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** 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.▼
=== Video Games ===
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* 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).
=== '''Unsorted''' ===▼
* 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.)
▲=== '''Unsorted''' ===
* ''[[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.
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