auticus's page

"As for: some think they are great, therefore they are great? Some think the earth is flat. That doesn't make the earth flat."

So if I am understanding you correctly, you are saying that those that don't agree with your opinion are wrong.

You have to realize that what makes something "great" is largely in the eye of the beholder.

The world being flat can be proven wrong by science.

1 + 1 = 2 is a mathematical fact that can be proven.

The color green is the best color of them all cannot be proven.

How do you prove an opinion on an abstract gaming element is right or wrong?

Will you next tell me the color red is also wrong?

We aren't dealing with something that can be proven by science, because it's all based on opinion.

You may be a mechanical-minded individual who feels that abilities = X, damage output = Y, and utility = Z, and greatness score = X + Y + Z and then compare it with Mage(X+Y+Z) and Ranger(X+Y+Z) to calculate who has the biggest and best overall score, but that still doesn't make it a fact, it only means that as you see it, it is superior.

We don't all score things the same.

There will be those that focus on the mechanics. There will be those that focus on the aesthetics. The disconnect often comes in the crossing of those two mindsets.

Ah but it's not all melee. There is a cleric and a druid involved and an oracle.

My campaigns usually feature a lot of fighters. Our optimization levels are usually average at best. We play the game for fun overall, not as a mathematical exercise where each player tries to one up the others. =)

In the two campaigns I'm running there are a total of 0 wizards or sorcerers.

It's quite nice actually.

Our rule is that if you die you come in a full level lower than the lowest level character in the party.

I also agree with the video game vs personality. I try to avoid the cool powers mindset, but its hard to do sometimes.

I allow the core rulebook and the APG. Anything beyond that is up to my discretion. I do this because of past 3.5 campaigns that got broken with the bloat.

One can be a power gamer and still like RP ;)

Bingo. Make sure everyone is on the same page. Nuff said ;)

You like challenge? Make sure your players like challenge. Done.

You don't like challenge? Make sure you are playing in a game where you are predominantly superior to anything thrown at you. Done.

Is any one way better than the other? No.

You can also play supermen vs super villains. That works too.

There are probably a large number of other options I'm missing as well =)

I myself prefer challenge and not having to dump a serious amount of time tweaking modules to challenge my players, so I stick with 10/15 point builds.

They do not have to be mutually exclusive, but I find they often are. Many people cannot think in both realms as well as they can one or the other (and often when two people of opposed thinking processes meet, you will get arguments lol)

I was a very logical-minded person until my mid 20s. I am a software engineer now (very logic minded) and also a writer, artist, and musician (abstract minded) so I can combine the two, but I can see so many times where someone can not (and up until my mid 20s I could never understand an abstract thinker or where they were coming from because it didn't fit into one of my neat flowcharted methodologies)

I should note that my example was a 3.5 game and not a PF game. The rules were very very abstract and the player in question was an "A" grade rules-lawyer who could argue a rule one way and win and then turn around and argue the same rule another way and win.

There was indeed a lot of twisting going on.

And here we are getting again into a bashing contest with mechanical / logical thinker vs abstract artistic thinker.

He was a 9th level character with magic items designed for 16th and higher.

He would craft the item, then use profession mercantile to up the price and find someone to buy it at the inflated price. If that didn't work he would hire henchmen and minions to corner the market and up the price that way.

That's how he ended up having 5x the amount of treasure that a normal 9th level character should have.

He would use that wealth to obtain items that were for 16th level and higher sources. When I tried to circumvent it, I'd have a 45 minute rules lawyer session on my hands about how I was breaking the rules and lame (to condense the argument lol). It was very disrupting.

When he wanted to take a lot of time off to craft and I'd throw hooks at them to get them to leave, he'd get mad. Then he decided he'd hire artisans of his own since he had a small stash squirreled away and using mercantile was able to talk their craft price down and max his return value, so that when I'd make them leave, people were still crafting his items that he would turn around and sell for very high prices.

He would then either go out of his way to find a high level caster to craft the item for him, or obtain ways to quest and send high level minions out to quest for the items using his wealth.

Just saying no you can't find that would again result in a 45 minute rules lawyer discussion and ultimately how I was being a "bad DM" (the trump card of D&D players everywhere) by railroading him and his ideas.

