What would you estimate you stats are? [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

Immabozo

2014-03-12, 11:03 PM

I am curious, how would you personally be statted in D&D?

If str for the average person is 10, and the average person can, according to my Google-fu, bench-press around 110 pounds, lets say 1 str is the ability to bench-press 11 pounds lbs

Again, the average person has a con of 10. which is harder to measure, but, again, according to my Google-fu, the average person can bicycle 8-10 miles. So we can measure 1 con to equal the ability to bike 1 mile in a single day.

Dex is another hard one to measure. I think this would have to be a little more abstract. Just judge for yourself, 10 being average.

For int, the average IQ in the USA is 98 (I would just like to take a moment to say that our education systems sucks and I have a few choice words to describe it, but that would get me banned, or at least in trouble). So lets round it to a good, even number and say 1 int is worth 10 IQ.

Wisdom is again, a little abstract, just do your best to give a reasonable number. 10 is the average.

Cha is again a rather abstract one. Try your best.

So, to sum it up:

1 Str = each 10 pounds you can bench
1 dex = try your best to gauge it
1 con = the ability to bicycle 1 mile in a day
1 Int = 10 IQ
1 wis = try your best to gauge it
1 cha = try your best to gauge it

For me, my stats would about be as follows.

str 10
dex 9
con 30
int 14
wis 20
cha 35

Seems rather accurate, I have great stamina, do lots of cardio, almost never get sick and I recover quickly, just started working out and I am benching about 100 pounds, I am very smart, far smarter than the average. I have picked up some secrets and seen the way the world works and my advice, particularly on women and relationships, health, food and friends, seem to hold pretty well. Finally, people like me, which I figure gives me a bonus, I get along with most everyone. I have even had fathers and brothers tell me that I should, or ask me to date their daughters/sisters and encourage daughters/sisters to break up with their boyfriends and date me. Which I figure is a serious bonus. I am also very outgoing, never shy and can be very persuasive, giving me another bonus.

So what are your stats?

Meth In a Mine

2014-03-12, 11:15 PM

Str 12
Dex 8
Con 25 (possibly more)
Int 15
Wis 24
Cha 4*
I am fairly strong, I can be pretty clumsy, I have a lot of endurance, I'm very smart, I'm quite perceptive, however my aspergers and poor social skills lead me to have a Cha score to make a duergar look good. The "*" signifies that if I can get to know someone and overcome my intense distrust of strangers, my Cha shoots up to 30 when interacting with those people who have softened my heart of stone.

OldTrees1

2014-03-12, 11:18 PM

1 HD humans have between 0 and 18 in physical stats and between 3 and 21 mental stats.

So it is silly to assume you have more than 20 in a stat.

Personally (using D&D as the metric rather than the OP's metric)
Str: Used to be 7, now probably 6.
Dex: 8
Con: 6? Hard to estimate (I have +fort vs some things and -fort vs other things)
Int: 13
Wis: 14
Cha: 12

Vrock_Summoner

2014-03-12, 11:28 PM

Immabozo

2014-03-12, 11:29 PM

1 HD humans have between 0 and 18 in physical stats and between 3 and 21 mental stats.

So it is silly to assume you have more than 20 in a stat.

This is a silly exercise, take it as such.

If you have a more accurate scale to judge by, please, be my guest! By my measuring stick, I have a con of 30-40, went with the lower number I have done many times. But you say I cant have more than an 18. So, perhaps there is a better, more accurate measuring stick to use.

And I am just trying to use a similar measuring stick to gauge wis and cha, which I have far greater than normal, farther above the normal than my con is above the normal, but a higher number seemed wrong.

But again, if you have a more accurate gauge, please share.

Remember, it is very common to have PCs with a stat in the 20's or 30s, even sometimes 40s, many are humans.

Sir Chuckles

2014-03-12, 11:30 PM

Your scale is horribly wrong.
I'm not normally that blunt, but, well, it is.

10 is the average human being. The highest they can be blessed with by virtue of nature is 18. Many people have tried this kind of scale, and most fail miserably.
The two big factors I'll call out on your's is Intelligence and Strength. Less than 0.1% of people today have an IQ of 145 or higher. 2% are between 130 and 145. IQ is a terrible way to judge the D&D Intelligence scale.

Follow that up with 1 point per 10 lbs to bench? There' a scale right on the SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/carryingCapacity.htm) for carrying capacity.
I can bench 210lbs. I highly doubt that my Strength score is 21, which would suggest that I could lift 460lbs over my head, or 920lbs off the ground.

Consider that 18 in a stat is considered the pinnacle of excellence.

Edit:

Remember, it is very common to have PCs with a stat in the 20's or 30s, even sometimes 40s, many are humans.

Consider that PCs at that level are superheroes. A 40 in strength is a +15, meaning they can break down a good wooden with likely a single shove. I don't mean opening it, I mean breaking it down. Off the hinges down.

Stoneback

2014-03-12, 11:32 PM

I have 5's across the board. My wife told me so.

Immabozo

2014-03-12, 11:35 PM

Your scale is horribly wrong.
I'm not normally that blunt, but, well, it is.

10 is the average human being. The highest they can be blessed with by virtue of nature is 18. Many people have tried this kind of scale, and most fail miserably.
The two big factors I'll call out on your's is Intelligence and Strength. Less than 0.1% of people today have an IQ of 145 or higher. 2% are between 130 and 145. IQ is a terrible way to judge the D&D Intelligence scale.

Follow that up with 1 point per 10 lbs to bench? There' a scale right on the SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/carryingCapacity.htm) for carrying capacity.
I can bench 210lbs. I highly doubt that my Strength score is 21, which would suggest that I could lift 460lbs over my head, or 920lbs off the ground.

Consider that 18 in a stat is considered the pinnacle of excellence.

Edit:

Consider that PCs at that level are superheroes. A 40 in strength is a +15, meaning they can break down a good wooden with likely a single shove. I don't mean opening it, I mean breaking it down. Off the hinges down.

Then what should my scale look like?

Vrock_Summoner

2014-03-12, 11:37 PM

This is a silly exercise, take it as such.

If you have a more accurate scale to judge by, please, be my guest! By my measuring stick, I can a con of 30-40, went with the lower number I have done many times. But you say I cant have more than an 18. So, perhaps there is a better, more accurate measuring stick to use.

And I am just trying to use a similar measuring stick to gauge wis and cha, which I have far greater than normal, farther above the normal than my con is above the normal, but a higher number seemed wrong.

But again, if you have a more accurate gauge, please share.

Remember, it is very common to have PCs with a stat in the 20's or 30s, even sometimes 40s, many are humans.

If you are human, and not Lolth-touched Half-Minotaur Water Orc or something, you are getting stats like those for one reason and one reason alone. You are very high level and as a result of that have lots of magic, be it spells or items. You are neither high-level, nor do you have any form of magic. Now that I reread your stats and see that 35 Cha, let me say, a stat like that could have everyone regardless of gender and sexuality date you on command, you could start a rebellion against the government over loudspeaker and make every soldier ordered to stop you love you too much. You then sweet-talk the president into committing suicide and are voted for unanimously to replace him.

Those scores are NOT realistic.

Edit: For a realistic score, think of the most charismatic person known in history, which may be a matter of opinion but the guy you settle on should nonetheless be insanely charismatic. He's probably got a 20 Cha. All the stats sort of work like that. An 18 in both Strength, Dex, and Con could make you an olympic gold medalist in just about every sport easily with only the barest minimum of proper skills training.

Immabozo

2014-03-12, 11:41 PM

If you are human, and not Lolth-touched Half-Minotaur Water Orc or something, you are getting stats like those for one reason and one reason alone. You are very high level and as a result of that have lots of magic, be it spells or items. You are neither high-level, nor do you have any form of magic. Now that I reread your stats and see that 35 Cha, let me say, a stat like that could have everyone regardless of gender and sexuality date you on command, you could start a rebellion against the government over loudspeaker and make every soldier ordered to stop you love you too much. You then sweet-talk the president into committing suicide and are voted for unanimously to replace him.

Those scores are NOT realistic.

haha, you are quite right. Is there a measurement you think I can use?

EDIT: Dont think I haven't had people, regardless a male or female, have propositioned me. I am a chef and a massage therapist, work out daily, good shape. Married, single, guy, girl, I've even had security guards at a government building (a male) come on to me. People come onto me all the time.

Just for the record, seeing as you brought that part up

nor do you have any form of magic

my girlfriend would beg to differ

Sir Chuckles

2014-03-12, 11:42 PM

Then what should my scale look like?

This is one of those things that's it's better to just not do. There would be far too much controversy, and, again, has been attempted multiple times with essentially no success.

It considered accurate that no human on Earth has ever reached 10th level. Its also considered accurate that few, if any, humans exist today with an 18 in any stat.

Let's look at your proposed Charisma. 35 is a +12, meaning that in about 6 seconds while being threatened (eg, a bouncer actively blocking your entrance, or someone insulting you out loud), you have a 10% chance of making them unfriendly instead of hostile. Given 10 minutes, you'd apparently turn a man holding a gun at your head into a normal person with a nearly 50% success rate.

MadGreenSon

2014-03-12, 11:45 PM

I think I like this though! I'm fat and out of shape, but I have strong legs and just kicking back and letting my legs do the work I biked about 35-40 miles over the course of a day back in December.

I like the idea that my slovenly self has 35-40 Con! :smallbiggrin:

Str and Dex? Honestly average, maybe a little less. There's some evidence I may be above average in Int, Wis and Cha, but I'm not sure where to place that. (How much Charisma for the fat guy who can still charm women with wit and humor rather than raw good looks?)

Ugh, now I remember why I hate these sorts of exercises. They're not actually good for the self esteem.:smallyuk:

Immabozo

2014-03-12, 11:52 PM

This is one of those things that's it's better to just not do. There would be far too much controversy, and, again, has been attempted multiple times with essentially no success.

It considered accurate that no human on Earth has ever reached 10th level. Its also considered accurate that few, if any, humans exist today with an 18 in any stat.

Let's look at your proposed Charisma. 35 is a +12, meaning that in about 6 seconds while being threatened (eg, a bouncer actively blocking your entrance, or someone insulting you out loud), you have a 10% chance of making them unfriendly instead of hostile. Given 10 minutes, you'd apparently turn a man holding a gun at your head into a normal person with a nearly 50% success rate.

First, yes, my numbers are off.

But I am EXTREMELY talented with my words. I have stopped a drunken fight, while both were yelling challenges at each other, with only my words, stopped ex-boyfriends from ruining their ex's birthday and starting a fight many times, I did have someone point a gun at my head, granted it was not with the invent to harm me, but I talked my way out of that one just fine.

I think I like this though! I'm fat and out of shape, but I have strong legs and just kicking back and letting my legs do the work I biked about 35-40 miles over the course of a day back in December.

I like the idea that my slovenly self has 35-40 Con! :smallbiggrin:

Str and Dex? Honestly average, maybe a little less. There's some evidence I may be above average in Int, Wis and Cha, but I'm not sure where to place that. (How much Charisma for the fat guy who can still charm women with wit and humor rather than raw good looks?)

Ugh, now I remember why I hate these sorts of exercises. They're not actually good for the self esteem.:smallyuk:

Sounds like great cha, con and int, potentially good wis too!

Cirrylius

2014-03-12, 11:53 PM

What would you estimate you stats are?

Depressing.:smallfrown:

MadGreenSon

2014-03-12, 11:55 PM

Depressing.:smallfrown:

I feel your pain :smallfrown:

Zetapup

2014-03-12, 11:58 PM

Edit: For a realistic score, think of the most charismatic person known in history, which may be a matter of opinion but the guy you settle on should nonetheless be insanely charismatic. He's probably got a 20 Cha. All the stats sort of work like that. An 18 in both Strength, Dex, and Con could make you an olympic gold medalist in just about every sport easily with only the barest minimum of proper skills training.

Eh, it depends on how scores are determined. If you're rolling scores with 3d6 (just for simple math), that's a 1/216 chance of getting an 18. Or of getting a 3. That's... pretty silly. I think any comprehensive attempt to convert d&d stats to real world values is doomed to fail from the start, since it's difficult to replicate real world attributes in a pen and paper game without excessive complexity.

Immabozo

2014-03-12, 11:58 PM

I feel your pain :smallfrown:

I was too, but I vowed to change things, and then did

Immabozo

2014-03-13, 12:00 AM

Eh, it depends on how scores are determined. If you're rolling scores with 3d6 (just for simple math), that's a 1/216 chance of getting an 18. Or of getting a 3. That's... pretty silly. I think any comprehensive attempt to convert d&d stats to real world values is doomed to fail from the start, since it's difficult to replicate real world attributes in a pen and paper game without excessive complexity.

True, but again, I thought of doing this just for fun

Sir Chuckles

2014-03-13, 12:02 AM

First, yes, my numbers are off.

But I am EXTREMELY talented with my words. I have stopped a drunken fight, while both were yelling challenges at each other, with only my words, stopped ex-boyfriends from ruining their ex's birthday and starting a fight many times, I did have someone point a gun at my head, granted it was not with the invent to harm me, but I talked my way out of that one just fine.

Consider once more that I said "In about 6 seconds".

I have done the same, similar, and more. By your Con count, I'd have around 60-80 Con. I'd be willing to guarantee that nobody on this forum has an 18 or higher in any stat.
35 in any stat is high for even a character, and they're doing it via extensive magical means.

Zetapup

2014-03-13, 12:10 AM

True, but again, I thought of doing this just for fun

Fair enough :smallsmile:

In that case, my ability scores are astronomical. My ability modifiers are higher than most people's highest ability score. I'm thinking mid 50s for most of my scores, maybe in the low 40s for my dex, I'm a bit clumsy :smallwink:

FirebirdFlying

2014-03-13, 12:12 AM

A bit of a pointless exercise, but going by percentages, the Int to IQ scale would be roughly:

3: 60 and below
4: 61-68
5: 69–74
6: 75–80
7: 81–85
8: 86–90
9: 91–95
10: 96–100
11: 101–104
12: 105–110
13: 110–115
14: 115–120
15: 120–125
16: 126–131
17: 132–140
18: 140 and above

where about .46% of people, rolling 3d6, have 18 Int and the same have a 140 or higher IQ. IQ isn't really a great way to measure intelligence, though, and likewise I doubt the abstracted nature of D&D stats can actually be translated well to the real world.

18s in a stat aren't that rare among rolled characters, though.

Melville's Book

2014-03-13, 12:17 AM

Would you kindly remind me about how it is that your average dog has an IQ of 20? Also people with 7-8 int are far from what I'd call mentally disabled, so I don't think the IQ comparison is fully functional.

EDIT: Partial swordsage by FBF.

Also your Cha and Con disturb me. Assuming the bare minimum, where you are a 1st-level Commoner, you would be able to survive three dagger stabs doing max damage with no chance of bleeding out. I figure full dagger damage is like having the full blade buried in you, so, uh, eep.

I'd say my own Con is 6. I'm extremely sickly by genetics and have a very weak immune system. But my Int and Wis are both probably 16ish, with a 12 or 14 Cha. My mental faculties are pretty fantastic, if I do say so myself. Graduating from an Ivy League college has probably helped my self-esteem more than it should have, though, so my scores may be lower than that.

Hytheter

2014-03-13, 12:17 AM

For someone who supposedly has a +12 Charisma modifier I find myself somewhat unconvinced that anything you're saying is true.

Gnome Alone

2014-03-13, 12:21 AM

Probably something like
STR 10
DEX 8
CON 12
INT 16
WIS 4
CHA 1,087

Can post flippant things on the Internet as a Spell-Like Ability 400 billion times per day

Immabozo

2014-03-13, 12:21 AM

For someone who supposedly has a +12 Charisma modifier I find myself somewhat unconvinced that anything you're saying is true.

A high bonus does not mean auto success, but as I have acknowledged many time, my numbers are high. Would you like to give me a usable scale?

