No connection between IQ and skill points

[Plasmablaster]

Um...while I don't necessarily disagree with a lot of your points, or for that matter your base assumptions in general, this is a really, really bad example. Speaking as somebody who both used to shoot a fair bit, and practices martial arts (and with a high IQ, which I hate saying because it always sounds douchey, but it's relevant to the point), I have to say that I don't see any particular crossover in skill sets whatsoever, even right down to the 'balance' argument.

I'll repeat myself here but my argument isn't that intelligence will make you any better in any of these practical skills but it will make you learn and understand them faster. I don't know what kind of example to bring forward for this -maybe I would need to write a book to prove that- but my life experience just shows how much more efficient in learning anything a smarter guy is. That doesn't have to do with how good he'll become at the end - another matter entirely.

In fact, to play devils advocate here a bit, being too intelligent can in some ways inhibit learning hand-to-hand combat skills, due to the natural tendency of intelligent people to be quite analytical. I know when I learned to switch off my brain and stop 'overthinking' things a bit too much, I became much more effective. That kind of thing is all about instinct and muscle memory.

Well, you have a valid point there. I've read somewhwere that in some studies, people who were intelligent tended sometimes to be less witty (wit being described as the ability to react fast in situations that require some thinking) because of the time they needed to analyze the situation. Weird isn't it?

But that doens't prove me wrong: Now that you've understood how being over-analytical can inhibit your progress in learning martial arts (and you need some good intelligence for that), next time you try to learn something else (still practical) you'll know how to approach it better won't you? That's my point in how learning a particular skill can actually help you learn another, seeimingly unrelated. It's the set of deeper understanding and knowledge that we build over the years and makes us more efficient in almost anything.

[Bryce777]

It's a problem in Fallout not so much in wasteland because skills are improved through use so your IQ just needs to be high enough to be eligible for the skill. A much better system, since like you said in fallout it's dumb to put anything less than 10 in IQ.

[Plasmablaster]

I really don't know how to say this in any elegant way, so I'll just say it: You haven't got the faintest idea what you're talking about.

I'm about the same age as you, I've served in the military, and I used to have a membership in Mensa (I haven't paid for it these last 10 years, which is why I'm no longer a member). I've been professionally trained in assault rifles, SMGs, pistols, three different types of rocket launchers, grenades, and various other military equipment. Trust me when I say that the actual overlap is so minimal as to be completely irrelevant. There's a bit of overlap between pistols, rifles and SMGs, but even though I was a very good shot with my rifle, I was a lousy shot with my pistol (compared to others in my troop). At no point did my intelligence give me an advantage in learning these things. I scored reasonably well in my written exams (I trained for sergeant), but those barely apply to real situations and are more of a thing you can use at the planning stage, before you actually use your actual skills with the weapons.

Your description of how these things work have no basis in real life.

Well you can be Rambo as well but in my own military service (ranked as sergeant and also served as a weapons trainer, mostly machineguns) I could immediately see who had a bit of IQ in his brains and who not. The smarter guys always tended to learn faster, apply their knowledge more effectively and most important of all did the least stupid mistakes.

I can remember a particular incident where I had to instruct a bunch of guys how to use the MG-3 machinegun in tripod configuration (derivative of the MG-42 used by the Germans in WW2). The MG-3 is a beast of a machinegun, it has a 1200 RPM cyclic rate of fire and shooting the 7,62x45mm round means that it produces some very serious recoil force. If not set-up correctly on its tripod it is impossible to control and shoot effectively. In this occasion, the tripods were set up on a concrete surface where it was impossible to tie onto (the tripods have spiky legs to help tie onto soil) so the set-up proved to be a challenge. The tripods & machineguns were already on-site before we arrived and were pre-set by guys who obviously didn't know what they were doing because the legs of the tripods were set at the wrong angle and the machineguns were sitting too high. Initial shots by all groups were awful because it was impossible to hold the machine gun down (the loader would hold the fron leg of the tripod but still the machinegun would rise, togehter with the tripod and the loader holding it (!). Of course I understood what was wrong (although not having being told about that "detail" by my superiors) but I found it a bit funny and let them on their own for a while to see what my instructees would do. One element (out of 3 elements in total) understood immediately that it was the tripod configuration that was causing the problem, readjusted the legs to lower the machinegun while the rest were just looking puzzled as to why they couldn't produce a decent burst. I had to instruct them directly what to do and even then, having not understood what the point of it was, they could't find out at which angle they had to set them up and I had to show them that as well.

