Random rolls: an exersise in character building

[brehobit]

The "how high of stats" poll brought up a different issue for me.

I've been doing point-buy since forever (I wrote rules for it back in 2nd ed for my games.) I find that random rolls can be fun, but you get an unbalanced party. What I like about random rolls is getting an "interesting" character you hadn't been planning on playing.

So a related discussion. How do you manage a PC with random rolls? I did the 3d6 stats in order thing, but rerolled until I got a non-useless character (per 3rd ed rules):

Str 16
Int 11
Wis 12
Dex 16
Con 5
Chr 11

Obviously the Con is killer (in pretty much every imaginable way) If you were going to build a 3rd ed PC out of this, what would he or she look like? How would you justify the outstanding Str and Dex vs. the very low Con? What class would you take? Race?

 

[Inconsequenti-AL]

Not sure how I manage random rolling. Guess it's a case of roll them up and decide on the character and concept afterwards?

With those stats... I'd go for a Ranger - Human most likely - sneaky and archery specialised. Someone who's spent a lot of time on the fantasy equivalent of gym work, bulked out and superbly co-ordinated. I'd make them a real hypercondriac, slightest scratch or hint of illness and they'd scream and faint. Would give them a morbid fear of being hit - preferring to stack the deck in their favour before fighting - ideally using traps and ambushes...

 

[Kathaer]

what about a warrior? maybe ill. .. cancer? .. something like that... or.. without half heart, or without some vital organs.. or... i would like "Skin Cancer" or .. pest... or lebbra, .. this will affect even the not so high chr.

 

[yennico]

Perhaps he or she has suffered from a magical disease which is cured too late so he has lost some points of con permanently.

My players always have to create their characters by point-buy-method because:
1. Attributes affect the whole PCs. The player has the right to distribute the points the way he wants.
2. If a player dislikes the rolls for the attributes and he anyway has to play it, he will perhaps let his PC die, so he can reroll a PC.

In former times (AD&D) I let the player roll their attributes but any roll below 9 must be rerolled.

 

[JimAde]

I agree that you'd need some in-character reason. A magical disease (as yennico suggested) is a good choice.

I'd probably go with a rogue specializing in thrown daggers for combat. The "thrown" part lets you use your strength bonus to damage so your daggers are doing 1d4+3 (average 5.5) compared to a short bow average 3.5. With the right feats you can get iterative attacks when you get high enough level. Of course if you can get the sneak attack that is much bigger than the base damage for any normal weapon.

But, of course, the character would avoid melee (and combat in general) whenever possible. He'd probably have 1-2 HP per level.

 

[Thanee]

Raistlin and his brother Cameron somehow got magically mixed up into a single body?

Too bad, that Cameron's mind got the upper hand...

Bye
Thanee

 

[yennico]

Str 16
Int 11
Wis 12
Dex 16
Con 5
Chr 11

hmm if the Con value can swap the place with Cha it would be almost a normal barbarian.
Because of his low mental attributes he can not take a spellcasting class.
Con 5 means -3 on each HD, so he needs a high HD to get hit points. Class either ranger or fighter with ranged combat. In melee combat this PC is dead meat because of his low hit points.
Perhaps at level 4 the PC raises his Con to 6, so he gets only -2 on his HD.

 

[JoeBlank]

Letting your rolls inspire you can be fun, but in 3.x I have only used point buy.

With the low Con, you have to decide if you are going to embrace the disadvantage or attempt to mitigate it. As others have mentioned, you could go with some sort of disease or other explanation.

You could also play a +2 Con race, getting you up to 7, and then bump up to 8 at level 4. Now you are not that bad off. Perhaps the character is slowly recovering from a the effects of a disease.

 

[delericho]

Str 16
Int 11
Wis 12
Dex 16
Con 5
Chr 11

A Dwarf Fighter who specialises in the use of Throwing Axes. Of course, the character wears the heaviest armour he can, and stays out of melee combat as much as possible. Early feat choices include the obligatory Weapon Focus, Specialisation and the like, but also Quick Draw, Rapid Shot, and other feats in that tree. Also, high ranks in the Profession (miner) skill.

The reason for not taking the Ranger class: d10 hit dice instead of d8, use of Heavy armour, and the Manyshot feat is useless to an axe-thrower. Besides, if you want to play a missile thrower, the Fighter does a better job than the Ranger, since it's so much more flexible.

To justify the low Con, I suggest the following: the character is slightly older than most adventuring dwarves. In his previous life, he was a miner, and inhaled large quantities of dust as a result. There is a disease of the lungs (the name of which eludes me), caused by this very problem.

Of course, as a proud dwarven warrior, he could not bear the sympathy of his clan, and struck out on the life of an adventurer, intent on dying in some suitably glorious and pointless manner. I'd probably play the character as a rather embittered warrior, who drinks hard, fights hard, and swears constantly.

 

[Thanee]

As a Troll, the abilities would get into a pretty reasonable range.

Str 28
Dex 20
Con 17
Int 7
Wis 10
Cha 7

Troll Fighter!

Bye
Thanee