Level Up (A5E) Alternative pointbuy system

[Faolyn]

You seem to very clearly grasp & express disdain for the fact that lowering PC starting attributes shifts them to require some degree of magic items, why does the inverse of that bounce off?

I have no idea what this means.

If reducing attributes to make a system that does not require players to have magic items makes them require them the inverse is that a system that does not require them will overload by adding them unless changes are made all over behind the curtain by the gm (ie to monsters, dc's, & everything else magic items boost).

So my next question is, why do you want PCs to have to rely on magic items instead of their own abilities?

Are you finding that the PCs are "too good" at what they do when they don't have to rely on magic items? If so, why is that a bad thing for you? Why can't you make DCs higher, or set them against tougher foes? Why can't you just let them succeed at their tasks?

Do you think that magic items are just so cool that you want to have them everywhere in your game, and thus are afraid of going Monty Haul on them if they also have regular stats?

Are you trying to control the players by making them reliant on an object--magic items--that only you can allow them access to, thus giving you more power over them?

Because I literally don't know why you think 27 points and the regular point cost is too high, or why you think players would be happy with their exceedingly low stats.

 

[tetrasodium]

I have no idea what this means.


So my next question is, why do you want PCs to have to rely on magic items instead of their own abilities?

Are you finding that the PCs are "too good" at what they do when they don't have to rely on magic items? If so, why is that a bad thing for you? Why can't you make DCs higher, or set them against tougher foes? Why can't you just let them succeed at their tasks?

Do you think that magic items are just so cool that you want to have them everywhere in your game, and thus are afraid of going Monty Haul on them if they also have regular stats?

Are you trying to control the players by making them reliant on an object--magic items--that only you can allow them access to, thus giving you more power over them?

Because I literally don't know why you think 27 points and the regular point cost is too high, or why you think players would be happy with their exceedingly low stats.

I want PC's to require some level of magic items so I don't need to track all the areas players are given magic items to improve & adjust things on my end to compensate. Adjustments are required because the base math assumes no magic items & adding them overloads things as a result. This is an unreasonable headache for a gm to manage over the course of a campaign that could easily span a year given my average.

Players can craft things, they are welcome to craft magic items & there are quite a few pages between the AG & T&T devoted to doing just that. AG426- 428 & T&T348-356 is all about how to craft magic items specifically & doesn't even get into listing one off abilities like how some strongholds will help with certain types of crafting. Providing players with room to actually use the magic items they create is the opposite of trying to control them I don't just want them to take advantage of those rules, I want them to feel empowered & incentivized to use the magic items they create rather than needing to be strict about limiting it.

 

[Faolyn]

I want PC's to require some level of magic items so I don't need to track all the areas players are given magic items to improve & adjust things on my end to compensate. Adjustments are required because the base math assumes no magic items & adding them overloads things as a result. This is an unreasonable headache for a gm to manage over the course of a campaign that could easily span a year given my average.

It doesn't really overload everything. The base math may assume no magic items, but you don't really need to worry about that when calculating an encounter. If they have so many magic items that you think they're OP, then make the monsters tougher by adding 1 or 2 to the total party level. You also don't need a totally accurate record (and if you do, you can just have them send you a copy of their sheet), unless you have dishonest players who lie about what abilities have. Guesstimating is fine. I tried to be perfectly accurate for a long time before realizing that it was actually a lot more fun for everyone, including myself, if I didn't worry about that so much.

Also, you're not making a lot of sense here. You want them to need magic items so you don't have to track the magic items? Honestly, this feels like you're trying to punish the players so you don't have to do bookkeeping.

Players can craft things, they are welcome to craft magic items & there are quite a few pages between the AG & T&T devoted to doing just that. AG426- 428 & T&T348-356 is all about how to craft magic items specifically & doesn't even get into listing one off abilities like how some strongholds will help with certain types of crafting. Providing players with room to actually use the magic items they create is the opposite of trying to control them I don't just want them to take advantage of those rules, I want them to feel empowered & incentivized to use the magic items they create rather than needing to be strict about limiting it.

But you still have to allow them to craft things, and let them have the downtime and gold with which to do it--all things you control.

But anyway, if you feel this is the best solution for your game, go for it. I hope your players are OK with it.

 

[tetrasodium]

It doesn't really overload everything. The base math may assume no magic items, but you don't really need to worry about that when calculating an encounter. If they have so many magic items that you think they're OP, then make the monsters tougher by adding 1 or 2 to the total party level. You also don't need a totally accurate record (and if you do, you can just have them send you a copy of their sheet), unless you have dishonest players who lie about what abilities have. Guesstimating is fine. I tried to be perfectly accurate for a long time before realizing that it was actually a lot more fun for everyone, including myself, if I didn't worry about that so much.