Vhaidara

2014-03-13, 12:22 AM

Melville's Book

2014-03-13, 12:25 AM

Why not?

Str: 12
Con: unsure (every time I bike I get injured), but probably 12.
Dex: 15
Int: 17 (I'm one of those people who does really well with book-learning and testing)
Wis: 6. My perception skills and Sense Motive are very lacking.
Cha: between 5 and 50, depending on how long it has been since I shaved.

"My beard gives me super Charisma!"

(I know that's the opposite of what you meant, but I saw a chance to implement a YGO: TAS reference so I took it)

Sir Chuckles

2014-03-13, 12:29 AM

A high bonus does not mean auto success, but as I have acknowledged many time, my numbers are high. Would you like to give me a usable scale?

10 is an average human. 18 is a god among men, as in Einstein and Beethoven had a perfect love child raised by Chuck Norris and Oprah.

The only two things that can be accurately judged by D&D stats are Constitution and Strength, and that's because of the Carrying Capacity and Overland Movement rules.
Everything is a crap-shoot.

Vhaidara

2014-03-13, 12:31 AM

"My beard gives me super Charisma!"

(I know that's the opposite of what you meant, but I saw a chance to implement a YGO: TAS reference so I took it)

If I could acquire an actual beard, that might be true. However, mine stops at "ugly, scratchy stubble".

Yanisa

2014-03-13, 12:32 AM

I will do a bit of over and underestamating.

Strength: 3 (I am a weak nerd who barely can get off 30 pounds of the ground)
Dexterity: 16 (I got very good reflexes, and sharp hand-eye coordination strengthen by years of gaming)
Constitution: 14 (I have a above average fort save, I survived a lot of bad food without getting sick, combined with (especially for a nerd) strong endurance)
Wisdom: 8 (I have heavy eye sight penalties cancelled out by glasses, but I have a decent feeling for common sense, unless I plot to take over the world.)
Intelligence: 18 (With the more correct way of comparing IQ* to Int I end up with a full 18 int, not that I feel like I have 18 int. I don't have any great smart achievement (like a good diploma), but I do learn quickly which allows me to understand new games in minutes, and new work features in seconds.)
Charisma: 5 (I am still a awkward and talking to people is hard. I am also shy and don't have a strong presence in a group.)

The conclusion, nerds, like me, are wizards.

*See FirebirdFlying post above, 10 IQ = 1 Int doesn't work when comparing to the real world.

Ziegander

2014-03-13, 12:37 AM

Str 12
Dex 15
Con 16
Int 17
Wis 12
Cha 15

I don't know what sort of adventurer those sort of stats would make me (other than a Wizard, boooooring), but I do know that, ideally, I'm a romantic swordie doing heroic things for the greater good. :smallbiggrin:

Sir Chuckles

2014-03-13, 12:38 AM

I'll be honest, using the 10 as average 18 as tip-top, my friends and I had a little "Real Life Zombie Campaign", where we played as ourselves. I had everyone, privately, rate each other. I have the sheet right next to me.
Str 13
Dex 9
Con 14
Int 14
Wis 15
Cha 13

The conclusion, nerds, like me, are wizards.
What does that make me?

Also consider that the Elite Array is 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8. Elite Array.

Hytheter

2014-03-13, 12:43 AM

A high bonus does not mean auto success, but as I have acknowledged many time, my numbers are high. Would you like to give me a usable scale?

I don't know, but whatever scale you use probably shouldn't give you more Charisma than Supernatural entities who are the physical embodiment of attracting people (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Succubus), or more Constitution than a Great Wyrm.

Drelua

2014-03-13, 12:57 AM

Because everyone sees ability scores differently, I find it helpful to be vague, so rather than guessing my ability scores, I'll just give you my approximate modifiers. My rough scale is that any ability is as easy to achieve for a real person as it is for a D&D character of the same level, so if you can build a low level character with 35 charisma, then I would consider that high of a number to be within the range of possibilities. I also look at the percent chances of a given number coming up as a result of rolling 3d6, so an 18 in a given stat would put you in about the top half a percent. I would, using this system, say that about 1 in every (216 divided by 6 stats equals) 36 people have an 18. To figure out where I fit in, I just compare myself to people I know. So, going by that system, I'm probably something like:

STR: +1ish. I'm not hugely strong, but I have done a decent bit of manual labour and can do just over 30 push ups in one go.
DEX: +2, maybe +3. I have good balance, reflexes, and coordination, though nothing too remarkable.
CON: +1, since I try to eat well and get a fair bit of exercise, very rarely get sick and I can go without sleep much better than most of my friends.
INT: Maybe as high as +3. I got good grades in school with little effort, and people sometimes comment on my intelligence and skill with words, even though I don't say much.
WIS: +1 or 2. I'm fairly perceptive and strong willed, having no real vices, and I'm decent at picking up subtle cues. I'd say I'm above average in most of these areas, but not really remarkable in any of them.
CHA: I really have no idea what to put here, but it's probably negative. My skill with words can translate poorly over the internet and with people I don't know, and I tend to freeze up in awkward situations, making them much worse, but I also seem to be likeable when I'm at ease, like when I'm playing PFS with complete strangers.

That works out to about 25-34 point buy if you assume an 8 charisma, so probably a bit optimistic for a level 1 expert, but nothing too out of line. We can't all be average, some of us have to have decent self-esteem. :smallwink:

Sam K

2014-03-13, 01:03 AM

EDIT: Dont think I haven't had people, regardless a male or female, have propositioned me. I am a chef and a massage therapist, work out daily, good shape. Married, single, guy, girl, I've even had security guards at a government building (a male) come on to me. People come onto me all the time.

Wow, I haven't seen a "But I'm hot IRL" argument since my days on IRC 15 years ago!

gadren

2014-03-13, 01:04 AM

I don't really care about my other stats, but I have an Intelligence of 42.

I am also a powerful wizard in real life.

I am not kidding.
(Yes I am.)

MadGreenSon

2014-03-13, 01:09 AM

I don't really care about my other stats, but I have an Intelligence of 42.

I am also a powerful wizard in real life.

I am not kidding.
(Yes I am.)

Sweet! When are you getting those Teleportation Circles and Wish Traps set up? :smallbiggrin:

Hytheter

2014-03-13, 01:10 AM

My rough scale is that any ability is as easy to achieve for a real person as it is for a D&D character of the same level, so if you can build a low level character with 35 charisma, then I would consider that high of a number to be within the range of possibilities.

You can't though
You can't even get that high with most non-epic characters

A human that rolls an 18 in a stat, puts all of his level up boosts into that stat, reads a +5 tome of [stat] and wears a +6 to stat item would still only have 34 at level 20.
A racial modifier, template, or weird class that boosts ability scores could push it over the edge, but it's not a likely circumstance.

gadren

2014-03-13, 01:11 AM

Sweet! When are you getting those Teleportation Circles and Wish Traps set up? :smallbiggrin:

10 years ago.

Sir Chuckles

2014-03-13, 01:13 AM

10 years ago.

Let me guess, you refuse to move out of Sealand?
Bring me my darn nutritious free wish-trap gruel, dang it!

Drelua

2014-03-13, 01:18 AM

You can't though
You can't even get that high with most non-epic characters

A human that rolls an 18 in a stat, puts all of his level up boosts into that stat, reads a +5 tome of [stat] and wears a +6 to stat item would still only have 34 at level 20.
A racial modifier, template, or weird class that boosts ability scores could push it over the edge, but it's not a likely circumstance.

Yeah, that's exactly why I don't consider anything above a 19 to be at all likely, or 21 if you were going by Pathfinder. Like someone else said, if you think you're more charismatic than a succubus then, well, I think you're wrong.

Edit: Oh, unless you're counting human paragon as a possible class choice. That raises the upper limit by 2.

gadren

2014-03-13, 01:23 AM

Yeah, that's exactly why I don't consider anything above a 19 to be at all likely, or 21 if you were going by Pathfinder. Like someone else said, if you think you're more charismatic than a succubus then, well, I think you're wrong.

Edit: Oh, unless you're counting human paragon as a possible class choice. That raises the upper limit by 2.

I also have a natural charisma of 24.

My real name is David Bowie.

Drelua

2014-03-13, 01:32 AM

I also have a natural charisma of 24.

My real name is David Bowie.

Hm, you must have that template from DMG II that gives a bonus to an ability score. Paragon, was it? :smallamused:

Hytheter

2014-03-13, 01:32 AM

David Bowie may not actually be human though

Sir Chuckles

2014-03-13, 01:37 AM

David Bowie may not actually be human though

I like to believe that he has so many templates that his base race does not fit.

gadren

2014-03-13, 01:40 AM

I like to believe that he has so many templates that his base race does not fit.

This is true, but most of it comes from my levels in Goblin King (full caster progression and the ability to permanently steal charisma from babes with the power.)

Derjuin

2014-03-13, 01:40 AM

Str: 39
Dex: 44
Con: 33
Int: 30
Wis: 10
Cha: 58

I am a level 14 sorcerer who swapped bodies with a gold dragonwrought kobold who got invited into a Sarrukh's home for dinner and a game of Stat Twister.

In reality-verse,

Str: probably like 13, I am quite strong but I don't train or work out, except manual labor at work.

Dex: 8 or 9, with Lightning Reflexes; my hand-eye coordination sucks, but my reactions are sometimes quick. ...sometimes.

Con: 12-14; even when tired I keep pushing, and sickness rarely affects me to an incapacitating degree.

Int: I dunno, 14 or 16? I'm usually quick to learn and I like to explore various options/things for the sake of learning.

Wis: Probably 10, MAYBE 12. My common sense is USUALLY sound, but i'm frequently not super duper aware of my surroundings.

Cha: At least 14. I can make friends easily, can make my voice heard and when I want to, be imposing.

So 13/8/12-14/(12, 14, 16)/~10/14. Int could easily be 16 or 12, since it's almost impossible to accurately rate the real-world mind's "int" score.

Sir Chuckles

2014-03-13, 01:46 AM

This is true, but most of it comes from my levels in Goblin King (full caster progression and the ability to permanently steal charisma from babes with the power.)

Take my name. Just...just take it.

Yanisa

2014-03-13, 01:48 AM

I'll be honest, using the 10 as average 18 as tip-top, my friends and I had a little "Real Life Zombie Campaign", where we played as ourselves. I had everyone, privately, rate each other. I have the sheet right next to me.
Str 13
Dex 9
Con 14
Int 14
Wis 15
Cha 13

What does that make me?.

Your stats suggest a cleric, a full plate wearing cleric. :smalltongue:

Also consider that the Elite Array is 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8. Elite Array.

My problem is that the Elite array is too positive and the normal array is too average (the normal one was 8, 9, 10, 11 ,12, 13 I believe)

As a elite character I would have: 8 str (too high), 10 cha (too high), 12 wis (too high) 13 con (okay) 14 dex (okay) and 15 int (again, okay)

As a normal character I would have 8 str (too high), 9 cha (too high) 10 wis (acceptable but probably too high) 11 con (too low, probably), 12 dex (acceptable) 13 int (too low)

I am a character of both low and high extremes, not some average hero or boring peasent. :smalltongue:

Sir Chuckles

2014-03-13, 01:53 AM

Your stats suggest a cleric, a full plate wearing cleric. :smalltongue:

My problem is that the Elite array is too positive and the normal array is too average (the normal one was 8, 9, 10, 11 ,12, 13 I believe)

As a elite character I would have: 8 str (too high), 10 cha (too high), 12 wis (too high) 13 con (okay) 14 dex (okay) and 15 int (again, okay)

As a normal character I would have 8 str (too high), 9 cha (too high) 10 wis (acceptable but probably too high) 11 con (too low, probably), 12 dex (acceptable) 13 int (too low)

I am a character of both low and high extremes, not some average hero or boring peasent. :smalltongue:

Further proof as to why applying D&D rules to real life without two-four weeks of consideration, delegation, and crying will only lead to massive headaches and sleep deprivation.

GoblinArchmage

2014-03-13, 01:54 AM

Str: 5
Con: 5
Dex: 5
Int: 8
Wis: 7
Cha: 5

I am an inferior human and I deserve a reroll. I don't even care about the first three. Int and Wis are the most important.

Yanisa

2014-03-13, 01:59 AM

Further proof as to why applying D&D rules to real life without two-four weeks of consideration, delegation, and crying will only lead to massive headaches and sleep deprivation.

Still it is fun bragging with 18 real life inteligence, rather that is accurate or not. (And that bragging imposing another charisma penalty)

SowZ

2014-03-13, 02:09 AM

The D&D stats are based on standard deviations. Having a 35 in a skill puts you twelve standard deviations above the norm. A 30 is 10. The stats you've given would make you without a doubt the highest statted person in all 200,000 years of human history. I understand, the way D&D generally plays, 30s and 40s come up so that may look like what really good people have. I understand. But that's when your playing Grecian demi-gods. It isn't actually possible.

Look at it this way, if you have a 12 in a stat, you are in the top ~40% of that stat. A 14? The top 15%. In any given stat, 95% of people have less than 16. An 18 makes you 1 in 216. Very, very, very good. Almost no one has a 20 or above. Not that it is impossible. But once you get to about 26, you are so many deviations above the baseline that the odds of it happening are astronomical enough to say 'impossible' without really being inaccurate even if it has happened a few times.

I probably have 10 Str, 10 Dex, 5 Con (Yes, really.) Maybe 15 Int? (Scored in the top 5% or so on standardized type tests but never taken an official IQ test. I do well on the online ones but even the best ones are fairly worthless if you buy into IQ theory. So this is just an estimation.) 10 Wis (This might be an 8 or 9. I can be reasonably insightful and pay attention to people and how they act. That could just be a couple ranks in Sense Motive. I can also be really Kramer-esque socially and not aware of my immediate surroundings. And I can make really stupid decisions.) 10 Cha. (I'm not bad with women, and my social groups are often people I bring together or at least keep together by planning the social activities. But I think that is more because I am extroverted and surround myself with Introverts, so I am just the most comfortable taking social initiative. Less so high Charisma. I can function at a party or social gathering at an average level. This could go as high as 12, maybe, not sure. No higher, though.)

Immabozo

2014-03-13, 03:20 AM

So, after understanding stats a little better, I'll take another stab at my stats.

str 11 (stronger than average, but not significantly so)
dex 9 (up from 8, I have a talent for losing my balance while standing still, and completely sober, but since starting to bike, I am much better)
con 14 (biker, significantly higher than normal, but I am not competing in any contests)
int 18 (according to the guide FirebirdFlying came up with)
wis 15 (I am pretty aware, pretty wise, give good advice, very observant)
cha 18 (I have a way with words, very strong of character, a talent with diplomacy and social skills, with a heavy negative to my bluff checks, I suck at lying)

Eldan

2014-03-13, 03:31 AM

Hmm.

STR 8. Below average, but not massively so.
DEX 7. Yesterday, I ran into things three times, including a glass door, ramming my knee into an open drawer and running into the edge of a table with my groin. Tripped over my own feet twice, dropped several small objects and had to try several times to tie my shoelaces. Fell to my knees when I didn't see the last step on a staircase.
CON 5. It's embarassing, really.
INT 15. Quite intelligent, I'd say. Master's degree in science, high IQ on a properly controlled test, etc.
WIS 8. Bad memory, no insight, especially into people.
CHA 10. Apparently, I can be charming when I try. I just almost never try. Most people find me off-putting or strange in person.

Seffbasilisk

2014-03-13, 03:44 AM

STR: 14 I used to work construction.
DEX: 17 I'm a casino dealer. I have literally slapped arrows away from my face.
CON: 14 I'm rarely sick, I recovery swiftly, double digit HP for sure.
INT: 15 I'm far cleverer than average, but I won't be redesigning cold fusion
WIS: 8-14 depending. I can be incredibly insightful, or extremely obtuse.
CHA: 16. I have a presence. I work with my hands and my wit. I'm charming for a living. I'm an introvert who rammed ranks up Bluff until I could take on Face roles in a party.

