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{{trope}}
[[File:2009-04-24-dumpstat 141.png|thumb|350px|Who needs Charisma for smashing orcs?]]
A phenomenon that occurs in games that involve multiple attributes for your characters and allow you to [[Character Customization|customize]] those attributes in some fashion.
'''This can occur for multiple reasons:'''
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* The stat would be useful if it wasn't nerfed into oblivion at some point in the testing process. Luck increases your chance to instantly kill weaker enemies! ... by .01% per point, and it maxes out at 10. Pass.
* The stat is glitched so it doesn't do what it's supposed to. ''[[Final Fantasy VI]]''<nowiki>'</nowiki>s Physical Evasion or ''[[Final Fantasy VII]]''<nowiki>'</nowiki>s Armor Magic Defense are two notorious examples.
* The stat actually ''is'' useful, but
* The particular game requires you to have a dump stat, either implicitly (e.g., a game where a score of 2 in a stat is "average" and you have 3 stats but only 5 points to buy them with) or explicitly (e.g., the same game, but instead of having points to spend, you are simply told to assign one stat a value of 1, one a value of 2, and one a value of 3).
* It's just a stat you don't need for '''this''' character or playthrough. If [[Min-Maxing]] is involved, playing twice with different styles will pay better than playing it with [[Master of None|average in all stats]], so one has to be sacrificed.
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{{examples}}
== [[Tabletop Games]] ==
=== Board Games ===
* Each stat in ''[[Arkham Horror]]'' is inversely linked with another. You can take a dump stat but it's always risky: lowering your Will gives you a better Fight but then just seeing the monster drives you insane, for example, and any stat could be called on in a random encounter. Luck of the draw and strategy factor heavily in the game. You can change stats at the start of every turn to adjust to the situation and having the right items can mitigate the risks of having a dump stat.▼
=== Card Games ===
* ''Space [[Munchkin]]'' parodies this trope with "Stat X" a mystery stat in addition to the 6 core D20 stats.▼
* In the [[Might and Magic]] games, intelligence has no effect on classes lacking elemental spellcasting abilities, while personality is useless for classes that can't cast self magic. Very few classes make actual use of both.▼
* Attacks in ''[[Pokémon]]'' are divided into normal and special; usually a Pokemon naturally has one attack stat higher than the other. By teaching a Pokemon inclined towards Special attacks only Special moves, the Attack stat becomes completely useless. The opposite is also true; similarly, it's not usually worth it to boost either defensive stat for [[Glass Cannon]] Pokemon who have really bad HP, since they're not going to survive much of anything anyway, or the speed stat for a slow Pokemon, because once you're slower than any likely opponent, the stat doesn't matter anymore (and some attacks/sets benefit from a low Speed stat, like Gyro Ball, which gets more powerful the higher the targets speed is compared to yours, and Metal Burst, which doesn't even ''work'' unless you go last). There are, however, some movesets that take advantage of upping what would normally be a Dump Stat in order to barely survive what would normally be a lethal blow, or to better-utilize attacks that work well against an otherwise difficult opponent.▼
=== Tabletop RPG ===
** Some [[Elite Tweak]] builds that emphasize this to the extreme. The most ridiculous example is for Shuckle, which naturally has ''four'' dump stats: its Speed, Physical attack, Special attack, and HP are all, to be charitable, quite abysmal. Due to its absurdly high Defense and Special Defense, as well as the Sturdy ability (which allows it to resist [[One-Hit Kill]] attacks), it can afford to use only [[Standard Status Ailments]] to deal damage—a strategy used by the Pike Queen in Emerald. Using this strategy, everything except HP becomes a Dump Stat when leveling up: the two defenses are already high enough that they don't need the help (though Defense will end up getting points anyway because they have to go ''somewhere''), the attack stats are irrelevant, and Shuckle is going to be going last so often (i.e. pretty much always) that there isn't much point to increasing its Speed.▼
** Pokemon actually encourages the dump stat mentality for Special Sweepers; it's more advantageous to have a special sweeper with a low attack than a high one. Why? Confusion damage is calculated based on the attack stat, so a Pokemon with a higher attack will take more damage hurting itself in confusion. That's the whole point of Swagger.▼
** The Pokemon Shedinja essentially has ''three'' dump stats; since its HP is always set to 1, putting effort values in HP, Defense, or Special Defense<ref>unless you baton pass a substitute to it, then the last two have a use, though not a major one</ref> is altogether meaningless, not to mention its pitiful Special Attack.▼
** There was a Suicune build in the second generation that actually used Speed as a dump stat—even though it's normally the [[God Stat]]! You see, the vast majority of people dealt with powered up Pokemon by using Roar or Whirlwind, which normally goes last... but a [[Good Bad Bugs|bug]] made them fail if it went first, and if both pokemon used Roar or Whirlwind, only the slower one succeeded.▼
* Any game with a "luck" or "charisma" stat will most likely be a dump stat, for most characters. ''[[Final Fantasy XI]]'', for instance, subverts this in the case of the bard and beastmaster, charisma is central to ''[[Ogre Battle]]'', and in ''[[Fire Emblem]]'', luck is the only stat that provides critical avoid (prevention of critical attacks), which is very useful in a game where one critical hit can kill off a character permanently.▼
* "Comeliness" in ''[[Champions]]'' does little to nothing with the base rules (its effect on social skills is a recommended houserule), and actually gives ''bonuses'' to Presence Attacks if it's low enough. Since it's also the cheapest stat in the game (1/2 point per increase), most people either sell it back to get an extra skill, or buy it up when they can't think of anything else during character creation.
