What is with point buys

[Vyanie]

I keep encountering DM's that tend to like 15 and 20 point buys. Is this the norm or something? Do people not realize that you now have the option of going caster and become a god(super sad class) or a martial (mad class) and being somewhat gimped. I am actually quite confused on this as I have seen pretty much every campaign the caster has 20 in the primary stat and has the flexibility to ignore the rest of the stats (for the most part) where as the martial has to focus on 3+ stats. The lower point buy just seems to hurt martial characters even more and I see less and less of them in groups. I am a person that tends to like martials simply because i believe casters are to powerful and I tend to abuse them. What are other peoples thoughts?

[Amphetryon]

I keep encountering DM's that tend to like 15 and 20 point buys. Is this the norm or something? Do people not realize that you now have the option of going caster and become a god(super sad class) or a martial (mad class) and being somewhat gimped. I am actually quite confused on this as I have seen pretty much every campaign the caster has 20 in the primary stat and has the flexibility to ignore the rest of the stats (for the most part) where as the martial has to focus on 3+ stats. The lower point buy just seems to hurt martial characters even more and I see less and less of them in groups. I am a person that tends to like martials simply because i believe casters are to powerful and I tend to abuse them. What are other peoples thoughts?

Is this 3.5 or Pathfinder? The two figure point-buy differently, making lower point buys marginally less painful in PF than 3.5.

It's also my experience that willfully dumping 2+ Stats is a recipe for trouble once Ability Damage comes online.

[Big Fau]

I keep encountering DM's that tend to like 15 and 20 point buys. Is this the norm or something? Do people not realize that you now have the option of going caster and become a god(super sad class) or a martial (mad class) and being somewhat gimped. I am actually quite confused on this as I have seen pretty much every campaign the caster has 20 in the primary stat and has the flexibility to ignore the rest of the stats (for the most part) where as the martial has to focus on 3+ stats. The lower point buy just seems to hurt martial characters even more and I see less and less of them in groups. I am a person that tends to like martials simply because i believe casters are to powerful and I tend to abuse them. What are other peoples thoughts?

I'm assuming PF, because 15pb in 3.5 is virtual commoner stats (the standard 10/10/10/11/11/11 is 15pb) and may as well be unplayable; the PHB outright states that players should have a total ability modifier of +1 or higher, and putting a 14 into a stat with 15pb can easily give you a +0 or lower.

Dice tend to be very unreliable when you can't see them. Point Buy is a way to unify character creation, and in all honesty rolling stats doesn't prevent godlike casters or gimped melee: It can actually force the former if you get bad rolls.

[SovelsAtaask]

That's a problem with the system as a whole. If you're seeing 15 or 20 point buy, that's probably Pathfinder and those numbers are actually pretty decent in that game. Even if you do rolling, casters will still put the highest number they can in their primary stat and any other good numbers are just gravy. Martials will need to distribute their scores even if they roll, and unless they're really lucky they'll probably end up with mostly average and then maybe a really good score. "Meh" martials is just part of the game.

[Telok]

"Balance"

Which, frankly, is silly given the class setup as the original poster noted. It leads to games where nobody has much, if any, charisma except for charisma based spellcasters.

[Jormengand]

I personally hate rolling to see how badly I've shot myself in the foot during character creation. If you miss with an attack, well, you could have devoted more character resources to make that attack better, and unless you're going to die from missing that attack, it's unlikely to affect you forever. Rolling makes it so that you can easily have crappy stats and there's also nothing you can do about it. MAD classes tend to prefer point buy to rolling, because then they can actually put points in things they need.

[Malimar]

In 3.5: The DMG suggests you can go as low as 15 points for a "low-powered campaign", and opines that 32 points is a "high-powered campaign". Some people may just be taking the DMG's word for it, not realizing that the writers of the DMG didn't understand the game as well as we do today. In reality, 30 is pretty close to reasonable; 15 or 20 is ludicrously low.

In PF: 15 is on the low end of reasonable, 20 is pretty close to the median of reasonable. Neither is outrageously low; either will make MAD characters make some hard decisions during character creation but won't leave them utterly gimped.

As for why go PB instead of rolling: Jormengand has the right of it. Plus if everybody has the same point buy, you don't wind up with one person having high rolls and another person having low rolls for their stats; such an imbalance within the party is just fundamentally nasty (though such an imbalance can be excused if the DM is doling out PB by tiers, which is probably reasonable).

[Vyanie]

Sorry I was meaning if PF.

I am more interested in why it was settled on 15-20 point buy as that just semi gimps non casters, higher than that the curve starts to help non casters quite a bit but does not help casters in any dramatic way. I did read on these forums the person that did the point buy based on class tier and that made more sense to me but also left it extremely complicated.

I guess I'm more confused as to why there are not more 25+ point buy campaigns as the more points do not help casters but seem to bring martials up to par. For a caster you do not really sacrifice anything at all with a 20 point buy, you can max out your one stat you need and meh line the others, if you add in 2 more dex or con to a caster it really is not a big deal since they are generally going to try and stay out of direct melee combat so you run a lot of 10 10 11 20 12 10 or something similar if you are unable to dump a stat. Conversely a rogue or a fighter must stack up STR for damage, Dex to avoid attacks since they are in melee for everything, Con to survive the inevitable being hit, Int for any skill points, Wis for saves since they get horrible will saves. Since the max you can put a stat is 18 pre race bonus you end up with barely above farmer john stats if you want to be able to do anything as a martial and yet casters always stay the same. The extra points in 25+ point buys end up only marginally improving the caster but are a HUGE benefit to the non casting classes. Since for the most part casters are an "I WIN" button after lvl 4-6 It would only make sense to help improve martials point pools to make them relevant more than level 3.

A good example of this is a campaign i just finished where we had a 15 point buy. We had a party of all casters because everyone realized that with only 15 points you could not benefit the party meaningfully besides basically being an NPC swinging a sword. Every caster had nearly identical stats just moved around for Wis Int or Cha caster. The campaign was laughably easy. I have been in the same exact campaign with a 30 point buy same amount of people but since the point buy was higher it allowed people to spread out and try different classes. We had a MUCH harder time with it because we only had 1 pure caster the rest went hybrid or full martials. I will let that sink in. 15 more or DOUBLE the points to toss around per character but because we did not go with an all caster party it was remarkably harder. The campaign started at level 1 and we ended around 15.

[FearlessGnome]

Most campaigns do seem to give the same stats to everyone, which sucks for melee. I've seen some campaigns where your class tier affects your point buy, which is a decent attempt to try to help non-casters out, though obviously MAD is not the main factor deciding tiers. Also I tend to not pick tier 1 classes, so maybe I'm just biased.

[Kurald Galain]

you run a lot of 10 10 11 20 12 10 or something similar if you are unable to dump a stat.
Wait, why on earth would you be unable to dump a stat? All point buy methods that I'm aware of allow you to dump stats, and it's usually a good idea to do so.


Conversely a rogue or a fighter must stack up STR for damage, Dex to avoid attacks since they are in melee for everything, Con to survive the inevitable being hit, Int for any skill points, Wis for saves since they get horrible will saves.
Well, you just picked two of the weakest classes in the game; that doesn't help your point any.

That said, rogues don't need anything in str (they attack on dex instead), nor in int (8 skill points per level). Fighters don't need anything in dex (hello, full plate), not a lot in con (1d10 hit dice), and not a lot in wis (they've got save-boosting class features).

So yeah, the issue isn't nearly as bad as you think it is.

[No-Kill Cleric]

My DM permanently switched after I rolled a character who didn't have a stat lower than 15. This was my first time ever rolling anything, so it might have been beginner's luck, but that risk of unevenness was too much for my DM, who has players that build "less than optimal" characters (a la "wait, I have spellcasting?!") so that amount of variety in character power was unacceptable.


We tried a mini-campaign with rolled stats, poor "what class features" had a high score of 14, while One Chop Lumberjack was averaging around 15 for everything....

[Krazzman]

Because rolling for stats is quite frankly utter crap. I have spend too many (luckily one-shot adventures) evenings with joe-shmoe the cripple while the people next to me had Adonis, Herkules, Gilgamesh or similar characters. With the grossest disparity being a Paladin with 18 18 18 18 17 16 against my 12 16 13 10 11 7(on a rogue)...

Ideally you would have a "tierbased" point buy but 20 or 15 points isn't that bad. The assumed "HIGH" is 25. Which still is not enough for some characters/classes.
For example my Paladin: 14 12 14 14 10 13 is rocking faces. But I went with an Angel Born Aasimar for +4 Str and +2 Cha. He is currently rocking 18 Str and 18 Cha pre items. He is perfectly fine in the campaign he is in using 20 pt buy. Depending on what you want to play in a game with "lower" point buy some adjusting is needed.

Pathfinder is playable with 15 point buy (don't know about 10pt, never tried it) but having up to 10 points more is making certain builds/concepts smoother.

[Kurald Galain]

For what it's worth, in Pathfinder the official point buy for adventure paths is 15, and general consensus is that this works fine, although some people prefer 20. The mandatory point buy for Pathfinder Society is 20, and nobody seems to have a problem with that.

If you think you can't make a viable non-caster on 15 or 20 point buy, well, there's thousands of regular players who'll show you that yes, they can.

[Metahuman1]

Wait, why on earth would you be unable to dump a stat? All point buy methods that I'm aware of allow you to dump stats, and it's usually a good idea to do so.


Well, you just picked two of the weakest classes in the game; that doesn't help your point any.

That said, rogues don't need anything in str (they attack on dex instead), nor in int (8 skill points per level). Fighters don't need anything in dex (hello, full plate), not a lot in con (1d10 hit dice), and not a lot in wis (they've got save-boosting class features).

