D&D 5E I'm really hating Constitution right now

[Hillsy7]

So now you're arguing that stats are significant, but not mechanically so. You're saying that there's some fundamental difference between Charisma 8 and Charisma 14 that exceeds beyond the reach of the math - that certain stats are inextricably linked to the way you approach the world and the types of decisions you make as a character.

I’ve always been arguing that stats are significant – I’ve just been saying though that they are not only mechanically significant. There are many ways of playing the game (from a GM and Player PoV). In some games, focusing on CON has No drawbacks. In some games, focusing on Con has significant drawbacks.

I mean, I get what you're saying, but you're also telling people how they should be role-playing their characters.

I’m doing the exact opposite. The OP lamented that CON was indispensable, which is a view applicable to a handful of ways (perfectly valid) of playing the game. Other ways exist in which CON is dispensable. I have rigorously been defending the position that there are many, many ways to play the game, because there has been a consistent line pedalled of “Your character doesn’t need anything other than Primary, CON, & DEX” without the accompanying qualifier (assuming it has even been considered) that this applies only to a narrow subset of gameplay styles.

You can role-play a Fighter with 8 CHA, exactly the same as one with 18 CHA, if you want. Or totally differently. Or not even bother because there’s a Bard with CHA 20 next to you. What isn’t fair is saying that "to put 18 in Charisma to justify role-playing a certain way is a waste, or inefficient, or an error". In many games, and for many players, it is important to do that.

Optimization - power gaming - is a valid way of role-playing in a world where failure will doom the world or at least kill you specifically.

I’ll go you one better and say it’s a valid way of playing the game full stop. The world could be decidedly undeadly: it’s still totally valid to power-game the hell outta your bard so he can swindle every merchant or king into getting exorbitant rewards for trifling stuff. Or just being optimised for stealing, or simply killing gophers. Totally valid.

Characters are generally encouraged to play to their strengths, because if you fail at your role, then everyone dies and it's your fault. Legolas and Gimli get spots in the Fellowship, because this is important and they're the best ones for the job.

And if those strengths are the 3 mental attributes, all the better, right? And again, other games will have people who deliberately don’t play to their strengths and everyone has a blast and doesn’t die and all the players don’t shout at each other because someone made a suboptimal choice. All game types are valid.

Is the fate of the world at stake? If not, then you have more freedom to play different characters who are less optimized. Is death the most likely outcome for failure? If not, then you have more freedom to play different characters who are less optimized.

I flat out reject this – literature, and indeed history, is replete with heroes who are not the best person for the job (or ‘optimised’) but save the world anyway (Frodo Baggins). That is entirely your opinion, and you may like games like that. Great. But you don’t get to say that Sub-optimal characters can’t “save the world” if that’s the game people want to play. Uh-uh, no way. Sorry.

I once again refer to Critical Role, where Vox Machina have “saved the world” multiple times with non-optimal stats arrays. That is your preference (which is totally valid) but it’s yours.

Fun fact, over the course of human history, the majority of individuals who have had the biggest impact on major world events were all generals, diplomats, politicians or scientists (Or in D&D parlance, characters with Low Combat survivability and very high mental attributes)

Based on observations of published material and other posters on this board, it's not uncommon for high-level characters to be tasked with saving the world, and death is always a looming threat. In those games, players may feel obligated to put points into Con instead of Charisma, and while that's not the only type of game you could play with these rules, it's common enough of a playstyle to lament how much more valuable Constitution is than any of the alternatives.

Yes, maybe the majority of players and GMs DO save the world by stabbing dragons, but by that very definition CON is more useful than other stats SO WHY COMPLAIN ABOUT IT? It is literally like getting annoyed that, when faced with a plank of wood that need cutting in half, everyone keeps reaching for a saw. The other tools are there to do other things – and a hell of a lot of people want to do other things with the plank of wood.

Sorry but in that scenario, the argument of “I want to saw this plank of wood in half, but everyone uses the saw: (Falls to knees, platoon style) For the love of God WWHHHYYYYY???!!!!!!” just isn’t valid. And you don’t get to say “I hate how the Saw is better than all the other tools” because you are just belittling a lot of people who do stuff with wood other than Sawing it.

