When you go to the first trainer, he agrees to train you based on a riddle. Unfortunately, it seems this riddle is all or nothing. You have a fifty/fifty shot at guessing right. If you miss it, it seems there's no way to get training, which is highly annoying.
Instead, wouldn't it be nice if you could use a decent SPEECH skill, say around 30 or so, to try to argue why you picked that answer? Thus allowing you access to the training? This would not only give the player a way to get back in the good standing with the trainer, but it'd be another worthy use of the SPEECH skill.
Also, another route for those without SPEECH that would be nice is if you could go talk to the Headmaster and pick up another quest in exchange for the Headmaster talking to the trainer on your behalf. Something that would be easy to implement, but would still give you access to the training. Perhaps something as simple as a 500 drach donation? Maybe hunting down a rogue thaumaturgist? Recruiting another student? Things like that.
The reason I suggest this is because having one dialogue choice that stops you in your tracks on something like Academy training promotes Load/Save mentality rather than role playing. If there was an alternative route for getting training, it wouldn't just make the player feel like going straight to the Load/Save menu rather than actually doing something in-game to redeem himself in the eyes of the Academy.
Just some thoughts on the subject.
Instead, wouldn't it be nice if you could use a decent SPEECH skill, say around 30 or so, to try to argue why you picked that answer? Thus allowing you access to the training? This would not only give the player a way to get back in the good standing with the trainer, but it'd be another worthy use of the SPEECH skill.
Also, another route for those without SPEECH that would be nice is if you could go talk to the Headmaster and pick up another quest in exchange for the Headmaster talking to the trainer on your behalf. Something that would be easy to implement, but would still give you access to the training. Perhaps something as simple as a 500 drach donation? Maybe hunting down a rogue thaumaturgist? Recruiting another student? Things like that.
The reason I suggest this is because having one dialogue choice that stops you in your tracks on something like Academy training promotes Load/Save mentality rather than role playing. If there was an alternative route for getting training, it wouldn't just make the player feel like going straight to the Load/Save menu rather than actually doing something in-game to redeem himself in the eyes of the Academy.
Just some thoughts on the subject.