D&D General How Do You "Roll Up" Ability Scores?

[Maxperson]

All of this is just "it is not that bad." Balance would still be better, and introducing intentional random imbalance remains a questionable idea.

Imbalance is what makes the game fun. It doesn't matter if it's intentional or random, so long as it's accounted for and doesn't disrupt the game, and high stats don't have enough impact to disrupt.

EDIT: I already asked earlier, but I being was serious. If randomly imbalanced characters are fun, why not randomise the starting level of each character?

See above. It can't be so great as to disrupt the game. That said, I've played in games where there were characters with as much as 15 levels difference between one another. You have to be a really good DM to be able to do that and make it fun for everyone, and those two DMs did it. I don't know how they did it(I'm good, but not that good. At least not in that way), but it's doable.

One bit of randomization(stat rolling) being good, does not mean that all randomization is good.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Has anyone said imbalanced characters are fun? My understanding is that random characters are fun, and that the imbalances are not significant enough (to those players) to detract from that fun. And randomizing starting level is purely about the imbalance, it's not about the things people enjoy from randomizing abilities.

What is fun about it? Like I said, with current methods where you are free to assign the scores you're mainly just randomising the power. The best stat goes here, second best here etc. Same than with array, except you have a chance of getting a bit better or worse scores.

If power wasn't part of it, you could just have a bunch of balanced arrays done with point buy, and you'd randomise which you get. But no one does that.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Imbalance is what makes the game fun.

How?

 

[Maxperson]

How?

Why are PCs not all identical in all ways. As soon as you make an elf and I make a dwarf, we have imbalance. As soon as your elf becomes a fighter and my dwarf a rogue, we have more imbalance. Class and race abilities are not perfectly balanced. Some are better than others. Once you introduce level you have even more imbalance as you get more and more abilities that are not in perfect balance. Same with treasure. Your fighter finds a +2 sword and my rogue finds a +1 short sword and cloak of displacement.

The game is not balanced. It never has been and never will be. Because the imbalance(variations) are what make it fun. Stats are just another area where you have variations that make it fun.

Hell, even using an array isn't going to guarantee that two elven rogues are going to be balanced. Stat placement, unless identical in all six stats, will create a very minor bit of imbalance.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Why are PCs not all identical in all ways. As soon as you make an elf and I make a dwarf, we have imbalance. As soon as your elf becomes a fighter and my dwarf a rogue, we have more imbalance. Class and race abilities are not perfectly balanced. Some are better than others. Once you introduce level you have even more imbalance as you get more and more abilities that are not in perfect balance. Same with treasure. Your fighter finds a +2 sword and my rogue finds a +1 short sword and cloak of displacement.

The game is not balanced. It never has been and never will be. Because the imbalance(variations) are what make it fun. Stats are just another area where you have variations that make it fun.

Hell, even using an array isn't going to guarantee that two elven rogues are going to be balanced. Stat placement, unless identical in all six stats, will create a very minor bit of imbalance.

Balance doesn't mean identical. Characters obviously can be good at different things.

 

[ichabod]

What is fun about it?

This question has been answered multiple times in this thread.

 

[Maxperson]

Balance doesn't mean identical. Characters obviously can be good at different things.

Balance does mean identical. It must in order to be perfectly balanced. As soon as you introduce variation, imbalance, however minor, occurs. The game of D&D is about the level of imbalance being within set limits, which randomized stats clearly fall into. If they didn't, WotC would not have included them as an option.

Characters can't be good at different things and be in perfect balance. Imperfect balance = imbalance.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

This question has been answered multiple times in this thread.

No, not really. It just seems people like to gamble to get good stats. Like I said, if gaining power was not part of it, you could just randomise between balanced arrays.

 

[Maxperson]

No, not really. It just seems people like to gamble to get good stats. Like I said, if gaining power was not part of it, you could just randomise between balanced arrays.

Arrays are not balanced, either. Consider the following two rogues.

S:12
D: 13
C:8
I:10
W:14
CH:15

S:14
D: 15
C:12
I:13
W:8
CH:10

Those are not balanced characters. Rogue #1 has decided to focus on social skills, so put high stats into wisdom(for insight) and charisma(deception and diplomacy). Rogue #2 wants the traditional rogue skills. The thing is, the stats are not equal. Some are better than others.

 

[Vaalingrade]

No, not really. It just seems people like to gamble to get good stats. Like I said, if gaining power was not part of it, you could just randomise between balanced arrays.

People have also stated they want the possibility of bad states.

For the risk taker, there's no point if there's no risk. And then there's the folks that like having low stats for whatever reason.

Also, they wouldn't want to randomize starting levels as you're already conditioned to start at the lowest possible level, so there's no element of loss.