Quote from: Omega;954726Says you. The lifepaths I've seen were mostly random with maybee some choice tossed in. Maybee not.

Then we're not talking about the same lifepaths, because I've never seen "mostly random" ones.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;954693"LISTEN TO ME ROAR!  WE ARE SO HARDCORE!"  Yeah, no.  And that's the beauty of this hobby, we can all play our way and ignore the tryhards!  Aren't RPGs awesome?

To be fair, the partisanship seen here so far is pretty mild compared to other hobbies I've seen.

Go to any GNU/Linux forum and type the following: "You know, I really like Ubuntu and I think Unity is a great desktop environment."

Then go pop some popcorn, come back, and watch the B-movie horror show of pure, unadulterated nerdrage commence.

Quote from: Tetsubo;954691If someone wants to play Fritz, cool, game on. But no one should be *forced* to play Fritz. Which is what a random system does. A player doesn't get to play the character they *want* to play. They get to play the character fate hands them. That is real life. I don't want to play real life. I want to play high fantasy.

You're talking to the wrong person. I never said anyone should have to play Fritz. I did say I could see one of my players building a Fritz and having fun playing it successfully.

Quote from: noman;954731To be fair, the partisanship seen here so far is pretty mild compared to other hobbies I've seen.

Go to any GNU/Linux forum and type the following: "You know, I really like Ubuntu and I think Unity is a great desktop environment."

Then go pop some popcorn, come back, and watch the B-movie horror show of pure, unadulterated nerdrage commence.

There's certain ways to trigger that here. Most of them involve Storygaming vs Roleplaying discussions. There was a good one over descriptions fairly recently.

Quote from: Tetsubo;954691If someone wants to play Fritz, cool, game on. But no one should be *forced* to play Fritz. Which is what a random system does. A player doesn't get to play the character they *want* to play. They get to play the character fate hands them. That is real life. I don't want to play real life. I want to play high fantasy.

Shopkeeper Rule - problem solved - next?

Quote from: Omega;954711Alot of lifepaths are random though. Cruel heartless random.

Dunno man, I've had Lifepath random gen give me a zero-level character.  Ended up being one of the coolest characters I had.

Quote from: CRKrueger;954739Shopkeeper Rule - problem solved - next?

What is the "Shopkeeper rule"?

All the reasonable people in this thread have been repeating that both point-buy and random-roll (and all variations) are fine. It's a preference thing.

That said, people are explaining their preferences, and that's cool.

Quote from: Tetsubo;954691If someone wants to play Fritz, cool, game on. But no one should be *forced* to play Fritz. Which is what a random system does. A player doesn't get to play the character they *want* to play. They get to play the character fate hands them. That is real life. I don't want to play real life. I want to play high fantasy.

Whether in character generation or in play, the principle of random rolls is that some players are forced to get results that are different than they might want. And some players like accepting the results of random rolls.

Personally, I like random character creation in Traveller and HarnMaster. However, I'm not thrilled with random generation in D&D, mainly because (a) best 3/4d6 and arrange doesn't actually hand give you much inspiration at all, (b) 3d6 in order only gives you a little bit more inspiration, and it is unclear in-game why PCs are different than ordinary guys such that they go zero-to-hero. Also, the superhero games with random roll that I know (MSH and Heroes Unlimited) often resulted in some weird characters that didn't really fit the genre.

Note: Almost no character generation is 100% random - they're generally a mix of some rolls and some choices. Also, lifepaths are one form of possible randomization - Traveller is randomized lifepath, while Burning Wheel is non-random lifepath.

Quote from: Sommerjon;954607Fritz is at -1 for everything he does.  He can't hit Easy DCs half the time.

Why would the rest of the group want to be dragged down by Fritz?

To the rest of the party, Fritz is a righteous Paladin fervent and beloved by his god in a fantasy world where the gods meddle in the affairs of man. By the time the other PCs realize Fritz is a kook, who knows what experiences the party will have encountered with him? THAT is interesting roleplay.

Also, -1 on D20 is -5% on D100. It's not some earth shattering penalty.