The end result was a 9th level psion wielding +4 and +5 items and wondrous items that a 9th level character shouldn't have, and in the combinations that he had made it so challenging him with monsters appropriately was very hard.

To top it off he would share his wealth with the party and gear them up so that they were also hideously powerful.

Just saying no was not working. It was becoming disruptive to the game.

So a dragon appropriate for a 16th level or so character descended... wanting to add to its hoarde. And it did. And he left the group afterward.

Bad DMing? Maybe. All I know is that from that experience, I am very careful about the intention of players who want to craft to make "extra money on the side" because it can disrupt the economy of the game and ultimately the balance of the game if its left unchecked.

One thing that I do not do any longer is play power games or DM power games, and while crafting/profession is not in and of itself breaking balance or bad, if a player wants to abuse it, and then spend an hour arguing about why he should be able to, it can be unbalancing if allowed, and at the least a game stopping annoyance to have to argue it.

The ultimate purpose that his crafting and profession skills had were to give him more money than he should have had for his level to purchase items that he shouldn't have been able to access at his level, and spun in a way that to say no made it railroading him.

It also depends on the culture. What is good in our culture can be considered evil in another, and vice versa.

It's hard to see outside of our own culture, as that is how we are programmed and raised.

Freeing slaves may seem like a good act to you, but to the other culture may be a pinnacle act of evil and injustice.

Point of view =)

As to PCs taking on armies, I have had that happen in a campaign way back almost 10 years ago when 3rd ed was still new. The party was around 12th level. They effectively took on a 10,000 man army and won because there was nothing that could really touch them.

Drunk with their power they claimed a small kingdom and then went to war again, this time with some backup.

The opposing army had some powerful creatures in it this time and gave them a run for their money.

It *is* cool (though very far fetched) for a party of PCs to smash an army.... once. After that there will be heroes on the other side of the coin flocking to some lord's banner in an attempt at glory and what not to take them down.

And the monster manuals are full of high powered monsters that could be leading and/or serving in the opposing army as well.

Putting PCs up against a horde of 1-3rd level NPCs is really in a realm of "don't bother rolling dice" to me. Sprinkle in appropriate challenges and the battle itself becomes the backdrop with the real challenges becoming the majority of the encounters.

I've had players exploit oversights before. It keeps you on your toes ;)

By the rules it appears both ways can be argued correctly in terms of crafting. What way the GM allows is up to the GM. I'd lean more towards following the existing items pricing as opposed to the crafting because I feel that the oversight would allow for cheaply made items compared to their power level but that's just me.

I've also had players use crafting and profession to well exceed the amount of gold that they should have been carrying, with the intention to purchase magic items and/or craft magic items that far exceed what they should normally have.

If you are a stickler for the rules you have to get very creative as a GM to find ways to circumvent this (in which case many will call foul).

I had a guy playing a psionicist once who did jsut this very thing, had 5x the amount of gold he should have had and had items taht were meant for a much higher level (back in my days of not saying no) and he single handedly wrecked the campaign with his power. The end result was a dragon ate him and stole his stuff for his hoard. (his reputation began to proceed him)

Said player quit the campaign after that though furious. Kind of a hard spot to be in though, when you have a grotesquely overpowered character (through the obtaining of items he should not be wielding at his level) wrecking the campaign. The only thing that *could* challenge him and his small army of retainers was a much more powerful dragon. (and it made sense)

I do a lot of prep work as well. Players that don't work well with other players or the GM in general tend to not last very long at my table.

I have had players that will go against the grain for the sake of going against the grain.

Campaign Story: Low magic, magic frowned upon, need to be licensed to use it or else breaking the law

Player: I'm going to run an archmage. I don't have a license. Because that's stupid.

At this point, all is still well. Player wants to play a character outside the bounds of the law. If character is played smart, would be a fun contribution to the party. If player insists that character brazenly shows his magical abilities and then gets upset when his character is arrested (and in some cases executed if he was summoning dead things and demons), then that's where we have the issue.

In that instance, it's a case of a single player going against the campaign theme and then choosing ultimately to push the boundaries as far as he can. Those are instances where there is no working with the GM or the campaign world, and if the player continually does that, player is politely asked to vacate the table for someone who will.

