Wisdom???

[jmucchiello]

Conceptually this is interesting. However, I think that machines are pretty good at perception. Searching for a file generally works when you use a search command and facial recognition software and other types of high tech stuff generally work when all the parameters are met. I say "generally" in both cases, but I mean unless there is an error they always work. Basically, they don't gloss over anything like a mind can do.

That's not perception. That's comparison. "Is this X? Yes/no." If there's a hidden directory on your hard drive and you didn't tell the search to look for files in hidden directories it won't go there. A human searcher might eventually disobey the "rule" and take a quick peak in the hidden place.

Perception, actually noticing stuff, is far more intuitive. Take this scenario: Someone walks in a room with a hidden weapon and is about to kill everyone. There are probably only a few people in the room who will "know" immediately that the guy is big trouble. Some more people will have a bad feeling about him. And the rest of the people in the room will not perceive any threat. How do you program a computer to have a "gut" reaction to someone entering a room? As you said, making inferences "he has a look of disdain on his face" "he's not walking straight but has his hip turned slightly like he hiding something behind his back" "his eyes were like Death's eyes" is hard for a computer because you can't really program it.

Where do you think will save fits into a machine?

Computers fail all will saves. They do what they are told by any one who can communicate with them successfully.

Also, how could I have forgotten to mention this one earlier, often WIS is described as sanity. Low WIS means more insane.

No, insane means low wis. That doesn't mean it is a reflexive property. There's a difference. Wisdom is perception. The insane tend not to view reality like normal people do. So insanity is usually modeled as a drain on Wisdom. It's not a perfect mechanic but it does make a certain amount of sense.

 

[Camelot]

I once thought of an idea to make skill challenges in 4e be just as tactical as combat encounters. Instead of having hit points, you had resource points, and once you were out of them, you no longer had any ideas that could be of use to the challenge unless you used an inspiration surge, instead of a healing surge. Wisdom would be used as a parallel to Constitution to determine how many resource points and inspiration surges you had.

Unfortunately, the metaphor falls apart right about there, and the system went nowhere. Oh well.

 

[Chrono22]

I once thought of an idea to make skill challenges in 4e be just as tactical as combat encounters. Instead of having hit points, you had resource points, and once you were out of them, you no longer had any ideas that could be of use to the challenge unless you used an inspiration surge, instead of a healing surge. Wisdom would be used as a parallel to Constitution to determine how many resource points and inspiration surges you had.

Unfortunately, the metaphor falls apart right about there, and the system went nowhere. Oh well.

Take heart- you aren't the only one that thought of this.
The game I'm working on has Stamina (hp) and Conviction (think morale or focus). I'm not a fan of surges, but as Stamina and Conviction are.. disposable resources, there are ways to recover them.

 

[Sadrik]

Wisdom normally means having smarts and knowledge but applying age and experience to temper it. That is why it is often a wise old man and a smart young man.

That's not perception. That's comparison. "Is this X? Yes/no." If there's a hidden directory on your hard drive and you didn't tell the search to look for files in hidden directories it won't go there. A human searcher might eventually disobey the "rule" and take a quick peak in the hidden place.

With all the search parameters set, it will find or not find the file. There is no gray area. If you set the parameters to search for hidden directories an algorithm could be drawn up to do that kind of thing. The competency is in how complex the algorithm is, not in if the algorithm can make guesses and leaps of faith. The program is what it is, a complex one will pick up more in this case than a very simple one.

Perception, actually noticing stuff, is far more intuitive. Take this scenario: Someone walks in a room with a hidden weapon and is about to kill everyone. There are probably only a few people in the room who will "know" immediately that the guy is big trouble. Some more people will have a bad feeling about him. And the rest of the people in the room will not perceive any threat. How do you program a computer to have a "gut" reaction to someone entering a room? As you said, making inferences "he has a look of disdain on his face" "he's not walking straight but has his hip turned slightly like he hiding something behind his back" "his eyes were like Death's eyes" is hard for a computer because you can't really program it.

Ah, but the human mind can accept that data input and perhaps a very sophisticated machine could as well. For instance, a very "smart" machine could determine the man holding something behind him. Could it know what it was though? That would be a best guess. Luckily though the human component is that we are on a whole other order of complexity from machines. I have read recently that human intelligence works by prediction, it expects things to be a certain way and then when they are not flags appear. For instance, you expect a nose to be where a nose is but when it is not a flag appears. A machine generally does not work that way. A machine would look at a nose and then go down a long list of noses and then pick out the most appropriate and if no nose existed on that list it would pick that one.

