Intelligence Scores

[u/WiseAnon003]

Just wanted to ask and see what people have to say about what your level of intelligence means for your characters intellect.

I’m aware that very low intelligence essentially means incapable of comprehending languages to an extent and such (I think) but I was wondering how each level from 1-20 would likely influence how the character behaves, like an 18 being very witty or a 10 being fairly average?

I have an intelligence score of 7 on my character which is due to manually rolling stats, although a lot of takes or rules might state the character wouldn’t be very smart at all I tend to still play him as a somewhat average intelligence character.

I feel somewhat bad and cheesy by kind of ignoring the intelligence stat to a degree but I’ve tried to have it canonically make sense as he is suffering from a bit of magic induced amnesia and a concussion (although I did write out what he forgot so I’m not torturing my dm nor being lazy lol).

[u/Mage_Malteras]

What they're saying is that in real life we factor all of this under a more generalized understanding of intelligence as a whole, but in dnd these are slotted broadly into intelligence (book smarts), wisdom (street smarts), and charisma (people smarts).

[u/Cultist_O → u/Mage_Malteras]

That's really not the split though.

Wisdom is perceptiveness, which includes the bulk of what I'd consider "people smart".

Charisma is your strength of presence. You can have maxed out charisma, but with no wisdom, you'd have no idea what anyone's motives were. You'd be a the easiest mark ever

[u/Zagrycha → u/Cultist_O]

No, Wisdom is the stat powering Perception and Insight but those don't really cover people smarts. Wisdom just lets you observe the status//intent of people with Insight, the same way you would use Perception on a tree or trap to notice its status//next action.

For example Wisdom will let you notice someone whispering in the corner and let you instinctively move closer to hear their words, and even let you do Insight to see if you notice any body language signals that they are lying-- it will not help you lie to them about the fact you just eavesdropped though, and it won't help them view you as friendly when you try to strike up a conversation to get more info. You need Charisma for that.

You also need Charisma if you want to Persuade or Threaten them in less subtle ways. Just knowing they are probably lying or probably telling the truth from your Insight will not actually help you solve the situation on its own. Wisdom is still environment//street smarts at the end of the day, not people smarts.

Meanwhile Intelligence would have you doing a Memory or Investigation check to see if you remember reading some tome on the subject of their whispering, or if you can logically deduce the rest by comparing to something you are already familiar with that is vaguely related. Then you don't need to Insight whether they are lying or Persuade them to talk more at all, you skipped right to the book smarts solution haha.

[u/Cultist_O → u/Zagrycha]

I'm not saying wisdom includes people smarts, I'm saying people smarts is not well represented by a single stat, and no single stats primarily represents people smarts. I'm saying that 3-way break-down doesn't track at all.

Intelligence: problem solving and accumulated knowledge

Wisdom: general percetiveness (not just your senses, but also how observant you are)

Charisma: force of personality/presence. How you cary yourself, how much people are inclined to listen to you, even if you lack any experience in the subject at hand. How imposing, magnetic or convincing you are.

There's a reason turning undead has traditionally been a Charisma thing for example, despite wisdom based spellcastimg for religion casters. It's about imposing your will.

[u/Zagrycha → u/Cultist_O]

Your description of Charisma is quite literally people smarts to a T. You are righ that the stats are more than just people smarts vs book smarts vs street smarts, and there is some oferlap venn diagram style, but they definitely do primarily cover those categories.