** In Sixth Edition Hero System (which is based on ''[[Champions]]''), the Comeliness stat has been dropped—if you want looks that have an in-game effect, you buy Striking Appearance. If you don't care if your looks have any in-game effect, you can define them however you want.
** Also in Sixth Edition, the OMCV stat (Offensive Mental Combat Value) has essentially ''no'' use whatsoever for non-mentalist characters. They still get it at its starting value of 3 for free, though, which can mean some easy free points by the simple expedient of buying it back...
* Defensive stats in [[Nippon Ichi]] games can be viewed as dump stats (unless using a class whose attacks are based on them), especially at moderately high levels (say, when you first top 1000). This is because the games are turn-based and damage is calculated in such a way that the absolute value of an attack stat matters quite a lot (i.e., 17K attack against 17K defense can still do several thousand damage while 100 attack against 100 defense will barely scratch). Depending on the game, it may be best to view [[Bonus Dungeon]] maps as one-turn blitzes.▼
* Every build in ''[[Dungeons and Dragons]]'' has at least one Dump Stat. One of the keys to good [[Min-Maxing]] is to identify your dump stats - what don't you need/want to care about? The D&D 3.5 community developed the term MAD (Multiple ability Dependency) as a criticism of classes that ''couldn't'' effectively dump several stats, and had to spread their resources too thin to be effective at anything—a classic case of [[Master of None]]. Some notable cases of Dump Stats and references to Dump Stats are listed below,
** Strength for most Arcane casters. At lower levels, anything not worth using a spell on isn't worth the damage bonuses that Strength provides to physical attacks, while at higher levels, using Polymorph to turn into a creature with high Strength is the best option if you can't use your offensive spells. The only disadvantage comes from the encumbrance rules, but spells, magic items, and pack animals provide easy ways around a low carrying capacity. Beyond that, in 3.5, if you have a good Dexterity score and a 'light weapon' you can take a feat to use your Dex modifier instead of your Strength modifier for attack rolls.
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*** That being said, each individual character is bound to have at least two Dump Stats. Since the rules allow for all of your useful abilities to be powered by [[One Stat to Rule Them All]], pretty much everything else becomes one of these (except Con, because everyone needs hit points).
*** Most 4th edition characters need two good stats to work properly. Their main stat, which covers attack and damage rolls, and a secondary one depending on their powers (like Rangers and Paladins needing at least a little bit of Wisdom, and the Fighter either Wis, Dex or Con depending on the weapon for secondary effects). Anything else can be dropped in case of extremely bad dice rolls.
** 5th Edition makes one token attempt to punish Dump Stating, by including the potential for saving throws to be based on any one of the six stats. In practice, Strength, Intelligence and Charisma saving throws are nearly non-existent, so it's right back where it started. Besides that intelligence now shares Charisma's problem of doing '''absolutely nothing''' if you don't have skills or character abilities based on it since it no longer determines how many skills you get or how many languages you know. Due to the poor implementation of "Bonded Accuracy" <ref>A design philosophy where a player character's raw ability modifier is tightly controlled to prevent gaining high numbers and allow basing all numbers in the system around that one modifier, but in practice means any character that doesn't max their main stat at the start is irredeemably useless because they'll always be ''behind''.</ref> dump stating is arguably mandatory, and with Dexterity and Constitution as useful as ever, viable ability score setups tend to look very similar.
* R. Talsorian's ''[[Mekton]]'' and ''Cyberpunk'' games effectively made every stat except Reflexes (and possibly Body) a Dump Stat. The Reflexes stat was the [[One Stat to Rule Them All]]: all-important to every aspect of combat and if your character ''did'' happen to get hit, Body determined how hurt he was. Several of the others - Empathy, Cool, and Technical Ability, were worthless. The most [[Egregious]] of these was Attractiveness. No. Use. At. All. That said, house-rules can save other stats - something so simple as a "Luck Save" will convince [[Player Characters]] not to skimp on anything. [[Butt Monkey|Except Attractiveness]].
