So that's why you like it

[Jack7]

My wife said that a single woman would use a Purse of Holding.

My wife has a purse sorta like that. I call it her Purse of Infinite Disappearance. I give her money, it goes into her purse, then nobody ever sees it again (nobody I know anyways). Single or married, women always have the best tricks when it comes to currency.

 

[Doug McCrae]

Can someone explain to me the appeal, which often borders on the fanatical, of using a point buying system for character creation in D&D?

I've always preferred point buy to random rolls, no matter what the system. I like randomness during play but not at the build stage, the only exception being as an idea generator. It's really important to me that I only have to use random idea generators when I want to, when I'm stuck for an idea. It should be my choice. If I already have an interesting idea, either as a player or a GM, why should I be made to abandon it by the dice?

The other problem with randomness at the build stage is it can lead to permanent power imbalances between the PCs, rather than the short-term imbalance randomness in play gives you, which is fine. That's a major change from the 70s/early 80s Gygaxian era when players had lots of PCs that were 'born' and died rapidly. Nowadays characters last longer, players control fewer PCs and are expected to put more thought into each one. I hear some people even give them names now.

<- Fanatic

 

[Doug McCrae]

Whereas, to me, the die roller is the refuge of cheaters who will roll and roll and roll until they get the stats they want anyway.

That's how it is down my way. The players that are keenest on random rolls also expect to reroll and reroll until they get a set of stats that are way above average. One method is by rolling up multiple PCs and only playing the best one or letting a substandard character die. Last time I ran 3e I allowed each player to choose between point buy and random roll and the rollers ended up with a significant advantage because of these practices. Next time it will be point buy only with those guys.

 

[Ariosto]

Point buy might make more sense than "roll and arrange". If the idea is to get more variety than usually comes from optimization, then a random factor applied to total points might help. If the idea is to start with a character concept and "build" it, though, then random factors are not notably helpful. The real ideal in that light is simply to assign whatever scores fit the concept. However, when everyone's concept is Suderduperman, that tends to make the whole ability-scores business irrelevant (as "the bestest" score ends up everywhere). So, some kind of game of trade-offs is a way to keep some interest. Maybe the real game is in picking a class, and ability scores follow from that (as opposed to the old vice-versa). Hence, Charisma-based zap-em powers for the Warlock and so on help to strengthen the link.

"Just roll 'em and play 'em" is suited to the opposite approach: that of discovering a character in the process. By way of speed, it's also advantageous for a game with a high mortality rate. I've had the experience in several (non-D&D) games of spending an hour or more generating a character that got killed in less than an hour of play -- in one case, in the first round of the first action!

As I like (in D&D) the challenge of playing humanly vulnerable low-level characters, I don't like to spend much time generating their game stats. I think a corollary holds for many people: a lot of prep time suggests a low rate of characters getting killed.

 

[Ariosto]

So, for instance, character generation in Traveller involves a lot of dice rolls, virtually a solitaire game (with, yes, some key decision points) in itself. Combat as a rule is not something to enter into lightly, but single-shot kills are not usually in the offing. The first hit is quite likely to render a character hors de combat. Likewise, Hero System in its original superhero context (Champions) makes fatalities -- in keeping with the comics -- quite rare.

 

[Hussar]

24 stats (6 attributes per four characters). Your point is still valid though.

Gack, as I said, I'm not a statistician. Or, apparently a graduate of 4th grade math. Sigh.

You're asking how many of my players have to play the stats they roll? All of them. Them's the breaks. They roll them up in front of me. Lots end up under 9. They have stats ranging down to 5 in the SCAP game I'm running now.
On the other hand, how many characters have a prime stat of 17+ under point buy compared to rolling (before racial adjustments)? A heck of a lot more.

So, out of 24 stats, you have 3 or 4 stats that are 9 or lower before racial adjustments? You sir, are an insipiration. In all the years I've played D&D, I've never, EVER seen anyone play that way. I've seen all sorts of nudges and winks and not once have I seen someone actually take the six they roll (unless they rolled well all the way through).

