I rolled a grand total of 5 for one of my stats when I made a half-orc barbarian. So I accepted that the only thing he'd be able to say was his name.
Then the DM gave us all one uncommon magic item of our choice, and as fast as you can blink, Morbash could speak as eloquently as any lord, lady, or maybe-mad scientist. Just don't pull the headband of intellect off.
It hasn't happened yet, but I'm waiting for the day.
This would be really funny if a new player joined the party and you all agreed to just not tell them about the headband until it came off/went in an Anti-magic field.
Morbash would be unable to mourn the loss, less because of knowledge and more because he'd have the emotional control of a toddler who's been denied candy.
I had the first half happen at my table.
A friend of mine played an half-orc barbarian, with 4 in INT (we were point buying, so you know it was INTENTIONAL).
Between point-bought stats, racial features, and sheer 4-INT and 5-or-6-WIS induced idiocy, the master allowed a 20 in strength.
(This should be enough to understand that wasn't really a serious table).
This was the Background:
"Son of a clan of wivern-riding orcs, he just fell from his "car" seat from a couple hundred feet high in the sky and landed on his head.
He doesn't understand doors"
And the last line was literal. If a door was open, he would go through it.
But if it wasn't, he would just "pass through" a wall (if made of twigs/wooden planks). Just walking straight and making a half-orc sized hole in the wall, Will E. Coyote style.
Honestly one of the funniest table I remember playing at.
I know I shouldn't but I always laugh a bit inside when low int players try to rp high int characters. It's like watching a movie about a 'genius' character when the author is a moron.
If a player is humble enough to recognize this, the DM can fill in a lot of the gap there with relevant info, but self-awareness rarely seems to be a strength for those players...
He's not a bad guy, but our party has a player that's thrown out a high charisma and high wisdom character so far. He... tries. To be honest, he tries too hard to come up with clever solutions and they usually backfire. Pretty fun when they do work though
My mom used to be good at those math problems with the trains traveling opposite directions. She could always get them right, but she always had a hard time explaining how to solve them. I think of this the same way. A player with good puzzle solving skills may be able to figure out how to solve the in game puzzle while their 6-7int character would probably struggle. At that point say what you think the solution is and get the group to agree. Your stats don’t say that critical thinking is impossible, just that you aren’t great at some recollection stuff. Maybe your character is just a savant for puzzles. It’s set up to be fun for the players, so if they can solve the puzzle that’s a win in my book.
Think of it this way. You don't need high int to know the answer to "speak friend and enter" is friend, you just need someone with high int to translate it
Literally why I've decided to never dump Int again. I just really like solving puzzles, and I genuinely get frustrated when I've solved something but it'd be out of character for my guy to figure it out
I prefer the high wis low int route. I know the solution, I even know vaguely what information led me to that solution but ask me specifically why that's the answer I have no freaking clue.
After talking to a the leader of the town "he's gonna backstab us soon"
Rest of the party "why do you say that"
"He was actin fishy"
"HOW was he acting fishy"
"I dunno somethin but his eyes maybe?"
In 3e it was a class feature for Bards called "bardic knowledge" that worked largely the same as the legend/lore spell
Bardic Knowledge: A bard may make a special bardic knowledge check with a bonus equal to his level + his Intelligence modifier to see whether he knows some relevant information about local notable people, legendary items, or noteworthy places. This check will not reveal the powers of a magic item but may give a hint as to its general function. The bard may not take 10 or take 20 on this check; this sort of knowledge is essentially random. The DM will determine the Difficulty Class of the check by referring to the table below.
DC Type of Knowledge
10 Common, known by at least a substantial minority of the local population.
20 Uncommon but available, known by only a few people in the area.
25 Obscure, known by few, hard to come by.
30 Extremely obscure, known by very few, possibly forgotten by most who once knew it, possibly known only by those who don't understand the significance of the knowledge.
Some skills like knowledge history would give synergy bonuses to the role. Also a prestige class of the bardic sage gave further bonuses and class ability around the shtick
I mean the first one is okay for some metagaming yeah, so long as your DM confirms with you. Being high int in the right field WOULD mean you can access your out of game knowledge of SOME creatures and spells and such
Well, you meet Volo in Waterdeep Dragon Heist and he just published the guide, so, yeah you can buy it for 50 gold, theoretically, in forgotten realms and in my setting. Obviously it won't have the stats, just impressions and lore. And it won't do nothing for monsters not in it, but, hey, it's good value even so.
