I swear half the time I see posts like this it’s followed by them listing a 20 and ONLY 3 18s. I personally lucked out with 8 8 11 12 9 13. One more point than a commoner. Despite the next lowest player having 20 more points than me I don’t think im gonna be given a chance to reroll. So how do I maximize this characters potential? I’m thinking my best bet is moon Druid but the party already has one and I’m joining late.
That is the problem with rolling for stats and why nearly every DM who does use rolling for stats allows some sort of house rule to deal with circumstances like that.
You are right in that moon druid is the most viable but even then your mental stats will be awful and you will be very weak when outside of your wild shape
The next most viable option is probably a rogue they only need high dex and if you go ranged con isn't that important. If allowed you could go for custom linage and but the ability modiffier into Dex and take skilled expert as a feat. At level one this would give you +3 to Dex (standard for a rogue) and a +7 to stealth (or similar) this character could themn work on remaining unseen and attacking from cover. If you make your character look like an elf you might be able to persuade your DM to let you take hte elven accuracy feat instead but this is not RAW and by the sound of it your DM is not going ot be willing to bend the rules to help improve your character.
You could play your character as a commoner as soon as anything dangerous appears you run and hide, though to have a character like that in the party would really frustrates some group of players.
You could also play a wanabee hero without a clue. For example a sorcerer who has found he has some magical abilities and thinks that makes him invincible (I'd make charisma as high as possible and put 8 into int). Such a character would be likely to make very poor decsions and die very quickly, but then you can get to re-roll and try to get a more viable character.
So, your DM can't force you to play a character that you don't want to play, if you feel that your character is no better than a commoner and you think you'll get no fun out of it either talk to your DM (best solution) or tell them that your character has decided that they are no adventure material and goes to farm potatoes in the countryside. You don't want to play a commoner in a world of heroes. It sounds fantastic on paper, because "oh it's interesting and different and whatever" but you'll just get annoyed by the fact that everyone has a place in the party except you because almost everything in D&D is calculated with stats. "This is our wizard, a infinite pool of knowledge; meet our barbarian, he can lift a boulder with one finger, and... oh yeh... that's Greg... he's... funny I guess?". Unless everyone in your group have similar stats, that's no fun. This also depends on how much emphasis your DM puts on rolling dice.
However, if you really want to play this character anyway, as long as you get at least one 14 I'd say you're good to go. I love playing negative stats, as long as I have at least a decent one. Your stats will even out at some point with ability scores improvements, you don't have to think to much about it.
You're going to want a (sub)class that's single-attribute dependent so you can focus your efforts on one thing. Ranged weapon users are a good option, since you can squeeze defense and damage out of the same ability score. Spellcasters can also work if you choose spells that don't rely on saves or attack rolls, or if you focus your spells on Intelligence saves (which are often low).
Have you chosen a race yet? Can you customize racial ability scores? Here's what you can squeeze out of that:
Custom Lineage can potentially get you +3 in one stat if you pick a half-feat.
Mountain Dwarves get two +2s, and can also wear heavy armor with no penalty for not meeting the strength requirement. They also get medium armor proficiency, which will let you get decent AC with lower dex than light armor.
Hill Dwarves get the standard +2/+1, but they also get bonus HP. This can help offset a low constitution score. Same no-penalty-for-heavy-armor thing as the mountain dwarf as well.
Half-Elf gets +2 and two +1s, which can help round out an additional ability.
Also note certain features that let you give yourself a +1. Forge Clerics can get a +1 armor or weapon, Artificers have their infusions, and if you're playing in Eberron, a "Mark of Making" human can cast Magic Weapon for free without concentration.
Example builds:
Mountain Dwarf, Life Cleric. 15 wisdom and 14 constitution isn't too bad, and you get to use heavy armor without issues. Being slow isn't a huge problem since you're not on the front lines.
Custom Lineage with a +1 int feat, Armorer Artificer, with infiltrator armor model. Gets to start with 16 intelligence, heavy armor that doesn't need strength and doesn't hurt stealth, and is attacking from range so their low HP isn't as big a deal.
Damn, at that point, ask if you can't just use the standard array or point buy. You'd still be better off then that crap...