If, as I suspect is the case, the real argument is “I want the plank chopped in half, my players want to cut the plank in half, but this Saw is boring”, that’s cool. You’ve got a few options, including getting another toolkit. But giving everyone all the information before saying that this Saw is just "too good" (and implying: therefore you're badwrongfunning D&D) is going to save a lot of confusion and offence.

I think this Carpentry analogy has gotten out of hand………

 

[Hillsy7]

Great, so both I & the sorcerer roll our dice & the sorcerer has a slightly higher chance of success. Two rolls are better than 1....
In this case the dice will reveal wether or not I know anything on the subject. And finding out beats the hell out of me just sitting there passively. Besides, what's the worst that'll happen? I roll too low & the DM tells me I believe the NPC?

Sure - if that's the way you play the game, then cool. I mean honestly, it's totally valid - no snark, no sarcasm, no judgement, no nothing. Really. It doesn't put barriers through excessive role-play, people roll dice and get involved in stuff, and the more dice rolled = more nat 20s which everyone loves. And a good time is had by all....great!

The entire argument I've been trying to make all along is that, for a decent chunk of people who play D&D, foregoing CON in order to boost their mental attributes so that they provide character validation to reinforce motivation, is not a "sub-optimal" choice. Sticking with the "Fighter and Sorcerer are confronted with a bogus point of Law" scenario.....

In some games, you don't bother with the roll because the Sorceror is there and it's not your job.
In some games, you roll anyway because, hey, 2 rolls is like advantage, right?
In some games, you roll, but the GM assigns very different DCs based on your character's "experience"
In some games, the GM says it's an auto-fail unless you can frame the roll in a way that better reflects the character's attributes (e.g you have 6 INT, you can't read)
In some games, the player themselves doesn't roll because he thinks "My character wouldn't have a clue what he's on about"
In some games, the player simply punches the guy in the face because, well, with 10 INT, WIS, and CHA and 18 STR, what else is he going to do?

.....the point is, all these possible actions (and the hundreds more - that's the beauty of D&D) all put different valuations on the need and desirability of the mental stats. And they are all totally valid, depending on what type of game you want to play. And saying "Well, half of those are stupid because you could just......" is belittling to the people who play the game in precisely that way.....


And ok, my defence of those alternate ways of playing may come across as "THIS IS THE ONE TRUE WAY OF PLAYING D&D!!!!".....and for that I apologise (forums, febrile atmospheres, incorrect context, and overkill are basically four cheeks of the same demonic arse). My intention is simply to fight back against the notion that these ways of playing the game are somehow pointless or lesser. They aren't - they are just as valid and power-gaming, kicking down doors, non-combat political intrigue, epic rags to riches narrative, or goofy who-give's-a-basilisk's-ass farce......and the player's priority of stats differ to.

Which - looping back to the original post - is why I said that the poster should really be checking what type of game he and his players were wanting to play before knee-capping CON in the name of greater player diversity. 14+ Con as standard is almost necessary for some games.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

I flat out reject this – literature, and indeed history, is replete with heroes who are not the best person for the job (or ‘optimised’) but save the world anyway (Frodo Baggins). That is entirely your opinion, and you may like games like that. Great. But you don’t get to say that Sub-optimal characters can’t “save the world” if that’s the game people want to play. Uh-uh, no way. Sorry.

Literature works out because it's just a story, and it isn't held to the higher standards of an RPG. Weak heroes succeed against greater odds because the writers want them to, rather than through their own merits. History only looks like it's full of weak heroes because of survival bias, and fortunately the stakes of any given engagement are spectacularly low.

Fun fact, over the course of human history, the majority of individuals who have had the biggest impact on major world events were all generals, diplomats, politicians or scientists (Or in D&D parlance, characters with Low Combat survivability and very high mental attributes)

Real people are remarkably risk-averse, and avoid battles to the death whenever possible. The average person in the real world will face vastly more challenges to their Charisma and Intelligence than to their Strength or Constitution. Real life isn't as full of adventure or dungeons or dragons as Dungeons & Dragons is.

