Having PC's regret a dump Stat? Stories please!

[TheDarkSaint]

Fellow GM's, I am curious as to how you have made PC's lives more....complicated when they choose to have a dump stat and then didn't rp it. I'd like to hear great stories about NPC reactions to low Cha scores, enforcing encumbrance on low Str scores, the best that you've got :)

[Bhaakon]

I had a player who dumped INT pretty fiercely (6 or 7, I think). Besides ribbing him horribly, I made him roll intelligence checks whenever he tried to read something with big words in it (over 4 letters being 'big'). If he failed, I'd make up some ridiculous madlibs on the fly. Fortunately he played along, and his character got really mad at the other PCs if they tried to read it for him.

I probably wouldn't do it now (I was fresh out of 2e, where you needed to spend non-weapons proficiencies to read instead of getting it by default), but it was funny at the time and it never really mattered mechanically.

[Shaynythyryas]

A lot in our group kinda dumped the Wis (well, "dumped" here meaning about 12, as we're running with almost epic stats). It never really put us in trouble, even if it made spot and listen difficult at times.

But the real deal happend when we found ourselves stranded on a desert island, and when the DM, a horrible grin on his face, said...

"everyone, make survival checks".

The trouble being that we didnt just dump wis : no one actually put a single point in that very skill.
In the end, nothing horrible happened, but of course many embarassing and excrcuciatingly well described little pains occurred.

[ArcturusV]

Typically by having intelligent enemies go after the Dump Stats. Or fight in such a way that they cannot use their jacked up stats.

Like I had a Fighter (Well it was a Fighter/Barb and probably was going to go into others) who dumped Dex because Dex wasn't important to him. The player in question didn't MIND this, but he did spend some "oh crap, I'm screwed!" energy, but otherwise thought it was interesting.

Enemy assassin who had been stalking him came in with some of the homebrewed Alchemical Items I had in the campaign, Ice Slicks. So there was smooth, glassy ice covering the ground where the Assassin chose to fight the warrior. And being a total jerk as I am, I told him, "You know... it's REALLY slick.. you can't use your Strength in melee, need to make Balance checks to move and avoid falling prone. And the reason you can't use Strength in melee is because you basically have no purchase on the ice to really apply raw muscle. And your Dex penalty to AC is doubled due to being unable to make swift movements without windmilling around unless you pass your Balance by over 5 for the round." Of course I applied the situation to both the assassin and the fighter. Which is probably why he didn't rage, other than his Barbarian Rage, about being Screwed.

Which made the fight for him go from "Ha ha, I will CRUSH this puny spindly armed weakling!" to "... oh crap... he has Weapon Finesse and is using Dex to fight and I can't use my primary stat and have to depend on my 6 Dex..."

[Feytalist]

I sometimes like playing low Wis characters. I like to play them brash and irrational; not stupid, just unthinking.

I remember one particular incident: the party came across a fairly wide spiked pit, with no way around. My 7 Wis ranger, in the lead, decided it must be an illusion, obviously, because how else would they expect us to get across? So he walked out into thin air, started falling, and only a very lucky Dex check allowed him to grab the edge as he fell. The very stupid fighter behind him followed him unthinking, and fell into the trap. Negative hp, dying fast. Eventually, it was the 8 Str sorcerer that had to haul us both up out of the pit, with a few very lucky rolls.

I like to roleplay my characters' failings, heh.

[Sith_Happens]

But the real deal happend when we found ourselves stranded on a desert island, and when the DM, a horrible grin on his face, said...

"everyone, make survival checks".

Surviving in the wild is a DC 10 check. I could maybe see a -2 circumstance penalty for it being a desert island, but overall as long as none of you actually had a Wisdom penalty you should have been fine.


And being a total jerk as I am, I told him...

At least you admit it.:smalltongue:

[TheDarkSaint]

Anyone ever make a PC's live miserable with in town encounters for a low Cha stat?

