This isn't really in keeping with the current state of the discussion, but I just want to point out that, as much focus as we've given hill giant strength, there's another obvious benchmark, which is ogre strength. Now, ogres are about 9 feet tall on average, and pretty muscley. You might think that they have an 18/00 strength, because of the Gauntlets of Ogre Power, but a careful reading of the 2nd edition monster manual shows that the average ogre actually only has a 16 strength.
Where did you get that from? The 2nd Edition Monstrous Manual doesn't give a strength score for ogres, but does say this:
"In small numbers, ogres fight as unorganized individuals, but groups of 11 or more will have a leader, and groups of 16 or more usually include two leaders and a chieftain. Ogres wielding weapons get a Strength bonus of +2 to hit; leaders have +3, chieftains have +4. Females fight as males but score only 2-8 points of damage and have a maximum of only 6 hit points per die. Young ogres fight as goblins."
It also gives the damage an ogre does per attack as "Damage/Attack: 1-10 (or by weapon +6)"
A normal ogre has +2 to hit and +6 damage adjustments for strength. Now, +2 to hit, +6 damage isn't quite as good as 18/00 (+3 to hit, +6 damage), but it's better than 18/99 (+2 to hit, +5 damage). So, a normal ogre appears to have 18/99.5 strength.
If the average ogre has a strength of 16, that would amount to a +6 modifier. Only the top 1% of halflings could match it (still unrealistic, but not quite as silly), and the top 1% of ogres would have 24 strength.
I think the basic problem is that D&D tries to make all six stats match a similar bell curve, even though one of them, strength, should be heavily dependent on total body mass. If halflings had to deal with 1/2 the normal strength of a human, then how would you keep them balanced? By giving them double the dexterity?
A more realistic system would give overwhelming advantages to large critters, but would also hobble halflings, gnomes, and dwarves--which wouldn't be fun for people who wanted to play them.
Iirc, in some editions it specifically states half-ogre chieftans, who are always the strongest ogre around have 18/00 strength, and others progressively less. Iirc, there were no 19 str ogres standard, but it stands to reason the world's strongest ogre should be higher than a generic chieftan.
If we go for a realistic point of view, any dragon should destroy most adventurers with a single claw hit, no need for magic... just imagine how strong an adult dragon would actually be...
@AstroBryGuy Hmm. You seem to be correct. I based that claim on something I remembered quite clearly, but upon referring to the source, it seems I was mistaken. I think, perhaps, that I'm remembering a different monster. Perhaps the half-ogre, although that doesn't quite fit either.
In light of that, let me amend my previous claim: Halflings cannot be stronger than ogres. Gnomes, however, can be. This is unlikely, though, since the gnome needs an 18/00 strength to be stronger than the ogre. So the better comparison is gnomes-to-verbeeg. Verbeeg (which you may remember from Icewind Dale) are "small" giants, about the same size as ogres, with strength scores ranging from 18/51 to 18/00. So it's relatively easy, within the character creation rules given, to make a gnome who's stronger than most 9-foot-tall giants.
If we go for a realistic point of view, any dragon should destroy most adventurers with a single claw hit, no need for magic... just imagine how strong an adult dragon would actually be...
If we go for a realistic point of view, dragons should go extinct after someone casted a single use of Meteor Swarm. Just like pretty much everything else on the globe.
I still stick to my point that searching for any kind of logic within D&D is a lost cause to begin with. The Complete Book of Elves being one of the greatest offenders, as was brought to the attention of its author: Colin McComb.
If 18 is the maximum human strength 180 lbs seems quite low.
Over your head though. And 18 isn't the max, 18/00 is. So that's... far more then 180 as you have to add per percentage point after that (I don't feel like doing the math). Lol.
If we go for a realistic point of view, any dragon should destroy most adventurers with a single claw hit, no need for magic... just imagine how strong an adult dragon would actually be...
If we go for a realistic point of view, dragons should go extinct after someone casted a single use of Meteor Swarm. Just like pretty much everything else on the globe.
I still stick to my point that searching for any kind of logic within D&D is a lost cause to begin with. The Complete Book of Elves being one of the greatest offenders, as was brought to the attention of its author: Colin McComb.
1) I'm not bothered at all with the way exceptional strength is handled. I think that it is a great way of putting Warriors (and not only Fighters) a little bit closer to spellcasting classes.
