Ahoy hoy my smol children. Ziggy's still at it (that bastard).
Today is a minor topic that required much pondering due to the vagueries of it's inclusion. Of all the job-classes in Overlord two stand out for how little context is given to them. Most other job-classes appear to at least be tied to archetypes but the two that stand out the most are (in Ziggy's opinion) Technical Master from Buser and Athletic Master from Azuth.
So what are they?
Well this requires knowledge from tabletop RPGs, but an Athletic skill exists of sorts, in many games so let us begin there. What are Athletics? Well it's many actions related to performing physical feats - Maruyama uses it for several scenes but it's the formula basically to do those things. It typically encompasses swimming, vaulting, and running, those sort of 'athlete' things funnily enough. Or not. You attempt athletics skill tests in various ways in games but typically it has rules in how to handle them instead of a physics engine running calculations.
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Having given up on himself, there was no hesitation in Ainz’s movements. Using his superior athletic ability, he mounted the Wise King of the Forest with a masterful vault. If he were an athlete, his name would have gone down in the history books. He did not have a saddle or reins, but several hours of experience was enough for Ainz to learn how to skillfully mount up. The pedestrians were gasping in awe as far as his eyes could see. He could even hear the sounds of women screaming in excitement. In particular, he felt the piercing gazes of his fellow adventurers burning into him. After seeing the copper plate around Ainz’s neck, their eyes went wide with disbelief.
[V2]
“Kufu!!” Albedo squeezed her legs together and hopped up in an adorable manner — the motion sending her into the ceiling. Such was the case when one possessed superhuman athletic ability. Ping! Or rather, it was a boom. A startling crash came from the ceiling, so great was the force of the impact. As they heard what sounded like a bomb exploding, the translucent bodies of several incorporeal monsters poked themselves out of the ceiling.
[V3]
The ends of the rope were tied to iron pitons sunk into the rock, and they creaked as they swayed. If anyone present could see through invisibility, they would be able to see a group of people descending the ropes. This much was nothing even for someone like Arche, who had focused on honing her magical prowess over her physical body and had not learned much in the way of athletic skills. Or rather, it would be better to say that both Workers and adventurers needed at least that much physical training. The training and the knots were put to good use as each Worker descended without a problem, landing within the tomb grounds.
[V7]
Kaijali flexed his arms in a front double bicep curl. They bulged mightily under his skin. “Kinda like that. And if you need a more impressive demonstration…” Next, Kaijali flexed his pectorals with a side chest spread. Although he was quite short, his athletic, muscular body attested to the fact that he was a born warrior. Nfirea wondered Why these poses? However, he could sense Kaijali’s goodwill, so he did not actually ask that question. Still, there was one question he wanted to ask.
[V8]
“Understood. Then, permit me this intrusion.” With that, she gracefully vaulted off her horse and landed elegantly in the doorway of the moving carriage. Although she made it look simple, given that she was wearing full plate armor and that both her horse and the carriage were moving at a full gallop, it was proof that she had considerable athletic ability. Still, that was only to be expected of one of the Four Knights that were the pride of the Empire. Among them, she had the greatest offensive ability. Her name was Leinas Rockbruise, also known as “Heavy Explosion.”
[V9]
He was a man who bulged with muscle. His neck was stout, and his chest muscles were impressive enough that one could sense them even through his thick armor. His powerful arms protruded from his rolled-up sleeves. There was no better way to describe him than “athletic,” regardless of which part of him one looked at.
[V12]
There was a shiny velvet chaise longue in the room. On it sat a man, a man she knew well — it was Azuth Aindra in the flesh. His upper torso was completely exposed, one could clearly make out his welldefined abs and puffed-up pecs. This was not exactly how one should present themselves in front of their client yet it was not the reason why Lakyus stopped her companions from advancing forward
[V14]
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The question remains however - what does a class like Athletic Master even do then? Given all classes make you better at performing in the role they are named (having Fighter Levels means you are better at fighting with weapons) the safest conclusion is it makes you better at.... Athletic tests? Maruyama described a few things he considers are 'Atheletics' in various volumes. Though Maruyama also seems to describe weight training or muscle building as being tied to Athletics too, curious enough.
Sadly we do not get enough scenes with Azuth to ascertain what he does with this class explicitly. Hence the ire of Ziggy in trying to figure out the nuance. The way Athletic Master works in the source material is it augments you when performing these Skill tests - however it also gives you special powers related to that Skill. So what does that mean for Overlord though? Well besides it probably also being a joke about one of his friends.
