Quote from: Mishihari on September 28, 2021, 09:18:55 PM

Quote from: Chris24601 on September 28, 2021, 05:08:02 PM

Quote from: Ghostmaker on September 28, 2021, 11:11:09 AM
The problem isn't 'Jane has a female PC with 18 Strength', per se.

The problem is that certain people want the bell curves to match, when they don't. There will never be as many women with 18 Str as there will be men.

In the general population, no.

But we don't care about the distribution of the general population, we care about the distribution in the population of adventurers.

Actually, no, at least when you say "we."  I've always considered the 3-18 spread to represent the entire population.  Strength is the only ability score with a solid realistic metric, and it seems to be a not-too-awful representation of the real human population.  Yes, there's problems, whatever, it's been discussed to death, but the approximate range and distribution is not awful.  If I was to consider the reasonable range of strength for an adventurer, I'd think the minimum would be significantly above the actual human average: it's kind of dumb to step into a dungeon without being strong enough to defend yourself.

And I really like the idea that you don't have to be special to become a (N/)PC.  My preferred approach is that the difference between a classed character and an unclassed one is just that the classed one had the bravery and gumption to step up and do something heroic.  With this approach it makes a lot of sense to use a realistic distribution rather than assume that classed characters have special stats.

Greetings!

Good points, Mishihari! I acknowledge the mythical heritage and roots of much of the foundations of the D&D game--there is some merit to such an angle, after all--however, I'm always reminded of so many examples through *history* of extraordinary characters arising from nowhere, from entirely obscure, humble, and ordinary backgrounds. Such ordinary characters--farmers and blacksmiths, common soldiers, down-and-out scholars and monks--even impoverished bandits!--emerge to do great deeds, and forge genuinely epic destinies.

Off the top of my head, from recent reading, I think his name was Huang-Jo. He came from a poor peasant background, and became a Buddhist monk, wandering the land, begging and poor--for a good number of years. Then he became an outlaw, bandit, and adventurer. For years he fought and struggled against the ruling Yuan Empire--and became a feared Bandit Warlord. Eventually, great city councils in rebellion to the Yuan Empire (The Mongol Dominion)--appointed Huang-Jo to be their leading General, and Commander of great armies. Huang-Jo led the armies of the rebel forces, and defeated the Yuan Emperor, and liberated China from Mongolian rule. Huang-Jo was elected to be the new Emperor of China. During these momentous weeks of victory, it had been dark and raining constantly. On the morning that Huang-Jo agreed to sit upon the throne as the Emperor, fortuitously, the dark clouds swiftly cleared, and bright, dazzling sunlight shown down, immediately uplifting everyone's spirits and morale. Huang-Jo became the first emperor of the Ming Dynasty, which endured for centuries. Huang-Jo was heralded with a new magnificent title--"The Bringer of Light".

Emperor Huang-Jo went on to rule the empire for many years, led massive armies into battle, and built enormous fortresses everywhere. The great palace fortress in Beijing today was built by the first Ming Emperor. Huang-Jo proceeded to strengthen the Chinese Empire immensely, and transformed all of China forever.

Quite a life for a poor peasant raised in a mud hut, eating bowls of rice.

I think it is good and appropriate that D&D abilities are a regular spread amongst normal human potential. I tend to like the long traditions of heroes being made, not born. Furthermore, D&D characters generally are best suited representing *heroes*--rather than *superheroes*. The idea of special stats just for Player Characters and a different set for all the unwashed masses, ehh. I'm nt in favour of that. The Player Characters get blessed plenty by being able to rise continuously in class level, while most NPC's remain relatively modest in level, hit points, and other abilities. I still like Player Characters to maintain a foundation linked to the mundane world and somewhat ordinary, regular people.

