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Author Topic: Rolling stats always leads to bad games  (Read 1233 times)

  • Youngling
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Rolling stats always leads to bad games
« on: February 02, 2023, 02:41:57 pm »
Prove me wrong

Anyway, once again I'm in a position of not joining a game because of stats that just aren't workable (mainly a 7 that I couldn't fit anywhere and a ton of 12s when the system wants 13s).  It seems to be an ongoing thing with EVERY saga game I join that one player ends up with god tier stats and the rest are just following them around.  I always try to talk the gms out of allowing any stat rolls (even when I roll well), instead opting for a point buy (28-32) or an array (standard+), even stupidly strong ones (I love me some order 66 point buy).  But yeah, it's getting super frustrating that I'm on my 3rd game I had to not join due to Fing rolling stats.  The fact that they even included it in the core book is...well, just bad game design.
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Re: Rolling stats always leads to bad games
« Reply #1 on: February 02, 2023, 03:37:55 pm »
You might have a hard time finding people here who'll try to convince you otherwise.  I know I've had a history of coming down on "rolled stats" especially when they come with a dose "help me build a X because I'm afraid I'll make a weak character" yet they show stats that equate to more than 50 points and don't have any scores that are below the 4d6 average.  If you asked on the r/rpg subreddit you'll likely get many more takers.


While it's impossible to PROVE and I'm no fan of rolled stat some people think it's great to play with overpowered characters that they can pretend aren't overpowered.  "Yeah, my 10th level character just soloed Vader; yeah my character was 100% legal although I happened to get really lucky rolling stats and ended up the three 18s and nothing below 14."  The "ALWAYS" is a bit too much so simply having people who seem to enjoy that kind of absurd gameplay exist I guess that may prove it wrong.

While I see rolling as the excuse for justifying super stats there are some who'll try to claim "I have to roll stats because if I don't I only can create a boring cookie-cutter character!"  Of course if I suggest I can let them roll for four stats and then remove the point equivalent of those scores from the 28 points I'd let them use to buy stats and spend the remaining points for the last two stats (randomly divided if necessary) they never really seem to appreciate that.

Suggesting how rolling often leads to imbalance in the party where you could potentially have two players who want to do the same concept but one is automatically screwed over by stats compared to the other often gets dismissed as well.  "We'll have everyone roll stats and then just 'pick one array' that everyone can use," is an all too common reply to that but looking at how that rolls that just means more stronger than expected characters as you're now picking arrays from multiple rolls so you certainly should see one that is above average.

As for why rolling stats is even in the books: LEGACY.  Stats were rolled in the first editions of DnD and good luck breaking that cycle.  Never mind that how the game is played has changed.
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  • Padawan
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Re: Rolling stats always leads to bad games
« Reply #2 on: February 04, 2023, 07:26:27 pm »
Joining the choir here, I never accept rolled stats in my SAGA games, and yes, the fact that they included it in the core book is a legacy thing. Perhaps so many people have grown so accustomed to rolling stats that they might not consider any other option, even if it objectively leads to worse games.

Rolling stats would be okay in A) a game in which stats don't actually matter that much (like the very first versions of D&D) or B) a game where the life expectancy of characters is very short (like Call of Cthulhu). SAGA is neither, so I fail to see the fun in a long campaign where some players get severely punished and others plentily rewarded for something that they rolled during the first session.

(I don't actually like rolled HP, either, and this is pretty much my only complaint in SAGA. I've houseruled it so that if a PC rolls less than the average of the die rounded up, they get the average of the die rounded up. If you roll more than that, you keep your roll. This keeps a random element in the roll but softens the impact of a bad roll. I balance this slight increase of power for the PCs by not using Destiny Points.)

There is one exception though, where we went with rolled stats and it turned out fine. That is playing with young kids. When they created characters, they were too young to use and optimize with the point buy system, so I let them roll for stats (which they liked very much). As it happened, both rolled better than average results, and one rolled slightly better than the other. But because of their age, they don't percieve game balance issues that well - the focus of the game is in other things. They've never complained about it, and it hasn't been a problem for me as a GM either. But come to think of it now, if one would have rolled really well and the other really poorly, they WOULD have noticed it and it would have turned sour. Ah, well. Guess it's not a good method for kids, either (the standard array might have been the best choice for them).

So... Just Say No!
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Re: Rolling stats always leads to bad games
« Reply #3 on: February 06, 2023, 11:15:03 am »
Sort and simple, I have been on both sides of rolling stats.  Had an 2nd level elf rogue in my first DnD ever (3.0) and I could beat both the ranger and the cleric (both level 2s) in a fight because my stats were so much better.  And had games where I felt useless because of rolling low.

I much prefer point buy because, even though it may feel a bit "samey" and not as random, I think it's more fun to make sure each player gets what he can and wants out of a system.
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Re: Rolling stats always leads to bad games
« Reply #4 on: April 21, 2023, 01:52:07 am »
I remember playing in a campaign in DnD 3.5 as a Rouge/Wizard/Fighter/SpellBlade/WarShaper. SpellBlade may be called something similar, a bit unsure on that. The reason was that I had to roll stats. I rolled 3 sets. Two of those was so bad that a Non-Heroic character would think it was bad. So I took my last set of rolls. Something like 17,17, 15, 15, 14, 12. That was so much better than everyone else that it was ridiculous. Even gimping my character with muli-classing I was dominant. I made the best of it, but it would actually have been more fun with lower stats. The GM did not let me lower any stats...
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