** ''[[Cyberpunk 2020]]'' also has two dump skills. The Brawling skill is added to a character's Reflex score when they make an unarmed attack. The Dodge & Escape skill is added to a character's Reflex when they try to avoid an attack or escape when grabbed. But the Martial Arts skill is added to a characters Reflex score when making an unarmed attack ''and'' when avoiding an attack or escaping when grabbed, and is added to the damage of unarmed attacks, ''and'' gives the character an additional bonus with "key" attacks (e.g., kicking for Muay Thai, throws for Judo, holds for Wrestling). This was supposed to be offset by the fact that each Martial Art had a difficulty factor, by which you multiplied the cost to improve the skill during play ... but some Martial Arts (like Wrestling and Boxing) have difficulty factors of 1. This makes Dodge & Escape useless unless your [[Game Master]] doesn't let you use Martial Arts for dodging non-melee attacks, and makes Brawling completely useless for anything other than role-playing a character who had no formal combat training.
** Empathy was actually ridiculously useful in ''Cyberpunk'', as it determined your starting Humanity score, which determined how many cybernetic enhancements you could cram in your body before [[Cybernetics Eat Your Soul|flipping out and killing everyone]]. This had the ironic effect of guaranteeing that anyone who wanted to end up as a weapons platform with (most of) a [[Brain In a Jar|human brain]] somewhere inside it had to start out as one of the most empathic people on the planet. Conversely, Attractiveness and Movement Allowance (MA) were not only of little use, but could be replaced wholesale with biosculpting or cybernetic legs respectively. With most stats you were either stuck with your starting score or could only modify it to your starting score plus a few points, but Attractiveness could be raised to a maximum of 12 whether it started at 1 or 10 (you paid by the point, so it did cost a litte more if you started ugly) and anyone could by a pair of cyberlegs that set their MA at 16 (out of a human maximum of 10) regardless of how fast they were with their organic legs. So, yes, it was a game of lightning fast sharpshooter supermodels with personalities like [[The Terminator]] who started life as glacial sharpshooter trolls with the compassion of Mother Theresa.
* In ''[[Ancient Domains of Mystery]]'', charisma and appearance are dump stats. Outside of shop prices, they have very minor effects on gameplay. Shop prices, after the mid-game, are irrelevant because there is a way of generating an endless supply of money (the Casino).▼
* ''[[The World of Darkness]]'' games make players decide on a Dump Stat ''Category'' due to being a [[Point Build System]] - you choose one category to get the most points for, one for the middle amount and one for the least. Mental Attributes are the most common choice; while you want to be able to put up a fight and be smooth, you can get by with one dot for each stat in Mental (you start with one automatically and two dots are the human average).
** Or, if you're playing the ''[[Old World of Darkness]]'', put most of your mental attributes in Perception (being able to spot what's trying to kill you can come in handy) or Wits so that you can attack sooner rather than later and make others suffer due to wound penalties for their rolls, and don't bother with Intelligence unless you're playing a character specialized in knowledge/occult skills.
** Many campaigns make physical stats [[Dump Stats]]. Sure, the buffed out PC can bash an opponent or two into the ground, but the master of [[Social Fu]] can determine the course of whole cities, mind control the [[Big Bad]], call in [[Godzilla Threshold|higher powers from their faction]], or buy their way out of problems. Much like in [[Real Life]], being able to beat others up comes in handy every once in a while, but being well-connected and clever can come in handy daily. As a ''general'' rule in both ''[[Old World of Darkness]]'' and [[New World of Darkness|New]], Werewolf and Hunter value physical stats more, Mage and Vampire value mental and social more, and the other games can go either way.
* ''[[GURPS]]'' carefully avoids a universal dump stat, mainly by using optional traits for things that are mandatory in other games. However, many character designs benefit from picking a dump stat, e.g. A brilliant telekinetic can afford to drop his ST down pretty low in order to get points to enhance his powers instead. Additionally, although the game lacks an official Charisma stat, many players tend to saddle themselves with social problems for more points, turning social skills into a Dump "Stat". This pattern can get players in a lot of trouble, however, if they are in situation where they ever need to pump NPCs for info: just because you can kill some one with your brain doesn't mean you can scare people to get the info you need.▼
** In GURPS 4ed games where the party have access to firearms, strength is only useful up to the minimum needed to effectively use your weapon. 11 is enough to use nearly anything. Light machineguns or very heavy magnum handguns may require as much as 13, but any more than that is a waste if it's a point short of 20, where things like heavy machineguns become possible. (While HP is also based off of strength, almost any firearm is capable of dealing enough damage to kill you instantly, and so HT, used to save against death, becomes a far bigger deal.)▼
*** Also, HP can be bought independently of strength, or sold back for points to below what the character's strength would imply, and so is really only based on strength in name only. However, the core rules do recommend allowing HP to only be bought up +30% of its default ST-based value for "normal" human(oid) characters.▼
*** Some characters may wish to carry many heavy objects without getting encumbered, too (or maybe you just [[Doesn't Like Guns|don't like guns]]); strength also improves carrying capacity. However, there are also separate advantages for Lifting ST and Striking ST as well as HP.