"Party Composition and Social Skills"

[PhoneLobster]

Let people start wtih 3-30 or however high you want things to go, and don't have racial modifiers, just say something like "all hill giants need at least 20 strength" and similar stuff.

You do realise that from the perspective of not limiting characters of specific races to narrow annoying stereotype careers you just officially went absolutely no where with that.

Indeed that suggestion seems to go absolutely nowhere from any number perspectives. What exactly DOES it achieve?

[Username17]

What exactly DOES it achieve?

It doesn't mean that everyone can play any archetype. But it does mean that there isn't any race that you're an idiot to not play if you want to be a specific class.

So while it doesn't let you play a hill giant as a good arcane archer (because you'll have a bunch of strength for no good reason), it means that you can play a barbarian that isn't a hill giant, because anyone can have a strength of 20.

-Username17

[PhoneLobster]

because anyone can have a strength of 20

No they can't, his examples were short on it but his actual proposal wasn't just racial Minimums it was racial minimums AND maximums.

Maybe the number of races who can have 20 strength would be higher (maybe) but its not just anyone.

So if you set up the system with many races that cover common and/or large min/max ranges and/or do not set minimum maximums for all attributes then there are maybe a few more race choices for the strength 20 guy than the current system. Because then the definition of the strength twenty guy is no longer "guy with at least +2 Str" its now "Anyone not specifically singled out to be stereotyped as a panty waist"

But if there are few races, and/or they overlap very little (or not at all) on their ranges of min/max attributes then your strength 20 guy is STILL always a hill giant.

Or in short if human guy gets min/max 3-18 on all stats and hill giant guy gets 19-26 on strength then under this system you just went nowhere at all.

Even if human guys strength gets more like 12-18 and hill giant gets 16-22 what is different between that and giving a hill giant +4 strength? Other than it being harder to select the race you want unless you roll arbitrarily high?

I'm really not seeing it be productive there.

EDIT:
Wait, I've just got to spell this out that last way again in more detail.

OK so min/maxing away...
if a humans Min Max were
Stat 1 of 2, (5-10)
Stat 2 of 2, (5-10)

and an elfs stats were
Stat 1 of 2, (7-12)
Stat 2 of 2, (3-8)

How is that different to
Elf, +2 to stat 1 and -2 to stat 2

Other than the bit where you need to roll right to choose the race you want?

[Username17]

You're not following him. RC actually said:

Let people start wtih 3-30 or however high you want things to go, and don't have racial modifiers, just say something like "all hill giants need at least 20 strength" and similar stuff.

There are no maximums for race, only minimums. So none of the races are a required choice for any of the classes. There is no "best choice" for Wizard. While the Gray Elf may have a minimum Intelligence, a human or half orc has the same maximum.

So races might be bad choices if you don't want to pay for a high value. But none of them is the best choice if you do want a high value. And I'm pretty sure this would go hand in hand with eliminating rolling for stats altogether.

-Username17

[PhoneLobster]

There are no maximums for race, only minimums.

I beg to differ.

If ability scores are kept, basically I'd rather have races be a set of minimum and maximum starting values and the basic starting ability score range be extended. So having a certain score which is below or above the min/max ability score range will restrict your race choice.

As far as I can tell that there was his proposal and the hill giant paragraph was just a narrow example which just gave a single partial example using the minimum end of a single stat.

Saying his giant example was a separate proposal where there are no maximums is the same as saying his giant example was a separate proposal where there are no racial minimums on any stat other than strength.

But I'm sure RC can speak for himself.

Still, lets pretend its a minimum only.

This worries me,

So races might be bad choices if you don't want to pay for a high value. But none of them is the best choice if you do want a high value.

How do those two statements exist in such close conjunction and yet pretend to have nothing to do with each other?

Right. So. Only minimums and narrow as hell hey.

Elf, Min 14 Dex.
Flayer, Min 14 Int.

OK I so there is a bad choice If I don't want to pay for a high value. I DON'T want high Dex. Therefore Elf is a bad choice. First statement proven.

