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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Greenfield" data-source="post: 6070771" data-attributes="member: 6669384">I re-read the original post carefully.  It still makes little sense.You get attributes from ability scores, and you don't increase ability scores with levels or racial modifiers.  Got that.  But at the end it says that attributes may increase ability scores.  Which would result in more attributes?The Fighter with the 18 Strength would have 4 attributes, but could apply no more than one to any function.  That is,he could get +1 to hit, +1 to damage, +1 to Climb and +1 to Swim.Have I got that right?  If I do then a top condition athlete, as good as a normal human can ever get, is slightly better at 4 things than Joe Average with the 10.5 strength (3D6 average).  Meanwhile, Poindexter the Nerd, who put points into Intelligence, will be a better athlete all around than the 18 Strength fighter, since he gets more skill points and can spend more than one of them per skill.  So he'll not only meet or beat the Fighter in Climb and Swim, he'll also do better at Jump and Tumble and pretty much everything else.  Sure the Fighter is better at brute force, but only a little.  (+1 really isn't that much.)And because stats don't get better over time, Poindexter will end up leaving the Fighter in the dust over time, beating him not only in typical nerd fields like Knowledge and Craft skills, but also in every athletic endevour as well.  Right now, melee hits and damage output are the only things that keep fighter types from going the way of the dinosaur, the only thing that lets them even stay close to spell caster types.  Sorry if I come across as the habitual nay-sayer, but when someone suggests rule changes I like to try and think them through.  I've known too many rules lawyers, I always look for the bolt holes they'll try to squirm through.  The holes in this idea don't require a squirm or a wriggle.  You can lead a camel through them.  Your solution to my previous objection was "Well, we simply won't let you do that".  How?  My 8 strength fighter chooses not to apply any negative attributes to combat.  He'll take his penalties in Swim (an almost never used skill) and Jump.  Both of those get bonked by armor check penalties anyway, and both can be bypassed by buying skill points.  One in each negates the penalties.How do you prevent that? Does the DM design my character for me, dictating what feats/attributes I get, and what skills I choose to buy?Here's the thing:  You can't do just one thing.  Players and the game world in general react to any change, and that causes other changes, ripples in the pond that go on forever.  Some of these other changes may be things you like.  Many won't be.  The law of unintended consequences doesn't merely apply in RPGs, it applied, got the job, and has tenure.</blockquote>

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