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[Neonivek]

I am reopening this suggestion as I've been thinking about it a lot.

One of the major reasons why high attributes should simulate skills is simply because without it you have to input "Natural skill" into every single living creature on the planet.

You need to give every animal an fighting, dodge, blocking, wrestling and what have you skill.

And while some, like snakes, justify the fact that they might have a superior wrestling skill that belies their abilities.

Tigers are just incredibly strong and fast creatures. Cats are fast creatures.

Basically there is a relationship between raw power and raw speed and skill. In that a swing that is incredibly fast going from an incredibly agile creature is harder to dodge independent of how great at fighting they are. Even with skill how hard it is to dodge doesn't appreciably change right away.

Even going into mythology Hercules has often been depicted as a brute using pure might in place of whatever lack of skill he might have. Even Berserkers were mostly known for just being mighty over anything else.

This isn't Artificial, it is less artificial then just giving all creatures skill. As well with how the game functions no skill and high attributes is far too weak.

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My proposal is basically that attributes give a phantom signature that apes skill. To reflect that a Bear will beat a martial artist.

The fact that skill is often to replace the fact that you aren't that fast or strong.

[AceSV]

Having not read the entire thing, it sounds like a D&D or GURPS style skill check would fix this for you.  Basically the classic table top skill check is to add Base Stat + Skill Level + Dice Roll + modifiers. 

So let's say your character has a Dexterity of 8, Locking Picking specialty of 5 and a +3 Lock Picking tool.  8+5+3 = 16 + the die roll (d20 for D&D, 3d6 for GURPS) = your skill check.  So your skill level for Lock Picking isn't even half of the success roll.  Different locks would have different challenges.  A worn out farm lock might need at least 10 to open, an average lock might require 20 to open, a hotel safe 30, a bank vault 40, etc.  Situational modifiers also come in to play.  If you're sleepy or drunk, you might get a -5 penalty.  If you've just downed your first cup of coffee after a great night's sleep, you might get +5 bonus.  More relevant to Dwarf Fortress, you psychological state could affect it, penalties for feeling miserable and bonuses for feeling happy. 

Bottom line, if some kind of creature or demigod has an outrageous skill level, it doesn't need the bonus from training to succeed at a particular activity, its skill level will suffice.  In the same way, a fantastic situation could also guarantee success without the skill level coming into play. 

GURPS:  http://www.sjgames.com/gurps/lite/ 
D&D:  http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Skills_Summary  http://www.d20srd.org/srd/skills/usingSkills.htm

GURPS is closer in spirit to Dwarf Fortress, as it typically aims to be more simulation and less gamey in its mechanics.  There are plenty of other tabletop RPGs and wargames out there too. 

[vjmdhzgr]

I like this idea for making wild animals better at fighting, however there's something very important you're forgetting: most creatures don't have modified attribute ranges. Like those lions and bears, or even dragons you've been using as an example just have default attribute ranges (except dragons, but they have high willpower which I don't think is involved in this suggestion). I know that attributes are supposed to affect skills as it is, including strength and agility affecting combat skills. I've just made a new creatue which is a dwarf with all of the attributes they normally have modified (which is all combat attributes except endurance and kinesthetic sense) increased to 5000, and I tested it out in the arena against a normal dwarf. I was hitting about 90% of tricky shots and I never missed any attacks of lower difficult. Trying a normal dwarf against a normal dwarf, I didn't get one hit in about 20 attempts, of all sorts of different difficulties. So, it seems like what you're asking for is already implemented.

However, to make it more like what you want, I'd say you could suggest that Toady goes back over creatures and adds a bit more detail to them. Like actually make bears notably strong rather than just a bit bigger than humans because body size isn't really enough to simulate how much stronger bears are, make big cats more agile, that sort of thing. As it is in game, someone with no skills has basically never even heard of the concept of combat. I imagine they'd swing a weapon around their back in an attempt to hit the enemy in front of them. With no skills you're not hitting anything, even another thing with low skills.

[crazyabe]

My +5 engraver baron punched a cave crocodile to death I severely hope the system gets improved because the wiki said that it would be lethal to an unarmed civ... Hope the stupid pric starves soon I wanted that croc

[dudlol]

Would the simplest description of this suggestion be:

A. Work creature size into attack/block/dodge calculations, allowing larger creatures to land attacks more easily but penalizing their abiloty to dodge, and to
B. Create a variance in the natural skill of non sentient creatures, such that a creature like a wolf might be naturally good at biting (a reasonable assumption, that being how they hunt)?