts and aspects.

[Sanctaphrax]

I think it'd be easier to just get rid of Burglary.

It's not really damaging to the game to have it, but...what's the point? Why bother including it?

I feel like everything it does could be done just as well with stunts.

[admiralducksauce]

I think it'd be easier to just get rid of Burglary.

It's not really damaging to the game to have it, but...what's the point? Why bother including it?

I feel like everything it does could be done just as well with stunts.

So like a Doctor -> Scholarship and Demolitionist -> Craftmanship setup, but for... Thief -> Deceit? Or Thief -> Stealth?

[Richard_Chilton]

Burglary works good for those whose concepts demand it.

A cop should have Investigation but a second story man should have Burglary.  One has been trained to investigate crimes while the other has developed a skill at committing them.  If nothing else the motifs are completely different.

Richard