D&D (2024) What should be ability score cap for standard PCs?

[Krachek]

14 for you, 25 for me.

Why? Because I am both petty and old school. But I repeat myself.

Indeed 25 was the kind of score for mighty character in old time.
So 25 should be the cap!

 

[Charlaquin]

I like the 20 cap. 18 is the highest you can roll on 3d6 (or 3d6 drop lowest), and species/background ASI can increase that to 20, so 20 is the “natural” cap. Makes sense to me. Not a big fan of the 19th level feat letting you get to 22. There’s already enough pressure to get your primary score to 20, let’s not incentivize spending more than half your feats on ASIs.

 

[Hayato]

I do dislike the 22 cap. It's break even more the "bounded accuracy" philosophy. That's why I do dislike the barbarian cap. That's said, I do think the Heavy Armor should increase to 19 AC and Medium Armor to 18 AC. Str should be more resilient than Dex and 2 AC is better represent than only 1 point.

 

[gametaku]

Best option: Removed ability scores.
Second best: max 13 as this will cause the modifiers to be more even.

 

[NaturalZero]

I like the idea of 22 being the cap for symmetry's sake. The untrained peak human with a 22 gets +6 to a roll and the average Joe with a 10 gets +6 if he's the most proficient. I'm fine with it staying 20 though.

I also strongly prefer going to back to the 3.5/4e paradigm where you just get feats and ASIs without having to choose between better math on your character sheet and special spells or moves. Anything that moves us away from "math goes brrrrr" and towards distinct actions and features is an improvement.

 

[Mirrorrorrim]

I'm really curious about something. Would it really be broken if you got both? How about this:

• ASI's are no longer a Feat.
• Feats no longer have the +1 ASI's built into them at all. They are only balanced against each other and without ASI's, they just broaden your functionality.
• You get both the two +1 ASI's and a Feat at the universal ASI levels. No choosing.
• Fighter bonus feats still happen, but they won't be ASI's.

 

[Vaalingrade]

I'm really curious about something. Would it really be broken if you got both? How about this:

• ASI's are no longer a Feat.
• Feats no longer have the +1 ASI's built into them at all. They are only balanced against each other and without ASI's, they just broaden your functionality.
• You get both the two +1 ASI's and a Feat at the universal ASI levels. No choosing.
• Fighter bonus feats still happen, but they won't be ASI's.

I approve of this message.

 

[mellored]

4 or 5.

As in simplify of the whole d20 + proficiency + (( ability - 10) / 2 ).

 

[Ulorian - Agent of Chaos]

I'm really curious about something. Would it really be broken if you got both? How about this:

• ASI's are no longer a Feat.
• Feats no longer have the +1 ASI's built into them at all. They are only balanced against each other and without ASI's, they just broaden your functionality.
• You get both the two +1 ASI's and a Feat at the universal ASI levels. No choosing.
• Fighter bonus feats still happen, but they won't be ASI's.

I have been doing exactly this for years.

 

[Horwath]

I'm really curious about something. Would it really be broken if you got both? How about this:

• ASI's are no longer a Feat.
• Feats no longer have the +1 ASI's built into them at all. They are only balanced against each other and without ASI's, they just broaden your functionality.
• You get both the two +1 ASI's and a Feat at the universal ASI levels. No choosing.
• Fighter bonus feats still happen, but they won't be ASI's.

I would just add +1 ASI to all feats, if feat already has +1 ASI, those two have to go to different ability,
that way if you start with 17 in your primary, you still need 3 feats to get to 20.
Or just 1 feat if you reduce ability cap to 18.