Likely, there is a [SKILL NAME] MASTER job class for every Skill. Now the powers they bestow are subtle but are things that break the limits of the Skill - think like powers normally only Demihumans have racially or magical beasts have. So for example an Athletic Master might be able to actually do the Mega Man X wall climb by kicking off the wall repeatedly or other such non-sense. How? All job-classes bend reality slightly - having these job-classes isn't a 'waste' just they bend reality in relation to one's Skill. So think of it like getting new options in video games you don't start with - like unlocking a parry, another jump, or being able to airdash; subtle mechanical things like that.
If you couldn't understand that, it basically gives you feats related to the Skill instead of something more combat orientated. So like you could break world records on Earth with these classes since they would give you bonuses how far you could go in a jump or sprint powered by magic. So instead of getting more tiers of magic or more martial arts, the mana within your soul and body is instead modifying your fundamental Skills.
A good example from text you probably forgot since it doesn't come up much is the Volume 12 demihuman info dump. Yay!
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Horuners — demi-humans with horse-like legs who were adept at sprinting. They could run for long periods without rest and possessed shocking mobility.
[V12]
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Here you see how a Racial Skill can likely become a Job-class skill via [SKILL NAME] MASTER classes. You probably wouldn't notice it at first though... Because levels just increase people's ability scores it's hard to notice something like a [SKILL NAME] MASTER. Effectively, races naturally attuned to certain Skills are sort of like natural born [SKILL NAME] MASTERs; the racial bonuses they have and unique skills are effectively the same as what humanoids can get from training to be a MASTER.
A good video game analogy is invincibility. Normally if you dodge past an attack, if your hurt box meets the hit box of an attack you get hurt, however most games make it lenient and give you I-frames(invincibility frames) so your dodges mean you can't get hurt. Theoretically (koff koff) a [DODGE] MASTER could unlock invincibility frames in the New World by training like Climb did but only in dodging. Will it make you stronger? Not alone no, but you can see how some of these 'power ups' [SKILL NAME] MASTER job-classes unlock can give you an edge in specific battles. Who doesn't love I-frames?
Now do [SKILL NAME] MASTER job-classes count as Fighter classes? That isn't quite clear, but given Buser and Azuth had Fighter levels, possibly. Now not all Skills are Fighter based so it might actually depend. For example Ainz, the master of bluffing, might one day mentor Neia to get the BLUFF MASTER job-class! The power of networking! Needless to say, that Skill isn't Fighter related at all so it might just depend on the context you use the Skill? Nonetheless, one must use their levels to acquire these powers. Remember Fighters are special in the New World for many reasons, tied to how they unlock Martial Arts in the first place(go read Magical Natural Philsophy for elaboration).
The truth is a mystery....
What even are all the Skills besides Athletics and Technical? Ainz never mentions either and he's a Player... Sadly only with meta knowledge can we speculate what these actually are. Given Neia learned how to bluff from Ainz though, at least BLUFF might be a Skill as we see many people use it and fail. The next confirmed one is possibly Charisma: the peerless power of the RIZZ. Dun dun duuuuun. Unlike all other social job-classes, like Noble, Charisma is unrelated to one's nation and career, further suggesting it's a Skill job-level.
(Ziggy checks his notes if he used that slang right.)
How do you do fellow kids. (tilts baseball cap backwards)
Ziggy could refer you to many games for examples but it's difficult to tell which Maruyama uses since he made Technical a Skill as well one can master and D&D actually doesn't have a Skill like that. Not all games treat all Skills the same either - some Skills anyone can perform but others are locked behind specific training (so anyone can do arithmetic but not everyone can perform Calculus). It's much akin to that nuance or everyone can run but not everyone can do somersaults? Muu....
Now for reference Maruyama's friend actually has Technical and Athletic as both being universal Skills anyone can get bonus Skills in. This likely was why Maruyama bothered to add them to his own game system - an homage to how this friend would GM. How he made these was any job-class could acquire Levels in these Skills. Maruyama likes to references his friends all the time in Overlord.
However another source makes it so you have to train so much in these Skills to get the MASTER designation that it unlocks the 'magical power-up'. The idea is the same with Climb's training - by training so much you can unlock special powers like he learned Limit Break. Now supposedly people with Aptitude can also unlock these powers or feats... Perhaps that was why Neia was so good as an Archer despite her low level? Now we're getting into semantics of template, class, racial, and job bonuses however. No body gyatt time for that. Har har.
