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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 7337394" data-attributes="member: 82106">That still means have your characters are 'unable to survive', which is of course ridiculous. You have pretty much the same chances of surviving with 6 12's in 1e as you do with the 'most likely array' (a 16, a 14, etc). I just don't believe Gygax. Sure, you can keep rerolling and using favorable methods, you could roll 3d6 until you got a paladin (I did it once, it used up several sheets of paper, 12 yr olds do strange things). Meh, characters of levels 1-3 that are making system shock rolls, and for whom it is critical what their 3rd or 4th choice spell was are already in a bad place. It will help you, SLIGHTLY. I mean, a couple 18s in say CON and DEX will basically be about as good as an extra level, which is nothing to sneeze at (at least at low levels), but even that's just shading the odds in your favor. It is far from being enough to call a character with the 16 and the 14 (or even just a couple 13s) 'unplayable'. Now, there's a DIFFERENT problem here with 1e. That problem is that, for casters at least, what is quite playable at low level is garbage at high level. A 12 INT wizard will do fine for the first half dozen levels, until spell level limits coupled with a narrow spell selection turns him into somewhat of a joke at higher levels. Actually, such a character is MUCH more on par with the average fighter than the wizard with a 16 INT. Even THAT wizard however is quite gimped above 15th level (not a big problem, but it kinda sucks to survive to that level range and then be denied the real goods).So, I can see Gary's point, if he's basically gotten to the point of starting people at level 5 and assuming all high level guys are basically casters, then maybe you want to just skip to the good stuff? He sure had a weird way of saying it...Anyway, for what it is worth, you've won the point on the PHB. I am sure we read that paragraph ONCE in 1978, laughed heartily (or scratched our heads) and went on with things.</blockquote>

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