D&D 5E Point Buy vs Rolling for Stats

[ccs]

I think it was either stupidity (if intentionally done) or an oversight (if unintentionally done) not to at least give a guideline or default for this, with a notation that what's written is only a guideline and an individual DM may do otherwise should such make sense for her setting. Two or three lines of text, tops - I'm sure they could have made it fit.

I could be wrong, but I don't recall any specific instructions on how to generate NPC stats in other editions.
Of course I've been doing this so long that I might have just glossed over & forgotten them. Afterall, a few weeks into gaming it ceases to be a useful paragraph - unless you're trying to win an internet argument & want to quote it.

So if previous editions didn't need this instruction it might just be a case of the designers assuming new readers aren't stupid and can figure it out.
As for the rest of you, my fellow veteran gamers, though.... Why do you now need it spelled out?

 

[Caliban]

As for the rest of you, my fellow veteran gamers, though.... Why do you now need it spelled out?

So you can "win" arguments on the interwebs, of course.

 

[Arial Black]

You keep going back to this fictional world of a pool of characters; it's a straw man argument. It has nothing to do with game balance or design.

You're right. But it has everything to do with a believable world which makes sense.

If you are playing a role in an RPG, then it's like suddenly seeing through the eyes of one of the inhabitants of this imaginary world and controlling his actions. This person existed before you started to play him; he was born, trained, had parents (probably with a short life expectancy ) and is one of the population. Probably on the extraordinary side, but still.

Of course, if RPGs are 'just a game' for you, if this character is just a playing piece like the car or old boot of Monopoly, then for you this character has no existence in the world until you play him.

That is the crux of the divide here.

 

[Arial Black]

That's why I play poker and other card games, and not things like craps, slots and roulette. I like games of skill, not chance as well.

Rolling stats doesn't remove an iota of the skill from D&D, though. In fact, it highlights the skill more if I roll poorly, than any point buy or array ever will. If I can use my skill to do well with low stats, I'm doing better than someone doing just as well with higher stats.

As an example, in the card-game 'bridge', the cards are dealt randomly. It is still a game of skill though, even if part of the required skill is to cope with the vagaries of random card distribution.

 

[Oofta]

You're right. But it has everything to do with a believable world which makes sense.

If you are playing a role in an RPG, then it's like suddenly seeing through the eyes of one of the inhabitants of this imaginary world and controlling his actions. This person existed before you started to play him; he was born, trained, had parents (probably with a short life expectancy ) and is one of the population. Probably on the extraordinary side, but still.

Of course, if RPGs are 'just a game' for you, if this character is just a playing piece like the car or old boot of Monopoly, then for you this character has no existence in the world until you play him.

That is the crux of the divide here.

I'm assuming you are a thinking, reasoning person, right? What's your Intelligence score?

Last time I checked I don't have one and you don't either. Because that number only matters for game mechanics. You're putting the cart in front of the horse. A character's intellect isn't based on their Intelligence ability score, their Intelligence ability score is based on their intellect.

So I think you're focusing on the game aspect instead of the world aspect. Ability scores only matter if they need to. For most NPCs they don't matter. That doesn't mean they don't represent living breathing individuals with their own intellect, strength dexterity and charisma. It's just that we don't care until we have to modify a D20 roll..

 

[Hussar]

And, just to add to Oofta's point, we only have to modify a d20 roll when the PC's are present in the scene. Granted, it's true, you can certainly do so without any PC's present. I'm not disagreeing with that. I'm pointing out that for the overwhelming majority of the time, we don't.

When your PC buys a longsword, we don't bother with a d20 roll to check it's quality. Was this crafted by some guy on a Friday afternoon 20 minutes before quitting time? We don't know, and, frankly, we don't care. That level of fiddly just isn't floating anyone's boat.

Thus the point in the DMG that NPC's only need stats if they are a threat to the PC's. Otherwise, we don't worry about it and just freeform everything.

 

[Arial Black]

Since the creatures in the game are described by (among other things, but at a fundamental level) their ability scores, then just because you don't want or need to know what those scores are at that time does not mean that they don't have scores!

We can measure a persons height and/or weight. We can use words (tall), numbers (6 feet 6 inches), other numbers (2 metres), or whatever.

If we choose not to measure a persons height, they still have a height! That 6-and-a-half foot guy is 6 foot six whether we measure him or not; whether we care or not!

In D&D, creatures have ability scores, whether we care what those scores are or not!

In real life I don't have an Int score? Maybe; we can judge each other's stats if we want. Villains and Vigilantes (an '80s superhero RPG) had the GM estimate the players stats because their first hero was meant to be the player but with super powers.

If we were in the game world then we most definitely would have Int scores! Whether or not the DM cared what those score were.

 

[Oofta]

Since the creatures in the game are described by (among other things, but at a fundamental level) their ability scores, then just because you don't want or need to know what those scores are at that time does not mean that they don't have scores!

We can measure a persons height and/or weight. We can use words (tall), numbers (6 feet 6 inches), other numbers (2 metres), or whatever.