So yeah, the issue isn't nearly as bad as you think it is.

Point 1: ZOMG! YOUR TAKING EXTRA POINTS OUT OF WISDOME AND CHARISMA AS A BARBARIAN TO MAKE YOUR DEX AND CON KEEP PACE WITH STRENGHT!? THAT'S MUCNKIN MINMAXERING AND WRONGBAD!!!!!!

Don't pretend like you've never met a DM that would do that. Or a player who would make a fuss and a DM that would, to not deal with it/get things moving, capitulate.


Point 2: Fighter needs a very high dex. His reflex save is bad and will be targeted for that reason, with damage effects and save or suck and save or loose effects. Grease, Web, entangle all come to mind just in the first couple of levels of play.

And he surely needs the boost too initiative, cause if you go too late in the round it severely hampers your ability to help, particularly if you don't have the awesomeness of casting.


At least there are easy to access ways to run Combat Reflexes on Str, or Con, Or at the least a mental stat, and not on dex. Oh, no, no, wait, no, no there are not. You HAVE to have a jacked up dex to make use of that feat, and it's a damn near mandatory feat for most melee types that you'd run as a fighter.

And with out an ability to apply an alternate stat too it, you still need to get your Will save up or else suffer and die the moment the DM uses a save or loose/die will save spell on you, hold person, confusion and glitter dust coming to mind at low levels and Dominate person at mid.

And ALL of that is out of the box and before you lump in things like if you wanted to run a dex based swashbuckling or chain using fighter. Were you still need Con and Str for survivability and unlocking still likely needed feats like power attack, respectively.






As for the rogue, in my experience, you kind of need that Int, particularly if you need the ability to have more then the most rudimentary stereotypical skill set. And str is for damage since Pathfinder hasn't had the decency to give Rogues Weapons finesse as a bonus feat and/or make it replace Str for damage as well as too hit with applicable weapons and have done with it. As well as again unlocking feats.

And wisdom is still needed for will saves. And Con for the hit points for survivability and the fort save. And these are just things that are needed.





And less weak classes still need this kind of mishmash.


Magus needs Str, Dex, Con and Int, and greatly benefits from Wisdom.

Barbarian needs Str, Dex, Con, Int if he wants some skills to reflect that cunning Conan type, Cha if he wants to be able to use Intimidate properly, and Wis for a weak will save.

Ranger needs Str, even if he's not melee but archer type, Dex, even if he's not Archer but TWF type, Con cause either way that fort save MUST be as high as possible and HP is none negotiable, Wis for spell casting, and if he wants enough skills to actually be rangerish or the ability to actually use certain class features like Wild Empathy, Int and Cha respectively.


Paladin's also MUST have Str and Con and must have Cha. Granted, they don't actually need more then a 10 Wisdom in this edition thankfully, thought it does help. And if they want any skill mileage, they need at last some Int. And of course, as explained, even with heavy armor, they MUST have Dex for initiative and combat reflexes and that ride skill if there going mounted. And that's being generous and not worrying about either AC OR reflex save, which is the bad save and still really tends to need the extra pick me up despite Divine Grace.


I'm not even gonna talk about the monk just to be nice.


Bard can get by with out Str, but it does help to have a little of it at least, at least in early game and more so if you not 1: Heavily optimized in other directions and 2: using backwards compatibility options.

He also needs the highest Cha and Con he can get, and a hearty investment in Dex (and he might arguably not need the help in reflex, but he DOES need the help with AC.), and in Int since he often lives by his skill points if he doesn't have the right spell at the time. And while Wisdom is a touch less critical then everything except str, with out multyclassing Paladin or backward compatibility, bard still wants as much of this as he can have with out loosing out on Cha, Con, Dex, Int in that order.




I could go on but I think I've made my point. Also, note that none of these are the Tier 1 or 2 classes, there all tier 3 or lower. One of the things that helps those Tier 1/2 classes is they can get by on Casting Stat, Con, and maybe some dex which they have means through spells and item crafting and summons and transmutation forms of mitigating more and more as they get higher and higher level, which lower tier classes tend not to have.

[Kurald Galain]

Point 1: ZOMG! YOUR TAKING EXTRA POINTS OUT OF WISDOME AND CHARISMA AS A BARBARIAN TO MAKE YOUR DEX AND CON KEEP PACE WITH STRENGHT!? THAT'S MUCNKIN MINMAXERING AND WRONGBAD!!!!!!
I've never met a DM that would do that.

Seriously. I don't think the people you (apparently) play with are at all representative of the gamer population as a whole.

[Âmesang]

I'm reminded of using Pathfinder's epic point buy to rebuild a character because after awhile I thought the stats I had rolled were too high. :smalltongue:

I went from about 12/17/16/17/15/18 down to 7/15/13/16/9/18; since the character was a fairly stereotypical noblewoman she retained the right amount of skill points, had enough Dexterity to represent poise and grace, just enough Constitution to match her physique and abundant health; dumped Strength since she finds melee combat and menial work to be beneath her notice, and dumped Wisdom to make her rather impulsive and foolhardy, give her some delusions of grandeur… yet due to classes she still retains a strong Will save.

I definitely find I enjoy point buy if I'm creating a character based on a pre-existing character (one I draw, write, or made in a videogame), since it makes it easier to set the character's stats in an appropriate manner; however I've had enough fun with a 5th Edition dwarf cleric who's stats were generated by rolling 3d6 in order. All 10s and 13s before racial mods, and all ending up in just the right spots.

[King of Nowhere]

Well, I feel I need to throw my support towards rolling stats since you all seem to dislike it so much.
With point buy, every character of a certain class will be utterly undistinguishable from a character of any other class. Rollling gives greater variability.
Of course there is the problem that some members of the party will be stronger than others, but really, nobody forces you to just roll once. I normally have people reroll some scores if they end up too strong or too weak, so that in the end everybody ends up roughly balanced. The remaining unfairness is lower thann that caused by the difference between tiers, or by the different skill levels of the players.
Also, rolling higher stats opens up more possibilities; you can suddenly afford to play a class with MAD that would be awfully weak otherwise, or you could experiment with something poorly optimized. If I was a player roling higher stats than the rest of my party, I'd use them to build something like a half-orc wizard, or an halfling fighter, using the unoptimal class-race combo as a way of keeping things fair while doing something that could interesting to roleplay. I mean, logic dictates that there are going to be half-orcs with 16 INT who go studying wizardry, or halflings with 16 STR who do heavy melee, so you may take the chance to play one if your (rolled highly) stats allow you to do so without castrating your power level. I'd like to see something different from half-orc barbarians, halfling rogues and sun elf wizards every once in a while.

Yeah, of course if you say "everybody rolls, then we play as it is", it's gonna suck. But if you say "well, let's roll and then see what I may do with it", that has good potential.

[Metahuman1]

I've never met a DM that would do that.

Seriously. I don't think the people you (apparently) play with are at all representative of the gamer population as a whole.

Then you've been profoundly fortunate, to a degree that is unreasonable to expect everyone else to be so lucky as to run across.


I do note however that you didn't mention if you'd ever had a player raise a fuss to that general tune about something of the sort and the DM just capitulate for whatever reason.

[Jormengand]

With point buy, every character of a certain class will be utterly undistinguishable from a character of any other class. Rollling gives greater variability.

No, with point buy you get to CHOOSE whether to have a normal or abnormal character, with rolling it's chosen FOR you. Seriously, I've had high-strength sorcerers and such before; it's not uncommon.

[martixy]

I realize I'm a significant probability outlier, but I've had a great deal of characters with very high rolled stats. The highest was 18 18 17 17 14 11.
Also, I do actually enjoy rolling stats as long as you are allowed certain rules that even out the probability space.

[nyjastul69]

Because rolling for stats is quite frankly utter crap. I have spend too many (luckily one-shot adventures) evenings with joe-shmoe the cripple while the people next to me had Adonis, Herkules, Gilgamesh or similar characters. With the grossest disparity being a Paladin with 18 18 18 18 17 16 against my 12 16 13 10 11 7(on a rogue)...

Ideally you would have a "tierbased" point buy but 20 or 15 points isn't that bad. The assumed "HIGH" is 25. Which still is not enough for some characters/classes.
For example my Paladin: 14 12 14 14 10 13 is rocking faces. But I went with an Angel Born Aasimar for +4 Str and +2 Cha. He is currently rocking 18 Str and 18 Cha pre items. He is perfectly fine in the campaign he is in using 20 pt buy. Depending on what you want to play in a game with "lower" point buy some adjusting is needed.

Pathfinder is playable with 15 point buy (don't know about 10pt, never tried it) but having up to 10 points more is making certain builds/concepts smoother.

There are those that enjoy rolling for abilities. Can you define 'utter crap' so I'll better be able to identify it in the future? I dont want to continue playing the game in an 'utterly crappy' way. I look forward to your enlightenment.

[eggynack]

Sometimes people institute rules that have a negative impact on balance. I dunno what's weird about it. It just kinda is what it is. Usually they do it cause they want some impact outside of the balance, like a more rough and tumble, lower power, game, rather than because they actively want that imbalance. It doesn't feel like there's all that much to this issue beyond that.

[Draco_Lord]

As for the rogue, in my experience, you kind of need that Int, particularly if you need the ability to have more then the most rudimentary stereotypical skill set. And str is for damage since Pathfinder hasn't had the decency to give Rogues Weapons finesse as a bonus feat and/or make it replace Str for damage as well as too hit with applicable weapons and have done with it.

This is no longer true. Unchained Rogues both get Weapon Finesse for free and have an ability to apply Dex to Damage instead of strength.