The DMs I've played with that allowed us to roll stats usually had some homebrew elements to it, the ones that stick to my mind are:
Roll 1d8, add 10. This makes it impossible to get negative stats though and most stats will be well above average.
Roll 4d6, reroll all 1s, all the time.
Roll 4d6, reroll 1s and 2s, once.
You're allowed X (where X is usually 2 or 3) stat spreads from rolling, pick what you want from those afterwards.
Or, as suggested above, you can just say this character is a farmer/peasant, ask if you can make it an NPC and if your DM still won't budge, make it your mission to make the worst character possible that will most likely die very very quickly and then reroll a new character... =P
If your DM isn't allowing you to have fun with a good character, make something that will give you fun regardless. DnD is meant to have fun, it's a game. If your DM won't even give you that, you might as well find a different table. Alternatively, I wouldn't do this to a DM I'm friends with, but if they still won't budge, I'd make something completely ridiculous like make it one level in every class or something and when/if my fellow allies give me slack for being useless or running away at the first sign of combat, I'd openly blame the DM and hopefully they'll understand that what they did was pretty lame.
I would just make a plain old human fighter. Human adds +1 to all stats and fighter has the most ASIs.
With the +1 from Human you are now only 14 behind the rest of the group.
Put the 14 in STR and the 13 in CON. At levels 4 and 6 you use the ASI to put 2 points in strength. Now you already have 18 in your main stat. Get heavy armor, so you don't need to care about dex. You're gonna be able to wear Ring at level 1, Chain at level 4 and Plate at level 6. With a Shield that gives you 20AC at level 6.
HP-wise you're still gonna be squishy due to low con, but... If you die you get to make a new char. If you live long enough, you can use the ASIs to increase your CON.
Honestly, I think rolling stats sucks if people just re-roll bad chars. That just leads to HP inflation. Might as well just give everyone the standard array +4 if you're gonna accept the good rolls and not the bad rolls.
A spellcaster build is probably best but you will want to focus on support and utility rather than damage.
Life Cleric, as previously suggested, could still be really good here. You can Bless your party, heal them, enhance their abilities for skill checks (be it Guidance or Enhance Ability), improve their weapons and so on.
Staying at range and the Sanctuary spell, combined with some armour and shield will help to keep you safe.
Mountain Dwarf is a great combo, as mentioned by OverdesignBob, for the decent buffs as with Tasha's that's +2 to any 2 ability scores of choice. That's pretty good. Mark of Warding Dwarf is also quite decent too as it will add decent protective and support/utility spells while also providing Mage Armour for free if you prefer that to wearing armour. Armour (or Mage Armour) + Armor of Agathys + Sanctuary + Shield, is going to provide a very decent amount of protection. Combined with the healing, especially for Life Cleric, and you can be a hard target to take out even with low con.
MoW Dwarf Life Cleric is what I would make with your stats.
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I swear half the time I see posts like this it’s followed by them listing a 20 and ONLY 3 18s. I personally lucked out with 8 8 11 12 9 13. One more point than a commoner. Despite the next lowest player having 20 more points than me I don’t think im gonna be given a chance to reroll. So how do I maximize this characters potential? I’m thinking my best bet is moon Druid but the party already has one and I’m joining late.
Now is when you seize the opportunity to teach your DM why rolling for stats is so bad. Your DM has given themselves an unsolvable problem by trying to ensure you have fun while the other players also have fun, given that anything they find challenging you will find impossible and anything you find merely challenging they will find trivial.
So embrace it. You only have 1 13, so slap that baby on Charisma and roll a Bard/Sorcerer (Warlock levels as well totally optional).
Consider an Artificer (ultimately a Battlesmith). It’s very SAD, so put your 13 in INT and get a +2 to that from your race with custom lineage. 15 is respectable. I’d put the 12 in CON. You won’t need to worry about any other stats.
You probably won’t want to do much weapon fighting until 3rd level, so pick a solid offensive cantrip. For example, Create Bonfire is a DEX save for the target, so you won’t have to worry about attack rolls.
Once you are at 3rd level, Battle Ready will use your INT to attack with magical (including infused) weapons. And you'll have a steel defender to soak up damage and block for you. Attack at range with a repeating crossbow and use buff spells.
