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I just started a campaign where I had the players roll stats....must rolled around 20 pt buy but one rolled 54 point buy.
So I let everyone have a 54 point buy with the option to use points to increase starting cash, 100gp per point.
So far they like it.
54 pts seems lot but I plan for a meat grinder type setting so....
Too true rolling, that is the only fair way. Point buy schemes suck.
WHO DARES TO DISTURB MY TWO YEAR SLUMBER!?
and do tell why players like having an equal potiential, when all it does in the long run is screw everybody.
you end up at every 4 levels you put the new stat point into your main stat and look for stat increasers of that stat....
Um.. what....
So it is a GOOD thing that one guy ends up playing Goku and another guy ends up wiht krillen????
Personally I think the problem with rolling is that it is TOO random...
And honestly, I seriously hate on people who say "no stat below 10" and try and claim "RP" as a reasoning...
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As a direct answer to the OP:
Point Buy gives slightly more freedom than an array while still making sure that all PCs feel like they started on equal footing. While some DMs may not want that, in my experience most players do. I have used point buy methods since the begining of third edition.
Prior to that, we had used ever sort of rolled method printed in the 2E PHB or any 2E suppliment. Eventually, for 2E we got to where we just let everybody choose there ability scores and before we played everybody had to show their scores to the group and the other players would decide if the character was fair.
In my experience rolled characters are almost always have more higher stats than point buy characters. Also, note how even the defenders of rolling have a slew of house rules for covering when a player can roll, how often, if other players can or can't use those scores and all sorts of of other stuff needed to make sure people don't feel like one character is the hero and the rest are his sidekicks.
Point buy eliminates all of that. You tell people and number and you know that they will have been the ones to choose their stats.
Although, I do sort of think that if you use point buy that racial bonuses should be removed in favor of class based bonuses. That would lower the total points needed for the point buy and wouldn't hurt MAD classes as much as point buy normally does.
Solution that should make everybody happy:
- Allow PFS players to roll for their stats.
- Any stat array over a 20-point buy equivalent is thrown out, and must be re-rolled.
People who like rolling get to roll for their stats. PFS play balance is maintained.
I love Win-Win solutions.
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As a long time advocate of rolled stats who recently converted to point buy my take away breaks down like this.
1. Party can knock it out without you: easy one but deserves to be said, the fact that I can set a point buy limit and my party can knock out the basics of their character before I even see it is pretty awesome. People don't have to wait or try to schedule a time to meet with me to roll their stats and if I think something looks fishy I can just check their math pretty simple. That way I can focus on the important parts like making sure they are making a character they will enjoy and that fits into the narrative of the story and not having to worry about if they got the right numbers to do that.
2. Party balance: As someone who's GM'd and played in a lot of rolled character games I can say one of the biggest nightmares that happens is when you get players who's character rolls f*@! up the curb. Having that one or two players who have no stats lower than a 15 makes it almost impossible to craft encounters where everyone is challenged equally (if differently) and not having those other players run roughshod over it all or end up feeling punished for their luck. Also it can make the rest of your party feel kind of unnecessary if they end up with stats pretty below those one or 2 characters and pretty soon they usually are. With point buy I've found everyone gets to make the character they want and fill the niche they were looking for while also leaving the rest of the players their room to shine more often.
3. It helps keep encounter balance in check: for the most part 15-20 point buy is about the power level Paizo assumes when the write up their aps, pfs content, and bestiaries. This means that the further above or below that average you go the more tweaking I as a gm have to do to make those encounters work. With dice rolling the actual apl of my party can be a total crapshoot depending on what their stats are and quickly turn encounters into either the aforementioned cake walk if it plays to the lucky players strength or a total disaster if they are gone, they die, or it plays to a weakness in the party. Now don't get me wrong difficult encounters are my bread and butter but having a barometer that fluctuates between either so easy why bother or I have to make it so difficult it is impossible feels both cumbersome and off putting. With the point buy I can pretty quickly figure out where they stand since creatures are built around those numbers and scale up or down the number of or which CR of creature I would like to use without having to go in and up the crap out of DCs or other stats in order to make them challenging.
then they should play 4e.....
I want my character to shine in the way its imagined and not be on the same power level as the next guy....
You can easily do both.
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Solution that should make everybody happy:
- Allow PFS players to roll for their stats.
- Any stat array over a 20-point buy equivalent is thrown out, and must be re-rolled.People who like rolling get to roll for their stats. PFS play balance is maintained.
I love Win-Win solutions.
Best part of this solution is that you can do it from the comfort of your own home, without a GM looking over your shoulder.
Solution that should make everybody happy:
- Allow PFS players to roll for their stats.
- Any stat array over a 20-point buy equivalent is thrown out, and must be re-rolled.People who like rolling get to roll for their stats. PFS play balance is maintained.
I love Win-Win solutions.
I don't think you have really thought this out. By doing it that way any roll that does not generate ability scores that are EXACTLY 20 point buy would be needlessly weak. If you roll less than exactly 20 point buy you should remake the character as a 20 point buy character.
Second, no character you could make with this system could ever NOT be made by a 20 point point buy. If you for some reason wanted a score lower than what is normally allowed in 20 point point buy I am sure that PFS would let you have that score as long as you didn't want extra build points in return.
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Solution that should make everybody happy:
- Allow PFS players to roll for their stats.
- Any stat array over a 20-point buy equivalent is thrown out, and must be re-rolled.People who like rolling get to roll for their stats. PFS play balance is maintained.
I love Win-Win solutions.
I don't think you have really thought this out. By doing it that way any roll that does not generate ability scores that are EXACTLY 20 point buy would be needlessly weak. If you roll less than exactly 20 point buy you should remake the character as a 20 point buy character.
Second, no character you could make with this system could ever NOT be made by a 20 point point buy. If you for some reason wanted a score lower than what is normally allowed in 20 point point buy I am sure that PFS would let you have that score as long as you didn't want extra build points in return.
Might want to use your 1/scenario re-roll on that sense motive check there.