[Vyanie]

Ok, my point was not on one form of stats over another (rolling vs point buy) I am just wondering why point buy is always so low. You ALWAYS see the exact same stats on every character, no deviation. Martial classes are gimped vs casters with the lower point buys because as someone in this thread pointed out for the point allocation. I always see lower point buy = more pure casters... period. There is absolutely no reason to have a martial that MUST spread stats around be in the same group. The person who sadly chose a non caster is just playing a stonger version of an npc swing sword repeat repeat.... ad nauseam. They lack the skill points to do anything else because they are REQUIRED to put them into STR DEX CON WIS, a frontline must worry about save or suck spells (mostly Wis and Dex) casters, in addition to already having good saves in at least one of those fields can focus the low points into another field. Martials have to get STR for any type of damage, (since pazio HATES dex to damage) then Con AND Dex for frontline (hopefully getting high enough AC to get missed and high enough HP to survive the inevitable crit) Wis because ohh yeah its great to get held, or better yet turned into an npc that is attacking the party. ohh wait you want to do something requiring skills? lulz funny you had to dump INT to get the bare minimum to make something that is basically an NPC. A charming character? cha? ohh hell no you wasted stats on that? you just gimped your already gimped character.

A higher point buy gives people the chance to try out different stuff, you want a charming swashbuckler? you want to still be effective? ok. you want to duel wield? high point buy ok low = you are a moron for trying. It was even pointed out that a rogue should dump INT because 8 skill points is soooooo much... so basically all rogues should be retarded. want to build a clever barb? low point buy NOPE.

This is my point. with the low point buy everyone is forced into either being a caster, or being meh. ohh look another big stupid barbarian that can only swing a sword. Before you say something about just getting magic items... remember how many items that is vs a caster. a caster needs INT boost... thats really it. a martial needs weapons to hit stuff, STR boost to hit and do damage, dex and con to survive (no self buffing like a caster) and that still leaves wis to shore up save or suck, and cha and int if you want to do something other than swing a sword.

Low point buys ONLY benefit casters. So why do people have such a hard time doing campaigns with higher than 20 point buy? is it that people do not understand or that they only want casters?

[Metahuman1]

This is no longer true. Unchained Rogues both get Weapon Finesse for free and have an ability to apply Dex to Damage instead of strength.

Is that the version that's listed out of the box on the pathfinder SRD? Or has that update not hit yet/been separated for heaven only knows why?


Aside from that, fine, they can make due with out Str, though it is still needed to qualify for some feats they may well want/like, particularly if there trying not to just play a stereo type.



Edit: Swordsaged:


And then there's the fact that just out of the box casters can get there gear half price for the cost of a couple of feats, meaning that not only do they need less gear, they can get double the mileage out of the gear they do get/invest in by making it themselves.

Deny them down time to make it and they tend to just complain, not even un-reasonably, until they get it.

So even pointing to magic items as a fix is just circling back to the fact that that still favors the casters.

[Jormengand]

Is that the version that's listed out of the box on the pathfinder SRD? Or has that update not hit yet/been separated for heaven only knows why?

Weirdly, listed under "Unchained classes". (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/unchained-classes/rogue-unchained)

[nedz]

We use Elite Array - it's not perfect but it is fair and it does stop the casters pumping one stat. It can be a problem for MAD classes, but they are going to have issues whatever chargen system you use.

[Metahuman1]

Weirdly, listed under "Unchained classes". (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/unchained-classes/rogue-unchained)

So, it's a variant rule that they spell out is something you can choose to not use as opposed to a full on rules as written Errata?


The difference is the latter tells all DM's "yeah, you can do it the old way, but that's home brew and your gonna have to admit that up front to your players. And it's homebrew that is there specifically to nerf that which doesn't need a nerf." were as the former leaves room for "Hey, yeah, it's there if I want to use it, but I don't want to use it so I'm going to ban it cause I don't like/approve of it and think it's broken. Now go roll that wizard that does the job better with 0 and 1st level spells and maybe an item feat for the thirtyith time."

[Jormengand]

You can always use an array like 16/16/14/12/10/8, or something similar adjusted for power level, if you're worried about SAD vs MAD. It's quite a powerful array, equivalent to 25 point buy, but you can have a 20-point one (16/16/12/10/10/8) or a 15-point one (14/14/14/12/10/8) or even a 10-point one (14/14/12/10/10/8). That way, everyone has two stats at the highest point, rather than one. Though, for 25 point buy, you can always have 14/14/14/14/14/10 if you're feeling really MAD-friendly.

EDIT: I don't know why I'm the one having to look for this, but it's not hard to find (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/unchained-classes) how Unchained is described.

[SovelsAtaask]

"Hey, yeah, it's there if I want to use it, but I don't want to use it so I'm going to ban it cause I don't like/approve of it and think it's broken. Now go roll that wizard that does the job better with 0 and 1st level spells and maybe an item feat for the thirtyith time."

Every single thing in the game in "optional" for the GM. The GM can ban all non-humans if they fancy. They can say nothing outside Core, or no taking , or decide they want a low magic, or throw out any number of rules if they decide to run their game that way. Does it [i]really matter that it's a variant class when every and any rule is technically optional for the GM?

[Metahuman1]

Every single thing in the game in "optional" for the GM. The GM can ban all non-humans if they fancy. They can say nothing outside Core, or no taking , or decide they want a low magic, or throw out any number of rules if they decide to run their game that way. Does it [i]really matter that it's a variant class when every and any rule is technically optional for the GM?

Yes. It does.


While there is truth to what your saying, there is also a flip side. Yes, DM's can just do all kinds of arbitrary bans, but some of them require actually explaining. All one race doesn't require much, it's a theme game. Same with all one specific class or type of class (say all arcane casters or all warriors or what have you.).

Some have a bad but built in excuse "To control game balance, Core Only!".

But when something is official core option, and is officially part of a class, unless your going to ban that specific class outright, which you really only have a built in explanation for in a theme game were scoundrels/skill monkey's are not the theme, it makes your ability to argue that what your doing has any kind of solid reasoning too it THAT much more tenuous and easy to see through and call out.

"Core only!" is far different from "Core only/core + these approve variants only. Except for this one class looses this one class feature cause I feel like it's OP, but I'm allowing blatantly more OP things that come with other classes that I like better.".

It takes away his pretense of being reasonable, which means he can't hind behind it. Meaning he has to have an honest discussion about it. Meaning it's much easier for players to collectively tell him "no, not running that way." on the matter, or just revolt and walk away all together cause they don't want to put up with the junk that is now openly junk.

[Pex]

I keep encountering DM's that tend to like 15 and 20 point buys. Is this the norm or something? Do people not realize that you now have the option of going caster and become a god(super sad class) or a martial (mad class) and being somewhat gimped. I am actually quite confused on this as I have seen pretty much every campaign the caster has 20 in the primary stat and has the flexibility to ignore the rest of the stats (for the most part) where as the martial has to focus on 3+ stats. The lower point buy just seems to hurt martial characters even more and I see less and less of them in groups. I am a person that tends to like martials simply because i believe casters are to powerful and I tend to abuse them. What are other peoples thoughts?

Cynical, but some DMs have a great fear of PCs being "powerful". Anything more than "I attack. You hit, roll damage. 7" and they scream minmaxing powergaming rollplaying munchkin. It's also Fighters Can't Get Nice Things thinking. It's ok for a wizard to do 10d6 damage to everyone in a 20 ft radius from over 400 ft away or fly or be invisible or make an orc a friend because it's magic, but let a non-magical person do 2d6 + 12 damage a hit all the time three times a round or jump over a 15 ft wide gap while wearing platemail they scream "it not realistic" and look for the nerf bat.

Then there are those who insist a character must have a weakness reflected in a mechanic. Part of name calling someone a minmaxing powergaming rollplaying munchkin, if a character does not have an 8 or two they are adamant the player only cares about POWER and not roleplaying, the Stormwind Fallacy. Heaven forbid the character has an 18 at 1st level. The horror the DM feels. They cannot fathom the character already has an inherent flaw by virtue of the player. A player is not perfect and will make mistakes. A player will make decisions of what his character does that aren't mistakes at all but inherently have consequences anyway based on what he does or doesn't do. It's the play of the game itself that makes things interesting. While there is nothing wrong with having an 8, it's not a requirement or else you're playing the game wrong. These DMs refuse to accept that PCs doing nifty things is the whole point.

Now, there is nothing inherently wrong with 15 or 20 Point Buy in Pathfinder with the exception that monks and paladins do not mathematically work in 15 Point Buy. The math of the game works against them in terms of their class abilities not working properly to affect the gameworld. They're stretched too thin to cover everything or have to sacrifice being able to do a class ability effectively if they want to be good at something else, but I digress. There is a point to saying that some DMs don't mind and actually encourage PCs doing nifty things but for some reason they can't stand high numbers. A PC can hit AC 25 but not 35. A PC's saving throw can be 21 on a Natural 10 but not 30. A PC can deal 25 damage on a hit but not 43. For these DMs the high numbers are too meta. Class abilities contribute to the high numbers. It's not all about the ability scores though they matter. When the ability scores aren't high the higher numbers don't appear until the campaign is almost over, because you can almost guarantee that a game that uses 20 and especially 15 Point Buy was never intended to reach level 20. It can happen, obviously, but more likely not.

[Metahuman1]

Cynical, but some DMs have a great fear of PCs being "powerful". Anything more than "I attack. You hit, roll damage. 7" and they scream minmaxing powergaming rollplaying munchkin. It's also Fighters Can't Get Nice Things thinking. It's ok for a wizard to do 10d6 damage to everyone in a 20 ft radius from over 400 ft away or fly or be invisible or make an orc a friend because it's magic, but let a non-magical person do 2d6 + 12 damage a hit all the time three times a round or jump over a 15 ft wide gap while wearing platemail they scream "it not realistic" and look for the nerf bat.

