D&D 5E Why no 16-18s allowed in Point Buy?

[mach1.9pants]

Ha thanks, I didn't really understand what he was trying to say on the site.

‘You've got to ask yourself one question. Do I feel 50-50 lucky? Well, do ya, punk?’

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

p. 9, first column, at the bottom. It's the badly placed table I talked about in my review, since it's a page and a half away from the rules for it.

Wow, the placement really is terrible. I almost want to take back my earlier comment that 'The 5e guys probably don't not want players to use PB'...

 

[GX.Sigma]

Can a math person tell me what chance you have of rolling a 16-17-18 at least once in your 4d6 drop lowest?

Approximately 57.8% chance to get at least one score of 16 or higher.

[sblock="The working"]Thanks to anydice.com, a roll of [highest 3 of 4d6] has approximately 0.134 probability of rolling at least 16.

In other words, there is a 0.866 probability for a given stat to have less than 16.

The probability that all six stats will have less than 16 is .866^6. That's about .422, or a 42.2% chance to have no 16s.

Of the possible 100%, you either get no 16s, or at least one 16 or higher. Therefore, the probability of getting no 16s, plus the probability of getting at least one 16 or higher, add up to 1. In other words:

1 - [probability of having all less than 16] = [probability of having at least one 16 or higher]
1 - .484 = .578

There is a 57.8% chance to get at least one 16.[/sblock]

 

[Lalato]

When I was 11 years old we re-rolled stats like a mofo! But I'm not 11 years old anymore (Yikes, I'll be 44 soon!), and I haven't met an adult DM that would allow such silly shenanigans. If you decide to roll, you roll in front of the DM, and you keep what you get. The only time re-rolls are allowed is if you roll something that is unplayable (as in the sum of your bonuses is negative). That said, I'm more than willing to play a character with negative bonuses... just to see how long the poor bastard can survive.

 

[doghead]

I think it's a good attempt at risk-reward. You can maintain absolute control with point-buy, but you can't get the very best stats. Or you can try for the best stats, but you have less control over the outcome.

Agreed.

I also like the fact that you can't just take an 18 straight from the get go and abilities are capped at 20.

As for cheating with the rolls, there are ways to prevent it. Enworld's internal dice roller is pretty foolproof.

thotd

 

[doghead]

When I was 11 years old we re-rolled stats like a mofo!

LOL. Yeah, so did we.

That said, I'm more than willing to play a character with negative bonuses... just to see how long the poor bastard can survive.

And, as has been true since the dawn of our hobby, there's a relatively simple way to get around 'You must keep your stat rolls!'

Been there.

- Notes -

After pushing around points for a bit, I decided I was so over point buy. I asked if I could roll stats. Verbatim gave me these numbers; 7, 14, 8, 10, 11, 12. My first thought was 'Damn.' My second was 'I can't really go back and ask to use the point buy method now. I guess I should see what I can do.' My third thought was, 'I love this character'. She might be sub-optimal or whatever, but don't ever tell her that. Eventually the DM upper her to 2nd level so he didn't have to worry so much about killing her. With only three hp, one good blow would have done the trick. I wasn't so fussed, but the extra spells and stuff were nice.

Unfortunately this game died in the Crash of '06 and Rain never really got the chance to live fast and die gloriously. She remains to this day on of those characters I would love to bring back and play again.

thotd

 

[Mistwell]

Right, so people will reroll until they get the character they like with an 18 or two and no body would ever use point buy thus defeating the idea that no one starts with high scores.

No they won't Crothian. Come on man. I've seen people do a few re-rolls, but two 18s would take on average 300 rolls! That's not common, and I doubt you've seen it happen often. Even one 18 is rare, and should require a full re-roll several times to even come up once.

In my experience, you get to roll one time through, and the only re-rolls are if you have a really terrible result. I have not seen a bunch of re-rolls since the early 1980s. And we've rolled out stats in every edition (at least some of us have in my group).

 

[IronWolf]

The easiest way to prevent the re-roll problem is to simply do character generation at the first session and watch folks.

I've been playing and running a lot of DCC RPG. 3d6 in order. It feels odd at first, but if the rest of the group is doing it, the game is still a blast even with crappy stats. In fact, in a lot of ways, non-superhero level is a whole lot of fun!

 

[Agamon]

Keep re-rolling stats until you get awesome ones? Do these DMs also let players reroll attacks until they crit and then reroll damage until it's max?

 

[Agamon]

Approximately 57.8% chance to get at least one score of 16 or higher.

Here's a tougher one. What's the odds on rolling 16+ on one stat and rolling at least equal to what would get from the array on the other five?