What are the consequences of raising attribute bonuses?

[SangoProduction]

So, say rather than the attribute bonus being
Bonus = (attribute / 2) - 5
What if it was simply
Bonus = attribute / 2

For all creatures.

Basically, the bonus is at minimum +0 from the stat. Maybe have it be at -1 when at score of 1 (and nonfunctional at 0), since 3 is considered bare minimum for sapience.
Essentially, readjusting the scale from human to... minimally functional.

Since both to-hit and to-AC stats increase by the same amount, it would have no effect on that.
To-save and to-DC stats would also increase by the same amount, so no change there.

Now... you will be getting +5 HP per level. Which does make the difference between wizard and barbarian much less pronounced.
But also, spell damage (which tends to be based on caster / spell level) will be much less performative. Same with sneak attack damage.
But with Strength-weapons getting a +5 damage to hit, they would be really potent beneficiaries of the system, especially once they get multiple attacks.
But bow-users are sadly very much sidelined. Again. Unless they are allowed adjusted composite bows (which should have a greater base strength allowance on account of the change).
Natural attackers are going to be bloody deadly. Especially those with rake and pounce. (Once again, Druids come out on top. lol)

Due to inflation, flat bonuses like Weapon Focus or Power Attack are relatively less valuable. Although PA consequently has substantially lower cost.
Similarly, a d10 averages 5.5 damage. A rounding error from equivalent to the stat "boost"/redefinition. A greatsword does 7 average damage. And a dagger 2.5. The difference between the average damage of the two common ends of the damage spectrum is lower than the stat boost. The choice of weapon is likely going to rely a lot less on its damage, and more on its useful properties.... of which there are not a bunch of mundane properties to go around. You've got...reach....and reach....and.... um... Oh, some of them let you use a combat maneuver through them.

Resources reliant on an ability (such as SoP's spell points or momentum) just got a massive freaking buff unlike any ever seen.
Should spell slots be adjusted as though they had +5 in the stat? That seems pretty insane.
Might be wise to make it so that it doesn't affect casting abilities.

Summoners are going to be really delighted because they get to effectively act like they got a bunch of buffed attacks.
Generally not a healthy archetype to encourage. (Looks at druid. Sighs)
Unwary spellcasters might send in their familiar thinking it's been freshly buffed, lulled into a sense of security by its inflated stats. Only to have it killed in one attack.

Any other consequences?

[AvatarVecna]

Skills will be a big one, I think. You just gave +5 to all skills, as well as giving everybody enough skill points for five more maxed out skills. I don't generally think "more skill points" is a problem, I think the system is rather stingy with them, but the main thing I wanna mention is how a lot of skill uses have flat DCs. Sure, opposed checks will be just as likely to succeed as before, same as Saves vs Save DCs. But with flat DC skill checks, everybody just got a little bit better: people who had no chance to succeed now have one, people who had a small chance to fail now lack even that, and people who were middling just became 25% more likely to succeed. Again, I don't necessarily think that's a problem, but if you're asking for definite changes in how the game would function, those are undebatable.

On a similar note: most diseases, and poisons that are itemized rather than part of a natural attack routine, have a flat DC not based on any attribute. Diseases in particular feels like it would be a big change on a societal level: +5 to both saves and skills (specifically, Heal, which is not trained only) is a monumental change in how difficult it is to get sick in the first place, and how easy it is to cure somebody who got sick.

EDIT: On the subject of "items that force saves with a flat DC", offensive alchemical items, much like poisons, have become even less worth using than they already were.

[AvatarVecna]

Unless armors have their Max Dex limit similarly raised, you've just made medium and heavy armor worth a lot less.

[meschlum]

- A lot more skill points, which is potentially a good thing?

Skill target numbers probably need to be adjusted
Jumping distance is boosted or needs to be recalculated
With 13+Int skill points per level, Rogues might invest in non-Rogue skills!
- X bonus to Y stat becomes a lot more powerful.