At 4th level, use your ASI for a feat with a one point INT bump like Fey Touched or Telekinesis. You’ll be at 16 INT and have a cool feature. At that point, you won’t seem too far behind the party, especially if you focus on buffing them and attacking at range.
This is one of those talk to the dm. If he doesn’t want you to reroll I would be asking to bump one of those numbers (probably a 9 or 8 for some semblance of balance) to a 15. I always feel with rolling you have to make sure one primary stat is above 15 or the character can be very difficult to make work and dms should work with you there.
at the very least allowing you to go standard array or point buy is fair. If the dm doesn’t work with you here with a pretty reasonable request I’d be considering other options.
I swear half the time I see posts like this it’s followed by them listing a 20 and ONLY 3 18s. I personally lucked out with 8 8 11 12 9 13. One more point than a commoner. Despite the next lowest player having 20 more points than me I don’t think im gonna be given a chance to reroll. So how do I maximize this characters potential? I’m thinking my best bet is moon Druid but the party already has one and I’m joining late.
If you're the type of player that cares about combat effectiveness, then you should never agree to roll for stats or allow anyone else at the table to roll for stats. If you're that kind of player and end up with the array that you rolled, then you won't have fun. You will always be behind with 40 character levels in stat progression (20/2 x 4) - Ie. you're at most a sidekick.
I probably wouldn't play that character, but if I did it would be a reckless character that might die in an interesting way someday such that it still added to the campaign and could set up the story for my next character.
I would just make a plain old human fighter. Human adds +1 to all stats and fighter has the most ASIs.
With the +1 from Human you are now only 14 behind the rest of the group.
Put the 14 in STR and the 13 in CON. At levels 4 and 6 you use the ASI to put 2 points in strength. Now you already have 18 in your main stat. Get heavy armor, so you don't need to care about dex. You're gonna be able to wear Ring at level 1, Chain at level 4 and Plate at level 6. With a Shield that gives you 20AC at level 6.
HP-wise you're still gonna be squishy due to low con, but... If you die you get to make a new char. If you live long enough, you can use the ASIs to increase your CON.
Honestly, I think rolling stats sucks if people just re-roll bad chars. That just leads to HP inflation. Might as well just give everyone the standard array +4 if you're gonna accept the good rolls and not the bad rolls.
"only" lol. 14 stat points, that's more than any character can produce from their path to level 20.
This thread isn't really about rolling for stats vs standard array / point buy but this roll does highlight the downside of rolling for stats. Most DMs house rule something to deal with these circumstances which inevitably involve increasing low rolls (either directly or with a re-roll) but not decreasing high rolls, a player who rolls 18,17,16,14,14,12 creates just as much imbalance as one rolling 13,12,11,9,8,8. Roolling for stats on average creates higher powered characters and as DerManiac said allowing low rolls to be changed but not forcing high rolls to be changed increases the diferential.
If you are allowed custom linage you can (with a half feat) get your primary stat up to 16, bot someone using point buy (or rolling 15 as their highest roll) can do that to get to 18, the compromise is you only get a half feat rather than dark vision of a full feat (or other racial benefits if you take another race). It isn't however just your proimary stat, as others have said your con will be low but other stats do matter, if entangle is cast you will really struggle because you dumped strength if someone casts hidious laughter or hold person you might be incapacitated for the who battle because you dumped wisdom, you will be scared to speak in the presence of an NPC in case the DM asks you to roll persuasion, having one dump stat and things like this happening occasionally is bouth funny and frustrating at the same time but having 3 negative stat modifiers will just make it tiresome at least for me.
The OP has been told by the DM that they have to use these stats, they have to decide whether they can have fun with such a weak character and then make the choice whether to make it as viable as possible, create a character they fully expect to die quickly or decide not to play at all because they will noy have fun playing such a weak character.
I swear half the time I see posts like this it’s followed by them listing a 20 and ONLY 3 18s. I personally lucked out with 8 8 11 12 9 13. One more point than a commoner. Despite the next lowest player having 20 more points than me I don’t think im gonna be given a chance to reroll. So how do I maximize this characters potential? I’m thinking my best bet is moon Druid but the party already has one and I’m joining late.
