Beginning Stats [Archive] - Wizards Community

Beginning Stats [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Quizzit
09-21-07, 12:44 AM Hey guys,

I am curious as to what rules you set (house or otherwise) for your players beginning statistics.

For instance, our DM gave us a 72 point spread to choose the stats as we please. Now this is a rather conservative total, and a few of our players had a bit of a problem with it.

I was wondering what other system people go by.

-Q
Lotusblossom
09-21-07, 01:22 AM 31 point buy.
albinomonkeyking
09-21-07, 01:32 AM 4d6, keep 3, reroll 1's.
PantherFern
09-21-07, 01:38 AM The way I went this time around is 4d6 drop lowest, roll 7 sets drop low set. No reroll on the 1's though.

Looks to be turning out decent stats overall, quite a few good stats but there are still a couple 8-9's in there. Nobody's uber all the way around but nobody's nerfed either.
KillerGM
09-21-07, 01:53 AM 25 point buy
DorkusTyranus
09-21-07, 02:04 AM I'm pretty new to the game and we did our stats differently, what does it mean to have a point buy?
Ephraim
09-21-07, 02:19 AM A friend of mine ran a game recently. In the interest of maintaining balance without encouraging the sillyness that sometimes accompanies point buy, he simply generated a single stat block and told us that we could arrange the six values as much as we wanted.
10, 11, 13, 13, 14, 16
The character will net +7 out of this block, which definitely qualifies as heroic. The three odd numbers means that there's a lot of possibilities for what to do with your 4th level ability point. Having a 16 forces tough decisions. Casters actually have to think about how they'll get their casting stat high enough for high-level spells -- or whether they'll multiclass before it becomes a problem. Combatant characters have to determine whether they want to be quick, tough, or strong, because 2/3 is about as good as they'll get.
Fsi-Dib
09-21-07, 02:21 AM We've had several different. One is that 4 * 4d6, drop lowest, rerolls ones. Then there has been a 7 * 4d6, drop middle (e.g. you roll 16 17 12 9 7 11 14, you drop 12). Once we tried a 6 * 5d6, drop two lowest.

In our home games we've never really used point-buy. I think I tried it once, but players (nor I) didn't like it.
herceg
09-21-07, 03:21 AM I'm pretty new to the game and we did our stats differently, what does it mean to have a point buy?

The point-buy is, basically, a system that makes you chose between multiple lower or few higher abilities (the higher it gets, the more costly).

It is as follows: 8 is the basic ability, from 9-14 point it costs 1 each, from 15-16 it's two and 17-18 costs 3 points (i.e.: 15 as ability costs you eight points, while 17 is thirteen points etc.)

The "standard" is 25 point-buy, 32 is called "high-power(ed)", etc.

The difference between point-buy and your method is that you use is that in your system 18 costs eightteen points, 14 costs fourteen points, while in point-buy 18 costs sixteen, 14 costs six.

EDIT: Point-buy actually rewards "moderate" (+1/+2 modifier) abilities (i.e. by 25 point-buy if you want 13 13 13 13 13 13 you can do it, but if you want only one ability at 18, you have only 7 points left, meaning 18 10 10 9 9 9 and such).
Radijs
09-21-07, 04:15 AM 28 point buy in two of my campaigns and 32 PB in one other campaign.
Sigst
09-21-07, 05:04 AM EDIT: Point-buy actually rewards "moderate" (+1/+2 modifier) abilities (i.e. by 25 point-buy if you want 13 13 13 13 13 13 you can do it, but if you want only one ability at 18, you have only 7 points left, meaning 18 10 10 9 9 9 and such).

I just love pecking at small inaccuracies...

For straight "13" you need 30 points...

If you put an 18 in an ability you have spent 16 points, leaving 9 left, so you could do 18 10 10 10 10 9.

But the basic gist is right, you get more ability score for your points if you spread them out, but doing so means you lose out on very high scores, scores which you probably intend to exploit more than the "dump stats".

Sig
herceg
09-21-07, 06:14 AM I just love pecking at small inaccuracies...

For straight "13" you need 30 points...

If you put an 18 in an ability you have spent 16 points, leaving 9 left, so you could do 18 10 10 10 10 9.

But the basic gist is right, you get more ability score for your points if you spread them out, but doing so means you lose out on very high scores, scores which you probably intend to exploit more than the "dump stats".