While increasing to hit and AC by 5 each is neutral, getting CHA to saves (Paladin) or WIS to AC is an extra +5 on top of the bonus, so paladins and monks (or owners of a Monk's Belt) are a lot tougher
- Constructs and Undead are relatively more fragile (no bonus HP, so d12 becomes worse than d4 + CON)
- Everyone has +5 HP / HD, and melee does +5 damage / hit, so characters are more and less fragile in odd ways

An attack that killed you in one hit is now more survivable if you're level 2+ (you gain 10+ HP, and take 5 more damage)
If you died in two hits, you are more at risk at level 1, and tougher at level 3+
...
Given rocket tag tendencies, hit point damage matters less at high levels (one hit kills are harder, and spell damage is relatively lower)
Cats and kobold hordes are more dangerous, because they get lots of attacks - a high level character can no longer survive being clawed by a cat for 10 rounds
- Healing is less effective, because there are more hit points to heal
- Items are more fragile (fixed HP, hardness is less effective)

Adjusting Break DCs is interesting - should they go up (so items are as hard to break as before, but easier to hack to pieces) or stay as is (so it's easier to break things however you try)
- Environmental damage is less of a concern (being on fire is fine!)
- Armor is worse as the Dex bonus limit is a lot easier to reach - mithril for everyone! This contributes to making attacks more powerful than before, since armor users are easier to hit.

[Beni-Kujaku]

Yeah, it probably won't change too much in creature vs creature, but any environmental danger will be moot (crafting poison was already a bad strategy, it will be worse, and everyone will make their skill checks), also +5 to damage with each attack means that many attacks is incredibly favored compared to single ones. At low-level optimization, simply being able to shoot several arrows per turn would make ranged combat much more attractive than swinging a big sword. It also slightly reduces the impact of different weapons. Currently, a character with 12 Str using a dagger deals 1d4+1~3.5 damage. The same character with a greatsword deals 2d6+1~8 (more than twice the dagger's damage). With the new system, it would be 1d4+6~8.5 to 2d6+9~17 (exactly twice the dagger's damage).
I think the ones who would benefit the most out of it are the classes who can use several attributes on the same thing. Notably the monk gets both Wis and Dex to AC, which means a net benefit of +5, and the paladin gets both Cha and other attributes to saves. That's absolutely incredible for both, and the monk will now really have higher AC than an armored guy (which was probably the original intent) while the paladin will get unaffected by everything. You see if that's what you want, but overall it's not an awful change.
Undead and Constructs are shafted even more by having so few HP (you could consider increasing the Construct size bonus to HP and even making undead HD d20).

In general, fixed-damage like spells and non-creature dangers are weakened, and a few weak classes (monk, paladin, ranger) are strengthened. Intelligence classes are no longer the only ones with a lot of skills, and the impact of having 8+int skills is reduced.

[Ramza00]

So, say rather than the attribute bonus being
Bonus = (attribute / 2) - 5
What if it was simply
Bonus = attribute / 2

For all creatures.


To my understanding it was game design which may be numerically similar but you want to keep unconscious positive associations to feel natural to new players.

For example THACO and AC are almost the same thing but we associate higher numbers as better than lower numbers. Likewise a top of a map can be any direction, but since magnetic compasses we make the top of the map North, but in different times and different cultures the top of the map is East for the sun in the morning rises in the East.

How one orients, with “orientation” is a facet of game design.

[Quertus]

Others have already covered most of it, so I’ll give a more… opinionated answer.

