Revising B/X Ability Scores (Part 2)

[continued from here]

So here's what I've currently got for revised ability scores.

Wait, wait, wait...just before I start, let me clarify something. While the title of this post is "revising B/X ability scores," I'm not really talking about house ruling B/X or writing a clone that's the equivalent of Labyrinth Lord that "mixes it up."

What I'm posting about is a new(ish) project of mine, a fantasy heartbreaker that is more basic in scope than Five Ancient Kingdoms. A smaller volume, a smaller scale with a (hopefully) easier ruleset that anyone with a handful of weird-sided dice can pick up and play sans difficulty.

In such a game...a game which has a specific objective...scale is extremely important. What does an 18 strength represent? Andre the Giant? Dwayne "the Rock" Johnson? Someone smaller?

[Johnson is 6'5", 260+ pounds and a lot of muscle. Andre was 7'4" and over 500 pounds. In the USA, only 3% of adult males (and 0% of adult females) are taller than 6'3"]

Does strength represent actual physical muscle? Or simply the application of strength? In 5E "Basic Rules" Strength measures "natural athleticism and bodily power" but the former would seem to overlap on 5E's definition of Dexterity ("physical agility, reflexes, balance, poise" all of which goes into the variety of skills needed to develop athleticism in sports). Is it a measure of size? Fitness?

In my game, Strength "measures your character's brawn, hardiness, and physical stature."

Gwen Christie is 6'3". And strong.

That's pretty reasonable. It gives the DM an easy method of describing an NPC to the players: "the guy looks pretty strong." Of course, tying it to actual muscle size has gender-related implications...but that's probably its own post (we'll see). It's definitely not "athleticism" except in the "physical strength" portion of the athletic equation...but feats of athleticism are not tied to ability scores in this game the way they are in other "roll under attribute" systems.

[why not? Well, I'm kind of moving away from the idea of "ability checks," for a couple-three different reasons. A) they're kind of a "lazy skill" system, B) they use a mechanic different from every other D20 mechanic in the game (where one is trying to roll high), but mainly C) they often penalize players who are trying to be creative/think outside the box (i.e. trying to do something for which there are no systems) by giving them an excellent chance of failure, based on their ability scores. In addition, they tend to weigh heavily towards certain ability scores (intelligence, dexterity, strength) and totally exclude others (wisdom, constitution, charisma). So right now, the mechanic of "rolling under an ability score" is kind of on my shit-list]

Now, it might seem like I'm spending an inordinate amount of time on the strength score. Well, strength is an interesting score and one sees it in a whole shit-ton of RPGs. It's present in my new FHB, too...and it's only one of two ability scores that make the cut from the D&D game. My six ability scores boil down to the following (in alphabetical order):

Agility
Charisma
Learning
Spirit
Strength
Wit

[I won't bore you with the descriptions of each]

I should note that Charisma is actually a late addition. I had limited the total stats to five because (originally) this was supposed to be far less wargame, and as such had little need for a stat that reflects the number of henchmen and morale in battle. Aside from a reaction bonus, that's pretty much all Charisma is used for in the basic delving game...and I'm not going to make a bunch of "charisma powered" feats and class abilities to suddenly make the stat pertinent in a skirmish-scale game focused on a small number of heroes (*cough* wotc *cough*).

Remember from my last post on the subject, I was talking about weighing ALL the ability scores so that players would be interested in all of them, regardless of class. Strength (just to blather a bit more on the STR score) may be useful to all characters in B/X because of its bonus to attack rolls and damage and kicking in doors, but wizards are hardly going to want to get into melee (and probably don't want to be the first ones through a stuck door, either).

[*ahem*]

ANYway...what changed my mind was remembering something from OD&D about hirelings of "unusual" nature, specifically monsters and the concept of followers over henchmen. Just checking out Ye Old Volume 1 ("Men & Magic"), scattered throughout several pages we find:

"Finally, the charisma [sic] will aid a character in attracting various monsters to his service."

"Monsters can be lured into service if they are of the same basic alignment as the player character..."

"Morale dice can cause a man or intelligent monster to attempt to surrender or become subdued. When this happens an offer of service can be made..."

"Loyalty of Non-Player Characters (including Monsters)..."

Couple all that with an interesting post over at Thought Crime Games and I started thinking, hmmm, maybe there should be other ways to overcome bad guys besides killing the shit out of them...like maybe converting them away from evil and over to your cause? Because like I said before, the characters in the new game are (default) "heroic good guys" on a mission. And it's not just an S&D mission.

[um...that's "search & destroy" for those who don't know]

More on the kind of mission later.

So, without further ado, here's how my revamped abilities work:

Agility: +1 to defense (think "ascending AC") per point over 12 when wearing no armor; characters receive half bonus when wearing light armor. Exceptional agility (15-18) gives a +1 bonus to attack rolls and reaction saves.

Charisma: +1 bonus to maximum followers per point over 12. Exceptional charisma (15-18) gives a +1 bonus to reaction checks.

Learning: 1 spell known per point over 12. Characters with exceptional learning (15-18) are literate and receive a +1 bonus when casting spells.

Spirit: +1 point of grit per point over 12 (a new resource that triggers some special effects). Characters with exceptional spirit (15-18) add +1 hit point per level and receive a +1 bonus to save versus magic.

Strength: +1 point to maximum weapon damage, per point over 12, when wielding a melee weapon with two hands; characters receive half bonus when using a melee weapon with one hand. Exceptional strength (15-18) gives +1 hit point per level and a +1 bonus to saves versus poison.

Wit: +1 additional "useful item" per point over 12 (character's otherwise have equipment limited by class). Characters with exceptional wit (15-18) receive a +1 bonus to detection rolls and surprise checks.

All ability scores in the game are determined by rolling 2D6+6 to achieve a range of 8-18. Female characters (not female players) only roll 2D6+3 for strength (they're smaller), but receive three extra points to distribute among their other abilities (they've learned to compensate in different ways). No score may be increased above 18.

[yes, non-gender neutral game mechanics]

Once ability scores have been determined, a player may freely swap any two scores to create a character more closely matching the player's concept.

All right, that should be enough to chew on for the moment.

[quick side note: my internet connection was down for almost a week. That last Seahawk post? I wrote and scheduled that back in February. This is the reason for my delay in getting this up. Hopefully, my posting should continue unhindered for the foreseeable future]