Don't even try to build anything out of this. Does your DM know about your terrible rolls? If so, negotiate, just ask if you can re-roll. Doesn't have to be fancy, but also depends on the DM. My DM is a friend, and I play with all people I know pretty well. No one is going to be that much of a rules lawyer to say "you have to keep those". I agree with @Mistborn20 (cool name btw) that you should talk to the DM. If he knows about the rolls, just ask to re-roll. It's not that big a deal, and I feel like a good DM wouldn't force you to keep those. Take all that with a grain of salt because your question doesn't tell me anything about you situation with the DM, so I can't give perfect advice :) If he says "no re-roll" ask if you can change a few (pretty similar affect, I personally as a DM wouldn't care which one you did)
Your highest stat is a 13. Someone in your group has to recognize that that's terrible, and take your side. If not, (again, I don't exactly know the scenario), maybe find a new group, or at least tell your DM what you're thinking. Communicate. Negotiate. Bribe. Threaten. Anything is better than not trying. Except maybe the last two. Don't do that.
To all the people saying "just go and commit suicide so you get a reroll": you're terrible, and you should feel bad. Sabotaging the game because you don't feel your numbers are fat enough is absolutely piss-poor play; if you're not willing to play a Village Idiot array, don't roll for stats in the first place.
Turtle rolled. he got a lowball array. The objective is 'how do I make this lowball array playable', not "how do I make the DM and the players all hate me so much they kill this character and let me try for Hero Stats again?" That is nothing but an extended temper tantrum, and if you try it you're no better off than a child. Have some bloody class.
Now.
One possibility I haven't seen come up yet is playing an artificer who takes their super lowball start as a challenge to overcome. An Armorer can disregard the Strength requirements for their arcane armor, and as they grow they can create Gauntlets of Ogre Strength and Headbands of Intellect to magically bolster their poor numbers. It's a very artificer-y way of playing - you use magical items and well-selected gear to overcome the disabilities Nature inflicted on you. The higher level you get, the more you can use magic to correct your starting penalties. Emphasize Intelligence and Dexterity with your 13 and 12, to bolster your tool-check stats, and see if you can work with the DM on a story of your character being born with a weak body and taking up Adventure to prove that doesn't make them a weak person. Their arcane armor might be a reflection of what they wish they could be - a powerful, impenetrable warrior concealing the fragile meat inside.
That would be where I'd go, perhaps even using ASI stat boosts to represent the artificer slowly replacing bits of their failing meat shell with artifice. Enhance their body and mind with magic as they grow, replace feeble flesh with wood, metal and stone. Become the perfect reflection of themselves their armor's always shown them to be.
To all the people saying "just go and commit suicide so you get a reroll": you're terrible, and you should feel bad. Sabotaging the game because you don't feel your numbers are fat enough is absolutely piss-poor play; if you're not willing to play a Village Idiot array, don't roll for stats in the first place.
Turtle rolled. he got a lowball array. The objective is 'how do I make this lowball array playable', not "how do I make the DM and the players all hate me so much they kill this character and let me try for Hero Stats again?" That is nothing but an extended temper tantrum, and if you try it you're no better off than a child. Have some bloody class.
First of all, pretty sure no one has said anything remotely like that. There has been advice to re-roll, but no one is talking about "sabotaging the game". Using standard array (a fair set of scores compared to the originals) has been brought up multiple times, as has talking it out with the DM. I agree with you that a case can definitely be made for a village idiot type character, and could be fun in certain circumstances. But dealing with being so behind of everyone in a campaign long scenario can potentially shift the balance of power too much. Some people are okay with being a Frodo in a world of Aragorns and Gandalfs. Others are not. Depends on the table. Again, we don't have a lot of info about the relationship to the DM and other players, and how they feel about it, so it's difficult to make final judgements. I see a point for roleplay here, where you could make your character a fun underdog, and I actulaly agree with your artificer idea. But I'll say this finally: there a bad stats, then there are these. His best modifier is a +1. Plus one! He has not one but two eights and a nine! That is legendarily bad. I'm not saying give him three 18's and a free feat to boot, cause sometimes you have to take the bad with the good. But at least give him a chance of keeping up with the rest of the party.
