How Can You Politely Say, "Your Character Sucks?"

[Dannyalcatraz]

1. Was it a tactical warlord? and

As you stated, you got your answer.

2. Why you do this?

Did everyone have similarly combat-bad characters?

Nope.

I did it because the stats reflected the PC concept.

So, why do it? Why would anyone do it? Do you believe you're a better roleplayer if you do that? Do you believe statistics must match character concepts in order to be playable?

The quality of my roleplay varies from hour to hour, and while I think I do a decent job, I'm not objective.

I DO believe that stats should match character concepts, and I base how I roleplay the PC based on that. Despite my IQ, I play my Int6 PCs like the dullards they are. When I play a PC with a stellar Wis, I don't act on my first impulse when the path of action is unclear, but rather put it to the table (DM included) "Does this sound like something 'PC X' would do?"

IMHO, if I didn't match stats to PC concept, I'd be cheating.

I mean, while you may certain expectations about what it takes for someone to do something, it isn't necessarily so.

Lets just look at physical size.

While you'd like your NFL QBs and Wide Receivers to be 6'+, Doug Flutie, Wayne Chrebet and "The Smurfs" receiving core of the Washington Redskins (none more than 5'10") did just fine. At a fudged 6'1" 203lbs, Bill Bates, Cowboys legend, was too small and too slow to play his position...but did so for more than a decade, winning Superbowls and Pro Bowl nominations while doing so.

At 5'7", Spud Webb played in the NBA...and won Slam Dunk contests. Muggsy Bogues, at 5'3" was a vital part of the teams he played for.

So, just like being taller than average isn't a requirement to succeed in the NFL or NBA, it isn't the case that a PC must always have his best score in his class' key stat to be successful (IOW, making a positive contribution).

It looks like he wasn't actually "combat-bad" -- he was an archer, built using the Fighter class, so his Dexterity was high but his Strength was 10.

He's playing silly buggers with the language, since the primary attack stat of any 3.x archer would be Dexterity*, not Strength.

I'm not playing silly buggers. It was a 2Ed campaign with rolled stats. 9 was the minimum Str for fighters, and my PC had a 10. While Dex was the primary attack stat, you realize that he was giving up huge amounts of damage by not placing Str to at least 2nd rank.

And, point in fact, his stats were Int & Dex (both 17's), Con15, Wis 12, Cha10, Str10. He was a warrior whose strength was cunning plans and battlefield command, not wading in to battle and swinging an axe. Small but tough, he had earned his keep as a militia archer before going adventuring.

So yeah, you can play a great low-Strength Fighter and do just fine... if you are an archer, or if you use Weapon Finesse + some kind of precision damage.

 

[pawsplay]

His sanity is a heavy fetter indeed.

Cheers, -- N

I do not define sanity as an inability to understand other intelligible viewpoints. While his own views are, no doubt, perfectly reasonable, imposing the same goals and values on others is not necessarily reasonable or productive. It is worthwhile sometimes to acknowledge you simply do not understand. By recognizing this, you can better check your own frustration or anger.

 

[fuzzlewump]

You cannot understand why someone would do such a thing.

Try me. Or not, it doesn't matter. But don't make the assertion that I cannot understand. You, really, don't know.

EDIT:Missed the last post. I'm not sure, but it seems like you think that I encountered "other intelligible viewpoints" but actually, I hadn't. I was waiting for those viewpoints. With Danny's explanation, I feel indeed a better sense of understanding of of our different values.

So, just like being taller than average isn't a requirement to succeed in the NFL or NBA, it isn't the case that a PC must always have his best score in his class' key stat to be successful (IOW, making a positive contribution).

That's interesting, but I don't know much about NFL. But, I'm going to assume that tall players and short players that do well have similar statistics. Similar completion rates etc.

And you wouldn't say they did well because of luck, right? So if they did similarly well, that means that whatever the primary stat you thought they had isn't the primary stat at all. They both had a stat of "Quarterbacking" that was similarly high. I'm not sure if that would correspond to something, but I imagine it would be dexterity in D&D terms.