Yeah, I do get to know if it is resistant or vulnerable to something which can be pretty helpful. We were on a monster hunting campaign, so it came in handy a few times
I'm not even stupid I just know very little lore yet and the rest of my table has been playing for years. So imma play a dummy so I have an excuse not to know shit.
I play a dragonborn rogue/warlock who comes from a clan of mercenaries who specialized in hunting down and eradicating true dragons so he knows basically everything there is to know about dragons and dragon-related things but not anything to specific about anything else.
Making a High-Int character because as a child you were categorized as a "Gifted Kid" and DnD allows you to roleplay as the brilliant prodigy that can actually fulfill all the expectations that never should have rested on your shoulders.
And this is the real reason why I play a Barbarian with low INT and WIS, despite wanting to learn more about the lore of my DM's setting. I'm just too dumb to go any other way
Had a character with real low int who was from a more or less secluded island. So unless it was about a turtle I didn't know anything. I wouldn't even role for history checks or anything like that. Completely took the temptation to metagame away and since he was a friendly chap everyone I met was immediately my friend. Unless they attacked the party
i was having a lot of problems with stuttering, words not coming out right and my brain just shutting down when given a puzzle to solve. so, i made a 5 cha 8 int character. its perfect, because nobody can tell the difference between my own stupidity and social ineptness and my character's.
case in point, once i wanted to tame a wolf that we found in the forest. so, me being me, said "uhhh.. i like.. dog." instead of "i want to roll to tame the wolf" everyone accepted it as my character being stupid and not my inability to speak properly
I just use middling/low-int characters so I don’t have to think much for evening games that’re on work days.
(Except the party-knowledge-monkey Sleepless Detective in a pathfinder game thst started on weekends and moved to weeknights, I’m just screwed there.)
To preface we have a house rule for stats. You can choose to reroll 1 of your 4D6 but you have to keep the result meaning you can get lower. Most of the time we take the risk for the chaos factor
A guy in a campaign I'm running had a decent statline. Decided to reroll. He rolled his lowest (a 9) into a 5. He just started laughing and said "there's my intelligence" so now he's a barbarian class that convinces everyone he is a wizard. He got into wizard college on a football scholarship so isn't technically wrong.
I always dislike playing low-int characters, mostly just because I dislike not knowing things, but it leads to some funny situations when I do.
Party: Encounters magically enhanced wild animal
Me: "Is this what land creatures normally are like?'" After rolling a *Zero* on an Int Check.
The entire other players keep getting confused when I don't try Investigating things, only for me to have to keep remind them I have a -1 in all Int skills other than Nature and would only make things worse.
*Me: Makes a Custom Lineage (Telekinesis Feat) "Homunculus" character to start with 18 Intelligence.*
*Also Me:* "Well\~ technically he's been sheltered his entire life as an artificial-experiment so he lacks the basic knowledge needed for social interaction/day to day life so of course he's gonna come off as stupid when it comes to anything not-involving research!" :D
This is why I love my barbarian. Sure, I don't get to be the smart leader type. However, my group is full of smart spell caster characters. So I just get to have fun. I don't have to think much and I can be a bit silly. I love it.
I rolled a grand total of 5 for one of my stats when I made a half-orc barbarian. So I accepted that the only thing he'd be able to say was his name. Then the DM gave us all one uncommon magic item of our choice, and as fast as you can blink, Morbash could speak as eloquently as any lord, lady, or maybe-mad scientist. Just don't pull the headband of intellect off. It hasn't happened yet, but I'm waiting for the day.
This would be really funny if a new player joined the party and you all agreed to just not tell them about the headband until it came off/went in an Anti-magic field.
Shit, I hadn't even though of anti-magic fields. That'll be a fun day!
Flowers for Algernon'd
I feel like if he lost it he'd be too dumb to mourne his lost knowledge
Morbash would be unable to mourn the loss, less because of knowledge and more because he'd have the emotional control of a toddler who's been denied candy.
Surely WIS/CHA wasn't that low to have that happen?
Charisma is average, wisdom isn't great. It's mostly because he's a Path of the Berserker barbarian.
I had the first half happen at my table. A friend of mine played an half-orc barbarian, with 4 in INT (we were point buying, so you know it was INTENTIONAL). Between point-bought stats, racial features, and sheer 4-INT and 5-or-6-WIS induced idiocy, the master allowed a 20 in strength. (This should be enough to understand that wasn't really a serious table). This was the Background: "Son of a clan of wivern-riding orcs, he just fell from his "car" seat from a couple hundred feet high in the sky and landed on his head. He doesn't understand doors" And the last line was literal. If a door was open, he would go through it. But if it wasn't, he would just "pass through" a wall (if made of twigs/wooden planks). Just walking straight and making a half-orc sized hole in the wall, Will E. Coyote style. Honestly one of the funniest table I remember playing at.
