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Ability Scores - Should they increase?
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<blockquote data-quote="Crazy Jerome" data-source="post: 5772697" data-attributes="member: 54877"><p>I would prefer not to have ability score increases at all. Of all the various ways that they can be done, I don't see enough benefits to cancel out the problems.</p><p> </p><p>But if they are to increase at all, they should increase consistent with how they are generated. That means that if point buy is used, with staggered costs such that higher ability scores cost more per point, then increasing them should work the same way. That way, you remove at one fell swoop the tendency to only increase the two scores that are already most important. Bob the Barbarian increasing his Cha from 8 to 10 over a few levels really doesn't bother me--or even his Int from 12 to 14. </p><p> </p><p>And of course, if you do that, then it does get rather complicated to track, because now you may need to put more than one "increase" into raising a higher stat. I suppose that you can simply save the "increases" off somewhere until ready to buy.</p><p> </p><p>However, at that point the wisdom becomes evident of the narrow range of score in the original method, though you'd like to tweak it a bit so that each plus on the modifier requires more and more range in the stat. Plus, that makes actually having an ability score instead of just a modifier useful. It is the "track" that determines how close you are to the next bump in the modifier, and also the game mechanic used when you want to emphasize simulation versus game play. (And the modifier is used vice versa.)</p><p> </p><p>So if you are with me that far, the next step would be to eliminate the negative modifiers altogether, adjust the math to compensate, and make a regular progression out of the increases, so that they are easy to remember. Something like:</p><p> </p><p>Ability Score(Modifier)</p><p>1 (+0)</p><p>2-3 (+1)</p><p>4-6 (+2)</p><p>7-10 (+3)</p><p>11-15 (+4)</p><p>16-21 (+5)</p><p> </p><p>And so forth. Now, giants and dragons can have huge Str score increases (that can directly affect lifting ability, encumbrance, etc.) without game-breaking combat modifiers. Point buy and various die rolling methods are now more in sync at generation, and point buy is very straight-forward for players. Buy one ability score point per point in point buy, but the more you spend in a single ability, the less modifier you get.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Crazy Jerome, post: 5772697, member: 54877"] I would prefer not to have ability score increases at all. Of all the various ways that they can be done, I don't see enough benefits to cancel out the problems. But if they are to increase at all, they should increase consistent with how they are generated. That means that if point buy is used, with staggered costs such that higher ability scores cost more per point, then increasing them should work the same way. That way, you remove at one fell swoop the tendency to only increase the two scores that are already most important. Bob the Barbarian increasing his Cha from 8 to 10 over a few levels really doesn't bother me--or even his Int from 12 to 14. And of course, if you do that, then it does get rather complicated to track, because now you may need to put more than one "increase" into raising a higher stat. I suppose that you can simply save the "increases" off somewhere until ready to buy. However, at that point the wisdom becomes evident of the narrow range of score in the original method, though you'd like to tweak it a bit so that each plus on the modifier requires more and more range in the stat. Plus, that makes actually having an ability score instead of just a modifier useful. It is the "track" that determines how close you are to the next bump in the modifier, and also the game mechanic used when you want to emphasize simulation versus game play. (And the modifier is used vice versa.) So if you are with me that far, the next step would be to eliminate the negative modifiers altogether, adjust the math to compensate, and make a regular progression out of the increases, so that they are easy to remember. Something like: Ability Score(Modifier) 1 (+0) 2-3 (+1) 4-6 (+2) 7-10 (+3) 11-15 (+4) 16-21 (+5) And so forth. Now, giants and dragons can have huge Str score increases (that can directly affect lifting ability, encumbrance, etc.) without game-breaking combat modifiers. Point buy and various die rolling methods are now more in sync at generation, and point buy is very straight-forward for players. Buy one ability score point per point in point buy, but the more you spend in a single ability, the less modifier you get. [/QUOTE]
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Ability Scores - Should they increase?
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