Official Court scholars wrote of the mighty emperor Huang-Jo that he remained coarse, suspicious, absolutely ruthless and brutal, and always remembered his peasant upbringing. Huang-Jo, they said, always fiercely championed whatever was good for *all* of the people--but had a fondness for ordinary, common people.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

Quote from: rytrasmi on September 28, 2021, 07:32:16 PM
Out of 100 real life women, you might find 1-2 with 16+ STR. Then, out of 100 men, you might get 5-8 who have 16+ STR.

IRL it's hundreds to one at least. IRL you don't need STR 16+ to be an effective warrior or an adventurer, though.

I rather miss GMing 1e AD&D or OSRIC with the Weapon Spec rules, where a Fighter just needs STR 9+ and can get +3 to hit & damage (& ATT 3/2) with their chosen double-spec'd weapon; Red Sonja doesn't need Conan's STR to be an effective warrior.

Quote from: Shasarak on September 28, 2021, 05:06:01 PM
That sounds like something that someone who thinks a Katana can not cut through a Tank would say.

"Chainguns always win!"

Quote from: S'monIRL you don't need STR 16+ to be an effective warrior or an adventurer, though.

Nor in a properly-run game of AD&D1e.

Quote from: rytrasmi on September 28, 2021, 07:32:16 PM
People get too hung up on numerical attributes. Some people even call them stats, which is silly. Stats is short for statistics. You can't have statistics unless you have a significant population, such as at least 100 or so individuals.

Out of 100 real life women, you might find 1-2 with 16+ STR. Then, out of 100 men, you might get 5-8 who have 16+ STR. Chance of rolling 16+ on 3d6? Ten in 216. You will have to encounter 400+ characters before a bias towards overly strong females characters registers statistically. In a party of five schmucks, there's no such thing as statistics. In a campaign that sees a couple dozen PCs and NPCs come and go, again nothing will register as statistically significant. If the chick fighter happens to have 18 STR, then I guess we got that one chick fighter with 18 STR. Lucky us.

Enforcing some kind of statistical limits on attributes only makes sense when you have a population -- not a party and not even 10 parties. There has to be a better way, one that makes more sense for regular games were we are not normally simulating 100+ PCs and NPCs.

Some of you children don't seem to realize that some of us have played or run for literally hundreds of PCs...

Quote from: Eirikrautha on September 29, 2021, 06:52:59 AM

Quote from: rytrasmi on September 28, 2021, 07:32:16 PM
People get too hung up on numerical attributes. Some people even call them stats, which is silly. Stats is short for statistics. You can't have statistics unless you have a significant population, such as at least 100 or so individuals.

Out of 100 real life women, you might find 1-2 with 16+ STR. Then, out of 100 men, you might get 5-8 who have 16+ STR. Chance of rolling 16+ on 3d6? Ten in 216. You will have to encounter 400+ characters before a bias towards overly strong females characters registers statistically. In a party of five schmucks, there's no such thing as statistics. In a campaign that sees a couple dozen PCs and NPCs come and go, again nothing will register as statistically significant. If the chick fighter happens to have 18 STR, then I guess we got that one chick fighter with 18 STR. Lucky us.

Enforcing some kind of statistical limits on attributes only makes sense when you have a population -- not a party and not even 10 parties. There has to be a better way, one that makes more sense for regular games were we are not normally simulating 100+ PCs and NPCs.

Some of you children don't seem to realize that some of us have played or run for literally hundreds of PCs...

And have the paper graveyard to prove it!

Quote from: Eirikrautha on September 29, 2021, 06:52:59 AM

Quote from: rytrasmi on September 28, 2021, 07:32:16 PM
People get too hung up on numerical attributes. Some people even call them stats, which is silly. Stats is short for statistics. You can't have statistics unless you have a significant population, such as at least 100 or so individuals.

Out of 100 real life women, you might find 1-2 with 16+ STR. Then, out of 100 men, you might get 5-8 who have 16+ STR. Chance of rolling 16+ on 3d6? Ten in 216. You will have to encounter 400+ characters before a bias towards overly strong females characters registers statistically. In a party of five schmucks, there's no such thing as statistics. In a campaign that sees a couple dozen PCs and NPCs come and go, again nothing will register as statistically significant. If the chick fighter happens to have 18 STR, then I guess we got that one chick fighter with 18 STR. Lucky us.

