I made these suggestions a few times...these are the final version, after a looong thought
Variable Attributes
One thing which I never really liked about Illarion was that the Attributes were static. You could spend all your life mining, and never become stronger, and if you make a stupid mistake with your attributes... beh, you're stuck with it.
My suggestion is that attributes should be variable, and should increase with time.
How I see it working, is this:
You're mining, once your mining skill increases to 10% (and at every 10% or so [numbers are to be discussed later]), your strenght (since its the attribute you're using most), increases by 1 unit.
Basically, every time your skill in one field increases to X, the attribute tied to that skill increases by 1. Note that they are tied together, so if for example; you get killed and you lose some skill, and you fall under X again, you lose that +1 attribute.
Fighting skill should increase ALSO your constitution, making you more restistant to damage after having fought a lot.
This way, if for example; you mine or chop a lot of trees down, you'll find it easier to attack, since you're stronger.
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Skill Synergies
Basically, its allowing one skill to get a certain bonus depending on another skill.
Imagine you're a miner, and you've spent half your life whacking a pickaxe against rocks. One day, you're given a warhammer, and you go and fight. Basically its a similar action, so its no wonder that you can bash your enemy's head with quite a bit of accuracy, having been trained as a miner.
Example 2: You're a smith, and you've smithed many armor and many weapons; one day, you;re attacked by an opponent with armor X. Now you've crafted armor X, lots of times; so you know a bit about it, you know, for example; that its weak point is the fact that the wrist area is quite loose, so you already have an idea where you're goign to attack your enemy. Also, you can dodge the weapon he's using, because you know about its defects, and the way to use it.
These are examples of skill synergies.
How they'd work:
Total Skill = (Skill level) + (Attribute calculation thingy) + [(Skill levels of related skills)/5]
Their effect is quite small, but if you're a master smith, you'll get a lot of help for example.
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