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Message: <blockquote data-quote="ECMO3" data-source="post: 9834074" data-attributes="member: 7030563">This is not true in play.  You act like this is deterministic and it is not.  It is a random process.Comparing 1st level characters; when B swings his sword, the most common damage done is 0, that is the mode average.  0 is also the mode average for A.  Against any AC over 10 zero damage is the most likely outcome of an attack for both fighters.  You can change the comparison to two identical fighters with a 16 strength and this is still true.Assuming the foe they hit has at least 23 hps and no resistance or vulnerability, there are 16 other possible damage outcomes for B that occur less frequently than 0.  These are all integer numbers from 8-23.  Other possible outcomes for A are all integer numbers from 5-20.  If we were comparing fighters with 16 strengths it would be all integers from 6-21.We are talking about balance here, and the difference in ability scores has almost no affect on it.Did you read the post you replied to?  I bolded "PEOPLE WOULD NOTICE" and you even quoted the bolded text, yet you somehow still missed it?People absolutely will notice.  They will notice when the PC with more hit points goes down first in combat and they will notice when a PC with fewer hit points goes down first.Again, having the identical hit points does not change this. They are not going to run out of hit points at the same time just because they start with the same amount.I never said stats don't matter.  You reply to me with quotes around something that I did not even post while you ignore what I did post?What I said, and I what I illustrated mathematically, is ability score disparities have very little effect on game balance.  Having players with equal ability scores will NOT make your game more balanced no matter how many times you say it will.  It is just not factually true.Game balance is dominated both quantitatively and qualitatively by things other than ability scores, even when we are talking about PCs that are otherwise identical and make identical decisions in play.  If we take the qualitive side out of it we are still left with highly variable and random quantitative processes.  Balance is an extremely unlikely outcome whether the abilities scores are identical or not and making the ability scores equal will not make the game significantly more likely to be balanced.</blockquote>

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