Yanisa

2014-03-13, 03:56 AM

Xerlith

2014-03-13, 03:58 AM

I'll take a spin.

STR: 15. Ish. Benching over 200lb, heavy gym workout. Often told that I should mind my strength while interacting with people.

DEX: 9. While not particularily clumsy, I've got my trip-over-my-feet moments, more probably tied to my Wis.

CON: 14. Since I started working out and eating clean, I don't really get sick and I'm able to run significantly longer distances than the people I know. Also I've got a pretty heavy bone frame.

INT: 14. Quick learning ability, reading faster than anyone I know, a natural thirst for knowledge and self-improvement. Ability to quickly mimic skills I've seen performed in front of me.

WIS: 8. At best. Speaking without consideration, lacking the ability to instinctively foresee the possible outcomes of situations (although I can make a conscious effort and try). While my sight and hearing are good (particularily hearing, virtue of being a trained musician), I'm more often than not lost in my thoughts to the point of not noticing half the things around me.

CHA: 12. Recovering from social withdrawal and mild depression. This probably would be up to 14 if not for the wisdom-mentioned part of recklessly speaking my mind. Supposedly handsome (depends), I am a rather likeable person (If I make a conscious effort at least). Most probably here I'm able to add my Int mod here.

*looks up and gasps* I'm an unoptimized factotum.

Seffbasilisk

2014-03-13, 04:35 AM

This is one of those things that's it's better to just not do. There would be far too much controversy, and, again, has been attempted multiple times with essentially no success.

It considered accurate that no human on Earth has ever reached 10th level. Its also considered accurate that few, if any, humans exist today with an 18 in any stat.

Let's look at your proposed Charisma. 35 is a +12, meaning that in about 6 seconds while being threatened (eg, a bouncer actively blocking your entrance, or someone insulting you out loud), you have a 10% chance of making them unfriendly instead of hostile. Given 10 minutes, you'd apparently turn a man holding a gun at your head into a normal person with a nearly 50% success rate.

It's also somewhat silly, there'll be those who take it serious, and those who use it stroke their ego. There'll be trolls, and there'll be discussion. It's a re-occurring topic, true, but it's also one that can be fun.

That said, I only ranked my Cha at 16, but in less than three combat rounds, I talked a guy holding a gun to my head into putting it away, and giving me free pizza.

If the IQ scale meant anything, I'd be at 17 Int, but while I'm rather canny, I don't have an eidetic or photographic memory. IQ is indeterminate.

I think D&D attracts a broad range, but those who stay with it tend to be the more intelligent folk. To take that the step further, and go to a forum specific for discussing the rules and intricacies? To want to know more? That's a sign of intelligence to to me at least.

SiuiS

2014-03-13, 04:55 AM

I want to draw a distinction between "the average strength is ten" and "the average person has a strength of ten". They are not the same.

If you take ten thousand people and add their strength together and divide by ten thousand, you'll get 10 as the average. But it's entirely possible most people have a strength of 6, and there are just enough outliers, athletes in the 16-25 range, who being the balance up to ten.

Kind of like the apocryphal accounts of people in the Middle Ages/dark ages. The average life expectancy was thirty; not because people died at thirty half the time, but because people died in infancy ninety percent of the time, enough to drag down the majority of folks who lived past their sixties!

The D&D stats are based on standard deviations. Having a 35 in a skill puts you twelve standard deviations above the norm. A 30 is 10. The stats you've given would make you without a doubt the highest statted person in all 200,000 years of human history. I understand, the way D&D generally plays, 30s and 40s come up so that may look like what really good people have. I understand. But that's when your playing Grecian demi-gods. It isn't actually possible.

Look at it this way, if you have a 12 in a stat, you are in the top ~40% of that stat. A 14? The top 15%. In any given stat, 95% of people have less than 16. An 18 makes you 1 in 216. Very, very, very good. Almost no one has a 20 or above. Not that it is impossible. But once you get to about 26, you are so many deviations above the baseline that the odds of it happening are astronomical enough to say 'impossible' without really being inaccurate even if it has happened a few times.

I probably have 10 Str, 10 Dex, 5 Con (Yes, really.) Maybe 15 Int? (Scored in the top 5% or so on standardized type tests but never taken an official IQ test. I do well on the online ones but even the best ones are fairly worthless if you buy into IQ theory. So this is just an estimation.) 10 Wis (This might be an 8 or 9. I can be reasonably insightful and pay attention to people and how they act. That could just be a couple ranks in Sense Motive. I can also be really Kramer-esque socially and not aware of my immediate surroundings. And I can make really stupid decisions.) 10 Cha. (I'm not bad with women, and my social groups are often people I bring together or at least keep together by planning the social activities. But I think that is more because I am extroverted and surround myself with Introverts, so I am just the most comfortable taking social initiative. Less so high Charisma. I can function at a party or social gathering at an average level. This could go as high as 12, maybe, not sure. No higher, though.)

This is no longer true.

From memory, on a 3d6 bell curve, 18 is three SD away from mean, 16~ is two and 13 is one.

From the 3e d20 standard, of 4d6b3, this is far less accurate. "Average scores" are below statistical average. (/anydice.com/program/13e)

E: note I'm passing on data from actual math people from another thread in Friendly Banter months ago. My language may be off, but the idea isn't.

hymer

2014-03-13, 05:07 AM

If you take ten thousand people and add their strength together and divide by ten thousand, you'll get 10 as the average.

This is all academic, but here's another view: Most humans age 20-30 will have strength 10 or 11, average 10.5. Some are born stronger, some weaker. That averages out to keep 10.5. Some will train to various degrees and advance beyond their 'natural' score, some will have accidents or diseases and fall beneath at similar amounts. Average stays.
There may be some cultural bias if there is, say, a body-building craze in an area, but these will be temporary effects, as will a polio epidemic.

It'd be surprising not to find normal distribution in strength, as your idea with eg. 6 being the standard score, even if the average is 10.5.

Azoth

2014-03-13, 05:10 AM

I will give it a whack.

Str: 13. I move 210-220lb kegs daily at my job and have had to carry a 300lb friend before. Carrying the friend I honestly felt like I was going to collapse under him with each step, so obviously near my absolute threshold.

Dex: 14. I am a very quick person with really good reflexes. Most of my cowrokers and friends joke about me being a ninja due to my ability to dodge things I am seemingly unaware of and smack even other trained fighters without them seeing it coming.

Con: ? Prob 12-14. I am a chronic insomniac so I can go about 72hrs without sleep before any sign of sleep deprivation is noticeable. I have been able to push 120hr work week doing physical labor with no "break" during my 6 back to back 20hr shifts. I can't run or bike distance for anything though, really bad cardio stamina. Though a cast iron stomach is nice.

Int: 13ish. One of those GT, Honors, Beta Club, Mu Alpha Theta, graduate with a 3.76 GPA kids. Quick to learn anything that interests me. Though I am a college drop out working in a bar...so not THAT bright by todays standards.

Wis: 8-10. I am prone to impulsive decisions and reckless actions with little regard for self preservation. At other times, I drop sage-like advice on people...just not when it comes to me. I must have put considerable stock in spot/listen/sense motive considering my job...wow.

Cha: 6. I am an *******. Most people can't stand me because I am rude, crude, offensive, and unsympathetic. Ask my firends and they will all admit that they are impressed when I show enough restraint not to make incredibly rude and offensive jokes that someone leaves themself open for.

Yanisa

2014-03-13, 05:11 AM

Togo

2014-03-13, 05:34 AM

hm.. Togo stats look something like this:

Str 15 (lifting friends above my head is a party piece, as is getting my wife to pick up someone, and then lifting her and them at the same time.)
Int 18 (no comment :))
Wis 16 (I'd rate myself lower, but I'm consistently told otherwise I also have unusually good vision, hearing, etc.)
Dex 14 (I'm good with thrown objects, have fast reflexes, can dodge extremely well and do competitive sports with rifle, bow etc. I'm not very good at picking locks, but I have done it. Then again, I'm not national champion or anything like that, and I'm not that flexible.)
Con 15 (run marathons, very tough, very healthy)
Chr 16 (Do stand up comedy, regarded as a diplomat, it's been suggested I should go into politics)

Feats: Endurance, alertness
Flaws: No sense of smell

So, clearly I'm a munchkin!

hymer

2014-03-13, 05:39 AM

it's been suggested I should go into politics

Don't you think that was a comment on your 'enviable intellectual suppleness and moral manoeuvrability'? :smallwink: That's a quote from Yes Minister, by the way.

Ruethgar

2014-03-13, 08:26 AM

Str 8
Dex 13
Con 14
Int 16
Wis 15
Cha 9
App 12

Einstein, and Hitler all may have had 18s in Int and Cha respectively, but with athletes it is more likely that they just have feats to improve skills than just straight 18s. A runner may have above average Con from eating healthy and exercising, but that doesn't mean he can hold his breath as long as a free diver or resist poison to a far greater degree. People who of course focus on improving strength may be able to reach 18, but that would have to be their focus, not improving for a specialized purpose. The 10 IQ per point is a fairly decent measurement, not the best, but then again IQ isn't great at measuring intelligence anyway.

Socksy

2014-03-13, 08:56 AM

Strength: Probably about 9 or 10. I'm pretty strong for my sex and height- I just happen to be a 17 year old girl, 5ft2, and 8 stone.
Dexterity: Maybe fourteen. I did karate from age nine to fourteen, I didn't hit that hard but I sure learnt to dodge. I've also karate-chopped a pencil away from my face after someone chucked it. (In fact, I've done that sort of thing a lot. Possibly Deflect Arrows ;p)
Constitution: Maybe twelve. I haven't been physically ill for years, but my endurance is nothing special. I guess my fortitude is good.
Intelligence: 22, using 10 + 1 for each five IQ points above 100.
Wisdom: My wisdom is probably about five. Possibly lower. I have Asperger's with associated anxiety and depression, I'm horribly disorganised, I'm a teenager, I used to do stuff like sniffing sharpies and still occasionally do, my hearing sucks... I've done some really stupid stuff at times. I'm intelligent enough to run any plan I think is such a great idea let's do the thing why has nobody done this before past wiser friends... At least a sizable minority of the time, but between my awful sense of direction and inability to realise what's a bad idea until its too late, my ability to climb, balance, and swim well has saved me more than once.
Charisma: Probably about 11 or 12. It used to be hideous, but I read and studied on how to not act so un-popular-ly, and I can talk my way out of most things. I'm also really cute when I want to be. I can fake an adorable, sweet personality too, regardless of how much it makes me squirm internally. Probably most of it is ranks in Diplomacy and Bluff, though, since when I'm trying to be honest and actually be myself, I stumble over words and I'm not really any more likeable than the average person.

TrueJordan

2014-03-13, 09:19 AM

For someone who supposedly has a +12 Charisma modifier I find myself somewhat unconvinced that anything you're saying is true.

He didn't put any ranks into bluff, or maybe you just have a high sense motive.

Socksy

2014-03-13, 09:24 AM

He didn't put any ranks into bluff, or maybe you just have a high sense motive.

And don't forget circumstance modifiers!

Firechanter

2014-03-13, 11:59 AM

Okay, let's go at this systematically. Actually I'm amazed that nobody here seems to remember that the basic rules tell us _exactly_ what the scale for Strength scores is. Just look at the carrying capacity table.

So apparently Google says the average person can bench-press 100 lbs -- which I find rather little, but let's assume this is true.

D&D sets the benchmark at 10-11 for "average". So you just look up how 100 lbs relate to carrying capacity -- voilà, it's the upper end of a Heavy Load!
So you take the figure you can BP and compare it to the Heavy Load entry.

You will also note that in D&D, the actual capacity double for every 5 points. So if you can bench press 200 lbs, your Str is 15. Not 20. 20 would be 400 lbs.
The world record for BP is around 1000 lbs, but that person does not necessarily have 27 Str. Maybe he just has a feat or two that allows him to increase his capacity.

On other note, keep in mind that 10-11 is AVERAGE, and average does not mean "everyone". For instance, the average man is still considerably stronger than the average woman. I'd say by about 50%? So the typical woman will have Str 8-9, and the typical man Str 12-13.

For the other physical stats, I'd use the same scale, i.e. "double performance for every 5 points".

For mental stats, it's much more difficult, here I'd rather do it the other way round, and go with the IQ percentiles and compare them with the odds to roll that score on 3d6. For Wis and Cha, we have to guess a little but can keep the percentiles in mind.

Now for the original question, how would I estimate my personal stats using these assumptions:

* My Str is probably average for a man, i.e. around 13. I don't BP, but I do practice archery, hiking with backpack etc, used to be in the army, and my experiences here kinda work out.
* My Dex is not as high as I'd like it to be; probably just around 11.
* My Con also seems to be rather average; I don't get ill often but it does happen, so I'd say also around 10ish.
* If I can trust various IQ tests I have taken, I am in the 98 percentile, so that would be around Int 17.
* Unfortunately, my Wis is not as good, I do tend to make stupid calls and don't really seem to know what's good for me, so maybe just a 7.
* Cha is the most difficult question; if I consider my impression on the opposite sex, results vary so wildly you could think I have two Cha scores, like a 6 and a 15. =D

Immabozo

2014-03-13, 12:05 PM

An intresting side note from this topic is that a lot of people judge themselves in the int ranges of 14-18... which means a lot of people here have a IQ of about 115-140.

The easy conclusion is that a lot of dnd players are smart people. :smallcool:

The question is: do smart people play DnD to stimulate their brains, or does playing DnD make you smart? :smalltongue:

I think D&D is decidedly more attractive to the more intelligent crowd. It's the sort of game to get the mental wheels turning, fire up the realm-of-imagination projector, and play on popular nerd culture. Most people with a lower Int score dont seem to like that sort of stuff.

Con: ? Prob 12-14. I am a chronic insomniac so I can go about 72hrs without sleep before any sign of sleep deprivation is noticeable. I have been able to push 120hr work week doing physical labor with no "break" during my 6 back to back 20hr shifts. I can't run or bike distance for anything though, really bad cardio stamina. Though a cast iron stomach is nice.

I am no doctor, so take this merely as advice, but vitamin E (about 100 mg a day) is supposed to help you sleep, It was explained to me because it helps the blood handle oxygen better.

In DnD 10,5 is the average, and most humans have a 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 and 13. So both 6 and 16 are rare exceptions, mostly found under heroic characters, like us.

It's that oddity in dnd that at one side they say 1 in 216 people have 18 strength, but at the otherside say the your average commoner cannot hope for anything higher then 13.

In real life I don't think the small percentage of athletes has any influence on the average strength score of 6 billion people. It's like saying mensa bumps up the average int of the world. Of the amount of pop singers bumps up the average cha.

Some pop singers have horribly below average cha scores and just get a circumstances bonus (who knows why) with the younger crowd. Miley Cyrus and Justin Bieber annoy me to no end and I... to put it politely... strongly dislike them. I think they single handedly bring down the planets average int, wis and cha scores.

And don't forget circumstance modifiers!

or there is intentionally failing a check, i.e not caring enough to put up a convincing argument because it is just a for-fun exercise.

ScubaGoomba

2014-03-13, 12:17 PM

Encumbrance rules (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/additionalRules.html#_carrying-capacity) are a good way to gauge strength.

Alcohol rules (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/mastery/drugsAndAddiction.html) can help with Constitution. Note that "sickened" is the condition, not "getting sick," so it's likely to refer to being "tipsy" in the real world.

The posted intelligence chart is likely a good way to determine your score based on IQ.

You guys are also crazy. 18 Charisma? Or higher? And Wisdom out the wazoo? Come on; those are people that are the top of the pack and the wisest/most charismatic/most dexterous in the world. the 9 - 11 range is the average because that's where pretty much everyone is.

Yanisa

2014-03-13, 12:18 PM

Some pop singers have horribly below average cha scores and just get a circumstances bonus (who knows why) with the younger crowd. Miley Cyrus and Justin Bieber annoy me to no end and I... to put it politely... strongly dislike them. I think they single handedly bring down the planets average int, wis and cha scores.