[Bhaakon]

Anyone ever make a PC's live miserable with in town encounters for a low Cha stat?

You mean like a torches and pitchfork mob turning out to burn the hideous monster?

I usually save that for a low-Cha character who also plays a nearly-always-evil race.

[supermonkeyjoe]

Another player once described his character as a smooth-talking ladies man, the player looked at his sheet and said, "with a charisma of WHAT?" CHA was pretty much his dump stat. We made sure to remind the GM that this character had a "charisma of what?" repeatedly.

[TheDarkSaint]

Maybe not that extreme.

Last game I ran, the low Cha thief was treated like the manservant most of the time by the general populace. He was not amused when people didn't take him seriously or didn't pay much attention to him while the highly charismatic sorceror was getting access to officals, cutting deals and getting treated like someone important.

[Bhaakon]

Another player once described his character as a smooth-talking ladies man, the player looked at his sheet and said, "with a charisma of WHAT?"

Player: My Character is scoping out the talent and working the room.

DM: With a Charisma of what?

Player: W-B-L, baby.

[drax75]

Let me tell you about Samuel Savren.

Samuel was a swashbuckler from the swashbuckiling adventures book.

Samuel had a mighty charsima (30something) and a mighty dex (30something).

Samuel was smart and strong as well though to a lesser degree.

HOWEVER

Samuel had only a 5 Wisdom.....

SO while he was so very good at everything else, Samuel had no willpower to speak of at all.....

Samuel walked into a town, in Ravenloft.

Samuel saw a "poor" woman being accosted by the towns people. Samuel failed his spot check.

Samuel proceeded to "rescue" fight the towns people, and saved the "poor" woman..... who happened to be a powerful vampire who was feeding off of the town.

Samuel is a constant reminder of why a dump stat was bad in our games. None of us ever wanted to be Samuel. Eventually even Sam's player didnt want to play Sam. Since he failed every spot, listen, and will save.....

I cannot tell you how many times our party had to put him down due to a charm effect.....

It became a constant DM's catspaw.....

Moral of the story? Do not be like Samuel.

[OverdrivePrime]

Ooh, Wisdom is a dangerous, dangerous dump stat, particularly for a warrior type with a lousy will save. Bad guys with "Charm Monster" or "Dominate Person" are common enough, and I just Magic Jared someone in my game a few weeks ago. I'm pretty sure she's getting Iron Will next time she levels.

I really like to use poison or monsters with ability drain attacks (yay ghosts!) to show the wisdom of keeping healthy stat levels.

Nothing shuts down a grey elf 'all powerful wizard' who dumped strength like a ray of enfeeblement followed up by a dart coated with scorpion venom (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/afflictions/poison/large-scorpion-venom). You can't cast (most spells) when you can't move!

[Shining Wrath]

A lot in our group kinda dumped the Wis (well, "dumped" here meaning about 12, as we're running with almost epic stats). It never really put us in trouble, even if it made spot and listen difficult at times.

But the real deal happend when we found ourselves stranded on a desert island, and when the DM, a horrible grin on his face, said...

"everyone, make survival checks".

The trouble being that we didnt just dump wis : no one actually put a single point in that very skill.
In the end, nothing horrible happened, but of course many embarassing and excrcuciatingly well described little pains occurred.

I like your DM. When our current group got going one of the first things I did was pass around a sheet and have everyone record their skills and languages, and then look for holes. We're still weak on K(Royalty and Nobility), and no one speaks Gnoll:smallbiggrin:

[Shining Wrath]

Maybe not that extreme.

Last game I ran, the low Cha thief was treated like the manservant most of the time by the general populace. He was not amused when people didn't take him seriously or didn't pay much attention to him while the highly charismatic sorceror was getting access to officals, cutting deals and getting treated like someone important.

I told a party once: "All the waitresses are flirting with [high CHR character]". Look at low CHR char: "You can't get their attention unless you set yourself on fire". It was CHR=20 versus CHR=8 or something like that. Guy playing low CHR thought it was funny and RP'd it well.