Now I DO want a high value, I want high Dex so according to statement two NONE of the options is a bestchoice... except that the flayer is now a bad choice because I am forced to spend points, good rolls or whatever on Int, reducing my ability to buy Dex. Bam. Elf is a best choice.

When the resources come from the same pool wanting a high stat is identical to wanting not to pay for other high stats.

Every race is probably going to have at least one minimum (if not diverse minimums on every stat).

If you want a high stat then the best choice is the race with the lowest total (or average, depending on stat generation method) of minimums on other attributes, and other races are, to varying degrees, bad choices.

Which can (and probably will) result in wierd shit thats probably counter to the intentions of having these minimums like...

Goblin, Str >3, Dex >3, Con >3, Int >3, Wis >3, Cha >3
Robot, Str>10, Dex>10, Con>10, Int>20, Wis>10, Cha>10
Illithid, Str>3, Dex>3, Con>3, Int>24, Wis>10, Cha>3

...Resulting in the characters most able to invest in Int being the lowly Goblin, the best kid on the block for high Int.

AND he is voted most likely to have maxed out any given attribute of your choice AND most likely to have ALL his attributes right where you want them.

You want average attributes accross the board? The goblin still wins. TWO high stats, well goblin ties with Illithid, but only if you let squid boy choose BOTH your two high stats for you.

And so on.

[Alansmithee]

1122439495[/unixtime]]

1122274704[/unixtime]]White is always assumed to have the advantage, because they get the first move and hence initiative. So even in chess "character creation" ensures that one side is suboptimal (the side that gets black).

This is so absurd that my mind is boggled.

I played chess competitively for nearly a dozen years (haven't really played seriously or often for about the past 7 or 8 years tho), won state championships, and placed nationally as well. In all that time, about the only people I ever heard gripe about having to play black were the little kids who just learned how to play.

I'm lazy and I like to play black and let the other player put on their plan. It's fun to give them all the rope they need to hang themselves. I have every confidence that when a computer simulation finally gives an exhaustive analysis of chess, the short answer will be that every perfectly played game should end in a draw.

I can't believe you played any sort of competitive chess thinking that. Even a basic understanding of chess would reveal why white has an inherent advantage. The more equal the players, the more advantage goes to white. In the 20th century, only TWICE has black won more than white in a world championship match. But I'm sure this is merely coincidence, right?

[Username17]

Even a system with minimums and maximums has advantages:

point buy: As point buy is currently constructed, racial modifiers give you points iff you want a high value in the stat they get a bonus to. That is, an Elf or halfling pays only 2 points to go to dex 18 from 16, because that's how much it costs to counterbalance their stat penalty and their stat bonus is "free". But with a system of minimums and maximums instead, everyone is going to be made on the same number of points.

Further, a system of minimums and maximums makes a number of things viable. You could, for example, play a Half-Orc Paladin without that being weird. You probably weren't going to pay for a Charisma higher than 16 anyway, so the cap doesn't even matter

Dice Rolling: If you roll for stats it's even better. a Majority of characters don't even have any far extreme stats to worry about, so they could just play as any race and it wouldn't make any difference.

---

The system with just minimums, of course, works even better. Your example with the Ilithid and the Elf is spot on. The thing you're missing is that everyone is getting enough points (or whatever) to have a couple of good stats. So the Elf is only a bad idea if you want Dex as a Dump stat. If Dex is a secondary or tertiary stat you haven't lost anything by being an Elf. Being a Mind Flayer is bad if you want Int for a dump stat. But again, you don't lose anything if some other stat is your prime concern.

People are probably supposed to have a big stat and a couple of medium-high stats, and some mediocre stats, and that means that requiring certain races to put certain stats in as mediocre or even medium-high doesn't meaningfully affect their access to character concepts that have some irrelevent big stat.

Like how in SAME Disgaea, a Manticore starts with Advanced Force. But they also start with enough discretionary abilities that they can fight with Fire Magic and Soft Sell if that's what they want to do.

----

It's not my favorite idea. But it is very similar to the current system and it's way easier to make an unusual character without being suboptimal. It is a flat improvement over the current method of handling ability scores.

