D&D General Warlocks: Charisma vs Intelligence

What should be Warlock casting stat:


Charlaquin

Goblin Queen (She/Her/Hers)
Easy to do since gen 1 only had tornado or something.
Pretty sure the only dragon type attack in Gen 1 was dragon rage, which deals fixed damage, so whether it was physical or special was irrelevant. Gen 2 introduced Dragon Breath, Outrage, and Twister, which were special.
 

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Charlaquin

Goblin Queen (She/Her/Hers)
A court of law saying, "It is simpler, easier, and more beneficial to consumers that laws written for 'sandwiches' apply to hot dogs" is, itself, a utility argument. It's not about simplicity of description, it's about simplicity of regulation. No need to redouble effort when the same safety and food-purity laws apply cleanly to both things.


Exactly.

To the average speaker, a hot dog is not a sandwich; if you refer to a hot dog as "that sandwich," e.g. by saying, "can you please hand me that sandwich," most fluent English speakers would get at least mildly confused. Most would ask you to clarify: "Did you mean this hot dog?" This implies people get that hot dogs and sandwiches are similar/related, but not so much that they're totally interchangeable in all circumstances.

To a judge, civil servant, legislator, or lawyer? The similarities far outweigh the differences. But this can be true even if things are completely NOT the same, or are things most people would definitely reject as being called "sandwiches," such as tacos (which, yes, there is a legal precedent out there somewhere that tacos are classifiable as "sandwiches".)

Finally, both your metric and mine reject the idea that coffee is a soup. It is a steeped and brewed beverage.
Yes. Language is for communication. Calling a hot dog a sandwich or coffee a soup obfuscates rather than clarifies your meaning, therefore making it ineffective use of language.
Instead, I offer you this tidbit: Broth is meat tea. You steep meat in boiling or near boiling water in order to extract nutrients from the material, which is discarded when the steeping process is complete. Various forms of instant "meat tea" exist, and dried material can be reconstituted to make it quickly. It's sold in both full liquid form and concentrated/dried form. Legally there's not all that much different between them. It just feels weird and uncomfortable to say that you're "steeping" meat and bones to extract their flavor and nutrients.
It feels weird and it doesn’t effectively communicate the intended meaning.
 


Instead, I offer you this tidbit: Broth is meat tea. You steep meat in boiling or near boiling water in order to extract nutrients from the material, which is discarded when the steeping process is complete. Various forms of instant "meat tea" exist, and dried material can be reconstituted to make it quickly. It's sold in both full liquid form and concentrated/dried form. Legally there's not all that much different between them. It just feels weird and uncomfortable to say that you're "steeping" meat and bones to extract their flavor and nunutrients.
This is morbidly hilarious, and now I have ample justification to add caffeine to my broth from here on out! :coffee:
 


EzekielRaiden

Follower of the Way
Easy to do since gen 1 only had tornado or something.
Even better, the only damaging Dragon-type move in Gen I is Dragon Rage...which ignores type effects (except immunity, though that didn't apply to it back then) and deals a fixed 40 damage regardless of the user's type and target's type. This was about a third of why Psychic-types were stupidly powerful in Gen I; the intended mega-powerhouse type was only useful defensively, not offensively, and didn't resist Psychic. (The other two thirds were that a single stat covered both offense and defense for Special moves, and Psychic was supposed to be weak to Ghost...but Gen I made them immune to Ghost, and the only Ghost-type pokemon in the game were also Poison and thus weak to Psychic, while the only Ghost-type move was the weak Lick, at only 30 base power.)
 

ezo

Get off my lawn!
This is why willpower and perception should be different mechanics, and not both based on the same number.
We base willpower on Charisma as part of the strength of your convictions and beliefs, which is why it is the spellcasting ability for Clerics and Paladins.

At any rate, what Wisdom once was seems to be migrating to either Intelligence or Charisma in most games.
 

Micah Sweet

Level Up & OSR Enthusiast
We base willpower on Charisma as part of the strength of your convictions and beliefs, which is why it is the spellcasting ability for Clerics and Paladins.

At any rate, what Wisdom once was seems to be migrating to either Intelligence or Charisma in most games.
I'd rather change Wisdom to Willpower, and divorce perception from ability scores. My preferred OSR does this.
 

Charlaquin

Goblin Queen (She/Her/Hers)
Even better, the only damaging Dragon-type move in Gen I is Dragon Rage...which ignores type effects (except immunity, though that didn't apply to it back then) and deals a fixed 40 damage regardless of the user's type and target's type. This was about a third of why Psychic-types were stupidly powerful in Gen I; the intended mega-powerhouse type was only useful defensively, not offensively, and didn't resist Psychic. (The other two thirds were that a single stat covered both offense and defense for Special moves, and Psychic was supposed to be weak to Ghost...but Gen I made them immune to Ghost, and the only Ghost-type pokemon in the game were also Poison and thus weak to Psychic, while the only Ghost-type move was the weak Lick, at only 30 base power.)
Night Shade was also technically ghost type, but had the same problem as Dragon Rage, dealing fixed damage regardless of type interactions.
 

EzekielRaiden

Follower of the Way
This is why willpower and perception should be different mechanics, and not both based on the same number.
If we absolutely have to stick to six stats (personally, I think fewer, four or maybe five, would be better) then I think we should merge Constitution and Strength (call it "Might"), turn "Wisdom" into Perception, and fold the intellectual part thereof into Intelligence and the "I can't be dominated" part thereof into Charisma. Then Dexterity can be split into "Quickness" or something similar, covering just Initiative, Acrobatics, and what we currently call "Dex saves", while "Precision" or just "Dexterity" covers fine-detail movement (Thievery, AC, hit/dmg with Finesse, etc.)

With that, you've finally got a recipe for stats where each one is still pretty powerful and nobody really wants to dump any of them. Precision is really the only one that doesn't have something kinda important attached to it, since anyone not using finesse weapons or medium/light armor doesn't really care.
 

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