Sig

Should I say... whooopsie? :D This happens when I have to rush (at workplace,it's not entirely "legal", if you catch my drift). Thanks for correction :)
Goon_for_Hire
09-21-07, 07:40 AM My players don't like point buys... they say it takes some of the 'thrill' out of building a character. Personally, I would prefer it for the sake of fairness, but nobody has really complianed over one character having better abilities than the others, so whatever makes sure they have a good time.

I have them roll 4d6 six times, dropping the lowest die. But I also have them roll up six sets of stats and take the one they think is most suitable for the character. They assign the numbers as they see fit to the character attributes.

With six sets of character stats there is still plenty of randomness, but noone has to play the King of Suck unless the dice were cursed.

The biggest dilemma my players face with this set up usually is whether to take a character with a lot of pretty good stats overall, or one wiht a couple of really great stats.

A system I used back in 2nd ed. was to have players roll a set of 3d6 scores, assign them as they pleased, then I gave them eight points to distribute among the stats any way they liked so long as they didn't exceed their racial maximums. That way you ould shore up bad stats or improve already impressive ones.
DorkusTyranus
09-21-07, 08:18 AM It is as follows: 8 is the basic ability, from 9-14 point it costs 1 each, from 15-16 it's two and 17-18 costs 3 points (i.e.: 15 as ability costs you eight points, while 17 is thirteen points etc.)

The "standard" is 25 point-buy, 32 is called "high-power(ed)", etc.

The difference between point-buy and your method is that you use is that in your system 18 costs eightteen points, 14 costs fourteen points, while in point-buy 18 costs sixteen, 14 costs six.

Hmmm... I'm still a little confused by this part. How much exactly does each stat cost?
herceg
09-21-07, 08:23 AM Sorry for the confusing answer.
So, the cost of each ability from 8 to 18 is as follows:

8 0
9 1
10 2
11 3
12 4
13 5
14 6
15 8
16 10
17 13
18 16
Stormbrand
09-21-07, 08:25 AM Personally, I prefer 32 pt buy, with 2-6 extra points for heavily MAD classes such as Monk, Hexblade and Paladin... Less if level-dipping, more if making the class a defining career.
Quizzit
09-21-07, 08:27 AM Interesting. I hope more will post, Id like to get a good sample and perhapps show the unhappy players that they really didn't get a raw deal.

My stats ended up being 8 14 12 18 10 10 for a Wizard. Fine for a class with 1 main stat, but one of the unhappy players choose to play a Paladin that has like 3 so you can imagine thier stats aren't very "uber" as far as game term are concerened.

a 32 point buy would prolly net anice spread, but no so much with a 25 point buy as Sig and Herc pointed out.

Rolling 4 or 5d6 and dropping 1's, lowest middle ect could net you higher scores, but they could also net you way lower scores.

For those of you that use the die roll, so you force your players to stick with a crummy result?

-Q
Goon_for_Hire
09-21-07, 09:03 AM For those of you that use the die roll, so you force your players to stick with a crummy result?

-Q

I'd like to think that my dice-rolling method prevents crummy characters, but there have been a few noteworthy and highly improbable days where six sets of assignable stats have been abysmal. At which point I have the PCs walk around their chair counterclockwise, dip their dice in salt, or otherwise follow some silly gambling supersitition, throw out the characters they rolled and start over.

Noone is going to have fun with a character with all 7s, however good a roleplayer they migh be.
Ephraim
09-21-07, 09:58 AM The game in which I am playing right now uses the following method:
Roll 3d6 eighteen times and pick the six best rolls. On the upside, the variance is lower, which reduces party imbalance. On the other hand, the DM tells me that the players have gotten complacent about having at least one 17 or 18 and often two, once they've applied racial bonuses. Next time we create characters, we are going to use a less silly method, like the tried-and-true 4d6-drop-lowest six times.

I think that the goal of decreasing variance is laudable. Especially among younger players, having one player with a great role and one player with a poor role can really skew the players' enjoyment of the game. One mechanism that might be really interesting would be to create characters as a party. Each characters rolls 6x-4d6-drop-lowest and then all of the resulting rolls are combined into a pool so that the players can negotiate who gets which numbers.
Acarg51
09-21-07, 10:35 AM Currently, in the game i'm running (Red Hand of Doom), we're using 28 point buy, with no stat allowed to be over a 16, before racial modifiers and stat points. Also, every four levels, players are allowed to increase two stats by 1. This system seems to encourage less min-maxing and, overall, characters that are better at everything, not just one specific thing.
Onikani
09-21-07, 10:53 AM In my last game we did a standard 30 point buy.

