More pointbuy

[brehobit]

Has anyone seen rules in d20 for point buy where you can use the points to buy something other than stats? Social status or items or a -1 ECL (say you either get 32 points or 25 points but get to be one level higher than EXP would indicate). I don't care if the rules are WoTC or not, I'm just looking for ideas.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

I've made a few suggestions along those lines but I haven't tested any of them in play.

My current version of the idea is:

24 points ECL -1
30 points ECL 0
36 points ECL 1

However, I'd be very careful with ECL -1. For non-magic using classes, it would probably be balanced but I don't think it would be balanced to have 2nd level characters casting 2nd level spells. I don't know how well it would work for 4th level characters to be casting fireballs either. It probably wouldn't make too much difference but it might well make "options" like ECL 0 sorcerors into mere illusions. So it might be a good idea to restrict the ECL -1 option to NPC classes and non-casting classes.