4e Fan Creations and House RulesWorking on variant powers? Statting up a PC race or your version of a monster? Creating or converting an adventure? Put it here!
Okay, point buy is nice, and I prefer it myself for real games, but what about when you want to make random characters? Well, you do what the rulebook says: roll 4d6 and add the 3 highest dice for each stat. This way, you get a number from 8 to 18.
But how come you always end up with a lower than average ability score set? Oh, you say to yourself, it must just be bad luck. Maybe next time. But then you look at the rules and it clearly says that when you roll scores, you will "on average come out a little worse than if you had used the standard array." I don't want the average to be a little worse, I want the average to be average!
The average score with stat generation is about 13. If you buy stats to make them all the same, you will get 5 being 13 and one being 14. So we'll say 13 is average.
If you roll 2d6, add them together, then add 6, you will get a number from 8 to 18. And the average? 13 on the nose. Perfect! *Hey, that's not average!* What are you talking about, of course it's average! *No, average is 13 + 1/6 because of that 14!* Well, true, so you're still a teeny-tiny bit less than average, but 13 is closer to 13.1666 than 11, which is about the average from rolling stats the old way.
Is my math about right? I'm going to give this a try and let you know how it works. Let me know what you think!
Take a look at Althai, my D&D 4e campaign setting, and The_Heroes of Althai, the dramedy of the heroes who did and will affect Althai. (Both on the backburner for now.)
Technically, when you roll 4d6 and you drop the lowest die, your average scores are average. When you use the standard array your scores are above average.
I guess you could also roll '3d6+2' or '4d6+1 drop lowest' if you wanted your average to fall somewhere nearer to the 13 mark.
__________________ Life's a die and then you bitch.
1) Just how random do you want your stat generation to be?
2) Just how fair do you want your stat generation to be?
-->2.1)Does "fair" mean character stats are close to expected point-buy average?
-->2.2)Or does "fair" mean each character in the party is approximately balanced?
One moderately-random but extremely "fair" (for both definitions) example:
-)Start all stats at 8.
-)In whatever order the player chooses, roll 1d6 per stat and spend that many ability points improving that stat.
-)Once you've rolled for all 6 stats, choose a new order for all six stats to roll them again.
-)Once a stat has been improved to 18, stop rolling for that stat.
-)Once you've spent a total of 32 build points (becuse you're starting your stats at 8 instead of an 8 and five 10's) you're done.
I realize that my math may be off a bit, but that's why I'm posting this here. =)
By fair, I mean that the average score set is the same as the average score set for point buy. Let's say that my math is right and the average score is 13. I also want every score the same distance from the average to be have the same chance of being rolled. So, you have the same chance of getting a 12 as you do a 14, the same chance of getting an 11 as you do a 15, all the way to the same chance of getting an 8 as you do an 18. Rolling two dice solves that, because that's how they work. I think three or four dice would do the same thing, but the problem with the current rolling method is that by dropping the lowest that somehow skews it but my math skills aren't good enough to figure out how it is skewed.
I personally have rolled up many characters with the 4d6 minus lowest die method, but more have come up as underpowered characters than overpowered or even average characters once they start playing. It just seems like the game is harder for them than it is for a team made with point buy.
Take a look at Althai, my D&D 4e campaign setting, and The_Heroes of Althai, the dramedy of the heroes who did and will affect Althai. (Both on the backburner for now.)
Also, 3d6+2 and 4d6+1 drop lowest would not work, because the lowest result for the first is 5 and the lowest for the second is 4. I want the range to be from 8 to 18, just like point buy, which from my experience is average.
I want to add that I don't want this method to replace the current method, as some may have had different experiences with it. I just want an alternative for those who prefer point buy but want some randomness.
Take a look at Althai, my D&D 4e campaign setting, and The_Heroes of Althai, the dramedy of the heroes who did and will affect Althai. (Both on the backburner for now.)
Yeah, that's a pretty good idea! Depending on the variability of the race (humans compared to something like goliaths), they have a wider range of stats.
I was searching for the probabilities and I found a handy chart. These are the probabilities of rolling a number with the two methods.
Clearly, 2d6+6 will get you higher stats, no questions asked. And the average of 4d6 drop lowest is 12.25, whereas 2d6+6 brings it right to 13. I think the slight raise in stats is nice for player characters, so the players don't feel like their characters got the short end of the stick when they rolled numbers lower than 8. The site I found this on discusses other D&D probabilities (from 3rd Edition, however) if you're interested. D&D Statistics
In my search I came across a site that'll roll character stats for you, and it gave you the option of multiple methods. One of those methods was 2d6+6, so I guess I wasn't the first to think of it (but of course I wasn't, it seems so obvious).
