Are attributes necessary?

[Todd Bogenrief]

If this is in the wrong forum, I apologize, I wasn't sure if it was theory or game design.

Alright, I know I don't read all this as much as I should, but I have been working on a design for what I like to call in my mind, "Yet another Sci-Fi game" and got to thinking about the role of attributes.

Are attributes necessary? By attributes I mean the things that are usually referred to as Strength, Wits, Dexterity, etc.  

I have been working on a way to de-emphasize these things because I have seen in so many games I have played, the standard build of making a character with very good stats, and then not worrying about actually being skilled at anything and just depending on their amazingly gifted attributes to pull them through until XP can buy them a better character.

I was thinking that instead, characters could just buy things like "Gifted Reflexes" or something along those lines that would give them an edge when using skills where they would apply, and just tying that all in with the advantages/disadvantages type of system.

Am I missing something important that these kind of character attributes provide in games?

[Daniel Solis]

There's recently been some discussion on this thread, but it's more about the necessity of advantages and disadvantages. There is also another thread along similar lines, but I couldn't find it. The gist of both discussions is that a trait is a trait is a trait. Be they general, like attributes, or specific, like skills, they all refer to the character's nature and what the player expects to do with the character in-game.

That being the case, in my opinion, the standard attributes (strength, yada yada) aren't necessary unless they're an explicitly necessary aspect of play. (Why bother determining the strength of a D&D magic-user if they'll rarely be expected to use it?) Otherwise, it's just better to implement self-created traits since they're automatically more relevant to the character.

[HMT]

Please read this thread.

[talysman]

I think you can't answer the question without knowing what the game's goals are supposed to be. obviously, from the broad perspective, attributes aren't necessary, since there are many games that eliminate or drastically change the concept. attributes in FUDGE, for example, can be eliminated or can be player-defined and are not as central to play as skills; Risus eliminates attributes, skills and advantages in favor of cliches; my own current system in development merges attributes with broad character classes, replacing Strength, Intelligence, and Dexterity with Hero, Genius, and Mystic.

what you need to do is not worry about whether your game has attributes or not, but concentrate instead on how many functional parts to play you want/need and how they work. here is my off-the-top-of-my-head analysis of functional parts in game systems:

the broadest categories are stats and toggles. a stat is a number that is used in some fashion, although some systems might substitute something in place of numbers (colors, hermetic elements, playing card suits.) a toggle enables or disables some kind of option, such as allowing special actions, allowing a particular stat to be used when it normally wouldn't, or altering how a GM interprets events in the game world.

there are several kinds of stats. target stats provide a target number for some game action (GURPS skills, TFT attributes.) modifier stats provide a bonus or multiplier that modifies a die roll result, target number, or another stat (D&D3e skills.) lookup stats invoke target numbers, modifiers, or toggles based on the stat's value, usually by crossreferencing the stat to a lookup table (AD&D1e/2e attributes and levels.) variable stats increase or decrease rapidly during play and are either a spendable resource, trigger lookups when they reach specific values, or both (hit points in D&D3e and many other systems, GURPS character points, Mage Paradox.)

that's probably an incomplete breakdown of stat types, and I didn't even analyze what types of toggles might exist, but I think you can get the picture. your first quesfion is how many types of stats and toggles are you going to use in your game, what do they do, and how do they interact. if, after creating a set of stats, you decide to name them "attributes" and use the standard personal adjectives of Strength, Intelligence, and Dexterity for their names, that's fine, as long as that set of stats has a real game effect. if you use the standard names and make attributes into lookup stats that provide modifiers and toggles, just like D&D, your game is going to look pretty much like D&D. you may want to try something different, to make your game stand out. why hasn't anyone tried standard attributes as variable stat resources, for example? Strength as a spendable pool of points that allows you to improve odds on physical actions?

