D&D General I don't think there's interest for stats below 8

[le Redoutable]

that's where Ranks ( for example FASERIP ) are welcome
you will tell me they are sacred cows
??
( how to get around this sacred cow ?? )

 

[le Redoutable]

... or shall I print,
you should no have more than one stat at 8 or less

 

[Shiroiken]

Why not? Low ability scores can be very interesting and fun, assuming you still have high scores for your primary abilities. One of my favorite characters was a wager against the DM back in 1E, where I played a magic-user with 3 Str & Con and 18 Int & Dex, since he didn't feel that Raistlin could actually survive at lower levels. I made it to level 5 or so before he deliberately changed both the adventure and rules to kill me, since I was proving him wrong.

 

[le Redoutable]

ok, but whereas you can see examples of high-str ( or so ) characters, it is generally difficult to adapt a pc to low-levels attributes ( ok it doesn't meet, because high-stats are also difficult to handle; )
perhaps the best approach would be to generate a chr with your attributes;
the problem here, notably is jealousness in players who haven't got your high degree in a given attribute, and you doesn't have their high degree in another attribute;

 

[tetrasodium]

I've had more than one player start with a three in a stat in the last 5 years & seen several characters with one or more stats below an 8. All of them were great characters. Prior to 3.x the PC attributes were fairly unimportant because you needed to go up to like 15 or 16 to start getting bonuses & down to like 5 before getting penalties. Each attrib had its own chart back thenso it's not an easy 1:1 comparison. In 3.x they standardized the attributes and narrowed the break even zone to -1 at 8 & +1 at 12 where it's been since. Lacking pointbuy options for anything below 8 or above 15/16(?) the mindset that anything below 8 is crippling was cemented & 5e took that further by dialing up so much to 11 that it became very difficult for the GM to do tradeoffs where PCs get something nice in one area but dialed back in another tointroduce things like stats below 8.

 

[Quartz]

IIRC there was an article in Dragon on this subject. 'So you rolled a three' or similar. Anyone care to delve through their collection?

 

[James Gasik]

It might not be healthy for a character to labor with a very low ability score, but it's not unplayable. Like sure, if you have a Constitution of 3, you're not going last very long, but it's not like you can't rp being sickly and frail, coughing a lot, etc.., and even attempt to find a way to overcome that weakness.

People may not be super happy about having a 5, but I think people are happy that lower scores exist. Like, imagine if in some future edition, D&D got rid of scores below 8. So now 8 isn't "below average" it's the worst. Nothing can be worse than 8. Even children are running around with Strength 8 because the system doesn't support anything weaker!

(You can see a similar problem with the current creature sizes the game supports).

You could streamline the game by dispensing with these low scores. Just like you could streamline it by getting rid of ability scores entirely, as Pathfinder 2e and Fantasy Age basically did. But then you run afoul of people saying the game wouldn't "feel" like D&D anymore (rightly or wrongly), and that would have an impact on it's popularity.

That having been said, I think it's fine to limit super low scores on PC's just because you'll quickly run into some serious issues with the game- I don't think, for example, monsters are designed with the idea someone is actually running around with a 4 Constitution, to the point they'd have to roll a 13 to save against ghoul paralysis and their lifetime hit point total will be 60 points less than a guy with a 10...but YMMV.

 

[tetrasodium]

It might not be healthy for a character to labor with a very low ability score, but it's not unplayable. Like sure, if you have a Constitution of 3, you're not going last very long, but it's not like you can't rp being sickly and frail, coughing a lot, etc.., and even attempt to find a way to overcome that weakness.

People may not be super happy about having a 5, but I think people are happy that lower scores exist. Like, imagine if in some future edition, D&D got rid of scores below 8. So now 8 isn't "below average" it's the worst. Nothing can be worse than 8. Even children are running around with Strength 8 because the system doesn't support anything weaker!

(You can see a similar problem with the current creature sizes the game supports).

You could streamline the game by dispensing with these low scores. Just like you could streamline it by getting rid of ability scores entirely, as Pathfinder 2e and Fantasy Age basically did. But then you run afoul of people saying the game wouldn't "feel" like D&D anymore (rightly or wrongly), and that would have an impact on it's popularity.

That having been said, I think it's fine to limit super low scores on PC's just because you'll quickly run into some serious issues with the game- I don't think, for example, monsters are designed with the idea someone is actually running around with a 4 Constitution, to the point they'd have to roll a 13 to save against ghoul paralysis and their lifetime hit point total will be 60 points less than a guy with a 10...but YMMV.

WRT that hypothetical 3 con (or 5 whatever) character it's entirely possible that they have a starting 17 or 18 & now thanks to that 3 or 5 they now have a lot more room to strive for magic items than a character who starts with 16/14/14/12/10/8* or whatever if the GM RE-introduces things like +X gear & body slots instead of x=19 advantage with Y & 3 attunement slots

*something like that, I'm not checking the optimal pointbuy array for precision there & it doesn't make much difference in the context if it's off a bit.

 

[LordEntrails]

As a DM, I make sure to play to a character's weaknesses as well as strengths. So if they have multiple dump stats, they are going to suffer for it. If I don't make them suffer for it, there is no reason not to dump as many non-primary stats as possible.

 

[Eltab]

1e Gamma World had a section on "Hopeless Characters", and 2e GW advice to PCs included the observation that being a hero is tough and very-low-stat individuals were unlikely to successfully face the hazards they would meet. (Both games used 'roll for stats'.)

I have carried that mindset into my other RPG games.
Yes I could do it but I would be fighting against the game's presumptions to do so. With a cool character concept it could be worth it, or if high-attrition is expected anyway so preparing backup characters is expected.