Then there are those who insist a character must have a weakness reflected in a mechanic. Part of name calling someone a minmaxing powergaming rollplaying munchkin, if a character does not have an 8 or two they are adamant the player only cares about POWER and not roleplaying, the Stormwind Fallacy. Heaven forbid the character has an 18 at 1st level. The horror the DM feels. They cannot fathom the character already has an inherent flaw by virtue of the player. A player is not perfect and will make mistakes. A player will make decisions of what his character does that aren't mistakes at all but inherently have consequences anyway based on what he does or doesn't do. It's the play of the game itself that makes things interesting. While there is nothing wrong with having an 8, it's not a requirement or else you're playing the game wrong. These DMs refuse to accept that PCs doing nifty things is the whole point.

Now, there is nothing inherently wrong with 15 or 20 Point Buy in Pathfinder with the exception that monks and paladins do not mathematically work in 15 Point Buy. The math of the game works against them in terms of their class abilities not working properly to affect the gameworld. They're stretched too thin to cover everything or have to sacrifice being able to do a class ability effectively if they want to be good at something else, but I digress. There is a point to saying that some DMs don't mind and actually encourage PCs doing nifty things but for some reason they can't stand high numbers. A PC can hit AC 25 but not 35. A PC's saving throw can be 21 on a Natural 10 but not 30. A PC can deal 25 damage on a hit but not 43. For these DMs the high numbers are too meta. Class abilities contribute to the high numbers. It's not all about the ability scores though they matter. When the ability scores aren't high the higher numbers don't appear until the campaign is almost over, because you can almost guarantee that a game that uses 20 and especially 15 Point Buy was never intended to reach level 20. It can happen, obviously, but more likely not.

Basically an elaboration on a point I made above. And it's shocking not only how common this mentality is, but how stanchly those who hold it will cling to it.

[Krazzman]

There are those that enjoy rolling for abilities. Can you define 'utter crap' so I'll better be able to identify it in the future? I dont want to continue playing the game in an 'utterly crappy' way. I look forward to your enlightenment.

Rolling for stats is similar to the Cold **** Syndrome (http://de.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Cold%20****%20Syndrome). It might have worked for ADND or so but since 3rd point buy just is the better alternative. And seriously spoken: If someone likes it then there is nothing wrong with that person, doesn't change the fact that I still think that the thing they like is crap. It's just my opinion. For example iPhones. There are people that like it, and that is fine... but there are also people that know how crappy those things are.

It is crap because you can have a character with 15 point buy next to one with 80 point buy. They both have to run through the same adventure together. Heaven forbid if the 15 pt buy guy can't play caster or wanted to play a fighter type? Well sure sucks to be you since the 80 pt buy cleric/druid/wizard picks up a stick and does more damage than you or is generally better in every conceivable way. For one-shots such stuff is ok. Since it is a short time where you will suck or be ultra awesome and then next weekend you can roll again and see what you get.
But for longer standing campaigns? Nope, I'm out. Either the DM kills your character off for having too much stats or you are set with an array that barely makes your class work.

And with many variations that try to ensure playable arrays like 6+3d6b2 or 5d6b3 or 4d6b3(but if it's all the same number take all 4) there might be one that is not crap, but what are the chances of the DM using that.

[Pugwampy]

Heck I could compare this to buying a single minis vs buying a random booster pack .

Well I think its preference . Some people dont like to risk rolling for AB points . Good or horrid stats effects your hero the whole campaign . Its unfair to be forced to choose another class just because the dice hated you . Same goes for choosing fixed hp over rolling for it .
Lets be honest everyone wants their double 18,s and point system <at least my one> will give you that.

Another reason is convenience . When you roll , DM wants to see that roll . Sometimes thats not possible <anti social nerd alert> . Points gives you the freedom to make a PC yourself and that saves time .

That said I offer both options but notice the majority of players prefer to try their luck and let the gods decide. They have my respect , I am usually not that brave .

I find it interesting that most players who rolled "Kek" totally forgot where they put those AB stats and have to roll again just before the game. Yeah yeah sure sure .

[Eldariel]

Every single thing in the game in "optional" for the GM. The GM can ban all non-humans if they fancy. They can say nothing outside Core, or no taking , or decide they want a low magic, or throw out any number of rules if they decide to run their game that way. Does it [i]really matter that it's a variant class when every and any rule is technically optional for the GM?

It also matters for global campaigns such as Pathfinder Society. Those are generally run on a "default rules are in, no variants" - thus, you miss out on all the fixed, good rules and have to play with the basic broken ones (I figured I might as well just play a Wizard; turns out it's pretty damn good).

[Manyasone]

Cynical, but some DMs have a great fear of PCs being "powerful". Anything more than "I attack. You hit, roll damage. 7" and they scream minmaxing powergaming rollplaying munchkin. It's also Fighters Can't Get Nice Things thinking. It's ok for a wizard to do 10d6 damage to everyone in a 20 ft radius from over 400 ft away or fly or be invisible or make an orc a friend because it's magic, but let a non-magical person do 2d6 + 12 damage a hit all the time three times a round or jump over a 15 ft wide gap while wearing platemail they scream "it not realistic" and look for the nerf bat
As a DM myself, I don't get this attitude. I want my players to be powerful. The movie in my head during our session is much cooler if they are. The standard 'I hit with my club' I find dull... They are heroes, not commoners, most of the time in a world where magic leaks out everywhere. My warriors jump 20ft chasms wearing plate? So what, background magical radiance is the cause, making small mutations happen (the PC's) for those familiar with Discworld, the area around UU is so magically polluted it actually causes stuff like that... Anyway. Just my two euros...

[Pugwampy]

I normally have people reroll some scores if they end up too strong or too weak, so that in the end everybody ends up roughly balanced.

How can you argue for dice rolling if you want everyone "roughly balanced" ?

[King of Nowhere]

My warriors jump 20ft chasms wearing plate? So what, background magical radiance is the cause, making small mutations happen (the PC's) for those familiar with Discworld, the area around UU is so magically polluted it actually causes stuff like that... Anyway. Just my two euros...

yeah, that's the same justification I use for all the less realistic stuff.
And anyway, if you want to limit the power of your campaign, low point buy isn't the way to go. It affects casters only marginally, they are still going to deal 10d6 in a 6 meter radius whether their casting stat is 14 or 20.

Though I fully understand the part about fearing the pcs being too powerful, because it is much more difficult to create meaningful challenges for them, it's more about player skill than anything else.
Heck, yesterday one of my players, through lucky rolls and clever diplomacy, ended in one round what was supposed to be a prolonged fight, captured the recurring villains who were supposed to hang around for a couple more levels, and left me without anything planned. It was embarassing, so I fully understand DMs not wanting that to happen. But, as I said, that's not achieved with point buy. My player figured out that they could ask for financial help from a very rich npc that the villains slighted, a guy I introduced as half-joke (he only ate diamonds and drank an amalgam of gold and mercury; he had a team of mid level clerics to keep him alive through that) and half-world-element (diamonds are material components for a lot of spells, so they have a role akin to oil in our society, and owners of diamond mines are incredibly rich and powerful); I never expected this guy to actually come back into the story, but hey, when I established that the relation of the villain with his last allies was purely economical, this player figured out they could call the diamond lord to bribe the villain's allies to turn the villain in.
And that would have worked if instead of the pc there had been a commoner, because the diamond lord was so rich that it made sense for him to pay without flinching, and so no diplomacy check was required to persuade him (especially as I showed, as part of the joke, that he considered throwing money in silly expenses to be a matter of prestige and a sign of personal success).

EDIT:

How can you argue for dice rolling if you want everyone "roughly balanced" ?
You can, because you can have players reroll until everyone is roughly balanced. You want them to be "roughly balanced" as opposed to "perfectly balanced"

[Quertus]

So, first off, low point buy (or low wealth) = low power tier 1 only. It's either a common trap DMs fall into, and/or a signal that the DM subconsciously wants the all mage party.


My DM permanently switched after I rolled a character who didn't have a stat lower than 15. This was my first time ever rolling anything, so it might have been beginner's luck, but that risk of unevenness was too much for my DM, who has players that build "less than optimal" characters (a la "wait, I have spellcasting?!") so that amount of variety in character power was unacceptable.

We tried a mini-campaign with rolled stats, poor "what class features" had a high score of 14, while One Chop Lumberjack was averaging around 15 for everything....

Because rolling for stats is quite frankly utter crap. I have spend too many (luckily one-shot adventures) evenings with joe-shmoe the cripple while the people next to me had Adonis, Herkules, Gilgamesh or similar characters. With the grossest disparity being a Paladin with 18 18 18 18 17 16 against my 12 16 13 10 11 7(on a rogue)...

I realize I'm a significant probability outlier, but I've had a great deal of characters with very high rolled stats. The highest was 18 18 17 17 14 11.
Also, I do actually enjoy rolling stats as long as you are allowed certain rules that even out the probability space.

Where do you guys get your dice / where can I get some like that? :smallsmile:


I've never met a DM that would do that.

Seriously. I don't think the people you (apparently) play with are at all representative of the gamer population as a whole.

Um... Allow me to second the opinion that you are a very lucky individual. Of course, I've tried to play with as many different groups as possible, and ran into lots of bad wrong horrible along the way, so I may be biased.


