D&D 5E (2014) Is Point Buy Balanced?

[Lakesidefantasy]

Well, that's not surprising. Its easiest to control a limited play-space, which is what an array is. I personally find the price there a bit high for it, but there's no question it serves a purpose.



I don't remember: were those just sets in terms of being six specific numbers or in arrangement? Because that's a big difference in my view.



Well, one of the issues I'm not sure has been touched--and to be clear, with 5e I'm unqualified to discuss it myself--is whether there are any of the six attributes that are only valuable to specialist characters and any that everyone genercally wants (in a lot of games including some F20 games, Constiution and/or Dexterity often land there). Those are going to at least slightly distort balance considerations.

Not in arrangement. The 54,264 possibilities are combinations of six scores from 3-18. With arrangement it becomes billions i think. maybe hundreds of millions. Maybe with Point Buy things look diverse because there are 720 ways to arrange each of the 65 arrays -- 46,800!

Constitutin seems to be important to everybody. I was told you need at least a 14 in constitution.
Dexterity I think is covered by the strength requirements for armor and the WTFAYDITFLA! But I may be wrong.

 

[Lakesidefantasy]

For reference, here are the 65 sets of scores that equal 27 points. The scores in bold are the 20 that conform to Optimization Guidlines. Attached is the full list of 54,264 scores. You have to scroll down really far to find the Standard Array.

Spoiler: 65 Point Buy Arrays

08, 08, 08, 15, 15, 15
08, 08, 10, 14, 15, 15
08, 08, 12, 13, 15, 15
08, 08, 12, 14, 14, 15
08, 09, 09, 14, 15, 15
08, 09, 11, 13, 15, 15
08, 09, 11, 14, 14, 15
08, 09, 12, 12, 15, 15
08, 09, 13, 13, 14, 15
08, 09, 13, 14, 14, 14
08, 10, 10, 13, 15, 15
08, 10, 10, 14, 14, 15
08, 10, 11, 12, 15, 15
08, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15
08, 10, 12, 14, 14, 14
08, 11, 11, 11, 15, 15
08, 11, 11, 13, 14, 15
08, 11, 11, 14, 14, 14
08, 11, 12, 12, 14, 15
08, 11, 13, 13, 13, 15
08, 11, 13, 13, 14, 14
08, 12, 12, 13, 13, 15
08, 12, 12, 13, 14, 14
08, 13, 13, 13, 13, 14
09, 09, 10, 13, 15, 15
09, 09, 10, 14, 14, 15
09, 09, 11, 12, 15, 15
09, 09, 12, 13, 14, 15
09, 09, 12, 14, 14, 14
09, 10, 10, 12, 15, 15
09, 10, 11, 11, 15, 15
09, 10, 11, 13, 14, 15
09, 10, 11, 14, 14, 14
09, 10, 12, 12, 14, 15
09, 10, 13, 13, 13, 15
09, 10, 13, 13, 14, 14
09, 11, 11, 12, 14, 15
09, 11, 12, 13, 13, 15
09, 11, 12, 13, 14, 14
09, 12, 12, 12, 13, 15
09, 12, 12, 12, 14, 14
09, 12, 13, 13, 13, 14
10, 10, 10, 11, 15, 15
10, 10, 10, 13, 14, 15
10, 10, 10, 14, 14, 14
10, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15
10, 10, 12, 13, 13, 15
10, 10, 12, 13, 14, 14
10, 11, 11, 11, 14, 15
10, 11, 11, 13, 13, 15
10, 11, 11, 13, 14, 14
10, 11, 12, 12, 13, 15
10, 11, 12, 12, 14, 14
10, 11, 13, 13, 13, 14
10, 12, 12, 12, 12, 15
10, 12, 12, 13, 13, 14
10, 13, 13, 13, 13, 13
11, 11, 11, 12, 13, 15
11, 11, 11, 12, 14, 14
11, 11, 12, 12, 12, 15
11, 11, 12, 13, 13, 14
11, 12, 12, 12, 13, 14
11, 12, 13, 13, 13, 13
12, 12, 12, 12, 12, 14
12, 12, 12, 13, 13, 13

 

[Lanefan]

Not in arrangement. The 54,264 possibilities are combinations of six scores from 3-18. With arrangement it becomes billions i think. maybe hundreds of millions. Maybe with Point Buy things look diverse because there are 720 ways to arrange each of the 65 arrays -- 46,800!