▼
* The ''D.C. Heroes Roleplaying Game'' had three categories of stats (physical stats - Reflex, Strength, and Body; mental stats - Intelligence, Will, and Mind; and spiritual stats - Influence, Aura, and Spirit) and three types of stats (an action stat that determined how well you "maneuver" in that category, including making and avoiding attacks; an effect stat that determined how powerful you were in that category, including the damage of your attacks; and a resistance stat that determined how durable you were in that category, including how hard you were to hurt and how much damage you could take). Having a low action stat made you a sitting duck to attacks in that category. Having a low resistance stat meant that you were a pushover if you ever got hit by an attack in that category. Having a low effect stat meant that if you chose to make an attack in that category, it wouldn't do much damage unless you had a high action stat and rolled well. Anyone could make physical attacks (it's called a punch). Only telepaths or people drawn into mental combat by a telepath could make mental attacks. There was no way to make a spiritual attack without using magical powers (which would have their own rating, which could be linked to your Aura stat, but didn't have to be). Not a lot of characters had high scores in Aura, the spiritual effect stat.▼
* ''[[Mutants and Masterminds]]'' 3rd Edition and ''DC Adventures'' (a rebrand with identical mechanics) feature this for Presence, which only has the effect of adding bonuses to three solitary Skills, and one can buy all of them together for 1.5 points while raising Presence costs 2 points and gives no further advantage beyond protecting from Weaken Presence effects (which, while possible, has never been printed in official material and the potential issue applies at least equally as much to every other attribute). An easily missed line in skill descriptions indicates Presence actually boosts certain Expertise checks, but the examples given (music) are almost never useful for heroics. It was already a weaker option in the 2nd Edition, and the changes in the 3rd Edition made it even worse.
** A common [[House Rules|house rule]] to fix this is making Presence give a free Presence based advantage (normally worth one point) every rank in it, putting it at 2.5 points worth of stuff for 2 points like most attributes. This leaves Fighting and especially Dexterity as the most obvious Dump Stat, as both are worth ''exactly'' 2 points worth of stuff for 2 points. While Fighting improves melee combat ability and the Parry defense, it's cheaper to improve a single type of melee combat (unarmed, a particular weapon) and parry directly, and some characters can avoid making melee attacks entirely. Dexterity's situation is more dire, as the two skills (Slight of Hand, and Vehicles) it improves are rarely used on the same character (indeed, few characters take ''either'' and both are trained only, meaning a character with infinite dexterity is just as hopeless as someone with negative dexterity) and many characters have no form of ranged attack and most that ''do'' have ranged attacks will focus on only one type of ranged attack (such as bows, thrown objects, or the projectiles created by their super powers) even more than melee characters will. <!-- Stamina and Intellect appear to only grant 2 points worth of stuff, but they actually give more. Expertise is an effectively infinite number of skills, which makes high Intellect very worthwhile if a character has one of the two advantages that allow using Expertise untrained. Stamina is the only way to acquire natural toughness, which secretly boosts its worth a few points, has the minor effect of increasing how long you can hold your breath, and both defenses it gives are effectively mandatory for all non-robot characters anyways. Damage Stamina effects are also relatively common in official material and the only real way to go from active to dead in the system. -->
* In ''[[Eon]]'', the attribute Bildning, roughly translated to Education, is often treated as a dumpstat. Education shows how much general knowledge a character has about the world and things in it, and players make a check in case they want to see if their character knows something about the town they're in, what races are common in the country, and other miscellaneous stuff. The thing is, pretty much everything you get to know by making a check against Education, can also be revealed by making a check against an appropriate skill, like History or Cultural Knowledge. These skills are often more specialized, granted, but at the same time they provide more in-depth information than Education. Besides, most classes that are expected to have a high score in Education also have most of these additional skills. Also, if there's anything worth knowing about a town, odds are a NPC is willing to share some knowledge, or one of the PC's have already been there before.▼
== [[Video Games]] ==
▲* In the [[Might and Magic]] games, intelligence has no effect on classes lacking elemental spellcasting abilities, while personality is useless for classes that can't cast self magic. Very few classes make actual use of both.
▲* Any game with a "luck" or "charisma" stat will most likely be a dump stat, for most characters. ''[[Final Fantasy XI]]'', for instance, subverts this in the case of the bard and beastmaster, charisma is central to ''[[Ogre Battle]]'', and in ''[[Fire Emblem]]'', luck is the only stat that provides critical avoid (prevention of critical attacks), which is very useful in a game where one critical hit can kill off a character permanently.
▲* Defensive stats in [[Nippon Ichi]] games can be viewed as dump stats (unless using a class whose attacks are based on them), especially at moderately high levels (say, when you first top 1000). This is because the games are turn-based and damage is calculated in such a way that the absolute value of an attack stat matters quite a lot (i.e., 17K attack against 17K defense can still do several thousand damage while 100 attack against 100 defense will barely scratch). Depending on the game, it may be best to view [[Bonus Dungeon]] maps as one-turn blitzes.