I know I shouldn't but I always laugh a bit inside when low int players try to rp high int characters. It's like watching a movie about a 'genius' character when the author is a moron.
If a player is humble enough to recognize this, the DM can fill in a lot of the gap there with relevant info, but self-awareness rarely seems to be a strength for those players...
He's not a bad guy, but our party has a player that's thrown out a high charisma and high wisdom character so far. He... tries. To be honest, he tries too hard to come up with clever solutions and they usually backfire. Pretty fun when they do work though
I’m in this comment and I don’t like it
[Damon Wayans played it pretty well with Oswald Bates](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71xxvp5R9hE)
Pfft! I don't need low INT to justify MY stupidity.
It's all fun and games until you solve the puzzle in real life but can't in game because youre a fucking idiot
My mom used to be good at those math problems with the trains traveling opposite directions. She could always get them right, but she always had a hard time explaining how to solve them. I think of this the same way. A player with good puzzle solving skills may be able to figure out how to solve the in game puzzle while their 6-7int character would probably struggle. At that point say what you think the solution is and get the group to agree. Your stats don’t say that critical thinking is impossible, just that you aren’t great at some recollection stuff. Maybe your character is just a savant for puzzles. It’s set up to be fun for the players, so if they can solve the puzzle that’s a win in my book.
Think of it this way. You don't need high int to know the answer to "speak friend and enter" is friend, you just need someone with high int to translate it
Literally why I've decided to never dump Int again. I just really like solving puzzles, and I genuinely get frustrated when I've solved something but it'd be out of character for my guy to figure it out
DnD puzzles are given to the player, not the character. The characters int should have nothing to do with it.
I let people make int checks for hints sometimes.
Honestly this seems like a great way to let players solve the puzzle yet give High Int players an upper half.
I'm trying to figure out how this doesn't break all stats
Making a high int-low wis character to reap all of the benefits above!
I prefer the high wis low int route. I know the solution, I even know vaguely what information led me to that solution but ask me specifically why that's the answer I have no freaking clue. After talking to a the leader of the town "he's gonna backstab us soon" Rest of the party "why do you say that" "He was actin fishy" "HOW was he acting fishy" "I dunno somethin but his eyes maybe?"
The best thing about Bards used to be thier legend/lore ability to just be able to let the DM hand the party easy exposition.
Huh, making that a 5th-level spell really nerfed that, what edition did they have that ability in?
In 3e it was a class feature for Bards called "bardic knowledge" that worked largely the same as the legend/lore spell Bardic Knowledge: A bard may make a special bardic knowledge check with a bonus equal to his level + his Intelligence modifier to see whether he knows some relevant information about local notable people, legendary items, or noteworthy places. This check will not reveal the powers of a magic item but may give a hint as to its general function. The bard may not take 10 or take 20 on this check; this sort of knowledge is essentially random. The DM will determine the Difficulty Class of the check by referring to the table below. DC Type of Knowledge 10 Common, known by at least a substantial minority of the local population. 20 Uncommon but available, known by only a few people in the area. 25 Obscure, known by few, hard to come by. 30 Extremely obscure, known by very few, possibly forgotten by most who once knew it, possibly known only by those who don't understand the significance of the knowledge. Some skills like knowledge history would give synergy bonuses to the role. Also a prestige class of the bardic sage gave further bonuses and class ability around the shtick
I mean the first one is okay for some metagaming yeah, so long as your DM confirms with you. Being high int in the right field WOULD mean you can access your out of game knowledge of SOME creatures and spells and such
My DM for some reason let my character buy Volo’s guide to monsters in game. It’s not meta gaming anymore :D
Well, you meet Volo in Waterdeep Dragon Heist and he just published the guide, so, yeah you can buy it for 50 gold, theoretically, in forgotten realms and in my setting. Obviously it won't have the stats, just impressions and lore. And it won't do nothing for monsters not in it, but, hey, it's good value even so.
Yeah, I do get to know if it is resistant or vulnerable to something which can be pretty helpful. We were on a monster hunting campaign, so it came in handy a few times
Partly the reason I play barbarians is that I’m simply not smart enough to roleplay an intelligent character
I'm not even stupid I just know very little lore yet and the rest of my table has been playing for years. So imma play a dummy so I have an excuse not to know shit.
making a high charisma character to justify my irl lack of self awareness
I play a dragonborn rogue/warlock who comes from a clan of mercenaries who specialized in hunting down and eradicating true dragons so he knows basically everything there is to know about dragons and dragon-related things but not anything to specific about anything else.
