What is the standard ability score set? Are most games playing too high?

[Emirikol]

So, if 25 is the "standard point buy" then scenarios in DUNGEON ET AL should be geared towards the following:

1st level: 15 (+2), 14 (+2), 13 (+1), 12(+1), 10 (+0), 8 (-1) = Total bonus of +5
4th level: Total bonus of +10 (with magic items)
8th level: Total bonus of +15 (with magic items)

I'm not a magic item guy..does that advancement seem right? The NPC's don't advance that fast, but they also have different wealth by level right?

I wonder why so many groups have trouble playing scenarios from DUNGEON with super high ability scores and more magic.

jh

 

[Keldryn]

28.58

Oops. I remembered it was higher than the "standard" 25 points, anyway.

Unless I was thinking of a thread elsewhere. It doesn't look like his experiment was dropping any characters that didn't meet the minimum 13 or higher and/or total bonuses of +1. Although that probably makes up a pretty small percentage of those characters generated.

 

[Emirikol]

25 is standard, I usually go 26 and have had no issues except whining players. They think anything below 30 is a severe handicap.

You must be one of those meenie DM's http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?p=3446589#post3446589

I suppose it's been tradition to actually have "higher" stats because there never was any kind of standard until 3.x right?



jh

 

[Emirikol]

Maybe if 25 was set as the standard and ability scores advanced a little more often than every 4 levels, people would rely more on them. Of course the math would certainly get more interesting.
jh

 

[Rhun]

My point buy games are always 32+. I like my heroes heroic.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I use 25 point buys in all my games, as I recall.

 

[Peni Griffin]

If players have trouble with a scenario designed for people with lower stats and less magic than they have, it's either a poorly-designed scenario, or they aren't playing it well.

We always do stats based on die rolls. Bring on that random element! But the ability scores we get don't really make that much difference in our effectiveness or enjoyment of the game. For instance, we are currently playing two campaigns. One player started a character in game A with, hand on my heart, three legally-rolled 18s and only one stat with no bonus. In game B he started with a single stat that had a bonus and one stat with a penalty. In game A he's a high-powered wizard who blows things away, lives a life of luxury between adventures, and can talk the hind leg off a donkey. In Game B, he's the world's bravest rogue, who sneaks alone into the lair of the enemy, backstabs grizzly bears, and inspires the populace with rousing speeches. (The population of Drellin's Ferry have got it into their heads that the entire party consists of paladins, and this guy isn't doing anything to disabuse them of the notion.)

The louder people whine about their stats, or their equipment, or their builds, the less likely they are to play worth a darn. Energy spent complaining is energy not invested in the game.

I can't get anybody else to get behind this idea, but I've always kind of wanted to run in a campaign set in a caste-based society, where you got your stats by whatever method the DM prefers and then generated your class randomly. As in a real caste society, you'd have to do the best you could with your natural talents regardless of what role your society forced you into. I think such a campaign would bring out the best in a good set of players, once they got over the routine griping. I think it'd also be interesting to see how it changed the way people arranged their ability stats.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

I like 25 point buy. Easy to DM, since you can use monsters straight out of the books as opponents, and it shows players how characters can be more than just their stats.

Heroic acts have nothing to do with metagame numbers on a sheet of paper.

 

[MerricB]

The game is balanced around 25-point buy characters (the array 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8). However, most games use higher points.

Cheers!

 

[wayne62682]

That is supposedly the standard, but I doubt it. Most of the new adventures seem to be WAY overpowered for an Elite Array, Core-only, 4 PC group. Same with most of the ones in Dungeon (and IIRC they said this was intentional as they assume you WON'T be using Core only and so scale up the encounters to allow for other non-core classes).

Sometime in the near future I want to conduct a small experiment.. run some "playtesters" through a newer module with the Four Iconics (i.e. Tordek, Mialee, Lidda and Jozan) and see how they hold up. I will prove one of three things: 1) The adventures aren't tested at all; 2) They're tested, but not with what they tell us is the "default" (my hypothesis); or 3) At least one of the modules is tested with the "default" and it thus serves as a good "normal" baseline.