▲* In ''[[Ancient Domains of Mystery]]'', charisma and appearance are dump stats. Outside of shop prices, they have very minor effects on gameplay. Shop prices, after the mid-game, are irrelevant because there is a way of generating an endless supply of money (the Casino).
* In ''[[Devil Survivor]]'' if you make your [[Player Character]] a magic user ([[Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards|you should]]), increasing strength serves no purpose except when you run out of MP (which you shouldn't if you increase [[One Stat to Rule Them All|magic]] properly), don't have any other physical attackers on your team, and need it to use certain spells/passive abilities.
** Strength becomes a lot less of a dump stat once you realize the only attack capable of harming {{spoiler|Beldr}} is the MC's physical attack, though - meaning if you neglected strength, have fun getting massacred while hitting for chip damage at best.
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* In ''[[EVE Online]]'', only characters training to be traders, corporation executives and fleet commanders benefit from high Charisma, and even they need the other stats to train to fly the right ships as well.
** The developers attempt to make charisma more useful by making a high Charisma stat grant a boost to learning the skills that boost stats, so having a higher charisma means you spend less time boosting the skills that boost your stats, but the effect is minor enough that it takes at least a year to recoup the time you invested in boosting your charisma.
▲* ''[[GURPS]]'' carefully avoids a universal dump stat, mainly by using optional traits for things that are mandatory in other games. However, many character designs benefit from picking a dump stat, e.g. A brilliant telekinetic can afford to drop his ST down pretty low in order to get points to enhance his powers instead. Additionally, although the game lacks an official Charisma stat, many players tend to saddle themselves with social problems for more points, turning social skills into a Dump "Stat". This pattern can get players in a lot of trouble, however, if they are in situation where they ever need to pump NPCs for info: just because you can kill some one with your brain doesn't mean you can scare people to get the info you need.
▲** In GURPS 4ed games where the party have access to firearms, strength is only useful up to the minimum needed to effectively use your weapon. 11 is enough to use nearly anything. Light machineguns or very heavy magnum handguns may require as much as 13, but any more than that is a waste if it's a point short of 20, where things like heavy machineguns become possible. (While HP is also based off of strength, almost any firearm is capable of dealing enough damage to kill you instantly, and so HT, used to save against death, becomes a far bigger deal.)
▲*** Also, HP can be bought independently of strength, or sold back for points to below what the character's strength would imply, and so is really only based on strength in name only. However, the core rules do recommend allowing HP to only be bought up +30% of its default ST-based value for "normal" human(oid) characters.
▲*** Some characters may wish to carry many heavy objects without getting encumbered, too (or maybe you just [[Doesn't Like Guns|don't like guns]]); strength also improves carrying capacity. However, there are also separate advantages for Lifting ST and Striking ST as well as HP.
* After several years worth of alterations, ''[[World of Warcraft]] [[Expansion Pack|Cataclysm]]'' arrived at a strict and simple system:
** Out of three core stats of Strength, Agility and Intelligence each class is geared towards one of them and the gear with others is mostly worthless and the loot distribution system tries to prevent players from grabbing an inappropriate equipment. One of them is always present on a piece of gear. Stamina is present everywhere and simply gives HP.
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* In ''[[Final Fantasy VI]]'', you can boost your Strength, Magic, Speed, Stamina, HP, or MP when you level up with the correct Espers, but you only get so many levels. For those players who want to max their stats, boosting your HP or MP for more than a few select levels turns out to be a waste—not because of the stats being useless, but because HP and MP increase with levels anyway, and come pretty close to the max without Espers. The true Dump Stat is Stamina. All it does is improve your resistance to instant death attacks (which can be blocked entirely anyway), and increase the power of Poison or Regen when afflicted to the character. That's right, boosting your Stamina ''increases'' the damage you take from Poison. The Regen boost isn't worth the bonuses you could be getting in Strength, Magic, or Speed, so a savvy player won't bother deliberately boosting Stamina. Additionally, [[Good Bad Bugs|Physical Evasion does literally nothing in the SNES version; Magic Evasion covers both physical and magical effects]].
** And considering spells and items can get your offensive and defensive figures as good as maxed without the need for Esper bonuses, Speed can easily be considered The One Stat. One turn per two seconds is a ''lot'' better than one turn per six.
* The intelligence stat in the original ''[[Final Fantasy]]'' is bugged; it does ''absolutely nothing''.
** Neither did most non-damage black magic spells such as Zap and Quake for that matter, [[Useless Useful Spell|but that's another story.]]
