Have These Basic Questions been answered yet?

[Amphimir Míriel]

I certainly hope there is no more rolling for HP. Seriously, do people still roll for hitpoints? No group I have been in has rolled hitpoints in ages. Everybody just gets max HP. Nothing sucks more than rolling a 1 for hp.

Yeah, I make my players roll for hp. However in my game, it's "best out of 2 rolls", so no one has pathetic hp.

In one occasion, one player rolled two 1's... so I let him roll a third time at the cost of having 1 less action point that level.

And ability scores, 28 point buy is pathetic. Does anyone actually play like that?

32 point buy is quite reasonable for me... My players prefer to roll 4d6-drop-lowest, but I use 32 point buy for NPCs and Elite array for significant monsters.

"sub-par" stats are part of the game (and part of the genre)... The incredibly intelligent wizard who can barely run one level of stairs without wheezing; The illiterate, uncouth barbarian; The Ranger who can rapport with the creatures of the woods but who is shy around people... All those are valid, fun concepts to play...

I don't see why it is more fun to play someone with 18,17,17,16,14,14 as starting stats.

 

[DandD]

Neither do I see the fun in having 14, 13, 12, 10, 8 and 6.

Different views, different opinions. I'm glad that point-buy will rather be the standart than random rolls. But for those who still prefer those antiquitated ways, they should rejoice that 4th edition also has the rules for determining your abilities randomly with dices as an optional thing.

I also frankly hope that random HPs are gone, and after what I read, it's going to be like that too, which is very very good.

 

[Dausuul]

Out of sheer dumb curiousity, do you happen to know what the point-buy equivalent would be for 5d6, drop 2?

Lanefan

Funny thing, I just last night sat down to calculate that.

3d6 has a point buy value of 16.11.
4d6 drop 1 has a point buy value of 28.53.
5d6 drop 2 has a point buy value of 38.04.
6d6 drop 3 has a point buy value of 45.67.
7d6 drop 4 has a point buy value of 52.01.

Of course, this is using the standard system in the DMG. I would actually reduce those averages a bit, since rolling for stats often produces stats with their "point values" allocated in ways that no sensible player would choose. In particular, you often end up with a lot of odd-numbered stats. Players using point buy are unlikely to put an odd-numbered value into anything but their top stat, unless they have a point left over at the end.

Also note that I'm valuing ability scores less than 8 at -1 per point below 8 (so 7 has a point value of -1, 6 has a point value of -2, et cetera).

 

[the Jester]

In 4e, the standard is now point buy, with other options in the DMG.

Nope. The Rouse quoted explicitly from the character generation chapter of the PH. There are three methods, equally available, for ability generation; none are set above the others.

 

[Amphimir Míriel]

Neither do I see the fun in having 14, 13, 12, 10, 8 and 6.

Maybe we can settle on 17,16,14,13,12,8?

 

[Mistwell]

I certainly hope there is no more rolling for HP. Seriously, do people still roll for hitpoints? No group I have been in has rolled hitpoints in ages. Everybody just gets max HP. Nothing sucks more than rolling a 1 for hp.

Everyone in your games gets max hit points, every level? That is a serious house rule, and an unusual one. The rules allow for averaging, but other than first level I have never seen a "every level gets max". That seems like it would be quite imbalanced against foes, unless they also get max hit points (which would make running pre-written adventures more of a pain). Which you do, you said. However, your implication that others "still roll for hit points" and reference to "no group I have been in..." implies that your method is somehow more a norm than rolling for hit points. It's not. Your method is highly unusual. Averaging is a normal method, but not maxing. Given HD is not balanced for that method of maxing, all it means is high level play will become increasingly wonky, requiring more DM tweaking as you go. That seems like a bad system, when averaging is available.

 

[Dragonblade]

Everyone in your games gets max hit points, every level? That is a serious house rule, and an unusual one. The rules allow for averaging, but other than first level I have never seen a "every level gets max". That seems like it would be quite imbalanced against foes, unless they also get max hit points (which would make running pre-written adventures more of a pain).

We just started it as sort of a last hurrah for 3.5, until 4e comes out. I also give monsters max HP as well. So far it has not been a problem.

We used to just give 75% of max, or you could roll and if you rolled less than half, you just got half. Thats what we did for most of 3rd edition.

 

[Mistwell]

We just started it as sort of a last hurrah for 3.5, until 4e comes out. I also give monsters max HP as well. So far it has not been a problem.

We used to just give 75% of max, or you could roll and if you rolled less than half, you just got half. Thats what we did for most of 3rd edition.

Like I said, at high level that system will break. The actual die used for hit dice is built for averages, not maxes. A d12 HD averages 6.5, which is not that far off of 2.5 for a Wizard, a 4 point difference. But when maxed, it's 12 vs. 4, it's an 8 point difference (double the average), which IS that far off. Done over many levels, it makes a big difference.

RAW provides a good system for averaging hit points. I don't see why you would go for max, knowing in advance the system isn't predicated on that sort of assumption. Particularly in a thread where you are criticizing people who use rolled hit points and implying your method is more the norm, when apparently it wasn't even the norm for your own games!

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

Funny thing, I just last night sat down to calculate that.

3d6 has a point buy value of 16.11.
4d6 drop 1 has a point buy value of 28.53.
5d6 drop 2 has a point buy value of 38.04.
6d6 drop 3 has a point buy value of 45.67.
7d6 drop 4 has a point buy value of 52.01.

How did you calculate this? I remember that the actual value of 4d6-drop-lowest is just over 30 points. However, that takes into account the rules for "hopeless characters", so a large chunk of the lower part of the distribution is eliminated before the average is taken. I think that if you did that, you'd see an increase in point buy values that diminished as the number of dice increased.

Of course, this is using the standard system in the DMG. I would actually reduce those averages a bit, since rolling for stats often produces stats with their "point values" allocated in ways that no sensible player would choose. In particular, you often end up with a lot of odd-numbered stats. Players using point buy are unlikely to put an odd-numbered value into anything but their top stat, unless they have a point left over at the end.

I suppose you could build an algorithm that removed points from odd numbered scores (with the exception of the highest score) and added those points to lower odd-numbered scores, when possible. Then, compare the average point values between these two methods (without adjustment, with adjustment) and thereby get an estimate of what the advantage of point-by-point allocation is, given in build points.

 

[Lurks-no-More]

I certainly hope there is no more rolling for HP. Seriously, do people still roll for hitpoints? No group I have been in has rolled hitpoints in ages. Everybody just gets max HP. Nothing sucks more than rolling a 1 for hp.

Our group uses max HP for the first level, then roll two dice and pick higher for the HPs at every level afterwards. You're unlikely to get lousy HP, but you're not guaranteed high HPs, either.