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This is a problem with your GM. It's your character, you're free to roleplay it however you like.
Dumping my stats and then #$*($& and moaning when the GM doesn't allow me to use my superior talking skills OOC for my character IC.
So the GM should adjust the world to match how you roleplay it, not based on your stats and how you roll your skill checks?
You have a character with a cha 7, and no ranks in diplomacy, but because you the player stands up and gives a great and inspiring speech, you should win?
And every NPC in the game should hear the 3 minute quote you recited from Winston Churchill on fear vs fear itself, instead of the 'I uh, I think, you guys are cowards, we should just attack the castle head on! Glory!' your character was capable of?
EDIT : CLarified last paragraph
Dumping my stats and then #$*($& and moaning when the GM doesn't allow me to use my superior talking skills OOC for my character IC.Dumping my stats and then spending resources in game on overcoming that and actually making the rolls with the penalties.
See the difference?
A player with a dumped stat character should not be forced to play it like a simpleton or buffoon. I said absolutely nothing about allowing characters to be socially/mentally adept without the abilities/skills to do so.
I've seen a more players excessively punished by GMs biased against stat dumping than I've seen players demand to have Smoothy McBrainiac, the Int 7 Cha 7 monk. These GMs require the stat-dumped players to make more social/mental rolls than other players (and not just in situations where the other players would be auto-successful), and punish them in other ways as well.
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And that's where the skill system comes in. Roll that d20-2, and see what happens.I have no problem with people dumping stats as long as they don't turn around and expect that their 7 cha character has everyone hanging on their every word without some investment in performance or diplomacy.
That's not what you said though. You said I shouldn't penalize them for roleplaying. And that d20-2 roll only works if it's usable untrained. They want to roleplay as SHerlock HOlmes with that 7 int and Intimidate and Perception skill! How dare I tell them they aren't Sherlock Holmes! BAD GM!
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That 7 INT is half-way between the minimum intelligence allowed to a sentient creature (3) and average (10).
Two words: Bell Curve. Not linear progression.
No problem Lemmy, I get this a lot when I post on this topic for some reason. I think it's a blind spot people don't realize they have.
I have no problem with people dumping stats as long as they don't turn around and expect that their 7 cha character has everyone hanging on their every word without some investment in performance or diplomacy.
Or that their character is a Sage with a 7 Wis without having some serious investment in Sense Motive and such.
I'd put it differently, I'd say...
I have no problem with people doing whatever they want as long as they invest the necessary resources and have the necessary means of doing what they want. Role play doesn't allow you to ignore the rules. You can role play the rules however you want (e.g.: the Wizard with Str 8 is not a weakling, but he has terrible back pains and can't carry much weight or strain his muscles) as long as you are aware that said description have no mechanical effect*.
Or that their character is Sherlock Holmes with a 7 INT without some serious investment in Profession (Detective) and some knowledge skill purchases.
Not that I disagree, but this is a tricky case. When a GM creates puzzles, what should he do? Ultimately, puzzles are for players, not characters. The Wizard with Int 38 should be able to figure it out in an instant, but that's boring. OTOH, he not benefiting from his ungodly high Int score is unfair... Most often, players are happy to try and decipher the puzzle for themselves, but I usually let high Int characters solve the puzzle with an Int check if the players don't mind. Or at the very least, I give the Wizard's player a tip.
People always bring up this hoary chestnut about how it can be overcome with Skill Focus and such, but they never actually play these builds (usually, your acharacter spent some resources on it). But that's very rare. Mostly I run into people playing a 7 int 7 cha barbarian with an 18 str and 16 con but they want him treated as someone who's listened to and popular with the ladies (all while spending their 2 skill points on perception and intimidate).
I never dump Int because I love skill ranks and can't seem to have enough of them. Even when playing a Wizard I'll usually spend my favored class bonus on skill ranks rather than extra hp. I's not optimized, but it seems like there is always another cool skill to learn.
Now, the guy with the Cha 7 can role play like he's popular and beloved by all... He'll just be delusional. The world will react to what he is (i.e.: His abilities, skills, attributes, etc), etc. After all, the player can only roleplay his own character, not my NPCs.