Enforcing some kind of statistical limits on attributes only makes sense when you have a population -- not a party and not even 10 parties. There has to be a better way, one that makes more sense for regular games were we are not normally simulating 100+ PCs and NPCs.

Some of you children don't seem to realize that some of us have played or run for literally hundreds of PCs...

I know this, and being a semi-old fart myself I've run a large number of PCs, too. Curious though, given the number of PCs you've run, did you notice a trend of attribute imbalance from what you might expect (like overly strong female characters)? I have not. I think that's because 1) there's too much noise in the data, which is what I was originally getting at, and 2) the time involved is rather long.

I know a lot of people get attached to numbers and attributes, and a lot of people also treat numbers in these games like a sort of voodoo. (Not saying anyone here specifically.) A 16 is objectively better than a 15, yes, but does that actually matter in play? Well, the modifier might be 1 higher. But how many rolls do you need to make before an extra +1 on a modifier means something? My view is a +1 means almost nothing and most likely gets lost in the noise of your d20 being poorly balanced. A +2 will break through die noise at around 50-70 rolls. That's a lot and I would ask if the typical character lives long enough to make that number of rolls against one attribute? That's like 10 combat encounters.

Quote from: S'mon on September 29, 2021, 02:19:03 AM

Quote from: rytrasmi on September 28, 2021, 07:32:16 PM
Out of 100 real life women, you might find 1-2 with 16+ STR. Then, out of 100 men, you might get 5-8 who have 16+ STR.

IRL it's hundreds to one at least. IRL you don't need STR 16+ to be an effective warrior or an adventurer, though.

I rather miss GMing 1e AD&D or OSRIC with the Weapon Spec rules, where a Fighter just needs STR 9+ and can get +3 to hit & damage (& ATT 3/2) with their chosen double-spec'd weapon; Red Sonja doesn't need Conan's STR to be an effective warrior.

I totally agree.

Quote from: S'mon on September 29, 2021, 02:19:03 AM

Quote from: rytrasmi on September 28, 2021, 07:32:16 PM
Out of 100 real life women, you might find 1-2 with 16+ STR. Then, out of 100 men, you might get 5-8 who have 16+ STR.

IRL it's hundreds to one at least. IRL you don't need STR 16+ to be an effective warrior or an adventurer, though.

I rather miss GMing 1e AD&D or OSRIC with the Weapon Spec rules, where a Fighter just needs STR 9+ and can get +3 to hit & damage (& ATT 3/2) with their chosen double-spec'd weapon; Red Sonja doesn't need Conan's STR to be an effective warrior.

Quite true. 3E kinda messed things up on that score (among other things).

So someone who understands martial combat better than me, would you be so kind as to explain something I've been thinking about?

This strays slightly from the topic of attributes for female characters but hear me out.

The sjdubs want to have the wheelchair/disabled characters. But from what little I understand, how would a fighter in a wheelchair be able to generate the power necessary in a sword or axe blow? Isn't a lot of power generated from stance and hips? Or for that matter, the fluid nature of combat. From a certain position in the wheelchair it wouldn't matter what your strength was right, if you could never generate the momentum?

Is my thinking off?

Quote from: S'mon on September 29, 2021, 02:19:03 AM
IRL it's hundreds to one at least. IRL you don't need STR 16+ to be an effective warrior or an adventurer, though.

I rather miss GMing 1e AD&D or OSRIC with the Weapon Spec rules, where a Fighter just needs STR 9+ and can get +3 to hit & damage (& ATT 3/2) with their chosen double-spec'd weapon; Red Sonja doesn't need Conan's STR to be an effective warrior.

I agree that the men/women strength difference is very significant as you say - and that in real life one doesn't need to be peak strength to be an effective warrior.