2) Comparing the power of a Fighter with, let's say, a Wizard is like comparing orange and apples. The two classes have the exactly oppose power curve. If you know that you would be stuck in level 3 forever, would you really choose a Wizard over a Fighter?
3) Somebody said here that Fighters are uninteresting to play with. This person clearly didn't read all the combat maneuvers from the Complete Fighter Handbook. No Stoneskin or Globe of Invulnerability or low saving throw will save your wizard from a good Wrestling maneuver. I'll never forget the day that my half-orc Fighter/Thief decided to tackle a lich. Do you know how many spells needs Gestual component? Lots of them.
4) On top of that, there are tons of interesting weapons that the players just overlook like the net, lasso, bolas, whip, darts.
5) The great thing about the Warrior in general is that they are always ready. No need to study, no need to be paranoid about a grimoire or a holy symbol. Everything in your hand can be an effective weapon. The same F/T that tackled the lich killed a vampire using a piece of a bed stage. Right through the heart.
6) A Fighter is about versatility. Even being non-proficient with a weapon you still get extra-APR at levels 7 and 13, and the only drawback is a -2 penalty to Thac0 - and warriors have a low Thac0 anyway. Every time I play a Fighter I always carry different weapons and many of them I don't even bother getting proficient.
At some point my Fighter/Thief had the following weapons: spear, warhammer, net, bolas, bastard sword (to altern between single-handed, two-handed and two-weapon fighting), throwing dagger (a nice way to disrupt a casting enemy due to its nice range and speed factor 1), darts (basically to deliver poison - lots of shots per round means lots of saving throws) and a composite longbow. Some of that trunk was kept in the party's wagon, but you got the idea.
To properly play as a Fighter you need to be creative. It's not the class' fault that most of the players just roll the dice and hope for the best.
Edit: The way Dexterity and Constitution scales bothers me way much.
2) Non-warriors getting a free ride right past all those percentile values if they get a +1 bonus at 18. In PnP I always interpreted this as getting you from 18 to 18/01; from 18/01 to 18/51; etc. The "+1" bonus really means "one step," not "one point."
Yep, if I were from Chicago I’d vote for this three times. This was explicitly stated in PnP v1, in either the Player’s Handbook or DM Guide, if not both. Mind you, I exploit this myself with swashbucklers and shadow dancers, but it always feels wrong.
6) A Fighter is about versatility. Even being non-proficient with a weapon you still get extra-APR at levels 7 and 13,
I think this is technically not supposed to happen...? In PnP. Yet Another Bioware Munchkinism.
Anyway, it's not that there's anything wrong with warriors getting better strength. It's just, 1) you don't need to use percentile to represent that. Just limit other classes to 16 and let warriors go to 20. Or limit other classes to 18 as normal and let warriors go to 24. Or whatever. The percentile thing doesn't really fit the system, and in this particular case it leads to IMHO the worst and most persistent bug in these games:
2) Non-warriors getting a free ride right past all those percentile values if they get a +1 bonus at 18. In PnP I always interpreted this as getting you from 18 to 18/01; from 18/01 to 18/51; etc. The "+1" bonus really means "one step," not "one point."
Add that to the cheesy bonus for half-orcs (it's supposed to be +1 on the roll but still maxed at 18 - not to make you as strong as a giant), and the cheesy way the game actually rolls ability scores, and the result is a mess in which non-warriors don't actually have the disadvantage that you are talking about. Because your wizard will just start the game with 18 STR, then pop a Tome, and suddenly you'll have +4/+7 on your melee attacks. That directly contradicts the aspects of the percentile scores that you are praising.
About the APR progression: Warriors get an extra half APR at levels 7 and 13 per PnP rules.
The way I see it is not a problem with the Exceptional Strenght rule, but the way IE implements it. On PnP you would need one hundred Tomes\Whishes to get from Str 18 to 19, IIRC.
About half-orcs getting 19 STR, I don't think that it is that overpowered. They don't have the shorty saves, they can't Dual-Class and it is quite easy to achieve STR 19 in the game.
I think that jumping Half-Orcs to 18/00 instead of 19 would be more accurate, but in terms of mechanics, the difference is just 1 point of damage so not a big deal IMHO. Even after getting Str 20 because of the Tome, the difference is just 2 points of damage.
And a Wizard with Str 19 would still struggle on melee because:
1) Severe weapon restriction
2) Huge Thac0 penalty for non-proficiency
3) The worst Thac0 progression.
