It seems like I'm only just hitting my stride again after my mostly unintentional long hiatus earlier this year, but now I'm looking right down the barrel of a mostly postless November, too. Why? Because I'm getting ready to tackle National Novel Writing Month for the first time since 2011. I've never actually "won." I've come close a few times before getting derailed in the home stretch. Now that the worst of my anxiety issues are in remission and I'm feeling fairly centered and stable, it's time to take another crack at it.
What am I writing? Nothing terribly ground-breaking, which means it's probably nothing that would interest most of my blog readers, given the seemingly overwhelming preference among OSR bloggers for something that's not just the same old formula in terms of world-building, adventure design, etc. Myself, I rather like the tried-and-true fantasy tropes. They're comfortable and familiar in a way I find inviting, and there's still plenty of room within them to tell a good story. Not that I have anything against the radically new and original, but I don't feel any need to reinvent the wheel at this point. Maybe after I get something "out there" in published form (e-book at least,) I'll get the itch to go off the rails into less charted territory, but not just yet. So yes, it's a high fantasy epic, with a wizard and magic swords and goblins and dwarves and elves and ancient evils and all that, but not just a retelling of LoTR. (Well, at least I HOPE I'm not inadvertently doing that. I guess we'll see.)
The upshot of all this is that, for the next month, the Flagon is going to be simmering quietly on the back burner so I can devote all the time and imagination I can spare to some intensive novel-writing. Twelve hours to midnight...Here goes nothing!
Thursday, October 31, 2013
Monday, October 28, 2013
More on abstract combat and the ten-second round
To recap the gist of the previous post, combat rounds are aggregate abstractions of all the action in an interval of time (in B/X, 10 seconds.) Choices in combat are not discrete maneuvers but broad tactical decisions applied to the entire round. The attack roll represents not a single attempt at attacking, but the likelihood of a combatant seeing and capitalizing on at least one opportunity to strike or rattle the target. A miss doesn't necessarily mean an earnest swing that fails to connect; it could also mean that no good opportunity was presented at all. Damage isn't necessarily done only by the attacker's weapon; the weapon merely determines the range of the attacker's damage potential.
Now that that's out of the way, I want to explore some special cases, and a few instances in the B/X rules that seem to ignore the principles behind the abstract aggregation of the ten-second round.
First, there's initiative. The most intuitive interpretation is that initiative literally determines who strikes first. Since we don't even know for sure until we roll attacks that an opportunity to attack has even occurred, we can't even say that initiative represents the first opportunity. I like to think of it more as an abstract measure of the ebb and flow of combat, a momentary edge which could permit a combatant to take his opponent out of the fight IF he can spot and capitalize on an opportunity. It's worth noting, though, that the game would actually function just fine without initiative at all - all combat takes place simultaneously. This might slightly increase the lethality of the game, because double kills would become more common, but the possibility of initiative-less combat intrigues me nonetheless.
Missile combat is troublesome because unlike melee combat, it uses up resources; specifically, ammunition. Even so, the number of arrows or bolts or sling stones expended doesn't necessarily correlate 1:1 with attack rolls. You can hand-wave it and say that the number of missiles expended averages out to one per round (sometimes you get off a couple shots, and sometimes you don't get a clear look at all.) You could also use an abstract method of tracking ammo.
Next, there's the issue of multiple attacks. B/X as written doesn't support multiple attacks for characters (at least not without magic like the haste spell) but BECMI and other old school editions do. It's not too difficult to grasp that a more skilled fighter will, on average, see and be able to take advantage of more opportunities to strike in a given time than a less skilled one. But, since we can't definitively say how many opportunities a character exploits with a successful attack roll, it's a little difficult to fathom what a second or third attack roll by the same character in the same round might mean. That they can potentially exploit twice or three times an indeterminate number of opportunities?
It seems to me that this might be more aptly modeled, and more consistent with the combat round as I understand it, by increasing damage potential rather than number of attack rolls. As characters increase in level, their chance to exploit at least one opportunity in a round increases with their improving attack rolls. Since the damage range given for a weapon doesn't necessarily represent the damage caused by one stroke of that weapon, it seems reasonable that damage per round could be increased for highly skilled characters without absurdly implying that they're necessarily doing a lot more with a single blow. You could increase the damage die size a step or two, for example 1d6 to 1d8 or 1d0, or grant extra dice of the same type as the weapon's base damage, say, from 1d6 to 2d6. The latter pretty neatly captures the spirit of multiple attacks, without messing with the base damage die for each weapon.
But wait a second...What if multiple attacks don't necessarily mean multiple swings (since we know that happens anyway) but the ability to threaten additional opponents in the same round? Say, a fighter with one attack per round, surrounded by orcs, could only attack and potentially do damage to one of them in a round, but a fighter who gets two or three attacks per round could attack two or three of them, and divide the damage rolled among them? This could still be handled with a single attack roll. If the targets have different ACs, the same roll is compared to all; some may take damage and some not. (Whether the damage should be divided by the total number of targets, or only between those that are actually "hit" is a question for which I don't have an answer yet.)
And now we come to the weirdness of monsters. Unlike characters, the multiple attacks of monsters are normally listed with specific attack forms for each, implying that, for instance, a grizzly bear makes one swipe with each paw and one attempt to bite in a combat round. That's a pretty neat and orderly attack routine for a wild beast. It would make more sense to aggregate the possible damage and use a single attack roll. A B/X grizzly does 1d4/1d4/1d8, so in the single attack format, 2d8 would be about right. (Rather than the bonus "hug" damage being activated on two claw hits, it could occur on a critical of 19 or 20 of the single attack roll.) It's not unrealistic to suppose that a bear could maul three closely-grouped opponents at once, so multiple attacks could be directed against two or three characters, and the damage rolled divided among them. (Naturally, only one, probably chosen at random, could be subjected to the "hug.") Now we need not concern ourselves about whether the bear went after Bob the fighter with a claw or a bite attack. We just know that the grizzly tore into Bob for 8 points of damage, and whether it was its slashing paws or snapping jaws or some combination that got him can be narrated any way the DM and player feel appropriate.
Some creatures, with huge damage potential and equally huge bodies, like dragons, may be able to attack even more than three targets at once. A big amorphous blob like a black pudding might be able to threaten everyone within striking distance of it at once.
