You primary stat should never be lower than 18

[Rith the Wanderer]

Saying that an 18 in your main attack stat is completely necessary to not lose is an exaggeration, but it is much more useful than it was in 3e. Yeah, you gain half your level to attacks, but enemies gain their level to defenses. Go through the MM and calculate what a character with an who started with an 18 and put points in it whenever possible, items of that monsters level, proficiency bonus if applicable, and add half the monsters level rounding down. This gives you about a 10 or 11 to hit, plus or minus a couple points depending on what defenses you'll be attacking (will defense will usually have a better chance, AC on soldiers and Fort on brutes will almost always have less).

If you did this with a 3e fighter looking at it's first or second attacks, you'd have at least 90%, probably a 100%. It would probably end up around 60% total over all four attacks, but that would be because the last one would always miss. The difference is your still doing damage every turn, where in 4e your not, you've just got the one attack and you better hit with it.

Having those two less points means a 5% higher miss chance for the rest of your characters career. This is almost never worth whatever you would put those 5 point buy points into. It is much more likely that it would be worth those extra 7 points if you are doing it organically (no race bonus) especially considering you've already spent a good amount just to get to the 16.

 

[Nifft]

In the core?

In the SRD, sure.

Is that so? Are you talking about situational bonuses from positioning and so on? Class powers? Magic bonuses?

Just in the PHB, without bothering to get magic items (which frequently stack), you can get these to add to your attack roll:
- Morale bonuses (Bardic music, spells)
- Rage (+4 Str = +2 to attack)
- Weapon Focus
- Weapon enhancement (greater magic weapon)
- Luck (divine favor)
- Insight
- Haste

At high level in 3e, it's easy to buy your way to a decent attack bonus. You cannot do this in 4e.

Cheers, -- N

 

[phil500]

So: 4e has fewer bonuses, fewer bonus types, smaller overall bonuses, and you as a player have less "granularity" in terms of spending bonuses.

Basically 4e keeps things really tight around the d20. your to hit wont change much between 1st and 30th level.

thats why the cleric at will seems broken. if you roll with 18 strength, at level 1 you are handing out +4 to hit, by level 30 you are handing out +9 to melee attacks. seems to me people will wait for this to land before trying their melee dailies, and the cleric will become a bit of a spambot.

 

[mach1.9pants]

If you are a min/maxer yes you should have 18+ in your primary ability score.

Same as every edition.

But 4E is the first edition that guarantees an 18 as the standard.

 

[Benly]

I would say it should never be lower than 18 without a good reason.

If you have a specific reason in mind, it can often be much better to have a 16 or 17 in your main (including any racial bonuses) and high secondary abilities. However, without such a reason and just building abstractly, a 16 with a +2 racial is the best "default".

The situation is much the same as it was with caster levels in 3.x. Novice optimizers memorized "never give up caster levels" and stuck to it religiously. Experienced optimizers knew when giving up a caster level was worth it.

 

[Nifft]

thats why the cleric at will seems broken. if you roll with 18 strength, at level 1 you are handing out +4 to hit, by level 30 you are handing out +9 to melee attacks. seems to me people will wait for this to land before trying their melee dailies, and the cleric will become a bit of a spambot.

Yeah, I'm a bit worried about that too. Conceptually I'd rather have it be a Str vs. AC which then gave your Wis bonus to your ally's attack. However, I want to see it in play a bit first.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Xorn]

I like the 16/14/13/12/11/10 as well. You're low stat is going to be a 12 eventually, and unless you're human you can easily land either 18/16 for 16/16/15.

Because feats have odd ability requirements, the importance of odd ability scores at start is bigger.

The ranger (archer) in my current playgroup went with 18/14/11/10/10/10 and she's playing out great so far. (20 dex, 16 wis, 11 con) She's fragile, but man she's a nightmare striker!

I also agree that +1 to hit is a very big deal in 4E, because scaling keeps the target defense "on the d20". While you are adding your level bonus and attribute increases to your attack rolls, the monsters are adding the same to their defenses. That little +1 extra, and the feats are going to be the edges that put you ahead of the curve.

Every level 10 is adding 5 to their attacks and defenses. It's the remaining modifiers that separate everyone from a 55% chance to hit.

 

[keterys]

I'd rather have it be a Str vs. AC which then gave your Wis bonus to your ally's attack.

Same general effect - still a big ol' +8 or whatever to hit, which is just extreme.

 

[Branduil]

I think with some builds it may even be preferable to go for the vaunted 20. Particularly with Wizards and archery-focused Rangers. An Elven Ranger can start off with

Str 10
Con 13
Dex 20
Int 10
Wis 15
Cha 8

and be none the worse for the wear.

 

[Nifft]

Same general effect - still a big ol' +8 or whatever to hit, which is just extreme.

Nah, Str to attack / Wis as bonus means you'd have to neglect Charisma and Constitution for 30 levels, which means you'll be suffering in other ways.

Cheers, -- N