I personally go with 25 point buy, but with stats capped at 16 before racial mods, and only one stat below 10, and that no lower than 8 also before racial mods.
This has the advantage of powering down SAD classes slightly, and otherwise results in the same 'top 3' stats as highly optimized 15 point-buy, meaning that you're generally as safe using the APs as written as you would be using 15 point-buy. And all while giving the characters an appropriately impressive and heroic stat spread.
It really works quite well.
Yes, this is good, but I don't give back any points for dumping.
Makes for much more balanced characters.
In a 15 point buy game, people tend to look at classes that have animal companions or Eidolons a bit more closely.
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I`m curious: Why do those of you DMs in this thread who recommend forbidding or extremely limiting low stats, do so? No weaklings/butter-fingers/chronically ill/simpletons/fools/socially inept concepts allowed? Or is it to prevent "unmanageably" high stats for the trade-off? Or some other reason? I'm not attacking your suggestion, I merely don't understand it.
Too many players build one trick ponies, glass cannons, etc. by Min/maxing. Yes, they can do well in one type of encounter, but they are a big FAIL in everything else.*
This limits the DM. Either you then build all your encounters so that they do well, or you just play them as they go. In the first, you get frustrated DMs, in the second you get frustrated players.
I think the "get points back for dumping" is one of Pathfinders worst features and a big mistake. Sure, it's a hold-over from 3.5 but in 3.5 rolling was the usual and point buy was more rare. Now point buy is the default. This makes the decision to allow players to dump a bad one, with unintended consequences.
*Too often, they read about these monstrosities here, where theortycrafters tout them as so great. But IRL they are often not fun to play. I remember thread where they suggested a newb dump WIS for his Paladin. He followed their advice and had a terrible first few games- being more or less shut out of Perception checks, failing a critical Sense motive and being left to twiddle his thumbs by failing a Will save. And all he got back was a +1 to STR.
We have threads here today to build the more damage dealing spellcaster possible. Great idea in theory and theorycrafting is an important mental exercise to test the limits. But say you play one of these and find you need more utility spells, or the DM's game focuses more on puzzle solving or the foes are resistant to fire and that's all you got?
Is it really Fun to be able to blow thru some encounters easily and be useless in the rest? Not to me.
Now- if that's Fun to you, great. Different strokes for different folks, and the idea is to have Fun.
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I personally go with 25 point buy, but with stats capped at 16 before racial mods, and only one stat below 10, and that no lower than 8 also before racial mods.
This has the advantage of powering down SAD classes slightly, and otherwise results in the same 'top 3' stats as highly optimized 15 point-buy, meaning that you're generally as safe using the APs as written as you would be using 15 point-buy. And all while giving the characters an appropriately impressive and heroic stat spread.
It really works quite well.
Yes, this is good, but I don't give back any points for dumping.
Makes for much more balanced characters.
I actually like having the possibility of characters with one notable weakness (a single stat at 8) and given the nature of players, giving them a couple of points for that ensures that it actually happens. And allowing a total of two extra points for one low stat doesn't create absurd stat dumping or anything.
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15pt buy tends to mean individual characters are less well-rounded as players still try to create characters that are good at their primary role... i.e. a magus will keep his Int and Str or Dex up, but will abandon thinking about a Wis/Cha above 10. Also, players will tend to be less likely to go for a single very high primary score (Str for melee, Int/Cha/Wis depending on the caster). This will typically mean the DC for player "save or suck" type spells is one lower than the 20-point buy.
Between these two aspects you end up with:
1) A party where folks are more role-based versus having a number of more well-rounded characters. This ends up providing better niche protection for classes that may need it. It also means the game might be more colaborative as folks rely on other PCs to accomplish certain things.
2) A slight increase in odds for enemies makes the encounters a little more challenging (i.e. they make a DC16 Color Spray but would've failed the DC17 Color Spray). If you have players who like to sweat out tougher fights, this inches them a little more in that direction.
Also, something to consider is 5 or 6 PCs skews the printed AP even further into "less challenging" territory. If you have 5-6 PCs, a lower point buy can help to mitigate this.