For my current game i prechose a 32 point buy array and gave it to all my players (they decide how to arrange them):

16
16
14
12
10
8

They all actually loved this array, good enough scores for a MAD pc, and yet everyone still has one weak stat...
(Also if it matters, we started at level 8, so they had 2 more points from leveling to add to this).
Matthew77
09-21-07, 11:11 AM When I'm the DM, my players use 32 point buy.

The campaign I'm a player in uses 4d6 reroll 1's, drop the lowest.

An alternate I've used in the past is start with an 18, roll 4d6 drop lowest 5 times and arrange as desired.

I used to use 80 points distributed as desired, but then I had a campaign where everyone showed up with 18, 18, 18, 10, 8, 8 so we switched to point buy. It is much better than a linear scale of stat cost.
Tequila_Sunrise
09-21-07, 11:51 AM 31 point buy.
I'm not sure if this is serious or a joke. 31 is just a weird number.

Anyway I use point buy when I DM, though someone recently came up with a new method that I want to use:

1. Get a deck of cards and take out 2 of everything from 4 to 9. This leaves you with 12 cards.
2. Shuffle the 12 cards and then deal them out randomly in pairs.
3. Turn the cards over and add the two cards of each pair together. This leaves you with six totals, ranging from 8 to 18.

This is the first roll v. point buy compromise that I've ever liked. It has the excitement of die rolling, while at the same time being 100% fair.
Ephraim
09-21-07, 01:00 PM I'm not sure if this is serious or a joke. 31 is just a weird number.

Anyway I use point buy when I DM, though someone recently came up with a new method that I want to use:

1. Get a deck of cards and take out 2 of everything from 4 to 9. This leaves you with 12 cards.
2. Shuffle the 12 cards and then deal them out randomly in pairs.
3. Turn the cards over and add the two cards of each pair together. This leaves you with six totals, ranging from 8 to 18.

This is the first roll v. point buy compromise that I've ever liked. It has the excitement of die rolling, while at the same time being 100% fair.

I think that this is my favourite method so far. The mean and mode of this distribution is 13. The standard deviation is approximately 2.3. It is symmetrical about 13. There are 66 possible combinations of 2 cards out of 12. The distribution looks like this:
8 - 1
9 - 4
10 - 5
11 - 8
12 - 9
13 - 12
14 - 9
15 - 8
16 - 5
17 - 4
18 - 1
The shape of this curve is pretty strange, so it is possible that I miscalculated somewhere, but this is a start. I am pretty sure that if you had 66 poker chips in a bag with the numbers 8 - 18 written on them in this distribution and the players picked 6 out at a time (mixing them back in between players) then you'd get the same sort of stat blocks.
Einvaldurinn_mikli
09-21-07, 01:24 PM I'm not sure if this is serious or a joke. 31 is just a weird number.

Anyway I use point buy when I DM, though someone recently came up with a new method that I want to use:

1. Get a deck of cards and take out 2 of everything from 4 to 9. This leaves you with 12 cards.
2. Shuffle the 12 cards and then deal them out randomly in pairs.
3. Turn the cards over and add the two cards of each pair together. This leaves you with six totals, ranging from 8 to 18.

This is the first roll v. point buy compromise that I've ever liked. It has the excitement of die rolling, while at the same time being 100% fair.

I like this. I might use it. That's okay with you right?
Puggins
09-21-07, 02:43 PM My favorite method:

Roll 3d6, rerolling anything lower than 7. Jot that number down as your first ability score. Then subtract that number from 25. That's your second ability score.

Repeat three times, for a total of six ability scores. You'll get six ability score between 7 and 18, and you'll get every great stat paired with a crummy stat and every average-to-good stat linked with another average-to-good stat.

Practically Every character you make with this system is worth somewhere between 30 and 40 points, though the higher you go the more crummy stats you'll have to work with. Sure, you can have three 18s, but you'll have three 7s too.
KillerGM
09-21-07, 03:30 PM Hmmm... I'm still a little confused by this part. How much exactly does each stat cost?