This does make for a more all-or-nothing experience in combat; a creature either does its full damage or none. This would be an advantage for well-armored characters and a disadvantage for lightly or unarmored ones. A monster which gets three attacks under the rules-as-written would do at least some damage 48.8% of the time against a target that it needs a 17 to hit; with a single attack roll it has a 20% chance to do its full damage. The same monster, against a target that it needs a 6 to hit, will hit all three attacks 42% of the time; with the single roll it will do its full damage 75% of the time. I don't have a problem with this, but your mileage may vary.
Now that that's out of the way, I want to explore some special cases, and a few instances in the B/X rules that seem to ignore the principles behind the abstract aggregation of the ten-second round.
First, there's initiative. The most intuitive interpretation is that initiative literally determines who strikes first. Since we don't even know for sure until we roll attacks that an opportunity to attack has even occurred, we can't even say that initiative represents the first opportunity. I like to think of it more as an abstract measure of the ebb and flow of combat, a momentary edge which could permit a combatant to take his opponent out of the fight IF he can spot and capitalize on an opportunity. It's worth noting, though, that the game would actually function just fine without initiative at all - all combat takes place simultaneously. This might slightly increase the lethality of the game, because double kills would become more common, but the possibility of initiative-less combat intrigues me nonetheless.
Missile combat is troublesome because unlike melee combat, it uses up resources; specifically, ammunition. Even so, the number of arrows or bolts or sling stones expended doesn't necessarily correlate 1:1 with attack rolls. You can hand-wave it and say that the number of missiles expended averages out to one per round (sometimes you get off a couple shots, and sometimes you don't get a clear look at all.) You could also use an abstract method of tracking ammo.
Next, there's the issue of multiple attacks. B/X as written doesn't support multiple attacks for characters (at least not without magic like the haste spell) but BECMI and other old school editions do. It's not too difficult to grasp that a more skilled fighter will, on average, see and be able to take advantage of more opportunities to strike in a given time than a less skilled one. But, since we can't definitively say how many opportunities a character exploits with a successful attack roll, it's a little difficult to fathom what a second or third attack roll by the same character in the same round might mean. That they can potentially exploit twice or three times an indeterminate number of opportunities?
It seems to me that this might be more aptly modeled, and more consistent with the combat round as I understand it, by increasing damage potential rather than number of attack rolls. As characters increase in level, their chance to exploit at least one opportunity in a round increases with their improving attack rolls. Since the damage range given for a weapon doesn't necessarily represent the damage caused by one stroke of that weapon, it seems reasonable that damage per round could be increased for highly skilled characters without absurdly implying that they're necessarily doing a lot more with a single blow. You could increase the damage die size a step or two, for example 1d6 to 1d8 or 1d0, or grant extra dice of the same type as the weapon's base damage, say, from 1d6 to 2d6. The latter pretty neatly captures the spirit of multiple attacks, without messing with the base damage die for each weapon.
But wait a second...What if multiple attacks don't necessarily mean multiple swings (since we know that happens anyway) but the ability to threaten additional opponents in the same round? Say, a fighter with one attack per round, surrounded by orcs, could only attack and potentially do damage to one of them in a round, but a fighter who gets two or three attacks per round could attack two or three of them, and divide the damage rolled among them? This could still be handled with a single attack roll. If the targets have different ACs, the same roll is compared to all; some may take damage and some not. (Whether the damage should be divided by the total number of targets, or only between those that are actually "hit" is a question for which I don't have an answer yet.)
And now we come to the weirdness of monsters. Unlike characters, the multiple attacks of monsters are normally listed with specific attack forms for each, implying that, for instance, a grizzly bear makes one swipe with each paw and one attempt to bite in a combat round. That's a pretty neat and orderly attack routine for a wild beast. It would make more sense to aggregate the possible damage and use a single attack roll. A B/X grizzly does 1d4/1d4/1d8, so in the single attack format, 2d8 would be about right. (Rather than the bonus "hug" damage being activated on two claw hits, it could occur on a critical of 19 or 20 of the single attack roll.) It's not unrealistic to suppose that a bear could maul three closely-grouped opponents at once, so multiple attacks could be directed against two or three characters, and the damage rolled divided among them. (Naturally, only one, probably chosen at random, could be subjected to the "hug.") Now we need not concern ourselves about whether the bear went after Bob the fighter with a claw or a bite attack. We just know that the grizzly tore into Bob for 8 points of damage, and whether it was its slashing paws or snapping jaws or some combination that got him can be narrated any way the DM and player feel appropriate.
Some creatures, with huge damage potential and equally huge bodies, like dragons, may be able to attack even more than three targets at once. A big amorphous blob like a black pudding might be able to threaten everyone within striking distance of it at once.
This does make for a more all-or-nothing experience in combat; a creature either does its full damage or none. This would be an advantage for well-armored characters and a disadvantage for lightly or unarmored ones. A monster which gets three attacks under the rules-as-written would do at least some damage 48.8% of the time against a target that it needs a 17 to hit; with a single attack roll it has a 20% chance to do its full damage. The same monster, against a target that it needs a 6 to hit, will hit all three attacks 42% of the time; with the single roll it will do its full damage 75% of the time. I don't have a problem with this, but your mileage may vary.
Saturday, October 26, 2013
Abstract combat and the ten-second round
For a long time, I think I've harbored a fundamental misunderstanding about how D&D combat works, or at least was mostly designed to work. It's taken me a while to put together all these pieces into a coherent theory, but (I hope) I finally have a good enough handle on it to explain it now.
It's never explicitly stated in B/X that an attack roll doesn't represent one discrete swing of the sword. In fact, there are a lot of factors that mistakenly imply that one attack roll does in fact represent a single attempt to do harm. There's the terminology of "hit" and "miss." There are monsters with multiple attacks, explicitly labeled "claw, claw, bite," implying that the creature attempts to strike exactly once with each of them during a round. Even the initiative roll implies individual blows, with one combatant taking a swing at the other, and then the other counterattacking.
Of course, ten seconds is quite a long time in the frantic scuffle of combat. Go ahead, count it out - one-thousands or Mississippis or whatever method you favor. While you do this, imagine a sword fight in real time. I'll wait right here...
Did you imagine one person swinging a sword, and then the other swinging in return? Of course not! You probably imagined a complex dance involving many thrusts, slashes, and parries, circling and jockeying for position, ducking and weaving, tripping, shoving, stumbling, off-hand punches, and dirty tricks. In D&D combat, all of this is neatly subsumed in a minimal number of die rolls: a d20 attack roll vs. a static Armor Class number to determine if each combatant was able to effectively wear down his opponent, and if that succeeds, a damage roll to determine by how much. A successful attack doesn't even necessarily mean that the attacker "hits" or threatens the opponent once and only once with his primary weapon. A fighter with sword and shield who scores a successful attack may do damage by thrusting with his sword, but also by bashing with his shield, kicking his opponent in the knee, tripping his opponent to the ground, ramming him against a wall, or some combination of these and other possible moves.
