Cross post from Reddit: Old School GM subsuming GM duties for a Pathfinder group.


Advice


The other GM is stepping down and here is an issue I have: heallowed the players to generate PCs using the following method: 4d6, roll 1s over, discard the lowest. Any result under 10 may also be re-rolled. I made a cleric, as an example, under this method. 1st level, human, attributes: 16, 14, 13, 13, 15, 16

Where do these bonuses fall in the scheme of PC power versus a standard, medium tracked campaign? Super Heroes?

I like for players to not have a bonus to every single thing they do, some things just need to be difficult to be meaningful to the story. I also am not a fan of min/max to 'win' D&D. Flaws and hindrances are also to be enjoyed and used in growing the PC.

The players had one session, so no attachment to the PCs yet, but I am leaning in favor of re-doing ability scores.

Advice?

Sovereign Court

Your ability arrays as chosen are extremely high. Your cleric, for instance, has a point buy value of 38 points. While rolling is going to give a less uniform distribution of ability score, 38 points is far in excess of most core balance assumptions. For reference, most games are run between 15-25 point buy. If you're not going to use point buy, consider just using 4d6 drop lowest, unless you're deliberately going for a very high-powered campaign.


Neverwillibreak wrote:
Your ability arrays as chosen are extremely high. Your cleric, for instance, has a point buy value of 38 points. While rolling is going to give a less uniform distribution of ability score, 38 points is far in excess of most core balance assumptions. For reference, most games are run between 15-25 point buy. If you're not going to use point buy, consider just using 4d6 drop lowest, unless you're deliberately going for a very high-powered campaign.

That is what I am afraid of here, they were allowed to create over-powered PCs. i will not be playing a GMPC, I simply wanted to see the method in action..and wow. I am looking at going for the 15pt buy method, which will hopefully allow each class to shine in its field of expertise.

They are not munchkins, the GM just did not seem to realize the level of power...


I'd actually suggest 20 points, Disemvowel. I believe that is the standard for Pathfinder Society play, and makes decent characters.

I'm running Skull & Shackles, and I let the players use 20 points.

It's worked out fine!

EDIT: "Heroic" NPC's are built with an array that equals 15 points.

Sovereign Court

To provide a second opinion, 15 points is a very solid way to have characters with built-in weaknesses. 20 is also good for normal games, but keep in mind that 15 really forces players to pick and choose their stats. At twenty points, it becomes far easier to compensate for dumping one or two stats extremely low, at 15, a player with 18 in a desired stat (such as a wizard maxing INT at the cost of CHA or STR) has to really pay for it.


I prefer playing characters with either no glaring flaws, or extreme strengths to compensate for the glaring flaws. I don't like situations where you have to have a flaw to be competent. Thus, I always give my players 20 pb or higher. It's up to you, though. You could require everyone to reduce their builds to a 25, for example -- most classes have one or two stats that they can safely reduce without a problem.


Thanks people! I played around with Hero Lab, 15 and 20 point buys. No too much of a difference, the extra five points definitely allow a bit of higher specialization without the rest of the stats suffering or being ridiculous.

Probably going with 20. Now, to break the news of switching GMs and adjusting PCs. Can't wait for those emails.


Just make sure you allow them to rebuild or replace characters too. Some severely suboptimal builds may only be working at all due to the ubermensch stats.

My group had also been using similar rules for superpowered attributes. Switching to 20pt buy was a shock, but after playing for a few sessions everybody was on board with it being a superior play experience. It was unexpected how the RP with NPCs improved, we hadn't realized how much the superior stats had led to being so dismissive of average folks.


Neverwillibreak wrote:
Your ability arrays as chosen are extremely high. Your cleric, for instance, has a point buy value of 38 points. While rolling is going to give a less uniform distribution of ability score, 38 points is far in excess of most core balance assumptions. For reference, most games are run between 15-25 point buy. If you're not going to use point buy, consider just using 4d6 drop lowest, unless you're deliberately going for a very high-powered campaign.

Though those stats add up to a really high point buy, it's nowhere near as powerful as an actual 38 point buy would be. Especially if that's after the Human +2 stat. With an actual 38 pt buy, I'd still expect to see dump stats, and a couple 18-20 stats.


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Disemvowel wrote:

The other GM is stepping down and here is an issue I have: heallowed the players to generate PCs using the following method: 4d6, roll 1s over, discard the lowest. Any result under 10 may also be re-rolled. I made a cleric, as an example, under this method. 1st level, human, attributes: 16, 14, 13, 13, 15, 16

Where do these bonuses fall in the scheme of PC power versus a standard, medium tracked campaign? Super Heroes?

I like for players to not have a bonus to every single thing they do, some things just need to be difficult to be meaningful to the story. I also am not a fan of min/max to 'win' D&D. Flaws and hindrances are also to be enjoyed and used in growing the PC.

The players had one session, so no attachment to the PCs yet, but I am leaning in favor of re-doing ability scores.

Advice?

Rerolling 1's means you can only 2-6 on d6. Using 4d6 less one with no ones, and rerolling all if <10 gives an average stat of ~13.75. Without the <10, your average would have been ~13.43. Standard 4d6 less one is ~12.24. Standard 4d6 less one with <10 gives ~13.18. After 2 hours, my spreadsheet indicates that a 20 Point Buy averages ~12.07.

These averages do not adjust for racial mods. Just the initial six stat values.

/cevah


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Old School Gamer here myself, Disemvowel. Get into Pathfinder is my best advice. It's a streamlined system compared to the old days, and it's plenty difficult and deadly. Enjoy it.

If I would advise any changes, I might suggest sticking with just the Core Rulebook (CRB) and the Advanced Players Guide. Don't allow any third-party published supplements, otherwise, players could come to the table with some really wacky builds and surprise you with the options available out there. Plenty of fun to be had with those two books, and possibly the Ultimate Magic book. Have fun.


I also recommend switching them to 20 point buy. 15 PB is really rather harsh. Those extra five points make a huge difference, especially to the classes that need 2 or 3 decent scores.


Did some more spreadsheets with exhaustive stat selection.

3d6 average stat = 10.5
10 Point buy average stat = ~11.09
15 Point buy average stat = ~11.58
20 Point buy average stat = ~12.07
4d6 less one average stat = ~12.24
25 Point buy average stat = ~12.53

This is before racial modifiers.

/cevah


Also (Old Schooler here as well) take a sharp look at what races you allow and disallow, I personally don't like Aasamir, Tieflings, etc...and some GMs disallow guns as a purist fantasy ideal. Owly said it well above about the 3rd party stuff, even the Paizo addons can add a lot of strange to your game. And my biggest issue making the switch was in spell descriptions, what I assume as old school has been changed drastically, especially the basic stuff like Detect "anything" and mainstays like Fireball, Lightning boilt, etc...

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