Is the character ability roll generator truly random? I've probably rolled tens of thousands of times and have never seen a total roll higher than 99 ever. Out of a possible 108, it's fairly quick to get 94, a bit longer for 96 and can take a while to get 98 (with the odd numbers being the same in terms of benefit)...
Are you aware of the normal distribution curve? The probability of rolling 18 on three die is substantially less than that of rolling 17 and so on right down to 10.5 (the mean result). The probability of rolling an 18 on 3 die is very small. A product of six very small probilities is negligible - Should you ever produce a six 18's character you would, according to any reasonable statistical measure, be deemed to have cheated.
Here's the best graph website I found so far: http://catlikecoding.com/blog/post:4d6_drop_lowest What I'm trying to find though (or figure out how to calculate) using the anydice tool: http://anydice.com/ is the probability of getting a total score of 100 or any other number...I haven't figure out how to use the tool yet so maybe in a bit I can figure out how to sum the 6 numbers. 3 18s from the website is 0.01% which I guess translates to rolling 10000 times for this to happen "once" (which I've seen before in my own rolls). Too bad the 2 11s and 1 10 wasn't that great on that roll. One reason that getting say 6 17s or 18s would be perfectly acceptable as well to me. Edit: OK, I think here is the formula to get a certain total value: output [highest 3 of 4d6] + [highest 3 of 4d6] + [highest 3 of 4d6] + [highest 3 of 4d6] + [highest 3 of 4d6] + [highest 3 of 4d6] named "total of 4d6 drop lowest" http://anydice.com/program/2484 Click on "At least" Since it shows 0.00 after 98, the data shows: Sum of 6 Rolls Chance Probabilty 1 in ## rolls 89 1.20942865558 82.68 90 0.77569889564 128.92 91 0.48128438693 207.78 92 0.28820681071 346.97 93 0.16613676592 601.91 94 0.09191567385 1,087.95 95 0.04863847606 2,055.99 96 0.02451848889 4,078.55 97 0.01171859870 8,533.44 98 0.00528045333 18,937.77 99 0.00222794157 44,884.48 100 0.00087277000 114,577.72 101 0.00031407114 318,399.20 102 0.00010239918 976,570.28 103 0.00002969580 3,367,479.83 104 0.00000746532 13,395,269.79 105 0.00000156613 63,851,785.30 106 0.00000025785 387,822,459.79 107 0.00000002971 3,365,610,242.60 108 0.00000000179 55,987,359,734.86 So to get a sum of 100 in ability scores, you'll looking at rolling 114,577 times. I've gotten 99 a few times actually and get 98 regularly. I must roll too much!
You are aware that the 100,000th roll (when generating a set of numbers for a character's attributes in this computer game) WILL be all 18s, aren't you? This is a cheat code that was built into the computer game by the game's original makers. This is why I hate game systems that use RNGs (randomly generated numbers) to generate player characters. It's not fun re-rolling sets of RNGs until you are lucky enough to get a decent set of numbers for a "hero" character to have. I remember playing a Basic Dungeons & Dragons adventure with my old role-playing group in our youth, where a friend rolled a 1 for his level 1 character's Hit Points. This completely put him off wanting to play his character, but I managed to persuade him to play anyway. During the first combat that we go into, his character was hit and died instantly. Pointless!
I really enjoy the random stats generation. Sure I often reroll, but sometimes I also play with what I get, and this throws up odd parties to think about how to play. I actually hate the point buy system because I can't see why any particular character type would not always pick the same set of stats, unless they deliberately nerf one - something I always struggle with. I was actually really disappointed when games/D&D moved over to point buy only. But I guess it's all a matter of taste. I've actually only ever rolled a 96 once in TOEE, and a couple of 94s. Most of my characters fall in the 80s.
Unless I'm playing a wizard or rogue Intelligence is the one stat I'm willing to nerf- heck, I transferred one of my D&D characters in to TOEE- a ranger with a 7 Int. I played him as being illiterate as opposed to stupid in D&D but it's interesting to see the dialog options he gets in TOEE...
