You primary stat should never be lower than 18

[JohnSnow]

Flat disagree.

There's no rational reason to insist on an 18 in your primary stat. For one, a 17 is almost as good and will be an 18 by 4th-level. For two, I refuse to let my class choices be restricted so narrowly.

For three, it's sometimes hard to say what your "primary stat" should be. Every class has three key abilities. And occasionally, the most obvious choice for a race is one where they don't get a +2 to the key stat. For example, Tieflings get bonuses to INT and CHA, but all the infernal pact warlock powers depend on CON. Does that mean you shouldn't play an Infernal Pact Tiefling Warlock? Don't be absurd.

I'd actually go so far as to say that Fourth Edition finally makes different stat choices than just Max primary, make secondary decent and dump the rest, not only viable, but, under the proper conditions, desirable.

I can see all kinds of reasons to stack your stat boosts to get 16/16/16/x/x/x. However, the tradeoffs are such that the desirability of high stats in your key attributes means that most characters will have one to two stats of 8 or 10. There's tons of other valid builds. All the arrays on pages 17-18 (default and the table of possibles with point buy) are viable when paired with the right stat boosts and the right character build.

Personally, I'd never pay the premium to boost a stat to 17 or 18 so as to get a racial-adjusted score of 19 or 20. But I'm sure there are others who'd think that's a great idea.

There's no longer "one correct array" for a starting character. And that's a good thing.

 

[Lab_Monkey]

This is a really interesting thread. I had planned on making an axe focused half-elf warlord (inspiring). Now you all have me questioning that decision and the way I allocated my stats.

Here's what I was thinking:
Str 16, Con 15, Dex 10, Int 14, Wis 8, Cha 16

Then bumping str and cha at every opportunity. The high con was for the axe focus and to qualify for heavy armor feats, and the extra hp/surges he'll need at the front line.

Here are the other stat options I came up with:
Str 16, Con 16, Dex 10, Int 12, Wis 10, Cha 16
or
Str 16, Con 15, Dex 10, Int 11, Wis 8, Cha 18 (this seems obviously sub-optimal now)
or
Str 16, Con 16, Dex 10, Int 13, Wis 8, Cha 16
or
Str 18, Con 13, Dex, 10, Int 10, Wis 8, Cha 16

Any insight on which of these arrays would be optimal?

 

[Lab_Monkey]

Also, the arguments about the advantage of an 18 over a 16 in your primary attack stat also favor the use of the +3 proficiency weapons (i.e., blades) over the +2 proficiency weapons (i.e., axes).

 

[Nifft]

For example, Tieflings get bonuses to INT and CHA, but all the infernal pact warlock powers depend on CON. Does that mean you shouldn't play an Infernal Pact Tiefling Warlock? Don't be absurd.

Hellfire Blood is an explicit fix. Tiefling Warlocks are all viable, thanks to that specific feat.

There's no longer "one correct array" for a starting character. And that's a good thing.

Right, there are two: 16/14/14/13/10/8 and 16/16/13/11/10/8.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Bagpuss]

I haven't crunched any numbers, but just looking at it logically, is there any reason to ever have less than at least an 18 in your primary stat?

Your DM is enforcing the fixed array?

 

[Cadfan]

Except it does. 3.5E Attacking 5x/round with the first 3 being "anything but a 1" hits, being 4 STR or DEX down doesn't have as big of an effect as attacking once per round with a 50% chance to hit, or 40% if you have 4 less STR. The difference is huge. In 4E you really really REALLY want to max out your prime stat.

Alright, I'll correct. IF you played in a campaign where you regularly encountered enemies whom you struck on "anything but a 1" on the majority of your attacks in your iterative attack chain, then you will see a difference in the value of a +1 to attack in 3e versus 4e.

For the rest of us in the real world, "anything but 1 hits" situations weren't actually common in 3e. And situations where you hit on "anything but a 1" with several of your iterative attacks really weren't common.

As Nifft points out, what matters is the curve, and whether you meet, exceed, or fall behind it. 4e has a curve just like 3e does. And while the curves are different, the math behind how they're affected by a +1 bonus remains virtually identical between the systems. You have a chance of hitting, a chance of missing, its mediated by a roll of a d20, and a +1 is a +1 either way.

