Reducing The Number of Attributes

[Diamond Cross]

This is an idea I've been toying with for M&M 3e. The current edition uses a total of eight Attributes. They are Strength, Agility, Fighting, Awareness, Stamina, Dexterity, Intellect, and Presence.

So they increased the original number of stats by two. I'm not entirely sure why they did that, was it to distance themselves from their original d20 based game? Personally, I prefer a game to have up to six attributes, especially in a point buy game system.

Then I realized that having both Agility and Dexterity is kind of redundant. The things that are covered by Agility can be covered by Dexterity as well as the things covered by Dexterity. So you really only need the one stat there, and that could be Agility or Dexterity, whichever word you prefer.

Then the more I thought about it, you probably don't really need to have eight different Attributes. So I decided to see what I could do to reduce the number of attributes, so here is what I came up with.

FIGHTING, AGILITY, INTELLECT, and AWE.

Fighting covers skills, advantages, actions and powers that are governed by Strength and Stamina, including Defense of Toughness and Fortitude.

Agility covers skills, advantages, actions and powers that are governed by Dexterity and Agility, including the Defenses of Parry and Dodge.

Intellect covers skills, advantages, actions, and powers that are governed by Intellect.

AWE covers skills, advantages, actions and powers that are governed by Presence and Awareness, including the Defense of Will.

I also want to combine Parry and Dodge into one defense as well.

This is just a basic idea that I'm considering that is not set in stone.

 

[Umbran]

I'd like to ask - why don't you like 8 attributes?

The major strengths of point buy are flexibility and granularity, allowing for notable differences between characters. Combining stats means that fewer characters will be mechanically differentiated. Especially when you are considering cutting the number of stats in half.

Is this your desire?

 

[Relique du Madde]

One potential problem I see is that "Fighting" would become under-priced in that house rule (if you keep the 2pp per +1) because it effects your melee attacks bonus, damage bonus, fortitude defense and toughness. Like wise the next valuable stat would be Agility (Ranged attack and parry and Dodge defense) followed by Awareness (Will power defense). Intelligence would be rendered a dump stat since it is the only attribute not tied to a defense.

 

[Jeff Carlsen]

Umbrean's point is valid, but that could be solved with specializations. And, this system solves the oddity that is the Base Attack Bonus. Though I'd more likely turn Fighting into a skill, rather than an attribute.

 

[billd91]

Fewer stats could also mean, given the combat heaviness of superheroics, that some stats become a lot more important than others. I would say that's why they included both Agility and Dexterity - to break up the value of the single stat Dexterity in MM 1e and 2e.

 

[Diamond Cross]

I'd like to ask - why don't you like 8 attributes?

For a couple of reasons.

The original M&M was a streamlined game. I like things streamlined. Having too many attributes tends to make things far more complicated, at least for me, than it needs be.

I also don't like redundant Attributes. To me, Dexterity and Agility are the same thing and all things these things the two stats covers can be covered by one stat. Agility is simply redundant to me.

But mostly, I just like my games streamlined and uncomplicated.

 

[Nahat Anoj]

This is an idea I've been toying with for M&M 3e. The current edition uses a total of eight Attributes. They are Strength, Agility, Fighting, Awareness, Stamina, Dexterity, Intellect, and Presence.

So they increased the original number of stats by two. I'm not entirely sure why they did that, was it to distance themselves from their original d20 based game? Personally, I prefer a game to have up to six attributes, especially in a point buy game system.

I think the main reason they did it is to make the point costs for each ability a little bit more equal.

I don't mind 8 attributes. The inclusion of a Fighting ability is most interesting, as I hadn't considered that before. I'd prefer another name for it, like Vigor or Pugnacity (is there a single word for "combat ability"?), but I think it's a good stat to have and am considering it for my never-to-be-finished fantasy homebrew. Splitting Agility and Dexterity makes sense, and I prefer the name Awareness to Wisdom (in my opinion, wisdom is better described as something acquired over time).

I feel like there could be one more attribute that describes ingenuity, guile, and penchant for duplicity - call it Cunning. It would cover lying, underhanded tactics, and other forms of skulduggery. I know Presence covers lying and the like, but it always seemed strange to me that someone would have a talent for lying, intimidation, and diplomacy. But I'm a weird bird.

 

[Diamond Cross]

The Fighting attribute was first used in the original MSH RPG, actually.

But, it's also redundant for M&M because M&M has it's roots based on the d20 SRD.

And in d20 all fighting abilities are covered by Strength, Dexterity, Constitution and the appropriate feats and skills so I don't really see a need for it in M&M.

 

[Umbran]

I also don't like redundant Attributes. To me, Dexterity and Agility are the same thing and all things these things the two stats covers can be covered by one stat. Agility is simply redundant to me.

As a model of the real world, the two aren't really redundant. There are lots of people who are dexterous but not agile, and vice versa. An old watchmaker may be dexterous (great eye-hand coordination and control) but not agile (he's a lousy dancer). And a football player may be great at moving his body on the field (agile) but fumble-fingered with the remote control of his TV (not too dexterous).

And, at the same time, it sounds like you want t wrap together some things that really aren't redundant - fighting and strength? The ability to land a punch is the same as the ability to lift a Mack truck? What if you want martial artists who are amazingly good at fighting, but can't bend iron girders?

Stepping away from the simulation aspects, I think the matter of over-valued stats is probably central to the issue. If you used to have two stats (Agility and Dexterity) and two skills (dodge and parry), and you reduce them to one and one, now it is much easier and cheaper to be extremely good at not getting hit.

Basically, you're wrapping up one very valuable package there, and giving it away for the same price. Are you sure you want to do that?

The dividing line there is kind of arbitrary - I've played fine RPGs that only had 3 stats, so 4 is certainly workable. However, those systems that have fewer stats have chosen to drop the level of detail across the board, and d20 isn't really a low-detail ruleset to use as a core for this. You'll end up rewriting most of the feats and skills to pull it off, re-balancing character creation and advancement.

Quite a job ahead of you.

 

[Krensky]

I'm not familiar with the 3rd edition, but...

It sounds like a massive risk you're introducing is overloading the attributes.

A classic example of this is in Interlock (Cyberpunk and Mekton). The most powerful stat in that is Dexterity (or whatever synonym they used, mind's fuzzy). It covered all combat, defense, and a massive pile of other things. It was also priced the same as stats like Tech or Cool that covered tiny fractions of the same. So people would buy Dex to 10 and figure the rest out.

Splitting Dexterity and Agility out reduces that.

In your example, it sounds like Fighting and Agility are far more powerful the Intellect, and Awe is slightly more powerful then Intellect.