[Gerrtt]

My first character was a druid with 7 strength. I only regretted it because it was my first character and I didn't realize that I could eventually just turn into a bear and not worry about my strength score anymore. At the time, though, when I was really concerned about whether or not I was going to hit with my club, that 7 strength was quite annoying, and I regretted putting it there.

If i played the same character today I'd be totally fine with a 7 strength, but it's only because I get what druids are capable of. To be fair, when I played that character before I didn't own a PHB and my DM was really fuzzy on what a druid actually did (we didn't realize I could cast spells till level 3...).

[Shining Wrath]

Moral of the story? Do not be like Samuel.

Will. Fortitude. Reflex. In that order, usually.
Few things in D&D suck like the unstoppable fighting machine switching sides.

[Keneth]

I've played a bunch of characters with dump stats, Charisma being the obvious prevailing stat to dump for the majority of characters. I'm not a very charismatic person by nature, so I have no trouble roleplaying massive douchebags or silent types. We also split Charisma and Appearance into two separate stats, so there have been lots of characters like my Cha 5, App 16 Magus who was often a rather popular figure up to the point where he opened his mouth.

I can't say I've ever really been punished for dumping any of my stats, nor have I ever punished any of my own players, since everyone at the table does a good job at roleplaying their failings. If anything, the dump stats lead to a large amount hilarious situations.

There are of course unfortunate circumstances that unintentionally happen from time to time. One of my characters had Wis 8 and zero ranks in Perception which, on a bad roll, resulted in being coup-de-grace'd in the middle of the night and having to waste all his hero points in order to avoid death. There was also a Barbarian who miserably failed his Fort save for a disease several times in a row and was subsequently Charisma drained to 0 points without anyone noticing since he never talked. Then there was a Frenzied Berserker with a pretty low Will save who critically fumbled on his first attack in a battle, hitting himself with the weapon instead, and triggered his frenzy which almost resulted in TPK in a completely routine fight.

I don't really think players should be intentionally punished for dumping a stat but they should from time to time be reminded that such character designs have consequences. Also, if they choose not to roleplay their characters accordingly, you can occasionally point out that the environment perceives them differently than they might think of themselves (http://i.imgur.com/f9FW2.gif).

[navar100]

Especially when you use Point Buy a player can't help but have a dump stat. The player and PC has to deal with it, but now you want stories of punishing players with their dump stats to give accolades.

And you wonder why some people use dice rolling methods like 5d6 reroll 1s take best three or how a player claims to have rolled three 18s at home.

A PC having an 8 in a score will matter, but it's no license to screw over the character for it.

[LTwerewolf]

Most of my players dumped wis and cha. Then they found out how much i love spot, listen, and gather information checks.

[PersonMan]

Especially when you use Point Buy a player can't help but have a dump stat.

Not in my experience. Unless you use really low amounts (for me this means ~25 and below, but I've only ever played with 30 or more), there's always enough to get everything up to at least 10 and still have a few good stats. You won't be running around with many 18s or 17s unless you have a ton of 8s, but I generally don't need stats that high, which are also quite rare when rolling, so I don't have problems with that.

--

Also, regarding "most of my players dumped X but they needed it" I'd warn them first. Otherwise it's similar to having people who focus on social skills and dumping them into a 100% fighting and traps dungeon. A bit exaggerated, but the principle is the same.

[Keneth]

Not in my experience. Unless you use really low amounts (for me this means ~25 and below, but I've only ever played with 30 or more)

A lot of us don't have such luck, I don't recall ever getting 30 or more points. :smallsmile:

[CaladanMoonblad]

Balance... is... Deadly.

My players rue every single ledge, narrow bridge, or crossing that requires a Balance check, because no one ever puts ranks in it. In the last session, I had a narrow stone bridge (like 2 ft) that I accorded a DC of 8 to cross. Not taking any chances, our brave intrepid heroes tied rope to each other in a long line. It was over a pit that seemed like it had no bottom (450 ft drop), but few wanted to chance it (despite 2 having feather fall rings, 2 with access to the spell, and 1 with the ability to fly). It was a 60 ft long bridge.

