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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5751474" data-attributes="member: 42582">I think that one answer to this was given upthread.In D&D, especially (but not only) 4e, a PC without a strong primary stat is significantly weakened in the core play of the game. If that primary stat is not a mental stat, then of necessity the PC - if strong in core play - is going to be weaker in one or more of the mental stats.This means, that if one wants to play a strong-in-core but non-primary-mental-stat PC, and one wants to be able to play that PC as witty, clever, charming, etc, one has to accept a certain looseness between mental stats and roleplay.Now it might be objected that the same argument goes through for a strong-in-core but non-primary-physical stat PC. But the two cases are not parallel: playing D&D is not generally an opportunity to be strong, healthy, quick etc, but it clearly is an opportunity to be witty, clever, charming, etc. Having my PC be weak or slow is a penalty purely to action resolution. But if my low-mental-stat PC has to be played without cleverness, wit or charm than that is also a penalty not just to action resolution but a burden on my participaition in the social activity of the game.My own preferred "solution" to this mental stat issue is the one I mentioned way upthread - structure investigations, social encounters etc in such a way that skill checks, preferably mulitple skill checks, are needed (which the weaker-statted PC will be less likely to succeed at) and then build consequences and complications around the results of those skill checks. This then will yield an in-play difference between the PCs with and without CHA and social skills without requiring the 8 or 10 INT/CHA PC to play in "Thog is a dumb a-hole" mode.For me this is a practical issue, not just a theoretical one - I have a 10 CHA but Diplomacy-trained wizard, an 8 INT ranger-cleric and an 8 INT fighter-cleric in my game. The method I describe above absolutely yields a difference in play between the various PCs based on their social and knowledge skills, without requiring anyone to play in a way that vitiates the expression of personal wit, cleverness or charm.EDIT TO ADD: One way of thinking of this approach is that it tends to treat mental stats and skills as player resources rather than PC traits/resources - investing in these doesn't necessarily change the character of the PC as expressed via roleplaying, but rather increases the prospects of the player succeeding when s/he has his/her PC engage a situation by deploying cleverness, wit or charm.</blockquote>

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