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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Mannahnin" data-source="post: 9067769" data-attributes="member: 7026594">Well, bear in mind that 4d6 drop lowest arrange to taste only gives an average of 12.24.  With the AD&D ability score charts requiring a 15 or better for most stats to give a bonus (as low as 13 for a couple of them), and Gary's advice that a character normally needs at least two 15s or better, we realized that a single set usually wouldn't get you where you're meant to be.  Multiple sets also gave a better chance of qualifying for one of the classes with higher requirements, like Ranger or Druid.Totally fair point about the huge stats seen in modules.  None of the recommended generation systems in the DMG would normally result in numbers like you commonly see in modules.  In retrospect my guess is that Wishes and other magical increases were assumed to be responsible and must have been more common than they were in our games, where we took Gary's inveighing against Monty Haul campaigns very seriously.  The alternate theory is that they were given better stats to compensate for having fewer magic items than you'd usually expect mid to high level characters to have.I still wouldn't necessarily expect all three of Str, Dex, and Con to be high enough for bonuses.  4d6 drop lowest (the most common method then as now, as far as I can tell) rarely gets you there.  My group's usual practice of giving three sets tripled the chances, but it certainly wasn't guaranteed or expected.Yeah, evidently a fair number of tables kept to 3d6, which is crazy to me.  But it must have been enough that they were a major proportion of the player write-in input for 2nd ed, because they made 3d6 the default method in that edition.Yup.I can't agree.  The stat tables are clearly built with the expectation of multiple high scores, and the daylight between "usually essential" and "mandatory" is vanishingly small.  I think it's only there to allow for people who want to play on hard mode.  Voadam's contrast between AD&D and B/X here is on-point.  B/X only requires a 13 or better for most stats to get a bonus, and allows point-swapping to the Prime Requisite, so despite being 3d6 down the line you're almost always going to qualify for at least a +1.</blockquote>

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