In the reverse, the PC with all 13s and +1 to everything is only 10% better than Fritz.

The raw math doesn't support the panic over the numbers.

Quote from: estar;954649In short there is no right answer only what one likes at that moment in time along with the various consequences of the two mechanics.

That's the main issue. There are significant consequences for both methods.

Quote from: Sommerjon;954654Except Fritz isn't bright enough to find these alternatives, nor charismatic enough, nor wise enough, nor strong enough, nor agile enough, nor tough enough.  All he is is a burden on everyone else trying to survive.  He can be a great guy, but he stays at home.

In 3D6 systems, the human average is 10.5. Fritz is slightly below average with his straight 8s.

Also, his INT 8 is based on what? Lack of brains? Lack of education? Lots of bad ideas? That's a conversation for players and GM.

And Fritz thinks he's chosen by his god, he can't stay home when there is a world to save.

Quote from: Tristram Evans;954674Baby Jesus cries every time a character is created through point-buy.

That's one check in the positive column!

Quote from: Christopher Brady;954693"LISTEN TO ME ROAR!  WE ARE SO HARDCORE!"

Wow.

In 2017, the new definition of HARDCORE is the ability to play a character with slightly suboptimal stats without having an emotional meltdown???

Quote from: Christopher Brady;954693Aren't RPGs awesome?

They are!

In fact, they are so awesome most children can play them without collapsing on fainting couches after a random TPK.

Quote from: Tetsubo;954691If someone wants to play Fritz, cool, game on. But no one should be *forced* to play Fritz. Which is what a random system does. A player doesn't get to play the character they *want* to play. They get to play the character fate hands them. That is real life. I don't want to play real life. I want to play high fantasy.

I agree with everything except the part I've bold.  In 'real life' if Fritz REALLY wanted to adventure, he'd train his body to be able to do it.  After all, police officers are trained to carry 9lbs. of gear on their waist, that will increase your strength and constitution.  Same thing with weapon's training, that will build your body.

Quote from: Nexus;954741What is the "Shopkeeper rule"?

It's the convention Omega was talking about, where the GM is encouraged to let the player reroll a truly hapless character.  I call it the Shopkeeper Rule just because it was actually defined in Hackmaster:

QuoteShopkeeper Rule. If your character has no raw single stat of at least 13 or two raw stats of 5 or less, you may name your character and then turn your sheet in to the GM for use as a shopkeeper, peasant or other hapless NPC and re-roll your character. Any other set of rolls is playable; you need to play that character for a complete game session before retiring him and introducing a new one (excepting the always-likely event of early mortality during play, of course).

Quote from: Spinachcat;954761THAT is interesting roleplay.

Why would you want that?

Quote from: Spinachcat;954761Also, -1 on D20 is -5% on D100. It's not some earth shattering penalty.
In the reverse, the PC with all 13s and +1 to everything is only 10% better than Fritz.
The raw math doesn't support the panic over the numbers.

It has nothing to do with math or statistics.  It has to do with people crying because their character isn't the star of the show based on nothing but certain measurements.

Quote from: Spinachcat;954761Wow.

In 2017, the new definition of HARDCORE is the ability to play a character with slightly suboptimal stats without having an emotional meltdown???

To those who never recovered from the horrors of D&D in 5th grade.

Quote from: Spinachcat;954761In fact, they are so awesome most children can play them without collapsing on fainting couches after a random TPK.

Some can, others carry scars for life.

Quote from: CRKrueger;954765It's the convention Omega was talking about, where the GM is encouraged to let the player reroll a truly hapless character.  I call it the Shopkeeper Rule just because it was actually defined in Hackmaster:

I thought that was a good rule they had.

Quote from: CRKrueger;954765It's the convention Omega was talking about, where the GM is encouraged to let the player reroll a truly hapless character.  I call it the Shopkeeper Rule just because it was actually defined in Hackmaster:

I see. Thanks.

Quote from: Black Vulmea;9541661e AD&D did not recommend 3d6 in order, but thank you for the knee-jerk edition bash, fuckwit.

It didn't recommend it, but we still did it and do it.