Which 16 array would you recomend

[UngeheuerLich]

Put if this way: If you think a 16 primary stat is playable compared to a 20, then those secondary/tertiary differences are trivial.

and indeed, they more or less are...

problematic is having characters with too high attack vs too low defenses... it makes combats binary...

 

[ourchair]

The only thing I miss is the guy with the 18 STR and 4 INT. Those were fun characters. The thing is they were fun because most characters were bland. In my group with 4e I find there are few, if any, bland characters. They probably have "typical stats" for the race/class they are, but beyond that they're pretty interesting. Using the 4e standard arrays in 1e would be pretty blah. Different game with different emphasis I guess.

Although I'm a pretty low experienced player, I know what you mean.

I guess I kind of shot my point in the foot by talking about my own game with high stats, but in other games we've run, using bracketed plus-margins and the 3x4d6/drop lowest array... we've had similarly interesting results.

Like one guy had a DEX of 5, yet grew to become the BBEG in our Star Wars Saga Edition campaign. I'm surely going to cap downwards before rolling scores for our next game though.

 

[N0Man]

Restricting characters to 16's has the effect of heavily discouraging (or punishing) certain choices of races or builds.

Random rolls has the potential to prevent a player from being able to play the type or build of character they wanted to play because they weren't able to roll the right stat distribution to meet the requirements for it.

My advice is just use the default rules. You say you are used to 3E rules and not 4E rules, and it's a good idea to actually play the 4E rules before trying to tweak them.

The point buy, as presented, works fine. If you are worried about an 18 or 20 being too high in the game, keep in mind that paying for sacrificing more of the other stats.

For example, to start with a base of 18, that only allows you 6 points left to distribute which at most could only give you a total of +2 to your other Defenses.

By stopping at 16 instead of 18, more than doubles the number of points you can spend in other abilities instead (giving 13 instead of 6). This allows for up to +4 to your other defenses.

That's also ignoring the impact on various skills. The simple truth is, what you see as a too optimized character has to sacrifice considerably in order to get a high score. It balances itself out fine as is, and doesn't require any heavy-handed DM restrictions on what type of players they are allowed to play.

Unnecessary house rules that cut down on player options can be really frustrating to players.

 

[Garmorn]

Restricting characters to 16's has the effect of heavily discouraging (or punishing) certain choices of races or builds.

Random rolls has the potential to prevent a player from being able to play the type or build of character they wanted to play because they weren't able to roll the right stat distribution to meet the requirements for it.

My advice is just use the default rules. You say you are used to 3E rules and not 4E rules, and it's a good idea to actually play the 4E rules before trying to tweak them.
[/qoute]

This answer is one reason I came here before I even have gotten my group together. I needed this type of input.

[qoute]

That's also ignoring the impact on various skills. The simple truth is, what you see as a too optimized character has to sacrifice considerably in order to get a high score. It balances itself out fine as is, and doesn't require any heavy-handed DM restrictions on what type of players they are allowed to play.

Unnecessary house rules that cut down on player options can be really frustrating to players.

You need to read more carefully. Part of the reason on toning down the stats a bit was to assist me in running balanced encounters. I had no intentions on preventing or discouraging any character type.

I came here because previous experience and shown that stats over 16 are close to being a entire level greater in power. The responses here and on a couple of other treads have shown me the are not.

Your input is welcome because I had not know that some of the classes needed the high stats to work.

 

[Jhaelen]

My 3e anecdote regarding rolling for stats:

When one of my players asked me if he was allowed to roll 6x 4d6 for stats rather than using 28pt buy, I told him, it was fine by me, but if he found he didn't like his stats and wanted to reroll, he'd have to start one level lower (i.e. just as if the character had died and been resurrected).

He rolled, didn't like the stats, started one level lower than the rest and decided to use point buy ever since.

It's bad enough that 3e still recommends rolling for hit dice (though it has so far worked well for all but one player) rather than just using the average.