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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 5002107" data-attributes="member: 4937">I'm not at all sure where you are getting that.  In 1e in particular, in my experience most people rolled for their stats rather than used a point buy system.  So, there wasn't really anything that stood in the way of a physically mediocre fighter with high int or charisma if you wanted it.  For one thing, unless your Str was 16+, you weren't getting a big benefit from it in combat anyway.  Below Str 16, strength was just a 'skill', much like 'intelligence' to be occasionally referred to when the designer felt like calling for a 'bend bars' check or an intelligence check (such as to spot an invisible creature) or when you got psionicly blasted.So, yes, the game heavily rewarded a fighter for having a high strength, but intelligence was largely unused mechanically by every class (except for things like determining the number of languages you spoke).  I'm not sure that any 'insult' was intended to the fighting man, in as much as 1e particularly emphasised 'player skill' over 'character skill' the need for intelligence to have wide ranging influences over character ability just wasn't seen as a critical design goal.Fourth edition is almost a 3 attribute system (like GURPS, for example) that gives you the option of determining what your three stats are going to be called.  But in terms of disbanding sterotypes, I don't see that 4e has made any progress at all just yet (although the room is there to do so).  We aren't nearly as far along as in 4e as even D20 Modern toward allowing you to play a 'Smart Hero' or 'Charismatic Hero' of any profession.  For third edition, I think alot could have been achieved by making combat feat trees for each of the 6 attributes of corresponding depth, breadth, and utility as those that grew from 'Power Attack' (strength) or 'Dodge' (dexterity).</blockquote>

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