Suppose my 4e character hits on a 9+. If I improve that to an 8+, I get about an 8% boost in effective damage over the long term.

Suppose my 3e character hits on a 6+ with his first attack, an 11+ with his second, and a 16+ with his third. A +1 bonus to attack gives me a net increase of about 12% when using iterative attacks.

And if you must know, if your first attack hits on a 1+, your second on a 6+, your third on a 11+, and your fourth on a 16+, a +1 to your attack roll still gives you a net benefit of about 9%.

Even if you can come up with some contrived circumstances in which a character in 3e hits on a number so incredibly low as to make a +1 less valuable for him during an iterative attack than it is for a 4e character doing a typical attack, which won't be easy to do mind you, you'll STILL have to deal with the fact that we're talking about 2 and 3% differences between the value of a +1 in each system.

+1s are valuable. They were valuable in 3e, and they're valuable in 4e. Its easy and cheap to get an 18 in 4e, so you might as well. But if you have a good reason not to, don't worry about it. Its still just a +1.

 

[evilbob]

1) an 18 in your primary stat is costly

2) Most (if not all) classes have secondary and tertiary stats which are important to them, and give benefits for being better than average - in flexibility of power choice if nothing else.

3) there will be very desirable feats which depend upon other stats than your primary stats (not just multiclass feats, but spell focus, or various added-damage feats for example).

So PCs that don't go all-out to maximise their primary stat will have a wider choice of powers available to them, and a wider range of feats which are likely to increase their capabilities in a number of ways.

I was going to say more, but this sums up my opinion perfectly.

I tried stating a character with 18, 13, 13, 10, 10, 8 (+racials). And then I realized I'd never get all the feats I wanted. Also, some not-really-too-minor aspects of your character are going to be very bland or even poor: you're going to have to give up HP, or initiative, or being good in skills, or something. In the end I switched to a more even spread and I'm happier.

 

[Branduil]

This is a really interesting thread. I had planned on making an axe focused half-elf warlord (inspiring). Now you all have me questioning that decision and the way I allocated my stats.

Here's what I was thinking:
Str 16, Con 15, Dex 10, Int 14, Wis 8, Cha 16

Then bumping str and cha at every opportunity. The high con was for the axe focus and to qualify for heavy armor feats, and the extra hp/surges he'll need at the front line.

Here are the other stat options I came up with:
Str 16, Con 16, Dex 10, Int 12, Wis 10, Cha 16
or
Str 16, Con 15, Dex 10, Int 11, Wis 8, Cha 18 (this seems obviously sub-optimal now)
or
Str 16, Con 16, Dex 10, Int 13, Wis 8, Cha 16
or
Str 18, Con 13, Dex, 10, Int 10, Wis 8, Cha 16

Any insight on which of these arrays would be optimal?

Personally, I'd go for the last one. You can pump up Str at every opportunity, and as long as you also up Con a couple times you can still qualify for the feats you're after. The only place you might suffer a little is Reflex Defense, but with shields, items, and the Lightning Reflexes feat you can minimize that a bit. Of course, it's up to you how you want to stat your character.

 

[Nifft]

I was going to say more, but this sums up my opinion perfectly.

I tried stating a character with 18, 13, 13, 10, 10, 8 (+racials). And then I realized I'd never get all the feats I wanted.

Then we're discussing different things: my position is that you need an 18 in your primary attack stat after racial modifiers.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Spatula]

What the guy who starts with a 16 instead of an 18 loses in "chance to hit" they most certainly can make up in other areas that are just as important.

Not really. Just about everything you do in combat involves rolling to hit. If you can't hit, your turns are mostly wasted. Utility/support actions (like healing and buffing) are now practically free, or tied to your attacks, to allow support characters to fufill their role and still be able to attack.

Hitting is everything in 4e combat.

Now, that doesn't mean that a 16 in your attack stat is not viable, but it does have a big impact. I think a 16 can work fine for AC attacks, because you can use a sword to make up for the loss of hit. It's a bit dicier for base defense attacks - many people have noted that the KotS half-elf "pew pew" cleric is pretty crappy in actual play because +3 translates into rarely hitting.