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Pathfinder Unchained / Background Skills / New Skills

Lore (Int; Trained Only)

Source Pathfinder Unchained pg. 50
You possess a specialized area of knowledge, generally narrower than that of a full-fledged scholar. Lore acts as a catchall skill for information, similar to how Craft handles artisanal skills and Profession handles professional skills. The category of a Lore skill can vary widely from that of another Lore skill. It could be regional (such as a city or country), about a discipline (such as cryptography), or related to a narrow set of people (such as famous musicians). The scope of region-based Lore skills can also refer to specific subcategories, such as taverns in a particular region.

A Lore skill must be narrow—far narrower than the most relevant Knowledge skill. The broader the scope of a given category of Lore, the shallower your knowledge is on that topic. If you know about taverns in a wide region, you know less about each of them than you would if you had Lore in taverns of a specific city. Lore skills normally can’t be used to identify monsters the way Knowledge skills can, unless they refer to a specific type of monster (such as owlbears or vampires). If Lore involves a common, broad category of race or monster, it needs to be more specific. Lore (elves) would be too broad, as would Lore (dragons).

Check: Lore skills use the same DC scale as Knowledge skills: DC 10 to answer easy questions, DC 15 for basic questions, and DC 20 to 30 for really tough questions. In many cases, Lore can substitute for a Knowledge skill, such as Lore (elven history) filling in for Knowledge (history) in a check involving elves. At the GM’s discretion, a player might be able to apply a Lore skill that’s only partially related to a subject with a –5 penalty, such as using a Lore skill about a region to recall information about a particular city in that region or applying knowledge of distilling to winemaking.

The table below describes some examples of Lore skills alongside examples of skills that would be too broad. This is by no means a comprehensive list, and the GM has final say on whether a particular Lore skill is appropriate.

Appropriate Lore Skills	Inappropriate Choices
A particular small city (or smaller settlement)	Settlements
One district of a large city or metropolis	An entire large city or metropolis
a particular monastery	Monasteries
Taverns in a region	Taverns
Bandits in a region	Banditry
Famous battles in a region	Famous battles
The spice trade	Commerce
Cats	Animals
Drow matriarchs	Drow
Dwarven history	Dwarves
Frost giants	Giants
Sarenrae	Gods
Dagon	Demon lords
Phlegethon	Hell
Military commanders	Warfare
Famous singers	Music
Infernal contracts	Devils
Evocations	Spells
Silver and mithral	Metals
Tea	Beverages
Trees	Plants
Tattoos	Art

Bards: Lore is treated as a Knowledge skill for the purposes of bardic knowledge and lore master, as well as similar abilities found in other classes, creatures, and archetypes. This applies only to Lore skills in which a character is trained. In other circumstances, use the more relevant Knowledge skill.

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Lore (Int; Trained Only)