ability scores and modifiers

M

mrphoenix

First Post

• Oct 11, 2007

• #1

on a german message board a poster claims to have a 4e miniatures stat card.
Hey says the ability scores are now printed in the format "+7 (19)".
An ability score of 19 has now a modifier of +7. An ability score of 14 oder 15 has a modifier of +5.
There are no negative modifiers anymore.
Perhaps now every third ability point increases the modifier by one?
0: 0
1-3: +1
4-6: +2
7-9: +3
10-12: +4
13-15: +5
16-18: +6
19-21: +7
...

Sorry for my English

 

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P

Paraxis

Explorer

• Oct 11, 2007

• #2

Thats very interesting, I was making my own homebrew system and used a stat range of +2 to +12 with (+5 being average normal human). My reasoning was to make stats more important that the random die roll and a strong second to skills.

Right now even an 18 (+4) in an ability score does not mean much for most skill use. It is a huge bonus as far as hitting, damage, saves, ect but thats how those things are balanced.

If you make saves and AC scale closer to level then the bigger bonus from ability scores works out well.

 

S

Scholar & Brutalman

First Post

• Oct 12, 2007

• #3

mrphoenix said:

on a german message board a poster claims to have a 4e miniatures stat card.
Hey says the ability scores are now printed in the format "+7 (19)".
An ability score of 19 has now a modifier of +7. An ability score of 14 oder 15 has a modifier of +5.

Click to expand...

That would be different. I wouldn't mind getting rid of stat based negative mods.

Can you ask the poster if he would be able to post a scan or photo of the stat card?

 

S

Stone Dog

Adventurer

• Oct 12, 2007

• #4

mrphoenix said:

There are no negative modifiers anymore.

Click to expand...

Cool find there! Are you sure there are no more negative modifiers or are negative modifiers just not shown on the cards? Because going up every two would still work out.

0-1 -2
2-3 -1
4-5 +0
6-7 +1
8-9 +2
10-11 +3
12-13 +4
14-15 +5
16-17 +6
18-19 +7

I would really hope that things didn't increase every three points. That is too many dead attribute scores for my liking. All it does is increases the speedbumps between scores that matter to the game mechanics.

 

L

Lackhand

First Post

• Oct 12, 2007

• #5

Ah, but it allows you to efficiently dole out stat boosts! Rather than 1 stat boost every 4, say, you could now get 1 stat boost every 2, without doubling the gain.

 

R

RFisher

Explorer

• Oct 12, 2007

• #6

At first glance, I would love to see that in 4e. I've considered doing the same thing in homebrews but have never gotten around to trying it.

 

Celebrim

Legend

• Oct 12, 2007

• #7

House cats are going to get even scarier.

 

DreamChaser

Explorer

• Oct 12, 2007

• #8

Scholar & Brutalman said:

That would be different. I wouldn't mind getting rid of stat based negative mods.

Click to expand...

Except how would your represent below average? If the "average" person has a +3 bonus, doesn't that just mean that the "average" of everything else would need to be raised by 3. An average difficulty skill check would be DC 13 rather than 10?

Negatives aren't complicated and they better reflect the idea of an "average" with individuals above and below that average.

DC

 

Reaper Steve

Explorer

• Oct 12, 2007

• #9

Is this is true, it will be a good thing. I hope that bonuses start at zero and increase... no negative scores.
Does it really change anything? Mechanically, not much, but it makes the mechanics more palatable.
The Elite Array (15,14,13,12,10,8) currently yields: +2, +2, +1, +1, 0, and -1.
If mrphoenix's speculation is correct, this same array will yield +5, +5, +5, +4, +4, +3. That's a much easier pill to swallow. No one wants negative stat mods... and most aren't happy with +1, either.

 

Celebrim

Legend

• Oct 12, 2007

• #10

Reaper Steve said:

Does it really change anything? Mechanically, not much, but it makes the mechanics more palatable.

Click to expand...

I think it changes more than you realize. Sometimes there is a big difference between 0-5 and 3-8. The average of the first is 2.5. Sure, the average of the second is only 5.5 but if this is an absolute number, its more than twice the result of the original system. Unless every number pool more than doubles, the latter is going to be relatively much much more effective.