Well, I feel I need to throw my support towards rolling stats since you all seem to dislike it so much.
With point buy, every character of a certain class will be utterly undistinguishable from a character of any other class. Rollling gives greater variability.
Of course there is the problem that some members of the party will be stronger than others, but really, nobody forces you to just roll once. I normally have people reroll some scores if they end up too strong or too weak, so that in the end everybody ends up roughly balanced. The remaining unfairness is lower thann that caused by the difference between tiers, or by the different skill levels of the players.
Also, rolling higher stats opens up more possibilities; you can suddenly afford to play a class with MAD that would be awfully weak otherwise,

I also generally like rolled stats. Of course, I also generally follow the, "this time, I get to play..." mentality. I can see the issues with rolled stats if you're dead set on one particular concept "this time" (or every time).


Rolling for stats is similar to the Cold **** Syndrome (http://de.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Cold%20****%20Syndrome). It might have worked for ADND or so but since 3rd point buy just is the better alternative. And seriously spoken: If someone likes it then there is nothing wrong with that person, doesn't change the fact that I still think that the thing they like is crap. It's just my opinion. For example iPhones. There are people that like it, and that is fine... but there are also people that know how crappy those things are.

It is crap because you can have a character with 15 point buy next to one with 80 point buy. They both have to run through the same adventure together. Heaven forbid if the 15 pt buy guy can't play caster or wanted to play a fighter type? Well sure sucks to be you since the 80 pt buy cleric/druid/wizard picks up a stick and does more damage than you or is generally better in every conceivable way. For one-shots such stuff is ok. Since it is a short time where you will suck or be ultra awesome and then next weekend you can roll again and see what you get.
But for longer standing campaigns? Nope, I'm out. Either the DM kills your character off for having too much stats or you are set with an array that barely makes your class work.

And with many variations that try to ensure playable arrays like 6+3d6b2 or 5d6b3 or 4d6b3(but if it's all the same number take all 4) there might be one that is not crap, but what are the chances of the DM using that.

You can have a tier 1 wizard next to a monk... and a straight fighter next to a fighter / barbarian / thug / dungeon crusher / crusader / war blade / whatever... next to someone who took fluffy prestige classes that make them worse than the straight fighter. Compared to that, what's a few stat points? :smallconfused:

Also, one of my characters, I intentionally lowered his stats down to something very much like "12 16 13 10 11 7(on a rogue)". Played him for years. He is one of my favorite characters.


No, with point buy you get to CHOOSE whether to have a normal or abnormal character, with rolling it's chosen FOR you. Seriously, I've had high-strength sorcerers and such before; it's not uncommon.

So... how about just choose your stats - write down whatever you want to? And "uncommon" - I do not think it means what you think it means. :smallwink:

[Fitz10019]

One major flaw of point buy is the disconnect with the stat increase at 4,8,12.... Players making SAD-casters will max out their casting stat in the point buy (18 for humans in most games, for example), and then use the stat increase levels to push that stat up to 22 by level 16. If another player makes a MAD-class character like a paladin, and that character's highest stat is 16 or even 17, those two characters won't be point-buy balanced after level 4. The caster is getting a more valuable increase for free when he goes from 18 to 19, than the paladin gets going from 16 to 17.

I'm not saying rolling for stats is better.

When I DM, the stat-increase levels are not a simple +1 to any stat. They are a point buy pool increase. The SAD casters get enough to continue pushing up that one high stat, and the MADs can push their highest stat AND have change left over to increase one of their other important stats. As an example, the paladin can start with good strength for melee and increase his charisma later (his spellcasting comes later anyway).

[Krazzman]

Where do you guys get your dice / where can I get some like that? :smallsmile:

I don't know, either his dice were naturally loaded, unnaturally loaded or he just had luck.


You can have a tier 1 wizard next to a monk... and a straight fighter next to a fighter / barbarian / thug / dungeon crusher / crusader / war blade / whatever... next to someone who took fluffy prestige classes that make them worse than the straight fighter. Compared to that, what's a few stat points? :smallconfused:

Also, one of my characters, I intentionally lowered his stats down to something very much like "12 16 13 10 11 7(on a rogue)". Played him for years. He is one of my favorite characters.


I am not saying you can't enjoy it. I am also not saying that there is no point in enjoying it. But from my experience and the comparative Powerlevel everyone at the table had... those stat points made BIG differences.
One of my most liked characters (had recently discovered the Duskblade class) had stats just above the "you can reroll" line. He was effective and fun until he failed a check to help someone and fell to his death (due to the stat disparity between him 14 str and 18 str of the barbarian and some DM shenanigans...)
This coupled with the fact that often times our Monk or Fighter outperformed our Wizards or were similar in powerlevels this was never a problem.

The campaign with my rogue went downhill quite fast as soon as the Paladin was introduced. Before that we were quite ok. Then came the Paladin and the Wizard (who was fine).

[SovelsAtaask]

It also matters for global campaigns such as Pathfinder Society. Those are generally run on a "default rules are in, no variants" - thus, you miss out on all the fixed, good rules and have to play with the basic broken ones (I figured I might as well just play a Wizard; turns out it's pretty damn good).

While you probably have a point here, the Unchained classes are explicitly allowed in PFS and I can't think of any other major global campaigns for the game. Unchained Summoner is even mandatory, but that's not really relevant to this discussion.

Seeing as PFS is at least partially a tactic to get people to buy their books, it makes sense that they'd allow at least some elements from most books. The Unchained classes were the least weird and inconvenient for global play from that book, so it makes sense that they were allowed.

[Kurald Galain]

Um... Allow me to second the opinion that you are a very lucky individual. Of course, I've tried to play with as many different groups as possible, and ran into lots of bad wrong horrible along the way, so I may be biased.

Oh, I've definitely met some poor to horrible DMs and players over the years. But not somebody completely losing it over a character having an 8 in one of his attributes (which after all is 1.clearly allowed by the point buy table, and 2.only a marginal difference anyway).

[Eldariel]

While you probably have a point here, the Unchained classes are explicitly allowed in PFS and I can't think of any other major global campaigns for the game. Unchained Summoner is even mandatory, but that's not really relevant to this discussion.

Seeing as PFS is at least partially a tactic to get people to buy their books, it makes sense that they'd allow at least some elements from most books. The Unchained classes were the least weird and inconvenient for global play from that book, so it makes sense that they were allowed.

Aye, that's both wonderful and fair enough. I'm just hoping one day we'll get to play with Path of War classes in a global campaign. Of course, I also wish that they seriously step up their mass scenario writing; I've played all of the big ones thus far and the interaction between the tables and the goals, and the calculation methods based on IRL time regardless of how many rounds events take has been disappointing to say the least.

[Tvtyrant]

I suggest that if you already know your group, just let them pick their stats. It makes the cc less about optimization and more about making the character they want. I actually found that the highest stat tended to fall if people could set their own stats.

[ryu]

I suggest that if you already know your group, just let them pick their stats. It makes the cc less about optimization and more about making the character they want. I actually found that the highest stat tended to fall if people could set their own stats.

Why would the highest stat fall? There's entirely real reasons not directly stemming from desire for power to want high stats. For example can you guess what stats the rain man wizard wanted to realize the concept?

[P.F.]

I am done with point buys. I have no interest in doing the idiosyncratic arithmetical optimization problem every time we start new characters, and for the past year+ I have simply asked the other players, "What's the best array with that point cost?"

They invariably give me a broad consensus on the "best" or "optimal" set, with caveats that I can have an 18 if I make the 14 a 10, or that I could make the other 12 a 14 if I make the something-or-other an 8. So I choose the variant which best suits the class I am going to play, and ignore the point-buy entirely for the rest of the month.

[Âmesang]

That's effectively why I insert a point-buy generator of sorts into a spreadsheet so I could effectively let it do the math for me. :smalltongue: All I have to do is insert the ability scores and make sure I don't go over the total buy.

[Vyanie]

While we can all agree there are a plethora of different ways to generate stats I was just always wondering why DM's seem to like to keep the point buy so low. As others have stated in the thread I was not sure if it was because DM's fear power creep even though lower point buy only helps the most overpowered classes stay that way. Higher point buy doesnt help them all that much but makes a huge difference for everyone else to level the playing field

[tsj]

While we can all agree there are a plethora of different ways to generate stats I was just always wondering why DM's seem to like to keep the point buy so low. As others have stated in the thread I was not sure if it was because DM's fear power creep even though lower point buy only helps the most overpowered classes stay that way. Higher point buy doesnt help them all that much but makes a huge difference for everyone else to level the playing field

I ALWAYS let players have at least 30 points (base value 8, 6 stats, avg 8+5=13) to use to avoid hurting mundane builds or any other builds.

Sometimes I add extra stats such as luck, appearance, sanity etc etc..
If I have for example 10 stats that can be modified with point buy then I take that in to account. .. let's say I wanted to aim for avg of 13 in a game with 10 stats... then I would give the players 50 points to buy stats. .. 10x5 points

I would set maximums though. .. max 20 and min 8 ... before applying modifiers from races etc...
Also no Stat may go below 3 after modifiers

[Tvtyrant]

Why would the highest stat fall? There's entirely real reasons not directly stemming from desire for power to want high stats. For example can you guess what stats the rain man wizard wanted to realize the concept?

Because most people don't play minmaxed characters out of choice, they do it as a trained reaction to limited resources. Our group wizard ended up with a high charisma and wisdom to be more like Gandalf, and our fighter had a good wisdom and dex.

Idiot fighters and graceless wizards derived from D&D, not the other way around.

[ZeroiaSD]

There's a reason 25+ points is my preference.


Or, if in a game using lower, using a race with nice stat mods.


Merfolk are the final fallback if you can't get the stats you want otherwise, thanks to their net +6 total. You can hit a 17 in your main stat (19 if it's one of the racial stats) without going below 10 on *anything* in a 10-point buy. Or get a good number of 14s if you spread out.