More skill points all around? That’s great. Do it. :smallbiggrin:

Not just more skills, but skills are easier? Might take some world building, but… ok? :smallconfused:

20 HD monster… only goes down at same speed if it took you 20 hours hits to take it down to begin with? Eh, this makes “deal damage” slowly move more and more towards “padded sumo” as level increases. And makes mobs of weak creatures scarier. Heaven forbid you face 1,000 cats! :smalleek: This very much changes the game, and in a way that encourages SoD effects over damage (already generally considered the weaker route). I’m not a fan. :smallfrown:

Huge armies of undead became scarier? Well, I guess that’s one good side effect? :smallcool:

Armor is dysfunctional? Yeah, no. :smallmad:

Losing your Con bonus is a trap? Disappointed! :smallfrown:

Static numbers… might need to be updated. Most weren’t good to begin with, though.

I’ll admit, I missed “add X to Y” effects on my first pass - I was just thinking “replace X with y” was still neutral. Yeah, things like Paladin and Monk get a buff. That’s probably fine. :smallamused:

The numbers are bigger, so the math is harder (Yes, it is! I’ve gamed with kids 7 (and younger? Unsure…), there’s definitely a difference in their processing speed of bigger numbers). That’s… suboptimal. :smallannoyed:

Well, there’s how I feel about this change. Muggle players might whine less that their skills don’t work, numbers (“action economy” variety) will matter even more (EDIT: encouraging minionmancy strategies that involve large numbers of monsters, slowing down the game (at most tables that aren’t mine)), math-impaired individuals will slow down the game, and SoD armorless casters will be even more strongly incentivized.

[ShurikVch]

Basically, the bonus is at minimum +0 from the stat. Maybe have it be at -1 when at score of 1 (and nonfunctional at 0), since 3 is considered bare minimum for sapience.
3 is the minimum only for Int - and only for PC
All other abilities are minimum at 1 (and for Str and Dex, even 0 is possible - if creature isn't supposed to act physically)

[Drelua]

3 is the minimum only for Int - and only for PC
All other abilities are minimum at 1 (and for Str and Dex, even 0 is possible - if creature isn't supposed to act physically)

While HP are damage are both increasing, that's going to make combat more lethal, since you're very likely going to get hit more times than you have HD. Carrying CLW wands gets more expensive since every hit costs basically an extra charge. And I feel like crits are even more dangerous, especially at low levels. If a level 1 character takes a crit they're already probably dead, but some low level enemies do very low damage, like d6+1, which this change would better than double. And you're less likely to land in between -1 and -9, or -CON score if it's PF, when the damage is higher, so you'll see more characters skipping right past dying into dead. It also favours monsters with a lot of HD, giving things like dragons a pile of HP.

Also, two handed weapons are even scarier. A Barbarian would have say 20 STR and 18 CON while raging, if not more. Their HP goes up by 5, but their damage goes from whatever dice +7 up to +15. This kinda nerfs power attack, (which probably isn't a bad thing) since PA is a smaller chunk of your damage, so the times it makes you miss hurt more.

[pabelfly]

Builds with a large number of hits - volley archers, two-weapon fighting and multi-weapon fighting - would do quite well for two reasons - static bonuses to strength and/or damage apply to each hit, and higher damage output, even when partially countered by higher HP, means damage reduction is less relevant.

[Jack_Simth]

Let's see...

