Optional bonus stats - good idea or bad idea?

[Vitruviansquid]

The problem: Building a character with a high score in a dump stat, like a wizard with high strength, is just as crippling to optimization as building a character with a low core stat. However, many character concepts, like Roy the intelligent fighter, require a high score in a dump stat. Now, I could just let everyone roleplay their character concept and only use their actual stats for actual rolls, thus allowing a player to play a smart fighter while having 10 intelligence, but it strikes me as a less satisfying solution because there's a certain currency to having something on your sheet, not just your brain. Besides, it wouldn't make sense for the wizard to be strong in every situation except when he needs to bend some iron bars.

The solution: As the last step of Character generation, I'll allow any player to take one of their dump stats and bump it up to 16. 'Dump stat' in this case means a stat that 1. Isn't used in any of the class's attack calculations (including Wisdom for Fighters) 2. Isn't Constitution. and 3. Isn't going to be used as as the main stat for a multiclassed class's attacks.

The reasoning: Unlike having a low core stat, having a high dump stat doesn't actually impact the game that much - that's why it was a dump stat to begin with. Fighters dump intelligence because so few of the class's calculations use it, so... why not just give the fighter intelligence for free? Not some kind of fake intelligence, but *real Soviet intelligence* that can be used on any check, any derived stat, and any feat requirements.

As far as I understand, the highest munchkin potential for this rule is for someone to use it to bump a NAD up which, while, it does skew the game's balance, I don't think it would skew it badly enough to drastically change the feel of the game. Aside from that, I don't see the harm in giving people access to some feats they could not normally have and giving them slightly better skill checks on some of their skill checks. Anyone see any other ways people could use this rule to give their character a big boost in power?

[Mandrake]

Not to helpful a suggestion, maybe,

but consider making what you like and throwing optimization out the window.
If you're the DM, adjust encounters so that they fit your players. I know that this is extra work, that you shouldn't be held accountable for system flaws etc etc...

Of course, this has its limits too, as you cannot really make a character with a low primary stat and still expect the game to run smoothly (unless you want some comedy acts). Still, you can encourage your players to bend it a little, not take some secondary ability scores, instead taking the ones they want. Oh, and also, they could find a way to use them once they took it - I believe that if I were a Wizard with high Strength (1) that strength would come from somewhere (some practice) and (2) I'd probably be happy to use it.

To conclude, I think that adding an extra high score is unbalancing, as you yourself expressed somewhere at the end of your post - it increases a defense or two, it gives access to feats, and it might be a major boost to skills (like intelligence, wisdom or charisma; even dexterity). I don't think you should do it. :smalleek:

[Ashdate]

I understand where you're going with this, but what you're going to have happen is people are going to "game" around it. What you're effectively asking them to do is to use point-buy and leave one of their stats as an 8, then turn it into a 16. If I'm a Wizard, I'm not turning an 8 strength into a 16 strength; I'm giving myself a 10 strength, 8 wisdom, an 18 Int, then posting the Wisdom to 16. Dump the rest in Constitution and call it a day.

(Similarly, I'm pretty sure my Fighter's "dump" stat would become Dex or Wis).

The biggest problem in my mind is simply that a character's "prime" ability is so useful compared to other stats, particularly dump ones (a dump stat really becomes one because it allows you to spend more points on the primary).

One imperfect option could be to allow players to "swap" Str/Con, Dex/Int, or Wis/Cha for the purposes of relevant skill/ability checks.

Thus, a 8 Str/14 Con Wizard could be treated as such for the purposes of hit points, but for ability checks he's instead treated as 14 str/8 Con. This prevents too much gaming of the system, while still allowing some amount of the flavor in.

[Kurald Galain]

What you're effectively asking them to do is to use point-buy and leave one of their stats as an 8,
But people do that anyway. The best point buy for any class is to spend all their point buy on three ability scores and dump the rest as much as possible, with such arrays at 18/14/11/10/10/8 or 17/15/13/10/10/8. Vitruvian is quite correct that bumping the 8 by a few points is not going to affect the game any.

...but bumping it to 16 is a bit much. For most characters, their secondary stat is going to be around 16, so having the dump stat match that feels odd. I think you could easily play a Roy fighter with an intelligence of 12, and that doesn't affect your point buy much.

[Ashdate]

But people do that anyway. The best point buy for any class is to spend all their point buy on three ability scores and dump the rest as much as possible, with such arrays at 18/14/11/10/10/8 or 17/15/13/10/10/8. Vitruvian is quite correct that bumping the 8 by a few points is not going to affect the game any.

