D&D 5E So 5 Intelligence Huh

[BoldItalic]

If you accept that int measures ability to reason, then low int MUST = low ability to reason and vice versa. That's how it works.

I do not accept your premise. Low Int does not neccessarily mean poor reasoning ability. Int doesn't directly equate to the ability to reason. The ability to reason is measured by Investigation, which depends on Int, Skill and Expertise added together. Other uses of the Int score, such as Arcana or History checks, measure knowledge of lore and the ability to recall it and have nothing to do with ability to reason. As I have demonstrated with my rogue, it is perfectly possible to have better than average reasoning ability and lower than average knowledge of lore at the same time.

If you play a low int as a high int, you are doing it wrong. Low = low. High = high. Low =/= high. People can in fact roleplay in a wrong manner.

Wrong by your standards or wrong by my standards? If you role play Lefty Locks as a near-imbecile, you are role-playing him wrongly by my standards. You can role-play your characters in your games however you like, but don't tell me how to role-play my characters in my games. You don't have that authority.

 

[TheCosmicKid]

[MENTION=6777052]BoldItalic[/MENTION], I think what people are really trying to get at here is just that, by the rules, Lefty Locks is going to be noticeably bad at anything that requires an Intelligence check. And those tasks go far beyond formal education. If he has to manage money, he's going to be bad at that. If he has to memorize a speech, he's going to be bad at that. If he has to put together a jigsaw puzzle, he's going to be bad at that. The game is written on the assumption that a low Intelligence indicates exactly what it sounds like: the character displays a generally lowered cognitive ability. So if you play the character as intellectually average, you are going to run into rules-roleplay dissonance where this average guy somehow keeps failing at tasks that should not be difficult for him.

This is not to say that you have to play the character as mentally disabled. In fact, as an advocate for disabled people I'd very much prefer you don't unless you really know what you're doing. But there are lots of different ways to be unintelligent. Jayne Cobb was mentioned upthread, and I think he's an excellent example: there's nothing wrong with his brain*, but he doesn't like to think, displays zero curiosity, and is aggressively bored by anything intellectual. My gut says to put him in the 6-7 Int range. His dumbness is more pronounced than a -1, but not so extreme to be a -3. So one way to play an Int 5 character could be like Jayne, only more so -- which is kind of a terrifying thought.

*Cognitively, anyway; sociopathy is another matter.

 

[Shasarak]

I enjoy a game where anyone playing can solve a riddle. It encourages participation!

I also don't enjoy games where the player of a 20 INT PC always solves the riddle by rolling dice. It defeats the purpose of challenging the players with a riddle in the first place.

The problem starts when the Player of the 20 Int Pc has a real life Int of 5.

But then Google is the great equaliser!

 

[Yardiff]

The book says that Int can correspond to reasoning ability, not that Int does correspond to reasoning ability.

If a character has low Int, that might be because it has poor reasoning ability. It might also be for some other reason.

A implies B, but it's not necessarily true that B implies A.

Reviewing the PHB.

Using Each Ability:
Every task that a character or monster might attempt in the game is covered by one of the six abilities. This section explains in more detail what those abilities
mean and the ways they are used in the game.

Intelligence:
Intelligence measures mental acuity, accuracy of recall, and the ability to reason.


I don't see the word CAN anywhere.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

I don't see the word CAN anywhere.

I don't see MUST either.

The description of the stat describes how it interacts with Intelligence checks. A character with low Int will demonstrate poor mental acuity, poor recall, and poor ability to reason; to exactly the degree that those are reflected by the penalty to skill and ability checks. Anything beyond that is speculation and interpretation.

 

[BoldItalic]

[MENTION=6777052]BoldItalic[/MENTION], I think what people are really trying to get at here is just that, by the rules, Lefty Locks is going to be noticeably bad at anything that requires an Intelligence check. And those tasks go far beyond formal education. If he has to manage money, he's going to be bad at that. If he has to memorize a speech, he's going to be bad at that. If he has to put together a jigsaw puzzle, he's going to be bad at that. The game is written on the assumption that a low Intelligence indicates exactly what it sounds like: the character displays a generally lowered cognitive ability. So if you play the character as intellectually average, you are going to run into rules-roleplay dissonance where this average guy somehow keeps failing at tasks that should not be difficult for him.

Okay, but Lefty as a character concept is average-to-good at mental tasks in general (he's quite capable of inventing a new kind of lock) but very bad at knowing lore (because he can't read). The trouble is, that if I make him Int 11, say, there's no way I can penalize his lore-based skill checks such as History and so on, because skills only add positive modifiers and there are no negative skills. I have to put the -3 on Int as a baseline, so the lore-based skills come out right, then boost it with +4 on Investigation to make that come out right too.

It's the ability scores as modified by skills, that matter. A character with low Int and no relevant mental skills will perform badly at mental challenges and can be role-played as such, but one with skills that compensate for the Int score will not perform badly at some tasks and (in my opinion) should not be role-played as if he did.

In other words, Int scores don't tell the whole story.

 

[Yardiff]

This is probably just me but.....

'A character with low Int will demonstrate poor mental acuity, poor recall, and poor ability to reason; to exactly the degree that those are reflected by the penalty to skill and ability checks.'

This tells me that you and those who think like you believe that ability scores are only for the mechanics part of the game and have zero to do with the roleplay part of the game. Again this is probably just me.

Myself and those who think like me believe that ability score are the core of the character and we roleplay them as such as best we can.

 

[Satyrn]

This tells me that you and those who think like you believe that ability scores are only for the mechanics part of the game and have zero to do with the roleplay part of the game. Again this is probably just me.

It's not that they have zero to do with roleplay. It's that they have whatever impact each player wants to give, whether that's zero or 100 (this is a metric scale of some sort I guess), and that each player is free to make that decision as they wish. Perhaps, like BoldItalic, considering the skills and various other attributes on the character sheet to decide this; or like Maxperson, using only the ability score.

Or maybe I'll play the character as a collection of numbers with no personality stamped onto it as I crawl through the dungeon.

 

[BoldItalic]

I'm curious - what's the general feeling on role-playing skills?

Lefty is okay at making deductions based on clues (+1 on Investigation). He's not in the league of Sherlock Holmes, but he's not stupid in that respect. Would you role-play him as reasonably capable of deductive reasoning?

I'm asking because it seems that at least some people wouldn't and I find that surprising. Not wrong, just surprising.

 

[Maxperson]

The book says that Int can correspond to reasoning ability, not that Int does correspond to reasoning ability.

That is wrong. I'll quote it again for you.

"Intelligence measures mental acuity, accuracy of recall, and the ability to reason."

Note that there is no optional language there. Intelligence measures those three things. Period. It doesn't say "or" the ability to reason. It's "and" the ability to reason. It also doesn't say "can measure". It says very clearly "intelligence measures."

If a character has low Int, that might be because it has poor reasoning ability. It might also be for some other reason.

Not by RAW.