ABILITY SCORES/Systems

I usually like them either very broad with a ton of sub-divisions, like "Mind, Body, Soul," but then there's a score of skills for each, or more specific with little to no sub-division, like if you went "Strength, Stamina, Reflexes, Coordination, Awareness, Intelligence, Education, Charisma, Willpower, Luck," and then didn't get anything else but like class mods or feats or whatever.

D&D's array is honestly not that bad, DEX is just spread a little too wide.

I like the way Legend of the Five Rings is set up though, with it's XkY setup, and the lower of the two pair deciding how many you get to keep. I've always wanted to work out a more pragmatic version that made logical sense and dropped the elemental thematics for more generalized use.

I like how WoD is a 3x3 grid of physical/social/mental with power/resistance/finesse.

And I like systems with few stats too, like lumping all into body/mind/spirit.

Paradoxically, As for D&D, agility and dexterity should be splitted, as should wisdom and perception, reason from knowledge (intelligence). But as I said, I prefer fewer stats.

Your main question should be:
>nature or nurture
>stats vs skills
And how to weight each.

>High Composure, Low Resolve
Internally panicking, but can hold a straight face long enough to inspire his comrades long enough to save his ass.

>High Resolve, Low Composure
Is freaking the fuck out but has total control of himself.

I feel like WoD often suffers the problem of a lot of arbitrary attribute systems. By saying 'we have nine attributes' first, the game is forced to try and make each stat equally valuable through mechanics it adds and builds on them, and basically every version of Storyteller I've seen has failed at this, with some stats being god tier and some being worthless.

Personally I much prefer specialised stat systems. Instead of sticking with a set number of attributes or the old physical/mental/social setup, ask 'What does my game care about?' and go from there. From that starting point, it's a lot easier to make every stat matter.

>ability score
such a fucking retarded term

I unironically think Paranoia does it best by simple fact that it lumps 90% of combat related things into the "violence" stat

Just dropping in here to compiment you for using brad neely comic pics

SAID stats.
Strength: Effectively a toughness stat that governs both the ability to move heavy things and resist damage.
Agility: Litheness of body that determines mobility
Insight: Perception and things that are normally related to intelligence. Using "insight" allows for characters to be smart but not skilled or be idiot savants. I prefer characters to be somewhere close to the intelligence of their player.
Dexterity: Like agility, but only regarding the player's hands. Fine motor movements use this stat (including aiming weapons).

CAMP saves.
Constitution: Derived from strength. Gives poison resistance, fatigue resistance, that sort of thing.
Athletics: Derived from agility and strength. Jumping and dodging.
Mental: Derived from insight. Seeing through illusions, resisting mental magic, overcoming fear.
Pain: Derived from strength and insight. Resisting extreme pain.

I like the SAID stats because they don't have charisma or intelligence. The player should bring those to the table, not the character. The character may modify their interactions, but you shouldn't be able to roll your way out of bad roleplay.

Isn't that from a certain video game?

It's my own homebrew, but it's heavily based on Mound&Blade Warband with a little bit of D&D.

Was moonbeam city any good?

I like the M&OCT way of doing things - it's a nice middle ground between abstraction and crunchiness.

I know this is irrational, but I hate any system that has exactly six ability scores, because I assume they ripped off D&D without thinking. Five is okay, seven is okay, just don't ever use exactly six.

Also I hate D&D ability scores because Wisdom is a stupid thing to have as a stat and Dexterity governs so many things it should be split into two stats.

Traveller has six without actually ripping off D&D. No WIS, no CHA. Those get replaced by Education (how much you know), and Social Standing. And most of the time, Social is optional use outside of background.

The fewer and broader the better. 6 is tolerable. 4 is optimal.

What about systems that forgo social or mental stats like wis, intelligence, etc? Currently my system only has strength, constitution, speed/agility, and dexterity. Are there drawbacks to only having physical stats?

Well, how are you handling anything that falls outside of them?