Sorry, I meant "leave one of their 'secondary' stats as an 8".

So if you took the OPs "fix", you'd turn an 18/14/11/10/10/8 array into effectively an 18/16/14/11/10/10 array, which - as we can probably agree - won't break the game, but that "16" isn't going to be showing up in any classes's "dump" stat. I'm pretty confident the "14" won't either.

I think 4e already can allow effective high str/low con Wizards or a high int/low dex Fighters without houseruling anything. They're just not optimal.

I think encouraging this is going to be 90% a player "with the idea" and 10% DM encouragement. Creating a specific houserule that applies to every character is probably just going to encourage more powerful (rather than more quirky) characters.

[ghost_warlock]

Honestly the biggest problem with this is being careful to watch out for people looking to exploit the concept like Ashdate is talking about with the wizard example.

The temptation for some people to dump their secondary stat so they can get a 'free' 16 is going to be strong. For some classes this will be easier to spot than others. For instance, really, the only stat that isn't utilized as a secondary stat by one or another wizard sub-build is Strength. Of course, even then, some wizards would happily boost their Str up to 16 for free so they can qualify for better armor proficiency.

If you do keep a close eye on it, though, the only especially exploitable bit would be feat prerequisites - particularly for multiclass feats. I can see the Swordmage multiclass feat that gives a daily AC- buff being fairly attractive to classes that would normally dump Int.

For some classes, this would inadvertently directly benefit a character's build beyond just a slightly higher NAD and skills. For example, warlocks normally dump Wis and dump it hard. Turning what would normally be an 8 Wis into a 16, however, would open up much better divine multiclass options than a warlock would normally have available. Star pact warlocks, in particular, would be attracted to this so they can get a decent multiclass feat benefit while meeting prerequisites for a paragon-tier feat that makes their curse and eldritch blast deal radiant damage. Of course, sorcerer-king and vestige pact warlocks, who normally lean a bit towards the leader role, would also appreciate easy qualification for divine multiclass feats that give them a daily use of Healing Word. Hexhammer warlocks might use the same trick so they can use holy symbols and qualify for Mighty Crusader Expertise (and thus avoid provoking attacks of opportunity for using ranged powers in melee).

I'd figure that pretty much every class has some trick or niche build that could be exploited in this method.

Making sure that the artificially inflated dump stat stays primarily a fluff benefit could quickly turn into a bigger headache than its worth.

[busterswd]

Even if your players aren't looking to exploit this, the most likely result is that they're going to have high NADS across the board; they'll have a +3 to all defenses and AC minimum. That's more than a feat's worth of enhancement, and while it probably won't break your game, it's a nice little power boost.

[Kurald Galain]

The temptation for some people to dump their secondary stat so they can get a 'free' 16 is going to be strong. For some classes this will be easier to spot than others. For instance, really, the only stat that isn't utilized as a secondary stat by one or another wizard sub-build is Strength.
Genasi elementalist says hi :)

But then, the wizard is one of the most oversupported classes in the game, with the fighter as a close second. Most of the later classes simply have one primary ability score, a choice between two for the second, and don't have much use for the remaining three ability scores.

[Zaq]

Genasi elementalist says hi :)

But then, the wizard is one of the most oversupported classes in the game, with the fighter as a close second. Most of the later classes simply have one primary ability score, a choice between two for the second, and don't have much use for the remaining three ability scores.

This is true until you start looking at feat prereqs. To take the obvious example, getting 15 WIS or CHA for Superior Will isn't easy for every class, but it's downright necessary by Paragon at the latest, because daze and stun are just that common and just that devastating. Then of course you get all the very specific feats that sometimes have weird requirements (Heavy Blade Opportunity and Polearm Momentum leap to mind), or the feats that might not be build-critical but that are still really nice to have if you just happen to align your stats for them (e.g., most of the expanded crit range feats in Epic). Heck, it seems like the majority of the feats in the two Martial Power books have bizarre stat prereqs, and having a free 16 in something that might not otherwise be a prime stat for you is still a pretty hefty mechanical benefit if you play your cards right and choose your feats carefully.

Honestly, I'd say just go with your initial idea of saying that the stats mean nothing and the character means everything. There's several ways you can handle this, none of them especially opposed to the others.