A Thief with Str 19, on another hand, is quite problematic when it comes to game balance. Especially when it comes to Backstabs.
Long story short:
i) Half-orcs having 19 Str is not the end of the world
ii) The percentile is really not a problem when it comes to PnP
iii) The way that IE implemented the Strenght augment is very problematic indeed
Fighters aren't boring to play with in 2nd edition because once you gain a decent amount of levels you start to get to do cool things like assemble armies. One fighter can get kinda boring yeah but when you can command squads you can get a lot more done.
Rangers could do this to a lesser extent but because they could get things like the Pegasus or Treant I always preferred them.
And yeah exceptional strength is a laughably broken mechanic.
As I am playing more humanoids based on the 2nd Ed. Complete Book of Humanoids, and trying to standardize my rules from that, I am finding it harder to think of playing a H/O with a 19, as they were limited to 18 % in that, and were 18/99 in 1st edition. Now I am just lowering it to %.
Now that being said, it's still a temptation, that 19 for H/O's, as I have played them ALOT n the past. Not that much difference bonus wise, but a BIG difference in chance when rolling a human vs a half-orc. The human is waayyyyy behind when trying to max out his strength. It just seems too easy for the H/O. 18/00 is very hard to get.
There were many rules that were never implemented on the games either for technical limitations or due to game design decisions. Fighters were quite flexible in 2nd edition with their very low penalty for using a weapon they were not proficient with. Ideal for those situations where the group finds themselves locked in the villains dungeon stripped from their equipment
There's pretty big issues with the way stuff works in 2nd edition, that is further blown up by the way the 2nd edition rules are implemented.
First off, 18s are quite unlikely. When you roll 3d6, there's a 1 in 6x6x6=216 chance to roll an 18, or a 215 in 216 chance to not roll an 18. If you roll six times, there's a (215^6)/(216^6) chance (larger than 97,25%) to not roll an 18, and thus only a smaller than 2,75% chance to roll at least one 18.
So, there's this exceptional strength thing, but only if you happen to be one of the lucky 2.75%. If you're not, you get a Strength of 17 at best, with +1 attack, +1 damage. If you are, then you roll the percentile dice, and it could easily be something like +2 attack, +3 damage (50% to get this or better).
It's just such a silly but extreme bump up. Generally, 2nd edition is already weird in that stats ranging from around 7 to 14 (the exact numbers vary from stat to stat) are basically a wash (except for non-weapon proficiencies), and then every point below that or above that provides a solid penalty or bonus. The step 17 to 18 is just that much bigger than the other steps.
Also, for some reason, the 'wash' area for strength is 8 to 15. If they had that at 7 to 14 like most other stats, it would already provide more leeway to spread percentile strength.
So yeah, on tabletop, the exceptional strength thing is a real oddity, but something that barely comes up. In BG/IWD, we are suddenly allowed to trade stat points around between our stats, making it very easy to gain that Strength 18. For BG, your frontline warrior having a Strength 18 is actually common, where it was a real rarity in tabletop.
And then there are the increases. The DMG is actually quite clear on this. When using a Wish or similar effect (such as the tomes and manuals) to increase one of your stats, the actual effect depends on the current value of the stat:
- If the stat is 15 or less, a single wish increases it by a single point. - If the stat is between 16 and 20, ten wishes are required to increase it by a single point. - If the stat is Str 18, a single wish increases the percentile strength by 10%, so 11 wishes are required to reach Str 19.
That is quite different from going from a flat 18 straight all the way to 19, effectively negating percentile strength after finding your first tome.
Another thing in 2nd edition that BG fortunately did not incorporate is the experience bonus. If you have a 16 or higher in your prime ability score, you gain a 10% bonus to experience. I don't understand the person that thought that this would be a good idea. Say there's 2 people playing fighters at the table. One of them was lucky enough to roll a 17 to get a bonus to both attack and damage. The other one was less fortunate with a strength of 15, and does not enjoy a bonus to attack and damage. Not only that, just because he rolled poorly, and as such will have a weaker character for the entire campaign, he also receives less experience!
There's some other oddities such as racial level limits, which are either a non-issue, or suddenly become a big issue.