On the other hand, I'm not fond of weapon specialization on simulationist grounds. One of my big problems with individual skill-based systems like BRP or GURPS is that it leads to warrior PCs who (for example) are deadly with a longsword but useless with a short sword or club. That doesn't match up to my reading of history. From accounts, it seems like the key skills for a warrior are broad things like keeping one's head in battle, being able to size up an opponent, and being able to take a wound without collapsing.

Quote from: Thorn Drumheller on September 29, 2021, 11:11:23 AM
Is my thinking off?

Probably. 

Can a 6-year-old with a knife kill an aware adult?  If the answer is yes, then size, leverage, and strength aren't the only factors involved in hacking someone apart.

Here's a video of someone in a wheelchair chopping wood.  While I don't think he's going to set a world record, if he can do it, I'm confident that someone in a wheelchair could cleave an orc, too, especially if they had significantly more upper-body strength. 

Outlier thinking... and bad reasoning. But I'll throw you a bone...

A six-year old capable of killing an adult human with knife? Sure. In a FIGHT? 99% of the time - no.

Just because a person in a wheelchair can chop wood - doesn't mean all people in wheelchairs can chop wood.

But let me steel-man you.

I've always held the D&D foundational assumption that PC's are "special people". They're special in the way peak-performers in their various skills and crafts are. Fighters are not just men-at-arms, they're Medieval Spec-Ops, they've been trained to use weapons writ-large. Same is true of the other classes in their respective roles.

I'm into cinematic combat. I'm not particularly interested in HEMA-style combat in most of my games. I'm more into 300. I want YOUR PC to be able to do the Spartan Test and feel awesome. I don't particularly care if you're a female, or a halfling, or gnome - we can narrate around that, as long as we make in contextual.

But that means the system has to also be flexible. In the case of being a paraplegic, contextually, I play Savage Worlds - that's an actual Hindrance you can have. If you purchased the Fighting Skill, and have the capacity to get into combat, yes, you most certainly would be able to cut someone down. But contextually, in the Spartan Test, there are narrative hurdles that matter for me to justify you being out there in a Combat Wheelchair in my games - because they don't exist. Could one be built? Sure. Or some other options - magical healing, a magical Tensers Disc you float around on (which might be more feasible) whatever.

The idea is that IF you wanted to play those things, a good GM will contextualize it for the game they're running - and that could and SHOULD come with the baggage that goes with it. You might spend a whole lot of time in another PC's backpack being lugged around (Fortunately the Savage World's game comes with Edges that would let you do exactly that). Or if you're a female - and you want that 18-strength, you're going to look like a woman with 18 strength. I don't personally care if it's *impossible* for a woman to have that much muscle-mass, if you tell me that you wanna play a woman, and your strength happens to be 18, sure. And you'll pay/gain whatever social rewards that come with it.

I actually had this happen with one of my female players who rolled an 18 strength (18(87) to be exact) - and showed her a picture of Dorian Yates and said - HE does not have an 18(87) strength strictly speaking by military press. She was so grossed out by it she asked to lower her strength to 17. I was perfectly fine with her looking like a hulked-out woman. SHE wasn't.

Again - it's up to you as a GM and what you're aiming for. I'm not into total "realism" - I'm into "what feels right" for the current game I'm running. As long as we can agree on the narrative style and parameters of what these numbers MEAN. If you wanna play looser and say "it's cinematic like Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and your 18 Str. female looks like a twiggy chick that happens to be unnaturally strong... okay.

That's closer to superheroes than what I want in my fantasy. But hey - it's your game.

Quote from: jhkim on September 29, 2021, 11:48:59 AM
On the other hand, I'm not fond of weapon specialization on simulationist grounds. One of my big problems with individual skill-based systems like BRP or GURPS is that it leads to warrior PCs who (for example) are deadly with a longsword but useless with a short sword or club. That doesn't match up to my reading of history. From accounts, it seems like the key skills for a warrior are broad things like keeping one's head in battle, being able to size up an opponent, and being able to take a wound without collapsing.