First, you can just choose to not force characters to roll things they "should" be good at, even if their stats disagree. E.g., even though a Cleric will have a terrible INT score, they should still pretty much automatically succeed at any Religion check involving the tenets of their church or a related church. You don't have them pick up a d20 for it; of COURSE they know it, and we're more interested in what happens as a result of them knowing it than we are of them rolling dice at it. The downside of this method is that it can mess up the success/failure system of skill challenges, but if you're careful with it, it's one of the simplest ways of keeping things running. This is also my preferred method of dealing with things that don't map well to the skill system; your character is a gourmet chef? OK, you can make a pretty damn good meal if you've got the equipment and the time. No, I don't need to see a roll for that. As long as that's established as part of your character, I don't need to see a lengthy discussion about "well, I guess it's kind of Nature, since he's working with vegetables and stuff, but maybe it's Arcana, since cooking is a kind of chemistry and all that sciencey stuff gets lumped into it, but wait maybe it's Diplomacy, since he's using it to try to impress someone, but oh no the book says Thievery is for making little things and a roast duck is totally a little thing, but wait what if . . ." Just make the damn gourmet meal. If I didn't already think of your character as a gourmet chef, then no, you probably can't do that, and I don't care what kind of die you just rolled. Done. Takes a fair and level-headed GM, but it works. I appreciate that this method encourages the players to play up the minor roleplay-ish aspects of their characters, but if you're in a group that's not evenly good at that, it can be a slight problem.

Second, you can apply large ad-hoc bonuses to things that make sense for a character to be able to do; to keep your example of Roy, the intelligent Fighter, give Roy anywhere from +2 to +5 on appropriate INT-based checks just because that's how the character is played, though probably not on every INT-based check ever. I don't especially like this method, because it feels squishy, but it's an option. The key pitfall here is that players are absolute hawks when it comes to sniffing out inconsistency of ruling (mixed metaphor much?), so you have to be really careful with it.

Third, you can let characters use different key stats for things that are appropriate. The archetypical example would be the big scary Barbarian using STR instead of CHA to make an Intimidate check (yes, I know there's an item for that; no, I don't care), but by the same token, I'm equally OK with the Avenger (whose character revolves around hitting people really hard with an unnecessarily large weapon) to use WIS instead of STR to force open a door, letting the Monk (who has total control over her body and is mobile as hell) to use DEX instead of STR to climb a wall, or letting the Runepriest (who knows more runes in the language of the gods than you know words in Common) to use STR to try to decipher some unfamiliar script, just because these are all things they should be good at. The advantage of this method is that you're still using numbers on the character sheet, and you're still keeping things close to what the game expects the numbers to be (the game expects a character who's pretty darn good at a certain skill to have training, a primary stat in it, and about an additional 2 to 5 points of bonus from race, background, items, and so on, and it doesn't really change matters what that skill happens to be). The disadvantage is that some people have a hard time divorcing the numbers from the stat, and they really think that the Runepriest is actually flexing their muscles at the script instead of just applying "good stat" instead of "written stat." If everyone is capable of thinking of it as simply "this character should be good at this task, so we'll roll the dice as though she were good at it in the way WotC anticipated," it's a decent way of still using numbers, if that's your thing. It also gives players relatively more reason to invest in small bonuses to this or that skill; for example, if you know that (using the first method above) you're not going to have to actually roll too many Religion checks, you won't bother picking up too many little bonuses here and there even on a character who's nominally good at Religion, but if you know that you're going to be rolling those checks (even if you're using whatever other stat instead), you'll still want the +2 from the background and the +3 from the item and whatever.

Fourth, you can use the lower DCs for things that the character should expect to be good at. You've got an Infernal Pact Warlock attempting to negotiate with some fiends? Use the Easy or Medium DCs on the table, rather than the Hard DC. The Bard with no connection to these fiends wants to help, he has to succeed at the Hard DC (like you'd expect), but the Warlock only has to meet the Medium DC, because this is his deal. The Rogue is a swashbuckling buccaneer who strikes terror into the hearts of enemy captains? He can use the Easy DC for climbing ropes and swinging on them on a ship (when everyone else would use, say, the Medium DC), but he's stuck with the Medium DC that everyone else has when he's climbing ropes on a mountain or in a dungeon. The downside of this method is that I feel you have to be very explicit why a given character is getting a given benefit (I even feel more so for this method than for the others, for some reason), but if all the players and the GM are acting in good faith, it works.

