Low ability scores -- more fun?

[Aus_Snow]

oops, double (delayed) post.

 

[Garthanos]

Quoted for truth. In actual play, this is what I (and many others) have found to be the case.

I will say in actual play... the highest strength party member and maybe one other got to roll against it.... nobody else even noticed the difference.... yup in actual play... so YMMV.

 

[Garthanos]

Hyper specialization may or may not be a thing of the modern world, but even if it wasn't it would perforce be a thing of the game world.

It seems like you conflate versatility (the opposite of specialization) with being "not-challenged" in your argument... it makes me feel like we are talking about high level wizards. (there have been things about how spells were defined which made this a true correspondence).

The issue with over versatility is not as I see it nobody fails or has reasonable challenges (the DM can make challenges arbitrarily difficult if everyone is having too easy a time of it and intersperse it with other npcs for instance failing vividly (the star trek red shirts phenom) to emphasize the feel that even when they have failures it is indeed because the challenges are extraordinary). But rather in order for people to make a good and interesting team they need to be to a certain degree interdependent too much versatility too much self sufficiency and the team game is undermined, it relates to the cooperative element of role play not the antagonistic one.

 

[Janx]

I wouldn't enjoy a low stat in real life, why would I enjoy it in a game where I'm supposed to be even more powerful?

If the score is so low it causes problems, that's not fun in real life. Sure its a challenge, but unfortunately everyday tasks get to be challenges when you're handicapped.


There are folks with handicaps who live great lives and when asked, wouldn't change a thing. But they also wouldn't wish it on someone either.