D&D 5E Ability Score Increases (I've changed my mind.)

[Maxperson]

The fact that it’s a weight class event would indicate that overall body size is not the only quality we care about when it comes to weight lifting. Someone at the top of one weight class is not a worse weightlifter than someone at the bottom of another. That’s the point of having weight classes.

The point of having weight classes is so that not all weightlifters are heavyweights. They made classes so that those weightlifters who weren't as good as the heavyweights due to body size would still be able to compete. There were originally no weight classes. Those got added in at the 1920 Olympics.

 

[mrpopstar]

The point of having weight classes is so that not all weightlifters are heavyweights. They made classes so that those weightlifters who weren't as good as the heavyweights due to body size would still be able to compete. There were originally no weight classes. Those got added in at the 1920 Olympics.

This. Though it's not that lightweights aren't "as good" as heavyweights, they just don't have the same mass and therefore aren't fairly matched.

It's most evident in combat sports. Featherweight matches are spats of protracted pugilism because they don't have the raw power required to level their opponents the same way that heavyweights do (raw power being attributed to mass).

 

[Charlaquin]

This. Though it's not that lightweights aren't "as good" as heavyweights, they just don't have the same mass and therefore aren't fairly matched.

It's most evident in combat sports. Featherweight matches are spats of protracted pugilism because they don't have the raw power required to level their opponents the same way that heavyweights do (raw power being attributed to mass).

Yes, that was my point. Being in a lower weight class doesn’t mean you’re “worse” at the sport in question. Being in a higher weight class doesn’t mean you’re “better” at it. There is more to these sports than pure physical mass, and the division of weight classes recognizes that fact.

 

[mrpopstar]

I'm oddly surrounded by combat sports. I've dated a pro wrestler, a competitive Taekwondo fighter, a semi-pro boxer, and a competitive mixed-martial artist. My father had golden gloves, and my uncle (his brother) teaches Krav Maga to private bodyguards.

I did ballet.

 

[le Redoutable]

Here is the issue. This idea of averages and percentiles and all of that is vaguely nice but it doesn't determine anything. And the terms being bandied about are things like "biological determinism". Under a model like that, it would be considered impossible for a woman to be a better weightlifter than a man. It would be said that whatever the current men's world record is, is something that a woman could not beat, because men are stronger.


Now, I don't know modern weightlifting, but I do know history. And that includes the story of Katie Sandwina, who was a circus performer and strongwoman. Really strongwoman. She would challenge the audience to try and match her lifting, a good show for back in the early 1900's. Until one show when the man who stepped forth was Eugen Sandow, internationally recognized as the strongest man in the world.

And, as you guessed, she beat him.

This is the fundamental difference. This is the thing that we are all going to say is obvious, but the paradigms constructed by determinism say cannot happen. Anybody can reach the top. Sure, it could be unlikely that a woman is going to beat the men's weightlifting gold. It might even be a difference that we say is insurmountable. But we can't determine what is possible, we can only determine what is likely.

And, to reference back to my elephants needing a strength of 116, the game isn't designed to perfectly emulate the real world. It can't. And no matter what you do to ASIs... it will never prevent things from being occassionally weird. Like this:


That d20 is always going to be a bigger determining factor than whether or not the gnome was able to get an 18 strength before 12th level... but that strength score sure does make playing that gnome easier for the person who is making attack rolls and dealing damage, and not trying to do a sociopolitical statement on the representation of strength in roleplaying games.

Is the 2 ft tall gnomes as effective a barbarian as the 8 ft tall goliath? Sure, why not. An axe to jugular is deadly no matter who is swinging it, and I'd rather let people be effective than decrying the breakdown of social norms because gnomes shouldn't be effective at swinging sharp pieces of metal at people.

oh! you're speaking of Size !

 

[clearstream]

Yet even positive stereotypes about real ethnicities would be racist.

This felt like an odd statement. On the one hand, I am not proposing creating stereotypes. And on the other hand, racism is about negatives, not positives, except where those positives are used to suggest negatives, which I am also not proposing. What is your example of something that is an unmitigated positive, and racist?

And as long this resilience is tied to dwarves it is a stereotype even if it wouldn’t apply to all of them.

I proposed that some dwarves - these dwarves - would have resilience, others might not. A stereotype is something ascribed to all dwarves. Just on account of their being a dwarf, they must have this trait. I can say that some people are tailors, without creating a stereotype that people are tailors.

A stereotype must also be an oversimplification. One could ask whether having wings can be a stereotype? It is not a stereotype to say that humans have eyes because it is not an oversimplification. Humans have eyes and nothing is being oversimplified in saying so. To say that an aarakocra has wings is not stereotyping aarakocra.

Which brings to light another possible filter. Remember I said that race features are ideally incommensurable. Perhaps one can add that they are also ideally not scalable. Not something that can be compared across races, on a scale.

 

[le Redoutable]

"savage attacks"

eh! from Marvel SH SAIW callings it's called Animal Nature

 

[clearstream]

Right. But as your last sentence already alludes, differences in temperament can actually be based on biology. For example I would imagine that intelligent creatures that have evolved from small herbivores would have rather different temperament than ones that have evolved from apex predators. Now whether actually depicting this is problematic is another matter. However; I have to say that if we cannot actually depict aliens/fantasy species as having different instincts and ways of thinking than humans, then it's not worth bothering with them. Those are the actually interesting differences, not whether someone can fly or shoot lasers from their eyes.

That seems contradictory. It opens by assuming temperament should come out of evolved role - predator - and then ignores features that should tie to role evolved - flying, laser eyes (were such things possible). If being a predator would make my temperament X. Having laser eyes should make it Y. These are exactly as fundamental and interesting as differences.

Note I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with you in saying that. What I think we are doing is trying to properly frame the problem, so that we know how to form and judge solutions. As I said, so far I have - not commensurable, not scalable, and if borderline cultural then called out as a feature of some, not all.

To my mind, assuming flying cat people all have temperament X due to their evolved role Y is risky. It goes right into stereotyping through oversimplification. So perhaps a desire for 'actually interesting differences' that are limited to temperament based on pseudo-scientific ideas about how erstwhile predators should behave post-sentience, is going to be problematic. It will provide narrative soil for the problems we have been talking about.

 

[mrpopstar]

All stereotypes are true, they just don't tell the whole story.

 

[le Redoutable]

oh! you're speaking of Size !

Oh! such a shame I have lost my 1st ED Monster Manual,
becuase I think Monster Abilities were very reusable for Player Characters
( next ? Manoeuvrability classes, for example )