Knights & Knaves Alehouse

After reading the WS thread, I was pretty surprised how many 1Eers actually liked this game element. So what other specialization did TSR come up with? I honestly didn't keep track of Dragon, but I assume they had other incredibly stupid unbalancing ideas equal to Weapon Specialization? Perhaps:

Magic specialization: where a magic user can double or triple the effect of any one spell by "specializing in it" and taking two or three of the same spell.

Thief specialization: where a thief can opt to take percentage points from one thief skill and attach it to another, so don't like that 20% Hide in Shadows, make it 40% and just reduce your climb ability by 20%

Cleric Specialization: Increase your chance to turn by +1 by exchanging it for a spell slot

I assume some of these must have come up in Dragon at some point.

This sort of swapping tit for tat could go on forever, but the basic premise of using rules to give personality (via real advantages) in lieu of just playing your PC with gusto (or in whatever other way you like) must have been out of the bag after UA was published.

2e more or less went this direction with Specialist Wizards and Mythos Priests, and giving Thieves 30 discretionary points to add to their skills when they level.

Hm. These things seem superfluous and/or counter-productive for my campaign, falconer. I like Archbishop Turpin type Clerics, I think that spell selection is what should really matter to make your MU stand out, which is a lot more fun in practice that just saying "Boom I'm a summoner with +2 on these spells bla bla blah," and Thieves are characterized IMO by what they do rather than how they roll.

Mileages will vary, obviously.

I have pretty much played with all the specializations in the past and don't use any of them now. Something I had to do, to know I didn't have to do it.
I agree that characters should be unique and memorable because they were played well, not because they had a special skill. But if a DM is going to allow such specializations it becomes incumbent upon they player to use them. Because if they don't they will be a substandard character when compared to their fellows. Specialized fighters will do two to three times the damage of non-specialized fighters. Thieves will be masters at two skills by level 4 or so. A 9th level evoker specialist will have 5 more evocation spells than a generalist. Okay... specialized clerics are usually gimp.