Skills are learned through a variety of means. Some skills, like combat skills, improve with use, while others do not. In general, all skills must be learned and improved by visiting a trainer. Trainers are located in many locations, and teach a variety of different skills.

At the heart of the Profession system is the dynamic skill system. Each profession has its own set of skills. These are called professional skills. When you join a profession, you will see these labeled as 'professional skills' when you type 'skills'. Each profession has 4 major skills. These skills can be learned up to 100 percent, and do not degrade as long as you are a member of that particular profession.

Also notice that you may have, or can gain 'other skills'. You may learn 4 'other' skills (skills not specific to your profession). These 'other skills' may be learned up to 60 percent, and will degrade over time, so you need to retrain them.

You may only have a total of 4 professional, and 4 other skills.

Thus, you may be a member of a profession, and excel in that profession's skills, while also 'dabbling' in other fields as well. This allows for a warrior who knows a bit of magic, or a wizard who knows a bit of thievery, and a bit about being a warrior, etc., and allows for maximum character variation, while maintaining a balanced game.

When you change your profession, your old professional skills will be moved into your "Other skills" slot, and the new professional skills will move into their place.

Consider the following example: Newguy the thief wants to change his profession to wizard. However, he still has tactics skill greater than 10:

      Professional Skills:               Other Skills:
      Nimbleness       :  20             Tactics          :  20
      Locksmith        :  20
      Stealth          :  20
      Theft            :  20

When he goes to a wizard trainer, he will receive a message that he cannot become a wizard just now: there is no space in his "other" skills to move his current professional skills. So, he needs to wait until his tactics skill is at 10 or less; he may use "skills disuse" command for that (see below).

After tactics is down to 10, Newguy can become a wizard. He goes to the trainer and confirms change of his profession. After that, his skills look like this:

      Professional Skills:               Other Skills:
      6th sense        :  10             Nimbleness       :  20
      Concentration    :  10             Locksmith        :  20
      Control magic    :  10             Stealth          :  20
      Resist magic     :  10             Theft            :  20

Note that the old 'professional skills' that Newguy had as a thief have now become 'other skills'. They will begin to degrade, and will need to be retrained if Newguy wants to keep his skills up.

Disused skills are the skills that you no longer need and want to get rid of, most probably because of them blocking your wanted profession change. You may select one (and only one) skill to disuse with the 'skills disuse' command. See 'help skills' for detailed syntax.