Advertisement, Commercials, Propaganda. However you name it the power of Marketing is stronger than any mere mortals circumstance bonus.

Encumbrance rules (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/additionalRules.html#_carrying-capacity) are a good way to gauge strength.

Alcohol rules (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/mastery/drugsAndAddiction.html) can help with Constitution. Note that "sickened" is the condition, not "getting sick," so it's likely to refer to being "tipsy" in the real world.

The posted intelligence chart is likely a good way to determine your score based on IQ.

You guys are also crazy. 18 Charisma? Or higher? And Wisdom out the wazoo? Come on; those are people that are the top of the pack and the wisest/most charismatic/most dexterous in the world. the 9 - 11 range is the average because that's where pretty much everyone is.

I do suspect the stats might be bloated, but my low wisdom tends to trust people. But also remember a 18 is not that special, its about 1 in 216. So about ~30 million people on earth have a 18 in a single stat, I cant name 30 million famous people, so I bet some must be unnoticed and can be posting on this very forum! In fact I got a 18!

Besides comparing a single accomplish relevant to said stat gives a screwed perception, like comparing bench presses for your strength (or even just carry weight). Then again DnD is only based on a vague perception of reality, not all it's aspects.

If you want a more realistic version try to get people to name their stats based on the normal array (8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13). But where is the fun in that? :smalltongue:

Piggy Knowles

2014-03-13, 12:45 PM

My wife does a 140-mile bike ride every year. She's hardy, but I doubt she has a Constitution in the triple digits.

HaikenEdge

2014-03-13, 12:52 PM

Str 9 (Weak for a man, but can lift own weight)
Dex 14 (Former competitive gymnast and competitive badminton player)
Con 8 (Distance running causes me to cough blood)
Int 14 (Don't think I'm close to genius, but likely much smarter than average)
Wis 10 (Sometimes makes common sense mistakes, but has sharp senses of hearing, touch and smell)
Cha 10 (Abrasive but assertive personality)

Probably 1st level commoner with Skill Focus (Knowledge [D&D Optimization]) and ranks in Profession (Library Staff).

SowZ

2014-03-13, 01:14 PM

Azoth

2014-03-13, 01:16 PM

Encumbrance rules (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/additionalRules.html#_carrying-capacity) are a good way to gauge strength.

Alcohol rules (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/mastery/drugsAndAddiction.html) can help with Constitution. Note that "sickened" is the condition, not "getting sick," so it's likely to refer to being "tipsy" in the real world.

My problem with this is that you have people like myself and my coworkers who are virtually immune to alchohol compared to the average person. Not that it is something to brag about, but bar employees like myself tend to have rather high tolerances for the stuff. Most of us can put tourists or recreational drinkers under the table before getting started with the heavy stuff. Now I refuse to believe that several of my coworkers who catch every bug that goes around and get noticeably hurt on an almost daily basis have massive Con scores because they can kill a full bottle of Patron Silver straight up no chaser and not be tipsy or drunk.

SowZ

2014-03-13, 01:20 PM

My problem with this is that you have people like myself and my coworkers who are virtually immune to alchohol compared to the average person. Not that it is something to brag about, but bar employees like myself tend to have rather high tolerances for the stuff. Most of us can put tourists or recreational drinkers under the table before getting started with the heavy stuff. Now I refuse to believe that several of my coworkers who catch every bug that goes around and get noticeably hurt on an almost daily basis have massive Con scores because they can kill a full bottle of Patron Silver straight up no chaser and not be tipsy or drunk.

I'd say you have the 3.5 feat 'resist poison.' +4 to Fort for resisting poisons.

Tvtyrant

2014-03-13, 01:22 PM

I have no idea what my stats are, but I thought I would chime in that I think the most accurate stat generation for humans would be roll 5d4 drop none. Maximum of 20 instead of 18, so it accounts for superior individuals, but the chances of getting that are .001, which means there should be about 7 million superior individuals in each category in the world today, which would be divided up amongst all of the outlets that ability could benefit from.

Aolbain

2014-03-13, 01:24 PM

If that is how you measure CON mine would be 20+. And I don't have a CON that high.

SowZ

2014-03-13, 01:29 PM

Drelua

2014-03-13, 01:32 PM

The problem with using alcohol tolerance to determine CON is that there's too many other factors involved. I think I can safely say that my friend has a pretty good CON score considering he runs everyday and he's a vegetarian, and he's told me he can drink more than pretty much anyone in his family except his aunt who weighs about 300 pounds and definitely does not have a good CON score. I've also never drank before, so it would probably take next to nothing for me to get hammered. So being in shape definitely helps, but there's also how much you weigh and how much you're drank in the past to build up a tolerance. Unless you can factor those things into the equation, you're not really getting any idea what your CON might be.

Yanisa

2014-03-13, 01:40 PM

The problem with using alcohol tolerance to determine CON is that there's too many other factors involved.

In general:

The problem with using [one thing*] to determine [ability] is that there's too many other factors involved.

*insert:
Bench presses for strength score
Carry Weight for strength score
Miles easily traveled by bike for con score
Reflexes for dexterity
IQ for Intelligence
Senses for Wisdom
Amount of friends for charisma
physical attractiveness for charisma

I don't get why alcohol is the first one to steer up a real conversation on the fact most people, including me, use one aspect of an ability to determine our overall ability. :smalltongue:

Socksy

2014-03-13, 01:44 PM

Azoth

2014-03-13, 01:46 PM

For Strength it is because we can use weight carried and benchpressing to equate to the carry capacity charts to get a strength score equivalent.

The rest I deally don't have a clue.

All I know is that vegetarianism/veganism does not make one "healthier" or more deserving of a high Constitution than their meat eating counterparts. If anything it is equal to it or would equate a negative to con. Sorry, we evolved canine teeth and a taste for flesh because we were meant to eat it.

SowZ

2014-03-13, 01:50 PM

hymer

2014-03-13, 01:53 PM

Sorry, we evolved canine teeth and a taste for flesh because we were meant to eat it.

While I agree with you generally (as in we're evolved to eat some meat, yes, but probably not as much as is common to the average Westerner these days), you should take a look at a gorilla's teeth sometime.

Edit: Chimpanzee'd while I was looking up images of gorilla teeth. Goes to show, post first, cogitate later.

Xerlith

2014-03-13, 01:57 PM

Actually it's perfectly fine to eat about 1.5-2 grams of protein per ~2lbs of your body weight, regardless of the source.
I myself find meat simply tasty and simple to cook, which makes it my primary choice of proteins. If your organism can digest the meat properly depends heavily on all the other things you eat.

Well, I'm speaking mostly about chicken meat though. Red meat is a different story altogether. It indeed is heavy and hard to digest.

Azoth

2014-03-13, 01:58 PM

Most over eat only overly processed and chemically treated/colored "meat", which is most of the cause for it being unhealthy to the general populace. Also, dietary needs vary from individual to individual.

I know personally, my body can handle large amounts of unprocessed red meat just fine, and actually perfoms better when it has a steady supply of it. I would likely wither and die as a vegatian. Hell, one month of no red meat, limited white meat, and mostly salads caused my ability to heal to become nearly nonexistent.

Again, I may not be the norm by any standard, but removing meat from the human diet entirely just doesn't seem overall the ideal healthy diet for the average person.

Yanisa

2014-03-13, 02:03 PM

Strength has tables.

Dexterity... Balance and reflexes

Constitution has tables, IIRC

The best Intelligence one I've seen is 10 plus one for each five IQ points above 100, rounded to the nearest whole number.

Wisdom and Charisma are harder.
No one brings up skill checks!
Lets expend this list while I am in whiny complaining mode. :smalltongue: (No offense to you Socksy)

Strength deals with:
*Muscle
*Physical power
*Carry weight
*Melee attack rolls
*Damage rolls
*Climb, jump and swims checks
*Breaking down doors

Dexterity deals with:
*Hand-eye coordination
*Agility
*Ranged attacks rolls
*Armor class (ability to dodge)
*Reflexes
*Initiative (Reaction Speed)
*Balance, Escape Artist, Hide, Move Silently, Open Lock, Ride, Sleight of Hand, Tumble, and Use Rope

Constitution deals with:
*Stamina
*Health/HP (The ability to take hits)
*Fort saves
*Concentration checks
*Various weather effects, like heat and cold
*Various exhaustion effect, like forced marches

Intelligence deal with:
*Languages
*Skill points
*Appraise, Craft, Decipher Script, Disable Device, Forgery, Knowledge, Search, and Spellcraft

IQ is probably a decent fit to get a general feeling, but I fail to see how my IQ of 140 helps me with Appraise, Craft, Decipher Script, Disable Device, Forgery and Searching, all of which I am pretty bad at. :smalltongue: Also my languages skills are subpar, as you might notice from my horrible grammar.

Wisdom deals with:
*Willpower/Will
*Common Sense
*Intuition
*Heal, Listen, Profession, Sense Motive, Spot, and Survival

Charisma deals with:
*Force of personality
*Persuasiveness
*Personal magnetism
*Ability to lead, and
*Physical attractiveness
*Bluff, Diplomacy, Disguise, Gather Information, Handle Animal, Intimidate, Perform, and Use Magic Device.

hymer

2014-03-13, 02:14 PM

I know personally, my body can handle large amounts of unprocessed red meat just fine

You do? You've examined how much undigested meat is in your innards on average? You know that your colon isn't taking DNA damage from the breaking down of the pigmentation of haemolobine in the red meat? That's impressive knowledge, I wonder how you came by it.

and actually perfoms better when it has a steady supply of it.

Naturally. Various kinds of meat contain a lot of good stuff our body must have from somewhere. That doesn't mean it doesn't also contain stuff that's bad for us. This is why a varied diet is so important, so you get little enough of the various kinds of bad stuff that your body can cope, while still getting all the good stuff you need.

I would likely wither and die as a vegatian. Hell, one month of no red meat, limited white meat, and mostly salads caused my ability to heal to become nearly nonexistent.

Seriously, man, you should see a doctor about that "can't heal properly without red meat" issue. I hope he'll say you're just imagining it.
I'll concede there may be people who actually cannot thrive without meat. But that's hardly a reason for us all to eat so much of it.

Again, I may not be the norm by any standard, but removing meat from the human diet entirely just doesn't seem overall the ideal healthy diet for the average person.

So very true. But it's probably still a lot healthier for the average person than what he's eating at the moment.

Drelua

2014-03-13, 02:23 PM

I can't speak to why no one brought up how unfair it is to base an attribute on one single thing before I did, I just brought it up because it seemed like a particularly useless metric, for the reasons I listed, and because it has no use for someone, like myself, that doesn't drink. Also, while I have no problem with other people drinking as long as they're responsible about it, it kind of bugs me how it's seen as the standard and anyone who doesn't drink is often asked for a reason why.

As to being a vegetarian, it is actually a very healthy choice as long as you're smart about it. If you eat a healthy diet including meat, and then just stop eating meat but otherwise eat exactly the same stuff, of course it's worse for you. You have to get protein from somewhere, like milk, eggs, or beans. Contrary to what some might say, meat is not the only, nor is it even the best, source of protein. In regards to the argument that 'we must have evolved this way for good reason,' that's just a ridiculous appeal to nature. Just because we evolved that way doesn't mean it's the best way; evolution doesn't care what's best for the individual, it only cares what path is most likely to lead to the production of viable offspring.

mythmonster2

2014-03-13, 02:34 PM

I'd say I have mostly average stats. Not going off of any particular scale...

Strength: 11 (A bit stronger than average, but not particularly so)
Dexterity: 10 (Can't particularly say I'm particularly clumsy or dexterous)
Constitution: 7 (I get sick quite a bit and have terrible stamina)
Intelligence: 13 (I've always done well in school, but never been the top of my class or anywhere near.)
Wisdom: 9 (I lack street smarts, but my intuition has served me pretty well in the past, so I'd say it balances out a bit)
Charisma: 12 (Though I don't like leading people and am introverted, I often get told I'm great at resolving disputes and being a leader for projects and other related stuff. I may disagree, but I suppose I should give myself some credit)

OverdrivePrime

2014-03-13, 03:46 PM

Ah, I love these threads. It's been a while since we've had a good one. I'll put in my two copper to agree that the comparison tables in the OP are absolutely silly. As others mention, we've gotten pretty good at arguing estimating these stats for real world equivalence.

Keep in mind that 18 is most definitely not the upper limit for human stats, and certainly not in the modern world where mechanical, chemical, biological and other enhancements are so readily available. I tend to look at dedicated use of a gym as equivalent to a manual of gainful exercise, with the enhancement bonus varying by how much sustained effort you put into it. That's how you get Lou Ferrigno looking like this in his 60s (http://metro.co.uk/2014/03/11/stan-lee-mediates-as-thor-and-the-incredible-hulk-get-into-punch-up-4532708/).

I've always seen these threads as a kind of modern online flyting, and approach them as such. :smallcool:

Some time ago, after the fifth or sixth "What are your stats?" thread I was in, I decided it'd be easier to make my own character sheet. I've since updated it to Pathfinder (http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=516246). My friends and I do a lot of RPing based on our real-world selves in various systems, so this is always fun for me.

OverdrivePrime (http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=516246)
Male NG Human Monk 1 / Ranger 3, Level 4, Init +1, HP 36/36, Speed 30
AC 12, Touch 12, Flat-footed 11, CMD 18, Fort +7, Ref +6, Will +4, CMB +6, Base Attack Bonus 3, Hero Points yep
Karate/Wrestling Unarmed Strikes +6 (Flurry at +4/+4) (1d6+3, x2)
Wedding Ring +30 vs Slatterns
Abilities Str 16, Dex 12, Con 14, Int 15, Wis 13, Cha 15
Alright, here we go:

Strength 16: I lift, bro. I'm a tall, broad-shouldered dude who enjoys athletics and physical contests. Things break when I want them to. Averaging max press and max carrying limit puts me here.
Dexterity 12: I'm faster than I look, but nothing too special. I can juggle, I'm harder to hit than most people, and I regularly work manual dexterity drills. I have very good hand-eye coordination and spatial intelligence compared to a normal person, but most of the people I work out with are much more impressive.
Constitution 14: I can take a punch to the face without complaint and usually outlast opponents when sparring. My alcohol tolerance is expensively high. I run, bike and swim long distances for fun. I do not tire under normal circumstances, but it's not like I'm an ultra marathoner or a professional fighter.
Intelligence 15: I enjoy knowing a lot about a lot. Online tests are garbage, but any cognitive test I've ever taken for work, school and otherwise says, 'dude, you're way smarter than you look.' People who know me regularly turn to me for academic knowledge and to help them with reasoning problems. I'm very quick to grok new ideas, and am rapidly able to teach concepts that I've just learned.
Wisdom 13: People who know me regularly turn to me for advice and to help them think through life problems. I read people very, very well. I don't lose my cool, and I make rational decisions. I have excellent vision, strong attention to detail, and selective hearing. ;) All the same, my willpower is not what I'd like it to be, and I can be easily distracted by something more entertaining than what I'm currently doing.
Charisma 15: I get people. After a short conversation, I understand someone's motivations and unspoken needs with impressive accuracy. In group settings, most people naturally look to me for leadership. I excel at mediating disputes and helping people see reasonable alternatives. I'm much more comfortable in a second-in-command role than taking the alpha position, but if I'm pressed to the lead I perform confidently and very naturally motivate the people around me. I'm a comfortably good-looking, very tall man, obviously in good health, and always portray myself as optimistic and upbeat. I quickly make it obvious that I genuinely care about whoever I'm talking with and would like to help them if I'm able. People respond well to me, and even people who position themselves against me have trouble sustaining any anger toward me.

Yanisa

2014-03-13, 04:16 PM

Keep in mind that 18 is most definitely not the upper limit for human stats, and certainly not in the modern world where mechanical, chemical, biological and other enhancements are so readily available.

