How to play a Conjurer - Very High INT, Very Low WIS

[Herremann the Wise]

Hello Everyone,

I'm introducing a new character into an old campaign - Conjurer 10 / Alienist 3 - and would appreciate a little advice in running him. His attributes as currently stand are at the extreme.

STR 8
DEX 8
CON 16
INT 21 (27 with his headband of intellect +6)
WIS 6
CHA 14
Alignment - Chaotic Good

Being an Alienist means that he only has a slight grip on reality. With such a low Wisdom score yet a high Intelligence, this seems to be amplified manyfold.
Should he be rash, insane or something different entirely?
Does he dump a Cone of Cold on the enemy not caring if he catches allies as well (13d6 Reflex DC 23) or is he so precise that he always looks for the optimal result leaving his allies free from harm?
Is a wisdom of 6 that bad?

Any thoughts or ideas would be highly appreciated.

Best Regards
Herremann the Wise

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

Does he dump a Cone of Cold on the enemy not caring if he catches allies as well (13d6 Reflex DC 23)

No, I think it'd be more that he would dump the Cone of Cold on the enemy with it possibly catching allies because he simply didn't realize/notice/pay enough attention. More absent minded type things...though being an alienist, it would be hard to describe him as completely sane.

 

[Chimera]

No, I think it'd be more that he would dump the Cone of Cold on the enemy with it possibly catching allies because he simply didn't realize/notice/pay enough attention.

And when he gets called on it, he does his level best to rationalize it in an intelligent manner, but always missing key pieces of "common sense".

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Low Wisdom Conjurer...

 

[shilsen]

Wisdom applies (like all stats) to many different qualities, so just decide which aspect(s) to emphasize as low. Your PC could, for example, be:

Very non-perceptive - "No, I didn't see the drow war party standing behind me"
Have low willpower - "Must touch shiny gem on evil altar"
Lack common sense - "But why can't I cook it with a fireball?"

And no, a 6 Wis is not that bad (says the person currently running the orc barbarian with 6 in Int, Wis AND Cha ).

 

[kigmatzomat]

The combination of chaotic plus low wisdom means he will do lots of well meaning but impulsive actions. He would be hyper-intelligent when prevented from doing his knee-jerk reaction, which likely involves calling a creature perhaps a bit more powerful than required by the situation. Or not regarding things like crowd response to his (eventual) psuedo-natural summonings.

IMC the player of the kender (it's DL) tends to make will saves for against his own ideas. The higher the "cooooool!" factor, the higher the DC. He doesn't tell people what he's thinking, we just hear "Ooooooh! Uh-oh." followed by dice rolling and either "Whew, that was close!" or "people should make spot checks to see if they notice...."

He wouldn't cook things with fireball but he might "help out" the town guard by summoning a great beasty behind them without warning them. And yeah, he has to touch the shiny gem on the alter in most situations.

 

[RithTheAwakener]

If you read the Dragonlance novels, i always thought Fizban to be a high-int low-wis kind of caster, always forgetting things, throwing fireballs at everyone, allies included. Thats all i have to say

 

[TracerBullet42]

Wisdom applies (like all stats) to many different qualities, so just decide which aspect(s) to emphasize as low. Your PC could, for example, be:

Very non-perceptive - "No, I didn't see the drow war party standing behind me"
Have low willpower - "Must touch shiny gem on evil altar"
Lack common sense - "But why can't I cook it with a fireball?"

Better yet...ALL THREE!!!!

Low willpower can be a heck of a lot of fun to play...

 

[Ghostmoon]

With his vast intelligence and arcane training, he may be able to track cause and effect on a multidemionsal scale. His perception of reality (Wisdom also governs perception) may be so divergent from a normal persons at this point, that he often does erratic things that make sense to him, but hold no logic to most.

Explanations such as: "Of course, I had to summon the chaos beast in the middle of the Lord's banquet! It was about to devour the good flumphs on the subplane of Qu'Toch! Am I not speaking clearly?" should abound as the PC struggles to explain his actions.

He can still be good (and still try to do good) but the heavy toll of dealing with such alien things and the burden of seeing too much will likely leave him weary and frustrated.

 

[Jondor_Battlehammer]

He could also be the type to do things "for science", while not seeing/caring that his ideas are being used for destruction. Maybe not entirly appropriate for a conjurer, but you get the idea.