Ability Scores (Heroic Array)

[Crothian]

Charisma will play a part in the campaign, but assuming a group dynamic:

So make charisma matter more for the oither players. Are they always going to have the one character speak for them? The DM has a lot of control and can easily make any attirubtes, class abilities, and skills and feats worth while to take or worthless to take. It sounds as if the DM is not willing to have the low charisma mater and be a pain for the players.

 

[Technik4]

...be a pain for the players.

<Cringe> Is that why the DM's job is? I thought we were all supposed to have fun...

It sounds as if the DM is not willing to have the low charisma mater

Thats just it though. I consider people with low charisma to be anti-social people, in one way or another. As a DM, I can't roleplay the PCs charisma, I can only react to it. And we are talking about PCs with a charisma maybe a point or 2 below average (so, for a benchmark anywhere between 8-10). You either have to assume that EVERYONE they meet in social settings has above average charisma (doesnt make sense) or create all these (imo) inplausible 'hatreds' towards some people for dumping Cha.

I don't blame people for dumping charisma because if you aren't going to be a social PC, you dont need it. That isn't my fault as a DM (and yes I could create some 'roleplaying' to hinder such characters), it is a fault of the system. If you aren't a bard, cleric, paladin, or sorcerer and you don't want to pick up social skills - Charisma makes the most sense as a dump stat. And, besides cleric, those are some of the rarest PCs I see...

Personally, I like social skills. I usually dump Con over Cha because Im fairly confident of my knowledge of combat rules to play accurately (fleeing when a character would flee, flanking, tumbling, etc). I don't think its fair to penalize a quiet PC who wants to play a quiet asocial character. No they won't ever get land or titles, but then, they don't want that stuff.

I hope that made some sense as to the frustration with Charisma as an ability score I have.

Technik

BG: I like the idea of combining Wis + Cha for Will saves. The problem with switching Will saves to Cha is that wisdom becomes the new charisma.

Damage - Str
ThAC0 - Str or Dex
AC - Dex
Initiative - Dex
Reflex - Dex
Hp - Con
Fort - Con
Skills - Int
Will - Wis

And all the ability scores reflect in skills and ability checks. An interesting thing to do in 4e (or another revision) would be to increase the rate of feat acquisition based on Wis. Then you could slide Will saving throws to Charisma and each ability would mean something to every character. As someone else said, sliding Wis to initiative wouldnt be a terrible idea either (maybe give one class like Rogue the ability to use Dex instead of Wis).

 

[Crothian]

<Cringe> Is that why the DM's job is? I thought we were all supposed to have fun...

Both, a DM's job is to put obsitcles and encounters. Some of these are a pain for the PCs; some literlayy like when they get hurt, some not literal like when the run into other roadblocks. Unless of course it is assumed in the games that the PCs will always win no matter what. IF it is that type of game then nevermind.

Thats just it though. I consider people with low charisma to be anti-social people, in one way or another. As a DM, I can't roleplay the PCs charisma,

But you can enforce them to role play it correctly. And the reaction doesn't happen all the time. It just should be established that people tend to react worse towards the 8 Charisma character then the 18.

[quoteI don't blame people for dumping charisma because if you aren't going to be a social PC, you dont need it. That isn't my fault as a DM (and yes I could create some 'roleplaying' to hinder such characters), it is a fault of the system. If you aren't a bard, cleric, paladin, or sorcerer and you don't want to pick up social skills - Charisma makes the most sense as a dump stat. And, besides cleric, those are some of the rarest PCs I see...[/quote]

Don't blame the system., There are rules there that you are not enforcing. Either the players aren't role plying it right or you are just letting all PCs act to them like they are all the same. Charisma is well defined in the book, has plenty of skills associated with it, and players can only get away with using it as a dump stat when DMs refuse to use the skills and other things associated with it.

 

[Technik4]

Don't blame the system., There are rules there that you are not enforcing. Either the players aren't role plying it right or you are just letting all PCs act to them like they are all the same. Charisma is well defined in the book, has plenty of skills associated with it, and players can only get away with using it as a dump stat when DMs refuse to use the skills and other things associated with it.