Well technically in DnD it is possible to have a "normal human" with with the following abilities: 34, 29, 29, 29, 29, 29.
But then we are talking bout a level 20 perfect man with full decked out magic items. (Base 18 + 6 enchantment + 5 inherent and one ability gets +5 from levels.)

In real life and according your statement we are talking about some cybernetically, genetically and chemically enhanced mutant super elite soldier. I don't think our average forum poster would even be cybernetically, genetically or chemically enhanced in one ability score, let alone 2 or more. :smalltongue:

OverdrivePrime

2014-03-13, 04:50 PM

Well technically in DnD it is possible to have a "normal human" with with the following abilities: 34, 29, 29, 29, 29, 29.
But then we are talking bout a level 20 perfect man with full decked out magic items. (Base 18 + 6 enchantment + 5 inherent and one ability gets +5 from levels.)

In real life and according your statement we are talking about some cybernetically, genetically and chemically enhanced mutant super elite soldier. I don't think our average forum poster would even be cybernetically, genetically or chemically enhanced in one ability score, let alone 2 or more. :smalltongue:

Eh, you'd be surprised. Certainly not the average poster, but we're not talking about average people here. We have a surprising amount of body builders, athletes and military personnel on these forums. These groups are known for use of chemical enhancement, though I certainly won't go around accusing anyone in particular. We also have a number of scientists and competitive academics, groups who are increasingly turning to intelligence boosters to improve their output and competitiveness.

Personally, I'm on a very common thyroid hormone replacement drug due to having my thyroid removed few years back. If I were to increase my dosage by 15% for a month (easily done), I could self-induce a mild state of hyperthyroidism, which despite a few drawbacks, can help with things like reaction time and fast-twitch activities.

Legal chemical enhancement is pretty easily to come by for boosting strength, endurance and cognitive agility (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nootropic). Prices have come down and availability has gone up. Cologne and perfume have been commonplace for centuries. It's more of a trick to find one that doesn't repel people (I'm looking at you, Axe), but the right scent to enhance your natural pheromones can make a remarkable difference in social interaction.

There are a number of medical treatments available to the general public that 15 years ago would have seem like they were cribbed from Shadowrun. Teflon joint coating? We're there. Enhanced lung capacity? Can do.

And while I know a number of people that qualify as 'bionic', I don't think that most of them are stronger or faster than they were before they got their mechanical parts put in. Still, they're quite a lot more mobile than they were before their injuries.

Ionsniper

2014-03-13, 04:51 PM

Darkz0r

2014-03-13, 05:11 PM

http://www.easydamus.com/character.html

I took this quiz to figure out my stats and class based on my real life personality. I thought it was fairly accurate.

Paladin 2/Sorcerer 2

Str:13
Dex:16
Con:15
Int:18
Wis:17
Cha:14

I read and debate alot of Philosophy and plus Im always building things so my int would be up there. I work out a bit but not enough to make too much difference.

Lol @ that test!!

True Neutral Halfling Fighter/Wizard (2nd/2nd Level)

Ability Scores:
Strength- 11
Dexterity- 12
Constitution- 11
Intelligence- 15
Wisdom- 16
Charisma- 17

Halfling, WHY? Hahah, I'm tall ffs.
I'd say it's an ok result though, but I'd change my cha to 16 and raise my int to 16.
I'm being very realistic about it though. These numbers are too subjective...

TrueJordan

2014-03-13, 05:46 PM

And don't forget circumstance modifiers!

What would those be? I guess over the internet you'd get a bonus.

Just a note, if you have a con of 10 or more, it means you can run around 10 mph for over a minute (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/movement.htm)
And I don't think that many people can do it.

I think I'd be 11s for Wis and Cha, with maybe a 13 or 14 in Int and Con, and a 9 in strength and dex.

Immabozo

2014-03-13, 06:01 PM

Seer_of_Heart

2014-03-13, 06:04 PM

I'm not an outstanding individual I'd estimate my stats are all pretty low :smallsigh:.

Str-7
Dex-8
Con-7
Int-9
Wis-7
Cha-6

Zweisteine

2014-03-13, 10:25 PM

These scales are horribly inaccurate. For example, almost nobody should have an 18, and you seem to have three actors above 20.

The best test of strength is to test how much is the absolute maximum you can pick up an stumble around with, and look at the encumbrance charts.

As you said dexterity isn't easy to measure. Your best bet is to compare ourself to others, and throw a guess out. Unless you're particularly clumsy or agile (only before any training you may have had), you'll probably have a 10 or an 11.

Constitution isn't so way to measure. The average maximum amount of time in a day you can maintain a steady walk (30ft/6sec) can be compared to rolls for a forced march, but there aren't many good tests for that.

Intelligence does NOT map directly to IQ. Sure, it looks convenient, but it's not so simple. I tried doing the math out to make a chart, but I had to give up. A 10 or 11 probably maps out to an IQ of 90-110 or 85-115, though the frequency of those values do not align.

Wisdom is the hardest to measure. Look at your senses, and at how good you are at figuring other people out, maybe.

Charisma is mostly force of personality. See how naturally "charming" you are, and how much people are drawn to you.

Above all, remember that most of your scores should be around 10 or 11, and without extensive training, most people won't have anything beyond a 13. The absurd smartest people among us probably don't have intelligence above a 22 (base 18, +1 levels, +3 age). Higher strength scores are probably more common, because strength is more easily trained into someone (muscles!), but an 18 is still incredibly rare.
The people with 18 charisma are the coolest, most sociable people out there (or they aren't sociable, an they wish they had less charisma). Maybe you made 20 acquaintances in a week, but your charisma might be "only" 10.
More often than not, though, our real-life skills are based on just that—skills. If you're really math-smart, you probably have ranks in Knowledge (math). If you are a great gymnast, you have ranks in balance, jump, and tumble. If you frequent the TO boards, you might have ranks in Knowledge (RPGs) or in Craft (cheese).

I'd say I look like this (without any of the tests from the OP or from above):
Strength 8-9
Dexterity 9-10
Constitution 9-10
Intelligence 13 (maybe 14)
Wisdom 10-11
Charisma 8-10

OldTrees1

2014-03-13, 10:31 PM

Above all, remember that most of your scores should be around 10 or 11, and without extensive training, most people won't have anything beyond a 13. The absurd smartest people among us probably don't have intelligence above a 22 (base 18, +1 levels, +3 age). Higher strength scores are probably more common, because strength is more easily trained into someone (muscles!), but an 18 is still incredibly rare.

I'd say I look like this (without any of the tests from the OP or from above):
Strength 8-9
Dexterity 9-10
Constitution 9-10
Intelligence 13 (maybe 14)
Wisdom 10-11
Charisma 8-10

I completely agree with your post.
Although I question your pessimistic self evaluation. Wis 12-13 seems more reasonable

Zweisteine

2014-03-13, 10:37 PM

My words are in green.

Paladin 2/Sorcerer 2
You have no magical abilities. I can personally guarantee that.

Str:13 That's quite strong.
Dex:16 You must be an incredible gymnast.
Con:15 And incredibly tough...
Int:18 Now this is getting silly.
Wis:17 Nobody has two scores that high.
Cha:14 Better, but not much.
With ability scores like those, you would be a celebrity of sorts. You'd be famous for being famous for a lot of stuff.

I read and debate alot of Philosophy and plus Im always building things so my int would be up there. I work out a bit but not enough to make too much difference.
So you have ranks in Knowledge (philosophy), maybe diplomacy (to debate), and possibly Craft.
Working out "not enough to make a difference" is probably enough to keep you at a stable strength of 10 or 11, no higher.

Conclusion: Online tests are not effective measures of abilities. They are made to roughly model you as an adventurer using stereotypical character archetypes and high-power point buys.

EDIT:
Oldtrees, I wouldn't say my self-evaluation was too pessimistic. Well, I'd probably put my Con at 10, not 9... I put in the low guesses to compensate for any bias I had to overrate myself.
And my wisdom isn't probably that high. Maybe I've got 12, but I'd say 11. Some of the things wisdom covers I can do quite well (listen), other things, not so much (read people).

Sir Chuckles

2014-03-13, 10:41 PM

Another big thing that I see in these is that many people just interpret the stats strangely.
"I work out and keep a good figure, and people think I'm attractive. So my Charisma must be high!"

Bleh.

OldTrees1

2014-03-13, 10:49 PM

Oldtrees, I wouldn't say my self-evaluation was too pessimistic. Well, I'd probably put my Con at 10, not 9... I put in the low guesses to compensate for any bias I had to overrate myself.
And my wisdom isn't probably that high. Maybe I've got 12, but I'd say 11. Some of the things wisdom covers I can do quite well (listen), other things, not so much (read people).

I was basing it on the assumption that the vast majority have a total ability modifier of +0 (15 point buy) and you are generally well reasoned which takes both Int and Wis.

However I would not say you were too pessimistic, just reasonably pessimistic to account for bias.

Ziegander

2014-03-14, 12:00 AM

My words are in green.

Str 13 is not "quite strong." It means you can bench 150lbs and hit slightly harder than an average human being. There are hundreds of millions of people in the world that are this strong.

Dex 16 does not mean someone is a great gymnast. Aren't you the one that brought up skill points? Without investing any skill points, all that +3 modifier means is that you are 15% more accurate with ranged weapons, have 15% better hand-eye coordination, and 15% better reflexes than your average joe. Millions of people in the world are this dextrous.

Con 15 may well be considered incredibly tough, though I'd liken it a lot more to just "tough." If we're going by fluffy denominators like this 12-13 might be hardy, 14-15 might be tough, 16-17 might be incredibly tough, and 18+ might be "invincible."

Int 18 is not beyond the realm of possibility. It essentially equates to IQ 155-160, and while that's a bit smarter than me, there are still millions and millions of such people in the world.

Wis 17, I will agree these abilities all do seem to be getting consistently high, but what did you expect? He used an online test, and acknowledged the results as not really being serious. Oh, and I think he's well aware that he doesn't have magical powers. What on earth made you think it was actually necessary to point that out to anyone?

Cha 14, seriously, there are hundreds of millions of people in the world with a Charisma score this high. Or, hell, if you're going to be such a stick in the mud about "realism," ability scores aren't real, nor were they ever meant to be fully based in reality. D&D is a game. It cannot fully and faithfully integrate every aspect of real life into quantifiable data. Some amount of handwaving and nonsense is to be expected. The game is supposed to be fun after all.

Your basic argument just seems to be nothing more than, "everyone is average. anyone who attempts to tell me otherwise is a either charlatan and a shameless liar, or an utterly, pitifully, self-deluded fool." No. I'm sorry, that doesn't apply to reality. Sometimes, some people have disabilities, physical and/or mental. Other times, other people are exceptional.

squiggit

2014-03-14, 12:03 AM

Str/Con/Dex/Int/Wis/Cha.... 10/8/6/14/12/8 I think. Maybe only a 12 or 13 on int.

Drelua

2014-03-14, 12:09 AM

Yeah, I've taken that easydamus test a few times in the past. It often gives vastly inflated numbers, even going so far as to include multiple 19s. The questions are just too vague and relative for even two physically identical people to get the same set of physical scores. Also, calling someone out that directly on the scores given them by an online test, when they openly stated that they believe them to be inaccurate, is kind of not cool. While your opinion on what certain stats represent is as valid as that of anyone else, statements that to me read as telling someone that their opinion is wrong are not.

That said, there's a good chance you didn't intend to come across as being so blunt as you did, to me at least, and I hope I haven't made that same mistake here, as I often have. :smallsmile:

Kazyan

2014-03-14, 12:16 AM

Str: 8
Dex: 10
Con: 7
Int: 16
Wis: 4
Cha: 9

I don't lift. 80 lb. sounds about right for my maximum load.

Nothing notable one way or another in terms of dexterity, though I used to be uncoordinated as a kid, so, calling it the lower end of average.

Occasional mild illness/sniffles, absence of cardio. No disabilities or anything, but health oddities? Yep.

I have some fairly impressive Int-related feats (not that kind of feat) to my credit, so I'm not afraid to say 16 here.

I miss perceptual things all the time, am rather weak-willed, and I get lost or confused way too easily.

I'm not necessarily likeable, but not particularly disliked, either. Introvert and unconfident, though.

Abbul

2014-03-14, 12:51 AM

Only read a few posts, but based on the Str thing in the OP my strength a couple years ago was 31-32. I like the sound of that :P

But really, based on overhead press which is what one of the load things is based off in DnD (I think heavy load is most you can lift overhead?) I figured it to be like 16 or so? I could be off. My bench was 315, and overhead press just over 200 so whatever that would translate to.

Also, it should be noted that Strength does not translate to unarmed accuracy for everyone ha. Unless I took the Weapon Finesse feat and wrongly apply it :/

Immabozo

2014-03-14, 12:58 AM

You have no magical abilities. I can personally guarantee that.

Have you slept with him? Some women may contest this point. Just saying.

Immabozo

2014-03-14, 01:00 AM

Only read a few posts, but based on the Str thing in the OP my strength a couple years ago was 31-32. I like the sound of that :P

But really, based on overhead press which is what one of the load things is based off in DnD (I think heavy load is most you can lift overhead?) I figured it to be like 16 or so? I could be off. My bench was 315, and overhead press just over 200 so whatever that would translate to.

I am officially impressed my friend. I am working out every day, and I am only about a third that

KnotKnormal

2014-03-14, 01:05 AM

STR:13 (can only bench about 100lbs but i get all my strength from my legs)
DEX:12 (reflexes leave something to be desired, but I'm a natural marksman)
CON:15 (rarely get sick, can keep a pace for a good distance)
INT:16 (162 IQ)
WIS:10 (commonly fail spot and listen checks, but i know tomatoes don't go in a fruit salad)
CHA:11 (fairly well liked, good with acting, role-playing, lying, accents,etc.)

of course I'm going of a strict 1-20 range. 1 being elderly with some sort of disease depending on the stat. 20 being world class athlete or thinker, again depending on the stat. if you want details on the scale let me know.

Rakaydos

2014-03-14, 01:36 AM

My Con is 12 base, with a +5 Inherent bonus (army) and a +1 from 4th level
My Strength is 11 base, with a +5 Inherent bonus (army)
My Dex is 12
My Int is 14
My wis is 8
My charisma is 8.

Manly Man

2014-03-14, 01:44 AM

Strength: 12 or 13. My arms aren't incredibly strong all by themselves, but I got some mean legs, definitely. Mostly because I use my legs for all my lifting anyway, as one's body was pretty much made to do.

Dexterity: 13. While I can't dance for squat (the main problem being that I've never really wanted to dance much anyway, and so don't really know how), many folks have described my movements in general as "catlike", and I'm pretty damn good at both catching and throwing things.

Constitution: Around 14, or maybe a 13 with a bonus to specific saves (disease and fatigue, to be specific). I can go foreeever on a bike, even with substantial bits being uphill, and as long as the pace is steady, I can work on a lot of stuff for hours on end. It takes me damn near being quarantined with someone to catch a disease, and walking for miles is no problem for me at all. On top of that is a respectable pain tolerance.

And yet, for some weird reason, running very much gets me tired quickly. :smallannoyed:

Intelligence: 15. In spite of how people have told me, I'm not exactly a genius, but I know I'm a helluva lot more intelligent than not.

Wisdom: 10, probably. Not exactly good at much of the other stuff related to it, like, at all, but things more directly related to my senses, such as listening or searching, come easily enough to me.

Charisma:13. I don't actively seek friends, and yet I end up with a bunch of them anyway, and I'm not going to lie in that I'm a bit of a pretty boy in real life. I've also got a way with words to be charming, mostly so that I don't have to dance with them instead and show that I somehow have the grace of a three-legged goat when I'm on the dance floor.

Captnq

2014-03-14, 02:09 AM

Lets see...

