Useless Skill

Overview

A Useless Skill is a skill that has little or no appreciable usefulness. While some skills have been useless since their introduction, through publishes or expansions they may be made useful. The reverse may also happen, also known as nerfing.

Current Useless Skills

Allows the collection of (very small amounts of) gold, and also some items (which are nearly identical to those that can be purchased from NPC vendors for tuppence). (Note: This one is half useless and half useful since Mondain's Legacy expansion. See Past Useless Skills below.)
Allows you (and those nearby you) to log out instantly in areas where your character would otherwise remain for a couple of minutes. Cannot be used in certain areas (such as champion spawn zones), requires consumable resources, and is all but made completely redundant by the Hiding skill, player houses and inns.
Allows you to determine who produced a given corpse. Pointless in that the poor soul who belongs to it can simply be resurrected then asked directly; assuming you have any interest in the matter.
Allows you to determine who's a member of the Thieves Guild. Pointless in that thievery from other players can only be performed in Felucca; an area where it is generally considered acceptable to kill anyone who invades your personal space regardless of their intentions.
Allows you to determine who picked a given chest. Pointless in that players do not need to lock containers due to the House Security system.
Used to identify potions. Pointless in that potions are usually labeled with their contents regardless of your skill level, and can be determined by colour if not.
Can detect poison in foods. Pointless in that the Create Food spell is a ready source of uncontaminated goods, and characters do not currently need to eat.

Past Useless Skills

Once had been primarily used for begging NPC vendors but now may go to the city of Heartwood to beg the elves for rare items and reversed image items instead of gold. It is especially useful for Halloween events.
Initially provided information on weapons and armor, but with Publish 44 imparts additional bonus properties to crafted weapons and armor.
Originally provided information on the target's Intelligence and available mana, but now imparts additional spell damage.
Previously used to determine the properties of a given item, which are now displayed regardless of skill. Can now be used to determine the value of an item according to NPCs and the imbuing ingredients the Items will unravel into.
Previously only allowed a character to understand what another dead player's ghost was saying (instead of 'OooOO oOOooOo ooo'), but with the introduction of Necromancy allows for health regeneration either from the character's mana or from corpses.