Also, you're not making a lot of sense here. You want them to need magic items so you don't have to track the magic items? Honestly, this feels like you're trying to punish the players so you don't have to do bookkeeping.


But you still have to allow them to craft things, and let them have the downtime and gold with which to do it--all things you control.

But anyway, if you feel this is the best solution for your game, go for it. I hope your players are OK with it.

The same logic applies in reverse. If magic items don't overload the math of the system when added then subtracting from stats won't harm the players.

 

[le Redoutable]

You can do something like that :
stats multiply ( like in 10x10x10x10x10x10 )
giving 0-levels a 12 and five 10s
( 12x10x10x10x10x10 )
then for PCs you do a ( 10+PC Level ) to one stat
( 12x(10+PC Level)x10x10x10x10 )
these are points that you can arrange as you wish
example for a 0-level:
12x10x10x10x10x10 = 1.200.000
with 1.200.000 you can build a
8x15x10x10x10x10
8x8x8x8x15x16
( well, it's only experimental lol )

 

[rules.mechanic]

@tetrasodium You may or may not want to match 4d6-and-drop-the-lowest probability but, if you do, here're a couple of options for that:

 

[lichmaster]

@tetrasodium You may or may not want to match 4d6-and-drop-the-lowest probability but, if you do, here're a couple of options for that:

View attachment 153732

This is a very interesting implementation.
Basically, we assume an underlying distribution and we sample values from it, with the prescription that we also maintain the balance for the percentiles for all the scores in the array of the 6 abilities (if you have the 50+nth percentile on an ability you must have the 50-nth percentile on another ability), so that the final array has a guaranteed median of 12, the distribution is symmetric (within rounding precision), but the kurtosis depends on how much you min-max your choices.

Something interesting emerges if we look at the modifiers instead of the raw scores (which are pretty much never used in the game, except maybe str for carrying capacity). One thing intrinsic to how ability modifiers are computed since 3E is that odd scores are always "suboptimal" in the sense that an increase of 1 point from an even number doesn't give any mechanical advantage, while a decrese of 1 point results in a modifier reduced by 1.
With this sysyem the basic array would be a 12 in each score, for a +1 modifier in each, or a total +2 modifier for each pair of abilities.
If we use the first variant, and stick to even numbers, the "good" choices are 10-14 (we lose a +1 on one score and gain it on another one), and 8-16 (we lose/gain 2). All other choices are poor because we lose a +1 modifier on one side without gaining it on the other (see 11-13, 9-15, 7-17 and 5-18)
This however doesn't account for background modifiers, that allow us to add 1 point on a given score.
This is very useful, as we can "gain" modifiers for free on a single pair: if we add the free 1 point increase to the lowest score of any single pair, ALL choices become optimal again (we have a total +2 modifier on each pair), while if we add it to the highest score, instead, all choices are optimal except for the pair that would be 5-19, were we still have a total +1 modifier (also some DMs may not allow starting with a 19 in a score). In the economy of the game it probably still "sucks" to have odd ability scores, but at least you're not effectively penalized in terms of total ability score modifiers. In LU however single point increases can be bought with a modest investment in a stronghold, without resorting to magic items, so it may still be a good deal, especially for characters that start at level higher than 1 and/or have enough money.

The second variant removes the constraint on the symmetry of the distribution of the 6 ability scores and allows for more varied characters. Also interesting is that it is not possible to generate the standard array (or better, one ends up with a "credit" of 2 points that cannot be spent). The closest one could get with this system would be 15-14-13-12-12-8 (or 15-14-13-13-11-8), which are quite better as they replace a 12 and a 10 with either two 12s or an 11 and a 13. Again we have to factor in one "free" point coming from the background ASI.
In terms of modifiers, both options end up with a total of +6 (unless in the second case we bring an even number to and odd one, which would be quite masochistic IMO).
The most min-maxed options would be 18-18-18-5-5-5, which could become 19-18-18-5-5-5 or 18-18-18-6-5-5 after the ASI has been factored in. Again, the total modifier is +6 in the first case, and +7 in the second case (because we've been smart and put the free point in an odd score to gain a +1 modifier somewhere).

So, all in all, I think this could be dramatically simplified as follows:

• you can have the scores you want (no higher than 18 in each), as long as the sum of your modifiers is +6.
• you then add your background free ASI, which can bring your total sum of modifiers to +7 (but not always, one has to be a little bit smart to figure it out, no big deal though).

