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<blockquote data-quote="Jer" data-source="post: 7629943" data-attributes="member: 19857">I mean, &quot;Method 0&quot; in the sense that IIRC Gygax explicitly pleaded with the reader to NOT USE THIS METHOD to generate characters because it's just terrible for AD&amp;D.&nbsp; 3d6 in order works fine for OD&amp;D, where there were a handful of basic classes and stats mostly gave some minor bonuses (though truly awful stats in your class prime requisite would mean that you had to earn a lot more XP to advance than everyone else, and excellent stats in the same meant you were advancing much faster).&nbsp; Once the ideas of stat minimums to playing certain types of characters and bundling all kinds of extra goodies into the stats were introduced, 3d6 down the line became the absolute worst.&nbsp; Especially because so many of those gates required above average stats (it wasn't quite so bad in Basic/Expert where the Elf, Dwarf and Halfling were gated behind a stat requirement of 9+).To this day I'm not certain where the love for 3d6 down the line comes from - I don't know if it's because so many of us &quot;actually&quot; played Basic D&amp;D and added in AD&amp;D stuff as we went, or if it's because a lot of folks cut their teeth on AD&amp;D 2e rather than 1e (where IIRC 3d6 down the line was not as explicitly called out as a horrible thing to do as Gygax did in 1e, though my books aren't handy so I can't check).&nbsp; Either way, I was so happy when the idea of point buy and later stat arrays became the defacto norm for D&amp;D.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Jer, post: 7629943, member: 19857"] I mean, "Method 0" in the sense that IIRC Gygax explicitly pleaded with the reader to NOT USE THIS METHOD to generate characters because it's just terrible for AD&D. 3d6 in order works fine for OD&D, where there were a handful of basic classes and stats mostly gave some minor bonuses (though truly awful stats in your class prime requisite would mean that you had to earn a lot more XP to advance than everyone else, and excellent stats in the same meant you were advancing much faster). Once the ideas of stat minimums to playing certain types of characters and bundling all kinds of extra goodies into the stats were introduced, 3d6 down the line became the absolute worst. Especially because so many of those gates required above average stats (it wasn't quite so bad in Basic/Expert where the Elf, Dwarf and Halfling were gated behind a stat requirement of 9+). To this day I'm not certain where the love for 3d6 down the line comes from - I don't know if it's because so many of us "actually" played Basic D&D and added in AD&D stuff as we went, or if it's because a lot of folks cut their teeth on AD&D 2e rather than 1e (where IIRC 3d6 down the line was not as explicitly called out as a horrible thing to do as Gygax did in 1e, though my books aren't handy so I can't check). Either way, I was so happy when the idea of point buy and later stat arrays became the defacto norm for D&D. [/QUOTE]

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