Conan Abilities: Point Buy?

[Clovenhoof]

if it costs 8 points to go from having a 16 to an 18 instead of just 2 points, then by picking a race that gives you a bonus in a particular attribute that you want to be high and you don't care about the stat that gets dinged, you are effectively getting many more points than another PC is getting during character creation.

Ummm... yes, indeed, that's the idea.
It's not _that_ many more points, but it does make a difference. Usually you're 4 points better off if you pick the right race and distribute your points wisely.
If it didn't make a difference, or wasn't supposed to make a difference, there would be no need for racial modifiers at all, and concerning the average NPC, the book could just read "Cimmerians are usually stronger but less smart than other people". I rather think racial modifiers have always been there _specifically_ for the PCs' benefit.

The modifiers also have their effect if you use dice, but admittedly usually not to such an extent as with point buy. It's more of a way to get that one score really high, or cushion a rather bad roll alternatively.
Favoured Classes also typically match rather well with the racial ability modifiers in all D20 games. Very often the favoured ability is only a secondary ability for the favoured class (like Dwarf/Fighter/CON), but it's never ever the opposite. I say that just to stress that a character is encouraged to make the best use of their strengths.

I used to use linear point buy in earlier campaigns. Then it dawned on me that I'm taking away something from alternative races. That's why I don't want to use that anymore.

 

[Sutek]

How about this one. (bare with me)

Every stat has a range of 18 down. You can make the spread anything you like, but I like to be fair in doing this, so everything is "on the evens", so a potential stat range of 18, 16, 14, 12 if there are four players involved.

Each player is assigned 100pts to bid total for all six stats, and each stat is bid on in turn.

The stat auction idea is one I really like because the players can choose to out-bid for STR, but that just means that they either need to hang on to bidding points to get something else decent later and can't afford to waste bids, but it also means that some people will have to take whatever is left over and plan a character around mediocre stats. Knowing this from the outset makes an awareness of the value of, say, Charisma much more important than just rolling and sticking with what you've got.

You can actually give the players any number of points you want to bid with. 100 is just a base. You can even use poker chips to keep track of the bidding process. High bid gets the highest stat, next highest bid gets the next down and so on; "loser" gets the lowest.

If you have a group of people that is an odd number, or they dont'want such a predetermined stat set, get all the players to roll six numbers each, by whatever method they wish (as long as they all use the same method) and write the numbers down secretly and anonymously on index cards. The GM then looks over the cards and takes the numbers in some way as the stat sets and starts the bidding accordingly. This is a lot scarier for the players becuse the high bid may win a 9 or sometyhing. (lol) Then watch their faces get all screwy as they try to decide how much they want to bid each time. :wink:

 

[slaughterj]

How about this one. (bare with me)

Every stat has a range of 18 down. You can make the spread anything you like, but I like to be fair in doing this, so everything is "on the evens", so a potential stat range of 18, 16, 14, 12 if there are four players involved.

Each player is assigned 100pts to bid total for all six stats, and each stat is bid on in turn.

Seems interesting for the right group, but what do you do if you have a new player join the group????

 

[slaughterj]

I used to use linear point buy in earlier campaigns. Then it dawned on me that I'm taking away something from alternative races. That's why I don't want to use that anymore.

Quite understandable, but again, my primary reason for doing it is simplicity, i.e., I don't have to memorize yet another chart. As I noted, I recognize the impact this has on muting the racial modifiers and I accept that small modifier for the sake of PC creation on the altar of simplicity It may not be the preferred method for everyone or anyone other than me, but it certainly works well for me

 

[Sutek]

How about this one. (bare with me)

Every stat has a range of 18 down. You can make the spread anything you like, but I like to be fair in doing this, so everything is "on the evens", so a potential stat range of 18, 16, 14, 12 if there are four players involved.

Each player is assigned 100pts to bid total for all six stats, and each stat is bid on in turn.

Seems interesting for the right group, but what do you do if you have a new player join the group????

Generally, this is for the usual set-up of a normal, established grup, rather than a casual play, flexible group. Either have stand-by pre-gen characters so that "floaters" can come in and out as they want, or have them play key villains (that's always fun!).

 

[Clovenhoof]

FYI,
I think I will propose to my players a 41 point buy, as calculated by user "are".
I made a sample character with this amount and it seems to hit the spot. We'll see how it turns out when players are let loose at it. ^^

 

[Aelric]

I agrre with the use of the roll.I had my players roll 4d6's and drop the lowest.Some guys had some high rolls and some didn't,thats they way the Ice crumbles but for the most part it hasn'r been an issue and they all seem to be enjoying themselves.

 

[Krushnak]

i used the heroic stat generation of 8 +1d10 with the players being able to chop and change their stats how they like. worked out quite well with all having stats well over the crummy 25pts for point buy. i like having the variation in stats cause not everyone is made equal so neither should all pc's be equals.

 

[Evil_Trevor]

I just started an online game here and had to use a point buy system since there would be no way to 'check' rolls. many years ago I did have a guy turn up to a game with a character he had prepared at home earlier with three stats at 18 which he told me he had rolled.

To be even handed I let my players distribute 80 points between thier stats before racial and level bonuses applied. This does not seem to open to abuse when you are playing with people 'virtualy' as opposed to a real life game.

One thing I did do once was to offer my players a gamble, either use points or roll dice, but if the dice rolls were poorer than the points buy they were stuck with the roll.

They had 100 points to build a character, they could roll 3d6 which gives a bell curve, if they got an avarge result (11-12) they got 100 points, for every step above (13-14,15-16,17,18) they got +10 points (max +40 for 18) but for each step below they lost 10 points 9-10 =90 points, 7-8 =80 5-6=70 3-4=60 only one player took the risk and got +10 points!

 

[tneva82]

I just started an online game here and had to use a point buy system since there would be no way to 'check' rolls.

One method: IRC+dicebot.

GM and players gather in IRC channel, bot does the handling. No cheating possible.

Alternative: Download program called Vassal. It's program for playing various games online and does job of IRC+dicebot(incase you don't have dicebot or don't know how to set it up).

Problem comes mainly if players are set up in so different time zones that there simply isn't time for GM and players to be available at same time(and of course it's going to take a while to set up) but if that can be sorted out you get benefits of rolling without possibility of cheating(and I prefer rolling any day over point buy).

Just a suggestion

 

[slaughterj]

I just started an online game here and had to use a point buy system since there would be no way to 'check' rolls.

Check out the die-roller on online-roleplaying.net, if a player tries to edit the roll, an error is revealed, so you know there was cheating.

They had 100 points to build a character, they could roll 3d6 which gives a bell curve, if they got an avarge result (11-12)

An average result would be 10-11, not 11-12, hope nobody got screwed!