The upshot of all this is that not only is B/X combat abstract, it abstracts by aggregating actions within a unit of time. It does not attempt to narrate a blow-by-blow of combat through game mechanics; it resolves the general outcome of ten seconds of battle and leaves any narration to be done on a post hoc basis. The dice tell you how much attrition of stamina each combatant inflicted on the other, but the precise "how" can only be explained after game mechanical resolution. Choices consist of broad tactical options rather than discrete maneuvers - to fight, retreat, or flee rather than whether to attack with primary or secondary weapon, parry, feint, or trip the opponent.
In contrast, many rules, both official and house, have been put forth with the goal of increasing the range of choice and the excitement of combat. A large number of these add options to perform specific actions and maneuvers and resolve them game mechanically within the combat round. For example, BECMI D&D (the heir to B/X) introduced a weapon mastery system that allowed characters wielding certain weapons at a high enough level of master to deflect attacks by making a saving throw vs. death ray. This certainly can be exciting, rolling to escape all damage from an attack in the moment as it occurs, but it also violates the basic assumptions of the abstract ten-second round by correlating each attack roll with a single discrete attempt to do harm.
This sort of granularity can be a slippery slope indeed. Are we to assume that unless a character has and uses the deflect ability no parrying takes place during a combat round? Or are we arbitrarily singling out one parry of many in the round for mechanical resolution, and if so what is the justification for hand-waving the rest? To move to a system of individual maneuvers rather than an abstract aggregate requires a lot of arbitrary decisions or assumptions as to where each action begins and ends and which ones are significant enough to warrant their own mechanical resolutions. Since these determinations are necessarily arbitrary, it opens up the possibility for all kinds arguments unresolvable by mere reason, and the ugly head of DM fiat must be reared. A combat round is, of course, also a purely arbitrary interval of time, but the potential for argument is limited to how long it should be. I imagine there are plenty of players prepared to go to the mat over their characters' signature combat moves, but very few who would bother to protest vociferously that the combat round is the wrong number of seconds.
It actually is possible to increase the range of player choice and agency in combat without short-circuiting the abstraction of the ten-second round or increasing the granularity of combat. Tactical options can apply to the entire round, and are best done with flat modifiers rather than additional dice-rolling. For example, an option to fight cautiously might grant a bonus to AC and a penalty to the attack roll. This simulates the character taking a conservative approach, passing up questionable opportunities for offense in order to concentrate on defense and deny offensive opportunities to the opponent. Reversing the modifiers simulates an aggressive approach, in which the character presses any perceived advantage at the cost of possibly leaving himself open or falling for a feint. Even though the choice only modifies two die rolls (character's attack roll and opponent's attack roll) - in fact, because it only modifies the standard die rolls of a combat round rather than adding more - it applies to everything that character and his opponent do in that round. The round is still resolved abstractly and in aggregate form; the players aren't calling specific maneuvers, but they do have a little more say-so in the outcome.
Telecanter's simple combat maneuvers can fit neatly into this framework as well, by interpreting the player's declaration of intent not as a specific maneuver but as a desired goal of a round of combat. It doesn't violate abstraction, because the player is not choosing simply to do a single maneuver, but integrating a goal into the cut and thrust of the combat round. Even if the character doesn't accomplish that intent, normal damage my still be inflicted by all . The round is not assumed to be taken up by a single action. If Bob the fighter wants to disarm his opponent, he isn't making a roll specifically to disarm; he is declaring that he wishes to make that one of the possible outcomes of the round's combat. He's stating that if the opportunity arises he would prefer to disarm the opponent than to inflict damage. Whether or not that opportunity does arise in a form which Bob can capitalize on is determined by the attack roll; if it doesn't, Bob hasn't necessarily done nothing else in the round. He has ranked his priorities, and taken whatever his opponent and his own level of skill allows him to take in that round.
I have some more thoughts on the implications of the abstract ten-second round on multiple attacks, damage, initiative, and monsters with more than one attack form, but those are probably best saved for the next post.
It's never explicitly stated in B/X that an attack roll doesn't represent one discrete swing of the sword. In fact, there are a lot of factors that mistakenly imply that one attack roll does in fact represent a single attempt to do harm. There's the terminology of "hit" and "miss." There are monsters with multiple attacks, explicitly labeled "claw, claw, bite," implying that the creature attempts to strike exactly once with each of them during a round. Even the initiative roll implies individual blows, with one combatant taking a swing at the other, and then the other counterattacking.
Of course, ten seconds is quite a long time in the frantic scuffle of combat. Go ahead, count it out - one-thousands or Mississippis or whatever method you favor. While you do this, imagine a sword fight in real time. I'll wait right here...
Did you imagine one person swinging a sword, and then the other swinging in return? Of course not! You probably imagined a complex dance involving many thrusts, slashes, and parries, circling and jockeying for position, ducking and weaving, tripping, shoving, stumbling, off-hand punches, and dirty tricks. In D&D combat, all of this is neatly subsumed in a minimal number of die rolls: a d20 attack roll vs. a static Armor Class number to determine if each combatant was able to effectively wear down his opponent, and if that succeeds, a damage roll to determine by how much. A successful attack doesn't even necessarily mean that the attacker "hits" or threatens the opponent once and only once with his primary weapon. A fighter with sword and shield who scores a successful attack may do damage by thrusting with his sword, but also by bashing with his shield, kicking his opponent in the knee, tripping his opponent to the ground, ramming him against a wall, or some combination of these and other possible moves.
The upshot of all this is that not only is B/X combat abstract, it abstracts by aggregating actions within a unit of time. It does not attempt to narrate a blow-by-blow of combat through game mechanics; it resolves the general outcome of ten seconds of battle and leaves any narration to be done on a post hoc basis. The dice tell you how much attrition of stamina each combatant inflicted on the other, but the precise "how" can only be explained after game mechanical resolution. Choices consist of broad tactical options rather than discrete maneuvers - to fight, retreat, or flee rather than whether to attack with primary or secondary weapon, parry, feint, or trip the opponent.
In contrast, many rules, both official and house, have been put forth with the goal of increasing the range of choice and the excitement of combat. A large number of these add options to perform specific actions and maneuvers and resolve them game mechanically within the combat round. For example, BECMI D&D (the heir to B/X) introduced a weapon mastery system that allowed characters wielding certain weapons at a high enough level of master to deflect attacks by making a saving throw vs. death ray. This certainly can be exciting, rolling to escape all damage from an attack in the moment as it occurs, but it also violates the basic assumptions of the abstract ten-second round by correlating each attack roll with a single discrete attempt to do harm.