-Username17

[Crissa]

I still say there's no reason for races to have insane stats. There's just no reason for it - most of the RP ability of being the big guy comes from being able to carry larger things, and that come from 'large', not from more Strength.

I want room for humans, centaurs, pixies, and avariel.

Sure, there's things some races will synergize better - but there is no reason having all your chips in one pile should make you win always. In fact, it should make you lose more often than not.

As Frank's RGB demonstrated (and he did not mention): You need to be able to make diversity into a strength, not a weakness.

-Crissa

[RandomCasualty]

1122497176[/unixtime]]
Sure, there's things some races will synergize better - but there is no reason having all your chips in one pile should make you win always. In fact, it should make you lose more often than not.

As Frank's RGB demonstrated (and he did not mention): You need to be able to make diversity into a strength, not a weakness.

As long as you've got the D&D stat system, this will pretty much never happen. Ever.

The D&D stat system is pretty much about creating prime requisite stats, moderately important stats and total dump stats that you don't care about. And when you've got a prime requisite stat, it's all about putting all your chips in one pile. To encourage diversity you need to stop people from relying on just one stat for all their actions. As it is now in D&D, fighter types rely on strength for all their attacks, wizards rely on int. Clerics (and druids especially) actually benefit by having a stat that's useful as an attack and a defense.

So long as you've got stats that represent "everything you do offensively" and a bunch of staggered defensive stats that may or may not help in any given situation, youl'l never have any degree of balance.

Strength helps melee attack and damage

Dexterity helps AC and reflex saves.
Con helps damage soak and fort saves.
Wis helps will saves.

Being a defensive specialist with stats is near to impossible in D&D, while being an offensive specialist is painfully easy. If you ever want a balanced game, that's got to change.

[Crissa]

Random, I don't see how your argument faces my point at all.

Wasn't my point, a page ago, that the uses of the stats needed to be balanced first.

The number of stats otherwise is irrelevent.

-Crissa

[Username17]

Wasn't my point, a page ago, that the uses of the stats needed to be balanced first.

The number of stats otherwise is irrelevent.

That's a compelling sounding argument, but it's wrong. Look at the RBY studies closely. Even if three or six stats are exactly balanced against each other, they're all still going to be better than having any mixture at all.

The number of stats is very relevent. It doesn't sound like it should be, but it is. Balancing a six stat system is impossible. And since the original purpose of statistics was to unbalance characters it is entirely possible that the original designers understood that (although that may be giving them too much credit).

You can't balance the stats unless you either add two, subtract two, are make them non numerical. You could combine Strength and Con and combine Wisdom and Charisma. Or you could add Agility and Power. Or you could force people to "tag" two stats as "good" and two stats as being "bad". All of those could work.

But even if you made the uses of Charisma and Wisdom precisely equal to the uses of Intelligence and Dexterity, the stat system would still be unbalanced. Anyone who invests in whatever powers their offense is always going to be better than anyone else is a 6 stat system. Always.

-Username17

[RandomCasualty]

1122459392[/unixtime]]
...Resulting in the characters most able to invest in Int being the lowly Goblin, the best kid on the block for high Int.

It's predicated on the fact that you can't put *all* your points into one stat either. Eventualyl you get to a point where you hit the cap for any one ability score.

So all the points you "save" by not buying dex as a goblin can't all be put into your int.

A basic system would have a number of points you're given along with a cap on ability scores, which is significantly lower than the number of points you're given.

So you might be given 80 points and a cap of 25 for instance.

So the elf, who has to spend a mandatory 11 extra points on dex isn't really all that bad off, since he should already have the 25 he needs for any one abiltiy score to be put to max.

A race with a lot of strict minimums may make it ineligible for the class, however the nice thing about minimums is that they're race contained issues, not global ones. Giving a race a +2 bonus to int automatically makes it the wizard race. It is better than every other race that doesn't have that same ability. By creating that +2 int race, you've just unbalanced your other races.

