Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="Chaosmancer" data-source="post: 8103364" data-attributes="member: 6801228">I'm not sure that really makes a difference. They are all small creatures. And the shortest Kobold is 2'3&quot;, which is six inches shorter and 10 lbs lighter than the halfling, who is 2'9&quot; at the shortest. But, the halflings gets no penalty despite being a foot and two inches shorter and 80 lbs lighter than the Tiefling. And those are all the shortest and smallest possible numbers. So, is that minor six inch difference really enough to incur a -2 penalty to strength, when a difference over double that size did not? I know there are thresholds, but what makes that fluff small size a threshold, but the actual mechanical small size not?However you want to phrase it, it has no basis in a lot of fantasy. There was no basis for it in some of the old source material, nor the modern source material. So if it was purely traditional for only select settings... that can be a setting rule or a houserule.And here we find ourselves agreeing, but while I get the feeling you see this as a problem, I really don't. Even with a strength of 8, in terms of lifting lbs of weight, a character is immensely strong compared to an average person. The can casually lift 120 lbs and just truck it. They can lift 240 over their head with little effort. That is an entire average person. And yet, in the mechanics of the game, they are weak. They deal damage with a negative mod. They actually could potentially deal 0 damage by punching someone. So, by one metric, they are stronger than most people I know. By another, they are laughably weak. And this is all because the scores are all relative and a game mechanic. The &quot;weak man&quot; in the party could have a 12 strength, which is still above average per the game, but is no where near what a &quot;strong&quot; individual needs to actually be for them to be mechanically a strength based character.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Chaosmancer, post: 8103364, member: 6801228"] I'm not sure that really makes a difference. They are all small creatures. And the shortest Kobold is 2'3", which is six inches shorter and 10 lbs lighter than the halfling, who is 2'9" at the shortest. But, the halflings gets no penalty despite being a foot and two inches shorter and 80 lbs lighter than the Tiefling. And those are all the shortest and smallest possible numbers. So, is that minor six inch difference really enough to incur a -2 penalty to strength, when a difference over double that size did not? I know there are thresholds, but what makes that fluff small size a threshold, but the actual mechanical small size not? However you want to phrase it, it has no basis in a lot of fantasy. There was no basis for it in some of the old source material, nor the modern source material. So if it was purely traditional for only select settings... that can be a setting rule or a houserule. And here we find ourselves agreeing, but while I get the feeling you see this as a problem, I really don't. Even with a strength of 8, in terms of lifting lbs of weight, a character is immensely strong compared to an average person. The can casually lift 120 lbs and just truck it. They can lift 240 over their head with little effort. That is an entire average person. And yet, in the mechanics of the game, they are weak. They deal damage with a negative mod. They actually could potentially deal 0 damage by punching someone. So, by one metric, they are stronger than most people I know. By another, they are laughably weak. And this is all because the scores are all relative and a game mechanic. The "weak man" in the party could have a 12 strength, which is still above average per the game, but is no where near what a "strong" individual needs to actually be for them to be mechanically a strength based character. [/QUOTE]

Verification