This sort of granularity can be a slippery slope indeed. Are we to assume that unless a character has and uses the deflect ability no parrying takes place during a combat round? Or are we arbitrarily singling out one parry of many in the round for mechanical resolution, and if so what is the justification for hand-waving the rest? To move to a system of individual maneuvers rather than an abstract aggregate requires a lot of arbitrary decisions or assumptions as to where each action begins and ends and which ones are significant enough to warrant their own mechanical resolutions. Since these determinations are necessarily arbitrary, it opens up the possibility for all kinds arguments unresolvable by mere reason, and the ugly head of DM fiat must be reared. A combat round is, of course, also a purely arbitrary interval of time, but the potential for argument is limited to how long it should be. I imagine there are plenty of players prepared to go to the mat over their characters' signature combat moves, but very few who would bother to protest vociferously that the combat round is the wrong number of seconds.
It actually is possible to increase the range of player choice and agency in combat without short-circuiting the abstraction of the ten-second round or increasing the granularity of combat. Tactical options can apply to the entire round, and are best done with flat modifiers rather than additional dice-rolling. For example, an option to fight cautiously might grant a bonus to AC and a penalty to the attack roll. This simulates the character taking a conservative approach, passing up questionable opportunities for offense in order to concentrate on defense and deny offensive opportunities to the opponent. Reversing the modifiers simulates an aggressive approach, in which the character presses any perceived advantage at the cost of possibly leaving himself open or falling for a feint. Even though the choice only modifies two die rolls (character's attack roll and opponent's attack roll) - in fact, because it only modifies the standard die rolls of a combat round rather than adding more - it applies to everything that character and his opponent do in that round. The round is still resolved abstractly and in aggregate form; the players aren't calling specific maneuvers, but they do have a little more say-so in the outcome.
Telecanter's simple combat maneuvers can fit neatly into this framework as well, by interpreting the player's declaration of intent not as a specific maneuver but as a desired goal of a round of combat. It doesn't violate abstraction, because the player is not choosing simply to do a single maneuver, but integrating a goal into the cut and thrust of the combat round. Even if the character doesn't accomplish that intent, normal damage my still be inflicted by all . The round is not assumed to be taken up by a single action. If Bob the fighter wants to disarm his opponent, he isn't making a roll specifically to disarm; he is declaring that he wishes to make that one of the possible outcomes of the round's combat. He's stating that if the opportunity arises he would prefer to disarm the opponent than to inflict damage. Whether or not that opportunity does arise in a form which Bob can capitalize on is determined by the attack roll; if it doesn't, Bob hasn't necessarily done nothing else in the round. He has ranked his priorities, and taken whatever his opponent and his own level of skill allows him to take in that round.
I have some more thoughts on the implications of the abstract ten-second round on multiple attacks, damage, initiative, and monsters with more than one attack form, but those are probably best saved for the next post.
Wednesday, October 16, 2013
Flexibility for the thief class?
A commenter on my last post on diversified mechanics mentioned some unease with the percentile thief skills being rather out of place amongst the mechanics of D&D. To be sure, I find them a bit odd too, and speculated that the authors of the game used d% in order to have enough granularity so that some improvement could be had at each level. Otherwise, the thief gets nothing more at most level-ups than another 1d4 hit points. The commenter (name withheld, since I don't know if he has a blog of his own or wants his G+ account posted publicly here) mentioned his B/X flavored "heartbreaker" which uses a 2d6 mechanic, with points at each level that the player can assign as permanent bonuses to particular skills.
That got me to thinking about the rigidity of the B/X thieving skills as written, and whether or not it would be a good or desirable thing to make thieves more customizable, and if it would still be B/X if I did.
AD&D 2E has a thief skill system that appealed to me greatly when I first saw it at some point back in the 90s. For those unfamiliar, each skill has a base value, and at each level, including 1st, a thief character receives an allotment of points to be divided amongst the skills however the player desires. If I remember correctly, there were some minor caveats about how many points could be assigned to any one skill per level, something like 35, I think, which does little to slow the maxing-out of a skill, should the player want to specialize to that degree. As with previous editions, thief skills are d%, roll under.
It does give the thief class tremendous flexibility. If you want to be primarily a pickpocket, or a cat burglar, or a tomb robber, you can just dump your points into the relevant skills, and never raise the ones you don't care about at all. It also has a few big drawbacks. Besides the relative ease of mastering any given skill, all those percentile points are a pain to keep track of. I'm pretty smart, and by no means mathematically inept, but I stuck to allocating points in blocks of five to keep the bookkeeping manageable. (If that's the norm, it makes little sense to choose d% over a d20 mechanic, since the probabilities on a d20 are in increments of 5% But I digress.) There's no way at all to tell at a glance if somebody has fudged on points, or made an honest but significant error in calculation, or just forgot to add the points from the last level-up. It's enough of a headache for a player. For a DM, it makes creating thief NPCs an ordeal. Instead of just rolling for hit points, and maybe ability scores, and referring to a table for thief skills as needed during play, you have to go through all the rigamarole of totalling up how many points a thief of the desired level would have, and distribute them without going over or leaving any unassigned.
The 2d6 system mentioned above is a vast improvement, not least because it reduces the figures to a level that's easier to grok on an intuitive level. Dealing in increments of one point is a lot easier than assigning 15 points per level, and I assume the points handed out per level can be counted on one hand. Also, those bonus points aren't added to a base number. They're added to a 2d6 roll. (Did I mention I like bell curves?)
A while back, when I was tinkering with my own heartbreaker, I hammered out a fairly simple system, using the familiar d%. Basically, all skills use the same advancement table, but there are three different rates of advancement: Good, Average, and Poor. All skills are Average by default, but a character could take Good progression in one or more by reducing a corresponding number of others to Poor. I also had consolidated a few closely related skills, for example Move Silently and Hide In Shadows into Stealth, but that isn't strictly relevant. I scaled the tables to stretch over 36 levels, with increments of 5% to start, and diminishing at higher levels. By level 36, a Poor skill maxed out at 80%, an Average one at 100%, and a Good one at 120%. (Higher than 100% offsets situational penalties for particularly difficult tasks.)