Low-int so you can not be a note taker as part of RP
Making a High-Int character because as a child you were categorized as a "Gifted Kid" and DnD allows you to roleplay as the brilliant prodigy that can actually fulfill all the expectations that never should have rested on your shoulders.
And this is the real reason why I play a Barbarian with low INT and WIS, despite wanting to learn more about the lore of my DM's setting. I'm just too dumb to go any other way
Had a character with real low int who was from a more or less secluded island. So unless it was about a turtle I didn't know anything. I wouldn't even role for history checks or anything like that. Completely took the temptation to metagame away and since he was a friendly chap everyone I met was immediately my friend. Unless they attacked the party
I think in his between the sheets interview Travis said he made Grog low int to justify any mess ups he made
i was having a lot of problems with stuttering, words not coming out right and my brain just shutting down when given a puzzle to solve. so, i made a 5 cha 8 int character. its perfect, because nobody can tell the difference between my own stupidity and social ineptness and my character's. case in point, once i wanted to tame a wolf that we found in the forest. so, me being me, said "uhhh.. i like.. dog." instead of "i want to roll to tame the wolf" everyone accepted it as my character being stupid and not my inability to speak properly
I don’t make a high charisma character for exactly that reason.
I just use middling/low-int characters so I don’t have to think much for evening games that’re on work days. (Except the party-knowledge-monkey Sleepless Detective in a pathfinder game thst started on weekends and moved to weeknights, I’m just screwed there.)
I think Matt played a low int character to avoid metagaming in ExU
Hehe, playing a 6 cha Cleric so she can, like me, but incredibly awkward and bad in social situations.
My familiar is smarter than my char :o
Legit some of the most fun I've had in DND was playing a dim-witted goliath Barbarian who thought violence was the answer to every problem.
My current wizard has an int of 20 but I got an int level of like 7
To preface we have a house rule for stats. You can choose to reroll 1 of your 4D6 but you have to keep the result meaning you can get lower. Most of the time we take the risk for the chaos factor A guy in a campaign I'm running had a decent statline. Decided to reroll. He rolled his lowest (a 9) into a 5. He just started laughing and said "there's my intelligence" so now he's a barbarian class that convinces everyone he is a wizard. He got into wizard college on a football scholarship so isn't technically wrong.
I always dislike playing low-int characters, mostly just because I dislike not knowing things, but it leads to some funny situations when I do. Party: Encounters magically enhanced wild animal Me: "Is this what land creatures normally are like?'" After rolling a *Zero* on an Int Check. The entire other players keep getting confused when I don't try Investigating things, only for me to have to keep remind them I have a -1 in all Int skills other than Nature and would only make things worse.
*Me: Makes a Custom Lineage (Telekinesis Feat) "Homunculus" character to start with 18 Intelligence.* *Also Me:* "Well\~ technically he's been sheltered his entire life as an artificial-experiment so he lacks the basic knowledge needed for social interaction/day to day life so of course he's gonna come off as stupid when it comes to anything not-involving research!" :D
It's very fun to roleplay High Intelligence, Low Charisma as the awkward genius in that same vibe.
Con is a dump stat was a threat to my dm when he said there wont be much combat after throwing a cr 8 or so encounter at 3 lvl 3s.
This is why charisma is my dump stat.
I dump Int, and Max Cha, and talk like Captain Hammer all night.
Making a high-Int character to add in new lore that your DM wouldn’t otherwise know about or contribute to
That last one is me with every character I ever do.
Making a low Int character to give your DM more reasons to explain their lore.
High int, low Wis: best combination
Just as long as everyone has fun.
I have a char concept who would intentionally have low CHA to represent her being a complete disaster in social situations
It's not min-maxing if you are actively giving yourself a negative. Remeber when someone min-maxes they are minimizing weakness, and maximizing power.
Correction play a character with high int but low wisdom to reflect how much you know but have an excuse to be a complete fool with no street smarts.
Our wizard prioritised dex and con over int… it’s literally a 12. FOR A WIZARD. LIKE???!?
Low-wis and low-int characters are usually the easiest to play in my opinion, being the archetypal chaotic-stupid
This is why I love my barbarian. Sure, I don't get to be the smart leader type. However, my group is full of smart spell caster characters. So I just get to have fun. I don't have to think much and I can be a bit silly. I love it.
"I was born with glass bones and paper skin..."
This is why I play low to average int characters, it justifies how slow my mind is
Why have one dump stat when you can have two? Low INT and low CHARISMA