In theory any Skill could have a job-class. With how rare they seem though, there seems to be a caveat to unlocking them - partially due to how one normally gets Skills like these from Occupational job-classes. The mystery deepens as both Athletic Master and Technical Master are non-Ordinary job-classes - they should confer the same stats as a combat viable class. The question though is are they worth investing in?
Apparently for Azuth it was worth the investment only if he's in the Powered Suit. Therein lies another clue to us - these are job-classes that tend to be better when your level and stats are higher. Why and how is up to your head-canon of course! Though we can speculate - perhaps by having new feats which scale to your ability scores, they can become far more powerful than intended when you have things like Powered Suits? That said, we don't notice much different from Azuth... The link here is the power of [SKILL NAME] MASTER job-classes seems tied specifically to Ability Scores. Thus as humanoids lack high ability scores (typically) Heteromorphs may actually benefit more from these [SKILL NAME] MASTER job-classes. Though given Azuth only noticed the benefit in the Powered Suit, only the Heteromorphs with absurdly high stats likely benefit from them.
One theory (read head canon) Ziggy had was whatever Azuth learned to use the Powered Suit better was actually what one had to do to better play YGGDRASIL. Recall how it was a theory amongst YGGDRASIL Players there was a way to play the game better.
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Q: Also, the Mask of Jealousy, the Devs certainly did as they pleased lolololol A: The Administrators were up to all kinds of mischief in the setting. Related to this or the DMMO [parts of YGGDRASIL] the most viewed thread on 2ch was “Man trains his body for the sake of DMMO” thread. But it was a setting that was decided. I would to reveal that sort of story one day.
[2010]
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Azuth possibly learned this same method but it also gave him a job-class as a result. Why? (shrugs) Possibly the controls on the Powered Suit are clunky but someone could figure out how to use them best and this inadvertently taught him the same method as required in real life for YGGDRASIL? Apparently its so specific it's not very useful outside the Powered Suit however... So it might just be a percentile version of the bonuses the suit gives him too - so it stacks with the Suit but outside it, it's not enough to benefit him to overcome the level investment.
Now onto technicalities... TECHNICAL MASTER.
Believe it or not, sundering is actually not that common in games. There's various rules for it but typically it doesn't get it's own class. You can see why Maruyama probably bundled that into a new Skill type - the Technical test.
Now what the hell is a Technical test?
Here if you are a child of D&D you probably got confused. The trick here by Maruyama is due to his preferences more than anything else. There is some method to the madman's madness however. Instead of Ability Scores determining everything, Skills play a factor as well given what we discussed in Magical Natural Philosophy - all New Worlder's use Skills to acquire their job-classes and can even evolve job-classes based on their Skills. Though inferior in terms of level, they have a far more open-ended system than Players have. There's some humour here as well - Players are like fixed stat monsters more than actual people from the New World. The Skill system is the nuance that conveys that.
One contradiction one might notice however is unlike every other job-class, where one's perception seems to play a role in how they are acquired by fitting an archetype, no one really comments on someone being a [TECHNICAL MASTER] or [ATHLETIC MASTER]. Normally. Brain however mentions how impressed he was with Sebas just punching someone, so New Worlders can perceive when things are amazing or when someone 'masters' a Skill should they have similar Skills.
So by mastering something 'technical' one appears to get the TECHNICAL MASTER job-class. The issue is what even falls under that Skill category? Here Maruyama defers not to a friend but rather a specific series. Why is likely due to how D&D never really put emphasis on sundering, and its rules are a mess (like the meme of grappling).
A Technical test is thus like Special - something that encompasses an entire set of mechanics. So why does it have it's own Skill category? There are several reasons, one being none of these games agrees on how to handle Skills. But Technical is reserved specifically for Skills you train in to acquire a 'technique' which isn't a Skill per se but a new option or tertiary mechanic. What actually fills this category is nebulous - you could say everything falls under ability scores but Maruyama treats these Skill categories as bundles of Skills basically. How Buser sundered better likely is contingent on how he used a two-handed sword one-handed; so he figured out a 'technique' to use the weight of his weapon to increase the force, exploiting physics to boost his number crunch. What a nerd.