I'm not a big fan of *World games, but I love the way Apocalypse World tackles its stats:

Cool - Do something under fire
Hard - Make a break, go aggro
Hot - Try to win someone over
Sharp - read a sitch, read a person
Weird - open your brain

Completely deviates from the D&D style norm without resorting to pointlessly confusing adjectives.

I'm a fan of the Japanese HS/university focuses. Logical (INT), cultural (WIS/CHA), physical (STR/DEX/CON).

One of my favourite weird stat systems comes from In a Wicked Age. It uses six stats, with a pair being used to describe an action and roll for it. The six are- With Love, With Violence, For Yourself, For Others, Overtly and Discretely.

Usually just roleplay/storytelling and system standard dice rolls (d100). I just don't get giving a character wis/int and then the player has no social skills irl so the roleplaying is all fucked up. Idk, am I being totally wrong about this? I've considered using something like REP in Eclipse Phase, but I don't have that great of a grasp on how it works in that game, and it wouldn't be a core stat i don't think it would be attributed to your character somehow else.

Leaving out mental stats is unorthodox but has the advantage of avoiding the "well I can't solve this puzzle but my CHARACTER could" problem.

That's a problem?

Roleplaying is about enjoying a fantasy. Someone not being the most socially adept, IMO, doesn't mean they can't play a social character, which is the advantage social stats and social skills provide.

Think about it. With all other actions, you don't ask the player to show you exactly what they're doing. You just ask them to describe it. Social and mental stats and skills can work just the same way. Saying exact lines, or coming up with a good plan, are both excellent descriptions that merit a bonus, but all a player really requires is a description of how they're attempting something before they make a roll.

Most of their early systems have this problem. Ex3 at least has a full fledged and admittedly very nice combat system.

There is 7th Sea's version of Roll and Keep with five traits.

Brawn - General Strength and Toughness
Finesse - General Dexterity
Panache - Charisma
Resolve - Stamina and Willpower
Wits - General Intelligence and Reflexes

Hmmm....

While I initially thought this , makes a good point. I still see the merit in the former position though, so I'll have to sleep on it. I may just have to completely restructure the stats in my system.

Okay, so Rep in EP is primarily a resource - gain it for doing noticeable things, spend it on favors.
Its also (from my understanding), a skill/stat. Roll it to get favors, info. Other people roll against your rep to see if they've heard of you.

Now, Rep in EP depends on the constant mesh connection that allows your muse to check the rep of a person with the aggregate score algorithms, which tally, index, and weigh by quality, every review and social media like/dislike of a person by everybody that has ever met or heard of them. Which why the weighing of the opinions - an ass-blasting review of a hypercorp exec is going to be weighed much less if the reviewer is a known autonomist. If its left by another hypercorp exec with a similar or higher C-Rep, the targets rep will tank.

Using EP style rep systems outside of the ubiquitous internet of modern cyber punk takes work - it has to be word of mouth, and is subject to distortion. It is also separated by subject or activity, unlike what many attempts think. Those often condense it to Fame/Infamy, or Hero/Villain - creating either a single scale with positive and negative, or (more rarely) a two bar graph of opposing points.
Really, rep is either 0 (no reputation) or is 1+. Scale depends, but gaining a bonus every ten points (might be a +1 if your die system has enough spread to make it significant, but not major) is usually good. Separating by subject also allows good distinctions between character types - most of us have never heard of many influential financiers, but they have a rep. Thus, a more realistic method than the Fame/Infamy scale is achieved.

Yes, as long as you go into it with the right mindset.

A lot of people (including myself) assumed it would be an Archer rip-off, which it totally isn't, it's much more in the vein of an adult swim show like Metalpocalypse or something. Watching it with that Archer mindset is a really really bad way to go about it, and seriously hurts the show. But I stuck with it, mostly for the art direction, and as I got more familiar with it and figured out what it was trying to be, I started enjoying it a lot more. I eventually went back and rewatched the first few episodes and was dying laughing at episodes I had not enjoyed at all before.