[Pex]

Rolling for stats is similar to the Cold **** Syndrome (http://de.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Cold%20****%20Syndrome). It might have worked for ADND or so but since 3rd point buy just is the better alternative. And seriously spoken: If someone likes it then there is nothing wrong with that person, doesn't change the fact that I still think that the thing they like is crap. It's just my opinion. For example iPhones. There are people that like it, and that is fine... but there are also people that know how crappy those things are.

It is crap because you can have a character with 15 point buy next to one with 80 point buy. They both have to run through the same adventure together. Heaven forbid if the 15 pt buy guy can't play caster or wanted to play a fighter type? Well sure sucks to be you since the 80 pt buy cleric/druid/wizard picks up a stick and does more damage than you or is generally better in every conceivable way. For one-shots such stuff is ok. Since it is a short time where you will suck or be ultra awesome and then next weekend you can roll again and see what you get.
But for longer standing campaigns? Nope, I'm out. Either the DM kills your character off for having too much stats or you are set with an array that barely makes your class work.

And with many variations that try to ensure playable arrays like 6+3d6b2 or 5d6b3 or 4d6b3(but if it's all the same number take all 4) there might be one that is not crap, but what are the chances of the DM using that.

The issue here isn't really about rolling for ability scores. The premise accepts Point Buy will be used. The issue is the Point Buy value given is too low which results in hurting spellcasters/SAD classes not at all and warriors/MAD classes a lot. In Pathfinder it's 15 points. In 3E it's 25 points. In 5E it's the game designers for absolutely forbidding an 18 and encouraging an 8 or two in the ability scores your class needs the least just to be good in the ability scores of what your class needs the most. I'm not familiar enough with 4E to comment.

You can play 3E and use a Point Buy value of 32. You can play Pathfinder and use a Point Buy value of 25. Everyone is balanced. Everything is fair. The problem is the perception at least that DMs aren't using them. Personal observation I have found on these forums that every time Point Buy was advocated those most vocal for it never used such values. They were proud to use 25 or 28 in 3E and 15 or 20 in Pathfinder. That's the problem. Those most gung ho on Point Buy won't use the higher values, weakening their argument, in my opinion, that they desire balance. It's not balance they want but low power and low numbers.

[MesiDoomstalker]

Low point buy's are usually some attempt at hamstringing PC's from getting too powerful too fast or an attempt at a low-power game. Typically its from an inexperienced DM or one that learned from a old codger DM from the the ye olden days when it was DM v. Players.

Anyways, my group does one of two things. Either a ridiculously high PB (35-45 in 3.5, 30-35 in PF) or a stat rolling matrix with some ridiculous rules. The most recent is as follows:


Roll 5d6
Reroll any 1s or 2s, till all die results are 3 or above
keep best 3 die
Repeat 36 times, arranged in a 6x6 grid
If any result is 5 of the same face (5 sixes for example) add 1 to the final result (19 for this example)
From the matrix, pick a line of 6. Horizontal, vertical and diagonal are all game
Assign rolls to stats
Apply racial modifiers


Needless to say, we end up with some pretty baller stats most times. What usually happens though, is our best stat is 17 or 18. Next best is 15-16. After that are stats we generally don't care about, so being 14 or 9 doesn't really matter.

[Metahuman1]

You can play 3E and use a Point Buy value of 32. You can play Pathfinder and use a Point Buy value of 25. Everyone is balanced. Everything is fair. The problem is the perception at least that DMs aren't using them. Personal observation I have found on these forums that every time Point Buy was advocated those most vocal for it never used such values. They were proud to use 25 or 28 in 3E and 15 or 20 in Pathfinder. That's the problem. Those most gung ho on Point Buy won't use the higher values, weakening their argument, in my opinion, that they desire balance. It's not balance they want but low power and low numbers.

I've had very much the same observation in too many groups. Anything that isn't low power and low numbers in such groups is often derided as OP/Unbalanced/Broken.


Follow up observation: That lower power/low numbers thing is also often used to allow NPCS that while technically rules legal would get a fit thrown at the player for even trying to make/build it to play with for being OP/Unbalanced/Broken/Minmaxed/Munchkined/ext, to be used to Rail Road the party in certain directions/heap failures on them and while keeping a thin illusion of choice and agency going. And it's not that uncommon for the one to go with the other in my experience.

[nyjastul69]

All this talk about point buy is making my dice cry!😭

[LTwerewolf]

I once tried an experiment with letting all the pc's start with 18 in every stat before racials. The only thing I noticed was some of the more MAD classes like paladin ended up actually getting played. Level 1/2 felt slightly easier for the pc's. After that, I couldn't tell any appreciable difference. If a DM thinks that stats are that important in the long run, they need to learn to DM a little better.

[nyjastul69]

I once tried an experiment with letting all the pc's start with 18 in every stat before racials. The only thing I noticed was some of the more MAD classes like paladin ended up actually getting played. Level 1/2 felt slightly easier for the pc's. After that, I couldn't tell any appreciable difference. If a DM thinks that stats are that important in the long run, they need to learn to DM a little better.

If a DM doesn't think stats are important they need to learn to DM a little better. You can thank me later for fixing that for you.

[LTwerewolf]

If a DM doesn't think stats are important they need to learn to DM a little better. You can thank me later for fixing that for you.

Having tried it on more than one occasion with more than one group of people and seeing similar results despite vastly different play styles and optimization levels, I'd like to think that means more than some snarky person on the internet that probably hasn't and is trying to be contrary just to be cute. A difference of +4-6 is not game breaking after the first few levels except at the very lowest optimization levels where wizards are picking spells like unseen servant and hold portal as their combat spells and fighters are trying to dual wield longswords without a two weapon fighting feat.

I won't thank you for "fixing" anything since you didn't, but I will thank you for letting me know someone that belongs on an ignore list.

[Manyasone]

Having tried it on more than one occasion with more than one group of people and seeing similar results despite vastly different play styles and optimization levels, I'd like to think that means more than some snarky person on the internet that probably hasn't and is trying to be contrary just to be cute. A difference of +4-6 is not game breaking after the first few levels except at the very lowest optimization levels where wizards are picking spells like unseen servant and hold portal as their combat spells and fighters are trying to dual wield longswords without a two weapon fighting feat.

I won't thank you for "fixing" anything since you didn't, but I will thank you for letting me know someone that belongs on an ignore list.
Savage, yet very true. Decent stats are rather important at the beginner levels. The extra ac , hp, to hit.... Make all the difference. I started my experience in Second edition planescape. We used to roll 5d4, reroll one die. We still do this day. For more powerful characters we use 4d4+4 and reroll one die

[ryu]

Because most people don't play minmaxed characters out of choice, they do it as a trained reaction to limited resources. Our group wizard ended up with a high charisma and wisdom to be more like Gandalf, and our fighter had a good wisdom and dex.

Idiot fighters and graceless wizards derived from D&D, not the other way around.

It's not about lack of grace. It's about justifiably being able to remember and recite pi to 100 decimal places without faltering... While casting silenced spells... Man that was fun.

[Tvtyrant]

It's not about lack of grace. It's about justifiably being able to remember and recite pi to 100 decimal places without faltering... While casting silenced spells... Man that was fun.

And yet nothing I said contradicted that. I pointed out that the stats fell lower when people were encouraged to take whatever fit their character, which is an observation from actual games. Nothing keeps you from having higher int scores, just write them down.

[LTwerewolf]

Decent stats are rather important at the beginner levels. The extra ac , hp, to hit.... Make all the difference

At the lowest levels sure they make a difference. I noticed the extra stats stopped meaning anything around 4-5. Most campaigns seem to get to this point, though, so it's not like saying "well the build comes online at level 18" making it not worth talking about when talking about the typical campaign.

[Kurald Galain]

I'm not familiar enough with 4E to comment.
4E has a 22 point buy that only allows you to reduce one stat to 8; everything else has a minimum of 10. Since races only get bonuses to abilities, not penalties, that's as low as it'll get. Rolling is not an alternative given in the PHB1, although of course some DMs import it from other editions. This used to be strongly discouraged on the WOTC forums, on grounds of balance.

Note that the way 4E works, most characters have three (or sometimes even four) dump stats. A standard stat layout is 18/14/11/10/10/8, arranged to taste; later books call this the "specialist array".

[The Insanity]

Pointbuy uber alles. The higher the better.

[Draco_Lord]

I once tried an experiment with letting all the pc's start with 18 in every stat before racials. The only thing I noticed was some of the more MAD classes like paladin ended up actually getting played. Level 1/2 felt slightly easier for the pc's. After that, I couldn't tell any appreciable difference. If a DM thinks that stats are that important in the long run, they need to learn to DM a little better.

Honestly, I think that sounds kind of boring. Everyone would be the same with those stats, and it kind of crushes some roleplaying. Everyone is the same. The wizard is just as beefy as the fighter, physically. The bard is no longer the prettiest. Not to mention failing at things your character should not be good at is harder. And failure and bad roles can sometimes make the best stories, or lead to some of the most fun when it happens outside of combat. In combat I can see how this makes sense, saves the wizard from being killed by a housecat at level 1, makes the fighter not so weak to a bomb thrown at them, it just seems less good when you are outside of those situations.

[Eldariel]

Honestly, I think that sounds kind of boring. Everyone would be the same with those stats, and it kind of crushes some roleplaying. Everyone is the same. The wizard is just as beefy as the fighter, physically. The bard is no longer the prettiest. Not to mention failing at things your character should not be good at is harder. And failure and bad roles can sometimes make the best stories, or lead to some of the most fun when it happens outside of combat. In combat I can see how this makes sense, saves the wizard from being killed by a housecat at level 1, makes the fighter not so weak to a bomb thrown at them, it just seems less good when you are outside of those situations.

