# Dexterity & Agility - are we missing something?



## Talislan (Dec 7, 2007)

I was just reading an interesting thread on the 4e forum about what people think the new reduced list of class skills will be.

Unfortunately, the following little old bug bear of mine, rose to the fore in my over worked mind and I was hoping someone could help me out. You see the problem is that Dexterity and Agility are two very different things in my head. However we have tended to use the former in (D&D) to describe the latter for so long that we hardly notice it's missing. And yet, there is a discussion going on as to which skills should fit with which attributes in order to reduce the skills list.

Hmmm... Wouldn't it make sense to have agility and dexterity as separate attributes?

I'd like you to read the following before giving me your thoughts:

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

agility (countable and uncountable; plural agilities)

(uncountable) The quality of being agile; the power of moving the limbs quickly and easily; nimbleness; activity; quickness of motion; as, strength and agility of body. 
(countable) A faculty of being agile in body, mind, or figuatively.

Agility definitions have traditionally centered around skills that are needed for the body to change direction at speed. A classic definition is the ability to change the body's direction efficiently, and this requires a combination of balance, coordination, speed, reflexes, and strength. Agility is usually achieved when the athlete is using his /her ATP_PC or Lactic Acid (Anaerobic) systems.
Agility however must be in response to an opposing player, moving target, as seen in field sports and racket sports. Sheppard and Young (2006) define agility as "a rapid whole body movement with change of velocity or direction in response to a stimulus."


dexterity (uncountable)

Skill in performing tasks, especially with the hands. 
_Playing computer games can improve your manual dexterity. 
She twirled the knife through her fingers with impressive dexterity._

Fine motor skills can be defined as coordination of small muscle movements which occur e.g., in the fingers, usually in coordination with the eyes. In application to motor skills of hands (and fingers) the term dexterity is commonly used.


My thinking is that if we want to make things simpler, maybe an extra attribute would lessen the need for so many skills. what do you think?

T.
P.s. if anyone thinks this belongs in a different thread/place please let me know.


The Boundaries of success are held only by the limits of your imagination.


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## Tonguez (Dec 7, 2007)

I agree and my revised attributes list would read Strength, Constitution, Dexterity, Agility, Wisdom, Perception, Intelligenece and Charisma

But I'm willing to compromise down to six stats however I'd put all the 'agility skills' under *Strength* on the rationale that 'strength isn't just brute force instead it is about muscle control (agility and reflexes) - look at a male gymnast or a boxer. 
A fighter uses strength as their main stat because they have learnt to strike with speed, accuracy and power

SO thats my contribution: *Dexterity* = fine motor skills and *Agility* is an aspect of strength


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## Aus_Snow (Dec 8, 2007)

Personally, I'd go with something not _too_ dissimilar to the above:

Strength
Agility
Constitution
Intelligence
Awareness (or Perception)
Presence

I don't think it needs to be divided, personally, but I prefer Agility to Dexterity as a catch-all term (even though technically it isn't.) And Wisdom has always bugged me as a stat - there is too much overlap. Hence, my preference.


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## Fifth Element (Dec 8, 2007)

Many of the abilities can be subdivided if that's what you want. For instance, Charisma could be chopped up into Charm and Leadership, for example, since those are quite different things meshed together in a single ability.

My first choice would be to separate perception/awareness from Wisdom. "I've spent years in contemplation and have a deep understanding of philosophical issues. Hey look, there's something over there! You can't see that?"


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## Hrothgar Rannúlfr (Dec 8, 2007)

Didn't they have something like this in 2nd Edition as an optional set of rules where each of the six abilities was broken down into 2 other abilities?

If so, would there be an advantage to houseruling it back into 3.5?


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## Kisanji Arael (Dec 8, 2007)

Uh, yeah. In my little I'm-never-actually-going-to-finish-this variant, Dexterity is a combination of Grace (agility) and Stamina (Constitution) that refers only to manual dexterity. It makes Weapon Finesse fun, since everything is completely different.


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## Morrus (Dec 8, 2007)

I think you can distill any of the six ability scores into a hundred different components.  At some point you have to sya "OK, it's fine to generalise".  The INT/WIS division is arbitrary, as is the STR/CON difference (endurance is a facet of strength and not even slightly related to your ability to resist a cold); and I don't dare to delve into the minefield that is CHA. 

The game isn't about simulating reality numerically; it's about a a [short] list of arbitrary scores which roughly define a character.  In themselves, they're hardly enough (why not a stat for appearance?), but they work for the purpose for which they're designed. 