In general Most things self-counter otherwise (AC is higher, but so is attack bonus; saves are higher, but so are save DCs). Some exceptions I see....
1) Anything that stacks an extra attribute on top of a thing (or the same one more than once) improves significantly. So Divine Grace, Monk's AC bonus, Snowflake Wardance, Gauntlets of Heartfelt Blows, a two handed weapon, Charger builds, Slippers of Battle Dancing, and so on are much sweeter than before.
2) DR matters less (unless it's based on a stat, which is rare). Old setup DR 10 vs. 1d8 from an Elf commoner-1's long bow means never hurt, DR 10 vs. 1d8+5 from the same commoner's longbow takes damage on a 6 or higher.
3) Max Dex bonus makes armor less attractive. Even the light armors: The +4 Max Dex on a chain shirt means a dexterity score over 8 is wasted. This will bring humanoid AC down, as nearly nobody is in full plate. Note that we have a 3.5 vs. PF difference here (The Monk's Belt/Robe explicitly doesn't add Wis to AC in Pathfinder).
4) Damage is higher, but so is HP. Attack bonus is higher, but so is AC. Unclear how the standard war of attrition will fall out. Note that we have a PF vs. 3.5 difference here: PF undead get Cha to HP and Fort; 3.5 undead don't.
5) Anything with a flat number is weaker than before. So poison DCs, alchemical item DCs, skill check DCs, and so on are easier to make. Spell DC's go up (tied to ability bonus) to match saves, though. Magic item DC's also increase (unless you also futz with the minimum casting stat for spells: it's listed as 10 + spell level, and items have the minimum attribute).
6) Everyone has more skill points.
7) Direct damage spells are less useful (they don't go up, HP does).
8) Healing effects are less attractive (you'll take more damage in a combat, but the healing numbers remain the same)
Probably more.

[pabelfly]

3) Max Dex bonus makes armor less attractive. Even the light armors: The +4 Max Dex on a chain shirt means a dexterity score over 8 is wasted. This will bring humanoid AC down, as nearly nobody is in full plate. Note that we have a 3.5 vs. PF difference here (The Monk's Belt/Robe explicitly doesn't add Wis to AC in Pathfinder).

Armor is less attractive, sure, but AC will be the same or even higher. For example, someone with 18 DEX at level 1 will have 19 AC before class levels or feats, even without any armor. People with middling dex will wear light armor and still get the typical 17-18 AC with minimal investment

[Jack_Simth]

Armor is less attractive, sure, but AC will be the same or even higher. For example, someone with 18 DEX at level 1 will have 19 AC before class levels or feats, even without any armor. People with middling dex will wear light armor and still get the typical 17-18 AC with minimal investment
Right. They'll get the typical AC. That's a problem, as attack bonus is up.

Before:
Rogue (Dex based): 18 Dex: 10 base, +4 Dex, +4 Chain Shirt = 18 AC.
Fighter/Cleric (two-handed weapon): 12 Dex: 10 base, +1 Dex, +8 Full Plate = 19 AC.
Wizard: 14 Dex: 10 base, +2 Dex, +4 Mage Armor = 16 AC.

After:
Rogue (Dex based): 18 Dex: 10 base, +9 Dex = 19 AC. Improved by one, and it's all touch.
Fighter/Cleric (two-handed weapon): 12 Dex: 10 base, +6 Dex, +2 Leather armor = 18 AC. Went down. Mithral Chain Shirt would bring it to 20, but that's not something you generally get at 1st or 2nd (full plate, on the other hand, tends to be on like half the melee NPC's you'll fight at 1st level).
Wizard: 14 Dex: 10 base, +7 Dex, +4 Mage Armor = 21 AC. Improved by 5.

Meanwhile, attack bonuses coming in have improved by 5 across the board. Wizard gets hit exactly as often, Dex Rogue and Fighter/Cleric get hit more.

[pabelfly]

Right. They'll get the typical AC. That's a problem, as attack bonus is up.

Before:
Rogue (Dex based): 18 Dex: 10 base, +4 Dex, +4 Chain Shirt = 18 AC.
Fighter/Cleric (two-handed weapon): 12 Dex: 10 base, +1 Dex, +8 Full Plate = 19 AC.
Wizard: 14 Dex: 10 base, +2 Dex, +4 Mage Armor = 16 AC.

After:
Rogue (Dex based): 18 Dex: 10 base, +9 Dex = 19 AC. Improved by one, and it's all touch.
Fighter/Cleric (two-handed weapon): 12 Dex: 10 base, +6 Dex, +2 Leather armor = 18 AC. Went down. Mithral Chain Shirt would bring it to 20, but that's not something you generally get at 1st or 2nd (full plate, on the other hand, tends to be on like half the melee NPC's you'll fight at 1st level).
Wizard: 14 Dex: 10 base, +7 Dex, +4 Mage Armor = 21 AC. Improved by 5.