Attributes can mean many things and skills exist outside the systematic basis of the attribute system. Charisma for instance can be force of will, leadership, physical attractiveness or any combination there-of (all these descriptions are in the PHB). Just because a Bard has normally high Charisma doesn't automatically mean he's beautiful. And a warrior can be wiry, yet strong. All that glitters is not gold; appearances can be deceiving. Thus, even if the attributes are the exact same, the visual representation as well as the aspects in which characters shine in their given attributes can vary. Furthermore, the actual ability is mostly derived off skills, feats and levels - a Wizard with 18 Strength and 18 Con will still have naturally low HP and average combat prowess when the level-ups kick in. Besides, exceptions confirm the rule: why should every Bard be the stereotypical pretty boy or every Barbarian the muscleman?

Why would class determine your character? Even with all 18s, characters can be just as different as before. And their strengths and weaknesses are mostly derived from elsewhere so it's not like an arcanist will want to be grappled or will fare in grapple even with 18 Strength - he doesn't have the feats, the BAB or anything else for the job (unless he picks his spells specifically with grappling in mind). And even with 18 Charisma, a character with no social skills is going to fall flat on their face. And even with 8 strength there's nothing wrong with describing your Wizard as a rather stocky, muscular type. It just means he aesthetically appears that way but there's little actual strength in there.

[Barstro]

Honestly, I think that sounds kind of boring. Everyone would be the same with those stats, and it kind of crushes some roleplaying. Everyone is the same. The wizard is just as beefy as the fighter, physically. The bard is no longer the prettiest. Not to mention failing at things your character should not be good at is harder. And failure and bad roles can sometimes make the best stories, or lead to some of the most fun when it happens outside of combat. In combat I can see how this makes sense, saves the wizard from being killed by a housecat at level 1, makes the fighter not so weak to a bomb thrown at them, it just seems less good when you are outside of those situations.

While everyone would be the same with the stats, it is the class and race that makes differences. The Wizard would be as beefy as the fighter, but still not as good at fighting due to lack of proficiency and would not have the AC due to armor restrictions and arcane spell failure. Frankly, having stats like this could encourage roleplaying as a way to help define the characters.

For many purposes, a stat is really just the same as a +n to a die roll.

Personally, I grew up with some of the other ways to make characters;

1) 3d6 in order (red box?)
interesting way to have a character forced upon you, but not a great way to be invested in the character.

2) 3d6 in order, can swap at a cost of 2:1 (AD&A First?)
A little better, but trying to customize your character can be costly

3) House rule of various things (d20, 4d6b3, etc.)
Finally get to customize your character, but unlucky rolls or cheating still lead to unbalanced parties.

This then translated into dozens of roleplaying computer games (Might and Magic, Phantasm, Wizardry series). Not surprisingly, hours would be spent at the beginning of the games constantly rerolling to get the best stats.

I think that Fallout was my first experience with point buy. I didn't care for it at first because I couldn't spend hours getting all the best stats, but I soon appreciated its fairness and need to try to build a balanced character with leanings towards a particular build. I now greatly prefer that sort of system.

As to the d20 type games, I still prefer point buy. I'm not hampered by a bad roll and I'm not overshadowing the party by a good roll.

The only argument against point-buy that I find compelling is that this can hurt MAD classes. But, I think that argument falls flat.
1) Bad rolls will hurt a MAD class just as much.
2) Mad classes tend to be mundane, and they seem to be better at lower levels while the Caster classes are basically not using their main attribute (20 Int doesn't help a level one Wizard all that much).
3) It doesn't take too long for magic items to increase stats anyway.
4) Even IF point-buy legitimately hurts MAD classes, it's not so much a problem with point-buy itself as much as it is a problem with how it is implemented.

If you really think point-buy hurts MAD classes, try to convince your DM to give MAD classes another few points.

[EldritchWeaver]

I hadn't yet the chance to use it personally, but I like the mirror method. Basically you roll three stats, then subtract each of the rolled score from 27, 25, and 23 as you want. That creates either more scores balanced around the middle or three higher scores and three lower scores as the extremes.

[Fitz10019]

In the one campaign I had where the DM wanted rolled stats, he gave us a free 18 and had us roll for the other 5 stats. We placed the numbers into whichever ability scores we wanted.

I played Living Greyhawk, and that organization used point buy with 32 points.

[Pex]

Honestly, I think that sounds kind of boring. Everyone would be the same with those stats, and it kind of crushes some roleplaying. Everyone is the same. The wizard is just as beefy as the fighter, physically. The bard is no longer the prettiest. Not to mention failing at things your character should not be good at is harder. And failure and bad roles can sometimes make the best stories, or lead to some of the most fun when it happens outside of combat. In combat I can see how this makes sense, saves the wizard from being killed by a housecat at level 1, makes the fighter not so weak to a bomb thrown at them, it just seems less good when you are outside of those situations.

Everyone is the same with Point Buy too with just a rearrangement of the scores based on class. Given two characters of the same class their stats will be the same. 5E is notorious. At least 5E does give a decent option for Dex fighting so maybe two warriors of the same class will be the same except Strength and Dexterity are reversed. In any case, you just won't ever see a dragonborn rogue or dwarf wizard.

Also, having an 18 in all stats does not mean failure never happens. The math does mean it happens less often than with a more typical array, but it is nowhere near 0%. Still, it was someone's experiment. For a more typical ability score array of course there is nothing wrong with the concept a character cannot do everything. No character should, but it still holds true it is not a requirement a character must be terrible at something, i. e. must have an 8 or two in his array. There is absolutely nothing wrong with having an 8. It is equally absolutely nothing wrong with not having an 8.

[Gallowglass]

I partially disagree with LTWerewolf. (However, unlike him, I will not be dismissive of everyone who disagrees with me and say they must be a poor DM.)

While I have certainly never tried his "Many-times repeated" experiment of giving everyone all 18s (because that sounds very silly) I do play in two distinct groups made up of many the same players who have two different character generation schemes. Group 1 is a simple point buy where you end up with generically normal stats and Group 2 gives you an 18,17,16,15,14,13 to put wherever you want.

There is a very noticeable difference in style between the two groups that lasts through all levels that is at least partially attributable to the difference in stats.

1. Group 2 are blithely unconcerned with saving throws. They have an attribute bonus to each save, they are less dependent on save buffing abilities and spend less WBL on save enhancing items. They never seem to fear save-or-suck enemies. Even people with classes with slow save progressions seem to make most saves.

2. Way more MAD builds. Way more exotic things taken.

3. Group 2 routinely fight and easily defeat way more powerful foes at each level than the other group. With 6 people and no low stats, there is at least a 18 point difference in group damage each round just from the extra str, dex, int or whatever being added onto each combat strike or spell damage. Yes, this lessens by the time you get to high level but it never goes away completely.

So the Group 2 DM(s) have to allot for the super-men characters by bumping up the challenge rating. Quite a lot at low levels and not as much at higher levels.

So, that's my experience. Your mileage may vary. But I very much resent the implication that my DMs "must be bad DMs" because that difference is felt as we go up levels.

[Jormengand]

In fact, in general, can we universally agree that you're only a bad DM if, and to the extent to which, your players aren't having fun or you're having a negative impact on those outside the game?

[Gallowglass]

In fact, in general, can we universally agree that you're only a bad DM if, and to the extent to which, your players aren't having fun or you're having a negative impact on those outside the game?

seconded. Jormengand makes good point. Summarily ignored by following posters. Maybe if he was nicer, LtWerewolf could finally become CPTWerewolf.

[Elder_Basilisk]

Though I fully understand the part about fearing the pcs being too powerful, because it is much more difficult to create meaningful challenges for them, it's more about player skill than anything else.

It's not even about the difficulty of creating meaningful challenges. Higher point buys (or high rolled stats) can effect the nature of the challenges themselves. The game (both PF and 3.5) reward offense over defense, so higher point buys (at one point, I ran a 36 point buy 3.5 campaign) will tend towards having higher attack scores without much of an improvement in defensive scores--and even if there is an improvement in defensive scores, the offensive increase tends to result in more impact on the game table. Now, you can deal with that by throwing harder challenges at the high point buy characters. More monsters, bigger monsters, environmental disadvantage in battles, etc. My observation was that going from 28 point buy to 36 point buy was roughly equivalent to +1 ECL on all the characters in terms of what kinds of monsters the characters could potentially defeat. However, it's not quite as straightforward as that because even if the 6th level fighter had the offense of a 7th level fighter (class used for illustration purposes only, my actual game had no fighters), he still only had the hit points of a 6th level fighter. So the higher point buy characters tended to roll over challenges that would have been appropriate for their hypothetical lower point buy dopplegangers but tended to be brittle when faced with challenges appropriate to their offensive capabilities. A streak of good luck for the opponents or bad luck for the characters was harder for the high point buy characters to recover from because their foes were tougher and the advantage of their higher point buy were more notable on the offense than on their defense/resilience. Based on that experience, I tend to think that the games (PF and 3.5 and 3.0 too for that matter) work better at lower point buys.

[Pugwampy]

God stats are overrated . Player A has a nice 14 AB while Player B has an 18 AB . Wow a whole +2 difference ...

What if Player A is a veteran or tactician player type . Player B is a newb .
Perhaps Player A has a nice magical +3 mace and Player B has a rusty mace .

How powerful is a multiple 18 stats player in a world where DM is beyond stingy on the magic goodies drop ?

[Jormengand]

God stats are overrated . Player A has a nice 14 AB while Player B has an 18 AB . Wow a whole +2 difference ...