See what I'm trying to say? Remeber, my argument isn't that IQ will make you better at anything but it will make you learn it faster. Understand the difference?

[hiptanaka]

@Plasmablaster

Intelligence is very helpful in learning the basics of anything, but to excel at something, I think other things matter more, such as ability to focus on one task, and for physical and crafting skills, just repetition. Practice. I'm speaking of experience, because yes I'm pretty smart, and I can quickly become good at things, but I know many people who do individual things a lot better than me, without necessarily being smarter than I am. And as I said previously, your intelligence won't help you at all in aiming a gun if your physics are such that you have an unstable hand (nervous system, muscles).

However, the most important point I want to make here is: Realism is secondary to a fun system.

[Drool]

in fallout it's dumb to put anything less than 10 in IQ.

Can't say as I've ever put 10 points into Intelligence in any Fallout game. I found maxing Luck was almost always far more useful and fun.

[Plasmablaster]

@Plasmablaster

Intelligence is very helpful in learning the basics of anything, but to excel at something, I think other things matter more.

That's exacty what I'm trying to say. Some people never manage even the basics because they are too stupid for that and this has somehow to be portrayed in the game.

[hiptanaka]

@Plasmablaster

Intelligence is very helpful in learning the basics of anything, but to excel at something, I think other things matter more.

That's exacty what I'm trying to say. Some people never manage even the basics because they are too stupid for that and this has somehow to be portrayed in the game.

Oh, OK. But to model that you'd have to do things like putting caps on certain skills at different levels based on IQ, and maybe make the early levels rise faster for high IQ characters. It wouldn't work like it does in Fallout, now.

EDIT: Example: In Fallout, even a 3 IN character can excel at science.

[Plasmablaster]

Oh, OK. But to model that you'd have to do things like putting caps on certain skills at different levels based on IQ, and maybe make the early levels rise faster for high IQ characters. It wouldn't work like it does in Fallout, now.

EDIT: Example: In Fallout, even a 3 IN character can excel at science.

That's an excellent proposition. I agree 100%.

[hiptanaka]

It wasn't really a proposition, but it could work. I think I'd prefer something less complex, though, that still doesn't simply give more skill points for high IQ.

[Badunius]

Arcanum

[MightyHedgehog]

Did I misunderstand this topic or are we forgetting that WL1 employed a leveling system from successful use of known skills? That meant that even low IQ characters could get fiendishly badass at melee or whatever skills lay within their reach. Doesn't that eliminate the need to pump IQ if you want? I think so, but, again, I may have misread this topic.

[Ekaros]

Did I misunderstand this topic or are we forgetting that WL1 employed a leveling system from successful use of known skills? That meant that even low IQ characters could get fiendishly badass at melee or whatever skills lay within their reach. Doesn't that eliminate the need to pump IQ if you want? I think so, but, again, I may have misread this topic.

Problem is how in SPECIAL you got skill-points based on your INT stat. Which meant there were certain disadvantages if you kept it lower. This is in someways a bad mechanic having one stat give such a huge bonus.

So 10STR, 10PER, 10AGI, 10END 1INT, could end up with less skills in melee than character with lot less in those but 10INT.

[Drool]

Who said we're using SPECIAL?

[Ekaros]

Who said we're using SPECIAL?

No one, but discussion is how INT equivalent shouldn't work like that in new game. So high-int doesn't end up in generaly allways more skilled character... And thus force to high int...

[Drool]

Yes, but there's a huge difference between Wasteland's generic, almost D&D-style attributes/skills and SPECIAL.

With Wasteland, IQ and Skill Points were connected, yes, but those connections were limited to ability to learn a skill and starting skill points. Brawling requires a 3 IQ while Energy Weapons required a 20 (or whatever it was). Yes, you needed a high enough IQ and yes, you needed those SP to learn the skills, but after that, IQ didn't matter. Dexterity, Agility, Strength all mattered for execution, and use of the skill was the most practical way to raise a skill. Nobody spent 100+SP to raise their Rifle from 6 to 7; they shot people with a rifle until it went up. Nobody raised Brawling by spending SP in the Library, they lengthened combats by wielding hand mirrors.

