What kind of stats do you have?
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Resources - Acquire and spend them like currency.
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Personality trait - some actions just check the stat, while narratively significant decisions change it.
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Skill - Gets better with practice or training.
When do you set the stat, when do you check it, when do you block the player out of an option entirely (e.g. don't give Rude conversation options if you're currently Polite). How do you decide when to do which, and how do you communicate your system to the player? If you block options off from the player in a menu-based system do you hide them completely, or keep them visible but disabled to tease the other playstyles?
https://emshort.blog/2016/02/15/set-check-or-gate-a-problem-in-personality-stats/
How do you advance them?
- Practice?
- Buy them with currency like experience points (XP)?
- Both?
- Other?
What improves?
- Traditional DnD chance of success or random damage amounts?
- Bonuses to speed or effectiveness of other actions?
- Anything else?
Skills through practice:
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Deterministic or probabilistic (count up to XP threshold or have a chance to upgrade each time)?
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Cost per level (x% more than previous level)? Some more possibilities discussed in this reddit thread
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Do you learn different amounts from failure than success?
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Do you learn different amounts based on your skill level and the task's required level? Too hard could be bewildering, too easy could be boring? Bell curve?
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Mental fatigue - do you slow down or stop learning after a while?
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If an action requires multiple stats, do you check them all at once (allowing them all to learn) and then report success or failure? Or do you check them one at a time and break off after the first failure? Can you use the same skill more than once in a single task? Wizard spells in Discworld MUD are good examples of multi-stage actions in a complex skill tree: see for instance Boolywog's Forbidden Pleasures or G'flott's Olfactory Nightmare.