Obviously, this doesn't allow for different chances for each individual skill, but when you look at any given line in the B/X thief skill chart, the difference between the best and worst skill is never greater than 10% anyway, if you don't count Climb Walls. A flat Good, Average, or Poor percentage applied to any skill isn't too far out of line, and with a little tweaking, even Climb Walls can be shoehorned into the formula without too greatly diluting its usefulness.
If you want a generic thief, you can just use average for everything. If you want something a little more specific, all you need to do is decide which skills he's good at, and which he's neglected.
Whether something like this is even useful or consistent with the B/X game is an open question in my mind. I'm not at all averse to keeping the default one-size-fits-all thief skills table, and have thief characters distinguish themselves by the skills they choose to use and how they use them rather than their percentile chances of success.
For anyone who cares to see it, though, here's what I came up with for my Good-Average-Poor system:
That got me to thinking about the rigidity of the B/X thieving skills as written, and whether or not it would be a good or desirable thing to make thieves more customizable, and if it would still be B/X if I did.
AD&D 2E has a thief skill system that appealed to me greatly when I first saw it at some point back in the 90s. For those unfamiliar, each skill has a base value, and at each level, including 1st, a thief character receives an allotment of points to be divided amongst the skills however the player desires. If I remember correctly, there were some minor caveats about how many points could be assigned to any one skill per level, something like 35, I think, which does little to slow the maxing-out of a skill, should the player want to specialize to that degree. As with previous editions, thief skills are d%, roll under.
It does give the thief class tremendous flexibility. If you want to be primarily a pickpocket, or a cat burglar, or a tomb robber, you can just dump your points into the relevant skills, and never raise the ones you don't care about at all. It also has a few big drawbacks. Besides the relative ease of mastering any given skill, all those percentile points are a pain to keep track of. I'm pretty smart, and by no means mathematically inept, but I stuck to allocating points in blocks of five to keep the bookkeeping manageable. (If that's the norm, it makes little sense to choose d% over a d20 mechanic, since the probabilities on a d20 are in increments of 5% But I digress.) There's no way at all to tell at a glance if somebody has fudged on points, or made an honest but significant error in calculation, or just forgot to add the points from the last level-up. It's enough of a headache for a player. For a DM, it makes creating thief NPCs an ordeal. Instead of just rolling for hit points, and maybe ability scores, and referring to a table for thief skills as needed during play, you have to go through all the rigamarole of totalling up how many points a thief of the desired level would have, and distribute them without going over or leaving any unassigned.
The 2d6 system mentioned above is a vast improvement, not least because it reduces the figures to a level that's easier to grok on an intuitive level. Dealing in increments of one point is a lot easier than assigning 15 points per level, and I assume the points handed out per level can be counted on one hand. Also, those bonus points aren't added to a base number. They're added to a 2d6 roll. (Did I mention I like bell curves?)
A while back, when I was tinkering with my own heartbreaker, I hammered out a fairly simple system, using the familiar d%. Basically, all skills use the same advancement table, but there are three different rates of advancement: Good, Average, and Poor. All skills are Average by default, but a character could take Good progression in one or more by reducing a corresponding number of others to Poor. I also had consolidated a few closely related skills, for example Move Silently and Hide In Shadows into Stealth, but that isn't strictly relevant. I scaled the tables to stretch over 36 levels, with increments of 5% to start, and diminishing at higher levels. By level 36, a Poor skill maxed out at 80%, an Average one at 100%, and a Good one at 120%. (Higher than 100% offsets situational penalties for particularly difficult tasks.)
Obviously, this doesn't allow for different chances for each individual skill, but when you look at any given line in the B/X thief skill chart, the difference between the best and worst skill is never greater than 10% anyway, if you don't count Climb Walls. A flat Good, Average, or Poor percentage applied to any skill isn't too far out of line, and with a little tweaking, even Climb Walls can be shoehorned into the formula without too greatly diluting its usefulness.
If you want a generic thief, you can just use average for everything. If you want something a little more specific, all you need to do is decide which skills he's good at, and which he's neglected.
Whether something like this is even useful or consistent with the B/X game is an open question in my mind. I'm not at all averse to keeping the default one-size-fits-all thief skills table, and have thief characters distinguish themselves by the skills they choose to use and how they use them rather than their percentile chances of success.
For anyone who cares to see it, though, here's what I came up with for my Good-Average-Poor system:
-
Level
Good Skill
Average Skill
Poor Skill
1
25
15
5
2
30
20
10
3
35
25
15
4
40
30
20
5
45
35
24
6
50
40
28
7
55
44
32
8
59
48
34
9
63
51
36
10
67
54
38
11
71
57
40
12
74
60
42
13
77
62
44
14
80
64
46
15
82
66
48
16
84
68
50
17
86
70
52
18
88
72
54
19
90
74
56
20
92
76
58
21
94
78
60
22
96
80
62
23
98
81
64
24
100
82
66
25
102
83
68
26
104
88
70
27
106
90
71
28
108
92
72
29
110
93
73
30
112
94
74
31
114
95
75
32
116
96
76
33
117
97
77
34
118
98
78
35
119
99
79
36
120
100
80
Monday, October 14, 2013
Diversified mechanics
It's been quite a while since I've read anything strongly touting unified mechanics in RPGs. That could be because most of my reading is in OSR circles, where most people seem content with, or at least tolerant of, the idea of a game of heterogenous mechanics. Even so, I still see occasional mentions of it in passing, and there have been musings on the incongruity of the percentile thief skills, attempts to render character abilities on d20, etc. Sometimes there's a good reason for rejiggering something to use a different die or combination of dice, but in my opinion, simply unifying mechanics is not one of them.
For my part, I like and prefer the diversified mechanics of old school D&D. Firstly, not all mechanics work the same. Sometimes you want the anything-can-happen linear randomness of a d20 or d100. Other times, the neat bell curve of a 2d6 roll, with results weighted toward the middle, models things more aptly. For very simple and routine tasks like opening stuck doors, surprise, and initiative, a simple 1d6 roll makes sense. Some mechanics, such as the spell-caster's spell slots or a simple comparison of an ability score to a target number (like a boulder that requires 20 points of strength to move), use no dice rolls at all.
Secondly, it makes different tasks feel, well, different. A unified mechanic, which by definition resolves every action with the same type of die roll, doesn't accomplish that. I know, it's all about imagining what the roll represents, but in a game in which the roll itself is the most immediate connection between the player and the character's action, it necessarily influences the players' perceptions of what's happening. Picking up a different die or dice feels like taking a different tool out of the toolbox.
Some might argue that a unified mechanic simplifies play, but some of the editions that attempt unification of mechanics are wildly complex, while B/X is noted for its relative simplicity and ease of play.