First of all, pretty sure no one has said anything remotely like that. There has been advice to re-roll, but no one is talking about "sabotaging the game".
I was actually surprised that somebody did. Maybe they were trying for snark.
In my early years I would keep rolling sets of 7 stats continually until I got something I liked, and the GM witnessed my rolls. But I'm too old for that poop now and that idea of massive has gone out of style.
Do the best you can with what you got - a closer tie to real life there =)
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There's more than one reply recommending - seriously - that Turtle make a squishy wizard character who charges into battle punching things in an attempt to get himself killed as swiftly as possible so he can reroll. That's the kind of sabotage I was talking about - going out of your way to play a character designed to do nothing other than die so you can get a chance at better stats. I've seen that suggestion crop up many times in threads like this - 'the quickest way to fixing your bad stats is a low CON modifier and a helpful orc warband' - and personally I find it repugnant.
If you're perfectly content to take the 90+-point Superhero Array, you have no business carping about rolling the 61-point Village Idiot array instead. Turtle, to his credit, made no mention of dumping the array and was looking for ways to make it work. The Life cleric idea, a couple of the utility caster ideas, the notion of a human fighter burning all seven ASIs, all are decent possibilities. Suicide-by-orc is a trollish move for ********, however, and needs to be slapped down.
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I swear half the time I see posts like this it’s followed by them listing a 20 and ONLY 3 18s. I personally lucked out with 8 8 11 12 9 13. One more point than a commoner. Despite the next lowest player having 20 more points than me I don’t think im gonna be given a chance to reroll. So how do I maximize this characters potential? I’m thinking my best bet is moon Druid but the party already has one and I’m joining late.
That is the problem with rolling for stats and why nearly every DM who does use rolling for stats allows some sort of house rule to deal with circumstances like that.
You are right in that moon druid is the most viable but even then your mental stats will be awful and you will be very weak when outside of your wild shape
The next most viable option is probably a rogue they only need high dex and if you go ranged con isn't that important. If allowed you could go for custom linage and but the ability modiffier into Dex and take skilled expert as a feat. At level one this would give you +3 to Dex (standard for a rogue) and a +7 to stealth (or similar) this character could themn work on remaining unseen and attacking from cover. If you make your character look like an elf you might be able to persuade your DM to let you take hte elven accuracy feat instead but this is not RAW and by the sound of it your DM is not going ot be willing to bend the rules to help improve your character.
You could play your character as a commoner as soon as anything dangerous appears you run and hide, though to have a character like that in the party would really frustrates some group of players.
You could also play a wanabee hero without a clue. For example a sorcerer who has found he has some magical abilities and thinks that makes him invincible (I'd make charisma as high as possible and put 8 into int). Such a character would be likely to make very poor decsions and die very quickly, but then you can get to re-roll and try to get a more viable character.
Ehi!
So, your DM can't force you to play a character that you don't want to play, if you feel that your character is no better than a commoner and you think you'll get no fun out of it either talk to your DM (best solution) or tell them that your character has decided that they are no adventure material and goes to farm potatoes in the countryside. You don't want to play a commoner in a world of heroes. It sounds fantastic on paper, because "oh it's interesting and different and whatever" but you'll just get annoyed by the fact that everyone has a place in the party except you because almost everything in D&D is calculated with stats. "This is our wizard, a infinite pool of knowledge; meet our barbarian, he can lift a boulder with one finger, and... oh yeh... that's Greg... he's... funny I guess?". Unless everyone in your group have similar stats, that's no fun. This also depends on how much emphasis your DM puts on rolling dice.
However, if you really want to play this character anyway, as long as you get at least one 14 I'd say you're good to go. I love playing negative stats, as long as I have at least a decent one. Your stats will even out at some point with ability scores improvements, you don't have to think to much about it.
You're going to want a (sub)class that's single-attribute dependent so you can focus your efforts on one thing. Ranged weapon users are a good option, since you can squeeze defense and damage out of the same ability score. Spellcasters can also work if you choose spells that don't rely on saves or attack rolls, or if you focus your spells on Intelligence saves (which are often low).
