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<blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 5802499" data-attributes="member: 82106">There is a difference. Say I give races that are strong a +2. Now, for a race that doesn't get a +2 they will be as good at being a fighter as most of the other races, and a few will be better. OTOH if a few weak races get a -2 then those races are worse fighters than almost all other races. People aren't too worried about playing a race that is as good as most of the other races for a given class. People will very rarely play one that is worse than 90% of the other races.One way is prescriptive, it says &quot;hey, play this if you want to be the best at X&quot;, the other is proscriptive, it says &quot;hey, don't play this, it isn't good enough to bother with.&quot;I don't think it is impossible to make a good system that has a few small penalties but if Orcstein has to buy an 18 INT just to get a 16 and every other race can have an 18 (even if its cheaper for a few) then Orcstein is a lot less viable seeming option. Plus his +2 STR is not worth much to him, so he's hit doubly, triply really because buying that 18 that is now a 16 means he's dropping other stats to do it.OTOH if there is no penalty then Orcstein is still not as good a wizard as Elfstein who pays for a 16 and gets an 18, but at least he's par on his ability to be a wizard. Sure, he's weird for an orc, but he's a PC, not your run of the mill orc.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="AbdulAlhazred, post: 5802499, member: 82106"] There is a difference. Say I give races that are strong a +2. Now, for a race that doesn't get a +2 they will be as good at being a fighter as most of the other races, and a few will be better. OTOH if a few weak races get a -2 then those races are worse fighters than almost all other races. People aren't too worried about playing a race that is as good as most of the other races for a given class. People will very rarely play one that is worse than 90% of the other races. One way is prescriptive, it says "hey, play this if you want to be the best at X", the other is proscriptive, it says "hey, don't play this, it isn't good enough to bother with." I don't think it is impossible to make a good system that has a few small penalties but if Orcstein has to buy an 18 INT just to get a 16 and every other race can have an 18 (even if its cheaper for a few) then Orcstein is a lot less viable seeming option. Plus his +2 STR is not worth much to him, so he's hit doubly, triply really because buying that 18 that is now a 16 means he's dropping other stats to do it. OTOH if there is no penalty then Orcstein is still not as good a wizard as Elfstein who pays for a 16 and gets an 18, but at least he's par on his ability to be a wizard. Sure, he's weird for an orc, but he's a PC, not your run of the mill orc. [/QUOTE]

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