The site I linked to also proposes this method:
1. Roll 4d6 and remove the lowest die. Do this for each stat.
2. If none of the stats are higher than 13, start over at step 1.
3. If the total modifiers added up are 0 or less, start over at step 1.
You end up getting an average total modifier of about +6, which means that the average score is 12 or 13. So around the same area. The problem is, this seems much more time consuming and I wouldn't want to have to reroll the scores for one character even more than once.
Some other score rolling ideas:
3d6 added together. Pretty brutal, though.
3d6 three times, use highest result.
4d6 drop lowest, but reroll 1s.
Take a look at Althai, my D&D 4e campaign setting, and The_Heroes of Althai, the dramedy of the heroes who did and will affect Althai. (Both on the backburner for now.)
It all depends on what you mean by "fair". Comparing 2d6+6 to a point-buy, you would need to consider a weight distribution, because the point-cost of an ability score increase dramatically as it gets closer to 18.
The weighted attribute value of traits would be:
8: -2 x (1 / 36)
9: -1 x (2 / 36)
10: 0 x (3 / 36)
11: 1 x (4 / 36)
12: 2 x (5 / 36)
13: 3 x (6 / 36)
14: 5 x (5 / 36)
15: 7 x (4 / 36)
16: 9 x (3 / 36)
17: 12 x (2 / 36)
18: 16 x (1 / 36)
Weighted Average: 4.11 * 6 = 24.67, + 2 to account for the single point-buy stat beginning at 8. So, the weight average of your curve is 26.27 point-value, compared to the 22 points in the "official" point-buy. That's considerably better.
I will do the math on 4d6 drop 1, to see how it compares to point-buy.
Here is the same math for 4d6 drop 1 die. Since is not possible to "buy" a stat below 8, I've extrapolated the negative values for lower scores. The odds of a getting a score below 7 is less than 6%, so those scores don't have a big impact, anyhow.
3: -7 x (1 / 1296)
4: -6 x (4 / 1296)
5: -5 x (10 / 1296)
6: -4 x (21 / 1296)
7: -3 x (38 / 1296)
8: -2 x (62 / 1296)
9: -1 x (91 / 1296)
10: 0 x (122 / 1296)
11: 1 x (148 / 1296)
12: 2 x (167 / 1296)
13: 3 x (172 / 1296)
14: 5 x (160 / 1296)
15: 7 x (131 / 1296)
16: 9 x (94 / 1296)
17: 12 x (54 / 1296)
18: 16 x (21 / 1296)
Weighted Average: 3.34 * 6 = 20.05, + 2 to account for the single point-buy stat beginning at 8. The weighted average is 22.05 point-value, almost identical to the 22 points in the "official" point-buy.
So, statistically the 4d6 drop 1d6 is very close to the point buy system, in the sense the "average" point-value for your rolls will be almost identical to what you would get through the point buy system.
However, it isn't really comparable, because you will be getting random values, and are not guaranteed the 16 primary score that you need to have an good character (there is about a 50% chance of getting at least one 16+ roll). So you can make an argument that the random averages should be better than point-buy to balance not being able to optimize your character.
Yeah, that's the kind of math I wasn't capable of! Thanks! I rolled up two characters with 2d6+6, and they are both rather overpowered. The highest stat I got was only 16 (though racial made it 18), but the lowest was only 12, for both of them!
So, I guess the probability amounts to the same, but I still want a way that guarantees 8 - 18 range without having to start over! Maybe 4d6, drop lowest, but reroll all 1s will work. This will give you at least a 6, and it probably won't get that low anyway. I shall find out...
Take a look at Althai, my D&D 4e campaign setting, and The_Heroes of Althai, the dramedy of the heroes who did and will affect Althai. (Both on the backburner for now.)
So, the weight average of your curve is 26.27 point-value, compared to the 22 points in the "official" point-buy. That's considerably better.
adjusting the weighting of the point buy method and centering it properly sounds like something worth fixing (though I do love my Character Builder app) .. after all if its supposed to only be used for heros why is it zero for a 10? instead of the 13?
So, I guess the probability amounts to the same, but I still want a way that guarantees 8 - 18 range without having to start over! Maybe 4d6, drop lowest, but reroll all 1s will work. This will give you at least a 6, and it probably won't get that low anyway. I shall find out...
4d6 (re-roll 1s, drop the lowest) is even more generous than 2d6+6. It works out to an average of 30.85 point-buy-value, and an average score of 13.43.
If you want to (a) retain the spread of the point-buy system and (b) keep the range to 8-18, I would recommend:
1) Use 4d6 drop the lowest.
2) Raise any score below 8 to 8.
3) If the highest score is below 16, raise it to 16 (so the character can have decent primary score).
That will be ensure you will get playable characters, and the "average" character will only be a bit better than the point-buy character. It has the advantage of being very close to the "official" rules as well.
