Comment on “A Training Idea, At Last”

So the current state of the proposal, for fighters at least, is:

1. a fighter with Amateur status in Instruction can, by fighting alongside a trainee, improve them to combat-trained (gaining the benefits of not needing morale to enter combat, better morale score, and first weapon proficiency)

2. a fighter with Amateur status can further improve a combat-trained person part of the way to first level, but not all the way (extent possible is TBD.)

3. an Authority in Instruction can take the combat-trained person all the way to first level (or take them from partly trained to first level, if someone has already trained them part way)

Do I have that right, based on reading your proposal and following the comment chains adding onto it?

So now there would be a kind of "half-level" between combat-trained and the 1st level.

I have some ideas for the extent of "half-levels."

The HP you give them could be the minimum possible on the 1st level hit dice, and then when they level up they can roll the dice for real. If they roll a better number (and hopefully they do), they get the difference between that roll and the min which they were already awarded. Gives them a little survivability boost for reaching half-level, but doesn't take away from how HD already work.

And perhaps at half-level they can earn an additional weapon proficiency, if they get more, and/or their first cantrip, if they're a class which gets them. (Hmm ... perhaps half-level clerics Wise enough for a bonus spell could even get that at the half-level mark, too.)

You mentioned "half-monks" (i.e. half-level monks) using sage abilities in the post responding to Vlad, which implies the half-level character ought to gain their specialization at this point too, and thus their 10 (12?) starting points + the ability awarded for same.

All of that comes out to a neat package forming a nice division between combat-trained (but with nothing related to character class) and 1st level (with all goodies intact.)