*: Well, kinda. I tend to give small (and not-so-small) bonuses to skill check and other rolls for good role play.
e.g.: If a player actually recites the speech he has in mind instead of simply saying "I roll Diplomacy/Oratory" I give him a +2 or +4... Or however much I think he deserves. If he describes to me in detail how he is looking for traps instead of simply saying "I roll Perception" he might get a bonus too.
I never punish any player for not role playing their skill checks, though. Some players are incapable, unwilling or simply not interested in such thing, and there's nothing wrong with that (even if I find it a rather dull play style).
I've seen a more players excessively punished by GMs biased against stat dumping than I've seen players demand to have Smoothy McBrainiac, the Int 7 Cha 7 monk. These GMs require the stat-dumped players to make more social/mental rolls than other players (and not just in situations where the other players would be auto-successful), and punish them in other ways as well.
If you have dumped your stat to 7, and you didn't put ranks into the skill, you should have to make more rolls.
A lot of things are DC 10. Which means the GM handwaves them because you can take 10 and succeed. But if you've dumped, you can't make a DC 10 on a take 10 which means, yes, you have to roll more often than the guy who has a 10 in the cha and didn't put ranks in. Oh well, too bad, so sad. Don't want to have to roll, don't dump the stat to the point you can't get 10 on take 10.
Your stat is your initial impression. Your skill is what you can achieve. Lets say you see an obvious country bumpkin in town shopping. As a merchant, his Cha 7 makes you less interested in him. However, his 10 ranks and stuff in Diplomacy and Bluff means that when he came to bargain with you, you sold him a cow for a couple of beans, and thought you got the best of the deal. Next time, you recognize him as a serious customer who must be respected. So, first impression: below average. Later impression: respect and watch out for the fast talker.
/cevah
I dusagree. Charisma does not represent initial reaction any more than Strength represents your combat prowess.
Charisma is your natural charm. The difference between a guy with low Cha and ranks in Diplomacy and a guy with with high Cha and no ranks in Diplomacy is just that one is naturally convincing while the other had to practice how to convince people.
If they both have the same total bonus to Diplomacy/Bluff/Intimidate/Whatever, they both are equally convincing.
Now, I'd like to make Cha a more useful attribute. Having an Initial Reaction check would be okay, but I'd rather use the 4ed idea of basing each of your saves on the highest of two attributes or the Kirthfinder idea of splitting Will save in two separate saves.
I agree that if the skill mod is the same, then they get the same result after interacting. However, if you need to quickly choose from a lineup, you have no interaction to speak of, so you only have Cha.
That said, here is my calculation for stat points:
sum occ pct std
3 1 0.5% 2.54
4 3 1.9% 2.20
5 6 4.6% 1.86
6 10 9.3% 1.52
7 15 16.2% 1.18
8 21 25.9% 0.85
9 25 37.5% 0.51
10 27 50.0% 0.17
11 27 62.5% 0.17
12 25 74.1% 0.51
13 21 83.8% 0.85
14 15 90.7% 1.18
15 10 95.4% 1.52
16 6 98.1% 1.86
17 3 99.5% 2.20
18 1 100.0% 2.54
This uses 3d6 as a base, as that is the defined normal population. A 7 is only 1.18 standard deviations below normal. This is not an outlier by any means. For that you need less than 5 or more than 16. [Two standard deviations.]
I don't know what real life distribution is, but genius is considered like IQ 150 or 95%, which above maps to Int 15. This is 1.52 standards away. Also, remember, PCs are heroic. That is they are exceptional. They normally fall on the high side relative to the normal population.
/cevah
That's not what you said though. You said I shouldn't penalize them for roleplaying. And that d20-2 roll only works if it's usable untrained. They want to roleplay as SHerlock HOlmes with that 7 int and Intimidate and Perception skill! How dare I tell them they aren't Sherlock Holmes! BAD GM!And that's where the skill system comes in. Roll that d20-2, and see what happens.I have no problem with people dumping stats as long as they don't turn around and expect that their 7 cha character has everyone hanging on their every word without some investment in performance or diplomacy.
No, that's exactly what I said. RP your character however you want; the skill system will handle it. Go ahead and make your huge dramatic speech, and watch your d20-2 result. Start making your brilliant deduction; when the GM calls for a Knowledge check to see what your character actually knows about the subject, roll that d20-2.
