Point buy

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

J

Additionally, point buy eliminates PC concepts just like random rolling does. If you go back to earlier editions, you'd be hard pressed to design Monk, Ranger or Paladin PCs with most "reasonable" point buy systems- those classes almost required an average stat of 14 to be effective. While that is not as much of a mechanical issue in D20, point buy still axes certain concepts.

If you wanted to be a monk, ranger or paladin and you rolled low, you couldn't do it effectively either.

There was an ancient Olympian competitor nicknamed Beta who earned his nickname by being 2nd best in every event in which he competed- a legendarily well rounded athelete. In modern times, you could look to multi-sport competitors like Jim Thorpe. Unless your point buy is quite high, though, such a build is nigh impossible without making him stupid, impulsive, and misanthropic in the balance.

The guy had lots of levels and lots of skill ranks in various sports skills, and if you ever designed any sports feats he'd have a lot of them, too. This isn't really the place to discuss D20 Modern, or I'd have lots more to say about it.

 

[megamania]

I use the 32 point buy system OR roll your six sets with rerolling 1's once. The next campaign, Chaos Effect, I will be using 32 point buy ONLY since a player has a die that has given him a 45 point and a 52 point character. Not fair to the others and makes it where I need to ovrpower foes to compete with his characters which in turn threatens to killl the others constantly.

 

[Elf Witch]

I use the 32 point buy system OR roll your six sets with rerolling 1's once. The next campaign, Chaos Effect, I will be using 32 point buy ONLY since a player has a die that has given him a 45 point and a 52 point character. Not fair to the others and makes it where I need to ovrpower foes to compete with his characters which in turn threatens to killl the others constantly.

I am curious does this player roll in front of you? And if he does and his dice is that good have you thought about having him roll for everybody.

 

[Gundark]

well I used to used dice until there was a player in my group who always brought a character with great stats to the group he would say "I alway roll well". At the time I was taking a stats class and I began to see how improbable it was for him to always be rolling this well.

You might ask "why didn't you make him roll in front of you?" . Well it's not like I had all the time in the world, when it came to having time to play I wanted to play not be the daddy figure and make sure that all the people in my group played by the rules.

Thus we use the point by from living greyhawk. Also it has the advantage of putting everybody on an equal playing field.

Rolling seemed to cause problems too. Player A would roll well and get a decent character. Player B would roll roll crappy and be like :

Player B:"hey can I reroll these?"
Me: Um no
Player B: *insert whining and complaining about how their character was nothing compared to player A's*
Me: Well alright you can reroll your CON.
Player C: (who rolled about average would get wind of player B's reroll) Hey I wanna re-roll my strength, you let player B do it.
Me:arggghghh

Yeah I use a point buy now.

 

[prosfilaes]

The whole game is built around rolling dice.

In 3rd ed. character creation, only attributes and hit points (and optionally height and weight, but I've never seen them done randomly) are created rolling dice. There's almost a subgame around picking classes and feats and skills and spells. There's a huge difference between rolls you make by the thousands that for the most part have no long term significance, and those made where one roll can negatively or positively affect your character for the whole campaign.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

IMO yes it is I hate seeing the same bland characters that get made with point buy. I hate the entire idea that there is such a thing as a subpar choice.

Some of my favorite characters I played would not have been possible with a 28 point buy. I could never have played my educated nobel knight who was a commander because on a 28 point buy I would not have had a decent enough stats to put in Str, Con , Int, and Chr but the fact that I rolled a 46 point character allowed me to make this character.

That is the reason I love rolling is that the randomness of the dice can give me some above average stats to try and make a different character instead of the straight fighter, wizard , rogue ect ect.

To be is not about being Superwoman it is about getting good enough stats to be at least a little better than just okay in something.

You could have played him. You just have the wrong* expectations on what a "good" score is.

*) better: different


With 28 point buy, you could get:
Str 15, Dex10, Con12, Int14, Wis10, Cha14

I don't know what classes you used, but if you multiclass Rogue and Fighter (or Paladin) or Fighter and Bard with this array, you get a pretty decent educated Noble Knight. Smart, Strong, Charismatic, Tough, all what you need.

Once your accustomed that 16 to 18 are not "must-have" scores and are instead a very rare occurence (not once per character, but more once per party), you would probably be able to play the Noble Knight just as good as with a rolled "46-point buy equivalent" character. Sure, it might be a bit harder to play with him, because you lack a 18-point-buy equivalent safety net, but that doesn't change the fact that the character is viable and will also fair well in regular RAW encounters.

 

[reanjr]

Other:

Players pick their stats.

Man, I wish I ran a group that could handle that kind of responsibility

 

[reanjr]

I use the 32 point buy system OR roll your six sets with rerolling 1's once. The next campaign, Chaos Effect, I will be using 32 point buy ONLY since a player has a die that has given him a 45 point and a 52 point character. Not fair to the others and makes it where I need to ovrpower foes to compete with his characters which in turn threatens to killl the others constantly.

I used to have a player with a die like that. It was a Yellow d20 with black lettering that was dubbed "the Batman die". He used to throw it around to people to use for important rolls. It's statistical average (within my sight) was about 16-17. It made things VERY difficult to run effectively.

 

[Elf Witch]

You could have played him. You just have the wrong expectations on what a "good" score is.

With 28 point buy, you could get:
Str 15, Dex10, Con12, Int14, Wis10, Cha14

I don't know what classes you used, but if you multiclass Rogue and Fighter (or Paladin) or Fighter and Bard with this array, you get a pretty decent Noble Knight.

Once your accustomed that 16 to 18 are not "must-have" scores and are a rare occurence, you would probably be able to play the Noble Knight just as good as with a rolled "46-point buy equivalent" character. Sure, it might be a bit harder to play with him, because you lack a 18-point-buy equivalent safety net, but that doesn't change the fact that the character is viable and will also fair well in regular RAW encounters.

I had two levels of the courtier class from Rokugn and the rest were fighter levels. Now this character came into the game at 10 level and was the front line fighter now a con of 12 only gives you a +1 that IMO is rather low for the front line fighter who is just soaking damage. Also I should point out that in this game like most of the games we play was a low magic game that meant no items to boast stats or AC and at best weapons were a +1.

What I am wondering is all this love of point buys at 28-32 has to do with the fact that the party ends up getting stat boosting items which I can see how that could really raise the power curve.

And I can play any character even one with low stats but that does not change the fact that sometimes it is just fun to play a really exceptional character.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

I had two levels of the courtier class from Rokugn and the rest were fighter levels. Now this character came into the game at 10 level and was the front line fighter now a con of 12 only gives you a +1 that IMO is rather low for the front line fighter who is just soaking damage. Also I should point out that in this game like most of the games we play was a low magic game that meant no items to boast stats or AC and at best weapons were a +1.

Same thing if you played a fighter/mage or other multiple concepts. You're not going to be the best at either.

What I am wondering is all this love of point buys at 28-32 has to do with the fact that the party ends up getting stat boosting items which I can see how that could really raise the power curve.

A +2 headband of intellect is the same thing regardless of the Int score of the wearer - it's equal. Furthermore, DMs are supposed to control the influx of magic items into their game - that's the whole point of "wealth by level".