You can find this generation method (and others) in the DMG, beginning on pg 169.

:)
Ecalsneerg
09-21-07, 03:57 PM We use 32 point buy.
Sunic_Flames
09-21-07, 04:28 PM Adopted from someone else: 4d6 drop lowest 6 times. If the end result is less than 32 PB equivilent, then instead use 32 PB. Still some variation, but has a solid floor so you don't end up sucking horribly, can effectively play MAD characters, and so forth.
Forgarn
09-21-07, 04:33 PM I do 6 columns of 6 stats, 4d6-drop lowest-reroll 1's. Then choose any column, row or major angle (1,1 - 6,6 or 1,6 - 6,1). This works out really well and gives you 14 different options to choose the best from.
Aryxbez
09-21-07, 05:13 PM I usually go with a strange method that Otto the Bugbear created long before I realized he made it.

Assuming 4, Each player rolls 4d6, drop lowest and ignore 1's. Each player rolls once, so you get 4 results out of 6. Then the DM does the same, and the last roll everyone rolls and you take the average of the roll. Thus you get said ability scores. Also this way everyone has the same ability scores.

However I am tempted to go for something less random, that is point buy. However as I do like decent abilities, I would make it around 40 pts. Thing is this way someone could easily have 18,18,10,10,10,10. That there is just kinda lame, and I would expect the player to roleplay his abilities accurately. Either that or 32pt, if in the end this is a bad idea, I will go back to my old method.
StSteven
09-21-07, 07:48 PM We came up with a point buy where you still roll dice. Start at 25 and add 1d10. If you don't like the roll, you can take a mulligan by doing 23+1d8. We just did it 'cuz my wife rolls crazy rolls on the character generation and I wanted more balance than here 49 PB equivalent Druid, but she (obviously) still wanted to roll the dice. It results in 26 to 35 PB on the first roll or 24 to 31 on the mulligan. You are stuck with your mulligan.
Ephraim
09-21-07, 08:19 PM The shape of this curve is pretty strange, so it is possible that I miscalculated somewhere, but this is a start. I am pretty sure that if you had 66 poker chips in a bag with the numbers 8 - 18 written on them in this distribution and the players picked 6 out at a time (mixing them back in between players) then you'd get the same sort of stat blocks.

I retract this statement about 66 poker chips being equivalent to the card-dealing method. If one of your pairs is 9-9, there is absolutely no way for one of your other attributes to be 17 (9-8 or 8-9). That's not true of the poker chip method.

With the card-dealing method, if one of your attributes is an 18, then the mean of your remaining five stats drops to 12 and none of them can possibly be higher than 16.

Likewise, if you get really "lucky" and draw an 18 and a 16, then the mean of your remaining 4 stats drops to 11 and none of them can possibly be higher than 14.

On the other hand, if you draw an 8 (4-4), then the mean of your remaining stats will be 14 and none of them can possibly be lower than 10.

The flaw in the previous analysis is that this isn't just 12 Com 2. All the previous chart did was lay out the probability table of a single pair of cards. Drawing from a sack of 66 poker chips ONCE would have the same probability function as summing 2 random cards from the proposed stack of 12.

I am consulting with a probability expert to help me come up with a probability function for the complete stat block.
Tarlin_Truesight
09-22-07, 05:01 AM I am thinking of starting a campaign using the 25 point buy. However, I am going to start the players off as Humans at the age of 15-16 and allow room for them to grow as they advance in lvl and age. I will place magic items such as Iou stones, gloves, books, and such so that they can increase stats. Also, I am thinking of rewarding points that would be equivalent to the 32 point buy, if it seems that things are a little too hard on the group. Hopefully this will encourage a little more role playing.
Tequila_Sunrise
09-22-07, 10:08 AM I like this. I might use it. That's okay with you right?

By all means! I snitched it from someone over on Enworld.org who posted it for others' benefit.
Tequila_Sunrise
09-22-07, 10:17 AM I think that this is my favourite method so far.
I don't like math enough to go through these calculations, but I'm glad you like the idea!
ObliterateHerald
09-22-07, 11:04 AM My house rules are as follow,

BTW these are very leanient,

player chooses before rolling,

1. 4d6, reroll 1s
2. 4d6, if all 4 does not add up to atleast 10, reroll whole set.
3. 4d6, reroll the lowest roll.

