What do you guys think Tony Stark's (Iron Man) Intelligence Score would be?

[Razjah]

The problem comes in when we have such characters as almost ubiquitous. You've mentioned examples below. Drizzt is not The Greatest Swordsman Ever. Han isn't off the ability curve. Nor, for that matter, is Obi-Wan (unless you don't have Force access). These characters are not legends that almost define the setting. The PCs should be able to resemble and then surpass them given time and experience. But this doesn't mean the same should be true for everyone - normally not for setting-wide BBEGs.

I agree with this. In a D20 game, I think Han would be around level 8. If I make a level 10 character following most of his build- I better be able to do things he can't! As for Drizzt- awesome swordsman-yes. But he has met several characters who can match blades with him (notably Artemis Entreri). So PCs should be able to match, then exceed, his capabilities.

I do think game designers/authors try too hard to protect how awesome a character is in the world. Like the Tony Stark thing, if he is one of the top 3 smartest people alive, I think giving him a 20-22 is perfectly reasonable. Normal people are gifted if they have an 16. A genius with an 18. Going higher than that is incomprehensibly smart. But now we run into the problem of games not defining what an "18" means or "level 5" in the world.

Perhaps authors should follow this : if something is truly spectacularly powerful- Don't freaking stat it out! For example, I only give gods stats in my games where it is something like an E6 game where they walk the earth. I wanted giants to be a threat to Olympus, so the giants could gang up and kill the gods. If I was playing a supers game in the Marvel universe and the characters were "street level" supers, then I wouldn't even stat out Iron Man/Tony Stark. He is smarter than them, and as Iron Man he can take on the whole group and walk away with little to no damage.

Adjusting my original answer:
E6/ "Merely Human": Stark has a high (PC can't reach it ) INT score
Low Powered Supers: Stark has something closer to a 25 INT
Avengers: Stark has something like a 30 INT and an an ability to boost his smarts based checks periodically (for moments of brilliance)
We Fight Galactus: Stark has an INT of slightly higher than the highest possible I expect the PCs to achieve. They could pull this off, at the cost of all other abilities (Stark's only power is his brain, the suit does the heavy lifting).

 

[Kaodi]

Do hyper-intelligent characters in comic books ever actually act like hyper-intelligent people in real life?

Think of it this way: We know how smart these characters have been stated to be. But how smart have their actions been written?

 

[Cadence]

Think of it this way: We know how smart these characters have been stated to be. But how smart have their actions been written?

Smart intelligent... or smart wise? (I'm thinking of the characters on Big Bang Theory too....)

 

[billd91]

Do hyper-intelligent characters in comic books ever actually act like hyper-intelligent people in real life?

Think of it this way: We know how smart these characters have been stated to be. But how smart have their actions been written?

It depends a lot on the writers. In fact, I'd say it's only been in the last 10 years or so that we've seen any writers really pushing Stark as being super smart outside of the realm of applied technology.
Tony Stark may be exceptionally intelligent if you try to express it as one numeric value... however, that doesn't seem to translate into being smart about all aspects of his life. He wasn't a stellar leader in the Avengers when he was chairman and had difficulty managing the two lives he lived as Stark and Stark's bodyguard Iron Man. His intelligence doesn't stop him from screwing up his personal life on multiple occasions.
I'm inclined to believe that Stark has a highly technical genius, but he lacks the same gift in social or emotional intelligence.

Reed Richards seems to have a better balanced intelligence between super technical and social/emotional intelligences though even he gets so focused on what he's doing that he annoys his wife. Nevertheless, he seems better able to understand and work the nuances of social behavior and understanding much better than Stark. His excellent use of psychology on Doctor Octopus in one story line comes to mind. But, as another caveat, that doesn't prevent his curiosity from getting him and the rest of the FF into trouble - usually when his explorations lead to unpredictable discoveries (like the cosmic ray mutations we all know and love). For example, exploring the Negative Zone may be kind of stupid... but he cannot resist it.

 

[Razjah]

Think of it this way: We know how smart these characters have been stated to be. But how smart have their actions been written?

