Skill Use in Combat

[drkrash]

Does anyone use skills in combat as "mini-powers"? Given the Specialties of a lot of physical skills, it seems like one should. Examples:

Athletics: Running, Throwing, Acrobatics

Escapology: (potentially any)

And some Mental Skills might affect the use of some mental powers.

So, aside from house-ruling it myself, is there any rule I'm missing? How about using Athletics/Throwing to throw a car at someone? Athletics/Acrobatics for defense? Escapology to get out of a wrestling hold?

Or would this just be too powerful? It just seems some of these specialties would rarely see use outside combat and make no sense to NOT use IN combat.

[Baelor]

The heavyweight in my game is tossing cars around some, and we have been using Athletics/ Throwing for that.

An acrobatic hero in the same game is using acrobatics to vault terrain, take cover, even attack by running part way up a wall and flipping over [She still makes a normal attack roll but I have given die bonuses for the Acrobatics]. She is also really sneaky, so I have let her use acrobatics to get to a place that is out of line of sight, then make a Steath roll to sneak up on a target.

As far as Athletics/ Acrobatics in place of a defense roll, I have not allowed that. But I would give a die or result bonus to someone who is moving acrobatically when they are attacked. In much the same way that high movement confers Defense bonuses [though in that case it is a multiple bonus, not die or result].

So far, this practice has had no unbalancing effects, and I want to encourage more of it, and the use of more skills this way. I like the way that it has made the players think about their characters more. And how to take some of the Cool - that's what they built the character for, after all.

Here are a couple more off the top of my head:

- Military/ Tactics to get a bonus to Priority, or even to hit, in appropriate circumstances.
- Stealth/ Palming and Planting Items to make a sneak attack by palming the knife, or plant a grenade in someone's pocket [Fallout 3, anyone?].
- Deception/ Manipulation to get a bonus by taunting an enemy into doing something rash.

Anyone got any more?

[BeardedDork]

I'm for anything that discourages standing slug-fests, and allowing for cool cinematic battles is one of BASH's strong points IMO. (I so, do not, miss Attacks of Opportunity)
So while I don't think skills should be allowed to take the place of powers, I wouldn't allow a skill check to duplicate a power, I do try to award hero points for creative skill use.
When we battled Damien Wayne in my first game I ran, his use of Acrobatics made him a real pain to deal with, I think that added to the game.