Apply ability bonus X to mechanic Y....

[Deepbluediver]

Ok, so this isn't any specific piece of homebrew, but lately I've decided that I really don't like all the various ways of using a stat not normally associated with some mechanic (attack rolls, AC, skill checks, whatever) to boost it in place of it's normal stat.
Just for one example, a monk's Wisdom boost to their AC. Lots of homebrew lets monks add it to their attack rolls, damage, or other things as well.

I recognize WHY it's done- it makes the MAD classes more SAD. And I've done plenty of it myself in the past. But lately, the more I think about it the more I really don't like doing that.

Primarily it just feels cheap. It's a quick and easy way of saying "let your best stat apply to everything because of reasons"; and you end up with a very one-dimensional character. I want all stats to be useful at least on some level, and deciding to make one thing a "dump stat" should be done with the full understanding of the implications, not just brushed off carelessly.

Also, your basic abilities are the foundation blocks of everything else the game-system run's on. When you start messing around with them and mixing and matching in ways that the designers probably never foresaw, the level of optimization starts to swing between cheezy and broken. For example, someone once told me about making Con their dump-stat and then using the Vampire Spawn template to turn it into a null-value instead.
One the one hand I love creativity and don't want to deny player's the ability to feel awesome. But on an emotional level that just feels like cheating to me.


I'm not sure what I'm looking for here- validation, maybe? I just feel like their should be better ways to address these problems than letting you add Int to your attack rolls or Strength to your intimidate checks. If your Rogue doesn't have the resources to boost his Strength for damage, that should be ok because Sneak Attack will make up for it. Or it would it it wasn't so restricted much of the time. I want people to look at a class and think "Ok, this is pretty MAD, but the abilities will compensate", or "this class has a lot of potential in different directions and I'm alright with having some things I'm not inherently good at".

[erikun]

I've found this is mostly just a concern with D&D, specifically D&D3e. This is why people complain about balance in the game - when the choices are "STR 1.5x two-handed" and "sneak attack damage" and "STR 1.5x two-handed with sneak attack damage", there isn't much real choice involved there. The system itself is fairly minmax-y, with customizable stats and level-up ability bonuses and magical equipment to increase stats further, all of which stack. And when we're comparing the Rogue to the Barbarian with 40+ attack, there really needs to be something which makes the Rogue relevant.

Oddly, this wasn't a problem with earlier versions of D&D, in part because of none of those "INT to attack" abilities, and in part because you didn't get to minmax to nearly the same degree. Other games don't have that sort of problem.

Other than that, I suppose you could try to make some changes to the D&D3e system - perhaps arcane spell DC is based of DEX and divine spell DC based off CON, under the assumption that arcane spell effectiveness is tied to how precisely the gestures can be done (and how well a cleric can channel divine energy through their body) - but changing too much would end up making the game unbalanced, or making enemies listed in official sources too overpowering.

[nonsi]

You mentioned the Monk.
Well, I did some Ninjitsu in the past and I now practice some Tai-Chi.
I can tell you that both Senseis are older than me, smaller, slower and less durable, but they know how to exploit bio-mechanics to evade blows with surprising ease and deliver grievous amount of damage. You wouldn't even know that it's coming.
That's Wis to AC/Att/Dmg.

[Deepbluediver]

I've found this is mostly just a concern with D&D, specifically D&D3e. This is why people complain about balance in the game - when the choices are "STR 1.5x two-handed" and "sneak attack damage" and "STR 1.5x two-handed with sneak attack damage", there isn't much real choice involved there. The system itself is fairly minmax-y, with customizable stats and level-up ability bonuses and magical equipment to increase stats further, all of which stack. And when we're comparing the Rogue to the Barbarian with 40+ attack, there really needs to be something which makes the Rogue relevant.
Fair enough- I can think of other ways to encourage people to use the types of weapons I want them them and to make certain class abilities not suck.

Part of problem, I think, is also that specialization tends to beat out generalization except in a very limited number of circumstances. I.E. having 1 excellent combatant and 1 excellent skill monkey is better than having 2 mediocre combatant/skill-monkey mixes. It's something I'll keep in mind.