It's simplistic, but it works.  Realism would require a hundred different stats.  but we ant a playable game, not a reality simulator.


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## Sylrae (Dec 8, 2007)

How about Strength, Dexterity, Stamina, Charisma, Manipulation, Appearance, Perception, Intelligence, Wits?

Split Dexterity into Dex and Agility, use White Wolf Stats, and Everything is Perfect! 

I've actually never done this. but it just might work.


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## Talislan (Dec 10, 2007)

Morrus said:
			
		

> I think you can distill any of the six ability scores into a hundred different components.....
> ....It's simplistic, but it works.  Realism would require a hundred different stats.  but we ant a playable game, not a reality simulator.




A very fair point and pretty much the way my thinking has gone to justify this in the past. My only wonder on this has come from the prospective new way of doing things (less skills) in the new edition.

I guess also this may be my pet nit pick where others may wish to break down other attributes (like cha) to their own personal preference.

All the suggestions so far make sense in different ways so I guess I'll just road test some ideas until June and see what the outcome of the new style of play is.

Many Thanks.

T.

The Boundaries of success are held only by the limits of the imagination


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## erf_beto (Dec 11, 2007)

Sylrae said:
			
		

> How about Strength, Dexterity, Stamina, Charisma, Manipulation, Appearance, Perception, Intelligence, Wits?
> 
> Split Dexterity into Dex and Agility, use White Wolf Stats, and Everything is Perfect!
> 
> I've actually never done this. but it just might work.



I've done it. But it was a one-shot game, so I can't say it was perfect cause I'd need more data, but it worked well. Had to wing a lot of things, though: d20Modern wasnt out at the time. It was pretty much an hybrid d20/Storyteller, with point buy atributes and backgrounds and vancian magic...   
I did it because the group played WW games, the setting was the same as our weekly Vampire game and I love how the 9 stats work... going back to 6 just felt... wrong


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## dystmesis (Dec 14, 2007)

How about this:

Strength
Perception
Endurance
Charisma
Intelligence
Agility
Luck!


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## Li Shenron (Dec 14, 2007)

Morrus said:
			
		

> I think you can distill any of the six ability scores into a hundred different components.  At some point you have to sya "OK, it's fine to generalise".  The INT/WIS division is arbitrary, as is the STR/CON difference (endurance is a facet of strength and not even slightly related to your ability to resist a cold); and I don't dare to delve into the minefield that is CHA.
> 
> The game isn't about simulating reality numerically; it's about a a [short] list of arbitrary scores which roughly define a character.  In themselves, they're hardly enough (why not a stat for appearance?), but they work for the purpose for which they're designed.
> 
> It's simplistic, but it works.  Realism would require a hundred different stats.  but we ant a playable game, not a reality simulator.




Exactly.

I liked discussions of these sort once, but nowadays I find them of little use. Because there is really no reason why you should divide things in 6 rather than 2 rather than 12 rather than 100 rather than 20...

The 3.0 skill system had a purpose (not the only purpose): to create a second-tier distinction of abilities, underneath the one of the 6 abilities. About 40 skills were created, which represent specialized uses of the 6 abilities, and that was a good choice of numbers 6 -> 40.

Early products from 3rd party added lots of new skills into the fray, partially misunderstanding skills for additional abilities like feats. The discussion concentrated on skills alone, not in relation to ability scores, and was polluted by the usual tendency of every gamer to make characters more powerful rather than less powerful: so the original usefulness inbalances between skills were "fixed" by suggesting merging of less-useful skills (same result could have been achieved by splitting the best ones, but no one wants a weaker PC).

Because there is really no reason to have a specific number of skills if you look at them in a vacuum, and every number is ok, but it feels better for you PC to get more abilities for the same price, many if not actually MOST of the gaming groups have lowered the skill list progressively more. At some point, if you never stop, you eventually end up with 6 skills... equivalent to the 6 ability scores!

Then at the same time some (but in this case, it's not widespread) some groups feel the need to differentiate between more than 6 different ability. Note that you could actually do the opposite here too: there is no reason why you couldn't just have 2 ability scores, "Body" and "Mind".

Personally I think this reveals that there is always a drive for differentiating, because differentiating allows for more combinations i.e. more diversity between characters. The opposite drive is simplificating, for the sake of making the game easier. There is no true point in between, you just need to make your choice. But I think it's important to see that ability scores and skills together achieve something greater than individually: because when you want a "dexterous" PC and an "agile" PC, you can already have them, just by balancing them differently between Dex and different skills.


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