In SPECIAL, your starting skills were determined via your Intelligence score (plus a base level) much like Wasteland. But you raised skills by spending points, not by using them. And those points were also based on your Intelligence score. So yes, in the Fallout games, if you had a 3 Intelligence, you were not only handicapped with your starting skills, but handicapped every level afterwards. And since the Fallout games had very limited methods to raise Attributes (unlike Wasteland giving you 2 attribute points every level to use as you wished), once you made your bed, you were forced to lie in it. Furthermore, Fallout had a limited pool of points which meant a 10 Intelligence required other Attributes to suffer while Wasteland generated each number independently, so all that mattered was your patience and willingness to hit the spacebar thirty or forty times to get well-balanced rolls.

I can see how people would want to completely sever the relationship between IQ and SP, especially if you've only played Fallout where they were joined at the hip. But my point is that you can have a relationship between the two without having them be inexorably intertwined. I think Wasteland provided a nice balance between Fallout's tight relationship and absolutely no relationship whatsoever.

[MightyHedgehog]

Who said we're using SPECIAL?

No one, but discussion is how INT equivalent shouldn't work like that in new game. So high-int doesn't end up in generaly allways more skilled character... And thus force to high int...

I don't see what's wrong with the system in WL1. The game is a combat-heavy, group experience with vicious penalties to losing. The balance of necessity for high-level combat versus and non-combat skills was generally good, IME, though the environments lacked enough opportunities to use many of them inside of combat scenarios, like Acrobat or Climb. The only fly in the ointment was how easy almost all enemies were after a point. WL combat can be very lengthy affairs compared to even the longest fight in any of the mainline FO games, especially in high level matchups. I mean, we're taking about double digit rounds in fights where loads of exchanges are pushing characters in and out of near-death. You need to configure the group for specialist roles to survive these. Remember, too, that this game isn't about one character...this is about, at least, four PCs and up to seven with NPCs recruited. You can use all of their skills to cover for what your party lacked and that was sort of their point in the game. That means the game was built to cover weaknesses with other party members and not try and build one-man fighters that can be necessary in the FO games for mid to low IQ characters. Wasteland is a band, not a solo act.

[Drool]

Unless you're using super-loot armor, the enemies in Cochise are never really "easy". Sure you can drop them in a single shot, but their dying shots can punch right through Power Armor without missing a beat. Actually, if you're using zone-appropriate weapons and armor, most anywhere in the game can be risky regardless of player or skill level.

[MightyHedgehog]

Unless you're using super-loot armor, the enemies in Cochise are never really "easy". Sure you can drop them in a single shot, but their dying shots can punch right through Power Armor without missing a beat. Actually, if you're using zone-appropriate weapons and armor, most anywhere in the game can be risky regardless of player or skill level.

Oops, yeah...the armor...too many playthroughs getting the same stuff warps the perception of difficulty.

[Dobbshead]

I've been thinking about a skill/character system that would avoid these pitfalls. I like the concept of skills that improve with use, but it is often executed poorly (Oblivion comes to mind). Wasteland also did this badly: you needed at least one skill point in a skill to get it to start leveling, which meant you needed to go to the library if you wanted a character to learn how to brawl. But once you had that one point, you just needed to use the skill a bunch and you could reach level 4 in the skill.

I think this is one of those times where things can be made better by making them simpler. I think we should get rid entirely of the numbered stat approach (10 str, 153 IQ, etc) instead at character creation you choose major and minor character attributes. For example lets say you are making a stealth assassin. At character creation you'd mark down Dexterity and Speed as a major attributes and Strength and Intelligence as minor attributes (the exact number of major and minor attributes is arbitrary). You then get an improved chance of success when using skills that rely on those attributes.

Then you choose your skills. You get a fixed number of skill points, but at character creation skills based on your major and minor attributes cost less than skills unrelated to your talents.

Then you play the game. Your character uses skills in and out of combat. You level up. You can then distribute skill points, of which you got a fixed number. But the skills you used a lot, and had more success with, cost less to increase than skills you didn't use at all.

That's the core system as I'd envision it. You could imagine having trainers in the game that would make it cheaper to level a skill, or even perks on level up that allow to select additional minor attributes or have what attributes are major and minor change as your skill-base changes.

What do you guys think? I wanted to try and get at the heart of the role-playing experience, but get rid of the arbitrary numbers game that happens in a lot of RPGs that can lead to one stat being the all powerful stat that every character must have.

[Drool]

That feels like you're abstracting a lot of things away. It actually almost reminds me of the Amber diceless system. And while that can be a lot of fun, it can also be exceptionally aggravating as a player trying to get a handle on what your character can do and how well they can do it. Also, the low/high method of assigning importance seems almost like coddling the player by rounding the sharp corners of choice.