point buy or standart array?

[Joseph Elric Smith]

Well to encourage rolling, I offer either 25 point point buy or 4d6 take the best 3. I have always preferred the radon rolling of stats, just because I find it often encourages the players to make and create very interesting characters.
ken

Can't decide which one to use for my next campaign. pt buy is very customizable but i'm afraid all players will have one stat 18 and others 11 which is not good, and Standart array method may create too many ugly fighters w/ Cha 8.
Don't want to use rolling cause my previous experience shows it generates very unique adventurers (good) but it is too unbalanced, PC to PC and NPC to PC. (very bad!)

What do you use and why?

 

[Zappo]

I can see the use of the standard array, but I think it's more appropriate to grunts and fast-generated characters. Overall, I've never used it, because for NPCs I assign stats arbitrarily. For PCs, point buy offers the same good balance and allows for exactly the character you want.

 

[MadBlue]

I start each ability score at 6 and the player has a pool of twelve "die rolls" (1,1,2,2,3,3,4,4,5,5,6,6) to distribute to each ability score (two per ability). Basically, it's like rolling 2d6+6 for each ability, but the dice are already rolled.

MadBlue

 

[Virtuaalivalo]

I've always used 32 point buy, but... KDLadage, I really like your method of random (but not too random) ability score generation... So maybe I'll try it in my next campaign...

 

[Tsyr]

I probably wouldn't play in a "Standard Array" game. Honestly, I can't see _any_ redeeming features in it (and I'm not trying to be inflamitory, I really don't understand), unless you're looking for quick NPC/Red shirt stats. In other words, I find Standard Array about as interesting as the quick table of NPCs by class/level in the DMG.

Agreed.

I don't use Standard Array, ever, and never would. I use point buy in my own world, which is a lower-power, low-fantasy game world... 28 point buy, even still. And I wouldn't if I still had classes like Monk or Paladin, that have a number of fairly important stats. Either Point Buy or an Array system sort of sucks for those classes.

Of course, when I do Dragonlance or Greyhawk, my character generation rules are 4D6, drop the lowest, re-roll *all* ones, and you can earn a bonus 1D4 die roll which you can spread the points from as you choose if you create a good background and hooks and so forth for your character... So I'm all for the organic character creation

 

[Destil]

I've always used 32 point buy, but... KDLadage, I really like your method of random (but not too random) ability score generation... So maybe I'll try it in my next campaign...

I'd have to agree.... That does look interesting.

 

[Mike Sullivan]

Something I really want to try is giving people the following, uh, "complex array":


16, 13, 10, 4d6 drop lowest, 4d6 drop lowest, 4d6 drop lowest.

 

[Conaill]

Time to post my three variant methods yet again. Al of these combine some of the better aspects of rolling and point-buy:

- Remove all but the 1-6 cards from a deck of cards. Deal 6 stacks of 4 cards, remove lowest card from each stack and assign as desired. Don't remember who came up with this one, might have been an early version of KDLadage's method. It's simpler, and has similar stat distribution as 4d6, but tends to be much better balanced.

- Roll only 3 stats using your favorite method. The remaining three are equal to 25 (or more) minus the first three (max 18). Probably the fastest method out there. For every even stat you also get an odd one, and for every high stat you also get a low one.

- Roll stats and calulate point buy value. If higher than a predetermined value, reduce some stats to match it. If too low, increase some stats. (If the total is too high, you are only allowed to decrease stats, and vice versa.)

 

[Valiantheart]

I just give my players 80 points and let them put them where ever they feel like. Minium of 8 max of 18.

Everybody can make the character they want and I dont have to listen to complaints for 3 sessions.