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Message: <blockquote data-quote="FormerlyHemlock" data-source="post: 7145528" data-attributes="member: 6787650">If you don't like "upset", can we agree on "is turned off by"? I want to avoid a semantic argument and focus on the substantive.I'm interested in hearing how you think think a campaign would be "severely" warped by having an all-18s character in it, in any substantive way besides stat-envy. My experience is thus: in terms of the PCs' ability to solve challenges, high stat rolls have a minor effect on the campaign (PCs may perform as if 20-25% higher in level or so), while skilled players have a gigantic effect which dwarfs stat rolls. This isn't true for all games but it has been the case with my entire 5E experience.If one or more players in the party happens to roll a bunch of 18s, but the player is of only average skill, the DM can basically ignore it and just run the same adventures he would otherwise run, and the PCs will do about as well as they otherwise would. Sure, maybe the Barbarian has 12 more HP at 6th level than a typical Barbarian, and +1 to AC, but the PCs still have to solve the Sphinx's riddle because they can't defeat the Iron Golem (despite all those 18s), and they still can't defeat 80 gnolls so a PC still has to defeat the Gnoll Chieftain in single combat--the all 18s Barbarian will do that easily, but a typical PC will still do it handily, and only a very rare PC group would consist entirely of PCs who are unable to defeat him at all. So, the effect of the 18s on the adventure is pretty minor.Contrast this with what happens when you run a group of players who are deeply savvy about the 5E ruleset, e.g. every single PC is Mobile and Stealth-proficient and Perception-proficient and familiar with the mounted combat rules, and the party is 75% range-specialized with 25% dual-specialized in both melee and ranged combat. Now the party has options they didn't have before: they can kill the Iron Golem and/or the Sphinx, bypassing the riddle entirely, and they can engage the whole gnoll tribe in a series of mounted skirmishes (with backup mounts pre-placed at strategic locations) and degrade the gnolls until they break. The additional player savvy has a major effect on the adventure, to the point where you have to either start writing more sophisticated adventures which anticipate sophisticated players, or you have to just relax and enjoy players stomping all over standard adventures. (This BTW is why I have little use for most published adventures--they don't work as advertised vs. savvy play.)I presume that you, @<a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/member.php?u=407" target="_blank">Seule</a>, have some other standard in mind for judging "severe warp", and I'd like to hear more about it.</blockquote>

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