Have you chosen a race yet? Can you customize racial ability scores? Here's what you can squeeze out of that:
Also note certain features that let you give yourself a +1. Forge Clerics can get a +1 armor or weapon, Artificers have their infusions, and if you're playing in Eberron, a "Mark of Making" human can cast Magic Weapon for free without concentration.
Example builds:
Damn, at that point, ask if you can't just use the standard array or point buy. You'd still be better off then that crap...
The DMs I've played with that allowed us to roll stats usually had some homebrew elements to it, the ones that stick to my mind are:
Or, as suggested above, you can just say this character is a farmer/peasant, ask if you can make it an NPC and if your DM still won't budge, make it your mission to make the worst character possible that will most likely die very very quickly and then reroll a new character... =P
If your DM isn't allowing you to have fun with a good character, make something that will give you fun regardless. DnD is meant to have fun, it's a game. If your DM won't even give you that, you might as well find a different table. Alternatively, I wouldn't do this to a DM I'm friends with, but if they still won't budge, I'd make something completely ridiculous like make it one level in every class or something and when/if my fellow allies give me slack for being useless or running away at the first sign of combat, I'd openly blame the DM and hopefully they'll understand that what they did was pretty lame.
I would just make a plain old human fighter. Human adds +1 to all stats and fighter has the most ASIs.
With the +1 from Human you are now only 14 behind the rest of the group.
Put the 14 in STR and the 13 in CON. At levels 4 and 6 you use the ASI to put 2 points in strength. Now you already have 18 in your main stat. Get heavy armor, so you don't need to care about dex. You're gonna be able to wear Ring at level 1, Chain at level 4 and Plate at level 6. With a Shield that gives you 20AC at level 6.
HP-wise you're still gonna be squishy due to low con, but... If you die you get to make a new char. If you live long enough, you can use the ASIs to increase your CON.
Honestly, I think rolling stats sucks if people just re-roll bad chars. That just leads to HP inflation. Might as well just give everyone the standard array +4 if you're gonna accept the good rolls and not the bad rolls.
A spellcaster build is probably best but you will want to focus on support and utility rather than damage.
Life Cleric, as previously suggested, could still be really good here. You can Bless your party, heal them, enhance their abilities for skill checks (be it Guidance or Enhance Ability), improve their weapons and so on.
Staying at range and the Sanctuary spell, combined with some armour and shield will help to keep you safe.
Mountain Dwarf is a great combo, as mentioned by OverdesignBob, for the decent buffs as with Tasha's that's +2 to any 2 ability scores of choice. That's pretty good. Mark of Warding Dwarf is also quite decent too as it will add decent protective and support/utility spells while also providing Mage Armour for free if you prefer that to wearing armour. Armour (or Mage Armour) + Armor of Agathys + Sanctuary + Shield, is going to provide a very decent amount of protection. Combined with the healing, especially for Life Cleric, and you can be a hard target to take out even with low con.
MoW Dwarf Life Cleric is what I would make with your stats.
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Ask the DM to allow you to reroll, or add points so that you're at the same minimum as the player with the lowest.
If the DM insists that you use those stats:
Make a wizard, for the lowest possible hit points.
Act like a crazy person.
In the first fight, charge in punching. Keep punching. Punch any random NPC that walks past.
Not long after, your character will be killed.
Now roll a new character
\0/ Onward to victory \0/
Might i suggest a homebrew stat roll method i saw?
1. Roll 2d6 (eg 3 and 4)
2. Add together (7)
3. Add 6 to the total (13)
Lowest number you get with this method is 8 and highest is 18 while giving a good sprinkling of numbers inbetween.
Maybe more useful for beginer players
Now is when you seize the opportunity to teach your DM why rolling for stats is so bad. Your DM has given themselves an unsolvable problem by trying to ensure you have fun while the other players also have fun, given that anything they find challenging you will find impossible and anything you find merely challenging they will find trivial.
So embrace it. You only have 1 13, so slap that baby on Charisma and roll a Bard/Sorcerer (Warlock levels as well totally optional).
