| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
There is far too much variability in severity of drawbacks to give a good answer. Far too much.
If I were you, I’d sort through the drawbacks and compile a full list of the “major” drawbacks and require the players to roll randomly on that list for half of their drawbacks and then let them pick the remainders out of all drawbacks… however you should also require them to submit their selections for approval so that you can veto any that have no effect on the character in question.
First off, going from 15PB to 25PB is nowhere even close to +1 CR. Seriously. The higher point buy is probably a +1 to two (including the highest) and a +2 to two other ability scores, or something like that. Meanwhile, the +1 CR advanced simple template is +4 to all ability scores.
Second, templates are not designed to be put onto PCs, and they're not balanced against class levels. They're many templates that could easily imbalance the game, so you'd have to either go through the whole, big list and ban a lot, or you'll likely end up with the players approaching you hope-filled to be shut down ten times in a row.
I don't think this is feasible, at least not for +1 class level or a +1 CR template. It would require a number of drawbacks so ridiculously high (I'm talking 30 or so) that just remembering what they all did would be a pain in the ass.
Higher point buy would take a much lower number, but the problem with drawbacks is that you can very easily end up with characters that have a bunch of skills and some other non-build-related stuff shut down, and thus players are notably driven towards characters that are bad at most skills and other non-combat things. And you'd still need 10 drawbacks or so to really balance it. And then you end up with the same half a dozen drawbacks being picked by every player, meaning you basically normalize PCs.
Why not just give the players 25PB to begin with?
I would think they would have to randomize the drawbacks they got, not self select them...
I do agree that (freely) picking them makes way too many of them very cheap, but randomness in character creation is terrible - you'll probably end up with a player virtually unhindered and another player who has half his character concept shut down. Or worse (and you end up with PCs that have to steal from party members to not cripple their character, and "fun" stuff like that).
Every official Paizo NPC statblock that uses a 25 Point Buy instead of a 15 Point Buy calls out that this is a +1 to CR. In fact, I’ve seen NPC statblocks call out a mere 20 Point Buy as being +1 to CR.
Did you miss the part where I explained while that's nonsense?
What part of the phrases “might even allow”, and “depending on what it is” did you miss? Did you see the word “template”, and completely ignore the rest of that sentence?
Again, I explained why just allowing select templates is not actually that easy. That you accuse me of ignoring part of what you said when that's exactly what you are doing is repugnant.
You are making the exact same mistake I made. I forgot that 2 Traits=1 Feat
No, I didn't make any mistake. You did, however, in blindly believing that a drawback equals a trait - which it doesn't, not in practise. It's not a linear cost, but the first 10 or so drawbacks are maybe worth one feat. So even if we take 5 feats = 1 level for granted for the sake of argument if nothing else, this does not mean 1 level = 10 drawbacks.
Because Pathfinder is balanced around PCs being CR=Effective Character Level, so if I add a +1 to that CR, something has to be changed to lower the CR back down, otherwise, I have to remake the entire campaign to be +1 CR, and sometimes, I don’t want mountains of work if I’m just running an AP.
You're vastly overrating how much point buy affects a PC's power. High point buy doesn't really do much for the strongest classes and strognest builds, and thus their increase in power is pretty minor. Meanwhile, a 25 point buy entices players to pick weaker classes and builds, which means increasing point buy can actually lower the power level of the group.
Overall, class and build selection have a much higher impact on a character's power level than point buy, as do level and equipment. That means there are a lot of different leverage points to tweak the group's power level.
Get a better gaming group. Good players don’t cheese the game.
- Presuming much? Not that the idea that picking somethign that's beneficial to your character was cheese isn't laughable to begin with...
It's funny how you call selecting non-hindering drawbacks "cheese", yet you're scared that 25PB will increase the power level of your characters. If your players are so saint-like, wouldn't they just round out their character with the extra PB points? I mean, increasing your primary ability score is just as much cheese, after all!
APs don't exactly use 15 point buy. They use a stat array from 15 point buy. A 25 point buy used strategically may actually be worth the +1. A witch with 18 starting intelligence is going to be a lot more dangerous than a witch with 15 starting intelligence.
The CR system was designed to give a GM a rough idea on how a party will do against a creature or creatures. It was never intended to be anything but a very rough guideline. Using it for anything else is foolish. It does not even do that good of a job as a guideline.
I agree with Derklord about the templates. The only way a PC should have a template is if all the PC’s have the same template. Anything else ends up creating huge imbalances.
If you want to run a high powered campaign just give everyone a higher point buy and adjust the game as needed.
The fastest way to kill a game is to have an imbalance between the players. What you are suggesting is going to create an imbalance.
They are quite right… the CR system doesn’t really work as a 100% accurate representation of power… balance within pathfinder APs tend to assume that the party has one of a few specific compositions. These party compositions tend to be fairly average in actual combat strength and broad coverage for skills. Which ultimately means that an AP run with a well built party even at 15pt buy can easily result in a “CR appropriate” fight being a cake walk. Similarly, a poorly built party could struggle with a low CR encounter, and TPK to a “CR appropriate” encounter.
So if your concern is needing to rebuild things, then you might want to run some simulated encounters on your own with the parties characters with both 15pt buy stats and 25pt buy stats… there are three outcomes you will most likely see.
1) the party struggles or dies with 15pt buy but does better with 25pt
2) the party breezes through encounters with 15pt buy and shaves off one round of combat at 25pt
3) the party experiences no noticeable difference between 15pt and 25pt buy.
Basically, it helps poorly built parties, doesn’t mean much to power builds, and is negligible to an average party.