What's the big deal with point buy?

[airwalkrr]

Stats under 8 I've never ever seen in a die rolled character because dice tend to fall off the table when that happens. Characters who wind up with sixes IME, are pretty much automatically rerolled.

This is a point I've seen you make several times now. I think it is quite possible that the way your groups have been handling rolling (what I would essentially call cheating; if you are gonna call a die cocked or off the table just cuz you don't like it, why are you even rolling?) has led you to believe it creates more powerful (hence powergamed) characters. I realize the crux of your arguments hasn't been that rolled characters are too powerful, but you have said that you believe rolling encourages powergaming more than point buy.

It seems to me that when your groups roll, they are quite "generous" in the rolling method and this often results in very powerful characters with ability scores much higher than would be attainable by most point buy methods. This would suggest that consequently you have built up an association between rolled characters and over-overpowered characters.

I would put to you that when my characters roll, they actually roll and take the good with the bad. For my current campaign, one of the former players (he moved away a few months ago) had rolled a 5 for one of his ability scores. He put the 5 into Charisma, played a half-orc (a rogue no less), and pushed it to a 3. He then took a flaw that gave him -2 to any ability score and put it into Charisma. Normally, I would see this as min/maxing and tell the player to choose another flaw. But I was rather amused at the fact that touch of idiocy was essentially a guaranteed one-hit "kill" for this character (not to mention Charisma damage in general) so I allowed it. It turned out that the Charisma score of 1 was detrimental to the character on more than one occassion. Besides being hideously ugly, devoid of all social skill whatsoever, and the ubiquitous black sheep of the party, Charisma damage came up several times in his adventuring career, much to his dismay. Had we used point buy, he probably would have had a 6 Charisma and such situations would not have threatened him quite so much.

Anyway, my point is that my players must keep the rolls they receive. Pulling a lemming is deeply frowned upon (as it should be in any group of mature gamers). If you use a rolling method that is too forgiving then of course you will develop the perception that rolled characters tend to be too powerful.

 

[Hussar]

but you have said that you believe rolling encourages powergaming more than point buy.

No, that is incorrect. I never said that. What I said was that rolling and point buy equally encourage powergaming. The fact that your prime candidate is purely powergamed pretty much shows my point. People will put their highest stat in the place that most benefits them. That's pretty much universal. I never said that "rolled characters tend to be powerful". However, the fact that three of your four characters, in your own words, are 35+ point buy characters would tend to support this.

I'm sure there are groups out there that enforce one set of rolls and force people to play what they rolled. Me, I would never force a player to play a character he didn't like.

 

[airwalkrr]

No, that is incorrect. I never said that. What I said was that rolling and point buy equally encourage powergaming. The fact that your prime candidate is purely powergamed pretty much shows my point. People will put their highest stat in the place that most benefits them. That's pretty much universal. I never said that "rolled characters tend to be powerful". However, the fact that three of your four characters, in your own words, are 35+ point buy characters would tend to support this.

I'm sure there are groups out there that enforce one set of rolls and force people to play what they rolled. Me, I would never force a player to play a character he didn't like.

Ooops. My bad. I just went back and checked and it was another poster who had said that.

At any rate, I'd like to talk semantics for just a second. I think it is important to distinguish here what you mean by "encourage powergaming." I think it is very clear that point buy encourages powergaming, at least in the sense of character planning, more than rolling. That is hardly even arguable because point buy is by definition not random and therefore more subject to character choice, and hence planning, while rolling is by definition random and therefore limits your character planning options to those available from the roll. For instance, with a point buy, you can plan to have X feat by Y level because you can set your starting scores at the minimum necessary to get that feat by that level. If said feat is a prerequisite for a prestige class, then you will be able to know you can take Z prestige class by YY level. And so on.

Other posters have commented on the fact that players often plan their characters from level 1 to 20 in 3e and I think that is often true. Perhaps point buy does not encourage munchkinism (that is, exploiting loopholes in the game, favoring numbers over everything else, etc.), but it certainly does promote character planning, which I think is at least an element of powergaming.

And a quick word on powergaming too. I consider myself a powergamer, but only in the sense that I tend to optimize certain parts of a character. However, I rarely do so to play to the character's strengths, rather I build characters with strengths that are unusual for their character type. For instance, I play a Living Greyhawk character with a 16 Strength, a 16 Con, a 13 Int, Power Attack and Improved Toughness. Guessed the character class yet? It's wizard? 7th level wizard and no other classes. The character happens to be a very good fighter, although not as good of a fighter as an actual fighter would be, but very good nonetheless, and he can still cast his highest level spells using a headband of intellect +2. So the character is powergamed for fighting, but as a wizard, not a fighter. Many of my characters tend to follow a similar theme because I find that fun to play. This has little to do with the point buy argument. I am simply saying that I powergame to an extent and I do not consider it a bad thing. But there is a mentality among some players to create an invincible character (usually newer players IME if that can be believed) and that is usually based on twinking out every little bit of the rules and finding every possible angle to cover every single contingency. Such a thing makes the game unfun because then it really isn't much of a game. Your character has already prepared for every contingency so that randomness doesn't affect you. With things like the luck and destiny domain and fatespinner levels, you can even prevent the occassional '1' from setting you back, and as long as you only fail your saving throws on a 1. As a DM, what is the point for me to run a game when the numbers already dictate that my players will win and they don't even need to rely on thinking clearly to achieve that goal. Even the BBEG of this dungeon can't hit the fighter's AC without a 20. *Yawn* I guess you guys just win. There isn't much of a point. Point buy encourages the type of character planning that leads to such "invincible" characters because it makes character planning easier and more precise. Of course that doesn't mean you can't plan with rolled scores, but rolled scores do not always give you exactly what you want. When they do it's awesome, and your character is awesome. That's fine because such characters are rare. But when the rolls don't go your way, you have to come up with a build that is probably less than optimal and probably requires you to wait a little longer than you'd like in some cases to pick up a certain feat or prestige class.