They also disliked Survival checks, or keeping track of food, so they all invested in "Everlasting Rations" from the MIC book, as well as "Everlasting Feed Bag"s for their mounts. And Endure Elements is a common spell when our heroes venture into the tundra or desert.

[PersonMan]

A lot of us don't have such luck, I don't recall ever getting 30 or more points. :smallsmile:

Well, I play mostly PbP, so I have the luxury of choosing the games by how well their rules fit the concept I want to play much of the time.

I have some characters who are very human, who'd I definitely enjoy playing out/having to deal with their flaws (not just stat-wise, but also their character flaws), but many of my concepts are larger-than-life and it doesn't fit my vision of them if they have, say, 8 Dex.

EDIT: I'm sorry, but "tied rope to each other" while going over a bridge like that does not say "not wanting to take any chances" to me, it says 'if one falls, we all fall with him/her!'

EDIT 2: Also, I've generally stopped even buying food since I realized that all of my characters (I don't have any with Wis penalties) can just take 10 on Survival to feed themselves, or are in an urban situation and buy some.

[Pesimismrocks]

I play a Wis 6 character. This doesn't effect him mechanically as he has keen intellect but he is awfully brash and naive. He also suffers form short-term memory loss.
He played a game of cards with a thieves guild, he ignored an epic level mystic theurge who was giving us a quest and he shows off his collection of holy symbols including his symbol of Hextor (for emergency situations).

For points buy, having an average character will work fine. It's only min maxers that will suffer. I find this is fair as they will be more powerful but have a gaping weakness.

I also agree wth the fact an 8 or 9 wont doom a character. Unless it's life-threatening another party member can take care of it or in the case of saves they shouldn't be too weak at higher levels and they will just be more dependent on the roll of the dice.

[TuggyNE]

Nothing shuts down a grey elf 'all powerful wizard' who dumped strength like a ray of enfeeblement followed up by a dart coated with scorpion venom (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/afflictions/poison/large-scorpion-venom). You can't cast (most spells) when you can't move!

True, although keep in mind that the order here doesn't matter; penalties don't drop you below 1 in an ability score, even if you later take ability damage. So all this would do is encumber the character well and thoroughly.


I'm sorry, but "tied rope to each other" while going over a bridge like that does not say "not wanting to take any chances" to me, it says 'if one falls, we all fall with him/her!'

Seems to me a successful Reflex save and Str check would let you catch someone before they really start falling (or a slightly harder Str check if you fail the save). :smallwink:

[CaladanMoonblad]

Seems to me a successful Reflex save and Str check would let you catch someone before they really start falling (or a slightly harder Str check if you fail the save). :smallwink:

Possibly, but I would have peeps roll initiative and the difference between the faller and the closest individual is the circumstance penalty to a DC 20 Reflex check. With so many magical items and people with access to the spell, I'd halfway expect someone doing something brave, like leaping in after a falling companion to try and dual parachute to the bottom.

[TuggyNE]

Possibly, but I would have peeps roll initiative and the difference between the faller and the closest individual is the circumstance penalty to a DC 20 Reflex check. With so many magical items and people with access to the spell, I'd halfway expect someone doing something brave, like leaping in after a falling companion to try and dual parachute to the bottom.

I meant with ropes tied. But yeah.

[Greenish]

Balance... is... Deadly.

My players rue every single ledge, narrow bridge, or crossing that requires a Balance check, because no one ever puts ranks in it.Well, given that most classes have very few skill points, and it's not a class skill for great majority of them (even rangers don't have Balance as a class skill!), no wonder. :smallamused: Of course, ToB to the rescue.

[Edit]: The rope makes perfect sense. It makes sure that the character with Feather Fall (the spell) is with and close enough other falling people, and ensures that the fall doesn't split the party.