The new point-buy?

[small pumpkin man]

I really wish they'd go just point-for-point.

Didn't we recently go through the serious problems with one for one point buy? It specifically hinders people who want to create more well rounded or off achetype characters, and encourages characters having multiple dump stats.

(Okay, yes, chances are you were in that thread arguing with me about it)

 

[FitzTheRuke]

Point for point would have everyone running around with at least one 18 and a bunch of crap stats.

Personally I prefer Maxed out stats as a rarity, but I've long since been beat down by the increasing level of munchkinism in the D&D community..

Fitz

 

[Ondo]

I thought it had been settled earlier that it was a 32-pt buy (starting from 8's) with a slightly different counting scheme than 3.x?

Sure, it was settled, but then people saw the PHB and found out that was wrong.

but didn't the pre-gen responsible admit that he had forgotten a point on one or two of the characters?

IIRC, he specifically said the stats were right. Then a bit later he admitted there were a few mistakes on the characters, but all in their favor.

Working from 5 10s and an 8, the KotS characters have a +6, +4, +3, +2, +2, +1.

I'm assuming going from +0 to +1 costs one point, as does going from +1 to +2.

Corrin has a +6, +4, +4, +2, +1, +0. Compared to KotS characters that's increasing one +3 to a +4 and then dropping a +2 to a +1 and a +1 to a +0, so going from +3 to +4 costs 2 points.

Erais has a +6, +4, +2, +2, +2, +2. Compared to KotS characters that's dropping a +3 to a +2 and increasing a +1 to a +2, so going from +2 to +3 costs one point.

Kathra has a +6, +6, +2, +2, +0, +0. Compared to Erais that's increasing a +4 to a +6, and dropping two +2s to +0s. So going from +4 to +6 costs 4 points.

Riardon has a +6, +4, +4, +2, +1, +0. Same as Corrin.

Skamos has a +8, +4, +1, +0, +0, +0. Compared to KotS characters that's increasing a +6 to a +8, then dropping a +3 and two +2s to +0s. So going from +6 to +8 costs 7 points.

Tira has a +6, +5, +4, +1, +0, +0. Compared to Corrin that's increasing one +4 to a +5, and dropping a +2 to a +0, so going from +4 to +5 costs 2 points.

So the table should be:

+0     0
+1     1
+2     2
+3     3
+4     5
+5     7
+6     9
+7     (12?)
+8     16

Unfortunately, this means the characters work out to 22 points, rather than 25, so it appears to be wrong. In fact, I think I just replicated Totoro's reasoning for the 32 point buy, just with 10 less points due to 5 of the stats starting at 10.

 

[beverson]

Sure, it was settled, but then people saw the PHB and found out that was wrong.

IIRC, he specifically said the stats were right. Then a bit later he admitted there were a few mistakes on the characters, but all in their favor.

I'm still trying to find a link, but I'm almost positive that a WotC staffer confirmed that the pregen characters don't use the standard PHB methods - they used an array to speed up creation.

 

[MindWanderer]

I'm still trying to find a link, but I'm almost positive that a WotC staffer confirmed that the pregen characters don't use the standard PHB methods - they used an array to speed up creation.

Which would suck, meaning that the pregen arrays are weaker than point-buys. Arrays should be at least as good, if not slightly better, than custom builds.

 

[Lanefan]

Still doesn't answer my question about such things: how do you achieve a character with one or more stats *lower* than 8 without making the obviously-suboptimal choice (officially a sin in 4e) to just throw away the stat point(s)? Wisdom, for example, is far more fun to play when it has a 7 or a 6 next to it...

I'll roll every time, thanks.

Lanefan

 

[Oldtimer]

Might work out that way, but I think it was a simple cost for increase, something like
+1 1 pt
+2 2 pt
+6 8 pt
+10 16 pt

These are not the numbers. It covered the full range, but gave the total cost for the stat bump. Thus it cost more to bump the 8 to a 16 than to bump a 10 to 16.

Sorry I didn't take notes on the chart.

I realized that another possibility is that the bump itself has the cost, ie the cost to go from 8 to 14 is the same as the cost to go from 10 to 16. In that case the table would look like this:

+1     1 pt
+2     2 pt
+3     4 pt
+4     6 pt
+5     8 pt
+6    10 pt
+7    14 pt
+8    18 pt

It still can't explain Kathra and Erais. They are still both short one point.

 

[Burr]

From the reports from the PHB Viewing we've learned that point-buy assumes you start with the array 10,10,10,10,10,8 and add 25 points to that.

Since this can't be using the normal point-buy table, I set out to find the new one. This is what I found:

 8 -> 9        1 point
 9 -> 10       1 point
10 -> 11       1 point
11 -> 12       1 point
12 -> 13       2 points
13 -> 14       2 points
14 -> 15       2 points
15 -> 16       2 points
16 -> 17       4 points
17 -> 18       4 points

It works out to 25 points for the standard array (16,14,13,12,11,10) used in the KotS pre-gens and also explains the stats for all the pre-gens from DDXP, except Kathra and Erias (only 24 points for them), but didn't the pre-gen responsible admit that he had forgotten a point on one or two of the characters?

So... comments?

Then I could take 17,15,12,11,10,8; and at almost all levels I would feel better on average (up till then) than the 18,14,10,10,8 guy, due to how people are saying the bonus stat levels are said to run*. Yeah, he'd have one more of the top stat half the time; but my top 2 stats totaled, top 3 stats totaled, and top 4 stats totaled would be all be better. Would this be a system mastery issue, or do you think it's just reflective of my own preferences?

*Last I heard (though I can't find it now), it was +1 to two different stats at 4, 8, 14, 18,... and +1 to all stats at 11 and 21. If that is wrong, however cool it may sound, I'd love to be corrected.

 

[mach1.9pants]

Still doesn't answer my question about such things: how do you achieve a character with one or more stats *lower* than 8 without making the obviously-suboptimal choice (officially a sin in 4e) to just throw away the stat point(s)? Wisdom, for example, is far more fun to play when it has a 7 or a 6 next to it...

I'll roll every time, thanks.

Lanefan

I've always done for every 2 points you go below the 8 you get one to put else where..lots of CHA 4 PCs in 3E

 

[keterys]

To be honest, I'm not sure that characters with scores lower than 8 -should- be adventuring. We look the other way and joke about it, but you're making the character have the equivalent of a debilitating mental handicap.

A character with a charisma of 4 is probably at the point where they shouldn't really be capable of conversing... and all to get a couple points?

Once you take a stat below an 8, I don't think there needs to be a mechanical benefit.