I think part of the problem is the perception that the 777 is a murderhobo who sits and never does anything except kill people.
For the record. If somone dumps all mentals and still tries to interact with the world around him I don't see an issue.
While no one. I have played with has done 777. We did have a 5 cha dwarf last campaign. The character said inappropriate things and often tried to talk to people. Basically if you were doing. Anything diplomaticslly sensative you probly did not want him around.
Two words: Bell Curve. Not linear progression.That 7 INT is half-way between the minimum intelligence allowed to a sentient creature (3) and average (10).
How about this, I'll give you a link, read it.
99% of the adult population fo the world right now are between 60 and 160 IQ.
A bell curve doesn't fit that.
To get the same effect of 99%, you have to look at 5 to 16 on the 3d6 curve. However, that means the lower end (5 to 7) corresponds to severe mental retardation up to moderate retardation. So if you want to talk about distribution curves, let's use the one that fits populations (gausian), in which case, you REALLY can't win an argument that 7 is as capable as 10. :)
If you have dumped your stat to 7, and you didn't put ranks into the skill, you should have to make more rolls.
If they are things that would normally require skill checks, sure. However, stat-dumped characters shouldn't be forced to make rolls that nobody else is even considered to be taking 10 on.
For example, I've seen a Cha 7 player forced to roll just to talk to NPCs and not have their attitude degrade. The character wasn't trying to improve the NPCs attitude nor make a request of the NPC (actual uses of Diplomacy requiring a roll). They were just moving through a basic social encounter without trying to accomplish anything requiring a roll... the GM had the NPC become unfriendly to them arbitrarily. That shouldn't happen.
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Secondly... USE it. If a character has a super low charisma, people are going to immediately dislike them. They will, in turn, dislike whoever he is with. They might try to pay that character less than the rest of the group for a job, refuse to let him in to any decent establishment etc. Guards will be more likely to harass him.That sounds like a sure fire way to make an unsocial character decide that he might as well go full murder hobo. And if he's super minmaxed it's not like that snotty noble who tried to pay him half wages is going to do anything but die.
We had a half-orc thief in a party back in 2nd Ed, who had the lowest possible Wisdom and Charisma after adjustments. The player did indeed go full murder hobo + steal from the party, grab every female's butt, start fights with everybody and run into unknown rooms/castles/situations with no regard for anybody's safety, but he didn't need any noble or other NPC to treat him badly to do it - that's just how he played the character, right from the start.
It's not as much fun for everybody else at the table as it might sound to the average selfish player.
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As to the question:
6 and 7 Charisma is a -2 to ability rolls.
Bob the half-orc barbarian stereotype without any social skills and a 7 CHA and Robert the Half-Elf Bard without any social skills but a 14 CHA both walk into a bar, and there are a pleasant half-orcc and pleasant half-elf waitress serving tables. The waitresses begin Friednly, because Bob and Robert are common guests who always pay well. When both Bob and Robert decide to use diplomacy check on the respective waitresses to make them helpful (looking for leads on a case), the roll is a DC10 + 1 (high charisma there for the non heroic peon NPCs).
On a roll of 9-20 Robert will succeed (60% chance)
On a roll of 5-8 the attitude will stay the same (20% chance)
On a roll of 1-4 the waitress will be put off (20% chance)
Bob on the other hand will worse...
On a roll of 13-20 Bob will succeed (40%)
On a roll of 9-12 the attitude will stat the same (20% chance)
On a roll of 4-8 the waitress will be put off (25% chance)
On a roll of 1-3 the waitress will become hostile (15% chance)
How much worse, I would not say to the level of utter incompetence. The poor charisma person has a chance of really offending the waitress, but still has the highest chance to improve the attitude over any other particular outcome, and an above 50% chance of not screwing things up.
According to the game rules, that is how the low CHA character gets penalized. How the actual interaction is played out can be left up to the individual GM and player. Maybe the half-orc is too forward in his request, and scares the lady. Maybe he uses inappropriate language. Maybe he insults her in his request. Up to the GM, but the mechanical effects are played out.
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According to the game rules, that is how the low CHA character gets penalized. How the actual interaction is played out can be left up to the individual GM and player. Maybe the half-orc is too forward in his request, and scares the lady. Maybe he uses inappropriate language. Maybe he insults her in his request. Up to the GM, but the mechanical effects are played out.
