The Lantern Hall
Painting: an ancient lexicon open on a carved lectern in a dark chapel of books, glowing runes and symbols lifting off its pages like fireflies.
TermTabletop term1974

Ability scores

Numbers rating a character's basic capacities. D&D's six (Strength, Intelligence, Wisdom, Dexterity, Constitution and Charisma), originally rolled on three six-sided dice each, became the template for countless games, from Ultima to Baldur's Gate 3.

Numbers rating a character's basic capacities. D&D's six (Strength, Intelligence, Wisdom, Dexterity, Constitution and Charisma), originally rolled on three six-sided dice each, became the template for countless games, from Ultima to Baldur's Gate 3.

Origin

Dungeons & Dragons (1974).

Quick answers

What does "Ability scores" mean?
Numbers rating a character's basic capacities. D&D's six (Strength, Intelligence, Wisdom, Dexterity, Constitution and Charisma), originally rolled on three six-sided dice each, became the template for countless games, from Ultima to Baldur's Gate 3.
Where does the term "Ability scores" come from?
Dungeons & Dragons (1974).

Nearby in the archive

Character class

Tabletop term1974

A package of abilities that defines what a character does, such as fighter, wizard, cleric or thief. Classes make roles distinct and parties interdependent, and they became a backbone of computer and online RPGs, from Wizardry to World of Warcraft.

Polyhedral dice

Tabletop term

The set of four-, six-, eight-, ten-, twelve- and twenty-sided dice used by roleplaying games, written in shorthand such as 3d6 (three six-siders added together) or d20. The icosahedral d20 became the emblem of D&D and gave its name to the d20 System of 2000.

Min-maxing

General term

Building a character to maximize strengths and minimize whatever the rules let you neglect, sometimes to absurd effect. Admired as system mastery by some players and derided as munchkinism by others, it applies equally to tabletop builds and online games.

Painting: three small plain tan rulebooks in a wood-grain cardboard box beside strange new polyhedral dice, pencils and a graph-paper dungeon map.

Dungeons & Dragons

Tabletop RPG1974

Three little booklets in a woodgrain box, hand-assembled in Lake Geneva in January 1974: the first published roleplaying game, and the template for every tabletop and computer RPG since.