D&D 5E Point Buy vs Rolling for Stats

[Caliban]

Not based on stats they won't. Character abilities, roleplaying and player ingenuity all have far greater impact on the game than stats do. People just let themselves get sidetracked by numbers.

You just want to play an ubermensch.

 

[Satyrn]

You just want to play an ubermensch.

Leap tall buildings in a single bound? Fun.
Faster than a speeding bullet? Sweet.
More powerful than a locomotive(whatever that is)? Heck ya!

 

[Oofta]

Not based on stats they won't. Character abilities, roleplaying and player ingenuity all have far greater impact on my personal enjoyment of* the game than stats do. People just let themselves get sidetracked by numbers.

* You forgot something in your post.

Did you read my first post? Where I show how much numeric superiority can impact the game?

You may not care about significant differences in stats. It may not make any difference to your enjoyment of the game. That's fine. You may be a better person than I am.

But to say that it has no impact on the game is provably false.

 

[Tony Vargas]

You may be a better person than I am.

Well he is a MAX person... but if max numbers don't matter, then no.

 

[Maxperson]

You just want to play an ubermensch.

Nah. When I was young I thought high stats were the thing to try to get. Then I got them and realized how meaningless they were. Now all I want is not to have crappy stats, but since I don't play with bad DMs(and it's almost as hard to get crappy stats by rolling as it is via point buy or arrays), that's not a worry. Roleplaying, player ingenuity and character abilities are where it is at.

 

[Maxperson]

* You forgot something in your post.

Did you read my first post? Where I show how much numeric superiority can impact the game?

You may not care about significant differences in stats. It may not make any difference to your enjoyment of the game. That's fine. You may be a better person than I am.

But to say that it has no impact on the game is provably false.

I didn't say it has no impact. I said the impact is minor. The place of highest impact is in combat, and then only in your primary character stats, so the rest of the numbers don't mean much there, either. Those +1s don't do much.

As for your first post, I pretty much ignored those numbers as they don't really happen in real life. You don't end up with multiple 18's a 17 and a 16 with 14 as your lowest, and then get matched up against crappy stats. I'm talking about kind of bonuses that you will encounter in the game, not some white room.

 

[Caliban]

Nah. When I was young I thought high stats were the thing to try to get. Then I got them and realized how meaningless they were. Now all I want is not to have crappy stats, but since I don't play with bad DMs(and it's almost as hard to get crappy stats by rolling as it is via point buy or arrays), that's not a worry. Roleplaying, player ingenuity and character abilities are where it is at.

Dude, I stopped taking this topic seriously many pages ago. It's just people saying "either way is fine...(by my way is really better and you should just admit it)..." in various ways, and the people who argue with them.

It's all just joke fodder to me now.

 

[Oofta]

I didn't say it has no impact. I said the impact is minor. The place of highest impact is in combat, and then only in your primary character stats, so the rest of the numbers don't mean much there, either. Those +1s don't do much.

As for your first post, I pretty much ignored those numbers as they don't really happen in real life. You don't end up with multiple 18's a 17 and a 16 with 14 as your lowest, and then get matched up against crappy stats. I'm talking about kind of bonuses that you will encounter in the game, not some white room.

Really? So I'm just a lying SOB when I said it happened in my game? OK. Thanks for that.

And how exactly do they "not happen in real life"? Random rolls gives you ... wait for it ... random results. In other simulations I've done, significantly different numbers happen on a pretty regular basis.

Last but not least ... how is a character fighting a monster of appropriate CR a "white room"? True, it's an encounter for a party of 4, not an individual but sometimes the party gets separated. It's a realistic scenario.

But, what do I know. I'm just a lying SOB.

 

[Maxperson]

Dude, I stopped taking this topic seriously many pages ago. It's just people saying "either way is fine...(by my way is really better and you should just admit it)..." in various ways, and the people who argue with them.

It's all just joke fodder to me now.

Fair enough

 

[Maxperson]

Really? So I'm just a lying SOB when I said it happened in my game? OK. Thanks for that.

And how exactly do they "not happen in real life"? Random rolls gives you ... wait for it ... random results. In other simulations I've done, significantly different numbers happen on a pretty regular basis.

Last but not least ... how is a character fighting a monster of appropriate CR a "white room"? True, it's an encounter for a party of 4, not an individual but sometimes the party gets separated. It's a realistic scenario.

But, what do I know. I'm just a lying SOB.

If it happened to you, it's such a rare occurrence that it's not worth worrying about again. I've seen hundreds of characters rolled up over the decades, maybe over a thousand, and I've never seen 3d6 or 4d6 drop the lowest generate stats like that. I have seen it with 5d6 drop the lowest 2 like a friend of mine likes to have players roll, but that's his system and not D&D. I just don't see the point in worrying about something that is so incredibly rare.