Would This Houserule Bother You: Unusual Backgrounds attached to high ability scores

[Christopher R. Rice]

in my current campaign about being the offspring of gods mortals have a soft limit of 16 in evertyhing with 17+ requiring an UB equal to the base cost of the attribute. So If you wanted a ST of 18 and were mortal you'd have to pay a 20 point UB.

I do allow Special Exercises up to four for Lifting and Striking ST as well.

Demigods have a limit equal to 20 + Racial Template Bonus and can purchase Special Exercises as well as divine gifts that increase their max ceiling.

[RGTraynor]

It's defensible, sure. But (say) someone going for IQ 15 is already investing a titanic amount of points into that and that alone, and unless you're starting PCs at 200+, how often does that come up anyway?

In the 17 years since 4th edition came out, there've been 43 PCs created in my campaign. Not a single one has had ANY stat exceeding 14, and few generated that high.

[Rupert]

My current campaign has PCs in the 800-1200+ range. The longest playing ones started at 150 or 200 points (I forget which). I never expected it to run so long, and it wasn't intended to be about super-humanly good and tough humans so if I'd had any inkling this was going to be the case I'd have set a cap for the base stats of 15, with a character allowed one stat at 16 for a 20 point UB. As it is, the oldest characters are hitting the default caps in most of their basic attributes and will probably then start pushing up all their secondary attributes as well.

[whswhs]

I will say that there's clear precedent for this in fiction: the character of Clark Savage, Jr., and that of Tarzan, though in his case "raised in the jungle by apes" is more than a justification for high stats. Possibly that of Edmond Dantes.

In a lot of campaigns, though, I'd be more inclined to set a hard limit. Allowing this sort of UB would be more plausible in a cinematic or epic campaign than in a realistic one. (For an epic campaign, "descended from the undying gods" would be a possible UB—a lot of the heroes of the Trojan War seem to have had this.)

[johndallman]

This seems pretty reasonable. I'm in one long-running campaign where IQ is very useful. It's been capped at 16, with negotiation possibilities: some characters have taken higher Will and/or Per in exchange for a lower IQ limit. None of the players seem to have felt the need for very high DX, HT or ST, AFAIK.

[whswhs]

Another possibility would be to allow purchase of stats, but change the upper limit of stats that can raise skill defaults from 20 to 16. That way, instead of being a master in every game and the equivalent of an experienced professional in every science, your world class genius character is no better than an entry level player in the first case and a beginning student in the second. Then with Unusual Background they could buy higher attributes with Super Attribute (+25%) and get higher skill defaults.

[Christopher R. Rice]

Originally Posted by whswhs

Another possibility would be to allow purchase of stats, but change the upper limit of stats that can raise skill defaults from 20 to 16. That way, instead of being a master in every game and the equivalent of an experienced professional in every science, your world class genius character is no better than an entry level player in the first case and a beginning student in the second. Then with Unusual Background they could buy higher attributes with Super Attribute (+25%) and get higher skill defaults.

That's actually not a bad idea. Hmmm.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by whswhs

I

Allowing this sort of UB would be more plausible in a cinematic or epic campaign than in a realistic one. ()

It might be more plausible in an epic or cinematic game but it would be my expectation that some one contemplating suc a limit is desiring to run a low-powered and/or gritty campaign.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

It might be more plausible in an epic or cinematic game but it would be my expectation that some one contemplating suc a limit is desiring to run a low-powered and/or gritty campaign.

In a gritty campaign you could certainly have the limit but I wouldn't necessarily allow an exception to it, or a UB that granted one.

[Christopher R. Rice]

Originally Posted by whswhs

Another possibility would be to allow purchase of stats, but change the upper limit of stats that can raise skill defaults from 20 to 16. That way, instead of being a master in every game and the equivalent of an experienced professional in every science, your world class genius character is no better than an entry level player in the first case and a beginning student in the second. Then with Unusual Background they could buy higher attributes with Super Attribute (+25%) and get higher skill defaults.

I knew I'd seen something like this before. This is pretty much Doug Cole's "By Default" from Pyramid #3/65: Alternate GURPS III.