If we choose not to measure a persons height, they still have a height! That 6-and-a-half foot guy is 6 foot six whether we measure him or not; whether we care or not!

In D&D, creatures have ability scores, whether we care what those scores are or not!

In real life I don't have an Int score? Maybe; we can judge each other's stats if we want. Villains and Vigilantes (an '80s superhero RPG) had the GM estimate the players stats because their first hero was meant to be the player but with super powers.

If we were in the game world then we most definitely would have Int scores! Whether or not the DM cared what those score were.

Ability scores are completely artificial game artifact, a simplification of reality. Even if we could accurately measure people's abilities (harder than it for many attributes) we'd still have to decide on scale and cutoff points. What you call 6'6" someone else would call 2 meters. Either is correct if you understand the scale.

As I said, people have an intellect. Some people are more or less intelligent (lower case "i") than others. But that doesn't mean that Bob has a 12 intelligence while Joe has a 10 just because Bob is smarter than Joe. All we know is that Bob is smarter than Joe and may be smarter than average. How much? Who knows.

The reason we have ability scores is because we need to determine a modifier, up to a +/- 5 or so to add to a D20 to resolve an uncertain event. Since people in the world do not roll a D20 to determine whether they succeed at tasks they do not need or have ability scores until we transform them into a game construct called a "character" and start playing the game.

Of course if your world is just a set of numbers and pawns on a complex chessboard then they may need numbers. But if it's a "real" fantasy world the ability score doesn't matter because their modifier to their D20 roll doesn't matter because there are no D20 rolls.

 

[Maxperson]

Here's a standard definition of control: the power to influence or direct people's behavior or the course of events. When you choose to roll 4d6 and drop the lowest die versus taking the standard array, you are influencing the numbers that end up on your character sheet such that you're increasing the chance that you will get scores that are better than what the standard array gives you. You're also increasing your chance of getting worse scores, but by a smaller amount because 4d6 drop lowest has a higher chance of better scores and a lower chance of worse scores. So you're controlling the outcome in that direction.

Sure, while you can control a range of numbers, you cannot without cheating control what specific numbers come up. You have zero control over that, which makes it impossible to have picked those specific numbers.

I agree the chances are slim, and yet it's one of the most probable outcomes of 4d6 drop lowest. For it to be a "colossal coincidence", it would have to be colossally less probable than other outcomes, and the standard array is not.

Which doesn't matter at all. If it takes an average of 150ish years for the array to randomly come up once, it's still a colossal coincidence. Other specific sets of numbers being less likely doesn't change that.

The rolling rules for adventurers, members of an adventuring class, are in the PHB. The chapter they are given in explicitly leads you through the process of creating a character for the purpose of "playing an adventurer" in the game. Now, that isn't to say they're for players only, and not for the DM to use. The DMG explicitly states that the DM can create NPCs that are members of an adventuring class by using the rules in the PHB. I also don't think it was stupidity or an oversight to leave out rules for rolling the ability scores of other NPCs. Clearly the intent is that you, the DM, can choose whatever method seems appropriate to determine (or not determine) the ability scores of any NPCs in your milieu.

There is not one rule that says that the PHB is for adventurers only.

 

[Maxperson]

Which implies that it takes less skill to play well with high stats, which can get from rolling (in fact, the method is intentionally skewed to deliver better stats).

And, of course, rolling or using array removes the elements of system mastery enabled in point-buy...

They're very different skill sets, system mastery can be a deep/involved/systematic sort of skill, and it's essentially a technical skill. Compensating for bad stats in play, rather than with system mastery at charge/level up (pick classes/races/feats less impacted by the bad stat, for instance), would be less that 'technical' sort of skill, more like interpersonal skills ('reading' and 'gaming' your DM, mainly).

However you get them, it does take less skill to play a character with higher stats. I also disagree that it takes more DM reading/gaming. Primarily, it takes better planning and strategy. When you have higher stats(more hit points, better AC and saves, etc.), you can be more reckless and survive. Lower stat characters have to be more careful and plan better. They have to spend more time learning what lies ahead. You know, skill stuff

You can't make a blanket statement on a forum without someone popping up to present themselves as a counterexample. For once, it's me. ;P

Yeah, I've totally gone there, not just one-off, but with characters I played for years. In both cases the jilted primary was STR, a 3.0 fighter (no, not using Weapon Finesse) and a 4e Warlord (at release, so before the whole 'lazy' builds got support).

Fortunately, my "blanket" statement included an "almost" in it, so you aren't in fact a counter example, but rather a supportive example of the rare player that I included in my "blanket" statement.

But, the point is, if you want a character with a somewhat lower primary and something else a bit higher, you can have it - and, whether you're using the 5e PH point buy variant, or the default, you necessarily do it by choice, since even random lets you arrange...

Ahh, but I'm not talking about a somewhat lower primary. I'm talking about bad stats. A 12-14 is a somewhat lower primary. An 11 or lower is a bad stat.