Ability scores are explained on pages 10, 11, and 12 of Men & Magic. Here is an alternate presentation.
| 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Str | Ftr XP | -20% | -10% | +5% | +10% | ||||||||||||
| Int | M-U XP | -20% | -10% | +5% | +10% | ||||||||||||
| Lang. | Common + Alignment | +1 | +2 | +3 | +4 | +5 | +6 | +7 | +8 | ||||||||
| Wis | Clr XP | -20% | -10% | +5% | +10% | ||||||||||||
| Con | HP | -1 per HD | +1 per HD | ||||||||||||||
| Survive | 40-50% | 60-90% | 100% | ||||||||||||||
| Dex | Missile | -1 | +1 | ||||||||||||||
| Cha | Hirelings | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 12 | |||||||||
| Loyalty | -2 | -1 | +1 | +2 | +4 | ||||||||||||
I think this table makes the effects of ability scores much clearer without needing to shoehorn them into a common pattern. This table could be printed on character sheets, and then the character attributes could be circled, or highlighted like a bar graph, as shown below.
Nicely done.
The bar graph looks really cool. Nice work.
I sometimes wonder how you OD&D folks get off on calling Pathfinder overcomplicated. =P
This is an elegant solution, though. Nicely done!
Heh. It might not be systematized, but it is still simple. 🙂
Literal lateral thinking! Good stuff.
Nice!
Very cool. I wonder what else in OD&D it would be beneficial to graph in this manner?
The first graphic is a brilliant illustration, but the bar graph approach in the second figure could, I think, be confusing to the uninitiated.
I’m smart enough to understand what you’re getting at, but purely from a graphic presentation standpoint, bar graphs imply cumulative information, suggesting that the entire range of the highlighted area is pertinent to your character. For instance, for Strength you’ve highlighted -20%, -10%, and +5% Ftr XP when really the only relevant point of information is the +5%. Likewise, one could assume that the language bonuses you’ve highlighted are cumulative, which would mean that this particular character gets not 7 but 28 bonus languages.
Sorry for being a jerk, it really is a great presentation of the fundamental information.
You’re not being a jerk at all; I had the same thought. To be really clear, one should probably circle the relevant number or modifier at the top of the bar. I just kind of like the visual bulk of the bars, as they give a sense of how a character’s abilities are distributed.
I thinkt here’s probably a visual compromise where the actual highlit bar ends in a zone and that is where your mod is