If you create a crappy race in a minimum system, you've botched that race, but you haven't screwed the system at all. So your giants may be bad wizards if they've got to spend a ton of points on strength and con, but you haven't thrown any existing races out of balance. Nobody ever becomes second best because you just added a race.

At worst, your new race sucks the big one and is unplayable. But that isn't really so bad compared to corrupting all your other material.

[RandomCasualty]

After some thought I think I may have constructed a 6 stat system. Though it is innately the same as the 2 stat system, only each of the two stats is broken into three parts.

Consider stats A-F with three sample characters, each built on 6 points.

Code: Select all

[br]Stats             A   B   C   D  E   F[br]Character I     6   0    0   0   0  0[br]Character II    1   1    1   1   1  1[br]Character III   3   3    0   0   0  0[br]

The key to this system is that everything has to be based on three tests, as opposed to SAME's two tests. So you pick any three different abilities and compare them. Assuming the results of each test are equal in value, you can get a balance.

C:I vs C:II
C:I Attack pattern: ABC, +5 A, -1 B, -1 C, overall +3.
C:II Attack Pattern: BCD, +1 B, +1 C, +1 D, overall +3

C:III vs C:I
C:I attack pattern: ACD, +3 A, +0 C and D, Overall +3
C:III attack pattern: BCD, +3 B, +0 C and D, Overall +3

C:II vs C:III
C:II attack pattern: CDE, +1 C, +1 D, +1 E, overall +3
C:III attack pattern: ABC, +2 A, +2 B, -1 C, overall +3

As long as you use exactly half of your ability scores for any one attack, you can have any even number of ability scores, and all your tests use the same ability score. You dont' have A vs. B tests for instance, any test using A is opposed by the other guys A stat. It seems if you meet those criteria, you can make a balanced system unless there's some flaw in my reasoning here, which there very well might be since I just came up with this after about 10 minutes of thought.

Seemingly the only consequences of adding more abiltiy scores to this model is making a system that is more complex with more wrong choices. In a 1 stat system you dont' have a choice. In a 2 stat system you choose red or blue. In a 4 stat system you can choose two of four colors. In a 6 stat system you choose three of six colors and so on.

Essentially all you're doing is creating variant shades of right and wrong choices. In a one stat system, you're never wrong, but you're never right either. In a two stat system, you're either completely right or completely wrong. In a four stat system you have more shades of right and wrong. Six or Eight stats increases this number significantly. But overall, all the systems seem equally balanced since each system is nothing more than another way of writing a Red/Blue system.

The main reason D&D is flawed is that it is based around ability tests between different attributes. Strength versus dex, Strength versus con, int versus wis, and so on. Doing anything like that immediately puts the advantage to the guy who pools his points into an attack stat, because the attacker chooses the attack type he will use and which of the defenders stats he will target. The attacker says, "I'll use my charm spell which uses my int, and force the opponent to roll a will save to resist, which uses his wis"

That's actually the fundamental imbalance of D&D.

[Username17]

As long as you use exactly half of your ability scores for any one attack, you can have any even number of ability scores, and all your tests use the same ability score. You dont' have A vs. B tests for instance, any test using A is opposed by the other guys A stat. It seems if you meet those criteria, you can make a balanced system unless there's some flaw in my reasoning here, which there very well might be since I just came up with this after about 10 minutes of thought.

That's really only balanced if people can only attack with ABC or DEF. If the option exists for attack pattern BCD, then people get jacked again.

While the guy with his 6 A and his ABC attack looks balanced against everyone you wrote up, imagine instead that he's up against this guy:

A: 0 B: 2 C: 2 D: 2 E: 0 F: 0

The ABC guy attacks at +6, -2, -2; +2 overall.
The BCD guy attacks at +2, +2, +2; +6 overall.

There's no guaranty that the things that people can defend themselves against you with are going to let you defend yourself against them - which means that imbalance is right back in.

Note: it's actually possible for stats to attack each other circularly rather than directly. It would be weird, but it's entirely possible for people to defend against Red with their Blue. This means that Red people would play eggshell/hammer games against each other and Padded Sumo against Blue people. That would be weird, but having Intelligence dodge Dex would work just as well as having Dex dodge Dex and Int dodge Int.

