pming
Legend
Hiya!
I have not read this entire thread...haven't read most of it, actually (76 pages!). My take on "low Int" (or Wisdom or even Charisma) is to treat it as I've always treated these things since my Basic Dungeons & Dragons days in '80:
The player can be as smart or as clever as he can or wants to be; outcome may be adjusted by me.
So a 5 Int character isn't smart. That's known. Can't count past 10, difficulty reading anything with more than 5 letters, can't remember names, places or events that happened too long ago (unless it was significant to the character), has trouble differentiating between silver, electrum an platinum coins, etc. That doens't mean the player can't say "Babs tries to lift up the door rather than push or pull it..." when presented with a door with no handle or visible hinges. Why? It's a role-playing game for people. The fun in playing the "puzzle" parts of the game are in using your own brain to solve riddles, tricks, and whatnot. If you remove that from a players hands...you just removed 1/3 or more of any campaign. Would you (general you) tell a player he couldn't engage in combat because he only had a 5 Str or Dex? Of course not.
Now, in my example, after Bab's players states she will try and life the door, I might say...: "Babs tries to life the door and it starts to move upwards. She then proceeds to get her fingers under the bottom, and lifts it up like she was curling a weight barbell...at a 45 degree angle to her! The door creaks, moans, then breaks in multiple places as it's ripped off". The result is the same...get the door 'open'. But her Int 5 didn't let her realize the door needed to be lifted straight up an into the above wall/ceiling, so she did it the most common way she knows...like curling a 150lb barbell with both arms.
PS: This only really works if the player is actually mature enough to do the whole "role-playing" part of the game. In other words...role-play a 5 Int for the sake of it...not "be annoyingly stupid in an attempt to inadvertently kill other PC's or piss-off other players/the DM". Roleplaying is important...everyone should roleplay their characters, but everyone can also use their own brains to enjoy the other tiers of the game as well.
^_^
Paul L. Ming
I have not read this entire thread...haven't read most of it, actually (76 pages!). My take on "low Int" (or Wisdom or even Charisma) is to treat it as I've always treated these things since my Basic Dungeons & Dragons days in '80:
The player can be as smart or as clever as he can or wants to be; outcome may be adjusted by me.
So a 5 Int character isn't smart. That's known. Can't count past 10, difficulty reading anything with more than 5 letters, can't remember names, places or events that happened too long ago (unless it was significant to the character), has trouble differentiating between silver, electrum an platinum coins, etc. That doens't mean the player can't say "Babs tries to lift up the door rather than push or pull it..." when presented with a door with no handle or visible hinges. Why? It's a role-playing game for people. The fun in playing the "puzzle" parts of the game are in using your own brain to solve riddles, tricks, and whatnot. If you remove that from a players hands...you just removed 1/3 or more of any campaign. Would you (general you) tell a player he couldn't engage in combat because he only had a 5 Str or Dex? Of course not.
Now, in my example, after Bab's players states she will try and life the door, I might say...: "Babs tries to life the door and it starts to move upwards. She then proceeds to get her fingers under the bottom, and lifts it up like she was curling a weight barbell...at a 45 degree angle to her! The door creaks, moans, then breaks in multiple places as it's ripped off". The result is the same...get the door 'open'. But her Int 5 didn't let her realize the door needed to be lifted straight up an into the above wall/ceiling, so she did it the most common way she knows...like curling a 150lb barbell with both arms.
PS: This only really works if the player is actually mature enough to do the whole "role-playing" part of the game. In other words...role-play a 5 Int for the sake of it...not "be annoyingly stupid in an attempt to inadvertently kill other PC's or piss-off other players/the DM". Roleplaying is important...everyone should roleplay their characters, but everyone can also use their own brains to enjoy the other tiers of the game as well.
^_^
Paul L. Ming
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