D&D 5E So 5 Intelligence Huh

[Ovinomancer]

What game is that?

If I had to guess, I'd say the hypocrisy game. Just a guess, though. Feel free to provide your answer.

 

[iserith]

If I had to guess, I'd say the hypocrisy game. Just a guess, though. Feel free to provide your answer.

I'm not sure what you mean or are driving at. My position in this thread is clear - I believe there is no objectively right or wrong way to roleplay a character with a 5 Intelligence.

 

[Ovinomancer]

I'm not sure what you mean or are driving at. My position in this thread is clear - I believe there is no objectively right or wrong way to roleplay a character with a 5 Intelligence.

Well, to clarify, what I was doing in that specific post was saying you were engaging in hypocritical behavior by engaging in evasive behavior while complaining that others were engaged in evasive behavior. Previously, I had asked a question to which the above is at least a partial answer, so the hypocritical behavior is at least lessening. This is a positive step forward, I think. What remains to be resolved about your above quoted statements is whether or not you think others are wrong for thinking there is an objective way to roleplay?

To be fully engaged, I for one think that there are objectively bad ways to roleplay a 5 INT. Roleplaying as Sherlock Holmes, unironically, is an objectively bad way to roleplay a 5 INT. I'm comfortable in that statement. However, there's a huge range of things that aren't objectively bad, and I don't have a solid test for where the line is. Again, I'm comfortable with that, I don't need to know every answer to be clear about some of them. Like porn, I know it when I see it. So, since I now have skin in the game, so to speak, do you account me as wrong for this opinion, or is it okay with you that I hold it?

 

[pemerton]

I was going to mention LLB Traveller but I couldn't remember if it used both EDU and INT, or how the difference was defined.

Book 1 says that INT corrsponds to IQ (the correspondence is not any further defined) and that EDU corresponds to the highest level of formal education. On a quick look through the skill entries, there are no DMs for INT or EDU but the description of Electronics skill says that some checks may require a minimum EDU or INT threshold.

classic Runequest has both INT & POW, doesn't it?

Yes. But INT is not done on 3d6. It is 2d6+6. RQ also has a way of distinguishing animal from human INT other than simply by score: it has the notion of Fixed INT for animals, which means the creature behaves in accordance with instinct rather than reason and is unable to learn knowledge or communication skills.

Practically-speaking, D&D players use INT to represent a "arcane spell caster" not a "smart person".

In my experience it's a little bit more than that, and relates both to [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION]'s recent post upthread and [MENTION=16814]Ovinomancer[/MENTION]'s reference to playing a 5 INT PC as Sherlock Holmes.

In my experience, RPGers try to bring their PCs' mechanical strengths to bear upon the fictional situation. In practice, that tends to mean that if INT and knowledge skills are not all that good, they will tend to opt for other sorts of solutions. And because many RPGs tend to make physical and/or violent solutions more feasible than they might tend to be in real life (in this respect, fantasy RPGs have genre resemblances to superhero comics, action adventure stories, etc), those other sorts of solutions are often available.

As a result, I tend to find it is fairly clear in play who is the cerebral character (often also the wizard, but not universally) and who is not.

If the player whose PC has 5 INT and no knowledge skills is declaring a lot of Sherlock Holmes-like actions, perhaps the GM is not framing the 5 INT PC into situations that speak to his/her mechanical strengths. If the player of that PC is declaring Sherlock Holmes-like actions and succeeding, then the problem seems to me to be not in the player's roleplaying, but in the action resolution system being deployed: it doesn't seem to be taking seriously the mechanical features of the PC.

In a low mechanics, high fiction resolution system like OD&D, taking the PC's mechanical features seriously may require the GM to veto or at least strictly negotiate certain action declarations. But in a mechanically laden system like 5e, with a whole chapter of rules for stat checks, skills to modify those checks, etc, the GM should probably be able to handle this through much lighter-touch framing of action resolution. In neither case would I see the burden as falling primarily on the player, though - who should be just as free to declare actions involving INT as the player of the 5 STR wizard is free to declare actions involving STR.