-Username17

[Crissa]

Frank, you missed the point.

In Random's numbers, it didn't matter by how much you defeated your opponent, it matterd that you defeted him at all. Best out of five, so to speak.

Look, stats as they stand aren't balanced, I know this.

[*]STR: +Melee Attack; +Damage
[*]DEX: +Ranged Attack; +AC, Reflex
[*]CON: +HP; Fortitude
[*]INT: +Skills; +Wizard Spells Known/Cast, Attack, Damage; Will
[*]WIS: Perception; Cleric Spells Cast, Attack, Damage
[*]CHA: Sorceror Spells Known/Cast, Attack, Damage

There are skills that use each, but that's really not part of the combat mechanism - noncombat can't balance combat. Looking at the list you should see that there's supposed to be two defense stats to every attack stat... But it doesn't work that way. Dice outsize the defense stats by a huge amount, as K said, no one would notice if we didn't see the numbers.

Fixing a six stat so that it's balanced as per Frank's math? Easy. Make everything into pairs. Break up some of the stats.

[*]STR: +Damage
[*]DEX: +AC
[*]CON: +Attack
[*]INT: +Skills
[*]WIS: Perception
[*]CHA: Magic

[*]Reflex: DEX+WIS
[*]Fortitude: STR+CON
[*]Will: INT+CHA

[*]Static HP per level.
[*]No extra spells from stats.
[*]All casters use CHA as the stat for spells when needed.

Now, there's still tons of things to fix, but the stats now do about the same thing for everyone. Sure, there's 'dump' stats, but Frank wasn't arguing against that - he wanted the single pile to defeat all other piles to go away. Now you need two or three piles, and they're the same piles for everyone. This is just like Frank's 'add a stat' system, in effect.

That's just an example off the top of my head, of course someone else would want to do the math.

-Crissa

[Username17]

No. In RC's math it matters that you defeat opponents by a similar margin to the degree they defeat you. Otherwise it's a setup in which everyone is balanced except that some people are better than you.

And that just isn't going to happen in a six stat system unless you give everyone the ability to see each other's stats and give people twenty different ways to attack people. A man is only balanced against BCD man if he instantly knows to attack in AEF and can do so.

---

And no. Your setup isn't close to balanced. A "magic" character invests in Charisma. A "might" character invests in Strength and Dexterity. An arcane warrior needs to invest in all three. And yet everyone is being defended against the same.

So the wizard hits harder than the barbarian who hits harder than the Arcane Archer. And that's not balanced. It can't be.

It is theoretically impossible for anyone to ever make a setup of six stats that is game balanced without being intractible (as in, the closest thing you can do is have people having twenty different additionatory setups in order to make it into an equivalent of a two-stat system). Really, we've run all these numbers from every direction, and the results are in.

An odd prime factor in the number of used stats is, if the stats are numerically transferable in any way, unbalanced by definition. Offense wins. And offense in this case means whoever gets to choose what stat they personally are rolling against (usually the person who decides whether they are going to throw a knife or cast an ice ray in most systems).

That's not negotiable. There is no setup of six stats that I can't find the degenerate answer to immediately, because it's a solvable problem and I've already solved it for the generic case. Six stats is just like a game of Mancala - it's completely solved and we know who wins. That means it's not even a game anymore.

-Username17

[User3]

1122563229[/unixtime]]It is theoretically impossible for anyone to ever make a setup of six stats that is game balanced without being intractible (as in, the closest thing you can do is have people having twenty different additionatory setups in order to make it into an equivalent of a two-stat system). Really, we've run all these numbers from every direction, and the results are in...

