should we keep the old 'roll your stats' feature?
solidbones
Member Posts: 11
this feature is the one thing I didn't like about BG. Rerolling stats either make me feel like I'm cheating, or that I'm really gimped.
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One of my current DMs uses a "roll 24d6, reroll 1s, keep the highest 18 and assign as desired to each of the six ability scores up to a maximum of 18 in any one score".
I wouldn't mind a difficulty setting at character creation that changes the lower limit on your ability score total; if you have it set to Easy, for instance, it will reroll anything with a total number of points less than (throwing out a random number here) 80. Normal? 75. Hard? 70. Hardcore? 70, and you can't rearrange the points.
I think the rolling mechanism is important, because in some cases it means you'll literally never roll the same character twice; and in others it means rerolling over and over again just to get that last 18.
The alternative, of course, is to decide how many points you want to use for your build, use the Ctrl+Shift+8 cheat to set everything to 18, and then adjust them based on what you want. (This way you can more carefully decide how many points to use if you want a character with a specific build.)
More and more I find myself preferring Point Buy games, (not for stats but for everything, like BESM2e) just because I prefer my randomness in the game, not when making my character. Plus it sidesteps a lot of problems when anyone can be a healer, etc.
Keep the randomness in, imo.
THE MORE YOU KNOW!
*reading rainbow logo*
You'd easily get way better ability scores by rolling than the point buy system. You'd have to be very unlucky to get a worse roll than the stats you'd get from point buy. Depending on how you spend your points, you'd get a point total somewhere in the mid-70s, which is a pretty terrible roll.
The point buy system would be terrible for a game based on 2E. The only reason it works in 3E, and games based on 3E (NWN, IWD2), is because you gain a point every 4 levels. If you used that system in 2E, you'd create some pretty crappy characters, since the ability scores will pretty much never go up under normal circumstances. There's also the predetermined array system, but that has the same shortfalls as the point buy system. A solution would be to offer more points available to distribute, but the problem then is that the number of points would be arbitrary to what the devs come up with and won't be based on any D&D rules.
That's the single most enjoyable part of the game.
Ok, I might be exaggerating, but still...
Actually, what I would really like is if you had an option to roll your stats before picking a class - I think it would be more realistic for your character to choose their profession based on what they are good at rather than the other way around!
About 8 years ago I once got a fighter (that I dualed into a mage) statroll with:
Str: 18/90
Dex: 18
Con: 18
Int: 18
Wis: 16
Cha: 16
(this was after adjusting stats, it was like 17/17/16/18/18/something.
Never gotten it that good since. I wish I'd take a screenshot!
http://forum.baldursgate.com/discussion/4246/time-spent-rolling-at-character-creation
Firstly, Baldur's gate has never utilized a point-buy system nor should it.
This is not Neverwinter Nights.
Secondly, rolling for you're attributes takes time and patience so you feel much more invested in that character. It doesn't take long to visually add and subtract the stats in front of you and makes it harder to spam that re roll button trying to obtain Superman i.e 18/18/18/18.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
You gotta roll with it
You gotta take your time ...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6XQzm0WlRcg
adding that option would make it better.
dont want it... well dont use it then.
@kiros - If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
so if i missunderstand you correctly. you think there should be no BG EE ; )
If you don't pay close enough attention you can miss a great roll. It's concentration like that that you need to psyche yourself up for a fresh playthrough.
Touché
However, I believe Trent is doing the best he can to keep to the original and not modify too many elements of the game.
Having nice visual aesthetics (UI, High resolution) is not much of an issue, start messing around with character creation and you'll have a lot of pissed off fans
We all have fond memories of hitting that re roll button, let's see those memories get imbedded in a new generation of gamers.