Agree 100%.
What get's my gizzard (and most people who are 'anti dump') is when Bob's player goes into great detail on how polite he is, and uses extremely polite language roleplaying his character, and then get's cheesed off when he rolls a 2 and the GM says 'You had all that in your head, and it sounded great, but it came out as 'Hey sugar****, you been boffing any red-headed guys with scars on their cheeks lately?' and claims that he didn't say that, and the GM should use what he said for the check, not what the roll indicated.
An endless ladle, then?
Back to the topic at hand; I've never dumped scores like that before; I as a DM would say that "your character is a burden that was left behind..."
I honestly see no reason to mechanically game the system like that- even my random fifteen pointbuy PC's rarely have a dump stat lower than eight- I have never even touched PFS before and am confused as to why the proposed builds are even considered neccessary...or even if they are in the first place.
Just my 2 cp.
According to the game rules, that is how the low CHA character gets penalized. How the actual interaction is played out can be left up to the individual GM and player. Maybe the half-orc is too forward in his request, and scares the lady. Maybe he uses inappropriate language. Maybe he insults her in his request. Up to the GM, but the mechanical effects are played out.Agree 100%.
What get's my gizzard (and most people who are 'anti dump') is when Bob's player goes into great detail on how polite he is, and uses extremely polite language roleplaying his character, and then get's cheesed off when he rolls a 2 and the GM says 'You had all that in your head, and it sounded great, but it came out as 'Hey sugar****, you been boffing any red-headed guys with scars on their cheeks lately?' and claims that he didn't say that, and the GM should use what he said for the check, not what the roll indicated.
That is a fair point , but honestly it got little to do with the 7 char score.
That is the player trying to get results over his skill check. This happens all the time, and with players with all positive scores also.
Hell i lost count of the number of times players want to know stuff because they "should know it" , good old backstory , i spent all my years studying outsider and i know all about them , but i got 0 points in the skill... Same goes for tons of other skills.
Right. The sad problem with skills and traits is that for your character to make sense, you need to have worked the back-story into the character. If you spent your childhood studying outsiders and the planes, and you put 0 points into knowledge (planes), or did not take the trait that gives you that knowledge as a class skill, then how is your character concept and your actual character related?
The Ultimate Campaign book does a good job trying to show people how to integrate a back story with a real character, but to pretend your character is good at something in the backstory (fluff) and not support it with the mechanics (the actual game results) seems either short-sighted, like you are playing the wrong system, or you are trying to game the system by having your cake (optimized build that ignores fluff-relevance) and eating it (the unattached fluff gives mechanical benefits).
The counter to that is "If you did spend all that time doing that, then you should show it by maxing ranks in Knowledge(the Planes) and also taking traits and/or feats to improve it further. Since you didn't, your character apparently didn't RETAIN all that studying."
hehe pretty much. Ah , the number of crazy reasons we need to come up with for this stuff , but in end the GM word is final and it should be. I know that when im in player sit i also try to go overboard with this stuff , it is hard to not do it , but hey , i accept when the GM said i failed.
Even a lvl 20 monk can roll a 1 and fail an acrobatic check , it is that simple.
Still this is not the same that saying a player should be mentally impaired because he got int 7 or saying he should be ugly/timid/etc because he got char 7.
I think the player can be the way he/she wants to be , when it comes to the skill check then his/her stats will make the work and balance it out, i dont think one should interfere on how their player act because of a stat score.
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According to the game rules, that is how the low CHA character gets penalized. How the actual interaction is played out can be left up to the individual GM and player. Maybe the half-orc is too forward in his request, and scares the lady. Maybe he uses inappropriate language. Maybe he insults her in his request. Up to the GM, but the mechanical effects are played out.Agree 100%.
What get's my gizzard (and most people who are 'anti dump') is when Bob's player goes into great detail on how polite he is, and uses extremely polite language roleplaying his character, and then get's cheesed off when he rolls a 2 and the GM says 'You had all that in your head, and it sounded great, but it came out as 'Hey sugar****, you been boffing any red-headed guys with scars on their cheeks lately?' and claims that he didn't say that, and the GM should use what he said for the check, not what the roll indicated.