That also assumes a few things, as far as I can tell... namely:

- Magic is as powerful as Might
- +4 in Magic costs the same as +2/+2 in Might
- Characters are using a point buy system to purchase statistics; if characters use a statistic array instead, they may be forced to specialize in one of the two facets, in the case of an arcane archer.
- Strength and Dexterity aren't ever used in Magic
- Magic is as useful in most situations as Might. For example, in close-combat situations, a character with Might should slaughter a character with Magic. In long-distance situations, a character with Magic should slaughter a character with Might. Knowing this, a character with Might will attempt to engineer his encounter to take advantage of his specialties and vice-versa. If close-combat situations come up more often than long-distance situations, Might is clearly the preferrable option.

Now if any of these conditions are betrayed; most notable if magic requires strength or dexterity for attack rolls, then you have a magic-wielder which actually isn't hitting harder than might-wielder. If your arcane warrior trades in weakness in might and magic for the added versatility of working in both close-combat and ranged-combat situations, so be it.

---

Now, the main problem I see with Crissa's proposal is that the non-combat stats (Int and Wis) are tossed in with the combat stats (the rest). This means somebody can absolutely suck in combat situations and own the game in non-combat situations. He's going to wander off and play SSBM whenever the party's fighting anybody, while the rest of the group has a tourney whenever they're not in combat.

[RandomCasualty]

1122533043[/unixtime]]

While the guy with his 6 A and his ABC attack looks balanced against everyone you wrote up, imagine instead that he's up against this guy:

A: 0 B: 2 C: 2 D: 2 E: 0 F: 0

The ABC guy attacks at +6, -2, -2; +2 overall.
The BCD guy attacks at +2, +2, +2; +6 overall.

Well against BCD, the ABC guy would attack with AEF for +6/+0/+0, overall +6.
Choosing the right attack pattern is going to get you the max value equal to the other guy. That's where the choice element comes in.

From a system standpoint you can choose any attack pattern you want, it isn't fixed. The attack patterns I chose for each character were the optimal patterns. And I think you will break even against an opponent if you choose the optimal pattern.

In actual game terms each attack pattern will be represeted by some ability. So fireball might BCE or lightning bolt may be ABC or whatever. So you may be boned in one fight because you're lacking a given attack pattern that you need to get an optimal result. But generally the abilities section of the game is supposed to be unbalanced anyway. Now the more stats you have, the more important it is to have different abilities which attack different stats.

The one advantage that you gain from putting all your points in one area is that it takes away some of your guesswork. If you put all your points into A for instance, you know that A is going to be part of your attack pattern. Which leaves only two more choices. So you're a lot better at attacking people.

On defending however, the other side just has to choose not A and they automatically have an optimal attack pattern. So you're also a lot easier to attack.

As far as I can tell the model seems balanced, I haven't been able to break it thus far. For any two characters, the optimal attack patterns are always even.

Note: it's actually possible for stats to attack each other circularly rather than directly. It would be weird, but it's entirely possible for people to defend against Red with their Blue. This means that Red people would play eggshell/hammer games against each other and Padded Sumo against Blue people. That would be weird, but having Intelligence dodge Dex would work just as well as having Dex dodge Dex and Int dodge Int.

Possibly, though Im' curious how a 4+ stat system would work with a circular pattern. It seems that the defense stat would get boned, but I could be wrong.

[Crissa]

Frank, of course, was assuming that Attack and Damage from spells was from one stat again... Which I didn't specify.

Are we wed to a system which is AC vs physical damage, then three saves vs magic damage? Why?

Why can't skills affect attacks and perception affect combat?

-Crissa

[RandomCasualty]

1122537983[/unixtime]] Sure, there's 'dump' stats, but Frank wasn't arguing against that

-Crissa

Dump stats can never work with open multiclassing.

If you have a dump stat, that means that one stat is useful for only a set of classes and useless to another set. So if you're a fighter you may have cha as a dump stat. If you're a wizard you may have str or dex, but if you're a fighter/wizard you don't have one at all. There's no way to balance that because it means fighter mages just plain get screwed.

It's possible to have dump stats in a single classed game, but you can't have some people with dump stats and some people who don't have them.

I would actually argue that dump stats are worse than having a stat system which just isn't numerically balanced. So long as the absence of each stat creates some vulnerability in your defenses, the system will at least be partially workable, it may not be balanced, but once you add abilities and tactical combat any system inherently becomes imbalanced. If you can ever say you don't need a stat at all, then you immediately create an irreparable imbalance in the game from the start.