You didn't address any of my concerns from an earlier post. If a party has a leader/negotiator/charisma guy to do all their social interaction on a town/job basis, then the only way to 'harry' a character with low charisma is to make life difficult for him in town or random encounters (by making him get picked on? Heck, most of the time its barbarians, fighters - who would love to get picked on).

I mean, my game is not an always-win situation. I tend to run tough combats and my players are perhaps not as skilled at maneuvering as I am, which means I have to tone that down in combat. Out of combat, I don't feel I'm doing anyone a diservice by not roleplaying every upturned nose towards the slightly-below-average charisma possesor. I would rather concentrate on someone's high ability score getting noticed, like the one person who does have high charisma. If they attempt diplomacy, bluffing, etc then yeah they get the associated negatives. My complaint is that the system doesn't have nearly enough of those scenarios for charisma to really have an impact (again, assuming a Party leader/negotiator - and honestly, its not like having one of those doesn't make sense).

Technik

 

[Crothian]

You didn't address any of my concerns from an earlier post. If a party has a leader/negotiator/charisma guy to do all their social interaction on a town/job basis, then the only way to 'harry' a character with low charisma is to make life difficult for him in town or random encounters (by making him get picked on? Heck, most of the time its barbarians, fighters - who would love to get picked on).

Well, one person might also do the talking but sometimes that person hiring the group wants to talk to everyone in the group. The fighter could have a great reputation for being skilled with arms and the person seeking the group out does so through the fighter and not through the Bard. It doesn't have to happen ever single session. But once in a while they can still talk to an NPC.

It doesn't even have to be this way. Bluff is lying so whenever they lie make them have a bluff check.

 

[Magonus]

One thought on CHA being the stereotypical "dump" score... Look at the Fellowship of the Ring. Most of them didn't have the "forceful personality" that CHA represents in d20. I'd say all but 3 or 4 members had CHAs of 10 or less.

The point I'm trying to get at is that heroes aren't all the charming or leader type. They're smart, skilled, strong, tough, but charistmatic? Game mechanics aside, it seems natural that it would be on the low end for a majority of players, simply for the sake of staying true to the heroic legacy.

 

[Technik4]

t seems natural that it would be on the low end for a majority of players, simply for the sake of staying true to the heroic legacy

I meant to say that in an earlier post too.

Technik

 

[wingsandsword]

You didn't address any of my concerns from an earlier post. If a party has a leader/negotiator/charisma guy to do all their social interaction on a town/job basis, then the only way to 'harry' a character with low charisma is to make life difficult for him in town or random encounters (by making him get picked on? Heck, most of the time its barbarians, fighters - who would love to get picked on).

Simple, the party may have a designated face man, there to be the person to talk when the party runs across some strange creature or does the important negotiations with an employer, but that doesn't mean he's the only person who ever interacts with townsfolk. Having a designated Charisma guy to do all the talking is like having a dedicated Constitution guy to take all the hits or a dedicated Strength guy to make all the attack rolls, it may end up like that a much of the time, but everybody gets hit/attacks/talks sometime.

Is that low-charisma fighter standing right next to Mr. Charisma all day and all night? Is he going out to the tavern with him every time? What about going shopping, just wandering around town? With a -2 CHA penalty and probably no ranks in social skills he could be in for trouble some time. As the DM, play up that you can't have someone else always do your talking for you. This is D&D where PC's are travelling adventurers, not modern celebrities with professional spokesmen and speechwriters.

Charisma is much more important than it used to be in 1e/2e. No character can afford to completely ignore Charisma.

 

[arscott]

The people in question aren't really munchkins, but for the entirety of their D&D careers have used rather generous rolling techniques (4d6 drop lowest, 7 times, drop lowest).

Let me just point out that 4d6 and 7 drop lowest aren't 'generous' rolling tecniques at all. They're what 3rd ed assumes is average amongst player characters.

