And Squall, and Cloud, and Cecil, and Claude, and Stahn, and Reid, and Lute, and Will Knights, and...

The skill based system i like is in Greyhawk: temple of elemental evil. you can choose a "class" which has some pros and cons, and then choose skills from there on. some skills only available to a class, but most are open to everyone. allows wierd possiblities like a lockpick skill for a mage and two-weapons combat for a cleric, and hunting/tracking for a monk. and multi-class. i just love a level-up and go deeper into the tower kind of game.

hi sheng long. saw your art shrine page. gods destiny... wow that's some old school v1. i didnt know about d20. i do prefer the idea of dice rolls instead of the vague ATK 15, DEF 13. dice sounds more clear how much hit points/damage actually will be determined imho. my "awesome" game is going to lean towards skill AND class based (based on shadowrun, a cool little cyberpunk skill/class based rpg on the sega genesis) and it will use simulated dice rolls. oops, sorry for the shameless plug.
Anyway I can't wait for v3. this is going to be a good year.

In my opinion, the d20 gaming system (particularly the D&D implementation) is one of the best gaming rulesets ever. It's incredibly detailed, leaves room for flexible character growth, and contains a very strategic, outstandingly detailed combat experience.

No matter what you think of D&D's content, the "engine" is fantastic.

I have implemented d20 rulesets into MUD systems (lpmud, and a short-lived Circle project), and it's actually not that hard to implement with to a sufficient degree.

The only thing I don't like are the restrictions on magic, and I'm not terribly fond of some of the "lore" content, but who cares? "d20 Modern" is a fantastic implementation, and it's basically content-less.

Good stuff. Even simply as an exercise for the interested designer, it's worth reading and learning. There is a ton of good idea there.

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=d20/welcome

Enjoy!

-lok
(moving company here... offline for a while...!)

Muahaha, responding to my own post! But I had to, I just found this old text file I wrote a while back, and I thought you guys might find it interesting. Sort of a skill/class system of my own design. Note that I wrote it several years ago, so it may be incoherent and/or stupid.

Ability System:

-Each town has a book shop where tutorials may be purchased.
-Equip a tutorial on an applicable character and all LP aquired by the character (when they use that move) will go to learning that ability.
-While the tutorial is equiped, the ability may always be used.
-Special books can also be equiped. These books teach one to become a different class. The tutorial may be equiped once a character has learned 3 different abilities in their respective class.
-When a class tutorial is equiped, the character becomes the class connected to the tutorial, and all actions performed by the character give it LP. A character may unequip the book, in which case they revert to their normal class, and no longer gain LP towards that class.
When a character is using a class tutorial, they have only the first special that class uses, none of their other specials remain unless the tutorial is unequiped.
-When a character has gained enough LP, they will learn the ability from their tutorial or permanently become the next class.