Does Attribute ratings include training?

[Conradine]

When I was 19, despite being a well nourished and robust boy, I was totally untrained and could bench press only 80 pounds, with much difficulty.
Actually, despite not being a professional athlete, after many years of regular - although not strenuous - workout, my record is 248 pounds.
That means, in D&D terms, coming from a strenght of 9-10 to something around 14. But I'm pretty sure I've not gained 16 levels in the maintime.


So, realistically speaking, the Strenght attribute of a character represents his maximum strenght after training, or his untrained strenght, or what?


PS If we were to pursuit some kind of realism, and 3d6 is the dice throw for untrained characters, what should be the dice throw for trained ones?

[Zombimode]

When I was 19, despite being a well nourished and robust boy, I was totally untrained and could bench press only 80 pounds, with much difficulty.
Actually, despite not being a professional athlete, after many years of regular - although not strenuous - workout, my record is 248 pounds.
That means, in D&D terms, coming from a strenght of 9-10 to something around 14. But I'm pretty sure I've not gained 16 levels in the maintime.


So, realistically speaking, the Strenght attribute of a character represents his maximum strenght after training, or his untrained strenght, or what?


PS If we were to pursuit some kind of realism, and 3d6 is the dice throw for untrained characters, what should be the dice throw for trained ones?


Keep in mind that high ability scores are only found on adventurers and other exceptional people.

Also, D&D doesn't lend itself well for modelling that isn't tied to becoming better at your main profession.

Or, that is to say, it doesn't do this very well if you see stats and levels as prescriptive.

Personally I always found it more fitting to see stats as descriptive instead.

What does this mean and what is the difference?

In short, prescriptive stats inform the reality of the game world. A fighter is strong because he has an Str score of 18.
Descriptive stats on the other hand just model the current status of a creature in the game world. The fighter is strong. Because of that, he is modeled with a Str score of 18.

Using your example with descriptive stats:
When you where young you couldn't benchpress for a lot. This would likely to be modeled as a low Str score.
Now you have muscled up. This would likely be modeled by a higher Str score.

You can't track the transformation with rules. With an descriptive interpretation you don't have to. This is simply not what the rules are for.

[Zancloufer]

4d6 dice roll would work fairly well. Also a 32+ PB could probably represent some training on top of that.

I think this is already somewhat mentioned in the different array types where some creatures and NPCs (mostly ones TRAINED in class levels) have better stat arrays.

IE: A 'Normal' stat array is 11, 11, 11, 10, 10, 10 (Which I would say is actually below average but w/e) while the 'non-elite' array of 13, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8, and the 'elite' array is 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8. Overall point buys would equal 15/15/25.

I Guess it depends on what you are aiming for. Average dice rolls have 3d6 x 6 equal to the normal array (or 15 PB) with non-elite being slightly better, though having the same PB value and probably makes for a more balanced character. 4d6 drop lowest x 6 is close to the 25 PB, and would probably represent a character with some skill/training.

Though IMHO if you want 'heroic/renown' PCs 32 PB is probably the lowest you'd want to go if you want decent mundanes. The roughly equivalent dice roll there would be 5d6 drop two x 6 or 3d4 + 6 x 6. If you still want to roll dice.

[fishyfishyfishy]

Don't think about it too much. Realism and D&D are anathema to each other.

[Kelb_Panthera]

There's a really obvious factor you're forgetting; modern life. A human in a modern, western nation will easily reach 16-18 years of age without -ever- having had to rely on his physicality to get by. Even then, unskilled workers in the modern world often end up in jobs where they're flipping burgers or operating a cash register or some other menial but fairly physically undemanding task.

Contrast that with the life of someone from before the industrial revolution. Working alongside the rest of the family doing the very physically demanding work of subsistence farming was the everyday life of most people from as soon as they're old enough to hold the tools until they're too arthritic to hold them anymore. Many of the people who don't have that life (and they're not exceedingly numerous) have a near equally demanding life manufacturing tools, arms, and armor. Even food production was quite a bit more demanding than it is now, try making bread with no powered tools sometime.

D&D models the latter, wherein your strength will quickly be pushed to near its natural limit and remain there unless you're one of the exceedingly few people lucky enough to be born with a silver spoon in your mouth. Serious training and the game's emphasis on heroic action can allow a character to push past that limit but most, normal characters will have no occasion to engage in either of those. The generally poorer nutrition available in yesteryear accounts for the generally lower physical scores of such people.