D&D 5E How does your group determine ability scores?

[Maxperson]

The last game I played that used point buy we had 1 PC that won the lottery and had a couple of 18s and a low of 14. My wife had a single 14, a 10 and everything else below. The results of rolling were anything but fair and equitable. What made it worse was that we had asked to use point buy - even if that meant that on average they would be worse. After the dice were rolled and she asked once more, the DM just laughed and said something along the lines of "Too bad." We ended up quitting the campaign because of this and a few other reasons.

So if the results of rolling are unfair, because they are unequitable, then all games are just plain inherently unfair. Take Monopoly. We all use the same rules and start out with the same money and same dice, but if I get good properties and you don't, that's unfair because I have advantage over you. Chess is unfair if I take your queen and still retain mine.

That's not how it works. So long as we are all starting on the same level playing field and use the same rules, it's fair no matter how it turns out. The results of rolling in the game your wife played were absolutely fair. They just weren't equitable.

 

[Oofta]

So if the results of rolling are unfair, because they are unequitable, then all games are just plain inherently unfair. Take Monopoly. We all use the same rules and start out with the same money and same dice, but if I get good properties and you don't, that's unfair because I have advantage over you. Chess is unfair if I take your queen and still retain mine.

That's not how it works. So long as we are all starting on the same level playing field and using the same rules, it's fair no matter how it turns out. The results of rolling in the game your wife played were absolutely fair. They just weren't equitable.

There's a difference between random rolls that will over time average out* and a one time roll that affects that PC for the rest of the campaign. But I'm not going to argue semantics, random results are not fair in my opinion. They're just random.

*Unless you're Will Wheaton, of course.

 

[Maxperson]

That's the way I like to do it, but I will note that the continuing move into online groups and play has complicated the situation.

Agreed. Online gaming definitely skews things towards point buy and array. That's why data from sites like D&D Beyond can't be used as evidence for how people play offline. Their data is skewed.

 

[Oofta]

Agreed. Online gaming definitely skews things towards point buy and array. That's why data from sites like D&D Beyond can't be used as evidence for how people play offline. Their data is skewed.

Is it? You're assuming people use DDB for online game more than in person games, I don't think that's a valid assumption. I only play in person, we all use DDB.

 

[Maxperson]

We tried that for a short bit... but then we caught someone cheating (and kicked them out) and decided it was just easier and better to skip the random character generation... we went back to it once in 4e when we had 6 players and we had everyone roll 4d6 drop the lowest twice... take the highest and used that to make the array, but we pretty much just find no value in rolling stats anymore... even more so now that we are all on r20

See, I view that as a good thing. Someone who would cheat at rolling stats is almost surely going to cheat at all kinds of things. Better to catch them early and get rid of them than to change the stat generation method and be less likely to catch them. And of course again, if you are playing online it changes things. Online groups are less likely to be able to meet up to roll stats.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

So if the results of rolling are unfair, because they are unequitable, then all games are just plain inherently unfair. Take Monopoly. We all use the same rules and start out with the same money and same dice, but if I get good properties and you don't, that's unfair because I have advantage over you. Chess is unfair if I take your queen and still retain mine.

yes I agree games are inharitable unfair... however what we can do is take as much unfairness out as possible without making every game end in a draw.

That's not how it works. So long as we are all starting on the same level playing field and use the same rules, it's fair no matter how it turns out.

no it's not fair that one person can start with 2 18's and nothing lower then 14 while another has a high stat of 14. Especially for a year or more campaign.... these rolls are not just 1 offs. they can effect months to years of your enjoyment.

The results of rolling in the game your wife played were absolutely fair. They just weren't equitable.

it was unfair to put her in a postion to play the character.

 

[Guest 7034872]

Is it? You're assuming people use DDB for online game more than in person games, I don't think that's a valid assumption. I only play in person, we all use DDB.

Right, but there is a nontrivial percentage of DDB users who are fully online (for their DDB campaigns, anyway), whereas in offline play that percentage is 0. It does change how we measure some things if we're trying to get reliable statistical data.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

We use point buy. Our very first 5E campaign used the 3.5 point buy with the "heroic" option (32 points, you can buy up to 18), but the PCs felt overpowered. I've never cared for rolling, and I've used some version of point buy in my home campaigns since before there was one (I used Living City's point by system). Before then people would just roll until they got something they'd like because we all knew that a PC with low scores should have stayed on the farm or if they ventured out would soon die a "heroic" death.

The last game I played that used point buy we had 1 PC that won the lottery and had a couple of 18s and a low of 14. My wife had a single 14, a 10 and everything else below. The results of rolling were anything but fair and equitable. What made it worse was that we had asked to use point buy - even if that meant that on average they would be worse. After the dice were rolled and she asked once more, the DM just laughed and said something along the lines of "Too bad." We ended up quitting the campaign because of this and a few other reasons.

Last but not least, I don't think PCs need super high ability scores. As long as everyone at the table is reasonable balance, it's all good. The problem with rolling is the huge gap between most inherently powerful and least powerful PC at the table that you will get on average. When I ran a set of combat simulations for PCs mimicking the average "low" and "high" in any given group of 6 using the same class, the "high" survived encounters about twice as often as the low. I don't believe that's fair, nor would I find it enjoyable to have that big of a disparity. Different strokes and all, but if a game has 4d6 drop lowest as the only option? I won't join that game.

I had the luck of two exceptional stat arrays (3x16s) and one quite bad one (maximum stat: 1x14, lowest stat 10).
I actually were allowed to reroll my bad array and rolled another exceptional array. But I decided to take the low one and optimized the fun of that character.

In the two exceptional cases I decided to play a fighter and a melee wizard, two classes that don't scale too much with above average stats. So if you have a social contract that allows high and low array characters to play at the same table, and allow the choice to reject a low stat then there should never be a problem.

If of course, all you care is combat performance and there is no appropriate social contract, then rolling is a bad idea.

Edit: just to clarify: there are different kinds of playstyles, some place more value in numerical balance as others and some care more about optimization. It is important to make it clear before playing how important those aspects are. In games, where everyone is expected to have characters that oull their own weight, I'd prefer point buy over rolling because of the reasons mentioned above by other posters.

 

[payn]

So if the results of rolling are unfair, because they are unequitable, then all games are just plain inherently unfair. Take Monopoly. We all use the same rules and start out with the same money and same dice, but if I get good properties and you don't, that's unfair because I have advantage over you. Chess is unfair if I take your queen and still retain mine.

That's not how it works. So long as we are all starting on the same level playing field and use the same rules, it's fair no matter how it turns out. The results of rolling in the game your wife played were absolutely fair. They just weren't equitable.

You are taking two entirely different games and trying to make the same point. Monopoly is an ameritrash game designed specifically not to be equitable at any but the starting stage of the game. Chess, on the other hand, is designed to be equitable entirely. Folks who don't like rolling stats are saying they don't want their D&D to be like Monopoly, they want it to be like chess. However, ideally it should be somewhere in-between. Which is why you have so many failsafe methods during stat rolling and playing like inspiration and/or hero points.

 

[Oofta]

Right, but there is a nontrivial percentage of DDB users who are fully online (for their DDB campaigns, anyway), whereas in offline play that percentage is 0. It does change how we measure some things if we're trying to get reliable statistical data.

DDB is not directly integrated with any online tool, many online tools also have their own PC tracking software. We don't know percentages either way.

Unless you have access to some data I don't, of course.