There's 16 numbers in the range (3,4,5,...17,18) and 6 stats. So, the number of possible stat sequences after arrangement would be something like 16! x 6, whatever that comes to (on quick calculation it's a really big - as in 15 digits big! - number).

 

[CreamCloud0]

The problem with balance in this case is that the supposedly-balanced methods eliminate a great many possible outcomes, which IMO is a cost rather than a feature.

if i had a choice i would rather try to find a method that expands the options provided by the balanced method rather than going into gambling my stats for variety.

 

[AlViking]

So tell me? How do your numbers help me when fighting a monster with an AC of 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21+? What you came up with is only really useful if everything has an AC of 16 AND someone rolls really badly AND the DM is one of the few who would make the player play the bad rolls.

Or in short, it's not very useful.

I did compare some as I posted earlier. The difference doesn't change much until you get to the only miss on a 1. Seems like you're just looking for an excuse not to believe the numbers. But fine. Going from AC 8 where B hits unless they roll a 1 it's 61% increase in damage. Goes up to 238% at AC 22 and I'm not going to bother fix my spreadsheet to account for only hitting on a 20.

Spoiler: Details

Again though, that's for a fighter which is actually about the best good ol' A can do. At level 8, A can get a 20 strength but they've fallen far behind on HP in my example with 60 to B's 100.

A better evaluation is the barbarian. Pretty stupid for A to play a barbarian but I want to compare apples to apples. At level 1 it's similar to a fighter so I'm not going to bother. At a higher level I had them switch to polearm master to max out damage thinking it might help A, it didn't matter much. I assumed they used their bonus action for the extra attack 4/5 hits.

At level 8 A has 69 HP and AC 12 (14 with breastplate) and B has 93 HP and AC 17 with no armor. It shouldn't come as any surprise that at the very low end of target AC 7 when both will hit on everything but a 1 that the difference isn't as significant at 28%. But it climbs to 49% at AC 14 and 284% at AC 25 where A needs a 20 to hit.

Spoiler: Details

So what's the next reason this is "meaningless"? Because I'm tired of punching in numbers when the pattern is obvious.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

if i had a choice i would rather try to find a method that expands the options provided by the balanced method rather than going into gambling my stats for variety.

Exactly.

Balance is never perfect, and one should never strive for perfect balance--doing so produces something like tic tac toe, or at best checkers, something diverting but not very engaging. But one should never strive to actively create imbalance. Not because balance is somehow perfection or whatever BS. It's because a meaningfully unbalanced game is usually almost as easily solved as a perfectly-balanced game!

Trivial balance leads to trivial solutions, yes. But imbalance also leads to trivial solutions! The only route that can consistently resist trivializing decisions is one that pursues asymmetric balance. That, of course, is also the hardest route, as is always the case, isn't it? If you want something really good, you unfortunately have to work for it--or pay someone else to work for it, in this case.

"Pick the thing that wins more" is the trivial solution for unbalanced games.

 

[Maxperson]

I did compare some as I posted earlier. The difference doesn't change much until you get to the only miss on a 1. Seems like you're just looking for an excuse not to believe the numbers. But fine. Going from AC 8 where B hits unless they roll a 1 it's 61% increase in damage. Goes up to 238% at AC 22 and I'm not going to bother fix my spreadsheet to account for only hitting on a 20.

Spoiler: Details

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Again though, that's for a fighter which is actually about the best good ol' A can do. At level 8, A can get a 20 strength but they've fallen far behind on HP in my example with 60 to B's 100.

