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Why isn't comeliness used? From my understanding of it Comeliness is the physical appearance while Charisma is Attitude and the like...I've heard some say that their the same thing, but personally I think not.
(from the dictionary)
Charisma: a personal magic of leadership arousing special popular loyalty or enthusiasm for a public figure (as a political leader) b : a special magnetic charm or appeal <the charisma of a popular actor>

Comeliness: pleasurably conforming to notions of good appearance, suitability, or proportion
2 : having a pleasing appearance : not homely or plain

Mostly because if Comeliness was allowed..then a higher point-buy method would need to be used..to which people would have higher str/dex/con/int/wis..considering cha tends to be the "garbage" stat..then to have 2 "garbage" stats would mean the other stats would end up being higher.
So they (rule designers) decided to throw comeliness/charisma together as just plain charisma.

Some people do make house rulings on it though..like for me personally, I would make it still be one stat, but have it deal with both sides..kinda how in earlier versions of DnD where str could equal 19/00 or something like that instead of just 19 or 20..so with my house rule (if I used one) I would make it so that if you put your cha to 14..you could then use those points as a pointbuy method to change it to like 12/15 or 10/16 or something like that..depending on how pointbuy works. So you can have comeliness10/charisma16..know what I mean?

Anyway, I am confusing myself much more than is necessary so I go sleep for now

*Edited*
Decided to hold off on sleeping

Anyway, I can see why they blended em together..and I can work with it like how they have it..but the thing that I don't understand is why the skill "handle animal" is a charisma based skill..whenever I make a character with high charisma that deals with animals, people always argue that I am not playing my character right when I am talking to other people.

For example, I am rude and obnoxious, and I play my character as well as I can so that people hate that character..and then they say out of character "hey, your character wouldn't do that, they have high charisma!"..I don't see why being really good with animals means I have to be able to talk to people as well. It's like me personally, I am really good with animals..animals love me..but I tend to piss real people off very easily.. Some people have said someone like that should have a lot of ranks in handle animal, but a low charisma..but that makes no sense to me when I want to be as good with animals and focus all my attention on animals. So I basically just tell say "screw em, I play how I play".

Thank you for putting that into perspective for me, Paranitis. Oh, and I also agree with you about the "Handle animal" skill, I don't see how it'd have anything to do with charisma... Thanks again

but for roleplaying value your charisma completely shapes your characters personality, that and inteligence

I agree there personally..but there are a lot of bad DMs out there that don't take cha/int/wis into account at all when someone wants to roleplay out their characters because they think they will affend the player even though the int6/cha7/wis9 dwarven fighter they play really shouldn't know anything about table manners, or how to effectively stop a half-dragon from burninating the peasants.

Then again a lot of bad players and DMs don't let it go when some players want to play their high int/cha/wis kinda immature..they believe that if you have int16/cha16/wis18 that you need to act as though you got a plunger handle wedged up your patootie.

Basically..some people don't think low stats matter as long as you can roleplay..even if by "roleplay" it means "being in a character that might not be the one you are supposed to be playing in the first place"..and they seem to thing the smarter/more charismatic statted characters lead to a character needing to have less personality.

So in conclusion..I would rather play the game most of the time with dogs eatting their own crap..because atleast they are somewhat consistant.

I think I know why Charisma was chosen for handle animal. Here it goes:

Just imagine if you subsitute the other stats in for charisma...

strength- I don't think that handling animals with brute strength by hitting them will be good for making loyal animal compainions.

dexterity- I don't think that you will control an animal by prancing around them gracefully and annoying them to death (may be a good way to kill em' though ).

constitution- I don't think that you are just going to let the animal beat up on you 'till it gets tired enough.

intelligence- I don't think you will really need to outwhit the animal (although some half-orc barbarians might have some trouble).

wisdom- Yes, you are going to use your greater common sence to control it...wrong!

Charisma- Now you will need a good personality to deal with animals...this is good for convincing them that you won't harm them. On the other hand this is a "trash" stat by most and it has to do something.

Also you don't have to be good with people if you have charisma, you might not even be good with animals, you might even just be a pretty boy. It all depends on your attitude, actions, and personal opinion.

But the thing I think is stupid is that by having a high charisma..you are automatically better with both animals and humans..and that is just not realistic at all. I understand using charisma towards animals to make em like you, and I can understand using charisma towards other people to make em like you..but it's just not right to have it apply towards both or neither.

Ah, but having a high charisma doesn't automaticly mean you are good with animals.
That's what skills are for.

To compare, a high intelligence doesn't automaticly make you know a lott about a subject, for instance Arcana.
You have to spend skillpoints in Knowledge Arcana.

It's the same with animals. You have to spend skillpoints in Handle animal.
A high charisma just give you an edge. A borne talent if you will.