In other words, the qualitative made "a positive contribution" aside, did the shorter players have just as good of game statistics as the tall players? If so, that means in D&D terms that they have the same stat, assuming over years of time luck was not meaningfully involved. Or, to take it as support for stats not having to match a character concept, the players both had the bonus. So, the STR 18 player and the DEX 18 player and the INT 18 player all contribute those stats equally to their quarterbacking ability. But, this is so funnily abstract, so I don't intend to argue this, but it's just a thought.

Or, maybe the shorter players would have been worse but they had to work much harder than the tall players in order to compensate? So, the shorter players are higher level but have lower stats?(Oh lord, I've taken this too far, haha.) I really don't know, was that/is that the case?

But, I don't believe that a concept has to match statistics, certainly not in 4E where the design in many ways is very abstract. So, we'll have to agree to disagree there, but thank you for explaining. I'm the kind of guy who doesn't compromise on his in-combat concept or on his out-of-combat concept. If I want a strong, intelligent fighter, I will still dump intelligence unless they make an intelligence build. I have the cake and eat it too, so to speak, but hey, I have fun with it.

 

[outsider]

Might I state, it has been and can be again.

I'll give you that before other good rpgs existed, D&D was obviously the best choice for non adventuring games, simply because there weren't any other options. It's pretty safe to say D&D hasn't been the best choice for at least 15 or 20 years though.

Though I didn't say D&D couldn't be the sort of game you can do any type of game with. I just said it wouldn't be. I'll also say that it shouldn't be. D&D is about pillaging dungeons, fighting dragons, and the like. Always has been, always will be. Don't get me wrong, you can tell great stories with D&D. It's just that those stories should be about pillaging dungeons and fighting dragons. If you want to tell stories that aren't at all like that, you probably should be playing a different game, and it's unreasonable to expect D&D to sacrifice it's clearly indicated specialty in order to serve your niche.

 

[Runestar]

Then maybe I should rephrase my question.

Say you were building a str-based fighter. Would you knowingly put a 10 in it (I assume you will not be boosting it every 4th lv), despite being well aware it would make your PC much weaker than it ought to be? What would your team-mates have to say about that? How would you even begin to justify your choice?

I admit I didn't see the part about the 10-str fighter archer coming. I honestly thought someone was actually able to create an effective str-based fighter while dumping str by somehow circumventing their drawbacks or through creative application of powers.

 

[Starfox]

So yeah, you can play a great low-Strength Fighter and do just fine... if you are an archer, or if you use Weapon Finesse + some kind of precision damage.

Just checking f we are talking about the same things here. There is no Weapon Finesse in 4E. Nor are there archer fighters. If you (Nifft) have been talking about experiences from 3E, I'd like to submit that 3E and 4E are quite different beasts in this regard. 4E is much more focused on maxing your prime stats than 3E was, and 3E had a versatility of builds that 4E lacks.

The 3E experience in regards to stat focusing is very different from the 4E experience. In 3E, you could indeed build a Fighter focusing in Dexterity (for ranged/finesse weapons) or Intelligence (for skills). These options don't really exist in 4E. While the fighter is unusual in 4E because there is some incentive for them to increase Str, Dex, Con, and Wis, they remain a Strength-based class and all their attacks key of Strength. They can only make clearly sub-par ranged basic attacks using Dex.

I don't like this faced of 4E, but it is a fact of life in the game.

 

[Herobizkit]

I'm in DannyAlcatraz's camp on this one. Stats do not make your character; YOU do.

I believe this is where the comparison of 4e to MMORPG's comes into play. In such games, you cannot reliably contribute to a team of min/max characters (gear, skills, etc) if you do not also have a min/maxed character. You also cannot reliably defeat the team challenges (ex instances, raids) in said games if no team member is mix/maxed.

This mentality somehow found its way into 4e, mostly due to the focus on combat. If the game conceit spells it out for you, that This Game Is About Killing Things and Taking Their Stuff, players will want to do that as best they can. And if the role-players decide to put a 10 on their Fighter's STR because they want to use the 14's array and have a well-rounded character, well... that makes the specialists angry.

That said, for 3e, I also play mostly DEX-based Warriors either focusing on TWF and Weapon Finesse, or Throwing Stuff.

 

[Runestar]

That said, for 3e, I also play mostly DEX-based Warriors either focusing on TWF and Weapon Finesse, or Throwing Stuff.

