Sure, it's been a while since we all did this.
A cleric who's not going to be a diplomat or the scourge of undead.
Looks like he's also has health problems.
Let's see here:
3d6
3d6
3d6
3d6
3d6
3d6Not terrible, I suppose. It'd make a good wizard.
You going by the old order?
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I've mentioned this in another thread, but my favorite roll method: 2d6+6 rolled 36 times, in a 6x6 grid, pick one of the 14 lines (6 vertical, 6 horizontal, 2 diagonal) and play as laid. Sure, it's a ton of dice to roll, but players seem to get a real kick out of it, and generally find a row that works for what they want to do but still has a little flavor.
Which is exactly my issue with point buy, or even assign at will options. Without organic play as laid, 80% of all characters end up looking the same. A wizard is a wizard, is a wizard. I like the organic character that is good at something he shouldn't be and bad at something which would stereotypically be a strength. I like the charismatic veteran fighter, or the dumb rogue, or the clumsy mage. It gives the character... ... ... penache.
The reason I don't use the rolling 4d6 for stats is because my brother has the luck of the gods when it comes to rolling stats and making critical hits. He one time rolled 3 18s, two 17s and a 15 for a character and I decided that after that I would no longer allow people to roll for stats.
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Mok's post seems to embody pretty much what I was going to say, only a little bit better thought out.
I like that point buy allows everyone to make what they want and still be on even footing stat-wise with every other player in the campaign. No BS "luck of the draw" to boss your character around. Even when one DM gave us a very generous rolling system and I had nothing lower than a 14, there was still that guy that had an array of 18,18,18,18,17,16... The stupid bugger was good at everything, so even though I had above-average stats compared to most other campaigns I had been in, I still felt overshadowed by my colleague's godly stats. So, I'm a fan of point-buy forever.
I don't need the promise of ultra-high stats waving in my face, I just want to be just as good as my friend next to me. And say that the rolling method grants me the power of the gods themselves, chances are one of my friends just rolled crap stats and is now having less fun because of it. When one person is having less fun, it drags the atmosphere down for the whole game.
(Disclaimer: I am by no means saying that having low stats cannot be fun, or is in any way the "wrong way" to play the game. Thank you for your consideration)
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I'm still a 4d6 best 3 any order sort of guy. Reasons Goblin stated - PC's look like clones in the point buy system as there is a "no brainer" layout for them depending on class.
Down with clones.
==> 14, 18, 12, 14, 9, 17
Now tell me I need some silly point buy system. With those stats the imaginary world is my oyster!
I use the 4d6, drop lowest method. I usually wind up with a character that can be bought for 20-ish points, which is high, but not a game breaker.
In my games, I have two different systems of rolling this is based on my players usually.
Three types,
one power gamers, 5d6 drop lowest two
two people who somehow cannot roll to save their lives 5d6 drop the lowest two
three normal players 4d6
recently I have been messing around with a reward system for hard core
rolling down the line and saying these are my stats, I will deal with them however they go
perhaps a lighter version of what they do in hack master?
each build point buys 5% when you hit 100% you get an extra point. but then I might have to find a way to open build points into normal leveling which could be difficult.
So who's running the pbp we're rolling these 3d6 for? I want to play too!
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While we're at it, Comeliness ;) :
Not horrible. Wizard? Mediocre bard?
Glass cannon sorcerer for me, I guess. Ouch. I think even a flumph can kill me with that Con score.
3d6
3d6
3d6
3d6
3d6
3d6
Glass cannon sorcerer for me, I guess. Ouch. I think even a flumph can kill me with that Con score.
Maybe...beware housecats, at any rate - one of them is a serious threat, two is almost certain death! ^_-
I'm curious...
I could go with gnome to be not so squishy, but then wearing clothing would be a light load. Guess I'm going sky-clad! NAKED GNOME SCORCERLATOR!
Let's have a go at this...
Not a bad rogue?
Well, there was a stiff breeze and I died. I am sad, as I was a tripod. So here's try #2:
Hmm. Totally a druid. Who needs physical stats when you can turn into a bear and maul faces off?
...and why not...
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EDIT: sweet, I'm going for druid...
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RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
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Hi, there.
Last week, for a different thread, I examined the results of 4d6, keep 3. I rolled up 350 characters and examined how much their attributes would cost in the Pathfinder point-buy system. (I made some allowances for rolling something like { 1, 2, 2, 1}, which generates a result of 5, which is too low to be purchasable under Pathfinder's point-buy.) The results: the median character could be constructed on about a 19-point buy. But the variance was impressive. There were a lot of characters that would have cost 45 points or more (highest: 54 points). There were a goodly number that would have cost -6 or below.
Now, if your group is interested in rolling for stats, this brings up some questions:
One - Are you rolling because you want disparity among the characters?
