Ahnehnois
First Post
I'm inclined to agree.But where do you stop? Space Opera, for example, broke the character down into Physique (physical size), Strength (pure physical power), Constitution physical toughness), Agility (balance and extended balance), Dexterity (fine motor skill), Empathy (ability to read and relate to another's emotions), Intelligence (mental agility and acuity), Psionics (what it says), Intuition (ability to come to a valid conclusion, devoid of real evidence), Bravery (again, what it says), Leadership (ability to have others do as you want), GTA (general technical ability), MechA (mechanical aptitude), and ElecA (electrical aptitude). There's a rationale for all of them and for the many stats that were derived from them. I can tell you that the complexity definitely impacted playability though.
While the sacred cows of the 6 attributes shouldn't necessarily be considered sacrosanct, I also don't see a pressing need to break them out into more. Playability is key and the more complexity that is added, the less playable the game becomes.
So my point was this, *if* you're going to redo ability scores, start from scratch, don't just tweak Wis and Cha. And carefully consider the ripple effect of any such changes.
Personally, I'm okay with them as they are. (Though, like I said early on, optional subabilities were an interesting rule).