RPG Stats - A beginning discussion Thread - RPG in a Box

Statistics, in the form of attributes, are just one part of a role-playing game but they are also an important part. Games made with RPG-in-a-box could certainly be designed without RPG attributes but there should at least be a discussion as to what attributes to include and how to utilize them.

After giving this topic some thought, my initial vote is this: Have the "traditional" attributes of Strength, Intelligence, Wisdom, Dexterity, Charisma and Endurance. Include Hit Points (HP) with an option to attach HP to some convoluted formula of the other attributes or through some method of the game developer's own design. The attributes would go from 0-100 (not 1-18[00] as in traditional D&D) in the game but go up to 255 to account for magical armor and whatever else the game developer envisions if they want the main character to be some sort of "super" character (or for enemies, boss characters, etc.)

There should be a flag to denote a character as invincible so a game designer can have a character that can't be killed and, thus, break a game or a quest.

HP would go from 0 to 65535 (256*256) although such high numbers would only be for special behind-the-scenes circumstances (again, boss characters & the whatnot). Have a flag if you want HP to auto-regenerate and, if so, by how much per real-time minute.

Magic Points (MP) would be a simplistic form of "magic" and be the same as HP in point totals and behind-the-scenes flexibility. It doesn't have to be used but it is there. Again, does it auto-regenerate and, if so, by how much per real-time minute.

Skills would not be hard-coded but a framework would be included so that the game developer could create skills, either arbitrarily set or based on some formula to be determined by the game developer. Skills could be negative or positive and affect the attributes so that they can be used as "ad-hoc traits" (your character was born pre-mature; Your character was raised upper-class and has a hard time relating to lower-class citizens; Your character looks weird and humans can't relate to your character but orcs talk to your character just fine, etc...).

The dialog options ought to be amended to account for high intelligence, strength & the other attributes (such as skills and "ad-hoc traits").

Gender has increasingly become a political issue; Remember when there were just two? However, have a male & female gender hard-coded (they can be turned off from being shown if necessary) with additional slots so if anyone wants to be creative, they can be.

Race is also a touchy issue; Most game developers simply make up races so that they don't have to deal with the thorny issue of excluding certain races or giving races unintended stereotypes and receiving backlash from the public. There ought to be slots for races but don't hard-code real race names and let game developers fill out the race names themselves.

Allow gender & race to affect attributes, HP, MP & skills but also allow the developer the freedom to turn this off as well.

OK, this post went on for too long but at least it's a starting point for including stats into the game.

Thanks VoxelSteve, these are great starting points for a stats system! I am going to pin this thread and we can use it going forward for further discussion related to stats and attributes as I begin implementing things.