Is it okay if one guy's PC would have cost 45 points to buy, and the guy sitting next to him has a hapless PC that's not as mighty as a commoner?
Two - Or do you just want to take some of the control out of the players' hands?
That's perfectly reasonable. Whenever we roll dice, we surrender control. We don't let our players pick which saving throws they'll make, or which attacks will hit,* and we might not want them to be able to tinker so precisely with their character's abilities that the PC feels genetically engineered.**
--+--+--
If you only want characters to be out of the control of the players, but still want them to be mostly evenly-powered, try this:
Roll 18 dice. Don't add anything. Clump all the "1's" together, all the "2's", and so forth.
Example:
1's: //
2's: /////
3's: //
4's: //
5's: /////
6's: //
Then use the 1's to buy Strength, the 2's to buy Dexterity, ... If there are excess points (like, you can't buy more with 6 points in Dexterity) then you can shuffle those excess points around.
Continued Example:
Strength: 2 pts = 12
Dexterity: 5 pts = 14
Constitution: 2 pts = 12
Intelligence: 2 pts = 12
Wisdom: 5 pts = 14
Charisma: 2 pts = 12.
There. A random character, completely outside the player's control, but every PC will have about the same power level as her peers. You could also go look up Craig Shackleton's "Three Dragon Ante" character generation method from Dragon #346; it does the same thing, but with fancy cards that give you some plausible ideas as to why your PC ended up that way.
--+--+--
If you don't mind having Batman and Black Canary hang around with Snapper Carr, then I'd suggest giving ol' Snapper some sort of compensation.
An Idea - Again, I go back to extra traits. Figure out the point buy of the most expensive character, and give the other PCs an extra trait (in any category) for every full 3 points their character is weaker.
For example, here's a party generated on 4d6, drop lowest:
Abelard: {STR 13, DEX 10, CON 8, INT 14, WIS 12, CHA 9} cost: 7 points
Bernardo: {STR 11, DEX 16, CON 17, INT 14, WIS 9, CHA 6} cost: 22 points
Caspian: {STR 10, DEX 8, CON 16, INT 16, WIS 17, CHA 8} cost: 29 points
Drucilla: {STR 14, DEX 11, CON 12, INT 9, WIS 13, CHA 12} cost: 12 points
Edwin: {STR 9, DEX 17, CON 10, INT 7, WIS 10, CHA 14} cost: 13 points
The oh-so-special character is Caspian, who would cost 29 points. To balance the party, we give Bernardo 2 extra traits, Drucilla and Edwin both get 5 extra traits, and Abelard gets 7 extra traits.
Another Idea - How about putting the party's two best-rolled characters on the slow experience progression table, and the two most hapless characters on the fast experience progression?
--+--+--
* unless we decide to use Hero Points.
** 'cause he is.
I have my players use the following: roll 4d6, no drop.
I have a history of raising the difficulty of the game (and the dice gods favor my DM d20 for some reason).
And for good measure (using my system for kicks):
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Clumsy dim musclebound sorcerer... nice.
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Twenty years of gaming with the same group, my dice rolling became so legendary that we had a couple of special rules, just for me.
It started with the 1e/2e rule that if I rolled a character that didn't qualify for *any* class, I was allowed to reroll (i.e. I didn't get a 9 or better in Str, Dex, Int or Wis, so couldn't qualify for Fighter, Thief, Magic-User or Cleric). And yeah, this did happen frequently enough that it was made a rule by three seperate DMs (including one who flat out denied that it could happen, until I rolled such a 'mulligan' right in front of him, although he did try to convince me to play some sort of homebrew NPC class using the apprentice rules for 0-level characters from some Greyhawk supplement, since I couldn't legally play anything in the Player's Handbook...).
By 3rd edition, the only GM who still used rolled-dice instead of point-buy ruled that I was allowed to reroll if I didn't get at least a net +1 bonus, adding up all six of my ability bonuses and penalties. So, straight 10s across the board would have been a mulligan for me.
Even then, the dice-curse didn't just extend to character generation, so there was also a rule that if I rolled a 1 on an attack roll or saving throw, I got a coin. I could then spend that coin at a later time to cancel out another 1 and get a reroll, essentially halving the number of 1's I would roll. I lost a coin whenever I rolled a 20, so that if I got statistically normal luck, I'd have ended up with an average of no coins. I often would have two or three of them saved up in my dice bag...
I prefer role-playing concepts, and it's hard to get into a character when you sit down to a game thinking, "I want to play a scholarly sort, and here's my backstory," and then you are told you have to randomly assign stats and end up with an Int of 7 or something. "Yes, I know it's a game about intrigue and investigation, but you rolled bad, so you get to be the guy with the shovel, who stands around and watches everything happen, because he can't even pronounce Enochian, let alone translate it, for the next six months. Enjoy!"
