D&D 5E Array v 4d6: Punishment? Or overlooked data

[spinozajack]

You have to go a long, long way to demonstrate that your personal experience is sufficient to cast aspersions to a wider group. So, please don't go there. In this, you have basically suggested it is a personal flaw for people to disagree with you - and that turns this into a matter of insult and ego, rather than reason, which means an invitation to non-productive argument.

So, as we usually say, don't make it personal.

I call it like I see it. Wasn't trying to be personally offensive to anyone, but I might suggest if people take it that way, they more carefully read the substance of my well-reasoned argument rather than a knee-jerk reaction to it. Sometimes the truth hurts. I've seen people throw dice across the room countless times, that's definitely immature behavior. It was funny when I was 13 and just starting to play this game. In my 30s? Not so much. When people say they loathe rolling stats or HP, I see that as an extension for a playstyle that does not want the dice to have any real agency at any point, and to me, that means D&D is not the game for them. The dice are important in this game. And we do have choice to use point buy.

Although picking average + 0.5 for HP per level is definitely unfair and I don't allow that. And as others have pointed out, the chance of having a very high score with rolling is offset by having several negatives, which can be very serious. Point buy is the safe bet, while rolling can allow a player to get the attack stat they want at first level, which frees up their 4th level feat from stat boost contention.

As we know from the survey results, playing it safe might mean that you never get to have that 20 main stat and the two or so feats that you want before the campaign is over at level 6. And that's what I believe upsets the stat min maxers, the inability to have a guaranteed outcome by a certain level. So in that sense, Wizards making 15 the max point buy was a stroke of genius, since it will encourage players to get out of their safe zone and take a tiny risk with their imaginary character (lol). I wish they had done that in 4th edition too. People often complain about not wanting "cookie cutter PCs", then in the same paragraph say they want to use standard arrays, and every X level fighter has the exact same amount of hit points. Reminds me of the clone wars, all those stormtroopers probably had the exact same stats, feats, training, HP, as one another. That's what taking the randomness out of character creation gives you. Cookie cutter character builds.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

People often complain about not wanting "cookie cutter PCs", then in the same paragraph say they want to use standard arrays, and every X level fighter has the exact same amount of hit points. Reminds me of the clone wars, all those stormtroopers probably had the exact same stats, feats, training, HP, as one another. That's what taking the randomness out of character creation gives you. Cookie cutter character builds.

You seem to be completely misunderstanding something very important. "Cookie cutter PCs" means different things to different people. To me, it means that even characters that are quite similar at the outset can reasonably progress along different interesting paths. Stats are not the primary means of differentiating PCs to those who roleplay by playing a role, rather than hoping dice does the work for us.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Does anyone go the extreme the other way from rolling? I'm not talking just point buy or even the standard array. But a set score for each stat so all characters before racial adjustments have the exact same stats in all attributes? This sounds like it would be most fair and balanced.

I am not sure most players would agree that it is actually more "fair and balanced" than other less extreme and more flexible alternatives FWIW.

But as a though experiment, it might have value. How about a truly flat array such as straight 14s?

 

[Hussar]

I've said this before. For those who die roll pc's, audit the characters in your current group. Odds say that the average of those characters should be the same as point buy since sometimes you roll high and sometimes low.

But, I'll bet that nearly every die rolled group averages above (and possibly well above) point buy value.

 

[Hussar]

Thing is for me the issue isn't that PC A has an 18 and B has a sixteen. Who cares about that? The issue is that the die rolled character probably has a +1-3 in every stat over the point buy character. By about sixth level, that character really is functioning at one level higher. It has better skills, better attacks and about one more hit die worth of hit points.

And, for me, that's still not really the issue. The problem comes when the entire group is operating above their weight class because IME that's generally what die rolled results in.

And we've seen complaints already. DM's talking about how their groups are blowing through hard and deadly encounters. How the encounter design advice in the DMG doesn't work. IMO, some of the blame for that rests on die rolled characters. How this or that fear is overpowered because the players can afford to take feats instead of stat boosts. Sure your GWF barbarian is nasty but a point buy PC has serious weaknesses in saving throws while the die rolled PC has none. That sort of thing.

 

[pemerton]

Thing is for me the issue isn't that PC A has an 18 and B has a sixteen. Who cares about that?

I do!

Especially in a system like D&D, where raw stat bonuses are very important to so many aspects of mechanical action resolution (contrast, say, RM, or perhaps high-level 3E, where allocated skill ranks carry the bulk of the weight).

People often complain about not wanting "cookie cutter PCs", then in the same paragraph say they want to use standard arrays, and every X level fighter has the exact same amount of hit points.

Which people are you talking about?

Like [MENTION=545]Ridley's Cohort[/MENTION] said, PC differentiation isn't primarily based on differences of stats, let alone on differences of stat spreads. Mechanically, it's based on the full range of PC abilities; and that's before we get to differences that exist only at the level of story/fiction.

 

[Lezta]

I've said this before. For those who die roll pc's, audit the characters in your current group. Odds say that the average of those characters should be the same as point buy since sometimes you roll high and sometimes low.

But, I'll bet that nearly every die rolled group averages above (and possibly well above) point buy value.

I don't allow rolling not observed by myself - we do a group character generation session. I think we mostly stick to the average. In our current group one player has several stats above, one is a tiny bit above, one is on the average, one is slightly below. In the last party, we had one slightly above, two pretty much on the average and one a bit below. Fun was had.

EDIT: I do agree though, that rolling ought to be monitored and that it can mean you get 'uber' PCs. We had a real problem for awhile in our group when playing 2e, where people would just keep rolling stats until they were 'happy' with the results. Broke the game utterly.

 

[Hrrunstar]

Point buy, or stat array means crafting to concept for something I want to do for that particular game or time. Rolling means having to accept something that I have to put story to which automatically puts a a bit of a damper on my fun. In many of the games that I play in, players are into rolling so that is what happens and I count myself fortunate that at least I can shuffle the stats around to something I can usually be okay with. I can still enjoy the games and I am not concerned about how much better or worse some other player's stat rolls might be.

 

[DaveDash]

Thing is for me the issue isn't that PC A has an 18 and B has a sixteen. Who cares about that? The issue is that the die rolled character probably has a +1-3 in every stat over the point buy character. By about sixth level, that character really is functioning at one level higher. It has better skills, better attacks and about one more hit die worth of hit points.

And, for me, that's still not really the issue. The problem comes when the entire group is operating above their weight class because IME that's generally what die rolled results in.

And we've seen complaints already. DM's talking about how their groups are blowing through hard and deadly encounters. How the encounter design advice in the DMG doesn't work. IMO, some of the blame for that rests on die rolled characters. How this or that fear is overpowered because the players can afford to take feats instead of stat boosts. Sure your GWF barbarian is nasty but a point buy PC has serious weaknesses in saving throws while the die rolled PC has none. That sort of thing.

I've watched a few streams now where the DM's let the players roll 4d6 for stats. Sometimes it does lead to fun moments, banter, and roleplay, but also I've noticed some of the players who get 20's pretty quickly are quite overpowered even early on.

In one stream I watched, one Rogue player started 18 in dex, then got 20 in dex by level 4. He dominated the early levels of play considerably (Rogues are bad enough early on as it is).

 

[DaveDash]

I just rolled 4d6 drop the lowest and got...

12, 11, 11, 13, 11, 13.

Ugh. Now as the DM would you let me re-roll, or make me suffer with the most boring stat array ever for the next year in your campaign?