Meanwhile, attack bonuses coming in have improved by 5 across the board. Wizard gets hit exactly as often, Dex Rogue and Fighter/Cleric get hit more.

Fair point.

[Quertus]

Improved: adding multiple bonuses (Paladin, Monk, übercharger, Iaijutsu Focus, maybe crits), mobs of minions, skills, “needing to hit a foe more times than it has HD”.

Neutral: unarmored SoD Wizard.

Weakened: healing, armored characters, DR, “no stat” effects (damaging spells, breath weapons), static DC item effects, negative levels (? The target loses 5 HP, right?), “needing to hit a foe fewer times than it has HD”.

???: poison (some is based off the con of the creature, but the rest?)

Did I miss anything important in my summary of changes thus far? EDIT: yes I did: AoO! Yay +5 AoO per turn! EDIT 2: and losing con (being an undead or construct) is a trap! EDIT 3: anything that makes the target “lose sex Dex to AC” is stronger, which also means that Initiative is even more important. EDIT 4: more generally, anything that changes the number of times you add stat(s) to something has a greater effect (this covers “adding multiple bonuses”, “losing con as undead or construct”, “losing Dex (flatfooted etc), and even various “number of attacks involved”. Also, the size of your weapon matters less in the grand scheme of things. Also, autocorrect :smalleek::smallredface:

Anything else I missed? (Incidentally, this is why not just intentional changes (like “low wealth 3e”) but even rulings are terrible compared to using, knowing, or looking up the rules: because approximately 0 GMs actually think through all the implications and ripple effects of their changes in the impatient 5 seconds (or other clearly inadequate amount of time) they spend on such things. As should be obvious from this thread, even simple changes should be approached very carefully.)

EDIT 5: as a ripple effect, the value of using Polymorph on the BDF has changed: this can fix their relative AC deficiency, in addition to giving them a different number of natural attacks (hopefully more), changing their relative damage output. Ripple, ripple.

[sreservoir]

"What happens if we randomly add +5s to things across the board based on a silly detail of how exactly they were written up?"

[Quertus]

"What happens if we randomly add +5s to things across the board based on a silly detail of how exactly they were written up?"

I think the word you’re looking for is “arbitrarily”? But even that isn’t really the case, as there’s presumably an intended purpose to doing so (perhaps as a step towards replacing “stats” with “bonuses”, or just for (perceived) simplicity?). So I’m not sure what words could actually fit in a fully-optimized version of that sentence.

I mean, plenty of words could fit into a sentence of that form; “foolishly”, “wisely”, and “tentatively” are the first to come to mind. But they fail to capture the proper intent.

[Bohandas]

Skills will be a big one, I think. You just gave +5 to all skills, as well as giving everybody enough skill points for five more maxed out skills. I don't generally think "more skill points" is a problem, I think the system is rather stingy with them

Oh, definitely.

That said, the big problem with increasing skill points is that because of the way the game is designed it means that you have to assign new skill points to all he monsters, so there's no nice prefabs anymore


- Constructs and Undead are relatively more fragile (no bonus HP, so d12 becomes worse than d4 + CON)

That's a good point. However, since most monsters will have to be redesigned anyway (see above) you might as well give constructs and undead a Constitution score while you're at it.

It never made sense from a gamist or simulationist perspective for them not to have one, and even from a narrativist prespective all it had to go on was a vague philosophical point that wasn't really applied correctly.


- Everyone has +5 HP / HD, and melee does +5 damage / hit, so characters are more and less fragile in odd ways

It would resolve a lot of low level creatures where their damage penalties are so big that ddamage rolls are irrelevant. (As discussed in this thread (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?649509-Technical-question-about-damage))

[Quertus]

you might as well give constructs and undead a Constitution score while you're at it.