Another thing that I really dislike (and provided me with an issue when I was DMing 2nd back in the day) are the rogue skills. Thieves (and a few other classes such as Rangers) gain a percentile chance to perform certain skills. Some of those, such as lockpicking, could be considered niche enough to accept that anyone without that stat has zero chance of success. Others, like hiding, should not be impossible to perform by others. I had a few characters trying to sneak up on a camp. One of them was a Thief, who had invested a couple of points in the matching skill. The others had no such rogue skills. What was I to do? Naturally, the Thief rolled for his stealth skills, and we determined they remained hidden. But the other classes? Should they be seen on default? That made little sense as there were opportunities to hide behind. Should they succeed on default? That would be unfair to the Thief.
Also remember that picking something up for a brief amount of time, even if you hold it over your head, is entirely different from carrying it on your back all day long as you fight bad guys, climb up ropes, run away from rolling boulders, make your way across narrow beams, et cetera. For example, in 3rd edition, the amount of weight that you can technically lift off the ground is twice as high as the amount of weight that you can carry on your back and still fight and properly cast spells.
I don't understand the comments on 3rd edition and fighters and barbarians gaining magical abilities. They do not?
Yes, fighters gain combat feats, but these aren't magical. They are just 'tricks' that they picked up, sometimes allowing them to perform a certain maneuver that others cannot, but usually just granting a bonus to a maneuver that everyone can perform. Naturally, a Fighter who is always swinging his sword can do more interesting things with that sword in his hand than, say, an Elven Mage, that just carries it around for the heck of it.
Yes, barbarians can enter rage, but again, this is not magical. This is just pumping adrenaline through his body and focusing on assault, gaining a bonus to Strength and Constitution, but a penalty to Armor. It does also grant a small bonus to will saves, but that's only +2 at level 1, rising to a grand +4 at level 20 IIRC. A raging barbarian does sound like he'd be a little less susceptible to charms and similar magic than a calm humanoid.
I've played 2nd for about 8 years, but I happily switched to 3rd. Sure, it streamlined some things, and it surely didn't fix everything, but I like it. The silly high is better/low is better inconsistency of 2nd edition is gone. The arbitrary caps (such as racial level caps or ability score caps) are gone. And the skill system means that any player can really try to do about anything, and there's something to fall back upon. Rogues can just be a lot better at a lot of things at the same time than other classes.
The really odd thing about 3.0/3.5/PF is that Rogues tend to not care about critting at all, because the base damage affected by critical hits is tiny compared to the rest of the damage they deal.
I do heavily advocate point buy, though, as well as fixed hp on levelup. Rolling for something that happens on the go, sure. Rolling for some odd 'stat' that will affect your character for the rest of the game, without anything in the story affecting that roll in any way, doesn't sit well with me.
@thels Yup, the old way of rolling in PnP (and we got very few rolls) did make it hard to even qualify for some classes, but when someone did qualify or get an exceptional strength, they really stood out as rare characters. That made sense in a way but not if one wanted something specific. In Unearthed Arcana, the rules were changed by Gygax, giving humans (only) an increased number of dice to roll for various stats based on each class. Course it was biased for humans with lvl limits as well but that's a whole other matter. I do miss the experience bonus, even though not all got it, and it made those rare character stand out even more (well in 1st ed anyway). That said, my current 75 no edit limit rule makes me really appreciate magic items, tomes, NPC's seen previously as having less than optimum stats (well compared to my previous minimums of 98s and 100+ rolls anyway) and even my own stats more, low or high (for interesting background ideas). The good thing is, we can all adapt many of these ideas or things as much or little as we want to suit our individual play styles. Then there is the glory of EEKeeper of course. Many times I will write up a set of 'houserules' for each character I run for BG. Keeps it more interesting anyway.
Ugh, the whole "A character stands out because he lucked on his ability score rolls" does not sit well with me at all! I'm glad such stuff as exceptional strength and experience bonuses are gone. Special bonuses should be rewarded for interesting roleplay, not for randomly rolling your ability scores.
Perhaps if they rolled poorly on their ability scores, I could see it. Something to balance it out...
@thels Heh, that's an idea, as characters with lower scores were always a little more difficult to keep alive. Now that you mention it in that light, and now liking characters myself with lower scores, not having it in the first place sounds like the best option. Even moreso as the high rollers already have more going for them in the first place.
Not a Warrior? Replace 19 by 18/10. (It would count as a 19 cost wise, and you could lower an 18/10 to an 18, or raise an 18 to an 18/10.)