The smart vs wise has been discussed. What about the limitations of the authors? If I wrote an Iron Man story, I would need to do a ton of research to make the technobabble correct. But If I was under a deadline, it would extremely difficult to do. And I had a limited space for words, it would be even more difficult. Without a lot of effort put into the research, the writers are limited by their own capability. Writing someone is smart is easy. Proving it by having them make amazing logical conclusions and process information in ways the writer can't understand (and can't properly communicate) is very difficult.

 

[fireinthedust]

I like the d20 modern idea. But... could I use the d20 mecha and cybernetics rules to make a reasonable simulation of power armor?

And can a reasonable copy of other avengers be made?

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[Razjah]

Mutants and Masterminds 2E (I'm not familiar with the other editions) can simulate Avengers. There are power level limitations at creation, which can allow for Avengers like power level. If the players are willing to work together and accept different power levels you can even have the difference in power the film had. Hawkeye, Blackwidow, Captain America< Iron Man, Thor, Hulk

 

[Votan]

But in Star Wars Saga Edition, the stats for Han Solo, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and the rest are pegged so that you cannot create a rules-legal 1st level character, adventure for however long to reach the appropriate level, take all the same advances, and arrive with a comparable set of stats. In order to match those characters, you must cheat. And in a game that is specifically designed to model the adventures of those characters, that's a rather fundamental problem.

And we see the same problem whenever D&D stats are generated for Conan, Elric, or the rest (or even D&D fiction characters such as Drizzt, Elminster, etc) - they're given stats such that it is not possible to match them with a rules-legal PC. Which, given that the game is allegedly designed to model their adventures, is a problem.

I agree with this analysis. Good discipline for a game designer would be creating Han Solo or Obi-Wan Kenobi with a 25 point buy. The same goes with Elric or Conan.

Trickier are characters specially spelled out as being exceptions. Sauron or Gandalf being some sort of celestial being and thus of a race not typically available to players. Anakin Skywalker being exceptional in force ability (in contrast to the Emperor who could merely be high level) might be a possible exception, although in Star Wars saga that could be mostly modeled by some sort of feat.

 

[billd91]

I agree with this analysis. Good discipline for a game designer would be creating Han Solo or Obi-Wan Kenobi with a 25 point buy. The same goes with Elric or Conan.

I can't really agree with that. These aren't characters intended to be run in game as a member of a "balanced" party. Game systems based on their stories should be able to model them, but there's no reason they need to balance with the stat buying rules the GM wants initial PCs to follow. To shift to a full point buy game, I shouldn't need to be able to model Superman with the same points I use to model Aqualad in either Champions or Mutants and Masterminds.

 

[delericho]

I can't really agree with that. These aren't characters intended to be run in game as a member of a "balanced" party. Game systems based on their stories should be able to model them,

As I said on another thread, if I'm playing a Star Wars game, then I expect Luke, Han, and Leia (as they appear at the start of Star Wars), and Obi-Wan, Anakin, Amidala, and Jar Jar (as they appear at the start of TPM) to be suitable starting characters.

I don't want to have to play through several pre-levels to reach their competence at the start of their adventures. And I certainly don't want the game set up so that I can never match them. The game is intended to model adventures similar to the ones we see in the film; if the characters from the film aren't reasonable examples of PCs then it is doing something wrong.

IIRC, the stats for Han Solo in the SWSE core rulebook place him at 15th level. That's absolutely fine. But it should be possible to create a 1st level Scoundrel using the default char-gen method for the game (which is 25-point buy), level him up to 15th level, taking all the same classes, feats, talents, and so forth, and end up with a character who matches the stats given in the book.

(Or, to put it another way, if the GM of the group decides to run a 15th level adventure, Han Solo should be a valid character to use... and should stand equal to any other 15th level character that is brought in by the other players. Unfortunately, in SWSE that just isn't so, and that's a significant weakness of that game, IMO.)

To shift to a full point buy game, I shouldn't need to be able to model Superman with the same points I use to model Aqualad in either Champions or Mutants and Masterminds.

No, but if your GM gave you a sufficient budget of points, would you not still expect it to be possible to build Supermen without cheating?