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<blockquote data-quote="Greg Benage" data-source="post: 8090473" data-attributes="member: 93631">I think a fair amount of this debate is rooted in the fact that ability scores are such a core part of the game, and...the design is a bit weak. It's not outright broken, but it's a &quot;wobbly wheel&quot; as AngryGM says. There's this weird dynamic where ability scores are really important, but they're more important early on, but then differences that arise out of character creation tend to be erased by level 12 (at the latest) through ASIs at the same time they're becoming less important...For example, if I can move from a +4 in a core ability modifier to a +5 (a proficient task or attack roll), that's a 25% increase in my ability level (4 * 1.25 = 5). That's significant for a 1st-level character, so anyone who cares about their character being 25% more capable in their core competency from the jump will tend to choose a race that gives them that edge. Conversely, at high level, going from a +10 to a +11 is only a 10% increase in ability (10 * 1.1 = 11), and it doesn't really matter anyway because the ASI advancement system means we're probably both maxed out at 20 (+5) on our core ability scores. So it's quite important early on when choosing an optimal race is the only thing I can do about it, and less important when the ASI advancement system makes it trivially easy to &quot;catch up.&quot;It's just a weak aspect of the design, and it's unfortunate because it's the foundation for task resolution and combat, which are fairly important parts of the game. My preference would be to make differences in ability scores less important, especially at low level, but it seems the designers are leaning towards making it easier for everyone to have optimal ability scores. At that point, I feel like you can do it in class selection, and a lot of the weirdness comes from trying to shoehorn it into race.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Greg Benage, post: 8090473, member: 93631"] I think a fair amount of this debate is rooted in the fact that ability scores are such a core part of the game, and...the design is a bit weak. It's not outright broken, but it's a "wobbly wheel" as AngryGM says. There's this weird dynamic where ability scores are really important, but they're more important early on, but then differences that arise out of character creation tend to be erased by level 12 (at the latest) through ASIs at the same time they're becoming less important... For example, if I can move from a +4 in a core ability modifier to a +5 (a proficient task or attack roll), that's a 25% increase in my ability level (4 * 1.25 = 5). That's significant for a 1st-level character, so anyone who cares about their character being 25% more capable in their core competency from the jump will tend to choose a race that gives them that edge. Conversely, at high level, going from a +10 to a +11 is only a 10% increase in ability (10 * 1.1 = 11), and it doesn't really matter anyway because the ASI advancement system means we're probably both maxed out at 20 (+5) on our core ability scores. So it's quite important early on when choosing an optimal race is the only thing I can do about it, and less important when the ASI advancement system makes it trivially easy to "catch up." It's just a weak aspect of the design, and it's unfortunate because it's the foundation for task resolution and combat, which are fairly important parts of the game. My preference would be to make differences in ability scores less important, [I]especially[/I] at low level, but it seems the designers are leaning towards making it easier for everyone to have optimal ability scores. At that point, I feel like you can do it in class selection, and a lot of the weirdness comes from trying to shoehorn it into race. [/QUOTE]

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