A Warrior? Replace 19 by 18/+10 to percentile strength. (Say you rolled an 18/69, you could then bump that further up to 18/79. 18/91-18/99 would become 18/00 and only if you rolled 18/00 could you bump to 19.)
(Quote)
Yeah, for a fighter... but for a thief it's like +2/+4.
Also even for fighters, even with the ridiculous BG stat-rolling system, it's pretty damn hard to roll 18/00. Whereas for a half-orc, you just roll 17 and trade 2 points of CHA or WIS and you're done.
Agreed. That's why 19 is so dumb... why work to roll the 18/00 when you can just plus up to a 19?
There's not really any reason to roll for 18/00 either way. You'll be using strength boosting potions in pretty much all the important battles and then the point becomes moot permanently once you get the strength tome.
If the extra point or two of damage against xvarts in the first half of the BG1 campaign was ever worth the time that goes into rolling 18/00 to you then if anything the half orc's ability to circumvent that just saved you from yourself.
Comments
"In small numbers, ogres fight as unorganized individuals, but groups of 11 or more will have a
leader, and groups of 16 or more usually include two leaders and a chieftain. Ogres wielding weapons get a
Strength bonus of +2 to hit; leaders have +3, chieftains have +4. Females fight as males but score only 2-8
points of damage and have a maximum of only 6 hit points per die. Young ogres fight as goblins."
It also gives the damage an ogre does per attack as "Damage/Attack: 1-10 (or by weapon +6)"
A normal ogre has +2 to hit and +6 damage adjustments for strength. Now, +2 to hit, +6 damage isn't quite as good as 18/00 (+3 to hit, +6 damage), but it's better than 18/99 (+2 to hit, +5 damage). So, a normal ogre appears to have 18/99.5 strength.
I think the basic problem is that D&D tries to make all six stats match a similar bell curve, even though one of them, strength, should be heavily dependent on total body mass. If halflings had to deal with 1/2 the normal strength of a human, then how would you keep them balanced? By giving them double the dexterity?
A more realistic system would give overwhelming advantages to large critters, but would also hobble halflings, gnomes, and dwarves--which wouldn't be fun for people who wanted to play them.
In light of that, let me amend my previous claim: Halflings cannot be stronger than ogres. Gnomes, however, can be. This is unlikely, though, since the gnome needs an 18/00 strength to be stronger than the ogre. So the better comparison is gnomes-to-verbeeg. Verbeeg (which you may remember from Icewind Dale) are "small" giants, about the same size as ogres, with strength scores ranging from 18/51 to 18/00. So it's relatively easy, within the character creation rules given, to make a gnome who's stronger than most 9-foot-tall giants.
I still stick to my point that searching for any kind of logic within D&D is a lost cause to begin with. The Complete Book of Elves being one of the greatest offenders, as was brought to the attention of its author: Colin McComb.
1) I'm not bothered at all with the way exceptional strength is handled. I think that it is a great way of putting Warriors (and not only Fighters) a little bit closer to spellcasting classes.
2) Comparing the power of a Fighter with, let's say, a Wizard is like comparing orange and apples. The two classes have the exactly oppose power curve. If you know that you would be stuck in level 3 forever, would you really choose a Wizard over a Fighter?
3) Somebody said here that Fighters are uninteresting to play with. This person clearly didn't read all the combat maneuvers from the Complete Fighter Handbook. No Stoneskin or Globe of Invulnerability or low saving throw will save your wizard from a good Wrestling maneuver. I'll never forget the day that my half-orc Fighter/Thief decided to tackle a lich. Do you know how many spells needs Gestual component? Lots of them.
4) On top of that, there are tons of interesting weapons that the players just overlook like the net, lasso, bolas, whip, darts.
5) The great thing about the Warrior in general is that they are always ready. No need to study, no need to be paranoid about a grimoire or a holy symbol. Everything in your hand can be an effective weapon. The same F/T that tackled the lich killed a vampire using a piece of a bed stage. Right through the heart.
6) A Fighter is about versatility. Even being non-proficient with a weapon you still get extra-APR at levels 7 and 13, and the only drawback is a -2 penalty to Thac0 - and warriors have a low Thac0 anyway. Every time I play a Fighter I always carry different weapons and many of them I don't even bother getting proficient.
