D&D 5E Why I Am Starting to Prefer 4d6 Drop the Lowest Over the Default Array.

[BookBarbarian]

Side question, but why would you ever lose a character sheet? Don't you leave them with the DM between sessions?

As for h.p., just like with stats the game has dice for a reason.

Lanefan

The game certainly has dice for a reason, but how those dice are used to maximize fun at a table can vary wildly. If my DM had me roll to see if I successfully got out of bed this morning and justified it with "the game has dice for a reason" my eyes would roll back in my head so hard they might never come front again.

P.S. 7000 posts! Nicely done.

 

[Oofta]

Side question, but why would you ever lose a character sheet? Don't you leave them with the DM between sessions?

Huh. I've never even considered the DM keeping character sheets as an option. Do you regularly do that? Why?

People sometimes hand me their character sheet to "review" and I glance at it for a moment or two while "hmmming" importantly. But honestly? I normally don't give two figs. Unless someone is doing something I don't understand I don't really care. I trust my players, and if they wanted to cheat there's little I could do to stop them anyway.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

As for h.p., just like with stats the game has dice for a reason.

Sure, but I find stats far more interesting than HP. From a roleplaying standpoint, HP variation (unlike say Int variation) is just noise as far as I am concerned. So, the roleplayer in me doesn't care about rolling HP; and the powergamer in me doesn't care about rolling stats because the average is better; so there's nobody at all inside my noggin who cares about rolling HP or finds it interesting.

 

[BookBarbarian]

Huh. I've never even considered the DM keeping character sheets as an option. Do you regularly do that? Why?

People sometimes hand me their character sheet to "review" and I glance at it for a moment or two while "hmmming" importantly. But honestly? I normally don't give two figs. Unless someone is doing something I don't understand I don't really care. I trust my players, and if they wanted to cheat there's little I could do to stop them anyway.

If I'm DMing I'm already having to keep track of quite a few papers. i don't want to be bothered with carrying around everyone's character sheets too.

 

[Soul Stigma]

For those of you fiddling with papers, just go digital. My players have their character sheets, but they were generated and are saved in Hero Lab. Losing sheets becomes a non-issue.


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[RotGrub]

Random chargen also allows for some unexpected great role playing opportunities. Got a 5 or a 6? Great opportunity there to play that out in the game. It adds variety as well. I personally really don't like how array always results in cookie cutter PCs. Every fighter has the same stats. Every wizard has the same stats, etc, etc. Boring.

so yeah, I really like random chargen. But that doesn't mean array doesn't have value as well. It's faster to create a PC, and you don't have to worry about someone cheating.

Was it Tenser or Otiluke that uses Gauntlets of Kobold Power?

 

[Sacrosanct]

Was it Tenser or Otiluke that uses Gauntlets of Kobold Power?

No idea. Otiluke isn't mentioned in the 1e Rogue's Gallery. Tenser is, but doesn't have anything like that listed. It does say Tenser, despite being a magic user, loves battle and will often forgo his spells. So he probably wouldn't have had something like that.

 

[Ratskinner]

That might be a good option for some games, but I do know players who would be very disappointed they couldn't play a low strength fighter. A character who had no choice but to survive by his wits alone.

dunno about wits alone, but as I mentioned, I'd probably put in several types of "Fighter" that specialize in various ways. I would imagine such a player would pick one of them instead of the "brute" version.

Of course, in my games combat isn't king. What you do in the campaign and how you interact with the world is what measures your character. I've seen players with powerful characters enter my game and end up having zero impact on anything important.

In fact, there are rows upon rows of graves out my window. Many dead 18 percentile fighters with names long since forgotten. So many combat focused mechanical dreams shattered and lives cut short. I need to animate them all sometime.

poetic. I bow to your obviously superior gamemastery and will hop right off your lawn after this post. Yet, if mechanics are of so little importance in your game...why have them? Or rather, why have mechanics govern the parts of the game that are of such little importance to you? Just play "let's pretend" and call it a day.

 

[Sacrosanct]

This whole discussion wants me to do an experiment. To have the players all put their highest values in they most non essential traditional stats, and see what kind of game that would be, if much different at all. I know my players pretty well, and the biggest thing I'd be anxious to see is how they alter traditional tactics. I think it could make for a fun and unique adventure.

 

[ccs]

Sadly, I remember a poster on a different "roll vs point buy" thread a while back that basically said that if they suspected someone purposely got their character killed that they would force the player to continue to play the same character.

It was probably me. And if it wasn't, I agree with the idea....
But as I've explained, if you've rolled your stats in my game it's because you CHOSE to do so & did so knowing you were expected to play the resulting character, whatever it may be, in good faith. Trying to kill them off because you rolled poorly & want better stats won't work in my games.