They're also not consistent with the array you've got above.

If you look at the 216 possible rolls on a 3d6, you'll find that:
3 and 18 show up once each.
4 and 17 show up 3 times each.
5 and 16 show up 6 times each.
6 and 15 show up 10 times each.
7 and 14 show up 15 times each.
8 and 13 show up 21 times each.
9 and 12 show up 25 times each.
10 and 11 show up 27 times each.

There are six ability scores, so divide those 216 results up into six groups of thirty-six:
the first group has the the '3', the '4's, the '5's, the '6's, the '7's, and one '8'.
the second group has twenty '8's and sixteen '9's
the third group has nine '9's and the '10's
the fourth group has the '11's and nine '12's
the fifth group has sixteen '12's and twenty '13's
and the sixth group has a '13', the '14's, the '15's, the '16's, the '17's, and the '18'.

If you take the mean of each group you'd get:
6.06, 8.44, 9.75, 11.25, 12.56, and 14.94 as the mean scores.

Those aren't very useful, so you could take the median of each group instead.:
6, 8, 10, 11, 13, and 15. These are the same numbers you get by rounding the means to the nearest whole.

those aren't very good scores for 3rd ed. that's a 16 in point-buy, assuming that numbers lower than eight give points back. (The DMG calls a point-buy of 15 'Low-powered')

If you did the same thing using all 1296 possible rolls in a 4d6 drop one scheme (or if you cheat and use percentages), you'll get 8, 10, 12, 13, 14, 16. that's a point-buy of 27 (25 = 'standard', 28 = 'tougher')

finally, if you split the 216 3d6 results into seven groups instead of six, you'd get 6, 8, 9, 12, 13, 15, and a final result that's exactly halfway between 10 and 11. drop the lowest for 8, 9, 10.5, 12, 13, and 15. that's a point-buy of 20.5 (22 = 'Challenging').

The system you've got on the other hand, is a 36 point buy (32 = 'High-powered') If the 18/7 option is taken, that climbs up to 38.

If that's what you want, go ahead. but it's alot better than 4d6 drop one.

 

[Celebrim]

One thought on CHA being the stereotypical "dump" score... Look at the Fellowship of the Ring. Most of them didn't have the "forceful personality" that CHA represents in d20. I'd say all but 3 or 4 members had CHAs of 10 or less.

What's that??? Are you talking about my book??? Are you dissing my peeps??? Are you cooing with my bird??? Dem are fightin' words!!!

There wasn't a single character in the Fellowship with less than a 12 CHR. Amongst the fellowship, CHR was probably the highest average stat. You can make a pretty easy argument for every stat but CON being lower, and that's only because the CON's in the party are epic.

But go ahead; name one member of the Fellowship with below average charisma.

Leoglas is probably the least charismatic member of the party, and he's a freaking elf Prince! Sam and Gimli have at least 18's. Gimli manages to patch up a 5000 year old blood feud between the elven and dwarven races. Gimli must have been like dumping his stat increases into CHR (he is after all a diplomat's son). Sam gets himself elected six times as the Mayor of the shire. He's the freaking hobbit FDR, and he's even apparantly got a few ranks in perform (poetry, song). Merry and Pippin are just little beacons of hope, honesty, and joy that go around rallying troops everywhere they go. Frodo is amazing in all the mental/social abilities. Everyone in the whole party is either a freaking diplomatic master (Gimli, Frodo, Gandalf), or so likable that they cheer up and inspire everyone around them (Sam, Merry, Pippin), or such a beloved leader that man and beast would willingly follow them into the gates of death (Frodo, Aragorn, Boromir, and by the end of the story Merry and Pippin). You know that first scene in Gladiator when Maximus (Russell Crow) walks the lines of troops and you see the utter devotion his men have to him - well that's Aragorn, Frodo, and yes even Boromir (read Faramir's account of his Brother).

Or maybe you were refering to the movies, with lying decietful impish hobbits, nervous and vacillating Strider, Boromir the psychotic, Gimli the ridiculous, and so forth.