EXAMPLE 2: Same campaign only this time multiple players decide they are going to run archmages.

In this case you have several players deciding to go against the main theme of the campaign world. You are now presented with an option.

You either:

A) enforce the main points of the campaign world on the party, in which case most if not all of the party will end up imprisoned, and you have them executed to teach them a lesson. The campaign ends.

B) Most of the party is imprisoned and you let a story plot develop around this, where the king or whoever sees the use of these characters and you let the arc head that way. The players may either cooperate or complain that you are out to get them and imprisoning them and making them work for the king is "no fun".

C) You alter the campaign and write in a way for magic using characters who brazenly break the laws to exist.

D) End the campaign and find a new campaign plot.

E) End the campaign and find new people to play with who will go along with your plot devices.

Here's the crux now. When you are dealing with a PARTY of players going against the campaign... then the GM is now the one who is odd man out.

Of all the options, only A really sticks me as being "wrong". B works if the party can take as well as they can give. If they can't then the GM needs to evaluate if he wants to continue with the party. this option is hard for some players to deal with because it means that they are "losing" and they are having to give in to the GM. Some people have issues with that.

Option C is an option that some GMs will guffaw at because it means they have to be the one who "loses" and bows to the whim of the players. Some people have issues with that.

Option D is a stalemate.

Option E is a waste of time but sometimes neccessary if a GM has a playstyle vastly different than his players.

In those instances I would adapt the campaign to fit to them more.

The players drive the story IMO.

lol so long as you aren't actively trying to break the campaign and rules lawyer the campaign into submission and power game your character into godhood and then get angry if I up the challenge on you, I'm pretty much good.

I've been the witness of a party of 10th level characters destroying a 10,000 creature army.

It made me twitch a couple times and drool for a month.

The disconnect is this:

Unless the rules specifically say "using a spell that has the [evil] tag associated with it is an evil act", some people will consider it to not be an evil act... because the rules don't say that it is.

Yeah. Alignment is something that has been removed from many games for the same reasons.

What is good and evil is highly subjective to the society/culture.

auticus wrote:

You have to understand that from a purely logical, mechanical viewpoint, that if the rulebook doesn't say it is, the only logical explanation and conclusion is that it is not.

And what does the "dead" condition give you from a "purely logical, mechanical viewpoint?"

The only place "pure logic" has any true application is in computer programming.

There are people who primarily think in a pure logical way. That is where a lot of arguments come into. A person who can only think in a purely logical flowcharted way cannot understand assumption or common sense application. The toggle switch is either "yes it is" or "no it isn't"

There are a lot of gamers who fall into this category. I have watched for years how it has spawned arguments such as this one. Playing wargames has also shown me this mindset vs a more abstract mindset.

I studied psychology and almost graduated with it before switching out to computer science. I am primarily a logic-minded person as well (and am a computer programmer) but am also an artist, writer, and musician so have been able to develop the abstract portion of my understanding.

So I can understand both stances equally well despite where my own leanings fall (and again in this I fall in the casting evil spells is evil, though what degree of evil or how that would affect alignment is iffy... I would rule a good aligned character won't cast evil spells but most characters I GM for the past 20+ years have been neutral for this very reason)

The developers have repeatedly stated that you're to use common sense when reading the rules. Ergo doing an act specifically marked as "evil" is an evil act.

To me, yes absolutely. From the devil's advocate slot, no it does not. Because the rules don't specifically state it so and I can come up with a dozen arguments to support that casting an evil spell is not evil if I'm not using the spell's application for evil.

Again, I don't know any GMs personally who would side with that, but I read the internet forums enough and have GM'd players who have come from the purely mechanical side of things to know that it exists out there (I ran into something similar when running RPGA events a few years ago)

You have to understand that from a purely logical, mechanical viewpoint, that if the rulebook doesn't say it is, the only logical explanation and conclusion is that it is not.

Rules designers tend to fall into the more abstract mindset where they say use common sense. Abstract thinking (emotional thinking) vs logical thinking are two totally different universes.