All players get to roll 3 sets of 6 stats, they get to choose the best one.

Even with these rules we have had rather normal characters.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Quizzit 09-21-07, 12:44 AM	Hey guys, I am curious as to what rules you set (house or otherwise) for your players beginning statistics. For instance, our DM gave us a 72 point spread to choose the stats as we please. Now this is a rather conservative total, and a few of our players had a bit of a problem with it. I was wondering what other system people go by. -Q
Lotusblossom 09-21-07, 01:22 AM	31 point buy.
albinomonkeyking 09-21-07, 01:32 AM	4d6, keep 3, reroll 1's.
PantherFern 09-21-07, 01:38 AM	The way I went this time around is 4d6 drop lowest, roll 7 sets drop low set. No reroll on the 1's though. Looks to be turning out decent stats overall, quite a few good stats but there are still a couple 8-9's in there. Nobody's uber all the way around but nobody's nerfed either.
KillerGM 09-21-07, 01:53 AM	25 point buy
DorkusTyranus 09-21-07, 02:04 AM	I'm pretty new to the game and we did our stats differently, what does it mean to have a point buy?
Ephraim 09-21-07, 02:19 AM	A friend of mine ran a game recently. In the interest of maintaining balance without encouraging the sillyness that sometimes accompanies point buy, he simply generated a single stat block and told us that we could arrange the six values as much as we wanted. 10, 11, 13, 13, 14, 16 The character will net +7 out of this block, which definitely qualifies as heroic. The three odd numbers means that there's a lot of possibilities for what to do with your 4th level ability point. Having a 16 forces tough decisions. Casters actually have to think about how they'll get their casting stat high enough for high-level spells -- or whether they'll multiclass before it becomes a problem. Combatant characters have to determine whether they want to be quick, tough, or strong, because 2/3 is about as good as they'll get.
Fsi-Dib 09-21-07, 02:21 AM	We've had several different. One is that 4 * 4d6, drop lowest, rerolls ones. Then there has been a 7 * 4d6, drop middle (e.g. you roll 16 17 12 9 7 11 14, you drop 12). Once we tried a 6 * 5d6, drop two lowest. In our home games we've never really used point-buy. I think I tried it once, but players (nor I) didn't like it.
herceg 09-21-07, 03:21 AM	I'm pretty new to the game and we did our stats differently, what does it mean to have a point buy? The point-buy is, basically, a system that makes you chose between multiple lower or few higher abilities (the higher it gets, the more costly). It is as follows: 8 is the basic ability, from 9-14 point it costs 1 each, from 15-16 it's two and 17-18 costs 3 points (i.e.: 15 as ability costs you eight points, while 17 is thirteen points etc.) The "standard" is 25 point-buy, 32 is called "high-power(ed)", etc. The difference between point-buy and your method is that you use is that in your system 18 costs eightteen points, 14 costs fourteen points, while in point-buy 18 costs sixteen, 14 costs six. EDIT: Point-buy actually rewards "moderate" (+1/+2 modifier) abilities (i.e. by 25 point-buy if you want 13 13 13 13 13 13 you can do it, but if you want only one ability at 18, you have only 7 points left, meaning 18 10 10 9 9 9 and such).
Radijs 09-21-07, 04:15 AM	28 point buy in two of my campaigns and 32 PB in one other campaign.
Sigst 09-21-07, 05:04 AM	EDIT: Point-buy actually rewards "moderate" (+1/+2 modifier) abilities (i.e. by 25 point-buy if you want 13 13 13 13 13 13 you can do it, but if you want only one ability at 18, you have only 7 points left, meaning 18 10 10 9 9 9 and such). I just love pecking at small inaccuracies... For straight "13" you need 30 points... If you put an 18 in an ability you have spent 16 points, leaving 9 left, so you could do 18 10 10 10 10 9. But the basic gist is right, you get more ability score for your points if you spread them out, but doing so means you lose out on very high scores, scores which you probably intend to exploit more than the "dump stats". Sig
herceg 09-21-07, 06:14 AM	I just love pecking at small inaccuracies... For straight "13" you need 30 points... If you put an 18 in an ability you have spent 16 points, leaving 9 left, so you could do 18 10 10 10 10 9. But the basic gist is right, you get more ability score for your points if you spread them out, but doing so means you lose out on very high scores, scores which you probably intend to exploit more than the "dump stats". Sig Should I say... whooopsie? :D This happens when I have to rush (at workplace,it's not entirely "legal", if you catch my drift). Thanks for correction :)