* ''[[Diablo II]]'' has Energy, which controls mana. No one, not even Sorceresses, puts a single point into it for several reasons. Your mana pool increases with character level and high level items add a lot of mana as well. Mana steal scales with weapon damage, making it more effective too. There is also a runeword for hirelings that gives the entire party a large mana regen bonus. Also, mana potions are readily buyable and dropped in massive quantities by every mini-boss if those are still not enough for you. Meanwhile, very few skills go up in mana cost per skill level. This means if you just wait for a few more character levels, your lack of mana will solve itself. The same applies to strength: the damage bonus is neglegible, so the only reason to invest into strength is item requirements and you can make do with zero strength if you have some + strength items. Therefore 95% of the viable builds in the game require the same stat point distribution: the minimum strength to wear end-game gear, just enough into dexterity to attain max block and everything else into vitality.
** There is ''one'' build that actually benefits from a lot of Energy. The Sorceress skill Energy Shield transfers some damage from health to mana. It's possible to crank it up to the point where you take very little actual damage, but it puts a huge stress on your mana pool. Instead, Vitality and/or Dexterity becomes the dump stat, depending on your focus.
* Charisma in ''[[Murkon's Refuge]]'' just reduces the rates you pay at inns and clinics. And the inn in the first town is always free, so if you keep that as your home base, it only affects clinic prices. (In the pre-web version, it instead affected how often monsters were friendly, a feature which the creator decided to dump for the web port.)
* For a long time, moxie became a bit of a dump stat in ''[[Kingdom of Loathing]]'', to the degree that having a high level of it would make the final boss battle exponentially harder, with the main attractiveness of the moxie classes (the special Moxious Maneuver) being less than useless. This disparity has since been modified. A bit.
* To this day, no one has figured out what Combat Shooting does in the PC port of ''[[Wasteland (video game)|Wasteland]]''. It's one of the most attractive point sinks to first-time players, and yet it might well be good for '''absolutely nothing.''' (On other platforms, it simply doesn't exist.)
* ''[[Things Mr. Welch Is No Longer Allowed to Do In An RPG]]'', [http://theglen.livejournal.com/131998.html 1001-1500]:▼
{{quote|1047. If my troll is the smartest character in the party, the entire party is vetoed.▼
1097. Even if he used INT as a dump stat, I don’t have to carve ‘this end towards enemy’ on the barbarian’s axe blade. }}▼
* The ''[[Elder Scrolls]]'' series has a few, though players focusing on roleplaying can find uses for many of the stats listed below.
** Personality in ''[[Oblivion]]'': there are ways to boost the stat for the infrequent few seconds you need it, and you typically only need it for a few seconds because time freezes when you start a conversation.
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** In Oblivion, your Luck doesn't affect the loot from containers, but instead gives boosts to nearly all of your skills, meaning putting points into it helps with pretty much everything. It has a minor impact on a couple other things in the game, but the skill increase is by far the most useful, making it an incredibly useful stat when you know what it does, and a likely Dump Stat for people who don't. [http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Luck See here for details.]
** In ''[[The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim|Skyrim]]'', they've gotten rid of stats all together. Everything boils down to Health, Magic, and Fatigue. There are, however, ''dump-skills'' that would be inefficient to waste perk points on; Lockpicking and Speechcraft work just fine without putting any perk points into them or artificially trying to raise them.
* In the doujin game ''[[Touhou Labyrinth
▲* ''Space [[Munchkin]]'' parodies this trope with "Stat X" a mystery stat in addition to the 6 core D20 stats.
▲* Each stat in ''[[Arkham Horror]]'' is inversely linked with another. You can take a dump stat but it's always risky: lowering your Will gives you a better Fight but then just seeing the monster drives you insane, for example, and any stat could be called on in a random encounter. Luck of the draw and strategy factor heavily in the game. You can change stats at the start of every turn to adjust to the situation and having the right items can mitigate the risks of having a dump stat.
▲* The ''D.C. Heroes Roleplaying Game'' had three categories of stats (physical stats - Reflex, Strength, and Body; mental stats - Intelligence, Will, and Mind; and spiritual stats - Influence, Aura, and Spirit) and three types of stats (an action stat that determined how well you "maneuver" in that category, including making and avoiding attacks; an effect stat that determined how powerful you were in that category, including the damage of your attacks; and a resistance stat that determined how durable you were in that category, including how hard you were to hurt and how much damage you could take). Having a low action stat made you a sitting duck to attacks in that category. Having a low resistance stat meant that you were a pushover if you ever got hit by an attack in that category. Having a low effect stat meant that if you chose to make an attack in that category, it wouldn't do much damage unless you had a high action stat and rolled well. Anyone could make physical attacks (it's called a punch). Only telepaths or people drawn into mental combat by a telepath could make mental attacks. There was no way to make a spiritual attack without using magical powers (which would have their own rating, which could be linked to your Aura stat, but didn't have to be). Not a lot of characters had high scores in Aura, the spiritual effect stat.
▲* In the doujin game ''[[Labyrinth of Touhou]]'', points put into stat and skill advancement, equipment enhancements to them, and points from gaining experience levels all act as a percentage multiplier to the base score. Thus it's hard to avoid emphasizing a character's initial strengths and weaknesses. Beyond that, every character (and monster) has one common dump stat: due to an unfixable bug in the game engine, ''it is impossible to avoid attacks'', making Evasion completely useless (This is quite bizarre, as basic Touhou gameplay is '''built''' on dodging).
