Quote from: Sacrosanct;800798My PCs stats are 18, 16, 14, 11, 10, 9, after racial bonuses and using the level 4 stat bump.

We've been playing several sessions as a group, up to about level 5 now.  On Saturday, I happened to notice some of the other character sheets.  One guy has stats of 20, 18, 17, 16, 14, 14.  The other has 18, 17, 15, 15, 13, 13.  I think.  Those 14s and 13s might have been switched, but no matter.  Point is, their stats are way higher than mine.

Damn your stats are better than mine! ;-;

The one with the 20 is kinda fishy, but in a r4k3 its perfectly possible.
So lets break this down. His starting stats were 17, 17 16 15, 12 12, assuming are all playing humans. The other was say 15 16 14 14  12 12 and yours were Id guess 15 15 13 10 9 8.

For the current group I am DMing the paladin, option human, had 16 15 15 12 13 12, the sorcerer, dragonborn, had 8 13 14 11 9 17, and the wizard, mountain dwarf, had 14 10 15 18  17 9 before race additions. All used their level 4 for a feat.

While in my group Jans half-orc fighter got 12 14 9 6 4 14, Kefra got 12, 14, 12, 7, 17, 12 (arranged in reverse order) the freakish thing was that the three 12s were each two 1s and 2 6s... She took wood elf and went Druid. And me playing warlock, option human, 15 12 10 7 8 13 (pretty much in order. Just swapped the 7 and before race bonuses.

Overall you cheated me man! I want a reroll!

In the next dungeoncrawl game I run, there will be no stats!

Players can pay me a $1 for a +1 to any roll.

Negative modifiers will be applied for making any humorous remark that fails to make me laugh.

I call this the "Free Market Equality System"

Quote from: Bren;800924Or they think that there is an objectively wrong way or right way for everyone to play elf games. Which is pretty crazy.

There may not be one right way, but let me assure, there are WRONG ways!!!!!

Personally from observing various groups. Usually no one gives a damn. The rare times I've seen grumbling was when someone noticed a player had several unusually high stats. Usually anything 16 and up. No one cared if Joe had a bunch of 14 and they had a 15 and lots of 10s or worse. or all 12s.

It seems to be the abnormal spikes that attract attention.

I think one of the problems is that with r4k3 some players are expecting still a r3 spread. So the tendency to get good rolls throws them off?

Sacrosanct: Would you have payed as much attention had the other players high stats been less, but more prevalent?

When we were young, I remember people getting upset about other players having characters who were more powerful than them (because of stats, class, level, whatever). It may have been over-involvement in the game, lack of spotlight time, or something else entirely.

In my current groups, no one seems to care. In fact, if one player does something awesome, that's a win for the whole table: I (we?) don't just get fun from seeing my personal character doing something cool.

Quote from: TristramEvans;800929There may not be one right way, but let me assure, there are WRONG ways!!!!!

OK, sure actually killing the players is wrong or at least it's probably illegal in most jurisdictions. But other than edge cases like that which, by the way, absolutely no one is discussing, I'm just not seeing anyone who is suggesting anything even remotely close to something that is wrong for everyone.

I don't care (much) if people want to play games where every PC is as mathematically as close to equal as possible to every other PC. It sounds like a boring as hell exercise in frustration to me, though if the rest of the setting and system sounded interesting I'd be willing to play it for a while. I wouldn't ever want to GM that, but as long as you don't try to make me be the GM what do I care if someone wants to spend their time as a GM trying to balance the PCs out of game. Seems like a waste of energy to me, but then there's stuff I do as a GM out of game that I'm sure some people wouldn't want to do if they were the GM. Strokes. Folks. Different. Etc.

Quote from: jibbajibba;800913Yup none of this matters until it matters.

No one cares what stats other PCs have and yet if I sat down with a 1st level PC with:

20, 19, 18, 18, 18, 18

then you might care.
The point is that that line between caring and not caring might be different for different people but I think there is a line.

If a player showed up with those "randomly" rolled stats then it would be a huge relief. At a glance I could tell that I wouldn't be able to trust that player with jack or shit.

That is useful information.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;800956If a player showed up with those "randomly" rolled stats then it would be a huge relief. At a glance I could tell that I wouldn't be able to trust that player with jack or shit.

That is useful information.

So where is your limit?

20, 19, 16, 16, 12,9

?