Other than that, I suppose you could try to make some changes to the D&D3e system - perhaps arcane spell DC is based of DEX and divine spell DC based off CON, under the assumption that arcane spell effectiveness is tied to how precisely the gestures can be done (and how well a cleric can channel divine energy through their body) - but changing too much would end up making the game unbalanced, or making enemies listed in official sources too overpowering.
I have my own ideas about spellcasting, but you're right in that any real fixes won't be simple. There's to much stuff that's interconnected to just tweak a few stats. Honestly though, if I lay out what each stat does and limit it to just that sphere of influence, then I think it will be a lot harder to minmax you're way to broken-status by making everything reliant on your single non-dump stat.


You mentioned the Monk.
Well, I did some Ninjitsu in the past and I now practice some Tai-Chi.
I can tell you that both Senseis are older than me, smaller, slower and less durable, but they know how to exploit bio-mechanics to evade blows with surprising ease and deliver grievous amount of damage. You wouldn't even know that it's coming.
That's Wis to AC/Att/Dmg.
First of all I'm talking about game-mechanics, not realism.

And second, is it really? I've studied martial arts as well, and I could make the argument that your teacher just has better BAB and more feats than you do. Your basic ability scores represent something like your natural untrained talent at certain tasks, but you can still practice and find other ways to get good at things you used to be bad at. For example, you can have two people, one with a penalty to Dex and the other with a bonus, but if the first person has 10 ranks in the Gymnastics skill he can still have a higher modifier than the second guy with none.

[NichG]

This is sort of a generic problem with boiling down something to a pattern of numerical bonuses. There's nothing particularly 'Strength'y about adding +2 to a roll, so when you look at it purely from the mechanical side of things everything looks like it should be interchangeable since at some level it already is all doing the same stuff anyhow. The fluff is the only thing that differentiates those things, and when you bring in homebrew or refluffing, that's exactly the element that is being altered.

To really protect the uniqueness of things in the face of optimization, they need to be mechanically 'incomparable' with eachother to some extent. That is to say, if you're asking 'should I have a +1 or a +2 to this thing?' from an optimization point of view, its a no-brainer: you go for the +2. On the other hand, 'should I get +3 to hit or +5ft to movement speed?' is more nuanced because each thing provides only a conditional advantage. That +5ft movement speed might let you kite an enemy you'd have to otherwise stand and trade blows with, but that +3 to hit might as much as quadruple your chances of actually landing a blow successfully (e.g. if you'd normally only hit on a 20).

So if you bind Ability Scores more strongly to incomparables, especially incomparables designed in a way that everyone can benefit from them, that helps stabilize them as non-interchangeable features. Of course nothing is stopping someone from writing an ability 'use your Cha to determine your carrying capacity', but the barrier is a little higher for that than 'hey, Cha mod is a number that adds to a die roll, lets just let it add to a different die roll that normal!'.

[Bruno Carvalho]

So if you bind Ability Scores more strongly to incomparables, especially incomparables designed in a way that everyone can benefit from them, that helps stabilize them as non-interchangeable features.

A.K.A AD&D's stat tables.

[NichG]

A.K.A AD&D's stat tables.

Its not so much the non-linearity as that different stats should do different types of things if you want them to really stay distinct. For example, the way that you became immune to illusions when your Int is above a certain threshold in AD&D, things like that.

Actually, if you've played the computer game Arcanum, that's a good example of some of the stuff you can do. The stats in Arcanum each gave you some particular distinct mechanical ability for getting them up to 20. If you get your Con to 20, you become immune to poisons. If your Dex is 20, you get a speed boost. If your Perception is 20, you automatically see invisible things, etc. On top of that, you had things like having the number of simultaneously sustainable spells scale with your Intelligence, the number of simultaneous party members you can have (and the permissable alignment differences) scaling with your Charisma, etc.