A better evaluation is the barbarian. Pretty stupid for A to play a barbarian but I want to compare apples to apples. At level 1 it's similar to a fighter so I'm not going to bother. At a higher level I had them switch to polearm master to max out damage thinking it might help A, it didn't matter much. I assumed they used their bonus action for the extra attack 4/5 hits.

At level 8 A has 69 HP and AC 12 (14 with breastplate) and B has 93 HP and AC 17 with no armor. It shouldn't come as any surprise that at the very low end of target AC 7 when both will hit on everything but a 1 that the difference isn't as significant at 28%. But it climbs to 49% at AC 14 and 284% at AC 25 where A needs a 20 to hit.

Spoiler: Details

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So what's the next reason this is "meaningless"? Because I'm tired of punching in numbers when the pattern is obvious.

It looks like you've fallen into the trap of believing that high percentages mean much of anything when talking about a few points of damage. When facing multiple creatures with who are huge bags of hit points, a 67 or 92 percent difference doesn't mean much when it's only talking about a total of 6 hit points of damage difference spread out over 2 or 3 creatures with 60 or 70 hit points each.

The difference is trivial, even if the percentages are high. Quite often we hear about how doing X or Y gives us a 300% increased chance of having a heart attack, but the news won't tell us that we've gone from .000001 to .000003, because they know that we would realize it doesn't mean much of anything, while 300% sounds like a huuuuuuuuuge amount.

 

[AlViking]

It looks like you've fallen into the trap of believing that high percentages mean much of anything when talking about a few points of damage. When facing multiple creatures with who are huge bags of hit points, a 67 or 92 percent difference doesn't mean much when it's only talking about a total of 6 hit points of damage difference spread out over 2 or 3 creatures with 60 or 70 hit points each.

The difference is trivial, even if the percentages are high. Quite often we hear about how doing X or Y gives us a 300% increased chance of having a heart attack, but the news won't tell us that we've gone from .000001 to .000003, because they know that we would realize it doesn't mean much of anything, while 300% sounds like a huuuuuuuuuge amount.

Yes I do believe doing more damage is indeed doing more damage. But it's not just damage, it's HP, for the barbarian AC and for both out of combat along with options for different builds.

Since you're just going to find an excuse to dismiss any numbers I give up. Have a good one.

 

[TwoSix]

It looks like you've fallen into the trap of believing that high percentages mean much of anything when talking about a few points of damage. When facing multiple creatures with who are huge bags of hit points, a 67 or 92 percent difference doesn't mean much when it's only talking about a total of 6 hit points of damage difference spread out over 2 or 3 creatures with 60 or 70 hit points each.

The difference is trivial, even if the percentages are high. Quite often we hear about how doing X or Y gives us a 300% increased chance of having a heart attack, but the news won't tell us that we've gone from .000001 to .000003, because they know that we would realize it doesn't mean much of anything, while 300% sounds like a huuuuuuuuuge amount.

Ok, but what argument are you making, then? Are you saying that the numbers don’t matter? Is there a magnitude where they start to matter? Are they meant purely as an aid to characterization?

The core issue with the “balance doesn’t mean much” idea is that it means all the progression and decision making we do around our characters isn’t really that important. And that means we’ve moved from “playing a game” to “engaging in a shared activity”.

I actually agree with you that in the D&D case the numbers aren’t that meaningful, which is why I’ve mostly moved to other games with more meaningful decision making.

 

[Maxperson]

Yes I do believe doing more damage is indeed doing more damage. But it's not just damage, it's HP, for the barbarian AC and for both out of combat along with options for different builds.

Since you're just going to find an excuse to dismiss any numbers I give up. Have a good one.

Yes, 2 is greater than 3. Neither is meaningful. Stat modifiers are not where the damage is at in 5e. Class abilities, feats, spells, etc. are where it's at.