Anyway point being- perception, I think, is INT based (we could probably go back and forth on this). To further this I think logic and deduction happen from being smart and not from hutches and gut instinct.

Computers fail all will saves. They do what they are told by any one who can communicate with them successfully.

You could also make the claim that they make all will saves unless they get the proper input. With the proper input they fail.

No, insane means low wis. That doesn't mean it is a reflexive property. There's a difference. Wisdom is perception. The insane tend not to view reality like normal people do. So insanity is usually modeled as a drain on Wisdom. It's not a perfect mechanic but it does make a certain amount of sense.

Yes but, I think for some mental conditions that could be true, for others not so much.

 

[Stacie GmrGrl]

If Wisdom is having the smarts and knowledge with the age to temper and usee it properly, then why not just blend that aspect of it with Intelligence and then take the rest of what wisdom represents, which is Perception, and have Perception as a base attribute?

 

[chronoplasm]

Intelligent men get out of situations that wise men don't get themselves into.

 

[frankthedm]

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

Instinct as well.

 

[Sadrik]

If Wisdom is having the smarts and knowledge with the age to temper and usee it properly, then why not just blend that aspect of it with Intelligence and then take the rest of what wisdom represents, which is Perception, and have Perception as a base attribute?

I think this is a very fair idea. Both with regards to the intuition-like wisdom being tempered smarts. I also think it is fair to make perception what wisdom is. However that treads on a cow or two in the game. What about Will save and the whole sanity bit, divine magic, and all the other aspects of WIS that were brought up in the thread?

 

[Sadrik]

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

Instinct as well.

What does that mean mechanically though?

 

[Camelot]

If Wisdom is having the smarts and knowledge with the age to temper and usee it properly, then why not just blend that aspect of it with Intelligence and then take the rest of what wisdom represents, which is Perception, and have Perception as a base attribute?

Let's see if I can explain my thoughts right.

Wisdom to me is not simply experience applied to knowledge. Wisdom is the knowledge you gain from experience that you wouldn't be able to gain from studying and memorizing. The Wisdom knowledge skills (Dungeoneering, Nature, and Heal, in 4e at least) represent knowledge that is gained from experiencing it first hand, not just reading from books. The way I see Intelligence vs. Wisdom for these skills is that a smart person memorizes facts and can recall them quickly, but a wise person can take what they know and see patterns in their experiences that they can apply to new experiences.

You could argue that a smart person can study how to forage for food in the wild, an activity covered by Nature. But they've never actually experienced being in the wild and having to find food before you run out; they'll quickly realize that actually experiencing it is a lot different from what they've read. Wisdom also helps maintain calm so you can succeed at what you're trying to do.

Also, things requiring the Wisdom skills are changing, wild, and unpredictable. You might come across food while foraging that you've never seen, but if you can tell that it's orange like those poisonous berries you once ate, you'll know to avoid it. You might come across a creature you've never seen or heard of before, but you see that it has traits similar to another creature, and you can project other qualities from that creature onto this one that are most likely accurate. You might be trying to heal your ally with improvised methods, but given your experience you can create medical tools from the things you have at hand.

On the divinity thing, gods want you to know why you're fighting for them. They don't want you to blindly follow their dogma without reason, because you might misinterprete things, like the Pharisees did with working on Sunday (sorry for the biblical reference if this insults anybody, but it's a good analogy).

For the primal power source, it goes back to experience. The spirits are not something you can study and channel. You really need to fight for their cause and understand what you're doing.

For psionics, that is definitely not something you can study and pick up. You have to really train your mind to be able to channel the unpredictable source of psionics.

Even some martial classes need a little Wisdom, and again this is because they need experience at fighting, not just reading about maneuvers. Wisdom in this case could be seen as practice.

The arcane source is all about Intelligence. Magic is predictable, even in its most wildest forms (this is argueable, true, but I'm not going to get into that), and if you study hard enough and are able to memorize the facts, you can control it. When wisdom is important here, it's just experience, like with martial classes.

That's just my ramblings. Even if my thoughts seem incoherent, I agree with those who say Intelligence and Wisdom are two seperate things, and it's not too hard to see why.