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5 years ago ::
Jun 12, 2008 - 12:49PM
#121
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Date Joined:
Jun 26, 2003
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For me, the outstanding question is why Intelligence is not also applied to finesse-style melee rolls, following the exact same logic that is applied to Reflex defense. One might rationalize that it would be cummulative with Str in line with Morholdt's offered houserule. (But to be 100% honest, I don't believe there is a good rationalization for an irrational fantasy game)
The short answer is that a PnP RPG that tries to model reality accurately (see Phoenix Command) has, until now, wound up being too complex to be any fun.
Who knows, maybe there's a da Vinci of RPGs out there who will soon create a system that will model how much intelligence effects an attack without becoming hopelessly muddled. Until then we have to work with abstractions.
If a DM feels particularily capricious, then he/she could throw out a surprise house-rule every once in a while. If a PC succeeds on a Int-based Reflex save, but would fail if it was a Dex-based Reflex, then that's one of those times that Intelligence makes a difference. The DM can ask the PC to justify how reasoning power would be used to avoid the effect. If the player can explain the use of some handy strategy or nearby cover, his PC is safe. But that should be reserved for the rare case that the DM feels a potential negative modifier is justified or just to keep the players on their toes  Luckily for everyone, I'm not a DM
Of course, I can't think of a reflex-based situation where high coordination will matter more than a half-second head start. Can you think of one?
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5 years ago ::
Jun 12, 2008 - 1:36PM
#122
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Have people stopped to think that bumbling proffesors would normaly not last half a second in a battle where there's people swinging swords, shooting arrows, and fireballs are exploding all around?
Literature and fiction use "Plot Armor" to protect them. Experienced veterans die al around them, but they somehow manage to survive it all. They dodge out of the way just in the nick of time even being in the middle of the mess. They shouldn't. Anyone not necessary to the plot would die in their place. But as the story needs them, they survive.
This is the same thing. There isn't much fun in playing a dead character, so you get to apply the best of two abilities to your defences, under the reasoning that at least one will be good enough. Is it realistic? Maybe, maybe not.
If you don't think it's realistic, you shouldn't complain that it doesn't represent the bumbling professor accurately. You should complain that the bumbling proffesor arquetipe exists at all, in any media. They're bumbling, they'd die if someone attacked them.
And in any case, an 8 dexterity and 20 intelligence won't help you with stealth or acrobatics, or any other dex based skill. There's plenty of room to be a bumbling proffesor type who ruins the teams chances at a sneaky infiltration, or almost slips and falls to his death from a narrow ledge.
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