AD&D Subability Scores

Well here you go. I said I would talk about the option of subability scores and here it is. Some people liked it, some hated it, and some were never sure. The point behind the whole thing is to simply allow the characters ability scores to be a little more in depth so as to aid in the fleshing out of the character. It does this by simply making the six standard ability score charts more flexibly in that it breaks them down into twelve charts. Sound complicated? Don't worry, it's not at all.

I think strength is by far the best example. Roll whatever method of choice you use and generate a number for Strength. We will use the number 10. So, Fighter 1 has rolled a 10 for his strength, that's all great (lol not really all that great but whatever). Now the subability scores for Strength are Stamina and Muscle. You can either put a 10 in both and just read across the Strength table, or you can divide it up like this: Double the number (we will get a 20), now divide that among Stamina and Muscle where they are no more than 4 points apart. That means you could have 8 and 12 as the maximum difference. So what does all of this mean? Ever heard the phrase "great out of the gate, but not much for the race"? Assume that the person wants a character that can get along pretty good, but isn't so much for raw power. Well, they would have a 12 in Stamina, and an 8 in Muscle. Make sense?

I'm not going to copy the Player's Option tables and stuff down, but here is how it will break your ability section down:

Strength
-Stamina: Weight Allowance (also influences Sprinting, Fatigue, and Proficiencies)
-Muscle: Atk. Adj.; Dam. Adj.; Max Press; Open Doors; BB/LG

Dexterity
-Aim: Missile Adj.; Pick Pockets; Open Locks
-Balance: Reac. Adj.; Def. Adj.; Move Silently; Climb Walls

Constitution
-Health: System Shock; Poison Save
-Fitness: Hit Point Adj.; Resurrection Chance

Intelligence
-Reason: Spell Level; Max # Spells; Spell Immunity
-Knowledge: Bonus # Profs.; % Learn Spell

Wisdom
-Intuition: Bonus Spells; % Spell Failure
-Willpower: Magic Def. Adj.; Spell Immunity

Charisma
-Leadership: Loyalty Base; # of Henchmen
-Appearance: Reaction Adjustment

I'm sure you are thinking, "well that's nice and all, but what's the point?" Well, page 21 in the "Player's Option: Skills and Powers" says it best, but I'm gonna sum this up.

With the subability score, you have subability checks. The way the rules implement them is for each point above 15 a player has in a subability score, the character may roll an additional 1d20 when it comes to checks involving that score. This gives, as per their example, the 17 Muscle Fighter a much higher degree of success lifting a heavy object than the 6 Muscle Wizard. However, it still doesn't take care of the fact that sometimes a character with a low score. To deal with that they add in another suggestion. You can make things tougher by making some things require multiple successful rolls to accomplish. For example if a boulder needs moving it may require two successes instead of one. Well, the fighter gets to roll two twenty sided dice, and the wizard only gets one. Therefore, even on a massive success, the wizard will NOT be moving the boulder that the fighter is incapable of moving.

I don't see why you couldn't apply the multiple rolls system to the regular ability score system though. Seems it would work just fine.

Thanks for reading, and happy gaming.