Topic: Human Racial Bonuses

[Falconer]

I am a GM new to HARP (I am planning to run The Iron Wind, 1980 ed.), and my players it will be even more new. (Well, we’re coming from AD&D 1e.) I worry about this step in character creation:

Humans do not have fixed racial bonuses. Players of a human character have 8 points [10 points according to the 2012 ed.] to divide any way they like between the 8 racial stat bonuses. No stat may have a bonus greater than +3.

I worry about this step since it seems like a lot of decision-making to put on a player who might be completely new to the system. An experienced GM might have some solid advice to offer at this point, but I am not an experienced GM. I fear my players will shy away from playing humans simply because other races have a lot less decision-making to do.

I am putting together a “quick” character creation document for my group, and I wanted to put in some advice at this step. Any experienced HARP GMs out there, if you were walking a brand new player through this step of character creation, what would be some stock advice that you could offer?

I know it’s not as huge a deal as I’m making it seem, but I just thought there might be some simple common sense logic which is obvious to experienced GMs. If it were just 3 points I would just say just put it all in your key stat(s). But it’s 8-10. Say you’re a Mage, you put 3 in Reasoning and 3 in Insight; you still have a lot left. *shrug*

[nash]

First I'd suggest not to stress too much about it - relay that to your players.  Getting it "totally" wrong won't have a great impact.

After that, yeah, 3 in your professions PRs, then the rest in what your player sees as their characters main other strengths.   

And let them change after creation if you realise it's not right. 

[Falconer]

Thanks very much. Based on just that little bit (plus what you said on Discord), I will be able to offer a few bullet-point suggestions.

[craig]

Show them the Master Skill List in Chapter 6 "Skills", it's just before the descriptions of each skill.  This will give an overview of what stats affect each skill.

BTW, SD is a good stat for lots of professions - it's good for spell casters (every caster uses SD and one other stat for their spells, and PP Dev uses SD + In); good for hit points (Endurance uses Co + SD); good for stealth (Stalk & Hide uses SD + Ag); helps with Perception (SD + In); Martial Arts styles use SD; and more.  SD is good choice if the player can't think of anything else to put some bonus points into.

For a Mage, I'd say that Re + SD is more important than Re + In - although RE + SD + In is even better (a human Mage can have +3 in all three and +1 in something else, maybe Qu to help with DB and Initiative)

BTW, stat bonuses don't have a huge effect anyway.  The effects of stats are more noticeable at low levels, but are rapidly outpaced by skill ranks (even at level 1, 6 ranks in a skill gives +30 and at level 2, 9 ranks gives +45) and bonuses from Professions and Talents (typically ranging from +10 to +30).   Most balanced characters won't have more than a +10 bonus for any stat so at most that will add up to +20 (+10 from each of two relevant stats)....certainly good and worth having, but not worth worrying too much about - the difference between having +5 in a stat and +7 or +8 isn't that big a deal.

e.g. St and Ag are good for weapon skills and most combat styles, but even a clumsy & weak (low Ag & St) character can be a dangerous fighter due to skill ranks (and can improve their physical stats too as they level up).


Also worth noting since you're coming from D&D: +5 in HARP is roughly equivalent to +1 in D&D....but not as significant because it's much more common to get bonuses & penalties of 5, 10, 15 or more to various skills.

[Falconer]

Excellent advice, thanks!