For me, using evil spells would not be something that a good aligned character would ever do. A neutral character could indeed do it, however. As a GM if a good aligned character were to cast an evil spell, their alignment would fall to neutral.

This is why 90% of the characters I have ever come across are usually neutral of some sort. Because then they can do whatever they want and the mechanics of the game do not hamstring them.

Using spells that are outlawed by a region would be unlawful and therefore punishable.

Killing guards attempting to arrest you for breaking the law would be murder. It would not surprise most people if you become wanted for such acts.

Well to be fair mdt... from a purely mechanical mindset the rules are not clear. I agree with you fully that using a spell tagged with [evil] is an evil act, but from the mindset of someone who is purely mechanical, unless it specifically states that it is, you cannot assume.

The devs of the game saying it is is telling. I also suspect most GMs will rule it that way as well.

I had a very mechanical-minded player a couple years ago who would argue something like this as well. You cannot run assumptions by them, it either states it is in the rulebook, or it is therefore not.

I play Games Workshop Warhammer and 40k, which can be a nightmare against mechanical-minded folk because the rules of those games are always fuzzy and notorious for not being black and white enough.

It would all depend on the world and the region in question and its laws regarding it's legality.

In my world, where the characters are currently, most magic is viewed suspiciously at best, and necromancy and daemon summoning are outlawed, punishable by death.

What this means that in my world, animating the dead, or summoning demons, is illegal, so performing such an act would be chaotic. However, in your world it may not be illegal, in which case casting the spell in and of itself would have no alignment (it would only be chaotic if it was breaking laws)

Casting necromancy spells that have the [evil] tag associated with them would also be evil in my book, so in my world, animating the dead would be a chaotic act as it breaks the law, and an evil act as the spell is tagged with the [evil] subtype.

I'm not sure what summoning demons is on the axis of good or evil. I would lean towards evil as well, but if its not tagged with [evil] then it wouldn't be an evil act unto itself unless the application of the spell was evil.

Much like casting a fireball is not evil, but casting a fireball at an inn and setting it ablaze and cooking the people inside would be an evil act.

Casting an evil spell that breaks local laws to perform an action that is not evil would not make casting the spell any less chaotic or evil, however the application of the spell would not be evil.

That's how I view it anyway.

As to player characters slaying town guards to hide their doings which were unlawful and also evil; that would pretty much be the pinnacle of evil actions yes lol. That would be akin to murder in my book.

But then we can argue that war is murder. Slaying an enemy soldier is murder. The town guards became my enemy when they tried to stop me, so they were no longer innocent bystanders, they were now enemy combatants, etc...

Some people can justify any action and can argue any angle. They are called lawyers =)

lol. Yes murderous hobos indeed ;)

It boils down to two factions... I can say that of course the world isn't black and white but in gaming I have seen these two factions before. Some people blend a little here and there but many people typically fall into one or the other (and before I get fragged, I'm not saying one is right or wrong)

* The mechanical person. Rules support mechanics. Roleplay is left to the individual outside of the mechanics. This person sees the character sheet as a set of numbers and modifiers which may have nothing to do with the personal interests, tickings, and goings on inside the character. If I am a blacksmith, I don't need a character sheet telling me that I am a blacksmith. I just say that I'm a blacksmith. Wasting slots on silly craft skills like this is pointless when other skills are more important and I can gain mechanically the same basic thing from choosing a more superior mathematical mechanical build / skillset.

Definitely see this in D&D 4e as they got rid of many skills that were deemed unneccessary mechanically and this argument / debate has been done many times over there.

* The character sheet as an RP guide person - Mechanics are secondary. If my character is a blacksmith, I want a rule on the character sheet to show that. If my character makes jewelry, I want a rule on the character sheet to show that. Yes, there are skills that can be used that mechanically do the same thing, but mechanics are secondary, and I am more comfortable seeing a character sheet with this on it.

As to murdering etc... again... two different factions lol. One side will see enemies as game pieces to be defeated. Another side sees things more like real-world, and therefore sees killing as murder.

And in betwixt the two shall never meet lol.

3.5 Loyalist wrote:

auticus wrote:

My 3.5 group woudl get angry at me for bumping enemies up. They wanted to be super heroes (their words) and me bumping enemies up did exactly what you said... made that worthless.