 

[pemerton]

It does have that concrete meaning. What you're doing here is taking that meaning, throwing away parts of it, and arbitrarily adding new information.

What is the new information that is being arbitrarily added?

In 3d6, 18 is strictly three times greater than 6.

All you seem to be saying here is that, as a matter of natural numbers arithmetic, 18 = 3*6. But in the same sense, 100 = 2*50.

If you are also asserting that the 3d6 roll is establishing a number that measure some quantity of something, which varies in its presence in a given person between 3 and 18 units, what is that something?

Let's take CON. The AD&D rulebooks (PHB, DMG) tell us that CON measures physique, fitness, health and resistance. What would it even mean (beyond loose metaphor) to say that PC A has twice or three times the physique or the health of PC B? There is no quantity of some determinable property ("health", "physique") being measured here. All there is is a chart that assigns certain mechanical consequences to certain scores, and then a device - the roll of 3d6 - that allocates those scores on a probabilistic basis (which, as I have said, also seems intended to correlate in some fashion to frequency in the population).

With IQ, there are also charts that allocate certain numbers to members of the population on a frequency or likelihood basis. If someone wants to take the IQ charts with their frequencies, and the stat charts with their frequencies (as calculated via the odds of a 3d6 roll), and then match the too up where the frequencies are (more-or-less) equal, what is the objection?

you've chosen to throw away information from that 3d6 distribution when mapping it to INT

What information has been thrown away? Certainly not information that 18 is 6 times as intelligent as 3, because there is no such information.

As I have said, the 3d6 score is not a measure of a quantity of something.

This is even more obvious in Classic Traveller (which uses 2d6 rather than 3d6 but is otherwise the same in its principles and logic). In Traveller, the Education (EDU) score is an indicator of the highest level of formal education attained. A character with a 10 EDU is not, though, 5 times more formally educated than a character with a 2 EDU. That makes no sense.

Likwise for Social Standing (SOC), another Traveller stat. A character with 11 or 12 social standing is a Knight or Baron respectively. There is no notion, though, that a Count has twelve elevenths of the social standing of a Knight. Again, that would not even be a coherent claim.

These random state generation techniques are for assigning scores that show rankings (from low to high), where the positions in those rankings are determined by their likelihood in some (fairly loosely defined) population.

EDIT: Here's another example - the MMII encounter tables are d8+d12, used to determine an entry on a chart where those entries are allocated on the basis of frequencies. There is no suggestion that the monster found on the 20 entry is 10 times as "encounter-y" as the monster found on the 2 entry.

3d6 ability scores are like that, except the entries are also in a ranking.

 

[BoldItalic]

...
I for one think that there are objectively bad ways to roleplay a 5 INT.
...

I find that a strange thing to believe, because of your inclusion of the word "objectively".

We may observe the way someone role plays and we may each approve or disapprove of the way they do it and label it "good" or "bad" accordingly; but we are each making a subjective judgement. There is no objective way to measure the goodness of an example of role playing - it's an art form; the goodness of it is in the eye of the beholder. How, then, can you believe that the word "objectively" can legitimately be applied to the goodness or badness of the performance as you or I perceive it?

Are you perhaps using the word "objectively" to indicate that you believe that your opinions about role-playing should carry more weight than contrary opinions? That is a natural thing to think but it doesn't stand up very well to critical scrutiny.

 

[pemerton]

There is no objective way to measure the goodness of an example of role playing - it's an art form; the goodness of it is in the eye of the beholder. How, then, can you believe that the word "objectively" can legitimately be applied to the goodness or badness of the performance as you or I perceive it?

This is a fair question.

I have a little bit of sympathy for accounts of aesthetic value that deny radical subjectivity. One reason for this is that it makes sense to try and cultivate one's taste - that is, to come to appreciate something in respect of which one, previously, couldn't see the value. And it is hard (not impossible, but at least tricky and perhaps a bit counterintuitive) to explain this purely by reference to the preferences of the self-cultivator.