Goon_for_Hire 09-21-07, 07:40 AM	My players don't like point buys... they say it takes some of the 'thrill' out of building a character. Personally, I would prefer it for the sake of fairness, but nobody has really complianed over one character having better abilities than the others, so whatever makes sure they have a good time. I have them roll 4d6 six times, dropping the lowest die. But I also have them roll up six sets of stats and take the one they think is most suitable for the character. They assign the numbers as they see fit to the character attributes. With six sets of character stats there is still plenty of randomness, but noone has to play the King of Suck unless the dice were cursed. The biggest dilemma my players face with this set up usually is whether to take a character with a lot of pretty good stats overall, or one wiht a couple of really great stats. A system I used back in 2nd ed. was to have players roll a set of 3d6 scores, assign them as they pleased, then I gave them eight points to distribute among the stats any way they liked so long as they didn't exceed their racial maximums. That way you ould shore up bad stats or improve already impressive ones.
DorkusTyranus 09-21-07, 08:18 AM	It is as follows: 8 is the basic ability, from 9-14 point it costs 1 each, from 15-16 it's two and 17-18 costs 3 points (i.e.: 15 as ability costs you eight points, while 17 is thirteen points etc.) The "standard" is 25 point-buy, 32 is called "high-power(ed)", etc. The difference between point-buy and your method is that you use is that in your system 18 costs eightteen points, 14 costs fourteen points, while in point-buy 18 costs sixteen, 14 costs six. Hmmm... I'm still a little confused by this part. How much exactly does each stat cost?
herceg 09-21-07, 08:23 AM	Sorry for the confusing answer. So, the cost of each ability from 8 to 18 is as follows: 8 0 9 1 10 2 11 3 12 4 13 5 14 6 15 8 16 10 17 13 18 16
Stormbrand 09-21-07, 08:25 AM	Personally, I prefer 32 pt buy, with 2-6 extra points for heavily MAD classes such as Monk, Hexblade and Paladin... Less if level-dipping, more if making the class a defining career.
Quizzit 09-21-07, 08:27 AM	Interesting. I hope more will post, Id like to get a good sample and perhapps show the unhappy players that they really didn't get a raw deal. My stats ended up being 8 14 12 18 10 10 for a Wizard. Fine for a class with 1 main stat, but one of the unhappy players choose to play a Paladin that has like 3 so you can imagine thier stats aren't very "uber" as far as game term are concerened. a 32 point buy would prolly net anice spread, but no so much with a 25 point buy as Sig and Herc pointed out. Rolling 4 or 5d6 and dropping 1's, lowest middle ect could net you higher scores, but they could also net you way lower scores. For those of you that use the die roll, so you force your players to stick with a crummy result? -Q
Goon_for_Hire 09-21-07, 09:03 AM	For those of you that use the die roll, so you force your players to stick with a crummy result? -Q I'd like to think that my dice-rolling method prevents crummy characters, but there have been a few noteworthy and highly improbable days where six sets of assignable stats have been abysmal. At which point I have the PCs walk around their chair counterclockwise, dip their dice in salt, or otherwise follow some silly gambling supersitition, throw out the characters they rolled and start over. Noone is going to have fun with a character with all 7s, however good a roleplayer they migh be.
Ephraim 09-21-07, 09:58 AM	The game in which I am playing right now uses the following method: Roll 3d6 eighteen times and pick the six best rolls. On the upside, the variance is lower, which reduces party imbalance. On the other hand, the DM tells me that the players have gotten complacent about having at least one 17 or 18 and often two, once they've applied racial bonuses. Next time we create characters, we are going to use a less silly method, like the tried-and-true 4d6-drop-lowest six times. I think that the goal of decreasing variance is laudable. Especially among younger players, having one player with a great role and one player with a poor role can really skew the players' enjoyment of the game. One mechanism that might be really interesting would be to create characters as a party. Each characters rolls 6x-4d6-drop-lowest and then all of the resulting rolls are combined into a pool so that the players can negotiate who gets which numbers.