In a video game, where all the number-crunching happens out of the player's sight, the particular mechanics don't matter at all so long as they produce a result that satisfies the player's expectations. In a tabletop RPG, though, not only does it not bother me that physical combat, the thief's skills, the cleric's turning ability, and the magic-user's spell casting don't use the same dice as each other, I prefer it that way.
For my part, I like and prefer the diversified mechanics of old school D&D. Firstly, not all mechanics work the same. Sometimes you want the anything-can-happen linear randomness of a d20 or d100. Other times, the neat bell curve of a 2d6 roll, with results weighted toward the middle, models things more aptly. For very simple and routine tasks like opening stuck doors, surprise, and initiative, a simple 1d6 roll makes sense. Some mechanics, such as the spell-caster's spell slots or a simple comparison of an ability score to a target number (like a boulder that requires 20 points of strength to move), use no dice rolls at all.
Secondly, it makes different tasks feel, well, different. A unified mechanic, which by definition resolves every action with the same type of die roll, doesn't accomplish that. I know, it's all about imagining what the roll represents, but in a game in which the roll itself is the most immediate connection between the player and the character's action, it necessarily influences the players' perceptions of what's happening. Picking up a different die or dice feels like taking a different tool out of the toolbox.
Some might argue that a unified mechanic simplifies play, but some of the editions that attempt unification of mechanics are wildly complex, while B/X is noted for its relative simplicity and ease of play.
In a video game, where all the number-crunching happens out of the player's sight, the particular mechanics don't matter at all so long as they produce a result that satisfies the player's expectations. In a tabletop RPG, though, not only does it not bother me that physical combat, the thief's skills, the cleric's turning ability, and the magic-user's spell casting don't use the same dice as each other, I prefer it that way.
Friday, October 11, 2013
The low end
Contrary to popular opinion, I don't consider a character with one or more low ability scores - even very low ones in the 3-5 range - to be necessarily unplayable or hopeless. As I noted in my previous post, most characters generated with the 3d6 in order method - the ONLY method described in the B/X rules - are going to have at least one low score. The ability score tables don't include modifiers for scores under 9 simply to fill space on the page. They're meant to be used by player characters. The game was designed to support play with characters who have weaknesses, and it's really a shame that so many players and DMs are so averse to the low end of the ability score spectrum as to effectively house-rule it out of existence.
Even though I accept this on an intellectual level, when the dice hit the table during character creation, I tend to go soft, and allow my players to re-roll characters with several "bad" scores. This post is at least as much for myself as for my readers, to fortify my resolve that subpar PCs don't necessarily make the game any less enjoyable, and that I'm not ruining the game for my young players by insisting that they play the hand they're dealt, so to speak, rather than keep rolling until they get a character with more robust stats.
A -1 penalty isn't really all that consequential in most cases. Yes, the guy with 7 Strength is a lot less effective in melee than the guy with a 17, but he's only slightly less capable than the one with a 12. Modifiers of -2 and -3 are more serious handicaps, but only 4.6% of scores rolled on 3d6 warrant such penalties. Less than half a percent end up with -3. Even these scores, though, are not inherently unplayable. It's only our expectations that make them seem so. Clever players find ways to minimize the effects of low scores, either by avoiding actions where they would be a liability, or making themselves useful in non-stat-related ways.
Here's a look at the average dice rolls of the usual assortment of D&D dice with modifiers of 0, -1, -2, and -3, keeping in mind that no roll is adjusted below 1.
0 -1 -2 -3
d4 2.5 1.75 1.25 1.0
d6 3.5 2.67 2.0 1.5
d8 4.5 3.625 2.875 2.25
d10 5.5 4.6 3.8 3.1
d20 10.5 9.55 8.65 7.8
Chance to roll a 14 or better on d20: 35% 30% 25% 20%
(Typical saving throw)
With these figures in mind, let's look a little more closely at how being below average in different abilities affects a character in play.
Strength affects both attack and damage rolls in melee combat. A character with a low Strength is probably well advised to avoid melee if possible, but isn't necessarily hopeless at it. It just takes him a little longer to dispatch any given opponent. At a -1 penalty, a character wielding a 1d8 weapon is about as effective as one of average strength with a 1d6 weapon, and only 5% less likely to hit. At -2 and -3, the penalty to damage becomes a fairly significant hindrance. Even so, a character with a decent AC and hit points might well make himself useful in melee by taking some of the pressure off the primary fighters. He provides another target for monster attacks so the heavy hitters aren't absorbing all the attacks, and a few points of damage here and there really can make a difference.
Of course, the best advice is often to avoid combat whenever possible, and this especially applies to parties with more than one physically weak character.
Intelligence affects literacy and languages known. More so than most other abilities, the deficiencies of one character are readily offset by having one or two smarter members in the group. Obviously a character with a low Intelligence isn't going to be reading the villain's journal or the inscriptions on tombs, but as long as there's somebody in the party who can read, even a total halfwit isn't much of a hindrance to a successful adventure. Knowing a good range of languages is certainly a benefit to a party, but a couple PCs of above-average intellect or an elf or dwarf can easily cover the shortcomings of a less-than-bright comrade.
Wisdom affects saving throws vs. magical effects. Saving throws come up a lot less often than attack and damage rolls, but the effects of a failed save are generally a lot more consequential than a missed attack or low damage roll. Even if you expand the scope of Wisdom to affect all saves rather than just magic-based ones, though, the unwise character is only a little more likely to end up charmed, petrified, or poisoned than his companions of average prudence. The best defense is smart play, to avoid having to roll a saving throw in the first place. (I heartily subscribe to the philosophy that a saving throw represents a last chance for a character whose player has failed to heed signs of danger and done something which by all rights should kill the character.)
Dexterity affects Armor Class and attack rolls with missile weapons. A PC with a low Dexterity isn't going to be the best archer, but it still may be worthwhile to carry a bow, sling, or a bandolier of daggers. Firing at a charging beast with a reduced chance to hit is still more likely to be of help than standing there watching others fire at it. Armor Class is a bigger deal, but the penalties still represent only a 5, 10, or 15 percentage point increase in the odds of being hit - significant, but hardly crippling. A character with decent hit points still has good survivability even with a low Dexterity, and need not shrink from a fight for that reason only.