But my way in would tend to be to query the use of "good" and "bad". Notions like "sophisticated", "subtle", "evocative", "inspiring", "emotionally demanding", etc seem to me to be more useful evaluative labels when trying to think about RPGing. There is something a bit crude about classic "pawn" play, for instance, where there is no attempt to shape a character with goals beyond beating the dungeon and thereby earning XP so as to get more powerful so as to beat the even tougher dungeon. I wouldn't say it's bad, per se, but one might wonder what it needs an INT stat for (maybe, as [MENTION=3887]Mallus[/MENTION] suggested, a Magic stat would be better).

But there are ways of playing less crudely than that other than the 2nd ed style.

 

[pemerton]

He presented his relevant experience and training along with reasons why he felt that the test could be wrong, and offered you his professional opinion.

It's worth noting that the only reason I have for believing those reasons about antigens and the rapid test is that the doctor told me, and he is an authority. I have no independent access to the plausibility of those reasons.

it doesn't matter if you're aware of a general contention around an issue, the issue was in contention in the argument.

If a geographer tells me the world is round, and a flat-earther tells me that the earth is flat, there is a contention between two parties. But it has no bearing on whether or not I should take the geographer at his/her word, because of the two contending parties only one - the geographer - is an expert.

That is an illustration of the point made on the Wikipedia page, that only controversy between experts casts doubt on the reliability of expert testimony as a guide to the truth.

Perhaps [MENTION=23751]Maxperson[/MENTION] is also experienced in the use of the word "irrational" among those who have a reason to care about reasons and reasoning. But no such experience has been mentioned to date in this thread.

I don't think you can declare that word usage is empirical in nature. We often determine the meaning of a new word through deduction, not empiricism. Thirdly, the empirical and contention arguments fail the moment you touch prescriptive vs descriptive usage.

By the phrase word usage is empirical in nature do you mean knowledge of word usage is empirical in nature? Because I only talked about the second.

I hope it is fairly clear that I am not talking about "prescriptive usage". I am talking about facts of usage. If someone wants to argue that fact of usage among academic philosophers and lawyers have no bearing on the permissible usage of "irrational", go to town! I haven't seen that argument yet, though.

As far as "descriptive" usage, knowledge of that - ie knowledge of facts of word usage - is acquired empirically (ie by observation - including testimony - and by inference from those observed facts), not by logical or mathematical demonstration.

It has nothing to do with the form of your argument, which was, 'I am a lawyer, I know what irrational means, and you, sir, do not.'

You misdescribe my argument.

I used the word "irrational" in a post. [MENTION=23751]Maxperson[/MENTION] queried my usage. I replied that my usage is consistent with the usage of a group of professionals (academic lawyers and philosophers) who have good reason to care, more than most, about the use of that word; and that I know this because I am a member of that group of professionals.

Here is a more formal statement of the argument that I have presented:

(1) Academic lawyers and philosophers have a particular reason (flowing from their professional concerns) to care about the use of the word "irrational".

Therefore,

(2) The usage among that group is a permissible - even, perhaps, a canonical - usage.

(3) I am an academic lawyer and philosopher.

Therefore,

(4) I am familiar with the usage, among that group, of the word "irrational".

Therefore, I am in a position to assert that

(5) My usage of that word in this thread is consistent with the usage among that group.

Therefore,

(6) My usage in this thread is permissible, and perhaps even an instance of a canonical usage.​

I think that this argument is valid (though not deductively so, at least as I have presented it - eg the move from (1) to (2) rests on unstated premises about how permissibility of word use is established; the move from (3) to (4) rests on an empirical conjecture that membership of a group results in familiarity with its practices, including practices of word usage - but I have not seen anyone contest these unstated premises).

The only appeal to expertise is in relation to (5). That is, instead of instancing the usage of academic lawyers and philosphers and thereby indicating that my usage is consistent with it, I assert, on the basis of my familiarity with their usage, that my usage is consistent with it.