Consider an Artificer (ultimately a Battlesmith). It’s very SAD, so put your 13 in INT and get a +2 to that from your race with custom lineage. 15 is respectable. I’d put the 12 in CON. You won’t need to worry about any other stats.
You probably won’t want to do much weapon fighting until 3rd level, so pick a solid offensive cantrip. For example, Create Bonfire is a DEX save for the target, so you won’t have to worry about attack rolls.
Once you are at 3rd level, Battle Ready will use your INT to attack with magical (including infused) weapons. And you'll have a steel defender to soak up damage and block for you. Attack at range with a repeating crossbow and use buff spells.
At 4th level, use your ASI for a feat with a one point INT bump like Fey Touched or Telekinesis. You’ll be at 16 INT and have a cool feature. At that point, you won’t seem too far behind the party, especially if you focus on buffing them and attacking at range.
This is one of those talk to the dm. If he doesn’t want you to reroll I would be asking to bump one of those numbers (probably a 9 or 8 for some semblance of balance) to a 15. I always feel with rolling you have to make sure one primary stat is above 15 or the character can be very difficult to make work and dms should work with you there.
at the very least allowing you to go standard array or point buy is fair. If the dm doesn’t work with you here with a pretty reasonable request I’d be considering other options.
If you're the type of player that cares about combat effectiveness, then you should never agree to roll for stats or allow anyone else at the table to roll for stats. If you're that kind of player and end up with the array that you rolled, then you won't have fun. You will always be behind with 40 character levels in stat progression (20/2 x 4) - Ie. you're at most a sidekick.
I probably wouldn't play that character, but if I did it would be a reckless character that might die in an interesting way someday such that it still added to the campaign and could set up the story for my next character.
Altrazin Aghanes - Wizard/Fighter
Varpulis Windhowl - Fighter
Skolson Demjon - Cleric/Fighter
"only" lol. 14 stat points, that's more than any character can produce from their path to level 20.
Altrazin Aghanes - Wizard/Fighter
Varpulis Windhowl - Fighter
Skolson Demjon - Cleric/Fighter
This thread isn't really about rolling for stats vs standard array / point buy but this roll does highlight the downside of rolling for stats. Most DMs house rule something to deal with these circumstances which inevitably involve increasing low rolls (either directly or with a re-roll) but not decreasing high rolls, a player who rolls 18,17,16,14,14,12 creates just as much imbalance as one rolling 13,12,11,9,8,8. Roolling for stats on average creates higher powered characters and as DerManiac said allowing low rolls to be changed but not forcing high rolls to be changed increases the diferential.
If you are allowed custom linage you can (with a half feat) get your primary stat up to 16, bot someone using point buy (or rolling 15 as their highest roll) can do that to get to 18, the compromise is you only get a half feat rather than dark vision of a full feat (or other racial benefits if you take another race). It isn't however just your proimary stat, as others have said your con will be low but other stats do matter, if entangle is cast you will really struggle because you dumped strength if someone casts hidious laughter or hold person you might be incapacitated for the who battle because you dumped wisdom, you will be scared to speak in the presence of an NPC in case the DM asks you to roll persuasion, having one dump stat and things like this happening occasionally is bouth funny and frustrating at the same time but having 3 negative stat modifiers will just make it tiresome at least for me.
The OP has been told by the DM that they have to use these stats, they have to decide whether they can have fun with such a weak character and then make the choice whether to make it as viable as possible, create a character they fully expect to die quickly or decide not to play at all because they will noy have fun playing such a weak character.
Don't even try to build anything out of this. Does your DM know about your terrible rolls? If so, negotiate, just ask if you can re-roll. Doesn't have to be fancy, but also depends on the DM. My DM is a friend, and I play with all people I know pretty well. No one is going to be that much of a rules lawyer to say "you have to keep those". I agree with @Mistborn20 (cool name btw) that you should talk to the DM. If he knows about the rolls, just ask to re-roll. It's not that big a deal, and I feel like a good DM wouldn't force you to keep those. Take all that with a grain of salt because your question doesn't tell me anything about you situation with the DM, so I can't give perfect advice :) If he says "no re-roll" ask if you can change a few (pretty similar affect, I personally as a DM wouldn't care which one you did)
Your highest stat is a 13. Someone in your group has to recognize that that's terrible, and take your side. If not, (again, I don't exactly know the scenario), maybe find a new group, or at least tell your DM what you're thinking. Communicate. Negotiate. Bribe. Threaten. Anything is better than not trying. Except maybe the last two. Don't do that.