Bob should be upset, because that is not what he said. He said all those polite things sure, but because of his overall roll on diplomacy those same words come across as snobbish, or creepy, or mechanical, or any one of hundred other reasons why being polite doesn't produce a guaranteed increased attitude adjustments in real life. Changing what a character said is big No, making a player take the result of his roll is not.
Then people, justifiably, get fed up with Bob. So, Frank joins the table. Now, Frank's got the charisma of a fence post. Its not that he's a rude person, but he laughs at the wrong times, is completely emotionless most of the time, bites his nails, is very shy, etc. He wants to play Zoro. So, he takes the Ninja class and maximizes social skills hoping to be dashing and charming. Frank still has the charisma of a fence post. He doesn't know how to do it. But, he can roll very well on his social skills. The other players expect Frank to be charming, but he's not. They tend to ignore his rolls. Eventually, he gets frustrated and eagerly waits for his character to die, so he can roll something else up. By this time, the other players are desperate for someone who can roleplay a high charisma character - somebody like Bob.
According to the game rules, that is how the low CHA character gets penalized. How the actual interaction is played out can be left up to the individual GM and player. Maybe the half-orc is too forward in his request, and scares the lady. Maybe he uses inappropriate language. Maybe he insults her in his request. Up to the GM, but the mechanical effects are played out.Agree 100%.
What get's my gizzard (and most people who are 'anti dump') is when Bob's player goes into great detail on how polite he is, and uses extremely polite language roleplaying his character, and then get's cheesed off when he rolls a 2 and the GM says 'You had all that in your head, and it sounded great, but it came out as 'Hey sugar****, you been boffing any red-headed guys with scars on their cheeks lately?' and claims that he didn't say that, and the GM should use what he said for the check, not what the roll indicated.
Uh-Oh, we have some confusion. Bob and Robert were characters. Is Frank a player? If Frank is a social awkward person in real life, and plays a rock-star PC, his GM and players should help him role-play the character up to Frank's and the table's expectation.
__When you say the other players expect Frank to be charming, do they mean Frank the player, or Frank the character. By definition, Frank the Character is charming, and the players are all working together to make the role-playing show this. If the table expects Frank the player to be charming because his character has a high CHA, they are new to life and role-playing.
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If the players are ignoring Frank the player's character because they do not like Frank, there is no amount of Statistical character adjustment that will fix the problem. The players need to be taught a productive way to deal with the mechanics of social skills divorced from real life social skill. Even if it means the GM narrating only the results of Frank's character's social interaction like "And Frank smoothly talks your way past the angry guard, leaving him breathless with amazement."
__
As for mdt's quote, he too was talking characters. If the player of Bob the barbarian comes up with a very clever way of saying his request before the diplomacy role, he is counting chickens before they hatch. So he gets through a clever request, rolls a two, and Bob the barbarian actually says "Hey toots, you stupid or something? Did you see him". After the game (or during it) the GM can remind people you roll diplomacy checks for requests first, in order to make breaking immersion less common in the future.
Keep in mind, your table needs to have a consensus with the GM as to how this works. I am a big fan of rolling first, talking second. (Imagine talking about how you hack off the Minotaur's arms before rolling a combat check, and being annoyed when the GM says "well, you imagine how awesome that would be, but your attack merely glances off his shiny hide armor").
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The method suggested by Anzyr is another fine method. The wording stays the same, but comes out poorly. Imagine poor Bob the Barbarian calling the lady "toots" and Humphrey Bogart calling her "toots". Same words, completely different result, based off the character's inherent charisma!
The problem I have with Anzyr's method is that the player is playing against his character. The player's using honeyed words, speaking diplomatically, and using phrases that given the character has no skill ranks in diplomacy and a natural ability that works against it. That's not 'roleplaying my character' that's 'I'll do whatever I want and only get the benefits but none of the downsides'. It would be like me making a character with a 7 str and 16 cha and describing him as looking like Fabio. I can't look like Fabio with a 7 str. Why does the guy with the 7 int and 7 cha get a pass on acting like James Bond when the 7 str 7 con guy can't look like Fabio?
In other words, if you want to play James Bond, build James Bond, not Burt from Sesame Street.