If you, or Maxperson, or anyone else wants to rebut my reply, you need to attack either (2), (4) or (5). That is, you need to show (i) that there is no reason to have regard to the usage among the relevant group of professionals in determining the permissible use of the word, or (ii) that I am wrong about their usage, or (iii) that I am wrong in my assertion that my usage in this thread is consistent with their usage.

I've seen no argument along the lines of (i).

As for an argument along the lines of (ii) or (iii): I've already stated that Maxperson is welcome to doubt my credentials or my honesty or my reliability. (I appreciate that board rules make it tricky for him to actually state such doubt, but if he keeps accusing me of being wrong on this point without presenting an argument along the lines of (i) I am going to be able to draw the inference.)

But none of that would make me guilty of a fallacy. It would simply show that one or more of the premises is false. (And hence that the argument, while valid, is not sound.)

You finish by begging the question.

There's no question begging. I simply affirm what, by Wikipedia, is the second premise in the standard form of the argument; and what, in my restatement of the argument, are premises (4) and (5). It's not question begging to reiterate the premises of my argument in circumstances where no on has offered any criticism of them.

Are you intending to offer such criticism? Do you think I am mischaracterising the usage of "irrational" among academic lawyers and philosophers, or the consistency of my usage with theirs?

 

[BoldItalic]

This is a fair question.

I have a little bit of sympathy for accounts of aesthetic value that deny radical subjectivity. One reason for this is that it makes sense to try and cultivate one's taste - that is, to come to appreciate something in respect of which one, previously, couldn't see the value. And it is hard (not impossible, but at least tricky and perhaps a bit counterintuitive) to explain this purely by reference to the preferences of the self-cultivator.

But my way in would tend to be to query the use of "good" and "bad". Notions like "sophisticated", "subtle", "evocative", "inspiring", "emotionally demanding", etc seem to me to be more useful evaluative labels when trying to think about RPGing. There is something a bit crude about classic "pawn" play, for instance, where there is no attempt to shape a character with goals beyond beating the dungeon and thereby earning XP so as to get more powerful so as to beat the even tougher dungeon. I wouldn't say it's bad, per se, but one might wonder what it needs an INT stat for (maybe, as [MENTION=3887]Mallus[/MENTION] suggested, a Magic stat would be better).

But there are ways of playing less crudely than that other than the 2nd ed style.

Yes, I would agree that labeling a performance as simply either good or bad is simplistic and recognizing a multiplicity of qualities (your examples are good ones) is better. I think that comes with experience, if the mind is open. But even so, and perhaps even more so, one's judgement about what qualities a particular performance has, whether one thinks it is sophisticated or subtle and so on, is still subjective. It was the use of the word "objectively" that rang alarm bells in my mind.

 

[Ovinomancer]

What is the new information that is being arbitrarily added?

Game statistics tied to the value. You yourself mentioned how a given STR means you can lift a given amount, did you not? This is new information added to the ability score that is not present in the 3d6 roll. The 3d6 roll has not such information until and unless you transform it into an ability score. At that point, it loses it's rational nature, becomes ordinal or interval data (depending on application) and gains new meanings.

All you seem to be saying here is that, as a matter of natural numbers arithmetic, 18 = 3*6. But in the same sense, 100 = 2*50.

Yes, you've got it. The result of rolling 3d6 generates a number. That number is just a number, and has all of the meanings that just numbers have. An 18 is just the number 18. Six times greater than the number three, and one more than 17.

If you are also asserting that the 3d6 roll is establishing a number that measure some quantity of something, which varies in its presence in a given person between 3 and 18 units, what is that something?

I am not asserting any such thing. I

Let's take CON. The AD&D rulebooks (PHB, DMG) tell us that CON measures physique, fitness, health and resistance. What would it even mean (beyond loose metaphor) to say that PC A has twice or three times the physique or the health of PC B? There is no quantity of some determinable property ("health", "physique") being measured here. All there is is a chart that assigns certain mechanical consequences to certain scores, and then a device - the roll of 3d6 - that allocates those scores on a probabilistic basis (which, as I have said, also seems intended to correlate in some fashion to frequency in the population).

