Hmm...? You mean like stealing NPC’s purses or something like that?
Stats are (almost) always nonsensical. The only difference is that each stats system is nonsensical in its own way and everyone can be fine with certain degrees of nonsense in some areas. Here you are criticizing Deadfire stats, but the other game we are talking about right now is Divinity Original Fucking Sin 2, where stats only exist to click on your primary attribute two times at each level up and to gasp at how dumb the skills system is. You want to be a warrior or an archer? Fuck Ranged and Two-Handed, put points into Warfare. You want to be a necromancer? Fuck the Necromancer skill, put points into Warfare.
It seems straightforward to you only because, for some reason, you find D&D stats more "real" or "grounded", but they have the same kind of problem that you pointed out for Deadfire.
That's exactly what I'm saying: all systems are flawed in their own way and D&D abilities are just as absurd and nonsensical as PoE ones.
But after having gained more muscles, are your skills with daggers improved and are you able to inflict deadlier wounds with them? Are you able to inflict deadlier wounds with a bow? Because that's what an high Strength score does. And the same absurd result can be obtained for every other ability. Take Dexterity for example: as an archer you want an high score, so now you also know how to hide, move silently and evade attacks. Why? Can't an excellent archer be a big fat-ass? Charisma: you are the most beautiful woman in the world, nobody could ever resist you... so now you are a great liar and you can scream to scare your opponents.
I don't think that all criticisms is invalid (there are deeply flawed systems: D:OS 1 and 2 stats are horrible, because every class just increases a single attribute and that's it, no more depth), I just can't relate to this specific "realism" criticism, because both systems require an high degree of abstraction (since they try to summarize all possible human traits with a combination of half a dozen numbers). When two systems require a good dose of a posteriori justifications, usually I think that the more abstract one is the superior choice, because it leaves its abstractions out in the open for the player to interpret (Might influences damages: for a warrior it means that he is physically stronger, for a wizard it means that he knows how to manipulate mystical energies; Constitution influences health: for a warrior it means he is buff, for a wizard it means he knows how to protect himself with magic to avoid attacks), while the one that tries to follow reality more closely inevitably tries to hide his flaws, contradictions and inconsistencies (Strength: I just want to be a very good swordsman, but I also need to be a giant bull that breaks down doors with his bare hands; Constitution: I just want to have more HP as a Wizard, but now I also have to be buff and to be resistant to poisons). Obviously those inconsistencies can be ignored/overcome, but through the same process that allows to ignore/overcome PoE attributes.
