Attributes: Scale

In this installment I’m going to talk about attributes. Telharis attributes are the same as Pathfinder ability scores in their purpose and use, but differ in several key ways. First of all, there will be no separate score and modifier; you simply have an attribute and add it directly to any relevant rolls. The odd ability scores in Pathfinder were basically empty space; why use two numbers when you can use one? There are then two choices to make—what is considered the base or average score and what is the minimum score?

Basing the system around 0 as the average has the obvious advantage that it’s fairly intuitive; someone who’s bad at something gets penalties and someone who’s good gets bonuses. However, the worst possible score is then some arbitrary negative number, and that seems rather inelegant. The alternative is that the scale starts at 0 and only goes up: everyone gets bonuses, but those who are good get bigger bonuses. This has some potentially problematic implications for some of the system math (particularly damage and hit points), but I think those can be dealt with.

With the minimum score established as 0, we must now determine what constitutes an average human score. Two options jump out at me: 5, which maintains the status quo, or 10, which increases the distance between the minimum score and the human average. In the context of skill checks, a difference of 10 is the difference between reliable success (while taking 10) and complete incapability. This seems about right for the difference between an average person (10) and someone with a crippling disability (0-2). For a reality check, let’s look at some actual skills. Based on the Pathfinder rules, the average person should be able to climb “a surface with ledges to hold onto and stand on, such as a very rough wall or a ship’s rigging”. That sounds like something that someone with minimal strength (the key attribute for Climb) would not be capable of doing. According to Pathfinder, an average person should also be able to hear a creature walking within 10 feet. Someone with severely impaired senses would probably struggle to do this. Finally, I want to compare the effect of starting attributes vs. bonuses gained from leveling and training. Characters gain between +1 and +2 to skills per level depending on how heavily they focus on them. This means that, using 10 as a base, a level 6 or 7 character with a crippling attribute can perform actions based on that attribute as well as an average level 1 character. For comparison, in a base 5 system this would happen around 3rd or 4th level, which feels a little too early to me.

So, to clean all that up: Attributes range from 0 (crippling), to 10 (average human), and technically have no upper limit, though scores above 20 should be highly unusual. The vast majority of humans have scores in the range 5-15, with typical scores maybe even more tightly constrained.

More on attributes next time.