Awesome Stats?

[Intrepid]

Hello, Armers.

I keep seeing vague and not-so-vague references on the forums of characters with extremely high stats across the board.  As a veteran
player with a long list of characters under my belt, I recently realized that I have never had such an experience.  I'm not overly worried
about the issue, since it does not hamper my play in the slightest, but I am wondering something...

...how much of this is fiction?  Are players really somehow randomly rolling up a pc with one or two AI stats?  Is there some factor in
character creation that makes this more likely?

[ianmartin]

It's random, I have had a character or two with AI stuff, but it pissed me off that they died quickly.  AI doesn't keep you alive trust me.

[janeshephard]

Age has a big impact. If you need someone young, quick and strong, pick a median age.

EDIT: As someone who plays humans a lot, the most I've seen is "extremely good" on three stats once. Other times It's usually "extremely good, good, good, average" based on priority.

[Intrepid]

I'm not really sure what a median age is.

[janeshephard]

I'm not really sure what a median age is.

For human according to this:

http://www.armageddon.org/cgi-bin/help_index/show_help?age

The median age of all  humans on Zalanthas, assuming they all die at 68 would be 68/2 = 34. I've usually gone for between 25-30 and the stats weren't bad. Remember at 34 you're getting older and stats will be penalized slowly over time.

[X-D]

Really?

Medium age is exactly what it says.

Something in the middle of the age range, but keep in mind, that middle is not what is allowed in chargen, if you go to middle allowed in chargen then you will be young.

You need to look up the ages for races in the docs.

Also, classes may or may not have an effect on key stats. (staff official stance last time I checked.)

As to good stat records, In 20 years I've had 40 or so PCs, Thats 6 AI on 5PCs, and I really cannot count the exceptionals.
At least 7 PCs with at least 2 exceptionals and nothing below good. Though I still consider the best stats on a certain ranger who had 4 goods. I've had 1 PC with what I consider to be horrible stats, two poors and nothing over above ave and 4 with marginal, IE 1 poor and nothing above good. And a Breed, and it does not matter what stats he had, Breeds Suck.

[bcw81]

I've had one AI stat in my year and seven months of play. He had decent other stats (except one).

[Intrepid]

Ahh, I see.  In retrospect, it didn't occur to me that the term "median" was that literal; I thought you guys were being relative and
vague based on perspective.

I've never made a pc as old as 30 in human and equivalent age terms, so if age does play a part, that could have something to do with
it.

If so, that is a neat aspect of the code.

[Simple]

3-4 years of play, my first AI was recently. My longest lived PC had the worst stats of all the PCs I've had.

[Rhyden]

I only get amazing stats with my merchant/aide characters who don't need awesome stats.

All my warriors/rangers/assassins get crappy ass stats.

That's ginka's law, son.

[Old Kank]

I had a character years ago that got all AI stats on a reroll.  I asked the staff if it was bugged, they looked into it and said everything was working fine and I won the roll of the dice.

I haven't seen anything higher than "exceptional" since stat aging went in.

[askaran]

I've never had AI stats. But I've had a good number of characters with more than one exceptional stat. All has to do with random rolls modified by age I think.

[Synthesis]

Out of 70ish PCs, I've had one AI/exceptional (agility and wisdom on a city-elf pickpocket...amazing) and a couple of exceptional/exceptionals (agility and endurance on a half-elf ranger, and strength and agility on a city-elf assassin).  None of those lived beyond 8-10 days, but yeah, they started rocking ass very quickly.

There appears to be a formula for increasing your odds of getting good stats, but I'm not going to post any speculation about it.  Once you've rolled enough PCs (if you pay attention) you'll start noticing certain trends, and when you piece those trends together with available documentation, you can form a reasonable guess as to what the underlying components are for the stat roll.  However, rolling multiple exceptional+ stats is obviously highly dependent on good luck, as well...I think my exceptional/exceptional city-elf assassin was actually minimum age, or close to it, before stat prioritization.

Since prioritization went in, I haven't gotten worse than "average" on my #1 priority stat (and that was on a 16-y.o. human, so theoretically at least, it would've eventually gone up).  If you toss out all the PCs I accidentally rolled at "young" age, I haven't gotten worse than "good" on a #1 priority or an "above average" on a #2 priority, which seems more than fair, to be honest.

(Although a long time ago an Imm joked about moving "average" to read "good" to appease the masses.)

[mangler]

I've had about 20 or so characters over six or seven years, never had an AI, or a character with more than one exceptional. I guess i'd consider anything with all stats average or higher to be decent, race dependant. Only ever had one character that was the pits because of stats, poor strength delf ranger.

[MeTekillot]

Characters with good stats will, on average, trump characters with good skills with similar playtimes.

[musashi]

I had a human ranger once, min age human who rolled AI on wisdom and agility ... but poor on strength and endurance.  That's the only time I've rolled more than 1 AI on a character.

[Thunkkin]

My best overall stats:

Your strength is extremely good, your agility is extremely good,
  your wisdom is extremely good, and your endurance is good.

C-elf warrior. The char learned VERY quickly and within a few days played was deadlier than most of my chars ever are. Nearly untouchable to tembo, for instance, which isn't something I normally experience (I know you badasses are used to it).

I don't think I've ever had an absolutely incredible ... well, naturally. I did have a merchant that required just one [censored] of [censored] and then he'd be at AI.

[titansfan]

In my years of play and nearly a trillion characters, I've only had 3 AI rolls. A lot of exceptionals though so I guess that still makes it pretty sweet?

[Intrepid]

I've had the occasional Exceptional.  However, I've never had a stat set that entirely above average or better.

[chrisdcoulombe]

I had a char with all exceptional...and he fuckin died, just like the others. 

[Bacon]

My best was a halfling ranger with:


Your strength is very good, your agility is exceptional,
  your wisdom is extremely good, and your endurance is good.

[Case]

My first was like...

Your strength is extremely good, your agility is very good,
  your wisdom is extremely good, and your endurance is absolutely incredible.

That was nice

[MeTekillot]

I once had a ranger who had every stat below average. He died to a gurth.

[Saellyn]

Think my BEST roll ever was three EGs and a poor wisdom. Wisdom I consider almost worthless except for the folks that need it. Three EG stats is like going to town and taking some names, but the rate of improvement was just -awful-.

At least, for some skills.

[Xagon]

Every character I've had with AI stats had an extreme downfall in some other category. So much so, that they died off.

I've got an inkling that you can only get AI if all the proper criteria line up. In D&D, elves get a boost to Dex but a negative to Con. AI Agility = rolling an 18 + 2 (from being an elf)

This doesn't explain how Old Kank got all AI's though. I presume any more theorizing would be frowned upon.