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<blockquote data-quote="The Sigil" data-source="post: 2484777" data-attributes="member: 2013">And Ennie-nominated, at that! <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile&nbsp; &nbsp; :)"&nbsp; data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />Myself, I prefer the free-form structure for advanced players, but when I'm DMing with newer players (as seems to often be the case; I'm a 20+ year vet DM who has almost never had a group with more than half non-newbs), I prefer Class &amp; Level.Class &amp; Level is simpler to use book-keeping-wise, and makes it easier to visualize &quot;who your character is&quot; based on his abilities.Point-Based is harder to use book-keeping-wise, and makes it easier to shape your character's abilities to your vision of &quot;who he is.&quot;For those who have a strong idea of what their characters should be - or crave a little more verisimilitude than C&amp;L offers - or simply want to shape their character's &quot;game stats&quot; to exactly fit their &quot;vision&quot; of him, Point-Based is the way to go.&nbsp; However, I also feel that, in general, it takes gaming experience to have a strong idea of what your character should be, or to have bumped up against the game system foibles that halt suspension of disbelief due to a lack of verisimilitude or who have enough experience to know HOW to shape their &quot;game stats&quot; to reflect their &quot;vision.&quot;&nbsp; A first-timer is still too busy wrapping his head around the concept of RPGs to worry about the &quot;numbers&quot; that go into shaping the way a character interacts with his RPG world.Which is a long way of saying that C&amp;L is good for starting out because it keeps the focus on &quot;how to play the game&quot; and once you're comfortable with that, you might be ready or interested in using point buy to &quot;game the playing of the game&quot; as it were (you may never reach that point of dissatisfaction with C&amp;L, but I have to think that a game with limited choices is easier to learn and get oriented in, and C&amp;L by its very nature presents more limited choices than point buy).I didn't vote, because I would rather PLAY point buy... but would rather DM class &amp; level. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink&nbsp; &nbsp; ;)"&nbsp; data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />--The Sigil</blockquote>

[QUOTE="The Sigil, post: 2484777, member: 2013"] And Ennie-nominated, at that! :) Myself, I prefer the free-form structure for advanced players, but when I'm DMing with newer players (as seems to often be the case; I'm a 20+ year vet DM who has almost never had a group with more than half non-newbs), I prefer Class & Level. Class & Level is simpler to use book-keeping-wise, and makes it easier to visualize "who your character is" based on his abilities. Point-Based is harder to use book-keeping-wise, and makes it easier to shape your character's abilities to your vision of "who he is." For those who have a strong idea of what their characters should be - or crave a little more verisimilitude than C&L offers - or simply want to shape their character's "game stats" to exactly fit their "vision" of him, Point-Based is the way to go. However, I also feel that, in general, it takes gaming experience to have a strong idea of what your character should be, or to have bumped up against the game system foibles that halt suspension of disbelief due to a lack of verisimilitude or who have enough experience to know HOW to shape their "game stats" to reflect their "vision." A first-timer is still too busy wrapping his head around the concept of RPGs to worry about the "numbers" that go into shaping the way a character interacts with his RPG world. Which is a long way of saying that C&L is good for starting out because it keeps the focus on "how to play the game" and once you're comfortable with that, you might be ready or interested in using point buy to "game the playing of the game" as it were (you may never reach that point of dissatisfaction with C&L, but I have to think that a game with limited choices is easier to learn and get oriented in, and C&L by its very nature presents more limited choices than point buy). I didn't vote, because I would rather PLAY point buy... but would rather DM class & level. ;) --The Sigil [/QUOTE]

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