D&D 5E Do you miss attribute minimums/maximums?

[Sacrosanct]

The 1976 results are not meaningfully different.
We're talking about strength maximums, not modifiers, so I thought strongest vs. strongest would be the most pertinent comparison.

You must be comparing the 75kg men (i.e. less than 75kg) with the 75kg+ women (i.e. 75kg and over). Obviously that's not a fair comparison. If we look at the previous category (men 67.5kg, women 69kg) the man in 1976 clean and jerked 170 kg, and the woman in 2015 clean and jerked 143kg. Still a 19% difference pound for pound, which is extremely large in athletic competition.




Women didn't compete in weightlifting until 1987, so that comparison is meaningless.

Again I don't support sex-based ability score modifiers or maximums either, but I have to call out people who are making stuff up to support their view. This cavalier attitude to factual reality is to some degree why there's a real sexist in the White House right now.

Well, congratulations on missing the point again, I guess. I didn't make stuff up. Look at what modern day women are lifting, and compare it to the mid 70s of what men were. It's not near as far apart as modern day woman vs. modern day man. Which was the point. I.e., back then, it was "no way a woman can be this strong" because no one was then, but time travel a modern day woman to the 70s and she would blow their assumptions away. The whole point was that the rules were created on assumptions of the time that aren't as accurate anymore, so to stick with the same rules they came up with in the 70s because "super realism" is flawed.

In terms of classes, this is averaging, not balance, and in terms of races it is demographics. Most important, how does it average out if the magic user dies at 2nd level? How is it balanced for the halfling fighter to stay at 4th level when the rest of the party is 12th?

It should be viable to play any race since they are in the game. Players should not suffer because Gygax wanted to limit people's choices. To quote Kenneth Hite, "That's crazy talk."

Firstly, having a class like the MU weak at low levels and powerful at high levels is not averaging by any definition of the word. We're not looking at the average power of the MU across all levels. We're looking at the power disparity individually, and saying that being weak at lower levels balances out with the great power they get at upper levels. In fact, that's the opposite of average because you need to intentionally avoid the average but look at each individual level independently. Again, you're stuck in this micro analysis when you need to look at the big picture of the game as a whole over an entire typical campaign run---as it was designed.

Secondly, Gary didn't limit people's choices to punish them. The game was designed to be human centric, so the rules supported that. It's his freaking game, so he can design it the way he wants. No one is getting punished. If you don't like it, then ignore that rule like so many others did. To quote me, "that's entitlement talk".

 

[Coroc]

In a way i do miss them, i think 5E would have been even better if they used the 3.5 System for race Attribute modifiers. But one has to take into account that you would need to raise possible natural maximum scores as well e.g. dwarf gets +2 to constitution so his natural maximum would be 22. I would also love if 5E just had used 3 saving throws as 3.5. But i do not know if all of that would not cause game imbalances.

I always say to my players if i allow e.g. halfings being fighters in a campaign to stay true to archetype and use a dex build in that case. No children in platemail wielding two handed swords in my campaign no, not even with magic.

 

[Lylandra]

I don't get why it is so hard to imagine a very, very broad and well-framed halfling with super strength.

From my own experience: I know men who are very tall but slender. They are 1,90m+ and still I (woman, 1,74m) could beat them in terms of strength. And then there are these guys in the gymn who are maybe 1,65m and they rock their weights. I jokingly call them "square guys" because they seem to be as broad as they are tall. And that's just what I see IRL. Fantasy games can and should exaggerate these extremes even more.

That put aside, I'd really love to see more switched (or no) gender dimorphism in fantasy races. D&D/PF has such a boring tradition of modeling everything after humans (besides elves. They are basically the same height and frame and therefore the weight difference doesn't really make much sense).

 

[Coroc]

I don't get why it is so hard to imagine a very, very broad and well-framed halfling with super strength.

From my own experience: I know men who are very tall but slender. They are 1,90m+ and still I (woman, 1,74m) could beat them in terms of strength. And then there are these guys in the gymn who are maybe 1,65m and they rock their weights. I jokingly call them "square guys" because they seem to be as broad as they are tall. And that's just what I see IRL. Fantasy games can and should exaggerate these extremes even more.

That put aside, I'd really love to see more switched (or no) gender dimorphism in fantasy races. D&D/PF has such a boring tradition of modeling everything after humans (besides elves. They are basically the same height and frame and therefore the weight difference doesn't really make much sense).