Naturally, with any of these methods, you have to be careful with exactly why you're giving any given character an easier time, and you have to be careful that players don't just keep coming up with increasingly ludicrous reasons why they should totally get away with this thing (unless that's the kind of game you love to run, in which case, go nuts and have fun). A decent test is just to see how the table reacts when someone says "come on, I should be good at this sort of thing." If most of the table just nods and says "well yeah, of course he should be able to do that," then you're probably on the right track. If most of the table says "wait, WHAT? Since when are you a master trapsmith/devotee of the Raven Queen/expert on dwarven cooking?" or whatever, then you probably shouldn't just charge forward with this. As is the case any time you're bringing GM discretion heavily to bear, know thy group and know why you're doing what you're doing, but I honestly think that applying some or all of these methods will be a lot less prone to abuse than what you're suggesting.

[Kurald Galain]

This is true until you start looking at feat prereqs. To take the obvious example, getting 15 WIS or CHA for Superior Will isn't easy for every class, but it's downright necessary by Paragon at the latest, because daze and stun are just that common and just that devastating.
No, not really. There are alternatives to this for most classes that cannot use superior will, such as items and utility powers that remove conditions (e.g. Circlet of Arkhosia, or Maiden's Waking). Polearm Momentum is explicitly a fighter feat, and indeed has prerequisites that line up with the fighter's secondary stats. HBO is tricky, but it requires that you attack with a heavy blade, and most classes that use those already line up with its prereqs. Yes, if you want some odd multiclassing you may require additional ability scores, but it would be more accurate to say that this kind of multiclassing is counterproductive to your character.

Note also that most campaigns never reach paragon tier and certainly never get anywhere close to epic (according to WOTC), so if you need a particular ability score only for a high-paragon or epic feat, that means you really don't need it at all. Most characters will never have to concern themselves with the outrageous prereqs for their Improved Critical Range feat.

So yeah, dumping three scores to their absolute minimum will work out fine for the vast majority of characters.

[mangosta71]

I honestly wouldn't be that concerned about bumping an NAD - both stats the defense they're bumping is tied to would have to be dump stats for the increase to be significant (most characters would get a +1 to one defense), and there just aren't that many classes that can safely dump both STR and CON, or INT and DEX, or WIS and CHA. The OP makes it clear that only stats that the class doesn't use can be bumped in the manner he describes, and CON can't be bumped even if the class doesn't use it as either a primary or secondary stat.

The rest of the issues about using this to game the system are valid, though.

[Ashdate]

I honestly wouldn't be that concerned about bumping an NAD - both stats the defense they're bumping is tied to would have to be dump stats for the increase to be significant (most characters would get a +1 to one defense), and there just aren't that many classes that can safely dump both STR and CON, or INT and DEX, or WIS and CHA.

The problem isn't the player who creates a Fighter with a 14 Wis and an 8 Cha becoming a 14 Wis /16 Cha character, the problem is the player who instead creates a 8 Wis, 10 Cha character (using the points that would have gone to Wisdom elsewhere to increase, say, his Con and Dex) and then bumping the Wisdom up to 16 (becoming a 16 Wis / 10 Cha character).

[mangosta71]

Ok, so he gains a +3 to Will defense in that case. That's only a big deal at low levels - by the time he gets to paragon, the things attacking his Will will hit anyway.

[allonym]

What? That's terrible logic. +3 will means 3 possible results on attack rolls that would have hit instead miss. It will rarely if ever be the case that appropriate monsters will be hitting your will defence on a 2+ if your Cha/Wis is 16. Monsters being relatively accurate against your weaker defences doesn't mean that investing in those defences won't do anything.

[Ashdate]

Ok, so he gains a +3 to Will defense in that case. That's only a big deal at low levels - by the time he gets to paragon, the things attacking his Will will hit anyway.

+3 to Will defense (~15% fewer attacks against Will hit), +4 to all Wisdom-based skills, ability to qualify for all feats that require Wisdom, +3 bonus to Opportunity Attacks...

... and numerous points that (instead of being put into Wisdom) can instead increase stats such as Strength, Constitution, and Dexterity, with all the bonuses to defenses, skills, feat qualification, etc. that comes with it.

That's a pretty big deal at all levels.