Acarg51 09-21-07, 10:35 AM	Currently, in the game i'm running (Red Hand of Doom), we're using 28 point buy, with no stat allowed to be over a 16, before racial modifiers and stat points. Also, every four levels, players are allowed to increase two stats by 1. This system seems to encourage less min-maxing and, overall, characters that are better at everything, not just one specific thing.
Onikani 09-21-07, 10:53 AM	In my last game we did a standard 30 point buy. For my current game i prechose a 32 point buy array and gave it to all my players (they decide how to arrange them): 16 16 14 12 10 8 They all actually loved this array, good enough scores for a MAD pc, and yet everyone still has one weak stat... (Also if it matters, we started at level 8, so they had 2 more points from leveling to add to this).
Matthew77 09-21-07, 11:11 AM	When I'm the DM, my players use 32 point buy. The campaign I'm a player in uses 4d6 reroll 1's, drop the lowest. An alternate I've used in the past is start with an 18, roll 4d6 drop lowest 5 times and arrange as desired. I used to use 80 points distributed as desired, but then I had a campaign where everyone showed up with 18, 18, 18, 10, 8, 8 so we switched to point buy. It is much better than a linear scale of stat cost.
Tequila_Sunrise 09-21-07, 11:51 AM	31 point buy. I'm not sure if this is serious or a joke. 31 is just a weird number. Anyway I use point buy when I DM, though someone recently came up with a new method that I want to use: 1. Get a deck of cards and take out 2 of everything from 4 to 9. This leaves you with 12 cards. 2. Shuffle the 12 cards and then deal them out randomly in pairs. 3. Turn the cards over and add the two cards of each pair together. This leaves you with six totals, ranging from 8 to 18. This is the first roll v. point buy compromise that I've ever liked. It has the excitement of die rolling, while at the same time being 100% fair.
Ephraim 09-21-07, 01:00 PM	I'm not sure if this is serious or a joke. 31 is just a weird number. Anyway I use point buy when I DM, though someone recently came up with a new method that I want to use: 1. Get a deck of cards and take out 2 of everything from 4 to 9. This leaves you with 12 cards. 2. Shuffle the 12 cards and then deal them out randomly in pairs. 3. Turn the cards over and add the two cards of each pair together. This leaves you with six totals, ranging from 8 to 18. This is the first roll v. point buy compromise that I've ever liked. It has the excitement of die rolling, while at the same time being 100% fair. I think that this is my favourite method so far. The mean and mode of this distribution is 13. The standard deviation is approximately 2.3. It is symmetrical about 13. There are 66 possible combinations of 2 cards out of 12. The distribution looks like this: 8 - 1 9 - 4 10 - 5 11 - 8 12 - 9 13 - 12 14 - 9 15 - 8 16 - 5 17 - 4 18 - 1 The shape of this curve is pretty strange, so it is possible that I miscalculated somewhere, but this is a start. I am pretty sure that if you had 66 poker chips in a bag with the numbers 8 - 18 written on them in this distribution and the players picked 6 out at a time (mixing them back in between players) then you'd get the same sort of stat blocks.
Einvaldurinn_mikli 09-21-07, 01:24 PM	I'm not sure if this is serious or a joke. 31 is just a weird number. Anyway I use point buy when I DM, though someone recently came up with a new method that I want to use: 1. Get a deck of cards and take out 2 of everything from 4 to 9. This leaves you with 12 cards. 2. Shuffle the 12 cards and then deal them out randomly in pairs. 3. Turn the cards over and add the two cards of each pair together. This leaves you with six totals, ranging from 8 to 18. This is the first roll v. point buy compromise that I've ever liked. It has the excitement of die rolling, while at the same time being 100% fair. I like this. I might use it. That's okay with you right?
Puggins 09-21-07, 02:43 PM	My favorite method: Roll 3d6, rerolling anything lower than 7. Jot that number down as your first ability score. Then subtract that number from 25. That's your second ability score. Repeat three times, for a total of six ability scores. You'll get six ability score between 7 and 18, and you'll get every great stat paired with a crummy stat and every average-to-good stat linked with another average-to-good stat. Practically Every character you make with this system is worth somewhere between 30 and 40 points, though the higher you go the more crummy stats you'll have to work with. Sure, you can have three 18s, but you'll have three 7s too.
KillerGM 09-21-07, 03:30 PM	Hmmm... I'm still a little confused by this part. How much exactly does each stat cost? You can find this generation method (and others) in the DMG, beginning on pg 169. :)
