Attribute won't rise (Speculation)

[Simon Marks]

Ok, it's my first real thread...

I'm working on the assumption that one of the issues to be solved in 3.x was the fact that tasks where either Auto-Success for a specialist or an Auto-Fail for 'everybody else'. This is the reason that 1/2 Level is added to skill checks.

Let's take an example - Tumble.

At about 10th level a 'maxxed out' character has +13 from ranks, +5 from a Stat, +2 from synergy for a total of +20.

+20 is the magic number, when you reach a variance of +20 it becomes Auto-Success vs Auto-Fail. It's reached around 10th level in 3.x

A variance of +13 from Specialist to 'baseline' is optimum (for me) - a DC of 17 becomes 20% fail vs 20% success. A variance of +15 is tolerable (DC 18 = 15% vs 15%)

I'm also working on the assumption that Skill Training = +5 to a roll, and Skill Focus feat = +5 to a roll.

So, we can now ignore Level as no longer adding to the Variance. The difference between a specialist and everyone else becomes;

5 (Skill Training) + 5 (Skill Focus) + ? (Attribute Modifier)

This number is +13->+15 at First Level (16-20 dex, assuming that +2 Dex can go over 18) - right in the optimum range.



If attributes go up over levels, this maths vanishes. The Variance goes from a Maximum of +15 to a Maximum of +18 at 24th level.

+18 means "Fail on a 1 vs Succeed on a 20". Too much.


I don't think that the Maths, nor the design goals, support this.

I'm guessing attributes don't scale.

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

I don't know where the myth that having a modifier of +20 or more is what breaks the mathematics. If the DC of a task is 30, having +20 means you've got a good chance to do it. Having +0 means you really don't. The mathematics break when two characters with wildly different modifiers try to do the same thing, and this is typically when they have drifted to +15-20 apart. Because everyone progresses the same in 4E, the only differentiation comes from abilities and trained/focus/feats/odd stuff, so if these can be kept low, the system succeeds. Trained + Focus + a positive vs. a negative stat + a feat + a condition might just reach the bad zone, but that remains to be seen. It certainly shouldn't for combat abilities, and there have been more than enough complaints that characters will be too good with skills as it is, so perhaps they have a wider scope.

Anyway, I agree that attributes won't increase, it puts too much strain on the maths, but thought I could clear up the erroneous beliefs about what makes the system break.

 

[Simon Marks]

In 3.x, however, a non-specialist can be assumed to have a roll of +0. It's a Variance of 20 pts that is the breaking point. So, we are agreeing.

 

[ZombieRoboNinja]

Alternate solution: No skill focus in 4e.

I'm actually guessing this is the case, since we've already seen the Alertness feat (which gives a +2 "feat bonus" to Perception and prevents you from being caught flat-footed).

Maybe rather than having Skill Focus, there's a series of feats like this to provide smaller skill bonuses alongside other perks.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

Hmmm.

I'm guessing we'll have skill focus more or less at Saga levels.

Why? Because I think the system will want monsters and challenges that don't represent true combat threats to still represent good skill challenges. As a game designer you might not want a sentry to be more above level 1, but you probably want that sentry's perception check to be a challenge to the level 5 rogue who's trying to sneak into the level 6 boss's tent.

You slap saga skill focus on top of trained perception and you have a very competent sentry who isn't going to unbalance the adventure by sneak attacking for 4d6 damage every round.

And then we'll have more attribute points over levels.

Why? One, it provides some variety and specialization between characters who might otherwise have very similar skill traits.

Two, it lets the player pump up the secondary attribute derived bonuses like hitpoints and attack bonuses as constructed rather than strictly derived attributes.