From my reading and limited understanding gleaned from sports, I'd say a little of column A and a little of column B.  All you say is important.  General footwork is incredibly important.  There are also specific techniques to the weapons, though.  There's a best, or at least better way, to grip each weapon, an angle to hold it, etc.  Heck, you even have different fighting styles with their own placements. 

It's not merely about what would work in real combat too.  It's also about doing it the same way every time so that you know where your weapon is and how it works.  For example, consider sport fencing differences between foil and epee.  Foil is much more regimented and only counts targets on the torso.  Epee accepts targets everywhere.  Epee isn't real combat, but it is closer to real combat than foil.  (To what degree will always be an argument, but it is undeniably closer by some amount.)  The grip and default stance for Italian-style foil takes advantage of the limited target area to give you other options.  You hold an epee like that against a decent opponent with a couple of years of solid training, you lose.  No question. Your hand is hit, touches happen, you lose.  Meanwhile, French-style foil and epee are making slight adjustments with their own pros and cons.  And of course all of them have changed over the years as they've become more about sports and less about dueling or personal defense.

Extrapolate that to real weapons, trying to kill or wound without having the same thing done to you, multiple opponents on each side, yada, yada, yada.  Everything you said starts to matter more, but there are also additional considerations on targeting and placement and options that also multiply.

Even with foil, that practiced technique and placement still matters so much that someone who has gotten a good handle on it routinely beats people more fit, bigger, faster, with longer reach--if that opponents has neglected that one aspect of weapon technique.  In more expressive terms, this is about "making the weapon an extension of your arm".  You know where it is, and you can make it go where you want like it is pointing your finger.  This is also a thing that does degrade quickly if not maintained, which of course is another thing that doesn't model to games very well.

Quote from: Thorn Drumheller on September 29, 2021, 11:11:23 AM
So someone who understands martial combat better than me, would you be so kind as to explain something I've been thinking about?

This strays slightly from the topic of attributes for female characters but hear me out.

The sjdubs want to have the wheelchair/disabled characters. But from what little I understand, how would a fighter in a wheelchair be able to generate the power necessary in a sword or axe blow? Isn't a lot of power generated from stance and hips? Or for that matter, the fluid nature of combat. From a certain position in the wheelchair it wouldn't matter what your strength was right, if you could never generate the momentum?

Is my thinking off?

We're talking about a game where carrying up to 120 lbs. of gear has zero impact on your ability to fight or perform acrobatic moves. With that in mind, I'd say footwork/wheelwork is nothing but fluff.

Quote from: Steven Mitchell on September 29, 2021, 02:39:17 PM

Quote from: jhkim on September 29, 2021, 11:48:59 AM
On the other hand, I'm not fond of weapon specialization on simulationist grounds. One of my big problems with individual skill-based systems like BRP or GURPS is that it leads to warrior PCs who (for example) are deadly with a longsword but useless with a short sword or club. That doesn't match up to my reading of history. From accounts, it seems like the key skills for a warrior are broad things like keeping one's head in battle, being able to size up an opponent, and being able to take a wound without collapsing.

From my reading and limited understanding gleaned from sports, I'd say a little of column A and a little of column B.  All you say is important.  General footwork is incredibly important.  There are also specific techniques to the weapons, though.  There's a best, or at least better way, to grip each weapon, an angle to hold it, etc.  Heck, you even have different fighting styles with their own placements.

Obviously, there are specific weapon skills that do make some difference - but the question is how important are they? In some games, weapon specialization is clearly optimal mechanically, and players will generally use it. But my reading of history is that most warriors - even the best / most famous - weren't particularly specialized in a single weapon.

Quote from: Steven Mitchell on September 29, 2021, 02:39:17 PM
It's not merely about what would work in real combat too.  It's also about doing it the same way every time so that you know where your weapon is and how it works.  For example, consider sport fencing differences between foil and epee.

I think sports isn't a great model for real combat. A sport tests a much more narrow set of skills than real combat, so it makes sense that it will reward specialization more.