** To be fair, it works to your advantage as enemies can't dodge either. And no one wants an uber buffed Master Spark to miss.
* The Charisma and Wisdom scores are typically dump stats in [[Baldur's Gate]] II. Unless you're playing as a Cleric, Wisdom is only useful for the Wish spell, and even then you can just get a character with high wisdom to cast it. As for Charisma, you get a ring after completing one of the first quests in the city which boosts your Charisma score to 18 when wearing it.
* The defense stat in the ''[[Mario & Luigi]]'' games is pretty much useless, since you can dodge ''every single attack'' in the game and none of them are that hard to dodge (except for {{spoiler|the Elder Shroob Princess' spinning tentacle attack}} in [[Mario & Luigi: Partners In Time|the second game]]), spending your bonus at level-up on the defense stat or getting accessories and clothes that increase your defense instead of your attack is a waste.
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*** It is also very dangerous to have low intellect if you don't know how to find every single book to effectively raise your skills, and in ''Fallout 3'' and ''New Vegas'' without DLC then your Max Level is way too low to get full skills in everything. Unless you just want to focus on something specific.
** Charisma is surprisingly useful in ''[[Fallout 2]].'' as it [[Arbitrary Headcount Limit|determines how large your party can be]]. Specifically, you can have a number of squaddies equal to half your Charisma score, rounded down, meaning a [[Player Character|Chosen One]] with 1 Charisma can't even convince one person to travel with him, while a player with 10 Charisma will have a veritable army. Since followers don't change the amount of experience you receive, they make the game a ''lot'' easier. [[Cloudcuckoolander|Sulik]], [[Genius Bruiser|Marcus]], and [[Retired Badass|Cassidy]] are each a force to be reckoned with.
** ''[[Fallout 2]]'' has a different Dump Stat, that may come across as surprising: Endurance. Most of the skills it modifies can be increased by books or quests. The resistances it provides are rarely relevant (and reloading the game is always an option) and items exist to erase any effect that Endurance resist. It influences [[Hit Points]], but so does Strength (albeit to a lesser degree) and there's enough [[Powered Armor|good armor]] laying around that you're rarely going to take damage that isn't a freak [[One-Hit Kill]] critical, anyway.
▲* In ''[[Eon]]'', the attribute Bildning, roughly translated to Education, is often treated as a dumpstat. Education shows how much general knowledge a character has about the world and things in it, and players make a check in case they want to see if their character knows something about the town they're in, what races are common in the country, and other miscellaneous stuff. The thing is, pretty much everything you get to know by making a check against Education, can also be revealed by making a check against an appropriate skill, like History or Cultural Knowledge. These skills are often more specialized, granted, but at the same time they provide more in-depth information than Education. Besides, most classes that are expected to have a high score in Education also have most of these additional skills. Also, if there's anything worth knowing about a town, odds are a NPC is willing to share some knowledge, or one of the PC's have already been there before.
* In ''[[Final Fantasy X]]'', Luck is a dump stat, but not for the reason you'd expect. In terms of what it does for your characters, Luck is absolutely godly, combining the effects of two other stats (in a game that generally averts this trope) and increasing your critical hit rate to cap it all. The problem is that the developers realized this, and made the Luck stat ridiculously hard to actually put points in - while you'll have more of the spheres increasing every other stat than you know what to do with, you'll get a grand total of four spheres for Luck boosts over the course of the main game, and if you want more you'll have to kill one of the game's [[Bonus Boss]]es at the Monster Arena, for one each time. Most players just invest in the two other stats (Accuracy and Evade), since it's just so much easier to do.
* In the ''[[Inazuma Eleven]]'' series, Stamina is only useful early in the game. Characters will eventually hit a point where they'll seldom if ever become fatigued. Usually, you can stop caring about your team's Stamina entirely around halfway to 2/3rds through the story.
* The My Unit creation system in ''[[Fire Emblem: Awakening]]'' goes out of its way to avert this. Whichever stat you pick as 'worst' will actually lower other stats too, though not as much. Picking Luck or Resistance (generally considered Dump Stats) for worst will also lower Strength and Magic or Magic and Speed respectively, all of which are considered very important stats.
* Vitality and Healing in ''[[Guild Wars 2]]'' are very niche stats that only see use in specific builds due to how the game works: everyone can heal, then investing in Toughness to reduce direct damage taken is often a better idea than increasing health, and the scaling of healing abilities with the Healing stat isn't always good enough to justify investing in it except for heavily healing-oriented builds. Only classes with very low base heatlth benefit substantially from Vitality if the player doesn't want to go full [[Glass Cannon]], and the Necromancer is a particular case due to its [[Multiple Life Bars|Death Shroud
* INT/Wisdom in ''[[Dragon Quest]]'' games prior to 8 only governs MP growth, which is useful in the early levels but suffers serious irrelevance after a while, skews the level a spell is learned by +/- 3 (but real world luck matters more), and (in the 4/5/6 trilogy) making the AI controlled party members less stupid. That would be ''very'' useful, except mandatory AI control of party members [[Scrappy Mechanic|proved so disliked]] and [[Artificial Stupidity|subject to dumb moves even with high stats]] every remake (the [[No Export for You|only official way]] to play 5/6 in English and [[Bad Export for You|only good way]] to play 4) removed it except for temporary party members (whom you have no control over the Wisdom of anyways).
