What's with the modesty about stats?

[Anthony]

The main reason for stat normalization is IQ, because IQ is too broad, and thus the only way to force people into reasonable levels of specialization rather than just being 'good at everything except shooting people' is to hardcap IQ. IQ should be split into a minimum of three different attributes, to properly encourage specialization; the D&D split between book learning (Int), social talent (Cha), and perception/intuition (Wis) works okay and is reasonably consistent with literary archetypes.

[trooper6]

Originally Posted by David Johnston2

Spending points on a single primary skill is actually point optimal.

All of the point optimizers I've seen on these boards say that the minute you have 4+ skills with one controlling attribute at an investment of 4cp, it is more point optimal to increase the underlying stat instead of putting points into the skills.

And I've seen them advocate that you should be able to trade in the cp you've spent in skills to up your attributes as well.

Neither of those forms of optimization work for how I see character creation or development. Not because I'm against high stats, but because I focus on concept realization over stat normalization or point optimization.

I'm just saying that there are more than just two camps: stat normalization or point optimization.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by trooper6

All of the point optimizers I've seen on these boards say that the minute you have 4+ skills with one controlling attribute at an investment of 4cp, it is more point optimal to increase the underlying stat instead of putting points into the skills.

For DX, if you're not near your disad limit, you want to buy up DX rather than associated skills once either (a) you have 30 points in DX-based skills, or (b) you have four skills with four points in each of them, all of which you care about improving (this is because DX includes 5 points of speed). For IQ, because it has both 5 points of Will and 5 points of Per, the inflection point is 20 points in IQ-based skills or 3 skills.

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by Anthony

IQ should be split into a minimum of three different attributes, to properly encourage specialization; the D&D split between book learning (Int), social talent (Cha), and perception/intuition (Wis) works okay

What price do you put on those three stats? Do you try to keep the sum at 20, breaking down RAW IQ, or do they get their own price schedules?

[Lamech]

GURPS sort of models reality, but it makes a lot of excuses and differences for the fact that its a game.

The learning by study rules are unrealistic. Defaults are unrealistic. The rules for sleep are unrealistic. (Most people could probably go two weeks with 7 hours of sleep a day without suffering hospitalization.) The rules for starvation are unrealistic. The rules for altered gravity are a joke.

So when people say "Well person X can't have this stat at Y because it would mean Z". Yeah, well you can say that about every person, for every stat, for every value.

[Polydamas]

Anthony's idea has a lot of merit, but some difficulties. I can also envision problems like Psychology (Applied) [does it derive from a different stat if if is self-taught than if it is learned in school?] and Poetry [is it book learning, social intelligence, or the ability to sense how people are responding to your patterns and semantics?]

I see DX and IQ as basically talents for too many physical and mental skills to bother tracking. Either stat at 16+ rarely seems appropriate to describe real people.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Anaraxes

What price do you put on those three stats? Do you try to keep the sum at 20, breaking down RAW IQ, or do they get their own price schedules?

Their own price schedule. RAW IQ is overly cheap given how subdivided GURPS skills are (there are on the order of 300 IQ-based skills, 200 DX-based skills, and a handful of Per, Will, or HT-based).

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Polydamas

Anthony's idea has a lot of merit, but some difficulties. I can also envision problems like Psychology (Applied) [does it derive from a different stat if if is self-taught than if it is learned in school?] and Poetry [is it book learning, social intelligence, or the ability to sense how people are responding to your patterns and semantics?]

There's no perfect split; I just pointed that one out because it's relatively common and does an adequate job of representing archetypes.

[Fwibos]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Their own price schedule. RAW IQ is overly cheap given how subdivided GURPS skills are (there are on the order of 300 IQ-based skills, 200 DX-based skills, and a handful of Per, Will, or HT-based).

A lot of those higher IQ skills were less practically useful a long time ago. Intelligence always has been a force multiplier, but it's only recently that it's far surpassed ST, DX, and HT as a useful trait

Hence the prevelance of people with ST 9, DX 9, IQ 11, and HT 9 doing pretty ok in the modern world.

[Gollum]

Originally Posted by trooper6

I'm just saying that there are more than just two camps: stat normalization or point optimization.

Yes. There are GMs who like both camps, depending on the campaign.

And those who especially insist on the story: everything can be justified... As soon as there is a good background or reason to justify it!

Even in a realistic world, for instance, a player telling that his character improves his DX rather than skills with a very good argument could sounds fine.

Through the practice of his favorite weapons, my character suddenly realized how to move his body faster and become more effective... "Perception!", he thought,"Perception is the key. Paying much more attention to the surrounding, to see things coming in advance and act rather than contenting myself to react! That is what I will try to do know."

Indeed, in reality, even in harsh and realistic reality, skill improvement is never progressive. Sometimes, you realize something that allow you to make a jump in a whole field of knowledge, if not several. And some other times, you stagnate at the same level, no matter the efforts.

Of course, in a harsh and realistic, this jump has to remain a little one. +1 to IQ or DX. No more.