At some point my Fighter/Thief had the following weapons: spear, warhammer, net, bolas, bastard sword (to altern between single-handed, two-handed and two-weapon fighting), throwing dagger (a nice way to disrupt a casting enemy due to its nice range and speed factor 1), darts (basically to deliver poison - lots of shots per round means lots of saving throws) and a composite longbow. Some of that trunk was kept in the party's wagon, but you got the idea.
To properly play as a Fighter you need to be creative. It's not the class' fault that most of the players just roll the dice and hope for the best.
Edit: The way Dexterity and Constitution scales bothers me way much.
The way I see it is not a problem with the Exceptional Strenght rule, but the way IE implements it. On PnP you would need one hundred Tomes\Whishes to get from Str 18 to 19, IIRC.
About half-orcs getting 19 STR, I don't think that it is that overpowered. They don't have the shorty saves, they can't Dual-Class and it is quite easy to achieve STR 19 in the game.
I think that jumping Half-Orcs to 18/00 instead of 19 would be more accurate, but in terms of mechanics, the difference is just 1 point of damage so not a big deal IMHO. Even after getting Str 20 because of the Tome, the difference is just 2 points of damage.
And a Wizard with Str 19 would still struggle on melee because:
1) Severe weapon restriction
2) Huge Thac0 penalty for non-proficiency
3) The worst Thac0 progression.
A Thief with Str 19, on another hand, is quite problematic when it comes to game balance. Especially when it comes to Backstabs.
Long story short:
i) Half-orcs having 19 Str is not the end of the world
ii) The percentile is really not a problem when it comes to PnP
iii) The way that IE implemented the Strenght augment is very problematic indeed
iv) Fighters are awesome
Rangers could do this to a lesser extent but because they could get things like the Pegasus or Treant I always preferred them.
And yeah exceptional strength is a laughably broken mechanic.
Now that being said, it's still a temptation,
There were many rules that were never implemented on the games either for technical limitations or due to game design decisions. Fighters were quite flexible in 2nd edition with their very low penalty for using a weapon they were not proficient with. Ideal for those situations where the group finds themselves locked in the villains dungeon stripped from their equipment
First off, 18s are quite unlikely. When you roll 3d6, there's a 1 in 6x6x6=216 chance to roll an 18, or a 215 in 216 chance to not roll an 18. If you roll six times, there's a (215^6)/(216^6) chance (larger than 97,25%) to not roll an 18, and thus only a smaller than 2,75% chance to roll at least one 18.
So, there's this exceptional strength thing, but only if you happen to be one of the lucky 2.75%. If you're not, you get a Strength of 17 at best, with +1 attack, +1 damage. If you are, then you roll the percentile dice, and it could easily be something like +2 attack, +3 damage (50% to get this or better).
It's just such a silly but extreme bump up. Generally, 2nd edition is already weird in that stats ranging from around 7 to 14 (the exact numbers vary from stat to stat) are basically a wash (except for non-weapon proficiencies), and then every point below that or above that provides a solid penalty or bonus. The step 17 to 18 is just that much bigger than the other steps.
Also, for some reason, the 'wash' area for strength is 8 to 15. If they had that at 7 to 14 like most other stats, it would already provide more leeway to spread percentile strength.
So yeah, on tabletop, the exceptional strength thing is a real oddity, but something that barely comes up. In BG/IWD, we are suddenly allowed to trade stat points around between our stats, making it very easy to gain that Strength 18. For BG, your frontline warrior having a Strength 18 is actually common, where it was a real rarity in tabletop.
And then there are the increases. The DMG is actually quite clear on this. When using a Wish or similar effect (such as the tomes and manuals) to increase one of your stats, the actual effect depends on the current value of the stat:
- If the stat is 15 or less, a single wish increases it by a single point.
- If the stat is between 16 and 20, ten wishes are required to increase it by a single point.
- If the stat is Str 18, a single wish increases the percentile strength by 10%, so 11 wishes are required to reach Str 19.
That is quite different from going from a flat 18 straight all the way to 19, effectively negating percentile strength after finding your first tome.
Another thing in 2nd edition that BG fortunately did not incorporate is the experience bonus. If you have a 16 or higher in your prime ability score, you gain a 10% bonus to experience. I don't understand the person that thought that this would be a good idea. Say there's 2 people playing fighters at the table. One of them was lucky enough to roll a 17 to get a bonus to both attack and damage. The other one was less fortunate with a strength of 15, and does not enjoy a bonus to attack and damage. Not only that, just because he rolled poorly, and as such will have a weaker character for the entire campaign, he also receives less experience!