What if Player A is a veteran or tactician player type . Player B is a newb .
Perhaps Player A has a nice magical +3 mace and Player B has a rusty mace .

How powerful is a multiple 18 stats player in a world where DM is beyond stingy on the magic goodies drop ?

Yes, it's a +2 difference. That means, for those in the proverbial back, a +2 to all skill checks on that skill, ability checks on that skill, possibly hit points per level, possibly skill points per level, possibly some type of saves, possibly all saves on a paladin, possibly attack rolls, possibly damage rolls (maybe even a +3), possibly spell save DCs, and probably something I've forgotten; it also might mean an increase in carrying capacity, spells per day, the number of attacks of opportunity you can make in a round with combat reflexes, the number of times per day you can use a class feature, how effective it is when you do or literally many other things. A +2 can double your chance of succeeding at a difficult task or make it possible to complete a previously-impossible one. There is an entire race that people take just so that they can get +2 to some skill checks and ability checks in a couple of scores, and that doesn't even take into account things like attack rolls or extra spells per day, or being able to cast spells of a particular level at all. A wizard who starts with 14 INT cannot advance his INT fast enough to cast spells of 8th or 9th level on time without some kind of magic item, for example. Ability scores are actually pretty important when you consider you're getting a +2 to quite a lot of stuff.

[King of Nowhere]

I find it hard to believe that high stats are more effective on the offensive rather than on the defensive. In fact, in my personal experience, it's the opposite.
See, a wizard is going to have an 18 (or at least 17) INT no matter what. A fighter, 18 STR. even with low point buy. Even with bad dice rolls, if the DM will let them reroll until they get at least one high roll. The difference is entirely made on the defensive. A barbarian with low point buy will have average DEX and bad WIS, and not too much CON either. That will translates to low AC and low saving throws.
Higher stats mean he'll get a big bonus to AC, decent saving throws, and 20% to 40% more hit points. The barbarian in my party rolled lucky (17, 17, 17, 14, 14, 7) and he doesn't hit any harder than any other barbarian of his level (well, he does because he's an orc and he gets a +4 racial to STR; let's say he doesn't hit any harder than any barbarian orc of his level). But he has a CA of 17 in light armor and without magical buffing, over 60 hp at level 5 (he rolled high there too), and a credible will save despite a racial penalty.
Basically, now that he's low level, it's like he got boots of resistance +2 (+2 dodge to AC and +2 to CON) and a ring of resistance +2 (+2 to all saves) for free. When he'll be high level, it will be like he'd have those same items that stack with any other bonus and occupy no slot on his body, for free.
I call it a pretty big defensive boost.
For a wizard the extra CON can matter even more, giving twice the hit points of a more fragile wizard. And with low BAB, a high dexterity is the only thing keeping that disintegrate or polar ray hitting consistently. Those high stats are the difference between a wizard getting hit in the face by a meteor swarm and dieing, and a wizard being hit by a meteor swarm, passing the saving throw, surviving the resulting damage, and smoking you the next round.


And I can testify that it is NOT something negligible like someone said. A character with those high rolls can consistently face much thougher opponents, as well as having more non-combat options thannks to more skill points.

[Goodkill]

for non-pathfinder (i don't like pathfinder) i like 28-32 point buys. i think neverwinter night's 30 point buy is a good model.

[Bobby Baratheon]

I've never used point buy in my campaigns as a DM, as it always felt a little, I don't know, bland. I don't have anything against the system - it seems to be a reasonable alternative to rolling, and as others have said if you're concerned about the power level you can either adjust the party by giving them extra points/equipment/whatever or adjust the difficulty level. My group has always gone with rolling 3d6 (rerolling ones) and getting a free eighteen. It's worked well for us, and the balance has never been too far off when we've added the further tweak that you get to roll three sets and pick the one you want. Probably wouldn't work for every group, but I though I'd throw my two cents in.

[Elder_Basilisk]

I find it hard to believe that high stats are more effective on the offensive rather than on the defensive. In fact, in my personal experience, it's the opposite.
See, a wizard is going to have an 18 (or at least 17) INT no matter what. A fighter, 18 STR. even with low point buy. Even with bad dice rolls, if the DM will let them reroll until they get at least one high roll. The difference is entirely made on the defensive. A barbarian with low point buy will have average DEX and bad WIS, and not too much CON either. That will translates to low AC and low saving throws.
Higher stats mean he'll get a big bonus to AC, decent saving throws, and 20% to 40% more hit points. The barbarian in my party rolled lucky (17, 17, 17, 14, 14, 7) and he doesn't hit any harder than any other barbarian of his level (well, he does because he's an orc and he gets a +4 racial to STR; let's say he doesn't hit any harder than any barbarian orc of his level). But he has a CA of 17 in light armor and without magical buffing, over 60 hp at level 5 (he rolled high there too), and a credible will save despite a racial penalty.
Basically, now that he's low level, it's like he got boots of resistance +2 (+2 dodge to AC and +2 to CON) and a ring of resistance +2 (+2 to all saves) for free. When he'll be high level, it will be like he'd have those same items that stack with any other bonus and occupy no slot on his body, for free.
I call it a pretty big defensive boost.
For a wizard the extra CON can matter even more, giving twice the hit points of a more fragile wizard. And with low BAB, a high dexterity is the only thing keeping that disintegrate or polar ray hitting consistently. Those high stats are the difference between a wizard getting hit in the face by a meteor swarm and dieing, and a wizard being hit by a meteor swarm, passing the saving throw, surviving the resulting damage, and smoking you the next round.


And I can testify that it is NOT something negligible like someone said. A character with those high rolls can consistently face much thougher opponents, as well as having more non-combat options thannks to more skill points.

I guess it depends how much your players insist on pumping their stats. You can have the starting 18 (3.5) or 20 (in your prime stat) on 15/25 point buy (again depending which system you are using). It just has a really high opportunity cost. The players I have gamed with are much more likely to spring for that on a high point buy than on 15/25 or even 20/28. If your players are going to insist on the 18/20 no matter what and go for the 22 if they can wheedle an orc, goliath or other +4 stat race out of the DM, then I guess your experience will be different. That seems to be your approach, even with rolled characters (keep re-rolling until you get at least one 17 or 18 has not been the standard in any group I've played in, but whatever). As to which is more common, my experience in Living Greyhawk, Living Arcanis, and Pathfinder Society suggest that most organized play players (probably around 90% in the Vancouver BC, SF Bay area, Southern California and Boise, ID areas) don't go with your "if you don't have an 18 or at least a 17 before racial modifiers, the character is not playable" approach and allocate some points for defense. (Also true for home game players I've played with in those areas but that's naturally a much smaller sample).

Once you've maxed your efficient point buy defenses (12s and 14s in defensive stats in 3.5), you get serious diminishing returns since your defensive stats are spread out over at least two (most likely three--possibly four if you are a paladin) stats and taking the offense to the max is a lot more attractive. On the other hand, if you've already decided that the 17 or 18 in your offensive stat is non-negotiable, having the extra points to get the 14s in defensive stats will make a big difference.

In my experience, lower point buys with points spent on defense are the range where the game works best and where appropriate challenges consistently have the best results. (Blowout victories are rare, but the characters can take a string of bad luck too and still come out on top). It could well be that it's the offensive focus and not just the high point buy that made my high point buy games more high variance than the 20/28 point buy organized play campaigns and that lower point buy characters who spend all their stats on a single 17 or 18 will be even more high variance (blowing through lots of encounters that should be challenging by the numbers, then getting annihilated when the enemy gets a few lucky rolls or they get a string of bad luck).

[King of Nowhere]

I guess it depends how much your players insist on pumping their stats. You can have the starting 18 (3.5) or 20 (in your prime stat) on 15/25 point buy (again depending which system you are using). It just has a really high opportunity cost. The players I have gamed with are much more likely to spring for that on a high point buy than on 15/25 or even 20/28. If your players are going to insist on the 18/20 no matter what and go for the 22 if they can wheedle an orc, goliath or other +4 stat race out of the DM, then I guess your experience will be different.

Oh, right, there's that. In the 3.0 manual one of the ways they suggest of handing down stats is for everyone to use 15 14 13 12 10 8 (which look awful to me, but still translates to a 25 PB). And it strongly implies that those are the stats around which the game is balanced. My assumption that people would go for an 18 no matter what is because when I have low point buy I go for SAD classes.

As for my personal choice of giving everyone at least a 17, it's less a stylistic choice and more a balance consequence of rolling; someone is going to roll an 18, and to keep things fair I have to give at least a 17 to everyone. Well, unless someone rolled something like four rolls in the 15-16 range and went for a MAD class with them.

[Tectorman]

While everyone would be the same with the stats, it is the class and race that makes differences. The Wizard would be as beefy as the fighter, but still not as good at fighting due to lack of proficiency and would not have the AC due to armor restrictions and arcane spell failure. Frankly, having stats like this could encourage roleplaying as a way to help define the characters.

Agreed. I once played in a Final Fantasy d6 campaign as a cyborg Viera Gunmage (think Bunnie Rabbot from Sonic the Hedgehog, but blasting magic spells out of a carbine). In Final Fantasy d6, despite multiple races being listed, drawn from all the Final Fantasy games up to that point, none of the races had any game mechanics associated with them. No stat increases, no special abilities, just recommended heights and weights that had absolutely no bearing on gameplay. Likewise, the addition of being a cyborg Viera was also bereft of any game mechanics. Meaning that if I wanted that aspect of that character to see the light of day, I had to bring it to life.

Meaning that I GOT to bring it to life. She ended up dying from a nuke to the face, and I still remember that campaign fondly. All the stats only applied to game mechanics and none of them were there to get in the way of the roleplaying.