This dramatically simple approach can be tailored to more gritty or heroic campaigns simply by changing the total sum of modifiers (maybe +4 or +3 for more mundane campaigns, up to +8 for very epic ones), or by increasing/decreasing the highest score one can buy this way

 

[tetrasodium]

@tetrasodium You may or may not want to match 4d6-and-drop-the-lowest probability but, if you do, here're a couple of options for that:

View attachment 153732

That zero point buy is an interesting start, but it feels more like something with a function of ensuring that resulting "rolls" are statistically believable & even the standard elite array of 15/14/13/12/10/8 leaves extra points to improve till you wind up with things like the completely bonkers 18/18/18/5+1/5+1/5 that @lichmaster noted. very the low odds of numbers below 8 with 4d6k3 is not properly weighted to the value of being able to minmax themuch better odds of high scores above 12 exactly asd much or little as needed. Almost no character needs more than 3 maybe 4 stats & even that odd nich ultra-MAD build could 18/18/16/8/5+1/5+1 for merely about average in the 4th & still has room to improve that 8 by reducing the 5's in attributes they expect to never use

I think part of the problem with point buy setups lies in the game evolving since 1st & 2nd edition with regards to how stats are handled without ever really rejiggering the pointbuy numbers around. Back in ad&d2.0(and maybe 1e?) a player didn't pick up a +1/-1 till they hit 6 or 15 effectively making 7/8/9/10/11/12/13/14 a dead zone varied a bit from score. In 3.x that got standardized to +/-1 for every 2 points above or below 10 so suddenly the dead zone became meaningful and the part that would give negatives mostly went away for pointbuy with a floor of 8 for zero points. That suddenly meaningful deadzone was somewhat mitigated by much tighter system math that assumed certain amounts of bonuses from magic items at different levels & differences in DC targets among other stuff like DR/x resist/x or SR/x but 5e did away with all that by shifting from most attacks miss to almost everything is successful most of the time unless it's your dump stat & untrained where the odds are merely okay.

Fixing that pg33 tome of variance pointbuy option might be doable, but it would probably still fall prey to the problems built up in pointbuy over the editions. Going a completely different route that puts the actual value of most attributes on the sheet front & center by presenting players with a choice of one or two stats with a number of points to buy the remaining 4-5 attributes based on that choice might be better.

Spoiler: Without doing the math for costs something like this should get the point across

The numbers could use some work but are chosen just to show an example of concept

• 1x18 then enough points to where the remaining stats are going to be a 6 or 7 unless deeper cuts are made to some in order to boost others.
• 1x15 1x11 then enough points for a bunch of 7s & 8s unless deeper cuts are made for some
• 2x13 then enough points for a bunch of 10s unless deeper cuts are made

 

[rules.mechanic]

Thanks both, food for thought (and impressed by the gritty/heroic callback and the GMBinder link!). You are very right - the truth is that the inherent skew of the 4d6-and-drop-the-lowest distribution is always going to struggle with the purchasing power of having access to the lowest scores. And the game isn't well set up for PCs that start with a primary stat of 19. I would definitely recommend limiting the extreme ranges (even though I used softer phrasing with the Tome's "you may wish to restrict how wide a range is available") and consider only allowing one instance of the most extreme value that you do permit. An alternative might be to use the 3d6 distribution (I'll maybe add that to the next version), which might also work better with @lichmaster 's simplified balanced modifier approach.

PS The A5E version of the Tome is nearly done. There's less need for some of the options but I've generally left them in, just fitting them in with the Expertise dice system etc.

 

[tetrasodium]

Thanks both, food for thought (and impressed by the gritty/heroic callback and the GMBinder link!). You are very right - the truth is that the inherent skew of the 4d6-and-drop-the-lowest distribution is always going to struggle with the purchasing power of having access to the lowest scores. And the game isn't well set up for PCs that start with a primary stat of 19. I would definitely recommend limiting the extreme ranges (even though I used softer phrasing with the Tome's "you may wish to restrict how wide a range is available") and consider only allowing one instance of the most extreme value that you do permit. An alternative might be to use the 3d6 distribution (I'll maybe add that to the next version), which might also work better with @lichmaster 's simplified balanced modifier approach.

PS The A5E version of the Tome is nearly done. There's less need for some of the options but I've generally left them in, just fitting them in with the Expertise dice system etc.

In all honesty I wouldn't mind a PC starting out with one 19 if the other scores were enough of a deficit that the penalties on a SAD class's dump stats actually mattered enough to hurt. I did some playing around with that sort of pick one then you get an associated number of points to spend this morning using [spoiler="these numbers"

• 13,13 +points for 12, 10, 8, 8
• 15,11 +points for, 9, 8, 8, 7
• 16,6 +points for 8, 8, +8, 7
• just in curiosity 20, 3 +points for 10, 5, 4, 4

[/spoiler]
I couldn't get anything that seemed to work in a sane fashion that couldn't be abused like that 18/18/185/5/5 to a lesser degree & it almost seemed like it would need a different array of costs to buy from to make each work but doing that would allow it to work great while solving as lot of the problems built up in pointbuy over the editions even if it took a lot of space to convey.