Technical Master thus likely boosts one's power at doing something they boosted naturally by pure 'skill' for their Skill check. So you get so good at something you unlock magical video game bonuses. That's not so different from how the FARMER job-class was described - one can get good at farming to the point they boost the output of their crops. Amazing.
A Technical category Skill is thus any specialized combat action or option(shit not in every game). Athletics are more just sports related specialized actions. Anyone can learn better ways to do things in either category - just learning to be a better athlete doesn't mean you will be better at breaking weapons. We see Buser having a more narrowed technique made his job-class more valuable unlike Azuth's which is vaguer and so didn't help him much outside the Powered Suit. That likely is the trade-off - you can MASTER any Skill but the vaguer the Skill category the less the bonus is you get in exchange for being able to apply your level magic to more situations.
The question now is: what constitutes a Skill Category? We have two confirmed ones:
Athletics
Technical
But what others are there?
Ziggy would argue Charisma counts as one since a job-class exists for it specifically though other job-classes also have oration Skills. The trick here is these Skills seem to be tied to level limited Skills compared to other job-classes. So by training these Skills one can eventually level up but this also means you can't improve in these Skills infinitely like in real life - they are tied to game mechanics somehow, likely from YGGDRASIL's arbitrary game engine calculations. Thus by training Skills the engine uses that overwrote all of causality, one can level up and gain job-classes like ATHLETIC MASTER. Theoretically of course. The issue is Charisma wouldn't fall into that category of Skills though it is a Skill still. This is probably why Charisma leads to an Ordinary-type job-class but both Athletic and Technical are not, and also the possible caveat that makes these job-classes uncommon (being a MASTER is a stricter requirement than it might appear to us).
The other trick here is that these Skills have to be ones not associated with another job-class. That appears to be why they are so vague and hard to figure out - they have to be things that could apply to multiple situations by design. No two games handle this the same in every way, so best to use your favorite way to interpret [SKILL MASTER] job-classes.
Ziggy's hypothesis is [SKILL MASTER] might be like the [MASTER CLASS] from YGGDRASIL. Maruyama implies in YGGDRASIL that [MASTER CLASS] required 25 levels but in the New World we see Antilene get one at Level 21, fitting the broader Base Ten wall theory. So Ziggy thinks these [SKILL MASTER] classes are ones you unlock access to at Level 21 or so fitting the broader [MASTER] motif. Locking these classes behind that wall seems troubling however that does suggest how it might grant powers beyond one's race normally - as they are powers tied to advanced job-classes so can fittingly enough match what inherent magical racial skills can offer. That distinction in job-class grade would also explain why people can unlock Charisma at lower levels but these [MASTER] classes appear to be so rare.
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After Level 20 you have the chance to acquire intermediate ranked(Chuu Kyuu) job classes (Classes you needed to be Level 25 to acquire in YGGDRASIL).
[Tenth Anniversary]
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Now classes like Sword Master appear at lower levels as well, though those are direct combat classes which may just be called MASTER due to the game(like Weapon Master). The reasoning here is fuzzy but using the inter texts we can see how Maruyama derived these names to an extent and even the power scaling to assign this new qualifier - the Level 20 base ten wall. THE WALL. The confusion comes from how YGGDRASIL had Master job-classes already but the New World's MASTER classes are specifically tied to Skills. Maruyama sure loves convolutions, leaving small flies in the ointment!
The logic, from the Skill system we never get confirmation on, is that you can only unlock the prestige Skills at these Base Ten Walls. This might be why Runesmith as well is a Level 11 or Base Ten wall class too. In that scope Base Ten Walls effectively let you acquire advanced Skills which can lead to special job-classes which might even explain how people unlock Level 30 Lesser job-classes far beyond their normal levels. The scope of these job-classes is a mystery as is why these Skills need these level walls. Ziggy gave an answer in Magical Natural Philosophy, though this seems grounded in the physics of the New World.
Nevertheless what do you think?
Like it is well-known, Skills in Overlord go absurdly under-explained. Hopefully the rambling today helped you conceptualize the rules a bit more. How Maruyama prefers to handle it is basically certain bonus feats grant you levels in [Skill Master] job-classes rather than just being a bonus option for YGGDRASIL classes. Why? Probably to balance how they give you power beyond what Skills normally grant you in other games.
The idea of some Skills being prestige locked is interesting mainly because what could one possibly unlock as a Outlier, a deviator? They are so rare it's tough to say.
Alas, farethewell my smol children. Ziggy shall appear again, but have fun thinking about MASTER Classes and Skills.
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