As you say, such comparisons are meaningless except to say that given number is more or less than another given number, and to compare the exact game mechanics assigned arbitrarily to the rankings. The roll on 3d6 is used to randomly (random just means 'we don't know or can't predict the cause) assign a value, yes, but a single roll is not a statistical model like the normal distribution. The distribution of many 3d6 rolls has information that isn't transferable when you transform those numbers into ability score.

Frex. I roll 3d6. I get a 12. I know that 12 is 4 times a 3, and one more than 11. If I continue to roll 3d6, I get a set of numbers that I can run a statistical model on. The parameters of this model happens to have a nice normal distribution. I am happy.

Now, I decide to play D&D. I assign my roll of 12 to CON. Now, I do not know that as 12 CON is four times a 3 CON. I have lost information. Depending on the edition, I do know that the difference between a 12 CON and an 11 CON is the same as between a 12 CON and a 13 CON, though (both are half steps towards a new bonus). So I can do some stats with interval data (in fact, most of the same I can run with rational data). But the results don't have the same information contained as that of the straight rolls, even though the distributions will look identical. They are not the same thing. I further pollute this by adding additional information to my CON ability, such as bonus hit points per level, the derived attribute modifier, and so on. All of these bits of information inform my understanding of my 12 CON, but aren't present in my understanding of a 12 rolled on 3d6.

With IQ, there are also charts that allocate certain numbers to members of the population on a frequency or likelihood basis. If someone wants to take the IQ charts with their frequencies, and the stat charts with their frequencies (as calculated via the odds of a 3d6 roll), and then match the too up where the frequencies are (more-or-less) equal, what is the objection?

What information has been thrown away? Certainly not information that 18 is 6 times as intelligent as 3, because there is no such information.

As I have said, the 3d6 score is not a measure of a quantity of something.

Ding. You should stop right here and consider your words. 3d6 doesn't measure anything. IQ attempts to rank intelligences, and so is a kind of measure (one that only says this is more than that as you go higher). So, how can you possibly compare the measurement of intelligence that is IQ to the total non-measurement of the 3d6 distribution? You can't. Any argument that tries to is automatically false. This continues when you try to compare the non-measurement of 3d6 to the measurement of INT ability scores, another ordinal (if occasionally interval) data set? You can't swap from one measurement scale to a non-measurement scale and then to a different measurement scale. The information lost in every step is huge, in this case most of it between IQ and 3d6.

This is the crux of my statement.

This is even more obvious in Classic Traveller (which uses 2d6 rather than 3d6 but is otherwise the same in its principles and logic). In Traveller, the Education (EDU) score is an indicator of the highest level of formal education attained. A character with a 10 EDU is not, though, 5 times more formally educated than a character with a 2 EDU. That makes no sense.

Likwise for Social Standing (SOC), another Traveller stat. A character with 11 or 12 social standing is a Knight or Baron respectively. There is no notion, though, that a Count has twelve elevenths of the social standing of a Knight. Again, that would not even be a coherent claim.

These random state generation techniques are for assigning scores that show rankings (from low to high), where the positions in those rankings are determined by their likelihood in some (fairly loosely defined) population.

EDIT: Here's another example - the MMII encounter tables are d8+d12, used to determine an entry on a chart where those entries are allocated on the basis of frequencies. There is no suggestion that the monster found on the 20 entry is 10 times as "encounter-y" as the monster found on the 2 entry.

3d6 ability scores are like that, except the entries are also in a ranking.

Ability scores are like that. 3d6 rolls aren't. With a 3d6 roll, 18 is six times 3. With an ability score 18 is some amount more than 3 (perhaps a definite amount, depending on if the use is interval or ordinal), but you cannot say it is six times 3.