Given a choice between being told that I can't play the sort of character I want to play, but will have my character randomly assigned to me, and doing something that I actually enjoy with my Saturday night, I'll be at the bar. Call me when the random schlep game is over, I've got a half-dozen of my own creations, most of them with two or three page backstories and ties to the campaign and hopes and dreams and ambitions, all ready to go.
Twenty years of gaming with the same group, my dice rolling became so legendary that we had a couple of special rules, just for me (...)
Makes me wonder if your dice-curse translates into the virtual world...
I won't use a point buy method in D&D. It has been my experience that rolled stats lead to better results at play time, particularly since 3x came along and made astronomical stats a lot less important. With 3x, you can get magic to improve any stat, stats can improve with level, and you can have the same bonus with 14 that you used to need a rarer 16 for in 1e/2e.
I also find that rolled stats keeps the balance between multi-attribute dependent and single-attribute dependent classes better than point buy which favors the single-attribute dependent classes.
So what do you do about players that are cursed by the dice gods? -----> 12,12,10,8,7,8 <----- Those are the normal rolls, not exact, but close.
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Twenty years of gaming with the same group, my dice rolling became so legendary that we had a couple of special rules, just for me (...)Makes me wonder if your dice-curse translates into the virtual world...
Apparently not. I've been doing fine in PBPs. Occasionally I get a streak (three attacks on a full attack, total on 3d20 ends up less than 10), but I've also gotten some lucky shots, so it probably balances out. (We always remember the bad luck over the good luck, so I tend to assume that stuff that wasn't witnessed by others wasn't quite as bad as I remembered.)
Ooh! Ooh! Me next!
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Battle Cleric FTW!
I wonder...
Edit:: First roll a 6, second "roll" a 6... Maybe it is protected from "editing in a reroll..."
Edit2::
Edit3:: Okay, it seems to be protected from editing in a reroll. I am not sure how "hardened" it is, but it is less vulnerable than I thought.
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RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
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Would you let players trade in traits for feats? The book says 2 traits roughly = 1 feat, but one might want to make the exchange rate 3:1 instead.
You're laying down the nuts-and-bolts of the idea, in a way consistent with the rest of the system. That's cool.
Well, at the standard exchange rate of 2 traits: 1 feat, our buddy Abelard there could get 3 feats and a spare trait. If he takes Toughness, Great Fortitude, and Lightning Reflexes to make up for his CON of 8 and his DEX of 10, then Caspian is still coming out ahead. So, sure.
I do 4d6, drop lowest, assign in any order. I allow each player to roll up to 4 complete sets of stats and pick one of the sets, no mixing and matching numbers from sets.
Actually, the last time my players generated stats, they only rolled once but I'm guessing one of the two players of that side-game would have rerolled if he didn't like the numbers it generated. (The other player really doesn't care.)
So what do you do about players that are cursed by the dice gods? -----> 12,12,10,8,7,8 <----- Those are the normal rolls, not exact, but close.
For one thing, I have them roll 2 sets with 4d6, drop lowest. Pick the set you prefer.
If they still end up with 12,12,10,8,7,8 as the better of two, they play it.Of course, if a player says that his dice always come up bad and I have reason to believe that's true, I have him roll but subtract the results from 21 (or at least give him that option from the outset). Gives the same distribution. I did this once with a player and his dice rolled true to expected form. His character came out pretty good.
So what do you do about players that are cursed by the dice gods? -----> 12,12,10,8,7,8 <----- Those are the normal rolls, not exact, but close.For one thing, I have them roll 2 sets with 4d6, drop lowest. Pick the set you prefer.
If they still end up with 12,12,10,8,7,8 as the better of two, they play it.Of course, if a player says that his dice always come up bad and I have reason to believe that's true, I have him roll but subtract the results from 21 (or at least give him that option from the outset). Gives the same distribution. I did this once with a player and his dice rolled true to expected form. His character came out pretty good.
My friend is cursed. The dice don't matter. Attacks rolls suck also. I was just hoping you had come up with an idea I did not have.
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We once did a roll where we rolled all the dice together and you could make your character based off of what the dice came up. So basically you rolled 18d6 and had to use the dice as they came up. a 4 a 1 and a 6 and you got 11 for one stat. you could only get an 18 if you got all 6's and used all 3 on the same stat. worked well for awhile since the dice tended to average out fairly well. Until I rolled. on 18d6 I had strait 6's. Yep thats right, I had everyone watching and jaws dropping. I have witnesses! It was the most powerful Ranger ever rolled. We stopped rolling as a group at that moment. well for dnd anyway.
Hmm…
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I'll be a human fighter.
My group's favorite method back in the 2E days was something of a hybrid of random and point-buy. The player would roll 3d6, freely assign the stats and, with the DM's permission, swap one or two points around.