Str: 15 - By the chart, I have carried humans to safety repeatedly. This was their weight range.
Dex: 8 - Nerve damage. I cannot draw a straight line.
Con: 18 - I've had my face sewn back on and survived more beatings then you can imagine. I got more metal holding my skull together then wolverine. Survived a 36 hour coma. I have stayed awake for 100 hours straight, I have walked 30 miles in 8 hours. Frankly, I'm a master at enduring pain. It's what I do.
Int: 16 - By IQ I'm brilliant.
Wis: 6 - By RL, I'm an idiot.
Chr: 6 - I'm ugly and have this tendency to simply tell people the truth, so my personality sucks.

Class: Expert: 4.

Jeff the Green

2014-03-14, 02:36 AM

Strength 6 (I have a hard time lifting more than 50 lb. over my head, though my lower body is stronger)
Dexterity 6 (You do not want to see me dance)
Constitution 7 (I have asthma and fibromyalgia, though I rarely get communicable illnesses so I must have some miscellaneous Fortitude bonuses; I do however get a +2 alchemical bonus to Constitution checks to avoid the ill effects of exercise if I use my inhaler :smalltongue:)
Intelligence 18 (IQ ~140, plus similar percentile a on things like standardized tests, SATs, and GREs)
Wisdom 5 (Nearsighted, oblivious, and largely unable to tell when someone's flirting with me)
Charisma 13 (I'm a decent leader, persuasive, a good performer and, I'm told, charming enough when I'm not too sociophobic to interact with others)

(So I could be an enchanter, I suppose.)

Expert 3, with various iterations of Skill Focus (Knowledge), and ranks in the same, Decipher Script, Diplomacy, Swim, Perform (sing), Perform (strings), Perform (oratory), and Perform (act)

Knaight

2014-03-14, 02:57 AM

1 Str = each 10 pounds you can bench
1 dex = try your best to gauge it
1 con = the ability to bicycle 1 mile in a day
1 Int = 10 IQ
1 wis = try your best to gauge it
1 cha = try your best to gauge it

A lot of these seem iffy, largely because of the linear extrapolation. D&D actually has exponential growth for strength - though it still works out really weirdly - using different metrics (drag rules, encumberance limits, etc.) puts me at anywhere from about 8-16, tending towards the high end, which is funny, because I'm not actually that strong (excepting leg strength).

For instance, regarding where these break down:

Strength: Eric Spoto is the current world record bench press holder. By your system, he has strength 72. Actual D&D carrying capacities put this as closer to 20.

Constitution: The average length of a stage in the Tour De France is approximately 100 miles. The ones that are actually reasonably flat, and not involving things like mountains go well above that. Moreover, this is done almost every day for almost a month, with the occasional rest day (where a 40-60 mile ride probably still happens); any Tour De France racer could go well past that. By your system, they are in the hundreds. 300+ is entirely reasonable, assuming fairly flat terrain, and this is in one go.

That said, the 8-10 figure seems really odd to me, for a real life standard. Even if I assume that this is for one ride and not one day, it seems low. I'm no paragon of stamina, and tend to get winded pretty quickly while running. I also hit 20-30 miles in a day just going to school a few years ago, with 7, 9, and 5 mile individual stretches (house to campus 1, campus 1 to campus 2, and campus 2 to house, respectively). These weren't exactly difficult, and I usually did them with no water, often after having not eaten anything for a solid 12 hours. I can also do a 100 mile ride in 1 stretch, though doing that for multiple days in a row isn't happening. Sure, I bike rather a lot, but I find it really hard to believe that I can bike ten times as far as the average person. It gets worse as applied to D&D - there is no way I have over 100 con. For one thing, that implies 20 minutes of breath holding, by which point I'd have drowned multiple times over.

Intelligence: IQ is a pretty terrible measure to begin with. IQ tests can be studied with, there's a whole bunch that ties into intelligence that they don't measure, there are multiple competing IQ standards, and the same person taking an IQ test can vary highly based on things like how hungry they are. Moreover, they were never intended to work with people significantly above average, and were specifically aimed at those far enough below for it to be a medical condition. The veracity is really sketchy even at the societal level, where individual variation is at least mitigated by lots of different people taking the test, at the individual level it is useless. But, lets say it isn't - in D&D you can have an intelligence of 3 and still be largely functional, as a -4 penalty isn't that huge with the d20 system. IQ 30, treating IQ as if it works? Capacity for literacy is questionable, proper functioning within society ludicrous.

SiuiS

2014-03-14, 03:39 AM

In DnD 10,5 is the average

10.5 is the average of the attribute range, but not necessarily the attribute of the average person.

and most humans have a 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 and 13. So both 6 and 16 are rare exceptions, mostly found under heroic characters, like us.

About three in five have the nonelite array. The other two in five have the elite array of 15,14,13,12,10,8. Let's see.

Sum of elite array is 15+14+13+12+10+8=72, double that for 144.
The nonelite array is 13+12+11+10+9+8=63, triple for 189.
144+189=333, and of the five people we have a total o six attributes for thirty, and 333 / 30 = 11.1, with a round down rule.

So by that, the expected stat of an average person is 11.

It's that oddity in dnd that at one side they say 1 in 216 people have 18 strength, but at the otherside say the your average commoner cannot hope for anything higher then 13.

D&D doesn't actually say that; we are talking specifically 3.5 where the odds of having an 18 stat are 1 in 100 (actually better) because by the rules you're not rolling 3d6. Additionally, the flavor text ("only a very few ever break out of the low range of average!") is not actually part of the game; the rules (4d6k3, 1.62% chance of 18 attribute) is.

Einstein, and Hitler all may have had 18s in Int and Cha respectively, but with athletes it is more likely that they just have feats to improve skills than just straight 18s.

Raw talent breakdowns attribute an 18 for the math to play out right. These aren't mutually exclusive; Einstein had the best equipment, Aid Another, probably skill focus, but he still had that +4 from attribute.

For mental stats, it's much more difficult, here I'd rather do it the other way round, and go with the IQ percentiles and compare them with the odds to roll that score on 3d6. For Wis and Cha, we have to guess a little but can keep the percentiles in mind.

No. 4d6, drop lowest. Not 3d6.

Also, fun fact; because averaging accounts for men, they don't get a bump. The average man being stronger than the average woman would mean the average woman is very weak (still six point difference) or not as much weaker as thought. "Average male" is the benchmark that people set the 10.5 at, becauE when they think average human they think male.

It doesn't become no longer true for D&D. But what, is 12 what the d20 books consider average? If so, just add 2 to all the numbers I listed. It is still unreasonable to put a stat at something like 23.

It's true that an eighteen being two SD away from actual average is three SD away from actual average? The standard deviation on stat rolls in 3.5 is 2.85, right?

But most people that eat meat overeat it to the point that it is unhealthy. We didn't evolve eating meat at every meal or even every day.

Conversely, those who do eat meat every day aren't nearly as bad off as this rubric would predict (http://discovermagazine.com/2004/oct/inuit-paradox). There is no easy answer for health; there is no One Little Secret unless you're grossly generalizing.

In which case, "eat less, move more", "lift heavy things" and "the best way to get good and is five sets of stop eating so much crap". :smalltongue:

most Americans dont know portion control. Anything is unhealthy in large enough amounts

Word. A serving of meat is 4oz. And the response is "four ounces? I won't get full off of that!" And somehow it's missed that the rest of your meal is vegetables starch, fluids, vitamins.

Volumetrics helps. So does snacking.

These scales are horribly inaccurate. For example, almost nobody should have an 18

Why?

I am officially impressed my friend. I am working out every day, and I am only about a third that

Diet change might help? I hear that's the usual success story when one of us gets to the point that no amount of exercise actually increases our strength.

Artillery

2014-03-14, 04:26 AM

What would those be? I guess over the internet you'd get a bonus.

Just a note, if you have a con of 10 or more, it means you can run around 10 mph for over a minute (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/movement.htm)
And I don't think that many people can do it.

I think I'd be 11s for Wis and Cha, with maybe a 13 or 14 in Int and Con, and a 9 in strength and dex.

I'm built more like a distance runner. Really skinny, stronger and lighter than most people expect. I'm very light for my height, 59kg at 174cm.

16 STR - according to d&d math for my legs, around a 13 for bench presses
15 DEX - Parkour and martial arts make you good with this
?? CON - What does running a half-marathon in 2 hours get you?
16 INT - Character test
15 WIS - Character test
13 CHA - character test

I am apparently Lawful Neutral Wizard 2/Sorcerer 1.
In high school I was the guy on the robotics team who ran cross country, my strength is probably lower now due to doing mostly just running at school and less power stuff. Jogging to school in -20f temperatures does beef up your constitution.

Zytil

2014-03-14, 05:06 AM

Str: 4: Based on heavy load carrying capacity rules.
Dex: 10: Average. Nothing special here. Moving on.
Con: 4: Possibly lower than this. My record for maintaining reasonable physical activity is 5 minutes, after which i collapse.
Int: 18: I'm intelligent. Honestly, i doubt that this forum has many people below 14 int.
Wis: 8: Definitely have a penalty here, the only wis based skill i can use is sense motive.
Cha: 10: Mediocre for everything except bluff, which i am decent at. Skill points. Eh.

Frozen_Feet

2014-03-14, 09:55 AM

Of all stats, Strenght and Intelligence are easiest to map.

Strenght, because D&D rules give explicit weights, in real-world weight units, that you have to be able to lift above your head and off the ground. In fact, going back, 1st Ed AD&D even specified how you have to lift a burden above your head: military press. So we can derive Strenght from simple military press and deadlift results, either averaging them or using the worse result to compare with carrying capacity chart. It should also be noted that the carrying capacity chart was reverse-engineered from real life weight-lifting and fitness charts, so this result is going to be pretty reliable.

I can lift 50 kg (110 lbs.) in a military press, and deadlift 110 kg (242 lbs.). Both of these place my strenght at 11.

Intelligence, because it measures primarily logical thinking, memory, and linguistic ability. It is graded along a bell curve. IQ also primarily measures logical thinking, memory, and linguistic ability, and is graded along a bell curve. Furthermore, 1st ed AD&D DMG flat-out said D&D Intelligence is comparable to IQ. So we know the authorial intent was for these values to be of comparable nature. As such, it is fairly trivial to map certain IQ ranges to certain values on the 3d6 roll, through comparing the bell curves.

My IQ is 91th percentile, or 121 using standard deviation of 15. If I recall the curve right, this places my Intelligence at low end of 15.

Dexterity and Constitution are complicated. They both suffer from lack of good benchmarks. We know what they stand for in D&D (armor class, saves etc.), but have almost no way to map those things to traits measurable in real life. Don't get me wrong - we have a huge amount of tests for measuring lung capacity, reaction time, health etc. - but nowhere in the rules is it even hinted at, for example, what reaction time +4 Initiative simulates, or what the save DC against common cold is.

Because of this, measuring Dexterity and Constitution are crapshoots. A standard reaction time test would be a good measure for the former, and a 12 minute running test for the latter. At this point, I have no good idea of what results would map to which scores. My reaction times are average, so I'd say my Dexterity is average as well, so I'll place it at 10. I can run 2800 meters in 12 minutes, or average of 76.55 feet per round for 120 rounds. I'm fairly sure it's possible to calculate my likely Constitution based on that, but I'm running out of time so I can't do that now.

Wisdom and Charisma are the hardest to map, because they don't have standardized benchmark tets in real-life. We know roughly what these abilities mean in both D&D and real life, but have no way to accurately measure them. When people cry "IQ isn't a good indicator of real-life intelligence!", what they often actually mean is "IQ doesn't measure Wisdom and Charisma". IQ is a perfect tool for measuring the primary traits of D&D intelligence, because they're the same: memory, logic, linguistics.

But neither IQ nor D&D Intelligence measure instinct, willpower, personal magnetism, social skills or sensory perception. There are many real-life tests that could be used to gain some insight to some of these invidual traits, but again, we have no instructions in D&D rules how to map them to ability scores. We don't know if being near-sighted influences Wisdom or by how much, and we don't know if a high score on autism or psychopathy checklists gives you a penalty; so on and so forth.

As such, at this point I'm not going to give scores for either Wisdom or Charisma. I'm open to suggestions on how to map them.

Immabozo

2014-03-14, 04:37 PM

Diet change might help? I hear that's the usual success story when one of us gets to the point that no amount of exercise actually increases our strength.

Oh, I eat extremely healthy. The problem was that I have never worked out on a regular basis before and used to be heavy. So I am starting from scratch. But thanks for the help!

Of all stats, Strenght and Intelligence are easiest to map.

Strenght, because D&D rules give explicit weights, in real-world weight units, that you have to be able to lift above your head and off the ground. In fact, going back, 1st Ed AD&D even specified how you have to lift a burden above your head: military press. So we can derive Strenght from simple military press and deadlift results, either averaging them or using the worse result to compare with carrying capacity chart. It should also be noted that the carrying capacity chart was reverse-engineered from real life weight-lifting and fitness charts, so this result is going to be pretty reliable.

I can lift 50 kg (110 lbs.) in a military press, and deadlift 110 kg (242 lbs.). Both of these place my strenght at 11.

Intelligence, because it measures primarily logical thinking, memory, and linguistic ability. It is graded along a bell curve. IQ also primarily measures logical thinking, memory, and linguistic ability, and is graded along a bell curve. Furthermore, 1st ed AD&D DMG flat-out said D&D Intelligence is comparable to IQ. So we know the authorial intent was for these values to be of comparable nature. As such, it is fairly trivial to map certain IQ ranges to certain values on the 3d6 roll, through comparing the bell curves.

My IQ is 91th percentile, or 121 using standard deviation of 15. If I recall the curve right, this places my Intelligence at low end of 15.

Dexterity and Constitution are complicated. They both suffer from lack of good benchmarks. We know what they stand for in D&D (armor class, saves etc.), but have almost no way to map those things to traits measurable in real life. Don't get me wrong - we have a huge amount of tests for measuring lung capacity, reaction time, health etc. - but nowhere in the rules is it even hinted at, for example, what reaction time +4 Initiative simulates, or what the save DC against common cold is.

Because of this, measuring Dexterity and Constitution are crapshoots. A standard reaction time test would be a good measure for the former, and a 12 minute running test for the latter. At this point, I have no good idea of what results would map to which scores. My reaction times are average, so I'd say my Dexterity is average as well, so I'll place it at 10. I can run 2800 meters in 12 minutes, or average of 76.55 feet per round for 120 rounds. I'm fairly sure it's possible to calculate my likely Constitution based on that, but I'm running out of time so I can't do that now.

Wisdom and Charisma are the hardest to map, because they don't have standardized benchmark tets in real-life. We know roughly what these abilities mean in both D&D and real life, but have no way to accurately measure them. When people cry "IQ isn't a good indicator of real-life intelligence!", what they often actually mean is "IQ doesn't measure Wisdom and Charisma". IQ is a perfect tool for measuring the primary traits of D&D intelligence, because they're the same: memory, logic, linguistics.

But neither IQ nor D&D Intelligence measure instinct, willpower, personal magnetism, social skills or sensory perception. There are many real-life tests that could be used to gain some insight to some of these invidual traits, but again, we have no instructions in D&D rules how to map them to ability scores. We don't know if being near-sighted influences Wisdom or by how much, and we don't know if a high score on autism or psychopathy checklists gives you a penalty; so on and so forth.

As such, at this point I'm not going to give scores for either Wisdom or Charisma. I'm open to suggestions on how to map them.

Spoilered for ease of reading.

You have some great points!

I think wis and cha would have to be more relative. How much more or less wise or charismatic are you than the average?

Jeff the Green

2014-03-14, 04:44 PM

Oh, I eat extremely healthy. The problem was that I have never worked out on a regular basis before and used to be heavy. So I am starting from scratch. But thanks for the help!

Have you gotten someone to help you develop a varied routine? A lot of strength is the extraneous muscles recruited to help the main ones, and they don't necessarily get exercised enough without specific routines to develop them. It's part of why my strength is so poor: my biceps (for example) aren't tiny, but the back muscles I need to support them during curls have a bunch of scar tissue in them from surgery so it's hard to lift things.

