Reallocating attributes through physical changes?

[Avianmosquito]

I have an NPC right now who is very clearly a retired adventurer after a fashion, specifically he used to be a naval entrepreneur who established trading posts and colonies, though he does use an NPC class. In the 25 years since he stopped exploring and focused on running his business this 6' 2" man has swelled from 260lbs to 355lbs, and is now pushing 50. As a result, his dexterity score has fallen six points (two from age, four from weight) and the points points lost due to his weight were reallocated to his strength score, which also took a 2 point hit from age for a net gain of 2 strength. Now, this is all backstory stuff and it seems reasonable for his physical ability to shift as his physicality does, but it raised an interesting question: Would you allow this for a PC, if you had a large timeskip? Would you allow PC to undergo radical physical changes and shift their physical ability scored significantly in the intervening years? What about a radical mental shift in the intervening time to alter their mental ability scores?

[Psyren]

Pathfinder lets you retrain ability score increases (the ones you got from leveling) as well as feats and skill ranks, but there's no real way to alter the physical stats you started the game5 with short of reincarnation, possession or the like.

Penalties from age are obviously fine. I'm not so sure about this part though:


In the 25 years since he stopped exploring and focused on running his business this 6' 2" man has swelled from 260lbs to 355lbs, and is now pushing 50. As a result, his dexterity score has fallen six points (two from age, four from weight) and the points points lost due to his weight were reallocated to his strength score, which also took a 2 point hit from age for a net gain of 2 strength.

I don't believe there's any correlation between Dex and how fat you are in the rules, so I'm not sure where this is coming from, especially since it almost seems to be a precise calculation. Not saying there couldn't be, just that it would probably be arbitrary.

[Avianmosquito]

Pathfinder lets you retrain ability score increases (the ones you got from leveling) as well as feats and skill ranks, but there's no real way to alter the physical stats you started the game5 with short of reincarnation, possession or the like.

Of course not, but most games take place in such a short timespan that radical changes just aren't that reasonable. There's a rather huge difference between a change reasonable in six months and a change reasonable in six years.


I don't believe there's any correlation between Dex and how fat you are in the rules, so I'm not sure where this is coming from, especially since it almost seems to be a precise calculation. Not saying there couldn't be, just that it would probably be arbitrary.

It's not a precise calculation. It was just "a lot" and 4 seemed reasonable. And no, the rules say nothing about dexterity being impacted by your weight, but everything dexterity effects would reasonably be detrimentally impacted by obesity. More mass takes longer to accelerate, and you are a larger target if you are a larger person, and he is absolutely enormous.

My question wasn't "Is it included in the rules?", I know it's not. My question was, "If a player wanted to make changes like this after a comparable timeskip, would you allow it?". If you come back to the world of a previous campaign and pick up your old characters after years or decades of IU time, would you allow your characters to shuffle some abilities around a couple points, if they can give an IC explanation for the change?

[shaikujin]

Yes, I'd allow this.

I would also use the rebuilding rules for ability scores in the PHB2. (So there are rules for this).

Basically it follows the point buy system where higher scores are worth more "buy points".

Rebuilding quest can be waived. (in this case, considered part of whatever the player did in the interim years/months)

[Crake]

Yes, I'd allow this.

I would also use the rebuilding rules for ability scores in the PHB2. (So there are rules for this).

Basically it follows the point buy system where higher scores are worth more "buy points".

Rebuilding quest can be waived. (in this case, considered part of whatever the player did in the interim years/months)

Seconding this, exactly what I was gonna say.

[ZamielVanWeber]

I don't believe there's any correlation between Dex and how fat you are in the rules, so I'm not sure where this is coming from, especially since it almost seems to be a precise calculation. Not saying there couldn't be, just that it would probably be arbitrary.

There is a vile feat in BoVD that causes you to become incredibly fat as well as penalizing Dex and boosting Con. Deformity (Obese)