D&D 5E DMs option: Intelligence for Initiative

[Hriston]

Highly intelligent people don't necessarily think more quickly than others, and those who do think quickly may just as often be wrong about their conclusions. The unintelligent may rush in where a more intelligent person may take a moment to consider.

 

[JWO]

The funny thing is that you can probably argue that Dexterity, Intelligence and Wisdom all could be used to determine when someone should react in any given situation.

But here's how I justify Dexterity as the modifier. Initiative is really not tied to any ability. Roll d20 and take the result. That would mean that everybody/creature would have no bonus (unless they have the awareness feat which grants +5). Then, the Dexterity modifier is just added to see when the PC/creature can act because it is tied to physically moving/reacting quickly. It works for me.

I can't believe I never figured this out! Dex for initiative checks makes so much sense now!

 

[Li Shenron]

I'm thinking of offering, in the campaigns I run, intelligence as an alternative to dexterity for initiative rolls, such that players can choose which modifier they'd like to use. It seems obvious that being extraordinarily brilliant would give one a leg up in terms of one's reaction time, and I don't really see any drawbacks to allowing it as an alternative to players. Can you?

I don't see any serious problem in your HR, although IMO it's also not going to have a particularly interesting effect...

Yes Int can be a dump stat, but when a player has decided it to be so, then it means most likely Dex is higher already for that PC, so increasing Int to get better Init would require many points just to make it higher than the current Dex...

Now if your HR said that initiative is only an Int check, that would have a much more significant effect for everyone: anyone would see a benefit in a small Int boost, and dumping Int would always come with a price.

But if it's either Int or Dex, I think the effects will be zero to everyone except those few who already are supposed to have high Int, or it will actually benefits Dex-dumpers.

So you are probably better of trying the stacking middle-way option.

 

[Li Shenron]

I’m not sure it’s a dump stat - it forms the basis of six skills, which are all quite broad ranging. ‘Dump Stat’ is such a loaded term anyway - it depends upon what you want from a class. I find Strength to be a bit of a dump stat for many of my characters

Of course there is no stat which is always dumped! It's just common to call "dump stat" something that some PCs can choose to completely ignore to the point of minimizing it.

In general, any stat that is used for passive checks or defenses is hard to dump. Almost nobody dares to dump Constitution because it's tied to HP. You can dump Dexterity if you choose heavy armor, and you can dump Wisdom if you can rely on the rest of the party to sense danger, but there are still frequent unavoidable defensive checks tied to both (saving throws for example) so they aren't widely picked as stats to dump.

OTOH, Strength, Intelligence and Charisma are naturally easier to dump because they are largely linked to proactive abilities, which in case of a low score you are simply never going to choose, when you can just focus on alternative skills and tactics: anybody who is not a melee warrior can always dump Strength, anybody who is not a trickster or a sage/mage can always dump Intelligence, and anybody who is not a 'face' can always dump Charisma. Defensive/reactive uses of these exist but are rare enough.

 

[Quartz]

I can see using Perception (Wisdom) for the first round and using Dex thereafter

 

[Ahrimon]

This probably works better with TotM than grid based, but I've been thinking about using the initiative rules from Edge of the Empire. Everyone rolls like normal DnD, but instead of those rolls being tied to the person rolling them, they belong to the team and the team can decide on who gets the slot. So the alertness dex champion may have +12 to his initiative but the group decides who takes the first initiative slot.

But I've been trying to figure a way to work in the whole advantage, disadvantage thing too. I'm not really sure how to do that one yet.

 

[Jaelommiss]

Off on a tanget, I am thinking about allowing a DC 20 Int Saving throw to prevent being taken by surprise. To prevent the party wizard from preemptively destroying the ambushers, anyone succeeding on their save would act last during the surprise round. Creatures that are unconscious or otherwise incapable of acting would automatically fail their check.

 

[professorDM]

For me, personally, it’s a bit of an overkill. I just think that both Wisdom and Intelligence are actually useful enough without adding extra aspects to them, and it complicates the relationships that Classes have to the abilities as they stand. If I put my highest stat in Dex it may very well be because I put a lot of stake in winning Initiative. Having others get the same bonus from other Ability scores means that Int Wizards essentially get a bonus to cast their spells early, but Dex-based classes like the Rogue are demoted in effectiveness.

Each to their own though.

It probably is overkill, lol. But that's what these boards are for, I suppose.

And the main problem to me is that INT does seem so woefully underrated, and I don't think it should be. But whateves. The game as a whole is wonderful. I haven't played since the 2nd edition AD&D days, 15 years ago, and it's great to come back to it again.

 

[Einlanzer0]

I don't think there's much denying that Int is too much of a dumpstat. It does have some useful skills tied to it, but they're all those type of skills where having one party member who's good at them helps everyone, and having multiple people be good at them is redundant and almost totally pointless. Moreover, Intelligence is actually really important to being successful at just about anything in real life, which makes its status as a dumpstat even more ludicrous. On the other hand, it's always been sort of a double edged sword because casters get so much from their main spellcasting stat that you don't want to give them a bunch of extra stuff on top of it, which is the main reason that Str, Dex, and Con are typically "better" than Int, Wis, and Cha. This is an example of how D&D's attribute system really isn't that great and should have been overhauled for 5e instead of clinging to useless sacred cows.

That said, I'm not terribly keen on using Initiative to balance it Int. While it's also arguable that Dex is a tad overpowered, this has the drawback of requiring modification to monster stat blocks and also just isn't terribly interesting. Also, Initiative isn't really about quick thinking (which isn't necessarily under the purview of Intelligence anyway), it's about agile reflexes (there really should be an agility attribute that is separate from Dexterity, but I digress).

So, what's my solution? A modification of the Hero Point system - Instead of getting a fixed number of hero points at every level, you get tactics points per day equal to 2+ your Int mod. These can be used to add d6 to any d20 die roll, just like Hero Points. Like HD, they only recover at a rate of 1/2 per day, so while you may have a maximum pool of 6 or 7 tactical points, you'd typically only get about 3-4 uses per day. The reason I like this is because it's so broadly applicable, as Intelligence actually is, without really encroaching on the role of any other attribute. As an example, this could be used for an Initiative roll to simulate agility of mind or situational awareness in helping combat reflexes.