Sewercop

2014-03-14, 05:04 PM

But I am EXTREMELY talented with my words. I have stopped a drunken fight, while both were yelling challenges at each other, with only my words, stopped ex-boyfriends from ruining their ex's birthday and starting a fight many times, I did have someone point a gun at my head, granted it was not with the invent to harm me, but I talked my way out of that one just fine.
!

Id call that profession Bartender :D
Sounds like a bad day at work in my experience.

Immabozo

2014-03-14, 05:49 PM

Have you gotten someone to help you develop a varied routine? A lot of strength is the extraneous muscles recruited to help the main ones, and they don't necessarily get exercised enough without specific routines to develop them. It's part of why my strength is so poor: my biceps (for example) aren't tiny, but the back muscles I need to support them during curls have a bunch of scar tissue in them from surgery so it's hard to lift things.

I am working with my father and he is somewhat knowledgeable. We do vary it quite a bit, I also ride my bike a lot. So that's more exercise.

My strength in, at least pounds I can lift, has close to doubled in 3 months.

As a thought, I am a massage therapist. I have a regular client that also has a lot of scarring in his back (from dislocating not one, but both arms) and a good therapist, that knows their way around deep tissue massage, will do wonders for your back. Trust me.

Mrc.

2014-03-14, 06:45 PM

I am working with my father and he is somewhat knowledgeable. We do vary it quite a bit, I also ride my bike a lot. So that's more exercise.

Sleep. Try getting more sleep, it may help. As these arguments tend to become circular as people either devise their own scores from personal, albeit biased, experience, or use online tests that give inaccurate results, could we try something different? To help us all get a more qualitative set of data by which to base our value off, I suggest we pick a person in real life, preferably one that most people know a lot about, and try to assign them scores. Then, next time someone says "I've clearly got an 18 in every stat" we can turn around and go "O Rly?"

Buufreak

2014-03-14, 06:49 PM

str 10
dex 9
con 30
int 14
wis 20
cha 35

Seems rather accurate, I have great stamina, do lots of cardio, almost never get sick and I recover quickly, just started working out and I am benching about 100 pounds, I am very smart, far smarter than the average. I have picked up some secrets and seen the way the world works and my advice, particularly on women and relationships, health, food and friends, seem to hold pretty well. Finally, people like me, which I figure gives me a bonus, I get along with most everyone. I have even had fathers and brothers tell me that I should, or ask me to date their daughters/sisters and encourage daughters/sisters to break up with their boyfriends and date me. Which I figure is a serious bonus. I am also very outgoing, never shy and can be very persuasive, giving me another bonus.

So what are your stats?

Seriously? You are gauging the ability to be a vulture and a douche as your only basis for high charisma? If that is the case, mine is NI.

1 HD humans have between 0 and 18 in physical stats and between 3 and 21 mental stats.

So it is silly to assume you have more than 20 in a stat.

Personally (using D&D as the metric rather than the OP's metric)
Str: Used to be 7, now probably 6.
Dex: 8
Con: 6? Hard to estimate (I have +fort vs some things and -fort vs other things)
Int: 13
Wis: 14
Cha: 12

FAR more accurate measurements.

Str: 11. Definitely not strong, but can carry my own and do some lifting. Daniel Tosh said it best as "skinny fat."
Dex: 10, Horrible aim, but I never trip ever and have great balance.
Con: 10, More of a sprinter than marathon runner.
Int: 17, Been tested, IQ is about rather high.
Wis: 13, Thinking this might be a bit of a measure of common sense and religious-ness?
Cha: 17. Okay, really thought about this one. One shining moment comes to mind, when I convinced someone that a blatantly chaotic evil character (not DnD) was actually lawful good because of the way I described his methods and tactics.

Sylthia

2014-03-14, 07:37 PM

How the heck do you get 35 Cha, that's practically a god in D&D terms.

For me

Str: 10 (probably, I don't really lift weights, but I'm strong enough to help move furniture)
Dex:~14 (I figure it's above average. It has to be. I'm a surgeon)
Con:~12 (I don't get sick that often, but I have asthma)
Int: 15-18 (it's hard to say this without sounding immodest, or an arrogant jerk. If every 10 points of IQ gets you a point, I'm 15. I have a doctoral degree, and was admitted to Phi Beta Kappa, so Int is my highest)
Wis: ~9-10 (I can be a bit absent minded at times)
Cha: 10 (I can be socially awkward, but I can also deal with patients when needed, so I guess it averages out.)

Frozen_Feet

2014-03-15, 06:46 PM

I think wis and cha would have to be more relative. How much more or less wise or charismatic are you than the average?

There are no good known averages to compare to. That's the problem. Longer explanation, to give an example:

Militaries tend to include various tests to gauge leadership potential. Furthermore, all applicants are also scored by professional staff.

I can't give you details for FDF tests (non-disclosure agreement), but for example, I was graded systematically above average by staff (on a scale from 1 to 5, all scores 3 or better) in leadership qualities, but below average by my underlings (on the same scale, all scores between 2 and 3). My initial score after basic training was strictly average. So on that basis, we could guess my Wis and Cha to be around 10 or 11.

But, these tests weren't designed to rate abilities in isolation - indeed, they rate all of them. The score gained after basic training is influenced by fitness records, marksmanship test results, intelligence and personality test results, professional opinion and peer/conscript opinion.

Of course, they do include some degree of breakdown of how the score is gained, but as noted, I can't give details, and it would not be possible to subject all posters here to the same testing.

Additionally: of all conscripts in an age cohort, only 30% are chosen for non-commissioned officer and officer training. Theoritically this means reservoir NCOs like me should be 70th percentile or up, and reservoir COs 90th percentile and up. In practice, this of course isn't so for multiple reasons:

age cohorts vary in make-up. For example, as a long-term trend, fitness records have been declining towards the present. In practice, this means newer conscripts have less Strenght and Constitution on average than they used to.
age cohorts are not evenly distributed among garrisons and troop units. Some units are de facto elite, while others get the bottom of the bunch as a rule. This means a mere corporal in a good troop unit might be of equivalent ability to a lieutenant in a weaker unit.
Some people are relieved of service because of sex, lifestyle, mental and physical health. This selection process means vastly below average inviduals are not let into the army in the first place.

As such, it's very hard to tell if I was selected for my position because I was 70th percentile of all people, or just 70th percentile of my troop unit. It's entirely possible my Wisdom and Charisma are considerably above average, but it's just as possible for them to be average, or even below average.

For example, let's entertain the idea that my troop unit was one of those bottom-of-the-bunch ones. If the average Wis and Cha were 7, I could've been made an NCO with scores around 9 just because I was best out of bad options. This happens and we know it happens. Military has quotas for NCOs and COs alike, and if they can't fill them with those who'd be good at the job, they fill them with those who are least worst.

---

As a side-note, I read over movement rules for D&D. The hustle rate for a normal, unencumbered human is 600 feet or 182.22 meters per minute, so 2194 meters in 12 minutes. Hustling in general is a better comparison point for endurance running, than run action which is clearly meant to represent a full run.

As such, I suggest 2200 meters in 12 minutes is the treshold for Constitution 10.

Based on existing fitness charts (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooper_test), I then suggest every 200 meters in one direction or another means a difference in score of 1 point. Hence:

{table=head]Distance in 12 minutes | Constitution score
400 | 1
600 | 2
800 | 3
1000 | 4
1200 | 5
1400 | 6
1600 | 7
1800 | 8
2000 | 9
2200 | 10
2400 | 11
2600 | 12
2800 | 13
3000 | 14
3200 | 15
3400 | 16
3600 | 17
3800 | 18
4000 | 19
4200 | 20
4400 | 21
4600 | 22
4800 | 23
5000 | 24[/table]

For the record, the world record for 5000 meters is 12 minutes, 37.35 seconds. This rounds to 4755 meters in 12 minutes. This would suggest the current world record holder, Ethiopian Kenenisa Bekele, has Constitution of 22.

This places me at Constitution 13 - above average, but not amazingly so. The best result I have personally witnessed was 3400 meters, by a national level endurance-runner - this would put his score at 16. A typical amateur endurance runner has results around 3000, so constitution 14. I, at least, am happy with these benchmarks.

Zweisteine

2014-03-15, 07:08 PM

Str 13 is not "quite strong." It means you can bench 150lbs and hit slightly harder than an average human being. There are hundreds of millions of people in the world that are this strong. Millions out of billions, but I see your point. I would, however, argue that strength is the easiest score to increase outside of skills, simply by regular exercise, though that would be impossible in D&D.

Dex 16 does not mean someone is a great gymnast. Aren't you the one that brought up skill points? Without investing any skill points, all that +3 modifier means is that you are 15% more accurate with ranged weapons, have 15% better hand-eye coordination, and 15% better reflexes than your average joe. Millions of people in the world are this dextrous. That was sarcasm on my part... And yeah, millions probably do have a lot of dexterity, but we have billions in this world.

Con 15 may well be considered incredibly tough, though I'd liken it a lot more to just "tough." If we're going by fluffy denominators like this 12-13 might be hardy, 14-15 might be tough, 16-17 might be incredibly tough, and 18+ might be "invincible." I'd say 10 is average, 12 is tough, 14 is really tough, 16 is incredibly tough, 18 is peak human, 20 is inhuman (though in name alone, as if someone had 20, it wouldn't actually be inhuman...).

Int 18 is not beyond the realm of possibility. It essentially equates to IQ 155-160, and while that's a bit smarter than me, there are still millions and millions of such people in the world. I'd say 18 intelligence is a bit above 160 IQ. Actually, thinking a bit about that, it sounds about right, though I'd probably say it's closer to 160-170 or 160-180.

Wis 17, I will agree these abilities all do seem to be getting consistently high, but what did you expect? He used an online test, and acknowledged the results as not really being serious. Oh, and I think he's well aware that he doesn't have magical powers. What on earth made you think it was actually necessary to point that out to anyone? The same sarcasm I used on dexterity. I was a bit tired when I wrote that, so I might have been a bit harsh...

Cha 14, seriously, there are hundreds of millions of people in the world with a Charisma score this high. Yes, but there aren't millions with five abilities above 13.

Your basic argument just seems to be nothing more than, "everyone is average. anyone who attempts to tell me otherwise is a either charlatan and a shameless liar, or an utterly, pitifully, self-deluded fool." No. I'm sorry, that doesn't apply to reality. Sometimes, some people have disabilities, physical and/or mental. Other times, other people are exceptional. Uhhhh... I didn't say that... My argument is that a lot of people are within the 8-13 range for all of their ability scores, and most are probably within 7-14. Even the people with unusually high ability scores don't have many that high, though. Almost nobody will have fourteens all around, and people with three eighteens are almost nonexistent.

Or, hell, if you're going to be such a stick in the mud about "realism," ability scores aren't real, nor were they ever meant to be fully based in reality. D&D is a game. It cannot fully and faithfully integrate every aspect of real life into quantifiable data. Some amount of handwaving and nonsense is to be expected. The game is supposed to be fun after all.

I was thinking that even before I finished reading your post. The most important rule in "D&D in real life" discussions is that they really don't line up perfectly at all. I apologize if it sounded like I had forgotten that.

TuggyNE

2014-03-15, 07:50 PM

As a side-note, I read over movement rules for D&D. The hustle rate for a normal, unencumbered human is 600 feet or 182.22 meters per minute, so 2194 meters in 12 minutes. Hustling in general is a better comparison point for endurance running, than run action which is clearly meant to represent a full run.

As such, I suggest 2200 meters in 12 minutes is the treshold for Constitution 10.

Based on existing fitness charts (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooper_test), I then suggest every 200 meters in one direction or another means a difference in score of 1 point.

Interesting. That would peg me as having had, at at least one point in my life, a Con of 11+, based on approximately 2400m up and down fairly steep hills round trip in 12 minutes, which is slightly less than my guesstimate of Con 12 based on moderately above-average health. (I have never been admitted to a hospital for any reason, and I almost never get sick enough to have to do anything more than blow my nose.)

Frozen_Feet

2014-03-15, 07:54 PM

I would, however, argue that strength is the easiest score to increase outside of skills, simply by regular exercise, though that would be impossible in D&D.

"Regular excercise", like gaining levels to increase ability scores, perhaps? Certainly, that is impossible in D&D! It is utter lunacy to think that person might take few levels of Expert and Human Paragon to get a +3 in an ability score across 4 levels! :smalltongue:

I'd say 10 is average, 12 is tough, 14 is really tough, 16 is incredibly tough, 18 is peak human, 20 is inhuman

Nah, accordinging to my graph above, 18 is "very good for an experienced athlete", and 22 is "peak human". This is much closer to what the actual D&D rules say, because as noted, a character with ECL 4 can have score of 21 through training (+2 paragon, +1 level).

18 Constitution on its own is not actually very tough. It's just +4 hitpoints and Fortitude saves at first level. A character who is a Warrior instead of Expert has +1.5 hitpoints and +2 fortitude saves at first level as well.

If you read the actual rules, Con 18 vs Con 10 is the difference between surviving 1 blow to the head and being left unconscious rather than dead. 1d8 weapon with 2x critical modifier does 16 hitpoints, max. An expert with max hitpoints and 10 Con is killed outright (6hp - 16 hp = -10 hp). An expert with max hitpoints and 18 Con is knocked unconscious and left bleeding on the floor (10 hp - 16 hp = -6 hp). Nothing in this screams "peak human", if you go and read actual peak human stunts when it comes to surviving injuries. (These include falling at terminal velocity, being hit in the face by an exploding bullet and surviving, and having an iron rod pierce your skull and brain without even losing consciousness.)

Almost nobody will have fourteens all around, and people with three eighteens are almost nonexistent.

I'm sorry, but what?

Having a single 18 is 1-of-216. To have three is hence 1-of-10,077,696.

We have 7 billion people on this planet. Around 108 billion (http://www.prb.org/Publications/Articles/2002/HowManyPeopleHaveEverLivedonEarth.aspx) have lived throughout Earth's history. This means we have around 694 people with three 18 alive now, and 10,716 have lived alltogehter.

As for 14s all around? The chance of having a single 14 is 6.94%. Chance of having six 14s is ~0.33%. Hence, there are ~2,339,788 people alive with those exact scores.

The overall chance to have all scores of at least 14 is considerably higher. The chance to have at least 14 in a score is 16.20%. Chance of having all scores at least 14 is 4.2%. Hence, there are 29,760,696 people alive with no score below 14.

TuggyNE

2014-03-15, 08:11 PM

Having a single 18 is 1-of-216. To have three is hence 1-of-10,077,696.

Actually, I think it's rather substantially more likely than that, since any three of six are sufficient. Doing some quick estimates with AnyDice suggests the rate is somewhere around 1.7e-6, or around 17 times as likely as your figure. That means there are roughly 12200 such persons alive right now.

Frozen_Feet

2014-03-15, 08:22 PM

Eh, point. I was too lazy to figure out how the remaining three ability scores would influence the probability.

Teapot Salty

2014-03-15, 08:32 PM

8-10 miles without rest, I think google means, not in a day. If you guys seriously had 25/30 Con, you'd be able to drink cyanide or oil/gasoline in large quantities with no adverse effects. Oh, and you could hold your breath for like three minutes before you even started feeling like you could use some air, and likely somewhere between four and six minutes before you were actually forced to come up. That's pretty crazy stuff.

Anyway, I'd estimate my stats at:
12 Str
10 Con
??? Dex (I have excellent reaction timing and acrobatic skill, being a martial artist, but I have terrible delicacy precision for something like picking a lock)
I disagree with your assessment of Int (especially since the average of 10 in the D&D rules is a bunch of completely uneducated peasants), but I'd say I have, oh, a 15 here. I'm FAR above the average, but I'm not quite a genius.
6 Wis
10 Cha

I know what you mean about the dex, I have the same problem gauging it, for the same reason. Anyway, my stats, and sorry If I come across as arrogant:

Str: 11-15 Definitely above average, but not ridiculously so, it really depends on the day.

