Languages

Languages are a big pain in the butt. How many ranks should you have to be considered fluent? How often should you make an "understanding" check?

Here's a "better" way to handle language skill ranks.

Each rank of a language gives you 1 language ability. Some language abilities are ranked and must be taken in order.

Speaking
1- gist of it- you can make a language roll to understand the gist of what is being said to you.
2- hear it- you are fluent in understanding a language, make a roll to communicate things to other people using the language.
3- got it- you are fluent in speaking the language and understanding the spoken form.

This means with 3 ranks you can fluently understand and speak a language without being literate in it.

Writing
1- kind of- you can roll a language (or decipher script) check to understand something written in the language
2- gist of it- you can pretty much understand the gist of something written down
3- fluent- you can understand the written form just fine, might need a roll to write complex things
4- got it- you need no roll to read/write in this language

With 4 ranks you can be literate in a language without being able to speak it.

Extras
Sign Language- you can communicate in this language using sign language if someone else has it. Dialect- each point can represent a special dialect of this language, such as yooper or southern terms "y'all, and 'eh!'" This can mean cants also (Like shizzle and l33t)
Read Lips- you can read lips to see what people are saying when you can't hear them by rolling a language check (requires full speaking).
Note: While read lips is a phonetic thing, there's little difference between "fuck him" and "looks grim". Only by understanding the language can you get any meaning out of the conversation, otherwise you can get major errors that make your final "transcript" make no sense.

Non-Specific Language Perks (Take as language skills)
Read Braille- you can read braille transcripts in any language you can read(and write)
Morse- you can communicate in morse code in any language you can read (requires full writing)

So If you took Spanish 2, assuming 1 rank read and 1 rank write, you can roll 2 dice whenever trying to read or write spanish. Further dice ensure less need to roll. More expensive, but closer to what was intended.

For your primary language, you are assumed to have 3 ranks spoken, 4 ranks written, with no extras at no cost.

Some edges or cyber/bioware may give you bonus language dice- these are not ranks, just dice to assist you at lower ranks.