Constitution affects hit points per Hit Die, and so directly influences the survivability of every character. Still, a fighter with a -1 penalty has about the same hp her die as a cleric, hardly a pushover. A cleric with a -1 is as tough as a typical thief, and with better armor. For magic-users and thieves, a low Constitution is a great hazard, especially at the -2 and -3 levels, when a d4 yields a maximum of 1 or 2 hp per level. Low-Con fighter-types can still be effective in brief skirmishes. Magic-users, thieves, and clerics with very low Constitution have an even stronger incentive than usual to avoid the perils of melee combat, and to tread carefully around places that may be trapped. Such frailness demands greater caution in adventuring, but need not keep a character from the adventurer's life. They must simply cultivate the virtues of caution, avoidance, stealth, and diplomacy to a greater degree.
Charisma affects reaction rolls and retainer morale. Like Intelligence, having a low-Charisma character or two in the party is generally little hindrance. Most commonly only one or two characters are the primary negotiators in encounters, so the high scores can be brought to bear while the low ones hang back to watch and whisper advice as needed. Likewise, the high-Charisma PCs will probably hire the retainers for the whole party, though even the low-Charisma ones might be able to find a henchman or two and ensure their loyalty with greater shares of the loot. Despite the undeniable benefits of having one or two charismatic PCs in the party, there is a reason why Charisma is the quintessential "dump stat" in games that allow rearranging of scores.
The bottom line is that low ability scores are really only crippling to the degree that players lack skill and imagination. Skillful play can significantly reduce the amount of dice-rolling in a game, and thus limit the occasions when negative modifiers are a factor at all. Judiciousness in picking fights and taking risks is an unmitigated virtue in D&D whether you're playing with 16s or 6s. Even a "hopeless" character with several low scores and no high ones is a potentially successful adventurer, if the player gives it a shot. Come to think of it, a whole group of them might actually be a fun change of pace from the typical badass adventuring party.
Even though I accept this on an intellectual level, when the dice hit the table during character creation, I tend to go soft, and allow my players to re-roll characters with several "bad" scores. This post is at least as much for myself as for my readers, to fortify my resolve that subpar PCs don't necessarily make the game any less enjoyable, and that I'm not ruining the game for my young players by insisting that they play the hand they're dealt, so to speak, rather than keep rolling until they get a character with more robust stats.
A -1 penalty isn't really all that consequential in most cases. Yes, the guy with 7 Strength is a lot less effective in melee than the guy with a 17, but he's only slightly less capable than the one with a 12. Modifiers of -2 and -3 are more serious handicaps, but only 4.6% of scores rolled on 3d6 warrant such penalties. Less than half a percent end up with -3. Even these scores, though, are not inherently unplayable. It's only our expectations that make them seem so. Clever players find ways to minimize the effects of low scores, either by avoiding actions where they would be a liability, or making themselves useful in non-stat-related ways.
Here's a look at the average dice rolls of the usual assortment of D&D dice with modifiers of 0, -1, -2, and -3, keeping in mind that no roll is adjusted below 1.
0 -1 -2 -3
d4 2.5 1.75 1.25 1.0
d6 3.5 2.67 2.0 1.5
d8 4.5 3.625 2.875 2.25
d10 5.5 4.6 3.8 3.1
d20 10.5 9.55 8.65 7.8
Chance to roll a 14 or better on d20: 35% 30% 25% 20%
(Typical saving throw)
With these figures in mind, let's look a little more closely at how being below average in different abilities affects a character in play.
Strength affects both attack and damage rolls in melee combat. A character with a low Strength is probably well advised to avoid melee if possible, but isn't necessarily hopeless at it. It just takes him a little longer to dispatch any given opponent. At a -1 penalty, a character wielding a 1d8 weapon is about as effective as one of average strength with a 1d6 weapon, and only 5% less likely to hit. At -2 and -3, the penalty to damage becomes a fairly significant hindrance. Even so, a character with a decent AC and hit points might well make himself useful in melee by taking some of the pressure off the primary fighters. He provides another target for monster attacks so the heavy hitters aren't absorbing all the attacks, and a few points of damage here and there really can make a difference.
Of course, the best advice is often to avoid combat whenever possible, and this especially applies to parties with more than one physically weak character.
Intelligence affects literacy and languages known. More so than most other abilities, the deficiencies of one character are readily offset by having one or two smarter members in the group. Obviously a character with a low Intelligence isn't going to be reading the villain's journal or the inscriptions on tombs, but as long as there's somebody in the party who can read, even a total halfwit isn't much of a hindrance to a successful adventure. Knowing a good range of languages is certainly a benefit to a party, but a couple PCs of above-average intellect or an elf or dwarf can easily cover the shortcomings of a less-than-bright comrade.
Wisdom affects saving throws vs. magical effects. Saving throws come up a lot less often than attack and damage rolls, but the effects of a failed save are generally a lot more consequential than a missed attack or low damage roll. Even if you expand the scope of Wisdom to affect all saves rather than just magic-based ones, though, the unwise character is only a little more likely to end up charmed, petrified, or poisoned than his companions of average prudence. The best defense is smart play, to avoid having to roll a saving throw in the first place. (I heartily subscribe to the philosophy that a saving throw represents a last chance for a character whose player has failed to heed signs of danger and done something which by all rights should kill the character.)
Dexterity affects Armor Class and attack rolls with missile weapons. A PC with a low Dexterity isn't going to be the best archer, but it still may be worthwhile to carry a bow, sling, or a bandolier of daggers. Firing at a charging beast with a reduced chance to hit is still more likely to be of help than standing there watching others fire at it. Armor Class is a bigger deal, but the penalties still represent only a 5, 10, or 15 percentage point increase in the odds of being hit - significant, but hardly crippling. A character with decent hit points still has good survivability even with a low Dexterity, and need not shrink from a fight for that reason only.
Constitution affects hit points per Hit Die, and so directly influences the survivability of every character. Still, a fighter with a -1 penalty has about the same hp her die as a cleric, hardly a pushover. A cleric with a -1 is as tough as a typical thief, and with better armor. For magic-users and thieves, a low Constitution is a great hazard, especially at the -2 and -3 levels, when a d4 yields a maximum of 1 or 2 hp per level. Low-Con fighter-types can still be effective in brief skirmishes. Magic-users, thieves, and clerics with very low Constitution have an even stronger incentive than usual to avoid the perils of melee combat, and to tread carefully around places that may be trapped. Such frailness demands greater caution in adventuring, but need not keep a character from the adventurer's life. They must simply cultivate the virtues of caution, avoidance, stealth, and diplomacy to a greater degree.