 

[wayne62682]

Jeez, with all the arguments I'm tempted to say let's all just use the Elite Array and be done with it.. since after all the game was balanced around that

 

[drothgery]

This is a point I've seen you make several times now. I think it is quite possible that the way your groups have been handling rolling (what I would essentially call cheating; if you are gonna call a die cocked or off the table just cuz you don't like it, why are you even rolling?) has led you to believe it creates more powerful (hence powergamed) characters. I realize the crux of your arguments hasn't been that rolled characters are too powerful, but you have said that you believe rolling encourages powergaming more than point buy.

I think it's human nature to favor rerolling bad rolls more than good ones when there are judgement calls to be made. And unless one does all of one's rolling on an electronic device, or maybe in a dice tray, dice are going to sometimes land places where judgement calls must be made.

I've never -- in multiple groups in multiple states run by people who never knew each other -- played in a game where the method for rolling stats wasn't somewhat more generous than the default 4d6 drop lowest, arrange to taste. The groups I played 2e with in college allowed ones on the die to be rerolled. The group I play with now allows three sets of rolls straight-out. Both had far higher standards for a "hopeless" character than the default, especially if most of the players ended up with extraordinarily good rolls.

Both of those effects mean typical rolled characters, in my experience, aren't 29-point characters (which probability based on straight-up rolling would indicate), they're 32+ point characters. Now, that's fine; there's nothing wrong with high stats (there is something wrong with big stat disparities among characters -- that's why I'm a point buy advocate). But it does mean the possibility of low stats isn't a good defense for why rolling is good.

 

[Crothian]

Stats under 8 I've never ever seen in a die rolled character because dice tend to fall off the table when that happens. Characters who wind up with sixes IME, are pretty much automatically rerolled.

Ah, see when I'm talking about rolling I'm refering to honest rolling and not what I would consider border line cheating of rerolls and dice getting knocked off the table.

 

[HeapThaumaturgist]

For me, all of the rolling "systems" I've played (again, multiple years over multiple states and multiple groups, from the first days of 2nd ed to today) ended up not being perfectly "true" to what was in the book.

My most powerfully statted character, that particular group had a Roll 4d6 Eight Times, Reroll Ones, Drop Lowest Die, Drop Two Lowest Totals ... so, really, all of the PCs ended up about 33-35 points and my guy was at least in the 40s ... 18, 17, 17, 15, 14, 14 ... 63 points? Ftr/Pal/DD. I probably should have played a monk with that array, just to suck it up a little for everybody else.

I want to play a paladin ... I just used Irony's dice server to serve up a normal roll (4d6x6, drop lowest) and got these numbers ... 15, 8, 12, 14, 15, 9 ... that's 27 points.
15 str
8 Dex
14 Con
9 Int
12 Wis
15 Cha

Now, 25 point buy (what should be an equitable point buy)
14 Str
10 Dex
14 Con
9 Int
12 Wis
14 Cha

Is the second character more powergamed? He's got fewer points, but +6 instead of +5 in total stat bonus! I'd play both of them. At 1st level the second character has an edge because I could "do more" with my fewer points by buying evens instead of odds ... at 4th level the rolled paladin breaks ahead and stays there through the rest of the career. The second character really is more mediocre. At 8th level I'll have probably spent my 2 adds in Con or Cha to reach 16 in one stat while the first will have blossomed into two 16s. I'd, honestly, RATHER have the first character than the second character, since no amount of evening and finangling will get me 2 more points to play with.

I don't get the value judgements being made. If starting at 1st level would I be a better person to choose the rolled character? What if I were coming into a game at 8th level, would I still be a better person for choosing the rolled character?

If playing 28 point buy, would I be a better person to volunteer to take 27 points just for the sake of real-roleplayer manliness? Am I superior if I make half my stats odd numbers?

Seriously, where's the moral value located at?

--fje

 

[Crothian]

Seriously, where's the moral value located at?

Not everything has a moral value.

 

[HeapThaumaturgist]

Not everything has a moral value.

Many people use arguments like "increases powergaming" as moralist arguments against point buy.

I don't see it, morally or logically.

--fje

 

[airwalkrr]

Many people use arguments like "increases powergaming" as moralist arguments against point buy.

I don't see it, morally or logically.

--fje

I don't think anyone has every said "increases powergaming." My contention is that it encouages powergaming. It by no means guarantees or increases it in an absolute sense, merely provides yet one more encouragement to the player to plan out his character from day 1.

Incidentally, I will be using the organic roll method from the DMG for my next campaign, although players will probably be allowed to permanently spend action points to reroll an ability or swap a pair of abilities.