[MachMoth]

To draw away from the ad/disad discussion for a moment, this is my theory.  Attributes are not a needed element.  If you want any sort of depth in physical character design, then the elements they bring to the table are.  Taking the generic style that older systems used, attributes group related skills and character elements together, and help or hinder them based on the character's general ability.  If you can emulate this in another way, then they aren't needed.  My Pneuma Engine emulates this by allowing the player to arrange the characters skills on a grid.  Skills that lie adjacent to each other are related, and thus help each other to advance faster.

If you feel that ads would emulate this element, then it's fine.  Or, as stated before, if you don't feel this element is a necessary for your game type, then go without.  It really depends on what kind of feel your shooting for.  Some games take too many routes to emulate a character's general ability, and it becomes difficult to guage them.

[Simon W]

You do not actually need any attributes, stats, skills, traits or anything to role play. You don't need numbers or even a character sheet if you don't want.

I have run games where I have had no rules at all just an idea for a scenario. I brefly set the scene and a rough idea of my expectations and then asked the players to describe themselves as they entered the scene.

A very good game ensued. I am sure there are others on this forum with similar experiences.

Admittedly this was a one-off and I'd prefer to have a sheet with something written down for long-term play, but even this could simply be in the form of a brief sentence or two (like in Soap), with key words underlined.

So basically its what fits the game or style you have in mind. Personally, I like attributes as a foundation of the character, but I don't like too many. When I design a game, if I use attributes, I try to ensure there are no more than four.

Simon

[HMT]

You do not actually need any attributes, stats, skills, traits or anything to role play ...

True. However, my guess is the question was intended to be something like: In a game where characters'  abilities are delineated on a character sheet, are attributes necessary? In don't think the question is intended to include games where there is no ownership of characters,  characters are more freeform, or charactersheets describe the kinds of stories the characters are involved in, in its universe of discourse.

I think the answer to the question as I have posed it is no. I say traits are traits.

[Daniel Solis]

Indeed. I'd say if you are going to use traits in the traditional sense, then attributes are only necessary when you want as few traits as possible applying to as many situations as possible. The attributes need not be a reference to a physical or psychological aspects of the character either, as is the case in Jared Sorensen's "styles."

EDIT: That is to say, the styles are a method with which one can see how frequently said character can be expected to solve problems in such-and-such way and a mechanic for rewarding the player with a metagame resource.

[M. J. Young]

I'm very surprised no one has mentioned http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=2051">Mike's Standard Rant #4: Stat/Skill systems or Ralph Mazza's http://indie-rpgs.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2050">Traits + Skills. The latter has links to other threads on the subject.

My thoughts are mostly on the thread HMT cited. You need things in your game that make the game work. If attributes and skills really do have different functions which are complimentary and not mere duplication at some level, then you want to have both.

Someone asked why a magic-user in D&D needs a strength score. The answer is that in D&D that is what determines how much he can carry, how hard it is for him to open doors, and possibly some other modifiers (possibly combat penalties). It's not egregious in D&D, because they don't have a stat+skill system and they don't have a point expenditure system to raise stats or skills.

In Multiverser, you need a strength score because it's part of the combat and body skill side of the system. It does have a stat + skill system; but it doesn't use point expenditures to increase anything, it makes attributes considerably more difficult to raise than skills, and it gives benefits to high-level skills that cannot be obtained by high-level attributes (such as faster at the skill).

If your system has no use for attributes, don't include them. If it has no use for skills, don't include them.

You do not actually need any attributes, stats, skills, traits or anything to role play ...

True. However, my guess is the question was intended to be something like: In a game where characters' abilities are delineated on a character sheet, are attributes necessary? In don't think the question is intended to include games where there is no ownership of characters, characters are more freeform, or charactersheets describe the kinds of stories the characters are involved in, in its universe of discourse.

