God Stat

A God Stat is roleplaying gamer slang for a character statistic with a particularly unbalanced effect compared to the other characteristics. It is the opposite of a Dump Stat. God stats are often accidentally created by GMs as a result of their house rules; sometimes, however, they are present in the system RAW. In combat-related games it is typically the stat that governs the number of attacks or actions-per-round the character is allowed. Dexterity/Agility is the most common god stat in combat-oriented games, often allowing one to hit more frequently and more easily, be hit less, and move faster. It also tends to plug into more non-combat skills than other physical stats, while Strength and Constitution/Endurance/Stamina are much more narrowly-focused on action. Intelligence is the second most common, since it tends to give out more skill points and offer greater versatility than other mental stats. It's also a popular stat for casting, and casters often out-muscle the competition in terms of both raw firepower and problem-solving ability.

Examples

• In Inquisitor, a Warhammer 40,000 RPG and skirmish-level wargame, the godstat is Speed, a stat derived from Initiative, as this gives more actions/attacks per turn.
• In Mage: The Ascension, the God Stat is literally Arete; it's a measure of how enlightened the character is with their godlike ability to defy the cosmos. It sets the upper-limit to a Mage's magic powers, and high Arete means a Mage can use magic without wasting time with foci or rituals. Maxing it out won't make you overpowered, but one point of Arete is worth more than one point of anything else.
• In Mekton, Reflex is the God Stat because without it you simply can't do anything awesome (like be a Mechwarrior, which is what the system is built around) and you will just fall over a lot and get hit all the time (like your average grunt suit pilot - NPCs should have low Reflex.) It's closely followed by Intelligence and Education, which govern your number of skill points. High numbers of skill points allow you to add a fuckton to dice rolls, since they're nearly all opposed checks using Reflex and at least one skill.
• In the Fallout series of games, there are two stats which tend to eclipse the others. The most powerful is usually intelligence, which determines the number of skill points earned when leveling up, and skill points determine how good your character is at almost everything in the game. Fallout 4 however, downplays this by removing skills entirely and merging their functions with stats and perks; intelligence now determines the amount of xp earned whenever you kill an enemy, making it one of the weakest stats in-game especially since dialogue skill checks have been all but eliminated. Agility is also very important: in Fallout 1 and 2, it was downright the most vital since it determined the number of actions you can undertake while in combat.
• In the Iron Kingdoms RPG, it's by far the Speed stat that again takes the cake - Not only is your Speed stat the total distance your character can move each round, it also feeds into two derived stats: Initiative (which let you go quicker, which, as in all games, is important), and Defense. Defense is what makes you able to dodge attacks, and as most attacks in the game tend to do a lot of damage or even ignore Armor, Defense is the better option. And the traditional enemies of high-defense-low-armor characters in the wargame, templates and fire/corrosion, are rarer and somewhat easier to survive or gain immunity to.
• In The Dark Eye Courage boosts spirit (mental defense), attack rolls, many important skills (like the ability to do anything when injured) and half the magic schools.
• Dungeons & Dragons has Dexterity, which adds to-hit (and damage in 5E) with ranged and finesse weapons, initiative, AC, the most-oft-used save, and several skills. Constitution is also important to all characters, determining hit points and one of the saves, and no sane player will have it under 14.
• The Storyteller System almost universally has Dexterity in this role, whether it's angsty grimdark, mythological epics mixed with shonen anime, or two-fisted superhero adventures. All the other stats certainly have their uses, but in a scrap Dexterity is the key to avoiding damage, hitting with all attacks, and making multiple actions a round without fucking yourself.

See Also

• Dump Stat
• Stats
• Derived stat