Your rl experience is the exception confirming the rule of thumb that the 10% of the strongest women are about as strong physically as the 10% weakest men and that is a fact. But in the game I agree that should not matter so imho no problem with the female human warrior being as strong as a man. With the smaller folk I got a problem in imagination that they should be as strong as well. They got their own shticks. What you are overlooking in your attempt to be pc in a game is, that this goes both ways. The next player of a human then wants to be as adept as the halfling in hiding in the woods or wants the lucky feat also etc. etc.

 

[Yaarel]

I don't get why it is so hard to imagine a very, very broad and well-framed halfling with super strength.

The Lightfoot Halfling is 3 feet tall (0.9 m), and ‘super strength’ is physically impossible, and this is a nonmagical race.

A starting Lightfoot character lacks high strength. This is even smaller and weaker than an ‘atomweight’ or ‘strawweight’ fighter.



That said, the Stout Halfling is said to be broader, with possible Dwarf ancestry, so there might be some magic involved. But still, just average Human strength, no ‘superstrength’.

 

[Caliban]

The Lightfoot Halfling is 3 feet tall (0.9 m), and ‘super strength’ is physically impossible, and this is a nonmagical race.

Eh...that's debatable.

Halflings in general are supernaturally lucky (re-roll one's automatically).

Lightfoots can hide behind medium or larger creatures - something that the equally short Stout halflings cannot. In fact, no other race has this ability. It could be argued to be a magical/supernatural ability.


I just chalk-up the ant-like strength of gnomes and halflings to fantasy biology/physics and don't worry about it.

I do find it mildly amusing that a 10 strength halfling that weights 30 pounds can carry 10 times their own body weight.

 

[Yaarel]

Lightfoots can hide behind medium or larger creatures - something that the equally short Stout halflings cannot. In fact, no other race has this ability. It could be argued to be a magical/supernatural ability.

Lightfoots can hide better because they are *smaller* and *thinner* than Stouts.

Stouts are stouter and ‘hardier’, and presumably their apparent Dwarf blood, makes the Stouts taller and denser as well. More mass.

I do find it mildly amusing that a 10 strength halfling that weights 30 pounds can carry 10 times their own body weight.

Heh, ‘amusing’ or ‘stupid’, it depends on ones point of view.

 

[Lost Soul]

I think people are missing the point. Rules should never be about punishment or making a race/gender/class suboptimal. Should women start out at the same strength score for humans and other similar races as their male counterparts? IMHO, no. Should a human female be able to reach a 20 strength? Yes! If you penalize a player in a way that gives them a penalty then give them a bump like skill training to make up for it. Give half orcs a -2 to CHA to bring home that fact that people do not like or trust them. Also give them advantage on Intimidation rolls to bring home the fact that when they attempt to threaten you, you just won't laugh it off. This way the world seems similar but still allow for heroic characters that stand out from the norm. Some races such as dwarves, halflings and gnomes are penalized with slower speeds and heavy weapon use. These disadvantages add to diversity and flavor. You can even reverse expectations for gender by making male drow with a strength penalty to mimic the reality that female spiders are larger and stronger than male spiders to reinforce differences between surface elves and drow,. Creative differences, flaws & strengths allow for richness in flavor and reduce the blandness of every race feeling like a human in a funny suit syndrome. Meeting a dwarf paladin is not much of a big deal now. Meeting a charismatic dwarf paladin when dwarves are not known as a race for being outgoing, talkative, enchanting characters (-2 CHA) makes for a more memorable dwarf because he stands out from his peers in a big way

 

[billd91]

I think people are missing the point. Rules should never be about punishment or making a race/gender/class suboptimal. Should women start out at the same strength score for humans and other similar races as their male counterparts? IMHO, no. Should a human female be able to reach a 20 strength? Yes!

How is that not making female fighter less optimal than male fighter? Oh, sure. She can get there, but by being penalized at the start, it takes longer to get there and/or she has to devote more development resources to equal her male peers which means less opportunity to invest elsewhere.
Gender-based limits are simply something the gaming industry does not need, certainly not if it wants to leave its history of sexism behind.

 

[Caliban]

Lightfoots can hide better because they are *smaller* and *thinner* than Stouts.

*shrug* It doesn't say anything about that in the Players Handbook. The size and weight are under the main race entry, and neither of the subraces specify that they are a different size or weight. "Hardier" means tougher, it doesn't indicate size or weight.

Heh, ‘amusing’ or ‘stupid’, it depends on ones point of view.

It's not game breaking and puts them at less of a disadvantage vs. the Medium size races. So I choose to be amused.