I think Gideon's point was not merely that you don't need anything because you can run games entirely freeform. I took him to be going this direction: since you can run a game entirely freeform with no stats at all, you have to recognize that no particular stat or kind of stat is necessary to every kind of role playing game. You can work without strength, or without hit points, or without skills, or without defense value, or without equipment--there is nothing that is vital to a character.

So you put on the sheet the information you will actually need in the course of play; and you don't generate information that isn't needed.

Hope this helps.

--M. J. Young

[simon_hibbs]

Someone asked why a magic-user in D&D needs a strength score. The answer is that in D&D that is what determines how much he can carry, how hard it is for him to open doors, and possibly some other modifiers (possibly combat penalties). It's not egregious in D&D, because they don't have a stat+skill system and they don't have a point expenditure system to raise stats or skills.

In rolled-stat games like D&D each characetristic is determined (usualy pseudo-) randomly, so you can't default to anything. I suppose you could roll n demand, but if the character turns out to have a particularly high or low attribute you'd probably want to be aware of that from the beginning. In points-build or pick-list systems you can just have unmentioned abilities default to something so it's not a problem.

In Hero Wars (and now HeroQuest) you don't need any particular abilities at all, since any abilities you might need for game mechanical resons default to a minimum value. After all just because a particular character in HeroQuest doesn't have a Close Combat (or perhaps any combat related) ability doesn't mean they're utterly incapable of defending themselves or swinging a club. They just do so with minimum standard competence.

I suppose another factor to take into account is whether characteristics have a different role in the game system from other abilities. They do in Born of the Blood, so I have a set of four basic attributes that everyone has. If so, it may well be convenient to note down the values of a few basic characteristics for convenience sake. In HQ they don't, so they're treated like any other ability during character generation because they're treated just the same in other ways. t's just a matter of consistency.


Simon Hibbs

[Nathaniel]

I was thinking that instead, characters could just buy things like "Gifted Reflexes" or something along those lines that would give them an edge when using skills where they would apply, and just tying that all in with the advantages/disadvantages type of system.

Am I missing something important that these kind of character attributes provide in games?

Nope, your not missing a thing.  I decided to go without attributes for my sci-fi horror RPG, Paroxysm.  Character creation is based on answering a bunch of questions, making a few lists and figuring out whether something is a skill or a descriptor.  I also have two hit point like scales for mental health damage which are determined through assessing the descriptors and figuring out if they should be above or below average (eg, if the character has "ready to snap" then they'll be a lower, while the other character who has "great in stressful situations" would have higher numbers).

The lack of attributes was indeed inspired by Fudge.  I ran several campaigns using Fudge and found that attributes were rarely, if ever, used in play.  And when they were, they were rarely rolled but instead used as karmic values-- he's stronger, so he should win this contest of strength.  Players then used their fudge points to narrate successful outcomes if they would have normally lost such a contest.

Like many have stated already, you only need what you're going to use.  If you're not going to use it, or are going to use it differently, you can probably get rid of it or change how it works.

Nathan

[Todd Bogenrief]

I'd like to thank everyone for their input.  My search-fu, must have been weak, because the number of links, and links within links you all have posted have been quite helpful.  It's encouraging to see that I wasn't completely out of line in thinking I could change the way "attributes" work.  

Like many have stated already, you only need what you're going to use. If you're not going to use it, or are going to use it differently, you can probably get rid of it or change how it works.

Cool! I'll take this advice to heart.  I have been playing so many games where the entire character is based on having a few good attribute stats, that it's kind of hard for me to break my mind out of the mold that it is set in.

[Nathaniel]

I have been playing so many games where the entire character is based on having a few good attribute stats, that it's kind of hard for me to break my mind out of the mold that it is set in.

I know exactly what you mean.  It's very very easy for a character to be defined by his sheet potency rather than have the character sheet represent the dramatic concept of the character (which may not be what you're looking for, but it is a different way to think about it).  If you're interested in how I'm doing character generation for a attribute-less system, you can check out this thread:

Paroxysm: Concept Based Character Design

Nathan
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