[mangosta71]

+3 to Will defense (~15% fewer attacks against Will hit), +4 to all Wisdom-based skills, ability to qualify for all feats that require Wisdom, +3 bonus to Opportunity Attacks...
It's not uncommon for to-hit modifiers to be so high by mid-paragon that the only possible way to miss is rolling a natural 1. As an example, I'm playing an ardent who's currently level 14. My low defense is Reflex, in which I have a 23. Such a bump would bring it up to 26. There hasn't been a single attack against my Reflex defense that hit me that wouldn't have still hit if my defense were 3 points higher the whole time I've been playing.

Anyway, back to our hypothetical fighter. So he's better at WIS-based skills than other fighters. So what? The party cleric is still better. So he qualifies for WIS-based feats. So what? Those feats still don't benefit his build. And I don't even know where that "bonus to opportunity attacks" comes from - an AoO is a melee basic, which is keyed off STR (or a specific power, which, as a fighter, will STILL be keyed off STR).

... and numerous points that (instead of being put into Wisdom) can instead increase stats such as Strength, Constitution, and Dexterity, with all the bonuses to defenses, skills, feat qualification, etc. that comes with it.
Except the point of this is that he's spending his points the same way anyway - WIS is his dump stat. The difference is that now the stat he would have left at 8 is now a 16. Per the OP:

3. Isn't going to be used as as the main stat for a multiclassed class's attacks.
I would expand this to "you're not allowed to take multiclass feats keyed off this ability score."

This really isn't as big a deal as some people seem to think it is.

[Kurald Galain]

Anyway, back to our hypothetical fighter. So he's better at WIS-based skills than other fighters. So what? The party cleric is still better. So he qualifies for WIS-based feats. So what? Those feats still don't benefit his build. And I don't even know where that "bonus to opportunity attacks" comes from - an AoO is a melee basic, which is keyed off STR (or a specific power, which, as a fighter, will STILL be keyed off STR).

Fighters have a class feature to add their wisdom modifier to their opportunity attacks. Other than that, you are quite correct that the added benefit of the 16 wisdom is minimal - AND the original poster specifically said that since wisdom is important to a fighter's attacks, a fighter couldn't boost his wisdom anyway under this system. He would have to boost intelligence or charisma, two stats that are utterly useless to a fighter.

[Ashdate]

It's not uncommon for to-hit modifiers to be so high by mid-paragon that the only possible way to miss is rolling a natural 1. As an example, I'm playing an ardent who's currently level 14. My low defense is Reflex, in which I have a 23. Such a bump would bring it up to 26. There hasn't been a single attack against my Reflex defense that hit me that wouldn't have still hit if my defense were 3 points higher the whole time I've been playing.

The highest a non-AC attack you'll find on a level 14 monster is going to be +19; so that would have your character being hit on a 4, to being hit on a 7. I'm not suggesting you become immune to such attacks, I'm saying that the game's math suggest you're either incorrect, or your DM is throwing some wacky monsters at you.

(Also, getting a free 16 Wis (or Dex) would be important if you're trying to qualify for a feat like Polearm Momentum.)


AND the original poster specifically said that since wisdom is important to a fighter's attacks, a fighter couldn't boost his wisdom anyway under this system.

The language of the OP reads to me that Wisdom would be okay for a Fighter to boost, but I can see how it could be read the other way too. But it still leaves a lot to be desired. Would the rule break the game? No.

But - more importantly to the OPs post - does it encourage high strength Wizards and high Charisma Fighters, or does it simply create Wizards and Fighters with an arbitrarily high score (that could - and is not limited to - +3 to a NAD, bonuses to skills, etc.)?

[Silma]

In my opinion, don't do that man. If your players want to dump a stat, then they have to roleplay it. If they think building your character in a way that stats reflect his personality/abilities is important (I personally thing it is), then they have to forget about optimization which is an awful thing, anyway. I mean no human being would devote his/her entire life/time to learning 1 particular thing, even if it is the thing that helps him make a living. On top of that, very fea people are born with extreme abilities/disadvantages. Besides, it's not that bad to be a fighter with 17 str instead of 18, so that u can raise your INT to 13 or something. Sure, you'll hit with -1 that what you would normally hit, but in the dnd experience as a whole, no one will remember who had the best attack rolls.
One of my players has a fighter (slayer) with 16 STR and 14 DEX. And he is still handling himself pretty well.

[Yakk]

Steal a page from the Gamma World game.

PCs pick a prime state and a secondary stat and a tetriary stat. These start out as 18 and 16 and 14 respectfully (plus racial bonuses).

For your remaining stats, you roll 3d6.

Now you can be Roy the intelligent fighter.