D&D 5E When Are Ability Scores Used?

[DND_Reborn]

I was able to see the range of human ability in them in a way that -5 to +5 just could never evoke.

I like to think of the modifiers as "standard deviations", since as a statistician that works for me.

As I also liked playing Vampire/Werewolf back in the day, the dots in those games represent the equivalent of -1, 0, +1, +2, +3 for me. Since D&D B/X started with -3 to +3 modifier, that works for me as well.

In AD&D, since the scores from 7-14 are "more-or-less" sort of "equal", I felt it was too broad, but I could appreciate the idea that "most people" are basically "average"--even if low-average or high-average, still average.

 

[cbwjm]

Instances are so few that we might as well use only modifiers instead and ditch the scores.

It would be an easy change to make, rolling the dice just creates your range of modifiers, no need to note the total score. Armour or multiclassing then just needs a minimum modifier. A few games that have evolved from DnD/d20 have taken the modifiers and ditched the scores, such as mutants and masterminds and ICRPG (I'm pretty sure they dropped some abilities as well).

 

[DND_Reborn]

It would be an easy change to make, rolling the dice just creates your range of modifiers, no need to note the total score.

That's what I'm thinking, but using a different method.

 

[Horwath]

It would be an easy change to make, rolling the dice just creates your range of modifiers, no need to note the total score. Armour or multiclassing then just needs a minimum modifier. A few games that have evolved from DnD/d20 have taken the modifiers and ditched the scores, such as mutants and masterminds and ICRPG (I'm pretty sure they dropped some abilities as well).

I can see it easily applied into dnd and character creation.

since we now have universal ASI's at character creation in +2/+1 or +1/+1/+1 we can ditch those and have modified pointbuy/default array.

I.E.

+3,+2,+2,+1,+1,+0

or point buy:

-2: -1 pt: optional
-1 : 0 pts
+0: 1 pt
+1: 2 pts
+2: 3 pts
+3: 5 pts
+4: 8 pts: optional

pool: 16pts