Sounds like they fear a challenge. Too used to easy computer games that don't want to lose consumers?

It probably has nothing to do with fearing a challenge or easy computer games.

If you want to feel like you're playing a competent and powerful character, always running into things that are a tough challenge doesn't help. It doesn't really matter what your stats (or even levels) are. If everything scales up with you, you don't feel like a superhero.

It's one reason I do like to occasionally have easy encounters, especially if they can be with something that was hard before. It gives a feeling of progress and power, that really doesn't come from a sequence of level-appropriate encounters.

Their words. "I play D&D to relax and kill monsters, not run from them and get beaten. Having you bump up the encounter difficulties makes my skills and feats useless since the encounters will just be as difficult and I don't want to play a game where my character is getting beaten, that's not why I play"

So it had everything to do with the challenge. Not "fear" of the challenge, they just didn't want the challenge in their game at all. This came after I was annoyed that they were carving through all of the encounters with ease, and had beaten down a dragon encounter in two rounds that was supposed to have been a challenge.

We had a talk, that is what came out of it. This was a good five years ago, it was the last campaign I ran with min/maxed characters and high point builds before 4th edition came out.

Bottom line: that particular group as a whole wanted a game where they knew they weren't going to die and would defeat whatever came across their path, and all had tweaked out characters which were good at a lot of different things.

I am more into games where I know I could be beaten. But please don't think that that means every encounter I toss out is supposed to be uber hard. I throw plenty of soft nerfballs their way.

Stick figures? ;)

Sounds like they fear a challenge. Too used to easy computer games that don't want to lose consumers?

To be fair there are a number of reasons why this is. One is indeed not wanting a challenge. They wanted to relax and slay things, and challenging them stressed them.

It is a part of the modern video game designer's toolbox to make games easier to beat. MMOs are like that as well.

For me I found I didn't enjoy that at all and that's why I'm very selective in what I run or play in now. Another reason I got out of 4th ed... it was just designed to be too easy for my tastes.

If the GM wants to bump the encounters, that's fine. But it really does suck for the GM to point-up all enemies just to comp; and are you really changing anything? Now both allies and enemies are better on paper. 15-point is the "play out of the box" level.

My 3.5 group woudl get angry at me for bumping enemies up. They wanted to be super heroes (their words) and me bumping enemies up did exactly what you said... made that worthless.

Depends on how you define "competent"

A competent laborer is good at laboring. A competent computer programmer is expected to be a good programmer.

A competent fighter should be good at fighting.

A low stat fighter is still good at fighting. Therefore, he would still be a competent fighter. He would just require more assistance in other areas.

In comparison to a higher statted character, they are mechanically inferior.

I didn't say they are gimped weak. I know that a low stat character is still strong, it's how I prefer to play and have no problem with it.

Howerver, they are weak(er) than the higher statted character, so in comparison standing side by side, mechanically the higher statted character is going to have an easier time than the same character with lower stats. In some cases this will be more extreme depending on the builds.

yet people who would make that kind of interesting pc do not need to be forced to do so by a low point buy.

No they don't need it, absolutely correct.

Low point buy vs high point buy affects mechanics largely. Roleplay is typically accomplished without any math though for some, the math can help them in their minds better (if I have a str of 18 that means I'm strong, if I have a str of 10 that means I'm weak (or average depending on who you talk to))

Mechanically speaking:

High Point buy means a character is good at many things, he/she can do more on their own and do not need others help as much, and unless the DM ups the difficulty of combat encounters, will have an easier time in combat (assuming a standard encounter). Poor choices, tactical deficient areas, and the like are largely mitigated. Direct approaches to solving challenges and encounters are more viable because skills are a lot easier to bypass due to a high % chance of success, and enemies are defeated easier with less damage taken in return.

Low point buy means that a character is only good at one or two things, he/she relies on others to help them, and combat encounters will be more challenging (assuming a standard encounter). Poor choices, tactical deficient areas, and the like can cause death more often than not, or at least a good solid thrashing. Direct approaches are usually difficult to achieve because skills are more difficult to pass due to a moderate % chance of success to low % chance of success, and enemies are harder to beat and require alternate ways of dealing with other than direct assault.