Ecalsneerg 09-21-07, 03:57 PM	We use 32 point buy.
Sunic_Flames 09-21-07, 04:28 PM	Adopted from someone else: 4d6 drop lowest 6 times. If the end result is less than 32 PB equivilent, then instead use 32 PB. Still some variation, but has a solid floor so you don't end up sucking horribly, can effectively play MAD characters, and so forth.
Forgarn 09-21-07, 04:33 PM	I do 6 columns of 6 stats, 4d6-drop lowest-reroll 1's. Then choose any column, row or major angle (1,1 - 6,6 or 1,6 - 6,1). This works out really well and gives you 14 different options to choose the best from.
Aryxbez 09-21-07, 05:13 PM	I usually go with a strange method that Otto the Bugbear created long before I realized he made it. Assuming 4, Each player rolls 4d6, drop lowest and ignore 1's. Each player rolls once, so you get 4 results out of 6. Then the DM does the same, and the last roll everyone rolls and you take the average of the roll. Thus you get said ability scores. Also this way everyone has the same ability scores. However I am tempted to go for something less random, that is point buy. However as I do like decent abilities, I would make it around 40 pts. Thing is this way someone could easily have 18,18,10,10,10,10. That there is just kinda lame, and I would expect the player to roleplay his abilities accurately. Either that or 32pt, if in the end this is a bad idea, I will go back to my old method.
StSteven 09-21-07, 07:48 PM	We came up with a point buy where you still roll dice. Start at 25 and add 1d10. If you don't like the roll, you can take a mulligan by doing 23+1d8. We just did it 'cuz my wife rolls crazy rolls on the character generation and I wanted more balance than here 49 PB equivalent Druid, but she (obviously) still wanted to roll the dice. It results in 26 to 35 PB on the first roll or 24 to 31 on the mulligan. You are stuck with your mulligan.
Ephraim 09-21-07, 08:19 PM	The shape of this curve is pretty strange, so it is possible that I miscalculated somewhere, but this is a start. I am pretty sure that if you had 66 poker chips in a bag with the numbers 8 - 18 written on them in this distribution and the players picked 6 out at a time (mixing them back in between players) then you'd get the same sort of stat blocks. I retract this statement about 66 poker chips being equivalent to the card-dealing method. If one of your pairs is 9-9, there is absolutely no way for one of your other attributes to be 17 (9-8 or 8-9). That's not true of the poker chip method. With the card-dealing method, if one of your attributes is an 18, then the mean of your remaining five stats drops to 12 and none of them can possibly be higher than 16. Likewise, if you get really "lucky" and draw an 18 and a 16, then the mean of your remaining 4 stats drops to 11 and none of them can possibly be higher than 14. On the other hand, if you draw an 8 (4-4), then the mean of your remaining stats will be 14 and none of them can possibly be lower than 10. The flaw in the previous analysis is that this isn't just 12 Com 2. All the previous chart did was lay out the probability table of a single pair of cards. Drawing from a sack of 66 poker chips ONCE would have the same probability function as summing 2 random cards from the proposed stack of 12. I am consulting with a probability expert to help me come up with a probability function for the complete stat block.
Tarlin_Truesight 09-22-07, 05:01 AM	I am thinking of starting a campaign using the 25 point buy. However, I am going to start the players off as Humans at the age of 15-16 and allow room for them to grow as they advance in lvl and age. I will place magic items such as Iou stones, gloves, books, and such so that they can increase stats. Also, I am thinking of rewarding points that would be equivalent to the 32 point buy, if it seems that things are a little too hard on the group. Hopefully this will encourage a little more role playing.
Tequila_Sunrise 09-22-07, 10:08 AM	I like this. I might use it. That's okay with you right? By all means! I snitched it from someone over on Enworld.org who posted it for others' benefit.
Tequila_Sunrise 09-22-07, 10:17 AM	I think that this is my favourite method so far. I don't like math enough to go through these calculations, but I'm glad you like the idea!
ObliterateHerald 09-22-07, 11:04 AM	My house rules are as follow, BTW these are very leanient, player chooses before rolling, 1. 4d6, reroll 1s 2. 4d6, if all 4 does not add up to atleast 10, reroll whole set. 3. 4d6, reroll the lowest roll. All players get to roll 3 sets of 6 stats, they get to choose the best one. Even with these rules we have had rather normal characters.