** Luck in [[Dragon Quest III|the third game]] gives a 0.05-0.24% chance to avoid a [[Standard Status Effect|status ailment]] nothing else. Even ignoring the question of if this rate is worth it, very few enemies worth worrying about actually inflict status effects to begin with - the one that does (the [[Bonus Boss]]'s sleep attack in the remakes) can't be guarded against anyway.
▲* Attacks in ''[[Pokémon]]'' are divided into normal and special; usually a Pokemon naturally has one attack stat higher than the other. By teaching a Pokemon inclined towards Special attacks only Special moves, the Attack stat becomes completely useless. The opposite is also true; similarly, it's not usually worth it to boost either defensive stat for [[Glass Cannon]] Pokemon who have really bad HP, since they're not going to survive much of anything anyway, or the speed stat for a slow Pokemon, because once you're slower than any likely opponent, the stat doesn't matter anymore (and some attacks/sets benefit from a low Speed stat, like Gyro Ball, which gets more powerful the higher the targets speed is compared to yours, and Metal Burst, which doesn't even ''work'' unless you go last). There are, however, some movesets that take advantage of upping what would normally be a Dump Stat in order to barely survive what would normally be a lethal blow, or to better-utilize attacks that work well against an otherwise difficult opponent.
▲** Some [[Elite Tweak]] builds that emphasize this to the extreme. The most ridiculous example is for Shuckle, which naturally has ''four'' dump stats: its Speed, Physical attack, Special attack, and HP are all, to be charitable, quite abysmal. Due to its absurdly high Defense and Special Defense, as well as the Sturdy ability (which allows it to resist [[One-Hit Kill]] attacks), it can afford to use only [[Standard Status Ailments]] to deal damage—a strategy used by the Pike Queen in Emerald. Using this strategy, everything except HP becomes a Dump Stat when leveling up: the two defenses are already high enough that they don't need the help (though Defense will end up getting points anyway because they have to go ''somewhere''), the attack stats are irrelevant, and Shuckle is going to be going last so often (i.e. pretty much always) that there isn't much point to increasing its Speed.
▲** Pokemon actually encourages the dump stat mentality for Special Sweepers; it's more advantageous to have a special sweeper with a low attack than a high one. Why? Confusion damage is calculated based on the attack stat, so a Pokemon with a higher attack will take more damage hurting itself in confusion. That's the whole point of Swagger.
▲** The Pokemon Shedinja essentially has ''three'' dump stats; since its HP is always set to 1, putting effort values in HP, Defense, or Special Defense<ref>unless you baton pass a substitute to it, then the last two have a use, though not a major one</ref> is altogether meaningless, not to mention its pitiful Special Attack.
▲** There was a Suicune build in the second generation that actually used Speed as a dump stat—even though it's normally the [[God Stat]]! You see, the vast majority of people dealt with powered up Pokemon by using Roar or Whirlwind, which normally goes last... but a [[Good Bad Bugs|bug]] made them fail if it went first, and if both pokemon used Roar or Whirlwind, only the slower one succeeded.
== [[Web Comics]] ==
* [[Word of God|Alt-text]] in ''[[Rusty and Co.
* As the characters in ''[[The
** [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0044.html Intelligence] is Thog's dump stat. Could you tell?
** Charisma is O-Chul's.
** There are actually a lot of characters who have one trait worse than all the others
*** [[Heroic Sociopath|Belkar]]'s is Wisdom, which is so low that he can't even cast the most basic of the spells associated with his ranger training. (He apparently took the training just so he could learn [[Dual-Wielding]].)
*** V's are Strength and Charisma, fittingly for a [[Squishy Wizard]] and [[Insufferable Genius]].
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== [[Web Original]] ==
* [http://motivationalposter.us/?tag=george-bush This motivational poster]{{Dead link}} accuses former President George W. Bush of using intelligence as his Dump Stat.
▲* ''[[Things Mr. Welch Is No Longer Allowed to Do In An RPG]]'', [http://theglen.livejournal.com/131998.html 1001-1500]:
▲{{quote|1047. If my troll is the smartest character in the party, the entire party is vetoed.
▲1097. Even if he used INT as a dump stat, I don’t have to carve ‘this end towards enemy’ on the barbarian’s axe blade. }}
{{reflist}}
[[Category:Tabletop Game Tropes]]
[[Category:Dump Stat]]
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