I would like to be able to use the same variables as available in the skin templates, in the Help articles.

For example, when a Help article says that the member should lookup his ID somewhere the article could also directly show his ID instead of telling him how to find it. The code to use would be: {ipb.member['id']}

You can also do it with javascript but that won't be useful in browsers with JS disabled.

All {ipb.*} variables should be available.

+1, although this could be a modification you should have the option to use ipsclass variables in the help files.