Dex: 8-14 Like I said above, I'm not sure if I'm above average, below, or right on the button.

Con: 13 I am tough, but I can't do things like hold my breath forever or run marathons (yet) so, ya.

Int: 14-16 I am a fast learner, know things on a deep level, and am one of the smarter people I know.

Wis: 7-11 I have good common sense, but I'm also reckless, this is a tough one.

Cha: 9-17 On one hand, my force of personality is very high, I make friends wherever I go, but I don't really have a way with words or anything of the like.

I wonder if anyone has given themselves all tens, or all tens and below.

Captnq

2014-03-15, 08:52 PM

For the record, the world record for 5000 meters is 12 minutes, 37.35 seconds. This rounds to 4755 meters in 12 minutes. This would suggest the current world record holder, Ethiopian Kenenisa Bekele, has Constitution of 22.

Or he took the Run feat. And maybe some monk levels.

Running is not dependant on con. Running fast is more of a Dex thing then Con. Con is running for HOURS, not distance. For example, I just walked door to door dropping off hang tags all day for 9 hours straight. I walked almost 12 miles. In the sleet. Fell in a huge puddle so I spent 8 out of 9 hours with soggy feet. Not a single blister. I did need a bath, however. Ready to do it again tomorrow.

How long can you stay awake? That's con.
How much pain can you endure? That's con.
How long can you go without food? Water?

Grim Reader

2014-03-15, 09:07 PM

Frozen_Feet

2014-03-15, 09:23 PM

@Captnq:12 minute running test is an endurance test. It was designed to measure stamina. On the other side of the equation, even with Run feat and Monk levels, it would still require Constitution checks by the rules. You have exactly no ground to stand on.

For the record: with the Run feat and 40 feet land speed (30 base, +10 from class), a character runs for 2000 feet in a minute. 4755 meters is around 16000 feet, so such a character would take 8 minutes to cross that distance. This is faster than the world record. It also requires the character to pass eight constitution checks, starting with DC 10 and ending at DC 18.

Even a character with 22 Constitution has just a 2% chance to pass all those tests.

EDIT: Furthermore, the idea that running should be associated with Dexterity is absolutely ridiculous. Sprinting over short distances has more to do with explosive strenght than either agility, nimbleness or reaction time, so it would fall under Strenght. Running for longer distances or times longer than a minute is a matter of stamina and endurance, falling under Constitution, and the rules acknowledge this.

TuggyNE

2014-03-15, 10:19 PM

For the record: with the Run feat and 40 feet land speed (30 base, +10 from class), a character runs for 2000 feet in a minute. 4755 meters is around 16000 feet, so such a character would take 8 minutes to cross that distance. This is faster than the world record. It also requires the character to pass eight constitution checks, starting with DC 10 and ending at DC 18.

Even a character with 22 Constitution has just a 2% chance to pass all those tests.

Only eight Con checks? 22 Con can run for 22 rounds (2 minutes 12 seconds) without a Con check, and then has a 10, 12, 14, … check every round (not every minute) following. After a mere 5 minutes total, the DC reaches 36 and can't be achieved even on a natural 20 even with DMGII's Prodigy (Con) and Endurance. At that point, you have to go back to walking.

Frozen_Feet

2014-03-15, 10:34 PM

You are right, TuggyNE. I'm not sure what I was thinking. Apparently, the rules for running are worded differently in the sections governing combat actions and movement. Going by the rules given under combat, your calculations are correct.

Invader

2014-03-15, 11:56 PM

Knaight

2014-03-16, 12:34 AM

Simple odds say say no one on this entire site has over a 13 Int but just about every person on the first page apparently divides their time between D&D and Mensa meetings.

There are over 100,000 members of this site, including numerous people with advanced degrees. I don't know where you get the idea that nobody has over 13 intelligence from, as simple odds don't produce that unless it's the sort of statistic held only by the smartest people in entire cities.

The standard array has a 13, and is for totally non-exceptional people. If we assume that everyone here used the standard array (which I wouldn't), and that the maximums are evenly distributed (unlikely), 1/6 of the people here have 13 int.

For that matter: MENSA tries to restrict their membership to the top 2% of the population as measured by IQ (which is a terrible metric, but whatever). With 100,000 members, assuming an average intelligence distribution there are still 2,000 people who would fit in that.

TrueJordan

2014-03-16, 01:16 AM

TuggyNE

2014-03-16, 01:42 AM

TrueJordan

2014-03-16, 07:27 AM

As is always the way on such threads, the posters evidently believing themselves to be of infinite resource and sagacity are only exceeded in number and vexatiousness by those believing that even the most moderate excellence is the province of sheer fiction. :smallsigh:

How sesquipedalian loquacious of you, Tugs.
Also you may be interested to hear of the Lake Wobegon effect, a psychological human condition that states that the average person thinks that he's better than the average person.
Unless he has really low self esteem, I guess

Togo

2014-03-16, 07:46 AM

How sesquipedalian loquacious of you, Tugs.
Also you may be interested to hear of the Lake Wobegon effect, a psychological human condition that states that the average person thinks that he's better than the average person.
Unless he has really low self esteem, I guess

And he's generally correct.

Statistical patterns only emerge if everyone uses the same metric, or a correlated metric. When it comes to self-worth, people don't.

It's an easy point to miss, but the reason why people regard themselves above average is that they are correct that they are above average, for the metrics they are using, and the assumptions being made by the observer are flawed.

If you really want to tie yourself in knots, try statting yourself out using the skills system, and then reverse engineer all the skills you end up with to work out what your int bonus must be. 18 int doesn't really cut it, many of us are clearly rogues of godlike intelligence. Or we can just chuck the level distribution out the window instead.

Togo

2014-03-16, 07:50 AM

How sesquipedalian loquacious of you, Tugs.

Is the grammer on that quite right? Wouldn't that need to be sesquipedalianly?

Of course, unless some of us suffer from hippopotomonstrosesquipedeliophobia, it's unlikely to be a huge issue.

Invader

2014-03-16, 09:20 AM

There are over 100,000 members of this site, including numerous people with advanced degrees. I don't know where you get the idea that nobody has over 13 intelligence from, as simple odds don't produce that unless it's the sort of statistic held only by the smartest people in entire cities.

The standard array has a 13, and is for totally non-exceptional people. If we assume that everyone here used the standard array (which I wouldn't), and that the maximums are evenly distributed (unlikely), 1/6 of the people here have 13 int.

For that matter: MENSA tries to restrict their membership to the top 2% of the population as measured by IQ (which is a terrible metric, but whatever). With 100,000 members, assuming an average intelligence distribution there are still 2,000 people who would fit in that.

OP said to assume that 10 was 100 IQ 11 was 110 and so on. A 14(140) would be less that 1% of the population , statistically there's no one on these boards that has an IQ that high let alone a dozen people with a 15 or higher. The bit about Mensa was a bit of hyperbole.

Socksy

2014-03-16, 10:01 AM

OP said to assume that 10 was 100 IQ 11 was 110 and so on. A 14(140) would be less that 1% of the population , statistically there's no one on these boards that has an IQ that high let alone a dozen people with a 15 or higher. The bit about Mensa was a bit of hyperbole.

Emphasis mine. There are statistically speaking 1000+ people on these boards (assuming 100,000+ users, is that correct?) in the top percentile. That's... The definition of percentile, dude.
Mapping IQ to intelligence by comparing more-than tables and z-values gives you this (http://simantics.blogspot.co.uk/2011/01/d-and-iq.html?m=1), and that's using 3d6. If you're using 4d6b3, you can assume your INT is a little higher.

So whoever it was with IQ 162, we're sat up at roughly INT 22.

I'm going to link to this thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=335534&page=2), because it's relevant. And has more statistics, tables, and other goodies.

Invader

2014-03-16, 10:27 AM

Emphasis mine. There are statistically speaking 1000+ people on these boards (assuming 100,000+ users, is that correct?) in the top percentile. That's... The definition of percentile, dude.
Mapping IQ to intelligence by comparing more-than tables and z-values gives you this (http://simantics.blogspot.co.uk/2011/01/d-and-iq.html?m=1), and that's using 3d6. If you're using 4d6b3, you can assume your INT is a little higher.

So whoever it was with IQ 162, we're sat up at roughly INT 22.

I'm going to link to this thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=335534&page=2), because it's relevant. And has more statistics, tables, and other goodies.

You are correct. It would have been more accurate to say no one in this thread would have an IQ that high but despite my poor argument the point remains that everyone inflates their scores fairly ridiculously.

And in my defense I never made claims about MY Int being high, of course all my other side ores are 25 :smalltongue:

OldTrees1

2014-03-16, 10:31 AM

You are correct. It would have been more accurate to say no one in this thread would have an IQ that high but despite my poor argument the point remains that everyone inflates their scores fairly ridiculously.
By "everyone" (on the first page) are you being literal or are you generalizing?

Invader

2014-03-16, 10:35 AM

By "everyone" (on the first page) are you being literal or are you generalizing?

I was generalizing, I realize it wasn't "everyone".

OverdrivePrime

2014-03-16, 10:37 AM

As is always the way on such threads, the posters evidently believing themselves to be of infinite resource and sagacity are only exceeded in number and vexatiousness by those believing that even the most moderate excellence is the province of sheer fiction. :smallsigh:

I find that the vexation tends to come from a firm belief that the real world should be 15 point buy, while it's clearly something like 2d6+genetics+socioeconomics. A hatred of Harrison Bergeron might also contribute.

Kurald Galain

2014-03-16, 10:42 AM

It always surprises me that some people insist that everybody on this forum must be an average human, with near-average stats. Why ever should that be the case? Extraordinary people are everywhere, one way or the other, and this forum has over 50,000 registered users. Even if not all of those are active, it stands to reason that this group include a fair number of extraordinary people. For example, if a trait (such as superior intelligence) appears in only 1% of the human population, then 1% of those 50,000 is still 500 users right here on this forum.

You've heard of Six Degrees Of Separation, yes? In the current world, if there's a famous CEO or celebrity musician or olympic-level athlete from your country or state, then it's pretty likely that this person is only two or three steps removed from you. So if such extraordinary people can be in your personal network, why is it so hard to believe there's extraordinary people on a 50,000-user forum, too?

Saintsqc

2014-03-16, 11:07 AM

If I use this scale :
<5 - incredibly low, caused by a disease
6 - very poor, probably caused by some disease
8 - below average, weak point
10 - average, almost all of my friends/family/acquaintance can do the same
12 - above average, strong point
14 - very good, very few people are as good as me, I'm in the top 20% of the population, if acquaintance would be asked they would say the same (ie : having a 14+ int mean anybody you know thinks you are smarter than most people)
16 - incredibly good, you are talented AND you work hard to improve this skill (ie : MMA figther, rock star, marathon runner, phD, psychologist, etc.), top 1% of the population
18 - super duper good, like most olympians or genius
20 - god-like...like athletes using steroids (20 str/dex/con) or special people (einstein, hawkins, ghandi, etc.)

I would think I have the following stats :

Str : 14 (can lift over my head weight most people can't even lift off from the ground, I do olympic weightlifting)
Dex : 10 (have good eye-hand coordination...but I'm clumsy in general)
Con : 12 (working out every day for hours develop a good constitution)
Int : 16 (good grades with minimal efforts, would go for a PhD if that would pay more, i love learning stuff just for the sake of learning, good memory, etc.)
Sag : 12 (people come to me for advices, strong will, I read and seize people quickly...I'm not in tune with people feeling though)
Cha : 8 (average look, dont like small talk, dont like meeting new people, I'm usually the underdog)

What class would that make me ? I think of myself as a gish lol

nobodez

2014-03-16, 11:25 AM

Note: only got through page 2 before posting.

Str: 13 (stronger than average, though my carrying capacity is borked because of my obesity)
Dex: 11 (high side of average, though perhaps I just have a dex penalty from obesity)
Con: 13 (don't get sick that often or that badly, and due to my obesity Combined with activity have decent endurance)
Int: 14 (my highest stat, I rated high on an IQ test, as well as did well on standardized tests, though my next stat kind of illustrates why I didn't do better in schooling)
Wis: 7 (very little willpower and little common sense. I know what to do, but I'm too lazy to do it)
Cha: 12 (I can usually convince people of my position, and have good relations with others)

SiuiS

2014-03-16, 12:49 PM

Of all stats, Strenght and Intelligence are easiest to map.

Bad premise, friend. Not only has the rubric changed since the 1e days, but this is specifically a third edition stats guesstimating, not a general D&D guestimating.

Oh, I eat extremely healthy. The problem was that I have never worked out on a regular basis before and used to be heavy. So I am starting from scratch. But thanks for the help!

Oh, okay. I'm on the other end of the scale; I can't use standard fitness advice because it's all geared toward weight loss and that will kill me. So for the reverse, putting on a bit of bulk, requires 90% don't eat like a stereotypical American, and only 10% lift heavy things.

Check out nerdfitness.com, it's a fun read and can help for starting from. Scratch. :smallsmile:

Having a single 18 is 1-of-216. To have three is hence 1-of-10,077,696.

Not true. Having a single 18 in one attribute is a 1.62% chance; better than 1:100 odds. Remember, we are asking "in a world of 4d6k3, with an average score of 12.5, what are your attributes?", all this 'human average is 10, you're over exaggerating' stuff is a holdover from people remembering fluff inertia. It's as accuracy as weak mystic Druids being scouts with their shapeshifting, and clerics being old wise healers who were lucky to give the fighter good backup.

How sesquipedalian loquacious of you, Tugs.
Also you may be interested to hear of the Lake Wobegon effect, a psychological human condition that states that the average person thinks that he's better than the average person.
Unless he has really low self esteem, I guess

Exceeept...., the math bears this out. The averaged ability score is ten and one half. But the average score for a living person is twelve and one half.

Emphasis mine. There are statistically speaking 1000+ people on these boards (assuming 100,000+ users, is that correct?) in the top percentile. That's... The definition of percentile, dude.
Mapping IQ to intelligence by comparing more-than tables and z-values gives you this (http://simantics.blogspot.co.uk/2011/01/d-and-iq.html?m=1), and that's using 3d6. If you're using 4d6b3, you can assume your INT is a little higher.

So whoever it was with IQ 162, we're sat up at roughly INT 22.

I'm going to link to this thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=335534&page=2), because it's relevant. And has more statistics, tables, and other goodies.

I don't remember the details, but, hasn't IQ been adjusted annually to account for the nature of the scale? The more technology and education we have disseminated, the higher the average intelligence of people is and so the more effort required to reach average IQ. So wouldn't it actually be a less accurate scale?

OldTrees1

2014-03-16, 01:04 PM

Remember, we are asking "in a world of 4d6k3, with an average score of 12.5, what are your attributes?", all this 'human average is 10, you're over exaggerating' stuff is a holdover from people remembering fluff inertia.

Nitpick: You are not a PC, you do not get 4d6k3. Since you get 3d6, your average is 10.5.

OverdrivePrime

2014-03-16, 02:32 PM

Nitpick: You are not a PC, you do not get 4d6k3. Since you get 3d6, your average is 10.5.

Who says we're not PCs? :smallconfused:

I adventure. It seems like a lot of people in this thread do as well.

Kurald Galain

2014-03-16, 02:49 PM

Who says we're not PCs? :smallconfused:

I adventure. It seems like a lot of people in this thread do as well.

I'm definitely a PC, yes. :smallcool:

TrueJordan

2014-03-16, 02:51 PM

Is the grammer on that quite right? Wouldn't that need to be sesquipedalianly?

Of course, unless some of us suffer from hippopotomonstrosesquipedeliophobia, it's unlikely to be a huge issue.

I'm super wasted right now (Happy Purim, Jewish GitPers!) but I would say you are correct :) Hooray for grammar! (Kelsey?)

Phelix-Mu

2014-03-16, 03:23 PM

I have 5's across the board. My wife told me so.

We already have a winner for the most accurate entry, way back on page 1. Congrats, