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Hey there, long time Palladium player, though I leave and come back to the system over time.

When I first started playing Palladium, beginning with Robotech back in the day, my group had not come from a AD&D background. We had played Marvel (TSR) before Palladium, and so the 3D6 roll was somewhat new to most of us. Naturally, when one saw that 16+ on an Attribute was the way to go, the emphasis became getting as many Attributes up there as possible.

I know it's widely stated and preferred that players make the characters they want, and no one should be stuck with a lemon character. But, in another vein, the balance of the game seems to drop off* if people continue to drop poor to average Attribute sets. A character who gets moderate boosts to physical attributes, like the Physical Training power-type in Heroes Unlimited is not as potent if everyone is rolling until they ace.

This all being said, and those points being debatable, what I want to bring up is what types of Attribute rolling methods and policies do people use in their own games? I'm ramping up to start running a HU game, so I was curious. To get the ball rolling, I'm going to post some of the methods I have seen our own group use over the years, with perhaps commentary on what I think of them.

Straight 3D6, No Retries: This is the hardcore solution we once used in Rifts. The player rolls 3D6 in front of the GM, assigns them in the order rolled, and the character must be played as is. You don't like the character, find a way for them to die in play. This is, imho, a bad method, and one I think few people use. You end up with very divergent characters from what you may want to play, and encourage people to waste time playing lemons. On the other hand, sometimes you roll very well, and it truly feels like it means something.

3D6, Roll and Place, No Retries: A more common method. 3D6 are rolled 8 times, and then placed as the player wishes in the Attributes. The big down side to this method is people can min-max easily, throwing a low roll in Speed (which is the easiest Attribute to raise in all Palladium games), but this can help with building the right concept. Like the preceding method, people may be stuck with lemon characters they don't really want to play.

Straight or Roll and Place, x Retries: Using Straight or Roll n' Place, but the player gets to re-roll the entire set a certain number of times. This method seems better overall.

Straight or Roll and Place, ∞ Retries: Sit and roll until you get the set you want. The most common method as I see it, and with a noted flaw. This means overall higher stats are gained, which means people begin to expect nothing but above-average characters. Anything below a 10 is "abysmal", and the 11-15 range is considered "mediocre".

Point Buy: We tried this once; you get a certain amount of points, and you spread them across the Attributes on a 1:1 basis. It's not a bad method, but prone to abuse (*cough* Speed *cough*).

Modifications
Worst Player Rolls Sets: Whoever rolls poorest rolls up all the Attributes. This has the benefit of not punishing the worst roller at the table, and giving everyone a level playing field. Though I find people tend to like a character more if they rolled the Attributes themselves.

Roll 4D6, drop lowest die...: We've seen this as an option as far back as AD&D 1st edition. It creates slightly better Attributes overall, and makes for more "heroic" seeming characters, especially if you also Roll n' Place. When a 16+ is scored, I tend to insist people use the 4th die as the "extra die" for exceptional Attributes.

Minimum Scores: This is a common modification. If the Attributes don't average to a certain number, the player is allowed to re-roll the set. I kind of like this rule as it means an exceptional Attribute will throw an average up, meaning a character with lots of lows and a few highs will likely not be cut, but a pure lemon character will be cut.

Anyways, here's the methods we've used in our history. What I'm looking for is less specific merits of this or that theory (ie: if people should play low or high Attribute characters), as this depends on playstyle. What I am hoping to get out of people is methods they use, and why they use them.

[sub]* This is especially true in the modern d20 family games, where so much is derived from your Attributes, such that people are beginning to say that anything below an average of 12 is unplayable![/sub]

Personally I use the 4d6 drop lowest or use it as exceptional bonus. Also I allow a re-roll of a stat set on a case by case basis. This allows a player to get something he is happy with and gives me some semblance of control over any possible munchkinism that may occur.

I used to have my players roll 3d8 with no extra rolls. Now I use the quick attribute tables found in the new Robotech books which have found their way into Dead Reign and will most likely end up being use din other Palladium games.

Roll 4d6, re-rolling ones and arranged as desired.

I do like the new quick roll method though.

I'm your points guy.