Yes, maybe the majority of players and GMs DO save the world by stabbing dragons, but by that very definition CON is more useful than other stats SO WHY COMPLAIN ABOUT IT?

Because it's boring that, in the infinite variety of games you could play about saving the world by stabbing dragons, so many characters end up so similar in so many ways. The character design space is harshly limited, as soon as you make one tiny assumption about the nature of the world you will be encountering in a game that is literally called Dungeons & Dragons. Given that the game designers are already making this assumption about how they expect the game to be played (as we can observe by looking at published adventures, all of which involve stabbing dragons in order to save the world), they could have done more to work with that premise and develop a game that includes more interesting choices within that space.

 

[Tony Vargas]

The "survivor bias" comment reminds me:

It might not be a bad conceit for an RPG, especially one leaning more towards genre-emulation/cooperative-storytelling, to be couched as old companions recounting tales of their adventures.

You still play it like any other RPG, you just know you're all going to survive the adventure, and probably the world more or less will, too (though maybe not, the camera could pull back revealing you're in the post-apocalyptic wasteland of your epic failure).

Attributes that let you take a re-roll, rather than being 'lucky' could be "hey, that's not how it happened..."

 

[UngeheuerLich]

You should consider always applying max hp instead of aberage hp per level if you remove con. I actually did like the first iteration of the game where con was not used as a bonus to rolled hp but instead was the floor similar to the durable feat. It also influenced hp regeneration which is valuable enough in itself.
So if I feel the need to change con it would be max hp per level, no con bonus. Con still affects short rests. Maybe at level 1 Con bonus applies to starting HP. That will be your first level boost. Instead you may just add a commoner to your hp which depends on your size. D8 for medium sized persons. D6 for small persons.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

You should consider always applying max hp instead of aberage hp per level if you remove con. I actually did like the first iteration of the game where con was not used as a bonus to rolled hp but instead was the floor similar to the durable feat. It also influenced hp regeneration which is valuable enough in itself.
So if I feel the need to change con it would be max hp per level, no con bonus. Con still affects short rests. Maybe at level 1 Con bonus applies to starting HP. That will be your first level boost. Instead you may just add a commoner to your hp which depends on your size. D8 for medium sized persons. D6 for small persons.

 

[Xeviat]

You should consider always applying max hp instead of aberage hp per level if you remove con. I actually did like the first iteration of the game where con was not used as a bonus to rolled hp but instead was the floor similar to the durable feat. It also influenced hp regeneration which is valuable enough in itself.
So if I feel the need to change con it would be max hp per level, no con bonus. Con still affects short rests. Maybe at level 1 Con bonus applies to starting HP. That will be your first level boost. Instead you may just add a commoner to your hp which depends on your size. D8 for medium sized persons. D6 for small persons.

I'm not sure I like the difference between 6 and 12. 3 to 7 is a smaller difference.


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[Xeviat]

I had a weird thought today. What if HD size was determined by size, like it is with monsters? Then, classes/subclasses are given stronger reasons to have high secondary stats, often other than Dex and Con. Then give additional encouragement for melee characters to be high Con. Rather than the warriors having high HD, they just have incentives to pump Con, while more squishy characters are encouraged to pick other stats.

Just a thought.


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[Yunru]

I never realised HD dice were determined by size for monsters.

 

[cbwjm]

I had a weird thought today. What if HD size was determined by size, like it is with monsters? Then, classes/subclasses are given stronger reasons to have high secondary stats, often other than Dex and Con. Then give additional encouragement for melee characters to be high Con. Rather than the warriors having high HD, they just have incentives to pump Con, while more squishy characters are encouraged to pick other stats.

Just a thought.


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I think you'd probably see less halfling, gnome or other small race being front line warrior classes since they'd be rolling a d6 for hit points. You might get more wizards and sorcerers having lower Constitution scores since they have a d8 instead of a d6 hit die (it might be just as likely that they will keep the same 14+ Constitution) but I don't think that you would otherwise see much of a change in the other classes.