It is not playing "against" character. Lots of attractive people have low Charisma. Lots of well-spoken people have low Charisma. The character can talk like James Bond and make the same moves as James Bond, the difference between a 7 CHR James Bond and regular James Bond is that 7 CHR James Bond is rejected because he not able to pull it off, while regular James Bond comes off as smooth, even though we all know his lines would never work otherwise.
And I would be very ok with the 7 STR 7 CON guy looking like Fabio. Why couldn't he?
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And I would be very ok with the 7 STR 7 CON guy looking like Fabio. Why couldn't he?
I don't see how he looks impacts his STR score or his CON score. Hell he could get sick everywhere he goes for all I know and I wouldn't be shocked if he considered 47–70 lbs. a heavy load.
Even a lvl 20 monk can roll a 1 and fail an acrobatic check , it is that simple.
For the record, a 1 is not an auto-fail on skill checks, just attack rolls and saves. So a level 20 monk rolling a 1 on an Acrobatics check is still likely to be a success, unless the DC is as astronomical as his Acrobatics modifier.
Just sayin'.
I'm sure lots of people who exercise and appear healthy and even lead healthy life styles may nonetheless get sick at the drop of a hat. I'm equally sure that not all people with muscle tone are able to lift similar loads. I think it is entirely possible for someone to be both toned and not especially strong. Take the Sherlock Holmes story where he unbends the iron bar a far more muscled individual had trouble bending and this becomes apparent that 7 STR character could look muscled without being especially strong.
Furthermore a 7 INT character is more then capable of coming up with a cunning plan. It can even be complex. It just had better not rely on knowledge from skills their not trained in. But keep in mind even animals are capable of using tactics and there are savants that possess considerable knowledge in one area without what would be generally called intelligent.
But no please go back to your outrage and narrow viewpoint that fine.
Even a lvl 20 monk can roll a 1 and fail an acrobatic check , it is that simple.For the record, a 1 is not an auto-fail on skill checks, just attack rolls and saves. So a level 20 monk rolling a 1 on an Acrobatics check is still likely to be a success, unless the DC is as astronomical as his Acrobatics modifier.
Just sayin'.
That was not the point i was trying to make hehehe.
But i get what you mean :D.
I could care less about mathematics degrees, or statistical distributions across a population, or anything else. In the d20 system, a character with a 7 in a stat is EXACTLY 10% less likely to succeed at given task than a character with a 10 in the same stat, all else being equal. No more, no less.
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That is a fair point , but honestly it got little to do with the 7 char score.
That is the player trying to get results over his skill check. This happens all the time, and with players with all positive scores also.
Amen.
Both times I played my rogue in social-based scenarios (The Blakros Matrimony and The Hellknights Feast) I was rocking double digit Diplomacy and Knowledge skills.
None of which helped my character meet the DCs when rolling 3's and 5's. So all that night in-character dialogue was just wasting table time.
I don't see how he looks impacts his STR score or his CON score. Hell he could get sick everywhere he goes for all I know and I wouldn't be shocked if he considered 47–70 lbs. a heavy load.So.. you don't see how muscles affect your strength score?
Anzyr, if I am in agreement with mdt (which I am here) then you are probably wrong.
Anzyr, if I am in agreement with mdt (which I am here) then you are probably wrong.I don't see how he looks impacts his STR score or his CON score. Hell he could get sick everywhere he goes for all I know and I wouldn't be shocked if he considered 47–70 lbs. a heavy load.So.. you don't see how muscles affect your strength score?
OH come on Shifty!
We've agreed before!
At least what, 2 other times?
:)
That is a fair point , but honestly it got little to do with the 7 char score.
That is the player trying to get results over his skill check. This happens all the time, and with players with all positive scores also.
Amen.
Both times I played my rogue in social-based scenarios (The Blakros Matrimony and The Hellknights Feast) I was rocking double digit Diplomacy and Knowledge skills.
None of which helped my character meet the DCs when rolling 3's and 5's. So all that night in-character dialogue was just wasting table time.
Been there. Done that. Refused to buy the t-shirt (I kept flubbing the negotiation roll and they wouldn't budge off the $19.99 price tag).
That is a fair point , but honestly it got little to do with the 7 char score.
That is the player trying to get results over his skill check. This happens all the time, and with players with all positive scores also.