Which sorta proves my point. Even when pumping dex in favour of str, you have to take a feat to mitigate this shortcoming.

I am also curious as to how one can manage a well-rounded character, especially when dumping their key stats. The very stats which are supposed to be the defining aspect of your class. MAD is all but gone in 4e, a fighter won't really get anything out of pumping his mental stats, for instance.

It is like saying I could play a 3e wizard with 10int and uses nothing but cantrips. Yes I can, but what am I really trying to prove here?

 

[GMforPowergamers]

ok, so just so we all are on the same page here... we all agree that each character needs to contribute to the group (I mean why would you travel with them otherwise), and that each player gets to make up there own mind in HOW they build there character to do so...

the only real point of conflict is 'how bad is too bad' from what I can see. Now me personaly I only started with a 20 once, and that was a wizard with INT, more often then not I start with a 16 (yes after race), but I could see myself starting as low as 14.

Now if a player sat down to play with a 20 str mintour wand wizard with an 8 dex and a 10 Int I might look at him like he grew a second head... but I would atleast give him a chance. (I think we can all agree that is like the woest you could do). And I will give anyone a chance becuse of Bane and Deflour... two of the worst characters ever made...and both kicked but in game.
bane was 3.5 ranger/barbarian with a 7 Int 11 Wis, and 6 cha (we rolled) who fought with 2 short swords, and weapon finess for his 15 dex...
Defour was a 2e human (rp wise we caled him a half orc) with a 8 str 8 dex 17 Con, 9 Int, 6 wis 17 cha (we rolled in order and he only had the stats for 1 class) wizard...

both characters had lousy builds, and bad stats and are still two of our fav characters to talk about.

Infact we had a player who for years was a cheating powergaming jerk (yes all three) and most of his character came off that way until he failed 1 saveing throw...
His 3.5 druid/sorcerer was struck blind... and he went 5 levels with his animal compainon wolf becomeing a seeing eye dog... he wne out of his way to find ways to compansate, until he finaly got his sight back. Those 5 levels had some of the best stories though...(Sure I'll take a watch... I guess no one is comeing...)


now after sleeping on it, I will admit a full game of these characters would not last long, but 1 out of 5... especialy if you have optimizers anyway picking upt the slack.... who cares...

 

[Gimby]

I'm in DannyAlcatraz's camp on this one. Stats do not make your character; YOU do.

I believe this is where the comparison of 4e to MMORPG's comes into play. In such games, you cannot reliably contribute to a team of min/max characters (gear, skills, etc) if you do not also have a min/maxed character. You also cannot reliably defeat the team challenges (ex instances, raids) in said games if no team member is mix/maxed.

This mentality somehow found its way into 4e, mostly due to the focus on combat. If the game conceit spells it out for you, that This Game Is About Killing Things and Taking Their Stuff, players will want to do that as best they can. And if the role-players decide to put a 10 on their Fighter's STR because they want to use the 14's array and have a well-rounded character, well... that makes the specialists angry.

That said, for 3e, I also play mostly DEX-based Warriors either focusing on TWF and Weapon Finesse, or Throwing Stuff.

Its also why some people (me included) don't really think that the MMO comparison has any weight in this case. I've been seeing this kind of behaviour in D&D players for about 15 years and theres advice in the 1e books that you should have 2 15s at least (quote is somewhere upthread, I think). The idea that this is derived from MMOs rather than the nature and history of a somewhat cruncy/weighty system where stats/build are important is, to me, somewhat laughable.

Specifically, if you go hunt the What's a DM/Player to do archives on the Wizard's forums then you'll see this exact issue cropping up since the earliest days of 3e at least. I'd lay good odds there are threads on this very sub-forum asking how to deal with characters with a wide range of cababilities dating to the early 2000s.

edit- I'm not denying that this can be an issue and isn't the way that everyone plays, or that 4e has this problem. Simply that the idea that it was somehow "brought in" by 4e and not endemic to most D&D editions is not well supported by history.

edit edit - Not the precise thing I was looking for, but 2 minutes of googling popped up this thread about a player worrying that their character needs to be better optimised to match the rest of the party. Dated 2003.

http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/45862-how-do-youre-monks-contribute-party.html