YMMV

Quote from: Hairfoot;301759Your experience can't be generalised to cover everyone else's.  

Maybe so. But you demonstrate that by describing your different experiences.

Tell us about the awesomely interesting characters even unimaginative players were able to create with entirely point-buy systems in game sessions you've been in.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;301765Maybe so. But you demonstrate that by describing your different experiences.

Tell us about the awesomely interesting characters even unimaginative players were able to create with entirely point-buy systems in game sessions you've been in.

Either of us may represent the majority.  There's no way of knowing.

You didn't mention unimaginative players.  You said imaginative players make better characters without point-buy.

Don't ask me to contest an argument you never made.

Okay, so you have no experiences to back up your claims. That's okay. We know we can ignore what you say.

I do. I've played and run GURPS for years, an entirely point-buy system. Most of the characters were boring and had no background or personality. Players usually reverted to their favourite cliches, like being a horny wrestler and so on. Most commonly, the character was just the player in personality.

The characters created with other systems by random roll such as Classic Traveller, the player couldn't revert to their favourite cliches, nor could they imagine the character as themselves, they had to choose something else. So the random rolling helped unimaginative players create more interesting characters than they would have otherwise, and the imaginative players really shone.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;301767Okay, so you have no experiences to back up your claims. That's okay. We know we can ignore what you say.

Ah, the Henry Kissinger strategy: declare victory and retreat.

If you want to do some chest beating, let's not bother comparing gaming experience, and cut to the chase with dick measurements.  13 inches!  Woo!

I just hate point buy because I like the characters to have different stats. It is nice when the spread isn't 18 13 13 13 13 10 for every character.

I think point buy was invented for people that cheat on die rolls. I think point buy is perfect for them.

I have to say that I agree with Kyle's point here, in general terms. Of course there can be exceptions, but usually he's right. Random chargen is just that, random. Sometimes you'll have awesome characters, sometimes mediocre ones, sometimes weak ones; but the results, from not being meticulously micromanaged, are likely to tend toward the unusual.
And it is usually much faster than point-buy.

Point buy, as well as being slower, tends towards creating characters that are above all uninteresting. I certainly don't think I've ever seen anyone create a sub-par character intentionally with point-buy, and its pretty much impossible to create a really superior character with it, though players will certainly spend HOURS trying to.

RPGPundit

Oh, I lament the elimination of randomness as much as anyone.  I opted out of D&D because the structural character-building became more of a focus than the actual playing.

Point-buy is one part of that, and there are decent arguments for and against, but currently I'm enjoying watching Kyle lose his shit just because someone doesn't accept his opinion as the Last Word.

I'm still waiting for his dick measurement. 13 inches, dude, thir-teen.

Point Buy is okay, but tends to be too damn slow.

Combine that with a lethal rules-set (such as Aces & Eights, which has a lot of PB options), and you really disincentivize me from wanting to run or play your game.

Quote from: Hairfoot;301769Ah, the Henry Kissinger strategy: declare victory and retreat.

It's not a "retreat" when I hold onto the position, and present evidence of experience to justify it.

Of course you may argue that experience means nothing, since everyone has different experiences. But then there is no sense in having conversations at all, since we have nothing to learn from each-other's experiences. If you think we can learn nothing from conversations with one another, then you have no reason to be on a discussion forum, so shut the fuck up.

I think that everyone can speak from experience, but some people's experiences are deeper and/or broader than other's. We demonstrate that experience by describing it.

I think as I do based on my experiences, which are that random roll characters may be interesting, or may be boring; but point-buy characters are usually boring. I'll go for possible success over almost certain failure any day.

When we point-buy, we naturally go for minimaxed characters, or turn to a single familiar and comfortable cliche. When we random-roll, we're sometimes forced out of our comfort zone and try something new. Sometimes it works well, sometimes it doesn't; it is in any case more interesting. With some players, random roll can mean feeling less attached to the character, "if they die I'll roll up another." Whereas if you spent hours creating it, you're more likely to be attached. So there's that against it.

If your experiences are different, describe them for us, so we can learn from each-other. Or shut up.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;301782If your experiences are different, describe them for us, so we can learn from each-other. Or shut up.

I go for option C: not comparing dicks and not shutting up.  I could describe my experiences, but you'll simply discount them, in the belief that yours are more significant because they're yours.

I agree with you 100% on the flight to cliches instead of well-developed and original characters, but point-buy is the least-contributing factor to that trend.

This is a very odd subject to get so wound up about.  It's obvious that you're trying to build this up into a serious issue so that we'll forget you went ape-shit because I regard your opinion as just an opinion, and not a fundamental cosmic law.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;301767Players usually reverted to their favourite cliches, like being a horny wrestler and so on. Most commonly, the character was just the player in personality.

Your gaming group is made of horny wrestlers?

As I mentioned in another thread, point buy has been outlawed in our D&D game, and I'm running 4E.  My group refuses to use point buy, because they said something along the lines of, "We'd much rather roll them up and see what happens."

I was perfectly fine with that.  After all, I like seeing the guy who normally plays a sweaty barbarian type trying his hand at the Avenger class, and my wife who love arcane casters giving Druid a go.  

We use 4d6, drop low, and roll them in order.  Only then do people start thinking about what they'll be playing.  It's lead to some interesting characters, and to some people expanding their comfort zones for what they like to play.  In my book, that's a success.  

I'm not saying that this could never happen with a point buy system, but I can say that were it not for our rolling rules, my wife would be playing a cookie-cutter Wizard right now.  After all, I had to hear about how much she'd rather be playing a wizard for the first few days after our character creation session.

Quote from: jswa;301787Your gaming group is made of horny wrestlers?

Luckily, no. But that was a cliche one particular player kept returning to. After a few campaigns with horny wrestlers, I got very bored with it, and when he asked to join the next campaign, I said, "on condition that you play a different character." He said, "okay!" and stepped on up and created some very interesting characters.

A second player also played the same cliche every time, basically Ash from the Evil Dead series. This, like the horny wrestler, was funny the first couple of times, but after a year or so got boring for me as GM. At the same time as the first guy, I asked this one to do something different. He cracked the shits and quit the group.

In both cases, we were about to use a point-buy system. Had we been using a random roll system, then they would have ended up playing whatever they rolled up, and I wouldn't have had to ask them to change or piss any players off.

Note that in speaking of "random roll", I mean almost everything or everything should be random rolled. If it's just attributes then skill and/or dis/advantage choices make it essentially point-buy. True "random roll" gives you random skills and dis/advantages, too. I think it's wise to have a few extra points to put in if the player decides they can't bear some low stat, or wants to take some low-level skill and make it more formidable.

Sometimes people just want to play what they want to play.

Different strokes for different folks. There is no ONE TRUE WAY, and anyone who says anything otherwise is an idiot.