[4E] Disassociating bonus damage/AC class features from secondary attributes

[The Troubadour]

So, let me take the Slayer and the Sorcerer as examples. The Slayer gains a bonus to damage rolls equal to his DEX modifier, while the Sorcerer gains a bonus to damage rolls and has his AC determined by either STR or DEX.

What if instead of using a secondary attribute, both classes simply used a static modifier? I'm thinking of +3 (the same as if the character had a 16 in the relevant secondary attribute).

[NecroRebel]

Well, you'd have to have it increase as the character leveled up, too, to compensate for the fact that their secondary stat would increase as they leveled up. Normally, they'd get +8 or 10 to their secondary stat by level 28 - 1 at 4, 8, 11, 14, 18, 21, 24, and 28, and possibly +2 from their epic destiny - so the bonus should probably be more like 3 per tier.

What do you intend to do this thing for? It seems like a pointless nerf to already-weak striker classes, if you did something similar to other classes' secondary stats you'd be weakening them, too, and unless every power with a stat-based rider worked as though the character had a specific stat value optimized characters would still have the same secondary stats anyway, so it wouldn't even free them from that.

[The Troubadour]

Well, you'd have to have it increase as the character leveled up, too, to compensate for the fact that their secondary stat would increase as they leveled up.

Well, yes, of course. Sorry, I forgot to mention it in the first post, but yes, of course the bonus would rise as appropriate - +4 at level 8, +5 at level 14, +6 at level 21, +7 at level 28. Besides the feature's usual scaling, of course.

What do you intend to do this thing for? It seems like a pointless nerf to already-weak striker classes,(...)

Why is it a nerf? A +3 bonus is exactly the same as if the secondary ability started at 16, as expected.
Well, first, I wanted to encourage some variety for a few of the classes. For instance, a Slayer could choose between using a STR/DEX array to get good Fort and Ref and a good RBA, a STR/CON array for increased toughness, or a STR/CHA array for good Fort and Will and better social skills. Or anything similar.
I also wanted to encourage some variety in races. A class that depends on a secondary ability for both AC and bonus damage, like the Sorcerer, encourages players to choose +STR/+CHA races (or +DEX/+CHA races, as appropriate).

[NecroRebel]

It's a mild nerf because most people who actually care about those bonuses are going to try for an 18 as their starting stat, as well as because as stated initially you didn't mention it scaling at all. Even with the scaling you suggested just now, it hurts people who choose an epic destiny that gives them a bonus to their secondary stat.

The more salient point, however, is that just disassociating those features from the stats doesn't actually disassociate the builds from the secondary stat for most characters. A dragon sorcerer is still going to need a high Cha and high Str because they have many powers that give extra bonuses dependent on strength. It doesn't do what you want it to, in other words, so you'd have to go farther and say that all powers assume a particular level in secondary stats... but that causes further problems.

Consider as an example the sorcerer's Stretch Spell utility. Adds Dex to the range of the user's ranged arcane powers until the end of turn. When you're decoupling classes from secondary stats, what do you treat their Dex as for that power? It's not a chaos or storm power, though in vanilla it might as well be due to its Dex reliance, so what happens if a cosmic sorc takes it? Normally a cosmic sorc would have lower Dex, but would you be treating the character's Dex bonus as +3 for that power, even though that's not supposed to be one of the associated stats? If you approach it that way, you're actually buffing the class a fair amount due to opening up combos that would otherwise be unattractive. Also, I think I remember seeing a power that gave Dex+Str to something; if it exists, how would you deal with it?

Overall, this idea just opens up many questionable rulings if you actually accomplish your goal, and avoiding bringing up those problems by ignoring the powers part of classes' stat dependencies causes it to fail to do what you want. I just don't see it working properly.

[The Troubadour]

The more salient point, however, is that just disassociating those features from the stats doesn't actually disassociate the builds from the secondary stat for most characters. A dragon sorcerer is still going to need a high Cha and high Str because they have many powers that give extra bonuses dependent on strength.

But now they may also choose the occasional power that gives extra bonuses derived from DEX. They may also prefer to increase Reflexes over Fortitude for some reason and simply pick powers that aren't geared towards any specific build.