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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Guest 6801328" data-source="post: 6860332">I originally posted this back on the WotC forums (RIP) but thought I'd share it here.I'm trying to address the downsides I see in the two main approaches, rolling dice vs. point buy/standard array.4d6-1 Dice Rolling "suffers" (depending your point of view) from being too variable.  You can easily end up with a big disparity between characters, and because you can arrange your scores you still get "dump stats". And the problem with Point Buy/Standard Array is that you end up with cookie cutter characters with predictable dump stats.  You almost never get a highly intelligent fighter, or a strong wizard.Yes, I know there are some/many of you already typing "Not in my campaign!  We have...etc." but in my experience, and from reading these forums, my impression is that most players have noticed both of these phenomena and to some extent don't like them.So here's my proposal:<ol> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">Roll 3d6 for each stat, in order.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol">Now spend 12 points to increase those ability scores using the normal costs for Point Buy.  (With a cost of 1/point up to 8.)</li> </ol>Mathematically it ends up being roughly equivalent to Point Buy/Standard Array.  The average of 3d6 is 10.5, so 3 10's and 3 11's, which starting from all 8's would cost exactly 15 points, leaving 12 points.  (4d6-1 averages 12.5, which is like 3 12's and 3 13's, which would cost 27 points via Point Buy.)It's possible you would have a tough time building your character concept if you happened to roll badly on the key abilities.  But even if you rolled, say, a 6 you could get to a solid 14 by spending 9 of your 12 points.I played around building some example characters and it results in some quirky stat arrays without the predictability of Point Buy.  You get some intelligent fighters and strong wizards.And of course you could tweak it in any number of ways if you wanted more powerful or more customizable characters<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">More/fewer points</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">4d6-1, but still in order</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Roll two arrays and pick your favorite</li> </ul>But I'd stick with the "in order" requirement to avoid the predictability of dump stats.Thoughts?</blockquote>

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