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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celtavian" data-source="post: 678912" data-attributes="member: 5834">Re32 pt is average to me. 28 is on the low end of average. I agree with this, high stats have a much greater impact at low levels making low level challenges much easier.The opposite is true at high levels, IMO. At high levels, if stats aren't magically enhanced, the characters will fail to defeat the challenges present before them.Considering that I don't much like magical stat enhancement, I prefer to have the characters already possess high stats. Even then, they often need stat enchancements to compete.Evil outsiders, dragons and other such creatures they fight at high level are very powerful. It makes the game difficult if the players don't have an optimal chance of survival.That is why I don't mind them being overpowered at low levels, because it will even at out at higher levels. I greatly prefer the high level game over the low level game. The adventures are by far more interesting at high level. This is a false assumption unless ones sole idea of a challenge is very simple combats involving nothing more than an exchange of rolls in an open combat field.For example, my group, all of them possessing stats that would make most EN world players puke, faced an enemy priest and his rogue forces. Not a single bit of this encounter was changed from the module. (If you have it, it is the Night Below Module. Ranchefus, Balrat, Wilmors, some zombies, and a single additional thief.) All the characters were 3rd level which is the recommended level for the encounter.They entire group set up a defensive position in room with a single door. The rogues flanked the doorway and readied to attack the first person entering the room. Ranchefus readied a hold spell to cast on the first person entering the room. The high statted PC's decided to rush the room. The first fighter was held, and the second fighter tried to push past him but was flanked and sneak attacked for nearly all his hit points. Suffice it to say that they were summarily repelled. They had to rethink their plans.This particular group is very powerful as well, yet they were defeated through good tactics on my part, the DM. All players, no matter their powerlevel, can be challenged by a good DM. Even if the NPC's are not equal to the PC's, the DM can use the environment to provide suitable addition to the challenge. This is not true at all. A low level wizard will survive better, a high level wizard will still die very easily. High level monsters are much stronger than they ever were before. No wizard can go toe to toe with say a giant or even an ogre and expect to survive.There low chance to hit would prolong the battle to the point where additional hit points does very little for said wizard. Whereas a barbarian or fighter could go toe to toe with a giant or an ogre, the balance between the barbarian hit points and base attack would allow him to survive.Remember, base attack must be taken into account along with hit points and Ac when determing the battle efficiency of a class.As far as Barbarian's skill set, they possess very few combat skills and will in no way outshine a fighter. Feats are much better than skills and often better than the barbarian's rage ability.Not one player in my gaming group has played a straight class melee. They always include a few levels of figher because battle feats are so important to being a melee combatant.Toughness is not a well-designed feat and does not increase survivabilty at low levels save versus very weak creatures such as Kobolds and goblins.For example, your average orcs strength bonus alone offsets the advantage of toughness. Should the advantage of a feat be offset by an average orcs melee abilities? Think about it, your average orc if he hits does 9 pts of melee damage. An average wizard or rogue with a 14 con (a fairly good con) will have 9 and 11 hit points respectively. The strength of many of these creatures in 3rd edition make Toughness a moot point to begin with.Skill Focus is still a very good skill. When I made a half-elf bard/rogue explorer, I took skill focus (disable device) and skill focus (search). Why? Even with an 18 intelligence, a search roll for an average glyph of warding is DC: 28. That means at first level if maxed out, I have a +9 roll. I need to roll a 19 to find an average glyph.My chances only improve by 1 per level. That means at 9th level, my total will be 12 skill, +4 intelligence, +1 half-elf. Now I need to roll an 11 or better at 9th level to find an average glyph. I still only have a 45% chance of finding an average glyph. If it is a greater glyph of warding, I have to roll a 14 or better to find it. That means I only have a 30% chance of finding an greater glyph. Let's not even talk about Symbols.I would say Skill Focus is still useful considering it improves my chances of finding traps by 10%. This statement I agree with, though I don't believe it is high stats that discourage good dungeoneering skills or the acquisition of useful feats such as Skill Focus.Magic items are the real culprit that ruin the game. Magic items provide utterly insane bonuses totally eliminating the need to take Skill Focus or Iron Will or some other feat that a person would rarely take.That is why I prefer to allow my players high stats and keep tight control of certain types of magic items. Lens of Detection pretty much allows a low level rogue to perform as if 10 levels highter than normal. Cloak and Boots of Elvenkind make scouting a joke. Ring of Free action ruins hold spells.I would rather have a fighter with a high wisdom have a better chance of making a saving throw, than have that same fighter wearing a Ring of Free Action. High stats do not ruin a game. They do not make creating a challenge hard for the DM. Magic items are more likely to destroy a game and create disparities between the players.A few good magic items or a single powerful magic item can really make a DM's life very hard. Yet, I don't see as many people harping on magic items as I see harping on stats. How were the PC's equipped? Did they have above average magic as well as above average stats?You may be right for inexperienced DM's, but even then I am not sure. I have been playing a longtime myself, and we have almost always run players with high stats.As a DM, I didn't have trouble challenging PC's with high stats. I had trouble challenging PC's with a great many magic items. I find players with potent magic far more difficult to challenge than players with high stats.  Young gamer's are probably always going to mess around testing the power level of the game. Heck, when I was young, I did plenty of the stupid things you hear young players doing: making gods, running super powered characters because you read too many comics, handing out every possible magic item just because it seems cool.They will grow out of it. For me, high stats are more an indication of a type of character. I do understand that heroes are defined by their actions, but there are different types of archetype heroes.Some can be made with low points, others cannot. For ezxample, no one here has argued that you can make a heroic archetype like Aragorn or Sir Launcelot with 32 points. Why? Because you know it can't be done.Such heroic archetypes would require a far greater number of points. They are the most powerful figures in their particular fantasy settings, and are the types of characters you would design a whole campaign around.My biggest problem with the point buy system is that the creation of such characters is not even included as an option. That is unfair to players would enjoy playing a character like Sir Launcelot or the many other heroes in the same ilk in the various fantasy books that many of us gamers like to read. That is the main reason why I view the point buy system as needing modification to include more options.32 points should not be considered the highest level of heroic play, period.</blockquote>

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