In this, I give the players options. I allow the players to choose if they want to roll 4d6 (in the same way as the described above) or divide 85 points around the eight Attributes. 85 points gives an average of 10.6, so the player can't simply average the points across the Attributes. As for min/max-ing, it falls to the GM to limit starting attributes to one at 18 and four at 14. The down-side to this is that if players meet these limits, they have handicapped their character. Points do have the draw-back that the player will take longer to find their character's Attributes, but if they have a clear concept in mind, points get them that character and not some close approximation. The question you have to ask as the GM is: Are they looking for a concept or simply min/max-ing? If the former is true, let them have fun. Should it be the latter, force them to roll for Attributes.

arthurfallz wrote:Straight or Roll and Place, x Retries: Using Straight or Roll n' Place, but the player gets to re-roll the entire set a certain number of times. This method seems better overall.

This is the same method we use rolling straight, if the player really hates the first set often allow them two reroll sets. Alternately, if the stats are close to what the player wants I allow a single stat swap, ie: say PS rolled high but the player wants something more high IQ, switch 'em around.

As for 'crappy' stats, I allow the player to choose between letting them ride without extra penalties, or using the below-average optional rules from the RUE for penalties from the poor stats and added bonuses. The in-game explanation basically being either, over the course of the character's life, he adapted enough to still function about as well as as the average joe in his weak areas, or let them be lax and focus on increasing his strengths instead to compensate.

Since locally, humans where often hardly taken (in a Palladium Setting), due to their abysmal stat line, I allowed races with 3D6's stats to place those rolls, which made Humans more desirable to play as, otherwise it's roll and down the line (our one player with known crap rolls I tend to show some rerolls to, even the other party members don't want someone who's rolled 3-5 on an entire character sheet before draggin'em down).

I find that attributes in a typical Rifts game do not matter at all. I could roll straight 9's and not willingly take a physical skill and be fine in terms of character power, though I might otherwise not qualify for certain classes (which typically demand maybe a 10 or 11 in one or two stats).

That said, no one I play with likes seeing a low attribute, so I offer them the following method;

roll 3d6 for each stat in order (with the exception of certain racial stats for more exotic races).
From here the player can re-roll any one stat.
From here the player may swap any two stats with any other two stats, assuming they were rolled on the same dice.

Because I seperate stats that may be 4d6 +X into 3d6 +1d6 +X and the like, this allows for a fair amount of customization.


Though really none of that matters, as most of the stats can be compensated for within the game.

I run three games.

Power games--Play any OCC/RCC but if you try to tweak the rules I'll tweak you.
4d6-Reroll 1,2's and open Ended 6's. (If you roll an 18 and a 6 on Exp Dice Keep rerolling that last 6 until you hit 30 or don't roll a 6)

Support Games--You aren't the hero but you are supporting them. IE Working with Robot Control, or your are a random grunt Squad in the War on Tolkeen.
4d6 Drop lowest. No Open Ended d6. No reRolls.

Low Power games. -- You aren't anything speical but **** keeps happening to you and your group.
3d6 Placment. No ReRolls. Use the LowPower rules in RUE.

I've also played a Dice Pool.
Everyone gets around a table and rolls w/e I pick from the above rules based on the game.
For Example. Six peple roll 3d6 No Rerolls. Add the Exp Dice if it's 16+ They Do this 8 Times. All of those Rolls are pooled into a Master list.
From there everyone picks up a D6 and rolls it. From there one who rolled the highest Picks a number from the Master List. (Which is always the highest number) and then they pick ClockWise.

Pro's This pervents a bad roller and and good fudger from having a huge gap.
Con's People can get **** because they are use to having all 20's or higher ZOMG Cheaters.

Dog_O_War wrote:I find that attributes in a typical Rifts game do not matter at all. I could roll straight 9's and not willingly take a physical skill and be fine in terms of character power, though I might otherwise not qualify for certain classes (which typically demand maybe a 10 or 11 in one or two stats).

That said, no one I play with likes seeing a low attribute, so I offer them the following method;

roll 3d6 for each stat in order (with the exception of certain racial stats for more exotic races).
From here the player can re-roll any one stat.
From here the player may swap any two stats with any other two stats, assuming they were rolled on the same dice.

Because I seperate stats that may be 4d6 +X into 3d6 +1d6 +X and the like, this allows for a fair amount of customization.


Though really none of that matters, as most of the stats can be compensated for within the game.

I use to ran like this due to the doge rule per GM Guide. However after RUE revampment PP because the Str of DD.

DocBuzzard, Sen-Zar is a game which uses a climbing point-buy system like you describe. I find it works very well.

I think the only time we ever rolled it straight was for our first Robotech PCs, which were our first system PCs as well. Every time after that, no matter who was in the group it has always been roll one die more than required, and reroll ones & twos. Oh, and humans were always allowed to then put their rolls into whatever attribute the player wanted them in.

Some of the methods I've seen used in games that I've played in:

• Roll 4d6, re-rolling all 1s. Drop the lowest die, and place the scores in the order in which you roll them.
• Roll 4d6, re-rolling all 1s. Drop the lowest die, and place the scores wherever you see fit.
• Roll 4d6, re-rolling all 1s. Drop the lowest die. If you are non-human, place the scores in the order you rolled them. If you are human, place them where you see fit. This is most commonly used in AD&D as demi-humans get bonuses to attributes and humans get the shaft.
• Roll 3d6, re-rolling all 1s. Roll x number of sets, taking the best set rolled.
• Roll 3d6, re-rolling all 1s. Roll x number of sets, and take the best roll from each set per attribute.

My favorite method is rolling x number of sets and taking the best set rolled. We usually use 3 sets as we feel that by the time you've reached the 3rd set, you've gotten a pretty good average going through the sets. This also doesn't slow down character creation too much, and it gives us a little flexibility when rolling up characters.

arthurfallz wrote:Worst Player Rolls Sets: Whoever rolls poorest rolls up all the Attributes. This has the benefit of not punishing the worst roller at the table, and giving everyone a level playing field. Though I find people tend to like a character more if they rolled the Attributes themselves.

So am I the only person who came out of this thread realising that the original poster fails probability forever

Rhomphaia wrote:

Rallan wrote:

arthurfallz wrote:Worst Player Rolls Sets: Whoever rolls poorest rolls up all the Attributes. This has the benefit of not punishing the worst roller at the table, and giving everyone a level playing field. Though I find people tend to like a character more if they rolled the Attributes themselves.

So am I the only person who came out of this thread realising that the original poster fails probability forever

To give him some credit, there is a clear ranking at my gaming table when it comes to who rolls the best. It is consistent and does not change. This may be the same for him too.

If everyone's using their own dice, that could be the explanation. Small dice with deep pips (or deeply carved numbers) can have a pretty distinct bias because their weight isn't evenly distributed (you'll notice that really really small six-sided dice with pips tend to give a _lot_ of 6s and not many 1s). And badly moulded dice (especially large polyhedrons like your d12 and d20) can also have a bias.

Alternatively, it could be a cognitive bias on the part of the players. Nobody remembers ordinary rolls, but exceptionally good and bad rolls stick out in everyone's memory. And if everyone thinks that Jim's a really lucky roller, their response to really good rolls by him will be to think that this is just what they expected ("Yep, that's Lucky Jim in action again, he's on another lucky streak"), and their response to really bad rolls by him will be to feel surprised and remember those results as atypical ("Wow that's not like Jim at all, he's normally much better than this" they'll say, remembering the results as "odd" and therefore not to be counted as part of his pattern).

Or alternatively alternatively, some of your players are just better at cheating than the others

Rhomphaia wrote:

Rallan wrote:

Rhomphaia wrote:

Rallan wrote:

arthurfallz wrote:Worst Player Rolls Sets: Whoever rolls poorest rolls up all the Attributes. This has the benefit of not punishing the worst roller at the table, and giving everyone a level playing field. Though I find people tend to like a character more if they rolled the Attributes themselves.

So am I the only person who came out of this thread realising that the original poster fails probability forever

To give him some credit, there is a clear ranking at my gaming table when it comes to who rolls the best. It is consistent and does not change. This may be the same for him too.

If everyone's using their own dice, that could be the explanation. Small dice with deep pips (or deeply carved numbers) can have a pretty distinct bias because their weight isn't evenly distributed (you'll notice that really really small six-sided dice with pips tend to give a _lot_ of 6s and not many 1s). And badly moulded dice (especially large polyhedrons like your d12 and d20) can also have a bias.

Alternatively, it could be a cognitive bias on the part of the players. Nobody remembers ordinary rolls, but exceptionally good and bad rolls stick out in everyone's memory. And if everyone thinks that Jim's a really lucky roller, their response to really good rolls by him will be to think that this is just what they expected ("Yep, that's Lucky Jim in action again, he's on another lucky streak"), and their response to really bad rolls by him will be to feel surprised and remember those results as atypical ("Wow that's not like Jim at all, he's normally much better than this" they'll say, remembering the results as "odd" and therefore not to be counted as part of his pattern).

Or alternatively alternatively, some of your players are just better at cheating than the others

No, no one cheats, so that's not the issue. One player is almost obsessive over using no set of dice in any two consecutive game sessions (she's tends to roll average), another player, described in another thread, just can't seem to roll badly no matter how hard he tries. Another player always uses his newest set and is almost always rolling average-poor. It's not cheating or cognitive bias or anything like that. The only thing I can attribute it to is just plain luck.

Luck is often underappreciated. Especially with a gamers dice. These small polyhedrons are our pride and joy..

While I was living in an area where I had to take a weekend to head to the game shop, I found a D20 that was just calling to me, that I SWORE was going to be my new "lucky" d20 (all of the luck having drained out of my previous lucky d20, because another gamer had reached over and borrowed it- without asking. He ended THAT session by going to the hospital, since I broke his hand).

The NEW "lucky" d20 wouldn't roll higher than 11 for me.. and getting that high was RARE! So, I tossed it to the bottom of the bag, and never touched it again, until one drunken night, when I was playing a human that challenged a dwarf to a drinking contest... 38 natural 20's in a single night, from a single die.

LUCK is one of the greatest things in the world...

Goliath Strongarm wrote:
Luck is often underappreciated. Especially with a gamers dice. These small polyhedrons are our pride and joy..

While I was living in an area where I had to take a weekend to head to the game shop, I found a D20 that was just calling to me, that I SWORE was going to be my new "lucky" d20 (all of the luck having drained out of my previous lucky d20, because another gamer had reached over and borrowed it- without asking. He ended THAT session by going to the hospital, since I broke his hand).

The NEW "lucky" d20 wouldn't roll higher than 11 for me.. and getting that high was RARE! So, I tossed it to the bottom of the bag, and never touched it again, until one drunken night, when I was playing a human that challenged a dwarf to a drinking contest... 38 natural 20's in a single night, from a single die.

LUCK is one of the greatest things in the world...

Probability and and the laws of nature are often underappreciated, especially by people who spend a lot of time playing games of chance without really understanding the math behind them. There's no such thing as lucky dice (although shops that sell magician props will be able to supply you with several kinds of "lucky" dice ). There's no such thing as good luck charms, good luck rituals, or bad luck mistakes. There's no such thing as getting the bad rolls out of your dice or ruining the good luck on your dice.

The one constant is that it's played by people, and we've all got brains that tend to see patterns and trends even where there are none, we tend to remember and overemphasise extraordinary results while forgetting that they're drastically outnumbered by all the ordinary results, and when we get a streak (good or bad) we assume that because it's improbable then our luck must be turning because we unconsciously think that if something highly unlikely happens then there must've been a cause.

I don't mind silly little dice rituals and talking up lucky or unlucky streaks and all the tabletalk that comes with games of chance, but sitting there and having to listen to people talking about it all as if it's real and actually makes a difference is just not something I've got the patience for. It's like having to politely sit through someone's long conversation about what an amazing difference a telephone clairvoyant is making in their life.

The odds of getting nothing but 1s with 40D6 are 13,367,494,538,843,734,067,838,845,976,576 to 1 against. Or around thirteen million trillion trillion to one.

So you'll pardon me if I'm just a little skeptical when someone tells me that they rolled a forty-dice set of snake eyes.

Rhomphaia wrote:

Rallan wrote:The odds of getting nothing but 1s with 40D6 are 13,367,494,538,843,734,067,838,845,976,576 to 1 against. Or around thirteen million trillion trillion to one.

So you'll pardon me if I'm just a little skeptical when someone tells me that they rolled a forty-dice set of snake eyes.

It's second hand, but a reliable source. Hell, one of the two people at that session that told me about it is on record as saying it is absolutely stupid to lie about gaming stuff, so he doesn't do it.

As far as being skeptical, when calculating odds, the math exists in a vacuum. It doesn't take real-world circumstances into account, such as dice bumping each other, house rules involving re-rolling dice that go off the table (which happened to a handful of dice in this roll) and other common circumstances. I am pretty skeptical that the odds, given real-world circumstances, are even a million to one, let alone in the millions of trillions.

Also, your math must be wrong. My ***** has a better chance of spontaneously growing 12 inches than the odds you gave. Are there any second opinions out there?

Meh, dice bumping into each other can be ignored because it's no more likely to favour 1s than any other result. Off-the-table rerolls can be ignored (as long as they're always rerolled) because a die that goes off the table is a die that "hasn't finished rolling" until it gets picked up and thrown again.

And the odds I gave are spot on. The odds of getting all 1s from a 40D6 roll are 1 in 6^40, and six multiplied by itself forty times in a row is an obscenely large number. We're talking the sort of large numbers that you normally only see in Hithchikers Guide when the Heart of Gold does something ridiculously impossible, or in Creationism tracts when Jack Chick is trying to convince us that life couldn't have happened by chance.

Anywise, I'd go with it originally involving way less dice but the amount of dice grew in the telling, or a failure that was pretty spectacular but the proportion of 1s to everything else grew in the telling. Or most likely both.

3d6 Straight down the line. The exception is being IQ. You can either simply take ten on a bad roll or roll again since it is one of the few attributes that can't be increased through skills

A point method I was playing with is using 125 pts the average would be high but for most not high enough so that would lead to lower and lower stats

I think low attributes tells a story in and of themselves about the character, especially in Palladium where you can have skills that increase the attributes, so I don't know what all the fuss about "rolling" is. Low attributes can let you know if the kid was sickly puny, clumsy and the skills can tell you what he did about it. Although I do use a point based system for skills. Before that I use to stack skills, body building x2 and what not. You might be muscle bound but you can't diffuse that bomb can you?

and I hate that bonuses start out at 16
15 means you can lift a motorcycle over your head
10 means you help roll it onto a truck bed
yet they do the same amount of damage
Then all of a sudden 17 is allowed to CARRY the motorcycle. If he puts it down he will hit you for a 1d4+2 punch, however if he throws the motorcycle at you you take 15d6 (assuming 1d6 per 20lb)

I don't think low attributes tell much of a story at all myself. Or mediocre attributes. Or anything except extraordinary attributes.

If the player chooses to go that extra mile and use his attribute rolls as a guide to what his character is like then that's great, but in most Palladium games there's no difference between a 1 and a 15 in any given attribute apart from a handful of isolated things that only have a limited effect on performance (especially in high tech games where your ability to haul a few hundred pounds of crap and run fast are drastically less important than your ability to fire a gun).

Rallan wrote:I don't think low attributes tell much of a story at all myself. Or mediocre attributes. Or anything except extraordinary attributes.

If the player chooses to go that extra mile and use his attribute rolls as a guide to what his character is like then that's great, but in most Palladium games there's no difference between a 1 and a 15 in any given attribute apart from a handful of isolated things that only have a limited effect on performance (especially in high tech games where your ability to haul a few hundred pounds of crap and run fast are drastically less important than your ability to fire a gun).

low attributes (7 or less) now carry penalties. (they have for several years now).

Damian Magecraft wrote:low attributes (7 or less) now carry penalties. (they have for several years now).

1) DM, this was about three years dead... trying to be a necromancer?
2) Yes, as of RUE, in RIFTS, that applies. Ever seen it anywhere else? Because I haven't.

All races re-roll 1's & 2's.

Humans place attributes as desired.

When rolling up a char for fun, I re-roll 1's and 2's. This gives the chars mostly double digit stats.

