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When you have the option in video games to increase stats, do you increase the stats they're already good at, making them a beast in that category, or do you increase the stats they're lacking to make them an overall more well-balanced character?
I think it depends for me, but I probably tend to increase their already good strengths making them as good as can possibly be with that stat.
If I only play as one character I do try to keep an eye out and make sure no stats are lagging behind. But if it's an RPG where you control a party I always maximize their strengths. Division of labor, it works for capitalism!
Uh, I rarely pay much attention to character stats so I'm pretty terrible at what I should do regarding increasing a certain stat over another. I usually just leave it to the game to determine that for me.
Play up strengths. I find that trying to balance out characters who are not meant for melee or not meant for magic results in less of an effect than if you were to use them as they are meant to be used, especially in Final Fantasy. There is a reason the games are set up into parties; the different characters compliment eachother. Trying to balance out everyone equally takes away from a great party combination that could focus on raising everyone to their strengths.
If you try to make everyone equal across the board, you are robbing yourself of untapped capabilities.
BEASTMODE!
In an RPG with a party of characters, I'll build up strengths of each individual character but in an action-adventure type game where you control a single protagonist, I'll usually choose to learn a new ability/skill/weapon rather than upgrade an existing one, if only to find out how it works. Though I suppose I still eventually always find one or two things that work better or that I prefer using, so by the end of the game, I've still got a fairly lopsided skill tree.
Auto-update.
It can vary, though usually I'll play up strenghts, and minor compensation for a weakness. Solo games I focus more specifically on certain aspects with some weakness management.
Sometimes I go funny, and find out a bizarre way to do it. Such as Chrono Trigger I give Robo all the magic tabs. Dude goes beast if you do that.
I usually only increase the stats they're good at as long as they don't have a need for survivability. If that's not the case then I'll throw a few at defense or HP every now and then. I like having my specialists.
Play up the strengths. A character with a solid skill set will always have a viable solution for completing most any objective assuming the game design is solid.
Fallout: New Vegas is a good example. You can play a social, stealth, combat, or skill character and most quests are more or less completable with any of these approaches.
Although even better design realizes the advantages of mixing-and-matching too without making a poorly-designed character still easy to play as.