Take a look at Althai, my D&D 4e campaign setting, and The_Heroes of Althai, the dramedy of the heroes who did and will affect Althai. (Both on the backburner for now.)
Here's a relatively easy way to do this without probability gymnastics.
Make several stat arrays using the same point-buy total. It doesn't matter how many.
Make a list of the ability scores in whatever order you want. It doesn't matter what order they're in.
Finally get two sets of d6 and d4, in two colors you can tell apart easily. Designate one color 'high' and one 'low'.
To create a character, first roll a d-whatever (depending on how many arrays you have) to select a stat array.
Then roll 2d6. Assign the highest value in the array to the stat indicated by the high die, and the second-highest according to the low die. If you roll doubles, use the indicated stat for the high value and the player gets to choose the second value.
Cross those ability scores off your list.
Use the same procedure, with the matching d4s, for the third and fourth-highest stats.
77IM posted a method of randomly generating stats that would come out to the same total modifiers across characters. See Balanced Ability Rolling.
From a balance standpoint, two problems I see are that many characters don't need, say, Cha/Wis so a character who gets high scores in both misses out on some benefits, and the fact that an 18 ability score pre-racial is worth a lot; characters with only a 16 may be somewhat left out.
Random rolling would make it difficult to play many the Strength-based classes unless they can swap around the rolls they got (e.g., swap a 16 Con with a 12 Strength). Wisdom has a lot of classes using it as a primary stat as well. So if you don't let characters assign their ability scores to the various stats, they'll need higher raw scores in general to have similarly effective characters.
Last edited by Elric; 13th July 2009 at 03:31 AM..
When you roll stats, you roll six scores and then assign them to whichever stats you prefer. So, say your scores are 13, 15, 9, 12, 13, and 16. You assign the 16 to the score you want to be the highest while the 9 and 12 are assigned to scores you don't plan to use. I don't think it's fair to have predetermined scores, because then you're railroaded into a certain set of classes, and the idea you had for a character could be ruined.
For real games that I DM, I'm going to have my players stick to point buy. But sometimes, I just like a bit of random craziness. =)
Take a look at Althai, my D&D 4e campaign setting, and The_Heroes of Althai, the dramedy of the heroes who did and will affect Althai. (Both on the backburner for now.)
I once calculated all the possible 22-point combinations (it's really not that many when a computer does it for you) and listed them in order from lowest to highest spread (so from 14-13-13-13-13-13 to 18-14-11-10-10-8). You then just generate a random number between 1 and X and look up the stat array.
However, most of those arrays will be suboptimal compared to actual pointbuy so I don't know if they can be called balanced?
However, most of those arrays will be suboptimal compared to actual pointbuy so I don't know if they can be called balanced?
This is significant. In order to have a balanced die-rolling system, you'll need to have well above 22 point-buy points on average. Firstly, the flexibility of being able to distribute points just how you need them is clearly quite valuable, and secondly, simply counting point-buy points commonly overstates the value of a distribution.
To see this, simply consider a character with a certain number of 18's. The first 18 is very valuable, being your primary stat. The 2nd 18 is much less valuable - it's nice, but it's worth much, much less. The 3rd 18 is generally almost worthless - it raises one non-AC defense and for some classes increases your options when it comes to power selection (but even this is only partially true since you can't raise that 18 throughout your career, and you'll run into weapon/implement selection issues). The forth 18 is worth even less - good for a few skills, and if Dex wasn't one of your primary 3 stats, it might raise your init. The 5th 18 might help your hitpoints somewhat. The 6th 18... well, you know those skills you dumped? Well, I guess you don't entirely suck at them, not that it really matters.
Despite the great variety in value, if you're generating stats independently, those characters that have many high stats will significantly raise the average point-buy level, while hardly being overpowered.
__________________
4e balanced random loot system
- Think item wishlists are devilspawn?
- Dislike the impact of a few bad item picks by the DM on the party?
- Or find it ludicrous that PC's constantly just "happen" to find magic items tailored to their needs?
Try: A simpler treasure system for (mostly) random loot.
3.5 death&dying variant
- Tired of players that won't cure their mortally wounded allies 'cause "he's only at -2"?
- Tired of a dying mechanic which uses anachronistic d10's?
- Tired of a dying mechanic which never kicks into action for high level characters, which tend to go from alive and kicking to instant death before anyone can intervene?
- Tired of horribly complex house rules?
Try: Death & Dying - a better (and simple!) system
I once calculated all the possible 22-point combinations (it's really not that many when a computer does it for you) and listed them in order from lowest to highest spread (so from 14-13-13-13-13-13 to 18-14-11-10-10-8). You then just generate a random number between 1 and X and look up the stat array.
Hahaha -- I just did the same thing! I went to post it on the forums and noticed this very relevant thread here...
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