Both of these approaches will appeal to groups of people differently.

Ah but charisma is much more than looks. One can be butt ugly and highly charismatic. One can be very attractive and have the personality of a rock.

Tyrion is an example of high charisma in a low appearance score body. I miss comelyness (sp) scores.

This is what I have done before...

SESSION 1: The players make their characters. We go over the party strengths and weaknesses.

If a player has low defensive stats, we discuss where he'd be best at in a fight.

Using 10/15 point builds, each character has a blatant weakness and we all have discussed where that can be taken advantage of so they can play to shore that up.

Example:

Cleric, Rogue, and Fighter are 15 point builds. Barbarian, druid, and paladin are 10s.

The cleric is the healer and positions himself as such where he won't be on the front line. Enemies tend to seek him out if they are smart because he's healing. The party does their best to block him off. So far they've done well.

The rogue is good at dex based things and horrible at fighting. Her reflexes are good and with her dodge abilities takes no damage for big effects if she makes her save. She is horrible in hand to hand combat but specc'd out to be good at ranged combat, so does her best to stay out of combat, climb a tree, etc... and use the terrain to her advantage to avoid being hit.

Fighter is specc'd to use a tower shield and pursue enemies with advance. He has a very high AC and does moderate damage. As such he wants to be in the middle of the line at all times and the cleric will often hide behind him to get the advantage of his shield's cover.

His weakness would be his reflexes. He's in the front line, the enemies often rush him first, but smart enemies need to get around him. He will be hit hard with area affect, so the rogue scouts to determine which enemies can do this and they try to take him out first to keep their line up.

The barbarian is super strong dump statted with no mental attributes. He roleplays a dumb orc barbarian as well, so he has a leash that the rogue holds beceause he will lunge into combat. His strnegths are if he hits you, you will probably die. His weaknesses are that his defense scores are low so he takes a pounding.

Keep him in the back until its time to spring out and lay the smack down, and it does well. Put him out front and he drops right away. Synergy. Combination wtih the other party members. Unleashed at the right time they can really hurt the monsters.

The paladin is high armor double handed weapon damage build. His AC is moderately high but lacks the shield bonus. He has a decent hit bonus and does decent damage, so he makes a good 2nd tank up front that shields the rogue or keeps an eye on the barbarian, and can dish out the pain as needed and provide minor healing support. His weaknesses are that his armor is only moderate so he can get hit fairly often being up front, and his reflexes are about the same as the fighter.

All in all, each party must overlap the weaknesses of their buddies with their strengths. Doing so provides a powerful party. Failing to do so opens up a hole in the party as a whole which will be exploited.

If they were 20/25 point builds, they'd have fewer weaknesses and all be basically good at many things, which makes for an entirely different playstyle and a different set of tension (or lack thereof)

Honestly. I would not play most of those rolls. I don't play to be sub average who is killed by a house cat ( again). Its one thing to want to play a flawed pc. Its something else to be forced to play one.

Different strokes for different folks. On the same token but on the other side of it, I do not like to play where everyone's super human, nor do I want to GM a game that contains that because I have to put in a lot of extra effort to balance out the game otherwise (unless the goal is to make the encounters not really challenging at all then I can leave them as they are)

I also try when writing adventures to put in a high risk high reward system. I will drop in a high risk place with a high reward, give them a standard option, or give them an easy option, but the easy option has little reward to doing it.

And yes ... PLAYER deaths should probably be rewarded Matthew you are correct ;)

Risking life and limb is not a safe gamble. You can't "win" if you die. But then again if I had to put an alignment on our society as a whole I'd nail it with an NE. But that's a discussion for another time.

I like 3D6 as well. The only thing I don't like about it is some people will be on extreme ends of the spectrum than others... though I think in the future I may allow either a point buy OR 3D6 method.

I infinitely love writing my own much more than modules.

And I write them with 15 pb characters in mind. With DM notes. So if I want it to be really hard, I make note that it was designed to be really hard.

I'm working on software now to let you run modules solo and will put some of my stuff out on the intrawebz when finished.