You need to have attacks that will "really screw over someone who dumped charisma" and so forth. If anyone can ever walk away scott free by not taking an attribute, then your system is flawed.

[Username17]

Crissa, I really do want you to get this through your head: it doesn't matter how you arrange the stats. It doesn't matter what you do to them, just the fact that there is an odd prime factor means that it isn't balanced. Regardless of what you do! I know that you don't like set theory or probability analysis or calculus, so you're just going to have to trust me here. No amount of throwing darts at the wall is going to make 6 stats balanced.

Here's the really simple abstract case:

You have two competing ways to do some thing that is going to be opposed by someone else. Maybe it's "attack them", maybe it's "get through check point", it's not actually important. The important thing is that you have two options to put points into. The options could be "stealth and diplomacy" they could be "psionics and gunsmanship", whatever. We are going to talk about them as "Red" and "Blue".

So what makes putting points into Red and Blue at the same time a good idea? The answer is that your opponents will resist Red or Blue to a degree that is sufficiently different that you are overall at least as well off having the ability to use the one which is going to be resisted worse than you would be just being better at the one you are good at.

And what makes putting all your points into Red a good deal? The answer is that overall you are going to be better at Red strategy, so if the bonuses you are getting every time you use it balance out the effective penalties you are taking every time you should have used a Blue strategy (which they will by definition unless Blue is inherently superior to Red), you are pulling ahead.

You got that? Putting all your points into Red is always better than splitting your points between Red and Blue from the standpoint of getting things done. In every system. All the time (even balanced ones like SAME, interestingly enough). And if there are three things or more to distribute points between, this is even more noticeable.

In the case where you have just two options, there will be times when the Red option is better (and thus points spent in Red are better than splitting points), there will be times when the Blue option is better (and thus the points spent into Red are equally worse to spending points in a split fashion as they are better in the previous option), and there will be times in which both options are equally valid - and here spending more points into Red is better! So the times when the Red option is better cancel with the presumably equal amount of times when the Blue option is better, and every time it doesn't matter counts in favor of focused character. And every instance where a Yellow or White option is best counts as time when it doesn't matter whether Red or Blue is better in this case.

So even in the binary case, focusing is better. In the trinary case, focusing is better. In the pentiary case, focusing is better still. And so on without limit.

And yet, I've said that SAME is balanced. And I believe it. And you know why that is? Because of the case when you are resisting, rather than choosing a course of action which will be resisted. On the defense, there is the case where someone has only Red (in which case Red defense is better), there is the case where someone has only Blue (in which case, Split Defense is better), and there is the case where it doesn't really matter to them which one they use (in which case, split defense is better).

In a binary system, you can arrange the fact that split defenses is better and focused attacks is better into an overall balanced system by tying attacks and defenses to the same stat. Since attacks and defenses will presumably come in equal numbers (by definition), excelling at one or the other should balance out in the end.

And can you do that with 3 stats (or 6? or 9)? Of course not! In the situation with three defenses, you actually aren't any better off spreading yourself out relative to when things are binary - but focusing your attack has become a better deal relatively. So tying offense to defense doesn't balance things. And then there's just nothing you can do. Putting more points into the Red option is just better than wasting some of your points on the Yellow or the Blue.

Period. Nothing you can say or do will change this basic fact. It doesn't matter whether you make melee and magic use the same number of stats - the fact is that it will never ever be a good idea in a non-binary system to invest in Might and Magic. It just can't be done.

I'm not just being defeatist, this is mathematical fact. It's as if you were trying to find a prime number between 5 and 7 or make a 2 dimensional map that can't be colored with only four colors. It doesn't matter how much it seems like there ought to be a way to do it - there isn't.

Splitting your options is better if you don't choose which option you use. Focusing your options is better if you do choose which option to employ. In a binary system it is possible to make the superiorities of these two strategies equal and opposite, thereby cancelling. With a non-2 prime factor this is no longer possible. Therefore focusing or splitting will be better. Period.

