I saw Jonas' argument. I don't entirely agree but we must be a minority to be interested in crunching numbers - I rather call it freedom of RP and opportunity to balance offensive/defensive traits, for ex. with WIS, DEX, and so on - but that last one is for D&D and relatives, perhaps Viking's system only makes sense by min-maxing, from a stat point-of-view.
Yes, optimal stats for Viking are pretty obvious for each weapon type or "class". For frontline fighters who use axes, swords, or fight unarmed, you'll want to put most of your points into Strength & Endurance (i.e., Constitution but also increases shield block %). If using knives or spears, then you want to invest in Finesse instead of Strength. For archers you want to max out Perception. Sense is sort of like a combination of wisdom / charisma so it's most important for support skills, e.g., witchcraft.
So you have a bit of freedom in how exactly you want to break it down but not as much as with D&D, unless you want to deliberately make a character who isn't great at combat… Which actually may not be a horrible idea as I found the combat eventually becomes too easy, even on insane difficulty setting.
Also not happy about picking 1 of 3 rhetoric/persuasion system - I know the game stated you can pick 2nd one later but I think it would make sense to be able to pick whichever seem most sensible at each point for RP.
I guess there's pros and cons to whatever system they went with. If they made it like a persuasion skill check in D&D + Pf then there's going to be players unhappy with bad rolls (probably some insisting the RNG must be broken). Some will say it encourages them to reload for a better outcome. If you make it like AoD & Shadowrun skill checks (hard requirement w/ no randomness) then people will say it tempts them to hoard points, reload, & put in another point until they pass the check.
What they're using here reminds me of Shadowrun Returns etiquette system, except you can only start out specializing in 1 out of 3. If you could use all of them I suppose it'd make things too easy. This way there's a tradeoff and arguably a bit of replay value.
That said, I think I'd prefer numerical skill checks even with the "temptation to save scum".. Some RPG players really need to work on our willpower. I'm
trying to play cRPGs without reloading unless my character/s die.