I haven't gotten to that point yet, but before each session I look at the things upcoming and calculate any issues that may arise. If the creature is super nasty and going to wipe the party, I will adjust it so that it is still challenging but not over the top nintendo-hard challenging.

That's also why I prefer writing my own adventures. I know what the challenge should be and I don't have to worry about gotcha monsters that are too powerful wiping the party unless I actively want that kind of monster appearing (in which case I will drop clues beforehand)

ok =)

Player deaths are also something we don't avoid. Player deaths are going to happen. That's part of the game for us.

I also have played at tables where player deaths were actively discouraged and hugely frowned upon. But for our campaign, they can happen and if they happen we roll with it.

We are playing Kingmaker right now on 10/15 point buy. Granted there are six of them, but I bump up the encounters to account for that by adding to the encounter itself extra monsters to account for the two extra PCs.

So far nothing unusual or untold has happened. And I roll the dice in the open and don't use a screen or fudge. =)

There's a cleric (15 point), rogue (15 point), fighter (15 point), barbarian (10 point), druid (10 point), and paladin (10 point)

For mine, they do a 500 word recap and gain +10% bonus to the next session's xp total.

It doesn't have to be a journal in their point of view, esp if their character doesn't write. Just an overall recap from their point of view.

Only two of the six players do it. But it adds a lot by being able to read the various view points regardless.

auticus wrote:

If you don't like dump stats you say... don't create dump stat characters. Problem solved =)

A character at a 15 point build is not a gimp cripple if they don't dump their stat. They will just be 5% less efficient at killing something than if they dump statted.

If you actually read my posting, I stated that 90% of the people do do that, but it isn't nessary. Still if my players are going to try everything they can to min/max their characters, and most of the time they feel they can only do that by dumping a stat....then just give them the extra points so they don't feel the need to do it.

This may sound assholish but I wasn't addressing you in particular. There have been several people that have said that 15 point or less characters are gimp and weak and will just die.

I have those same players so I understand. They will min/max no matter what system you give them. That's just their nature.

My apologies, I meant a 5% difference in modifier. I didn't account for the trade ups and downs.

I've yet to have a problem running my group through encounters and they are 10 and 15 point buys. It definitely makes things more of a challenge, which is what the point of it was, but they are far from being gimped.

They just can't carve through things as easy, it creates a more party-centric environment because the characters specialize at something but need someone else to cover their back in other areas, and makes you trade off one thing for another, as opposed to being good at both.

That's what I prefer so that's why we roll with it. I don't like playing or running characters that are good at everything, it kind of starts to lose the point of rolling dice when you get to that point where you almost auto-pass everything or come close to it.

I also don't care if they dump stats because they are actively choosing to gimp themselves in an area that can bite them later. My group is about 50/50. 50% have dump stats and the other 50% have no stat below 10.

If you don't like dump stats you say... don't create dump stat characters. Problem solved =)

A character at a 15 point build is not a gimp cripple if they don't dump their stat. They will just be 5% less efficient at killing something than if they dump statted.

That's cool. Most tables don't require that. Most tables I have seen have a guy that does max RP, a guy that doesn't care at all about RP and sees everything as numbers, and the rest of hte people are somewhere in the middle.

Roleplaying at its most extreme - a person who talks in character at all times and describes in narrative what is happening with everything the character does. If the character attacks, he explains it in vivid detail. If the character casts a spell, he explains it in vivid detail. If the character makes a spellcraft roll, he explains it in vivid detail. If the character makes a diplomacy roll, he explains it in vivid detail. The dice results are incorporated into the details.

Rollplaying at its most extreme - a person who pushes his miniature forward on the battle map. Rolls a D20. Says he hit AC 16. Rolls damage. The character sheet is a collection of numbers and mechanics. When a player must attack, he rolls a dice and gives you the math. When a character casts a spell, he rolls some dice and gives you the math and explains the rules mechanics. When the character must make a spellcraft roll, he rolls the dice and gives you the math. When the character makes a diplomacy roll, he rolls the dice and gives you the math. The details are all in the number rolled.

Which one is the best and which one is "doing it wrong"?

=)

I'm sure you can tell what the correct answer is to that question. For those of you that do not, or insinuate I'm taking up for one side or the other, the correct answer is: "neither".

Semantics.