Wisdom???

[Sadrik]

I think one of the big problems D&D over the years is with its definition of WIS. It has always lacked. What is WIS? Think about it, where most people will agree on what all the other stats mean, WIS is sort of a shifting target (runner up is CHA). No other stat is as convoluted as WIS.

My feeling is that WIS should be the flip side of CON and make it mental defense and very little else. This is how it was in 1e, it gave you a mental save bonus and immunities to certain mental spells. Making it not that far away from the 1e reality (other than the hiccup that Clerics use WIS- should have been CHA like the paladin imho). CON does not do much other than provide defense for the body, WIS imho should not do much except defend the mind.

So what is WIS:
Willpower
Divine magic
Perception
Sense Motive/Insight/Hunch/Detecting Lies
Knowledge (certain types, 3e and even more expanded in 4e)
Psionics (1e along with INT and CHA, as I recall WIS was most important, 2e went to all stats, 3e went to INT, I don't where 4e is)

I really like the idea that being really smart sees through illusions like in 1e/2e. That is basically perception and the ability to notice flaws in the illusion. Way back when I played 1e, we used INT checks for perception checks. In 2e that went more towards WIS checks (especially Ravenloft) and 3e it was firmly planted as WIS based. However, I never liked perception being WIS based.

I think attention to detail is more INT based than WIS based anyway. Sherlock Holmes is smart not wise. Clerics should not be innately perceptive, wizards maybe, in any case I'd buy it for wizards over clerics.

The stat has become more convoluted in each subsequent edition. In any future iterations I would hope that it would be cut back some.

So for discussion purposes let us assume that INT means Knowledge and CHA means Diplomacy/Social stuff.

What does WIS mean to you?

 

[ExploderWizard]

It was never confusing to me. Wisdom was pretty much treated as common sense.

 

[Theo R Cwithin]

I tend to look at it this way:

WIS is common sense; depth of thought & perception; understanding
WIS is analogous to STR.

INT is knowledge; quickness & flexibility of thought; mental acuity
INT is analogous to DEX.

CHA is will-power; self-awareness; personality projection.
CHA is analogous to CON.

 

[JustKim]

I think one of the big problems D&D over the years is with its definition of WIS. It has always lacked. What is WIS? Think about it, where most people will agree on what all the other stats mean, WIS is sort of a shifting target (runner up is CHA). No other stat is as convoluted as WIS.

Okay, I'm thinking about it. And now I'm disagreeing with you totally.

When I explain the rules to people new to D&D, the way I break down Intelligence and Wisdom is to say that Intelligence is your scholarly knowledge and Wisdom is your intuition. Nobody has ever had a problem with that, or asked later why intuition would help you to do X or Y.

It's a well established fact in the real world that there are multiple kinds of intelligence. D&D is only slightly ahead of the curve of video games by breaking the measure of mental ability into two scores. It is behind other RPGs, such as White Wolf's core system which tracks 3 mental ability scores and 3 social. None of these is redundant with another.

I think the problem lies with the assumption you seem to make, that all smarts are a linear scale. This has no basis in reality. A person who is equally good at all things cognitive is a creature of fantasy.

 

[jdrakeh]

INT has always represented formal factual knowledge in my games. WIS, on the other hand, has always represented common sense. Frex, if a PC has a really boneheaded idea that flies in the face of common sense, I'll have them make a WIS check (roll 1d20 under rating). If they pass, I tell them "After mulling it over, you think that might be a really bad idea." — if they fail, I tell them "Hey! That sounds like a great idea! Go for it!" (I've found that this keeps people from making WIS a dump stat).

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

Wisdom to me has always been common sense and intuition. There are people who are book smart (high INT); they can recite a litany of facts, but they just don't get how the world actually works. High wisdom is the opposite, they may not be good at balancing their checkbook, but they intuitively get how things work, or how they should work. Willpower usually gets dropped into Wisdom because it just tends to be a better fit than INT; peple know intellectually that smoking is bad for you, but they still do, so it isn't a matter of INT, therfore WIS makes more sense.

As for perception, I disagree, especially when it comes to illusions. A high WIS would allow somebody to have that feeling that something doesn't feel right, without being able to say exactly what that is. That could mean that feeling that somebody is watching you, or that the illusionary wall just somehow seems wrong. If an illusion perception were INT based, then to me it should become a check between the caster's and your INT for their ability to create a perfect illusion and you to notice the flaws. By making it WIS based, the spell is assumed to be perfect by all intellectual means, but that niggling little voice says something doesn't add up, and it has to overrule your physical senses that are telling you it is really there.

 

[Aus_Snow]

Simple 'fix' that might align well with where (it seems) you're coming from:

Strength, Dexterity/Agility, Constitution, Intelligence, Perception/Awareness (replaces Wisdom), Willpower/Presence (replaces Charisma). Actual words used might, of course, vary.

Instantly clears up that kind of confusion -- assuming that's there to begin with -- and, with a little trivially easy rearranging, 'Charisma' is certainly no default dump stat anymore. Oh, and neither is 'Wisdom'. But then, for 3e, that wasn't necessarily going to be the case anyhow. Will saves are handy that way.

Depends largely on what else you do with whatever base edition/version you're using.

 

[Jeremy Ackerman-Yost]

As a research scientist surrounded by highly intelligent people.... perception in the D&D sense (or the biological sense for that matter), is something entirely separate from either memory (int) or inductive reasoning (fuzzy as heck).

In any case, all 3 mental stats are frankly silly as silos of mental capacities.
But the capacity to simulate reality borders on the pathetic without a massive, unwieldy variable set that would be no fun for anyone. If you really need a "reality based" theory of int and wis, I suppose the split-brain patient provides us with sufficient support for the caricature of Int = Left brain, Wis = Right brain to just move on with our lives.

 

[MichaelSomething]

I read long ago that Int is reading a topic and thinking, "This is an edition war!" while Wis is reading the same topic and deciding not to participate in it.

 

[ProtoClone]

Wis, to me, represents knowledge that I have learned by chance.

Int is something that can be learned from a book to increase your understanding of things, like math. But Wis is something akin to "I learned that not all dogs are nice dogs".

A low Wis score, to me, then would mean that despite having met mean dogs I still haven't learned that not all dogs are nice dogs.