Stats That Would Never Fly

[Gabriel Stone]

So I was rolling up a new D&D character the other night using 4d6 take away the lowest. Usually when we start a game we roll 4d6, remove the lowest die. We roll about 6 set of stats and keep the set we like.

Single digit abilities are rare, but they happen and most characters end up with at least one 17 or 18 and decent mix of 11-16. It's the style we like.

But I rolled and my first set was 18, 17, 18, 17, 11, 18. One of the best sets I've rolled in a long time. The more I thought about it though the more I realized that while I'd have a character with bad ass stats they really wouldn't be all that fun to play.

I ended up going with: STR 16 - DEX 15 - CON 18 - INT 14 - WIS 12 - CHR 15.

I made him a Knight (PHB II).

[Ravenshire]

See, you just didn't want to be stuck with that aweful "11" with its +0 modifier.

Honestly, if you roll sucky stats, you play 'em. Why not play them when you roll well? Personally, every character can have a story worth telling. Those fortunate enough to be born/created with advantages have their own baggage as well. Their own expectations as well. Its part of the roleplaying process.

[Gabriel Stone]

Busted! My secret's out! It was the 11!

It was actually the concept of playing a guy who could just "do it all" didn't really appeal to me, none of the back story I had created for him could justify stats that high. I could however justify an increase in abilities later in his career once multi-classes.

Had I just been whippin him up with no back story I'd prolly had used them, but now I'll just I'll just tuck em away for a NPC villian, maybe a Knight of the Thorn or Lily... hehehe.

[Alessa Neri]

Eh, even a sextuple 18 never gets you a character that can do it all.

Unless you go Factotum/Chameleon, the classes that were literally made to do it all >_>

Otherwise, someone is always going to be better than you at things, even in your same party. The All 18's wizard still get's less skill points than the 10 Int Rogue, for example and probably hits a lot less often than the 15 Str Barbarian.

Don't misinterpret me, I know why you did it, sometimes you just don't like the stats even if they are awesome, I just tend to like to mold the backstory to the mechanics instead of the other way around, much easier to do. =D

[Mr Fox]

Perhaps an alternative would be to talk to your DM and see if you could bank those numbers. By which I mean keep that good set but start him lower and pick up +1 to a stat every level rather than every 4 until you are back up to the original numbers. That would satisfy your desire to not start out so buff, but still give you the growth to be 'the uber' when you do multiclass later.

[Velvet]

He is the DM, in this case.

[Mr Fox]

Oh, in that case, he'll never get his DM to agree.