Updog
To all the people saying "just go and commit suicide so you get a reroll": you're terrible, and you should feel bad. Sabotaging the game because you don't feel your numbers are fat enough is absolutely piss-poor play; if you're not willing to play a Village Idiot array, don't roll for stats in the first place.
Turtle rolled. he got a lowball array. The objective is 'how do I make this lowball array playable', not "how do I make the DM and the players all hate me so much they kill this character and let me try for Hero Stats again?" That is nothing but an extended temper tantrum, and if you try it you're no better off than a child. Have some bloody class.
Now.
One possibility I haven't seen come up yet is playing an artificer who takes their super lowball start as a challenge to overcome. An Armorer can disregard the Strength requirements for their arcane armor, and as they grow they can create Gauntlets of Ogre Strength and Headbands of Intellect to magically bolster their poor numbers. It's a very artificer-y way of playing - you use magical items and well-selected gear to overcome the disabilities Nature inflicted on you. The higher level you get, the more you can use magic to correct your starting penalties. Emphasize Intelligence and Dexterity with your 13 and 12, to bolster your tool-check stats, and see if you can work with the DM on a story of your character being born with a weak body and taking up Adventure to prove that doesn't make them a weak person. Their arcane armor might be a reflection of what they wish they could be - a powerful, impenetrable warrior concealing the fragile meat inside.
That would be where I'd go, perhaps even using ASI stat boosts to represent the artificer slowly replacing bits of their failing meat shell with artifice. Enhance their body and mind with magic as they grow, replace feeble flesh with wood, metal and stone. Become the perfect reflection of themselves their armor's always shown them to be.
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First of all, pretty sure no one has said anything remotely like that. There has been advice to re-roll, but no one is talking about "sabotaging the game". Using standard array (a fair set of scores compared to the originals) has been brought up multiple times, as has talking it out with the DM. I agree with you that a case can definitely be made for a village idiot type character, and could be fun in certain circumstances. But dealing with being so behind of everyone in a campaign long scenario can potentially shift the balance of power too much. Some people are okay with being a Frodo in a world of Aragorns and Gandalfs. Others are not. Depends on the table. Again, we don't have a lot of info about the relationship to the DM and other players, and how they feel about it, so it's difficult to make final judgements. I see a point for roleplay here, where you could make your character a fun underdog, and I actulaly agree with your artificer idea. But I'll say this finally: there a bad stats, then there are these. His best modifier is a +1. Plus one! He has not one but two eights and a nine! That is legendarily bad. I'm not saying give him three 18's and a free feat to boot, cause sometimes you have to take the bad with the good. But at least give him a chance of keeping up with the rest of the party.
Updog
I was actually surprised that somebody did. Maybe they were trying for snark.
In my early years I would keep rolling sets of 7 stats continually until I got something I liked, and the GM witnessed my rolls. But I'm too old for that poop now and that idea of massive has gone out of style.
Do the best you can with what you got - a closer tie to real life there =)
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
There's more than one reply recommending - seriously - that Turtle make a squishy wizard character who charges into battle punching things in an attempt to get himself killed as swiftly as possible so he can reroll. That's the kind of sabotage I was talking about - going out of your way to play a character designed to do nothing other than die so you can get a chance at better stats. I've seen that suggestion crop up many times in threads like this - 'the quickest way to fixing your bad stats is a low CON modifier and a helpful orc warband' - and personally I find it repugnant.
If you're perfectly content to take the 90+-point Superhero Array, you have no business carping about rolling the 61-point Village Idiot array instead. Turtle, to his credit, made no mention of dumping the array and was looking for ways to make it work. The Life cleric idea, a couple of the utility caster ideas, the notion of a human fighter burning all seven ASIs, all are decent possibilities. Suicide-by-orc is a trollish move for ********, however, and needs to be slapped down.
Please do not contact or message me.