[Deepbluediver]

.....
So if you bind Ability Scores more strongly to incomparables, especially incomparables designed in a way that everyone can benefit from them, that helps stabilize them as non-interchangeable features. Of course nothing is stopping someone from writing an ability 'use your Cha to determine your carrying capacity', but the barrier is a little higher for that than 'hey, Cha mod is a number that adds to a die roll, lets just let it add to a different die roll that normal!'.
Yeah, I recognize that there has to be some amount of abstraction and there can be a little overlap because of other intricacies in the game system. I don't mind the Dex-to-attack rolls for light weapons as much because its part of the base rules instead of a class-specific trait. A lot of the other shuffling and fluff feels weaker (and I realize that personal taste also factors into this) and instead it's justifying from the back end a logic of "this class is too MAD".

Although it would change D&D somewhat, I would have less of a problem if your stats where named things like Fight, Magic, Skills, Face, etc. That way they can be more abstract and you could have a hulking gladiator and a lithe, nimble fencer both with a good Fight stat. You could redefine them for game purposes of course, but calling your stats "Strength" and "Dexterity" puts a very specific picture in someone's mind and of what that means, and not every has the mental flexibility to unlearn that.


Actually, if you've played the computer game Arcanum, that's a good example of some of the stuff you can do. The stats in Arcanum each gave you some particular distinct mechanical ability for getting them up to 20. If you get your Con to 20, you become immune to poisons. If your Dex is 20, you get a speed boost. If your Perception is 20, you automatically see invisible things, etc. On top of that, you had things like having the number of simultaneously sustainable spells scale with your Intelligence, the number of simultaneous party members you can have (and the permissable alignment differences) scaling with your Charisma, etc.
That's very interesting, and it seems a little bit like what I was talking about with more abstract but widely applicable stats. I'm not sure that kind of thing would work out for D&D, but it's an interesting mechanic to keep in mind.

[Deepbluediver]

I only recently stumbled across this thread from the lost of old stickied/famous thread, and it's exactly the kind of thing I'm talking about: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?125732-3-x-X-stat-to-Y-bonus

I don't necessarily have to eliminate every possible instance of it, but I feel like there should be some sort of cost to this benefit.

[silphael]

And second, is it really? I've studied martial arts as well, and I could make the argument that your teacher just has better BAB and more feats than you do. Your basic ability scores represent something like your natural untrained talent at certain tasks, but you can still practice and find other ways to get good at things you used to be bad at. For example, you can have two people, one with a penalty to Dex and the other with a bonus, but if the first person has 10 ranks in the Gymnastics skill he can still have a higher modifier than the second guy with none.

They are real life people, therefore have a level of at most 3, which gives them 2 more bba points, around 2 feats (including monk feats), definitely not enough to ensure to never be hit. Always hit MAY be guaranteed, not always dodge.

I think that would ask for a refund of the whole system... on that topic I'm particulary found of the "power, finesse, resilience" point of view, that makes usually stuff like barbarians/fighters (champion-styled) and sorcerers have high power, rogues/fighters (tacticians) and wizards have high finesse, paladins/monks and clerics have high resilience. But well, that's not the topic here.

To return to the topic, to do that you would have to increase the madness of the sadest classes, to ensure everyone can have nice things... and those are already horribly breaking the game.

[Deepbluediver]

They are real life people, therefore have a level of at most 3, which gives them 2 more bba points, around 2 feats (including monk feats), definitely not enough to ensure to never be hit. Always hit MAY be guaranteed, not always dodge.
I'm not really a fan of trying to debate D&D-as-compared-to-real life. I find it sufficient to say that someone who studied martial arts for years would be a good deal better than most of us in a fight, who are probably comparable to Commoners in a fight (and only in a fight). It was really only to show how someone can be better at something than you while having lower base attributes.


To return to the topic, to do that you would have to increase the madness of the sadest classes, to ensure everyone can have nice things... and those are already horribly breaking the game.
I would certainly do that- my magic fix in particular tries to make all casters spread their stats out between at least two of the base-attributes, while at the same time leveling the playing field for things like Spell-DC and caster level.