Ability Score Breakdown by Population?

[orsal]

To compensate, I have long-maintained that IQ should be modelled as (Int x 5) + 50. This approximates reasonably well to a standard 3d6 bell curve, centres the 10/11 at roughly the mean of IQ distribution and has the advantage that means that the poor soul with a 5 in Intelligence didn't do very well at school but can at least count if he takes his gloves off.

I think that's right on. 3d6 has mean 10.5 and standard deviation 2.96. Multiplication by 5 multiplies both those numbers by 5, and adding 50 then shifts the mean. So your formula has mean 102.5 and standard deviation 14.8, very close to IQ distribution (mean 100, standard deviation 15).

 

[Celebrim]

It's funny how these things change over time - when D&D started, 3d6 created the typical _adventurer_, average 10.5, "normal" people didn't have stats

That was the theory at least.

if they did have stats they'd be well below 3d6 average 10.5.

That is one of the places where things started breaking down. In published adventures, NPC's consistantly had attributes that would come out to 40+ point buy in today's terms. Part of that was that in 1st edition, you didn't even get a bonus for your attributes until you hit 15+. I can remember having several characters with 'good stats' - 13 or 14 in just about everything, that didn't really obtain much tangible advantage from that. Between DM's 'competing' with the PC's by making thier NPC's uber-characters, and PC's receiving no advantage from slightly above average attributes, there was alot of upperward stat inflation in first edition. Remember the Unearthed Arcana table for generating high level NPC's?

Then adventurers got best 3 out of 4d6 and average people got 3d6, creating the bell curve analysis we're discussing now.

This solved one problem in that NPC's got to be people too, but it didn't solve the problem that attributes in the 12-14 range generally provided you no significant advantage. Also, whether 4d6 choose 3 or 3d6, luck meant you could end up with something barely playable or something fantastically good. There was alot of cheating.

I think that on one hand it is a really good thing to assume that NPC's are people too, and therefore must have stats and levels. It was never really satisfying (or good for balance) to assume that NPC's of every sort were mere monsters. But I do not think that NPC's have to be equal to PC's in every way.

Then came 3e and Point Buy, with heroes getting 25 PB or Default Array...

I think 25 PB is pretty decent, but I almost immediately inflated to 28 PB and now I'm probably more comfortable with the PC's at 32 PB. I think that's absolutely as far as I'd go though. I want the PC's to be built as well as I'd ever need to build an NPC. Except for your Elimenster type characters, I don't see the point of going beyond 32 PB in building an NPC. As the above 'ordinary' arrays show, you can get pretty much every concept out of a 15 PB provided you are just trying to build a character compotent at what he does and not someone designed to directly compete with the NPC's. I've got to the point where its really rare for me to produce NPC's built with more than 20 PB.

and these days I see many products (Conan, Grim Tales, etc) where "average" people get the Default Array of 15 14 13 12 10 8*!

I think that is ridiculous. I know very few people IRL with what I think are 15 14 13 12 10 8 (or better) attribute arrays. Sure, I've met some people that seem like they are just extraordinarly talented, atheletic, charismatic and gifted in everything that they do, but those people are really rare. Most people that I know are rather intelligent, but that's to be expected because that's just the social class I've ended up in. But most of the people I know who are rather intelligent are not also atheleticly and socially gifted as well. Likewise, when I've done my blue collar stints, I've met various people who are gifted in some other fashion or another. But most people tend to have gapping holes in there ability that forces them to rely on someone else, or have merely ordinary (though valuable) talents. And that is what attributes 10-11 mean. If 'average' people had and average stats of 12 instead of 10.5, then 12 would provide +0 bonus instead of +1.

It seems like stat inflation is inevitable.

I think DM's are mostly to blame for this - whether we are talking average DM's running tables or the sort of professional DM's publishing products. It's easy to blame the players for stat inflation because player are always demanding more and more stuff, but I don't think players would be unsatisfied with 25 PB if they didn't feel like the weakest NPC that they met had 25 PB and most of the ones they were expected to compete against had higher (sometimes much higher) PB's. DM's simply should stop trying to make NPC's with are 'cooler' than the player's PC's. A good NPC is good because of the life you breath into it, not because its so uber-good at everything. DM's should just let thier PC's be the protagonists in the story.

Once DM's start believing that giving thier NPC's large PB's reflects badly on them rather than well on them, the problem of stat inflation goes away. It is possible I think to be a munchkin DM who only runs NPC twinks. At some level this is less mature than being a power gamer.

 

[Celebrim]

The problem with this is of course the question of where one starts. One can begin by taking the bell curve, buying the old canard that IQ = Int x 10 and then shoe-horn the statistics necessary. The major deficiency with this approach is that it de facto makes any PC with an Intelligence of 7 of less unplayable.

I've not seen alot of PC's with intelligence of 7 or less, and I would frankly discourage it. I simply don't think the average role player is skilled enough (and sufficiently unconcerned by success) to consistantly roleplay a 7 intelligence character. The intelligence gap between the player and the character is just too great.

With a score of 5 or below, our friend the half-orc will be instutionalised, not saving the world.

Which is a good reason not to be playing characters of that low intelligence. Actually, in a medieval world there aren't alot of institutions, and 5-7 intelligence people end up driven out in to the wilderness and if they survive end up being 'ogres'. The lucky ones end up in a monestary or some such, and the story of 'The Hunchback of Notre Dame' shows that its possible for Quasimodo to be a hero - but I doubt the ability of most players to stay in character. The easiest way to handle it would be tell the player that he has the intellect and understanding of a 2nd grader, but even that's going to be a problem if the player had a 9th or 12th grade reading level in the 2nd grade.

Similar things apply to other very low attributes. Such a character is playable by a very skilled player, but it also requires cooperation from a skilled party willing to provide continual care for the character. It's not something that I'd recommend.

To compensate, I have long-maintained that IQ should be modelled as (Int x 5) + 50.

The only problem I have with that is that it means your average ordinary genious has a 18 INT. If we follow the same logic, this implies that in any group of 10000 or so people, there are 60 people who have an attribute in the 20-25 range. PC's are naturally going to wonder why thier Wizard has 'only' an 18 INT, or thier rogue doesn't have the 24 DEX of a professional athelete, etc. I mean, if this is the way attributes are distributed, I'd expect every other gaming group has at least one member with over 18 INT.

This approximates reasonably well to a standard 3d6 bell curve, centres the 10/11 at roughly the mean of IQ distribution and has the advantage that means that the poor soul with a 5 in Intelligence didn't do very well at school but can at least count if he takes his gloves off.

I always make the assumption that a disabled PC recieved the best possible care and as such makes the very most of thier talents. Deaf PC's speak sign language fluently, can read or write, read lips, and so forth. A character with a 5 intelligence (assuming this is 50 IQ) - and assuming that he trusts the other PC's completely and they are willing to care for him, could presumably be as able bodied as a dull 3rd grader, capable of counting, doing simple arithmatic, dressing himself, writing his name, and reading small words. I expect that IQ's in the 60-80 range are far more common than your average gamer realizes, simply because his natural proclivities have led him into a social strata in which almost everyone has IQ's in the 120+ range. But for every gamer group, there are probably several social groups out there were must everyone has an IQ in the 60-80 range, or if not then are at least severely learning disabled in one area. You likely never meet them because they don't do what you do and they don't go to the places you go and they didn't take the same classes that you took in HS. But to normal people they will seem to be normal right until they are challenged with some sort of academic problem, because alot of these people are basically functional - they just can't do higher math, etc.