Charisma affects reaction rolls and retainer morale. Like Intelligence, having a low-Charisma character or two in the party is generally little hindrance. Most commonly only one or two characters are the primary negotiators in encounters, so the high scores can be brought to bear while the low ones hang back to watch and whisper advice as needed. Likewise, the high-Charisma PCs will probably hire the retainers for the whole party, though even the low-Charisma ones might be able to find a henchman or two and ensure their loyalty with greater shares of the loot. Despite the undeniable benefits of having one or two charismatic PCs in the party, there is a reason why Charisma is the quintessential "dump stat" in games that allow rearranging of scores.
The bottom line is that low ability scores are really only crippling to the degree that players lack skill and imagination. Skillful play can significantly reduce the amount of dice-rolling in a game, and thus limit the occasions when negative modifiers are a factor at all. Judiciousness in picking fights and taking risks is an unmitigated virtue in D&D whether you're playing with 16s or 6s. Even a "hopeless" character with several low scores and no high ones is a potentially successful adventurer, if the player gives it a shot. Come to think of it, a whole group of them might actually be a fun change of pace from the typical badass adventuring party.
Tuesday, October 8, 2013
Ability scores in B/X
Ability scores in D&D have always been a focus of some fascination for me. The first thing you do when you create a character in B/X is roll ability scores, and so ability scores are the first window into who this new character is and what kind of adventurer he or she might be. True, they aren't the most important or essential parts of a character in game terms - in fact, D&D as a system runs perfectly well without any ability scores at all - but they inform the concept of each character, as well as granting a few perks and disadvantages that distinguish different characters in play.
B/X uses the old tried-and-true method of rolling 3d6 six times, and applying the results, in order, to Strength, Intelligence, Wisdom, Dexterity, Constitution, and Charisma. I came to understand that they were arranged that way, at least in part, to set Constitution and Charisma, the two scores which were not prime requisites for any class and could be neither raised nor lowered in the optional adjustment phase, apart from the others.
Once scores are rolled and a class chosen, players are allowed to boost the character's prime requisite ability by lowering other scores, at a ratio of one point gained for every two dropped, with the caveat that no score may be lowered below 9. Only a PR could be raised in this way, and the rules as to which other scores could be lowered by which class were probably the fussiest thing about B/X character creation. We tended to ignore those bits and allow characters to lower any of the first four abilities to raise a prime requisite score. Co and Ch were still off limits.
Scores of 9-12 are considered average, and warrant no bonuses or penalties in play. 13-15 earns a +1 bonus, 16-17 a +2, and 18, the highest possible score, a +3. Conversely, a 6-8 takes a -1 penalty, 4-5 a -2, and 3, the lowest, a -3.
The interesting thing about this method of generating ability scores is that it inclined strongly toward producing PCs with at least one above-average score, that is, one that gains a bonus of +1 or more. Any given score is about 26% likely to be a 13 or higher, and thus result in a bonus, and only about 16.5% of all characters will roll no above-average score at all. With the rules for boosting a prime requisite, that percentage drops even further.
On the flip side, most characters will also have at least one ability that's below average, with each roll being 26% likely to produce an 8 or lower, and only a 16.5% chance to escape with no low scores at all.
The chance of any one ability score being in the average range (9-12) is about 48%. The odds of ALL SIX ability scores being average, however, is less than 2%. This means that the vast majority of characters are going to have both strengths and weaknesses that actually have an impact on play, but the + or - 2s and 3s are reserved for the truly exceptional - the top or bottom 4.6%. That's exactly how I like it.
Contrast this with AD&D 1E, in which bonuses often weren't gained until a score of 15 or 16, and penalties until a score of 5 or 6 going the other way. About 86% of ability scores on 3d6 will be in the "dead zone" of 7-15, and a full 40% of characters rolled will have no adjustments from their abilities. Using one of those average-boosting methods like 4d6-drop-lowest gives things a push toward the upper end of the spectrum, but almost guarantees a lack of low scores, which can be just as interesting to play as high scores.
If you like ability scores which are meaningful through the entire spectrum of possible scores, instead of just at the extremes, the B/X rules deliver quite nicely.
B/X uses the old tried-and-true method of rolling 3d6 six times, and applying the results, in order, to Strength, Intelligence, Wisdom, Dexterity, Constitution, and Charisma. I came to understand that they were arranged that way, at least in part, to set Constitution and Charisma, the two scores which were not prime requisites for any class and could be neither raised nor lowered in the optional adjustment phase, apart from the others.
Once scores are rolled and a class chosen, players are allowed to boost the character's prime requisite ability by lowering other scores, at a ratio of one point gained for every two dropped, with the caveat that no score may be lowered below 9. Only a PR could be raised in this way, and the rules as to which other scores could be lowered by which class were probably the fussiest thing about B/X character creation. We tended to ignore those bits and allow characters to lower any of the first four abilities to raise a prime requisite score. Co and Ch were still off limits.
Scores of 9-12 are considered average, and warrant no bonuses or penalties in play. 13-15 earns a +1 bonus, 16-17 a +2, and 18, the highest possible score, a +3. Conversely, a 6-8 takes a -1 penalty, 4-5 a -2, and 3, the lowest, a -3.
The interesting thing about this method of generating ability scores is that it inclined strongly toward producing PCs with at least one above-average score, that is, one that gains a bonus of +1 or more. Any given score is about 26% likely to be a 13 or higher, and thus result in a bonus, and only about 16.5% of all characters will roll no above-average score at all. With the rules for boosting a prime requisite, that percentage drops even further.
On the flip side, most characters will also have at least one ability that's below average, with each roll being 26% likely to produce an 8 or lower, and only a 16.5% chance to escape with no low scores at all.
The chance of any one ability score being in the average range (9-12) is about 48%. The odds of ALL SIX ability scores being average, however, is less than 2%. This means that the vast majority of characters are going to have both strengths and weaknesses that actually have an impact on play, but the + or - 2s and 3s are reserved for the truly exceptional - the top or bottom 4.6%. That's exactly how I like it.
Contrast this with AD&D 1E, in which bonuses often weren't gained until a score of 15 or 16, and penalties until a score of 5 or 6 going the other way. About 86% of ability scores on 3d6 will be in the "dead zone" of 7-15, and a full 40% of characters rolled will have no adjustments from their abilities. Using one of those average-boosting methods like 4d6-drop-lowest gives things a push toward the upper end of the spectrum, but almost guarantees a lack of low scores, which can be just as interesting to play as high scores.
If you like ability scores which are meaningful through the entire spectrum of possible scores, instead of just at the extremes, the B/X rules deliver quite nicely.
Subscribe to:
Posts
(
Atom
)