JulesMrshn@aol.com wrote:

> Having higher stats means you rely on them more. Instead of comming up with a
> plan, you rush right in with your stats and rely on them to get you through.
> THIS IS BY NO MEANS every case, but look back and you will see it is the
> majority of times. You make some easy plan that relies on stat/prof rolls,
> or spells that you have in abundance. With high stats you rely on rolls not
> roleplaying. It is the way those PCs are played. I know, I have played a
> charcter with no stat lower then 14 (yes i did roll them and in front of my
> DM who had a stroke : ) though we used the 4d6 method) but the first time I
> rolled a crappy character, my Dm said, no don't throw him away, play him out.
> So I did. I found that I could do more, especially since being a thief was
> all I could do. I wasn't the "tank" so I could I played him and he died a
> glorious death of tripping while inching along an aligator pit, not being
> kille by the aligators but by falling on the dagger I was using to try and
> stop myself from falling. Next time I rolled to get average stats. (Note: We
> play deadly games here in my group. Our first DM had no mercy so as the
> group evolved, we kept that deadly sense of a game. If you can survive our
> games then you are either lucky or have developed a good fleeing technique.
> None of that roll doctoring here) When you play an average theif, or an
> averag mage, or an average fighter and survive, you show your meddle. Maybe
> the problem realizing the shear feat of surviving with average stats to a
> high level like 10th is becuase your DM is a wimpy DM. There are a lot of
> them out their and I have seen my share online. They don't seem to go for the
> kill. They have the villians lay off someone with a lot of wounds, when
> natural selection dictacts to all by instinct to kill the wounded, the
> weakest link in the chain, especialy if they are a contantly high damaging
> fighter. No Mercy to the PCs : ) After all they are just paper and another
> PC is a few rolls away.
> ************************************

I think you're generalizing in a couple of places a little too much. High stats
give characters the opportunity to do everything that a low stat character can,
and more or better. I am especially deadly to players who try to use brute force
rather than ingenuity (of course, there is the fact that there is only the
capacity to be so deadly with a group who has regular access to the Ressurection
spell). Also, my major tenet as a DM is that I (and any DM) has the right to take
away anything from the party except two things, a player's character and a
player's participation. I encourage people to get very attached to their
characters, and so I will not just kill off a character permanently without very
good reason (the player being an idiot or trying to act immortal is a good one).
Same thing with the player in the campaign. Once invited, I will not go and kick
someone out without very good reason. As happened recently, unfortunately, with
inner-party RL bickering. I don't see this as weak. There's almost always another
chance for players who show improvement and maturation of their characters. I
guess that's enough ranting for now.
Thx,
--Alaric