Well, by point by, when you say 17+, you really mean 17 or 18. And, if you go 25 point buy, that 18 is going to really, really hurt you. In my current game, which uses a 27 point buy, I think 1 out of 7 characters has an 18 before racial adjustments. Granted, this is a 3.5 game, so maybe that makes a difference.

But, if you go by 25 point buy, you probably won't see many 18's. An 18 is 16 points, meaning you've got 9 points to spread over the other 5 stats, and it costs you 2 points just to avoid the penalty for the stat. A single 18 means you've got at least one score of 9 or less. And most likely two or three. I see an awful lot more 16's.

-----------

On the Far Realms

There's a pretty good reason, in my mind, why the Far Realms has gained popularity. It's different without being difficult to use. Anyone who's played for a while has likely used humanoids. They've also probably used demons/devils as well. Far Realms creatures give you a nice, easy to use bad guy that hasn't been done to death. F.R. creatures are bad, so you don't have to worry about moral quandaries miring your game. They come with built in cultists, just like demons/devils, so you can use them at almost any level. And, they're new enough that it's unlikely that your players have memorized their stats, or even met them before. Meeting a Vrock is pretty blase for an experienced D&D gamer. Meeting a tentacled beastie is new.

I'm sure a few years down the road, it will be something else.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Re: Point-buy D&D

There's a few good reasons for it.

1) It prevents cheating. A corollary to this is that you can be confident people can do the stat generation at home without worrying that they're just sitting there rolling and rolling until they get something they like.

I'm a big fan of point-buy rpgs- I've been playing my favorite all time RPG HERO since it first came out (as Champions) in the 1980s, after all- and I can tell you that it is still possible to cheat in a point buy system. Shave a point here... trade off something there..."miscalculate" the cost of something...

Now, if you combine a point-buy system with mandatory use of a character building spreadsheet, the incidence of cheating dwindles dramatically...but it still is possible.

2) You don't get someone having an 'unfair' advantage when he has really great dice luck and so can get all the cool feats with x-level stat requisites. This used to be much, much more pronounced in earlier D&D editions where you had to have stratospheric stats to do certain things. Everyone starts on a more level playing field.

Assuming no actual cheating, I don't personally see a great roll or even a set of great rolls as being "unfair."

After all, just like at a gambling table, everyone else had the opportunity to do just as well (equality of opportunity, not of results), and the longer you play, the less those initial rolls mean to the outcome of the game (the initial individual rolls get lost in the noise of the increasing number of rolls).

3) It prevents you from having to play a PC you dislike when you roll a 5 for Int and a 6 for Wis, etc. Of course you'll probably just let him die and roll up a new PC, but what's the point really when you can just go with point buy.

This IS inarguably true. OTOH, I usually saw such PCs as a challenge, but that's my personal outlook.

 

[Rechan]

The roll vs. point buy is increasingly becoming less "Explanation" and more "point counterpoint". Perhaps it is time for a fork.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

The roll vs. point buy is increasingly becoming less "Explanation" and more "point counterpoint". Perhaps it is time for a fork.

*picks up fork*

 

[Nai_Calus]

After all, there are humans all over the world, in many environments, and that doesn't constitute sub-races of humans.

Why are demi-humans different?

Traditionally in D&D, there's no 'God of humans'. Nobody specific is given who created them, they're just there. They do whatever. Nobody specifically shaped the race, nobody specifically changes it.

Demihumans usually are created/found races, with specific racial gods. Elves for example had Corellon Larethian, who was supposed to have created them from his own blood. The entire Elven pantheon is Chaotic Good or Chaotic Neutral, most of them are portrayed as artistic, thus it actually makes sense that there are a bunch of elven subraces - Presumably the result of the Seldarine tinkering with the race they watch over. Aquatic Elves are usually attributed to Deep Sashelas, for example. He gave some of the already-existing elves the ability to breathe water, so there's now a subrace of water-breathing elves.

*shrug* Makes sense to me.

Couple of things from me:

Dragons, and by extension Dragonborn. Does not compute.

The idea that having crappy stats is somehow tied to good roleplay and a lack of powergaming - 8 CHA is usually scoffed at as powergaming and dumpstatting, but 8 STR builds character. Why is being weak physically, which may not even affect your personality, somehow 'better' than not being a people person?