Amen.
Both times I played my rogue in social-based scenarios (The Blakros Matrimony and The Hellknights Feast) I was rocking double digit Diplomacy and Knowledge skills.
None of which helped my character meet the DCs when rolling 3's and 5's. So all that night in-character dialogue was just wasting table time.
I do tend towards a bit of leeway here and there in terms of character knowledge and decent roleplay. There are certain very basic things characters ought to know by dint of existence and living that aren't covered on character sheets.
And stupid and boorish can be represented in as many ways as serene and beaurtiful.
For example my cha dumping cavalier knows all about politeness, and proper chelaxian etiquette and for all intents and purposes is a pretty friendly and decent fellow.
Trouble is he's also brutally honest, goes thourhg social mores like a bull in a china shop, has a handshake that can crack walnuts, and is the sad owner of a number of polite but obvious bigotted notions about women, othe races, his race, his b+~$! of a cousin, his family, etc. etc.
In short he can in fact tell you all about proper etiquette and negotiation. Just gods help the people in front of him when he practices either.
I could care less about mathematics degrees, or statistical distributions across a population, or anything else. In the d20 system, a character with a 7 in a stat is EXACTLY 10% less likely to succeed at given task than a character with a 10 in the same stat, all else being equal. No more, no less.
Moro, it all depends on the target task's DC
DC -----%chance with 7 Stat -----% chance with 10 stat
5 ------ 70% chance (7-20) ------ 80% (5-20)
25 ------ 0% chance (18 max) ----- 0% chance (20 max)
0 ------ 95% chance (1 fails) ----- 100% chance (no fails)
So when you check the middle, 10% is common, but depending on the target it can change. If you look at my earlier post about Bob and Robert, you will see that as the rolls get more complex (Diplomacy to affect attitude in that case), the results become even less clear then simply saying "-2 makes it 10% worse"
Why I can't take your arguments seriously.
And I would be very ok with the 7 STR 7 CON guy looking like Fabio. Why couldn't he?
Hey now, Fabrizio specifically has the 14 con 14 strength.
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If my Cha 5 character uses feats and skill ranks to have amazing Bluff, Diplomacy and Intimidate skills, then I better have amazing Bluff, Diplomacy and Intimidate skills. I'd be pissed off if my GM told me people dislike me despite my +48 Diplomacy check just because I have low Cha score.
This is a flawed response.
If you're dumping int/cha/etc, you are not wasting feats on skils. You're putting those feats into combat skills.
Its not a flawed response. they're talking about an actual character, you're talking about theorycrafting other peoples build decisions.
Case in point, I have a Tengu inquisitor of Calden Cayen with a Charisma of 7... but he has the conversion inquisition which lets him use his wisdom instead of cha. for diplomacy bluff and intimidate... which means he uses wisdom for 99.9999% of what he'll ever use charisma for.
You don't need all three social skills: usually 1 is sufficient to cover for the others (diplomacy especially is the perception of social skills). A fighter with a 13 int putting the points into diplomacy will far outstrip a 13 charisma fighter over the long haul.
Diplomacy is an active skill that require 1 minute of interaction, your charisma modifier is what other people "see" when meeting you.
That you are capable to convince someone that you are a wonderful guy if he want to listen to you for a minute require the target to be interested in listening to you for a minute.That is situation dependent, if you are trying to affect with your diplomacy someone that has reasons to listen to you, good for you, if he is not forced or motivated to wait for your speech to end he will react to your charisma and leave/disregard what you say/cut your speech short as often happen in real life.
The first edition of AD&D had a difference in NPC reaction between the initial reaction and the modifier you get after some interaction, something that wasn't maintained in the 3.X rules as an explicit rule, but that appear in the time needed to use diplomacy.
The initial reaction check of the old AD&D game for random NPC or wandering encounters sometime had fun effects and was useful to avoid a standardized behavior set by the GM from all the NPC.
your charisma modifier is what other people "see" when meeting you
Citation?
The first edition of AD&D had a difference in NPC reaction between the initial reaction and the modifier you get after some interaction, something that wasn't maintained in the 3.X rules as an explicit rule, but that appear in the time needed to use diplomacy.
No. They do not actually appear anywhere in the time needed to use diplomacy.