And when the rolls are the same number and type of dice, swapping them about.

But if it is something being watch by the GM...ask how he does things before even starting to roll anything and do things his way.

jaymz wrote:Personally I use the 4d6 drop lowest or use it as exceptional bonus. Also I allow a re-roll of a stat set on a case by case basis. This allows a player to get something he is happy with and gives me some semblance of control over any possible munchkinism that may occur.

Pretty much the same here.

Although other GMs in our group would have us roll 5d6, instead, as well as reroll 1s and 2s.
Which always seemed like a "why bother rolling, then?" kind of thing... but different strokes for different folks.

One of the problems that I've noticed over the years is that people tend to treat their own house rules as standard for the universe, which leads them to believe that the setting makes less sense than it does.
I've seen people complain, for instance, that it was too easy to get strike/parry bonuses in PFRPG, and that made the AR system rather useless.
Of course, they were using attribute rolling methods where extraordinary attributes were fairly ordinary, which skews the system since it was designed for a straight 3d6 rolling system.

I roll down the line using the dice stipulated in the game rules. For a human that means rolling 3D6 for each attribute without moving them around. The rationale is that I cannot move my elf's around so I likely cannot move my human's around either. The only exception to this is if I already have a character concept in mind and the rolls do not meet the minimums in which case they get bumped to the minimum. Otherwise I develop a character concept from the rolls.

Most attribute numbers have little to no actual bearing on the game, or at least didn't for a very long time, until negatives were introduced for very low stats. An ME or PP of 1-15 was pretty much the same for years. An IQ of less than 6 is pretty much impossible to portray (and wouldn't have an OCC, let's face it, not gonna happen). The only stats that actually matter are MA and PB for roleplaying, and PS,PE, and SPD for direct physical stats. PP is a special case, it is irrelevant until it's 16+, then it might be the most game shifting stat.

I just have people roll their characters in the traditional 3D6, on attribute at a time system, and select whatever OCC they want. When their attributes don't meet the minimum requirements, we bump them up. Recently had a character roll an IQ of 9, wanted to be an operator, pow! Now it's 10 (the minimum for an Operator, I believe).

That being said, try rolling characters up sometime and REMOVE the 'extra' D6 for stats of 16+ and watch the dynamics of the game change drastically. The massive jump of 16+ alters peoples perceptions of characters greatly.

I think it totally depends on the game you're trying to play. I'm gonna run a game soon, and I'm going to let each player have at least 1 plus 16 stat. I want them to be good in one spot attribute wise. But I'd also play in a game where everyone was more ordinary or even take some pretty bad stats to have fun with a role play. It depends on the group, the game, etc.

I am in a Phase World game where everyone has super high stats, there is an Angel like character with a 36 PB, a few super human 30+ PS characters. But it was said from the beginning that its going to be a High Powered game where you start at level 8, a few people have Super powerful Rune Swords they started with. I made a massive Pole Arm that basically combined 3 different Pole Arms in Rifts/Phase World and the Merc book. We're gonna fight the Kreegors and all sorts of Demon Lords and Gods maybe, I don't know. But that's the game. Adjust the characters with the game you're trying to make.

I have a set level for games:

Standard - 3D6, no re-rolls
Elite - 3D6, re-roll 1's
Heroic - 4D6, take the best 3
Legendary - 4D6, re-roll 1's, take the best 3

For non-3D6 attributes (i.e. from non-humans);
If the attribute is greater rolls more than 3D6, then use 3D6 as a base (and use the rules above) and add the extras as a "bonus" after the roll (and possible exceptional dice) I do this because such beings are meant to be stronger than average humans, which to me should also follow that their "exceptional" members should likewise be stronger than exceptional humans.
If it is less than 3D6, then it starts getting iffy, but the general rule is 2D6 has the chance (on a 12) to get a single extra die, while 1D6 is it. I do this because a lower number of dice means less variation between members (and, usually, a lower average score overall). As above, depending on what type of game we are going for, they may add an extra die and/or re-roll 1's as necessary

If it's anything other than a D6, then use the same type.