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Possibly, though Im' curious how a 4+ stat system would work with a circular pattern.

About the same way as SAME, except that the defenses would be split. So you'd have a game of psionic spies. Like Psiops. Now in this game, people who are observent have an easy time hitting people with guns and have an easy time seeing through illusions. Meanwhile, people with good intuition are good at projecting illusions that are natural, and good at dodging bullets. Further, people with good Conviction are good at dominating peoples' minds and remaining concious while filled with bullet holes. Nonchalant people are harder to overwhelm with mental attacks and shoot people in more deadly places.

It's the COIN system (Conviction, Observation, Intuition, Nonchalance). It's one in which if you are gunman, you have an easier time killing other gunmen and if you are a psyker you have an easier time killing other psykers. You can do that sort of thing if you want.

-Username17

[RandomCasualty]

There is one complication to the mixed versus monocolor debate, and it is not one of math at all, but rather one of game theory and the value of deception.

It has already been shown that in the 2 stat system, in SAME and in my 6 stat system that if you choose the right type of attack, you will be equal to the other guy if he chooses the right attack.

The question of balance now falls into the realm of choice. The important question being, "Who is more likely to choose the correct choice?" Lets use Red/Blue as an easy frame of reference. You have three basic types of characters:

MonoRed: Most/all points in Red
mixed: Points about evenly split
MonoBlue: Most/all points in blue.

Now, Monocolors have a very easy choice. Based on numeric distribution probabilities, it is almost always the case that attacking with their color is the correct decision. The only time when it is the incorrect decision is if the creature is more monored or monoblue than you are monored or monoblue, which is going to be rare.

A mixed character has a problem however. Assuming you know nothing of the creature you're attacking, your choice is at best a 50/50 coin flip. Thus 50% of the time you will be choosing right and 50% of the time you will be choosing wrong. A monocolor who always chooses his color will however be choosing correctly against you 100% of the time. This places you at a significant disadvantage.

This means that focused characters are slightly better because they are much more resistant to deception than mixed characters. The fact is that mixed characters will be faced constantly with difficult decisions, and focused characters will constantly have easy decisions. Knowing your enemy's point distribution balances this, but in an RPG it's pretty safe to assume that you won't always know what you're fighting and at some point you will be put to a decision. It can also be shown that monocolors will much more frequently make the correct decision than split characters.

Regardless of what you do I think focused characters will always have small advantages.

[Username17]

Yes, the advantages of deception are greater when you are monocolor. However, the disadvantages of uncertainty are larger.

Remember, while we play a fight until we win, we play the game until we lose. Big chances big prizes is ultimately a bad thing for players.

So to a very real degree, SAME encourages players to diversify stats and NPCs to specialize them. NPCs are going to show up once, so they gain the maximum benefit possible from deception. PCs stay in the game until something extraordinary happens to make them drop out - and that means that they benefit the most from a setup that gives them less extreme results.

-Username17

[Crissa]

Stats aren't trumps - it doesn't matter how much you beat someone with your Attack over their Defense if you also then have Damage and Mitigation.

Which is, by the way, how D&D does it: You have your Attack (BAB, Spells), vs their Defense (AC) and your Damage vs their Mitigation (Saves, HP). Most spells skip the Defense layer, but there's no reason for them to do so.

This gives more ways to deal with it than single stat vs stat combat: Which is far less balanced, in my opinion.

I'm much more open to your other thread, though.

-Crissa

[Murtak]

Which is, by the way, how D&D does it: You have your Attack (BAB, Spells), vs their Defense (AC) and your Damage vs their Mitigation (Saves, HP). Most spells skip the Defense layer, but there's no reason for them to do so.

This gives more ways to deal with it than single stat vs stat combat: Which is far less balanced, in my opinion.

So how does physical combat in DnD differ from a stat vs stat system? Strength vs Dexterity sounds pretty much like stat vs stat to me.

As for balance: what is unbalanced in a stat vs stat system? I could understand labeling it boring, but unbalanced? I can not think of a more balanced system.