Everyone has a fairness band

My fairness band is everyone rolls the same dice the same way right in front of me during chargen.  There's always a "shopkeeper rule" - you have to have at least one 14.

In 5e I was more lenient.  If your random roll didn't meet the total points of the standard array, you could take the standard array.

One 18 and I'd shrugg. It happens. Even an 18 and a 17.
Two 18s is stretching it even for r4h3.

This is of course assuming someone rolled outside of my sight and just brought it in.

It used to be that I'd have looked at a string of 16s as a little suspect. But lately I've been getting those in batches on NPCs and one PC for a different campaign.

Quote from: jibbajibba;800959So where is your limit?

20, 19, 16, 16, 12,9

?

Everyone has a fairness band

Let me reiterate my point, because it seems to be getting lost.  You keep throwing out these values that realistically will never happen.  I.e., sure, I can see some players not being happy if another player shows up with a 20, 19, 18, 18, 16, 14.

But that doesn't happen.  What may happen (again, random rolls result in lower stats as well) is something like 17, 15, 14, 14, 12, 8.

So when you compare the results from actual random roll, compared to the non-random methods, are you expecting me to believe I will feel cheated and gimped compared to the above?  If I didn't even notice the difference in the much larger gap in my OP, I certainly wouldn't notice the more likely result above.

TL;DR: If the basis of your argument as to why random rolling is unfair based on a result that doens't actually every happen, rethink your argument.

3d6 in order, 5 runs:

8, 8, 14, 8, 17, 13
10, 9, 13, 7, 12, 10
10, 10, 9, 12, 9, 15
10, 4, 5, 9, 8, 10
12, 6, 8, 11, 8, 17

I suspect person #4, with a max stat of 10, might feel a little outmatched by ... well, everyone else, particularly #1.

Quote from: Will;8009743d6 in order, 5 runs:

8, 8, 14, 8, 17, 13
10, 9, 13, 7, 12, 10
10, 10, 9, 12, 9, 15
10, 4, 5, 9, 8, 10
12, 6, 8, 11, 8, 17

I suspect person #4, with a max stat of 10, might feel a little outmatched by ... well, everyone else, particularly #1.

Didn't realize 3d6 in order was a method used in 5e.  Or for that matter, the only random method to use.  Or for that matter, widely used by people who prefer random stat gen (some sure, but not the majority by any means).  Or that you'd have point buy/array at the same table where only 3d6 in order was the alternative.

Once again, I find your tactics to be just a bit disengenous.  I shall repeat: if the only examples you can think of to support your argument are those that don't actually occur, you may want to rethink your argument.  Especially since by your own admission you don't even use random rolls, so how would your really know to begin with?

Quote from: jibbajibba;800920I am begining to tire of your lack of basic comprehension.

Read the post. The post is about Random rolled stats so your reference to "impossible unless using random roll" is entirely irrelevant and you always focus on the detail of an example when its just an example. I don't give a shit if the guy could get a much better bonus from this combination of x, y and z.
The discussion is around fairness and the perception of fairness. Some people have a very wide boundary of what is fair and for some people its very narrow.
If you entirely don't care about fairness then you would be entirely happy to roll 3d6 straight for your PC and for me to have all 18s. Most people care about fairness more than that. But for some people the fact that you have an additional +1 bonus over them is unfair. It's a continum. There is no right or wrong. You can't say a total of +3 more bonuses is fair but +4 is unfair. We all have a different tipping point.
A good DM is aware of that and tries to pitch his game so that all the players are happy.

That is all I am saying.

How about this fuck off? I understand perfectly it's you that doesn't and keep putting up more inane crap that most players wouldn't care about (like me) because a decent DM would have made it a non-issue in the first place. As I said before at this point you're just trolling so I'll troll back for the lolz.

Quote from: Will;8009743d6 in order, 5 runs:

8, 8, 14, 8, 17, 13
10, 9, 13, 7, 12, 10
10, 10, 9, 12, 9, 15
10, 4, 5, 9, 8, 10
12, 6, 8, 11, 8, 17

I suspect person #4, with a max stat of 10, might feel a little outmatched by ... well, everyone else, particularly #1.

How would you know? And what DM wouldn't allow for some sort of reroll? Especially if you're using such a restrictive chargen method not even listed as an option in 5e. (Most experienced players would ask or just be Opa and not care). In otherwords it's a situation unlikely to happen in an actual game.