3d6 in the order attributes are listed in the book no rerolls

Wow, it's been... three years since I started this thread! Well, may as well chime in again on what I think.

I do like that RUE has low attribute penalties, and the bonus(es) you get for keeping them makes me think of the implied rule. It's Palladium, so it's no spelled out in true old school fashion, but this seems to be the governing rule. If you don't like the stats, you don't play them.

Essentially, unless the GM has insisted you sit down and roll up characters in front of him, you just keep rolling attributes until you get a set that reflects what you want to play. There's a lot of fun and gamer pride to be had at rolling up a set and saying "first ones rolled", but often as not, someone might have a concept in mind when he or she sits down to play. You see in your mind a big, strong warrior, and roll up a P.S. of 6. Do you change your concept, keep what you rolled? Swap attributes around?

Really, I don't think there is a right answer. But it's food for thought. I'm going with, play the attributes you can settle on.

I must be odd. For 95% of the time we roll the dice as is and in order. Player picks race, dice are rolled, and then character classes are chosen. If someone rolls dismal (7 or under average) he can keep the rolls or roll the whole thing over.

With RUE we do whatever the thing is where they get a boost somewhere else (I think it was that, maybe not), but we try to follow the rules on character creation. I've never had a player so keen on a concept that they wouldn't try a vagabond/witch/etc. If they rolled low.

The last time I played, we didn't even roll attributes. We selected our skills, spells, powers, etc and wrote descriptions of our characters which we gave to the GM. The character sheets the players had didn't have numbers on them anywhere (no skill percentages, no attributes, no bonuses, no PPE, no armor MDC, etc) just descriptive terms (average PS, good PP, great IQ, mediocre PE, etc). We never saw the character sheets that the GM created for our characters, but I doubt he assigned numbers to attributes.

--flatline

I use Roll 3D6 and place them as you want (if you are unhappy with any result, you are free to re-roll that - but you must take the new one, even if it is lower)

Roll 3D6, reroll 1s, assign where wanted. If playing a non-human with 4D6 or 2D6 stats mixed in, then those are rolled separately and mixed and matched separately (ie ME and MA and PB are 2D6, three sets of 2D6 are rolled and assigned between those three). This way my group gets a lot of 12-13s, but even after throwing in skills, attribute bonuses are not common. Plus it makes sense to me. A player likely has a concept before rolling the dice, and the created character will reflect that concept. Backstory wise, it doesn't make logical sense for a character to have studied to be a psychic, for example, if their ME is low.

I'm generally roll as listed, reroll 1s (but only once per stat).

However, I do know someone who totals the dice, roll those, then assign dice as listed. For example, a human wpuld roll 24d6, then assign 3 dice to each stat
It encourages a bit of min/maxing, but also allows characters to not suck royally in a stat if the player is smart. Also, it ensures qualifying for the OCC you want, and lets characters shine in their area. Of course, he also has a different way of figuring out bonus dice.

Panomas wrote:

flatline wrote:The last time I played, we didn't even roll attributes. We selected our skills, spells, powers, etc and wrote descriptions of our characters which we gave to the GM. The character sheets the players had didn't have numbers on them anywhere (no skill percentages, no attributes, no bonuses, no PPE, no armor MDC, etc) just descriptive terms (average PS, good PP, great IQ, mediocre PE, etc). We never saw the character sheets that the GM created for our characters, but I doubt he assigned numbers to attributes.

--flatline

Hmmm... This sounds interesting; though I'm of the belief numbers should be assigned regardless-

How is the game though are you enjoying it?

That campaign was over a decade ago, but it went extremely well. The players never did any rolling, but I believe that the GM was using his version of FUDGE (or something very much like it).

If I were to run a game today, that's probably what I'd attempt to do, although I'm still struggling with how I want to handle damage. FUDGE damage is okay, especially in that it handles scale differences between weapons and targets, but it's not as elegant as the rest of the system is and I'm confident there's a more elegant way to do it. Savage Worlds damage is more along the lines of what I have in mind for damage except that I'd use the FUDGE levels rather than numbers.

--flatline

I just go by the books; each race has its strengths and weaknesses, and I'm against the cardboard character syndrome where everyone's a human whether they're a dragon or not.