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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ariosto" data-source="post: 5290734" data-attributes="member: 80487">You are, once again, completely missing the point.There is no more than that "nothing" preventing me from writing on my character sheet, in OD&D, that my character is a tremendously skilled knitter of yarn.I have pointed out where the actual difference, which is more pronounced in the character-modeling approach, really lies. It is not skill at knitting, or lack thereof, that most notably characterizes Earth's Sorcerer Supreme in most minds!As the Champions rules put it, a "disadvantage" that is not a disadvantage is not worth any points.Game of Builds:0Not Game of Builds:0Ditto Umbran's huffing about personality. If you guys seriously think a character can't have a hobby, or personality, or history, without the "game of builds", then you are plainly and simply factually wrong in the world in which I live.On the contrary, I am defining it in the broadest possible sense. In whatever way a phenomenon actually is part of the game, I call it "implemented in the game".I am likewise defining "the rules" in the broadest possible sense. Whatever facts define and regulate a phenomenon in the game, those are "rules".I do not think so. Why you would think this more likely to happen in a game that lacks a "game of builds" is quite a puzzlement!The most prominent, fundamental and unifying reason I choose old D&D instead of 3e or 4e is that I want not to have such a pile of formal rules that demand this or that exercise in dice-rolling and calculation. The absence of a game of builds is just part of that.Your "arguments" have not been contradicting my statements at all! Is it really the case that knitting and harmonica-playing are in the same "arbitrarily significant" league as Perception or Encounter Powers? If so, then what is the rationale for limiting one but not the other?Let us make this very, very simple: The things that a game of builds limits, the things it treats as wealth to be purchased with some currency, are what  I mean by "arbitrarily significant". They are significant enough to warrant all that jumping through hoops, eh?Now, when Carol has invested points in a "Diplomacy" factor, or in a "shield bash" power or feat, the value of her investment depends on Bob -- who invested his points in something else -- not getting the benefit. That's what the points are for, and it would be pointless if points were not limited!Those are the facts of the matter, without which there is no game of builds.It is the purpose of the build system to prevent one character from being more "powerful" than another, however the game defines power. Its purpose is to prevent either Doctor Strange or Patsy Walker -- or both -- in the name of a more narrowly defined "balance".That is generally not the purpose of a random-roll system. Random rolls are, well, random! They place bounds and tend to averages, but that they should produce imbalances ought to be desired -- because it is the result in any case.The purpose is very clearly not intrinsic to a modeling system that says nothing whatsoever about "power" or "balance".</blockquote>

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