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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 7181687" data-attributes="member: 4937">I partially agree.&nbsp; It depends very much on implementation and the aesthetic goals of the players.&nbsp; You are correct in theory, but it rarely works that way out in practice.One of the reasons that I eventually decided I liked class based chargen more than point buy chargen, as in practice I found point buy chargen in many systems frequently lead to predictably narrow Johnny One-Trick characters that had invested all of their points in being awesome at one thing.&nbsp;&nbsp; Depending on the system, you can be heavily punished for not doing that.&nbsp; So for example, WoD systems ironically heavily punished players for creating story based characters as opposed to one dimensional mechanically based characters.&nbsp;&nbsp; GURPS is nearly as bad.And once characters are pushed toward being mechanically based, you end up with just the illusion of choice as in the long run all characters get honed into certain known optimized builds, often refined down to one build for each of the things you can be good at.&nbsp; As a proof test of this, try sitting down for a few moments and comparing the different D&amp;D characters you come up with between generating ability scores with 4d6, drop one and you can't rearrange the rolls, and characters you build with standard point buy or with the ability to rearrange the rolls to taste.&nbsp; The first forces you to build more diverse characters that you either can or would likely build yourself, while the second pushes you to conform the results to what you know would be most functional for the character type.&nbsp; This raises the puzzling counter-intuitive prospect that slightly limited choice may result in more creativity than fully unlimited choice.&nbsp; That limited choice actually prompts inspiration in a way that unlimited choice doesn't necessarily.Now, I don't actually use random stats because the benefits are outweighed by the drawbacks, but I do miss the creativity and diversity that they could at the best of times prompt.&nbsp;&nbsp; On the other hand, in my experience most players rarely actually wanted to access that diversity.&nbsp; They really preferred the more optimal and/or successful results.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 7181687, member: 4937"] I partially agree. It depends very much on implementation and the aesthetic goals of the players. You are correct in theory, but it rarely works that way out in practice. One of the reasons that I eventually decided I liked class based chargen more than point buy chargen, as in practice I found point buy chargen in many systems frequently lead to predictably narrow Johnny One-Trick characters that had invested all of their points in being awesome at one thing. Depending on the system, you can be heavily punished for not doing that. So for example, WoD systems ironically heavily punished players for creating story based characters as opposed to one dimensional mechanically based characters. GURPS is nearly as bad. And once characters are pushed toward being mechanically based, you end up with just the illusion of choice as in the long run all characters get honed into certain known optimized builds, often refined down to one build for each of the things you can be good at. As a proof test of this, try sitting down for a few moments and comparing the different D&D characters you come up with between generating ability scores with 4d6, drop one and [I]you can't rearrange the rolls[/I], and characters you build with standard point buy or with the ability to rearrange the rolls to taste. The first forces you to build more diverse characters that you either can or would likely build yourself, while the second pushes you to conform the results to what you know would be most functional for the character type. This raises the puzzling counter-intuitive prospect that slightly limited choice may result in more creativity than fully unlimited choice. That limited choice actually prompts inspiration in a way that unlimited choice doesn't necessarily. Now, I don't actually use random stats because the benefits are outweighed by the drawbacks, but I do miss the creativity and diversity that they could at the best of times prompt. On the other hand, in my experience most players rarely actually wanted to access that diversity. They really preferred the more optimal and/or successful results. [/QUOTE]

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