There's some other oddities such as racial level limits, which are either a non-issue, or suddenly become a big issue.
Another thing that I really dislike (and provided me with an issue when I was DMing 2nd back in the day) are the rogue skills. Thieves (and a few other classes such as Rangers) gain a percentile chance to perform certain skills. Some of those, such as lockpicking, could be considered niche enough to accept that anyone without that stat has zero chance of success. Others, like hiding, should not be impossible to perform by others. I had a few characters trying to sneak up on a camp. One of them was a Thief, who had invested a couple of points in the matching skill. The others had no such rogue skills. What was I to do? Naturally, the Thief rolled for his stealth skills, and we determined they remained hidden. But the other classes? Should they be seen on default? That made little sense as there were opportunities to hide behind. Should they succeed on default? That would be unfair to the Thief.
Also remember that picking something up for a brief amount of time, even if you hold it over your head, is entirely different from carrying it on your back all day long as you fight bad guys, climb up ropes, run away from rolling boulders, make your way across narrow beams, et cetera. For example, in 3rd edition, the amount of weight that you can technically lift off the ground is twice as high as the amount of weight that you can carry on your back and still fight and properly cast spells.
I don't understand the comments on 3rd edition and fighters and barbarians gaining magical abilities. They do not?
Yes, fighters gain combat feats, but these aren't magical. They are just 'tricks' that they picked up, sometimes allowing them to perform a certain maneuver that others cannot, but usually just granting a bonus to a maneuver that everyone can perform. Naturally, a Fighter who is always swinging his sword can do more interesting things with that sword in his hand than, say, an Elven Mage, that just carries it around for the heck of it.
Yes, barbarians can enter rage, but again, this is not magical. This is just pumping adrenaline through his body and focusing on assault, gaining a bonus to Strength and Constitution, but a penalty to Armor. It does also grant a small bonus to will saves, but that's only +2 at level 1, rising to a grand +4 at level 20 IIRC. A raging barbarian does sound like he'd be a little less susceptible to charms and similar magic than a calm humanoid.
I've played 2nd for about 8 years, but I happily switched to 3rd. Sure, it streamlined some things, and it surely didn't fix everything, but I like it. The silly high is better/low is better inconsistency of 2nd edition is gone. The arbitrary caps (such as racial level caps or ability score caps) are gone. And the skill system means that any player can really try to do about anything, and there's something to fall back upon. Rogues can just be a lot better at a lot of things at the same time than other classes.
The really odd thing about 3.0/3.5/PF is that Rogues tend to not care about critting at all, because the base damage affected by critical hits is tiny compared to the rest of the damage they deal.
I do heavily advocate point buy, though, as well as fixed hp on levelup. Rolling for something that happens on the go, sure. Rolling for some odd 'stat' that will affect your character for the rest of the game, without anything in the story affecting that roll in any way, doesn't sit well with me.
I do miss the experience bonus, even though not all got it, and it made those rare character stand out even more (well in 1st ed anyway).
That said, my current 75 no edit limit rule makes me really appreciate magic items, tomes, NPC's seen previously as having less than optimum stats (well compared to my previous minimums of 98s and 100+ rolls anyway) and even my own stats more, low or high (for interesting background ideas).
The good thing is, we can all adapt many of these ideas or things as much or little as we want to suit our individual play styles. Then there is the glory of EEKeeper of course.
Many times I will write up a set of 'houserules' for each character I run for BG. Keeps it more interesting anyway.
Perhaps if they rolled poorly on their ability scores, I could see it. Something to balance it out...
Not a Warrior? Replace 19 by 18/10. (It would count as a 19 cost wise, and you could lower an 18/10 to an 18, or raise an 18 to an 18/10.)
A Warrior? Replace 19 by 18/+10 to percentile strength. (Say you rolled an 18/69, you could then bump that further up to 18/79. 18/91-18/99 would become 18/00 and only if you rolled 18/00 could you bump to 19.)
Agreed. That's why 19 is so dumb... why work to roll the 18/00 when you can just plus up to a 19?
If the extra point or two of damage against xvarts in the first half of the BG1 campaign was ever worth the time that goes into rolling 18/00 to you then if anything the half orc's ability to circumvent that just saved you from yourself.