It never made sense from a gamist or simulationist perspective for them not to have one, and even from a narrativist prespective all it had to go on was a vague philosophical point that wasn't really applied correctly.

How so? By which I mean, from my PoV, there’s no such concept as “a skeleton that is tougher and more resistant to disease”, so why would the Simulation give a skeleton a Constitution score? Ignoring this thread, how is “no HP from no Con” different from “no HP from average Con” (which is what I think would make a Gamist gamer cry). And what would the narrativist philosophical point be?

[Bohandas]

How so? By which I mean, from my PoV, there’s no such concept as “a skeleton that is tougher and more resistant to disease”, so why would the Simulation give a skeleton a Constitution score? Ignoring this thread, how is “no HP from no Con” different from “no HP from average Con” (which is what I think would make a Gamist gamer cry). And what would the narrativist philosophical point be?

You don't get no bonus HP from "average CON", you get no bonus HP from 11 CON or lower. Whether that intersects with average CON usually depends on the monster type. For monster varieties that are particularly tough (and usually any monster of size large or larger) it usually doesn't. This means that undead and constructs, particularly those that are big, generally have disproportionally low HP and fortitude saves for their hit dice, and it diminishes the effect of additional hit dice, which is particularly troublesome for undead that advance primarily by character class (particularly if they're a martial class thay would usually have a harge hit die AND a high constitution score) as they're generally not going to have a mess of extra monster hit dice to make up for it. The d12 hit die mitigates it somewhat, but that only goes so far; if a creature would have had a d12 hit die anyway or would have had a CON bonus greater than +4 it doesn't help

EDIT: The game is called Dungeons & Dragons, and d12 is already as bad or worse than d4+CON for adult dragons, and that's ignoring the fact that they already get d12s anyway. So unless the template multiplies hit dice like the zombie template becoming undead is going to make them much flimsier.


And what would the narrativist philosophical point be?

The philosophical point is exactly that thing you said about skeletons not getting diseases or other biological concerns, and being generally interchangable.

Admittedly it's not really narrativist, it's somewhere between narrativist and simulationist, but more abstract than either of them. But the idea is that they've got it into their heads that the Constitution score is necessarily symbolic of biology rather than representative of a creature's toughness or a means for the DM to fine tune that toughness.


The lack of biological concerns and not having organs to worry about is also the rationale behind undead and constructs having immunity to critical hits, the idea being that no vital organs means no vulnerable areas. But this ignores a large chunk of undead film and fiction where undead are nearly impossible to kill unless certain critical areas are damaged or they are rended limb from limb*. It also (in the case of constructs) ignores the fact that you won't make my car not start by smashing out the windows.


*Examples:
"...find this great Un-Dead, and cut off his head and burn his heart or drive a stake through it, so that the world may rest from him." -from Dracula
"The survival command center at the Pentagon has disclosed that a ghoul can be killed by a shot in the head or a heavy blow to the skull. Officials are quoted as explaining that since the brain of a ghoul has been activated by the radiation, the plan is, kill the brain and you kill the ghoul." - from Night of the Living Dead
"I know now that my wife has become host to a Kandarian demon. I fear that the only way to stop those possessed by the spirits of the book is through the act of... bodily dismemberment." -from The Evil Dead
"Thou canst not kill that which doth not live. But you can blast it into chunky kibbles." -from the instructions for Quake

[Crake]

3 is the minimum only for Int - and only for PC
All other abilities are minimum at 1 (and for Str and Dex, even 0 is possible - if creature isn't supposed to act physically)

actually, the only two ability scores REQUIRED to quality as being a creature are wisdom and charisma, and you in fact cannot have one without the other, because they are inherently linked by the game's defintion, the ability to percieve the world, and the ability to differentiate yourself from the world around you. Every other ability score can be a nonability, but if you dont have wis/cha, then you're not a creature, you're an object.

Citation is somewhere I can't remember where, but its in the rules.