Editing Skip Williams

'''Skip Williams''' is one of the chief designers of ''[[Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition]]'' alongside [[Monte Cook]] and [[Bruce Cordell]]. He is notable for his "Sage Advice" column that was run on [[Wizards of the Coast]]'s website for a time; which covered errata, rules issues, and similar issues of [[Skub]]bery. Many of his clarifications were interesting, if only on a basic level. He also wrote several [[splatbook]]s for the system, which run the gamut from entertaining to [[Cheese|absolutely game-breaking]].

Skip had earlier written ''M2: Vengeance of Alphaks'', which continued ''two'' traditions of the day: the [[Epic Levels]] tradition of being bad, and the [[M1: Into the Maelstrom|M series]] tradition of being derivative. Under [[Lorraine Williams|You Know Who]] he co-wrote [[WG9: Gargoyles]] and [[WG10: Child's Play]] for initial-stage 2e [[Greyhawk]], which the [[grognard|Greyhawk fandom]] [[Rage|hated]]. (It would only [[Greyhawk Wars|get]] [[From The Ashes|worse]] from there. Although we will note, in fairness, that his later-submitted prequel to [[Scourge of the Slavelords|the A series]] would be fine.)

Skip is better known, these days, for his [[Munchkin|creative]] interpretation of the rules and for absolutely fucking ''hating'' the semi-newly-introduced [[Sorcerer]] class. He is on record as repeatedly voicing his feelings that the Sorcerer "wasn't a proper caster class" and that in breaking with the [[Vancian]] casting system for a more spontaneous spells-per-day model, that the Sorcerer was [[skub|horning in on]] the [[Wizard]]'s gig. (Monte Cook didn't like the 3e sorcerer much either; he'll roll his own for [[Eldritch Might|Eldritch Might II]], and will float other mage-options for [[Arcana Unearthed]].) According to several sources affiliated with WotC, Skip is the primary reason for the huge amount of content that blatantly favors the Wizard over the Sorcerer - to the point where almost any book he wrote would openly shaft the Sorcerer in favor of the Wizard. Some of this fuckery was rolled back in 3.5 and ''[[Pathfinder]]''; for example, the 3.0e sorcerer had no class skills whatsoever that relied on its god stat (charisma), while 3.5e added Bluff.

The Wizard/Sorcerer splatbook from 3.0, ''Tome and Blood'', is one of the most notorious examples, as of the various prestige classes and items in the splatbook, a huge number of them blatantly favor the Wizard, such as Metamagic rods (which give Wizards free access to a Metamagic feat but mandates that the Sorcerer still spend a full-round action to use them). Of the fifteen [[Prestige Class]]es in the book, all but nine are ''vastly'' easier for a Wizard to acquire than a Sorcerer, and one is essentially Wizard exclusive. To elaborate: many of these prestige classes can be spliced into by level 6 for most, but a Sorcerer must be at least level 12 for ''the exact same classes''. The one Prestige Class in the splatbook that is Sorcerer-exclusive also happens to substantially undercut the Sorcerer's spellcasting capabilities; it does not get any additional Spellcaster levels and essentially [[fail|gains stats better for a combat-capable class]].

[[Category:Dungeons & Dragons]][[Category:Game Designers]][[Category:Writers]]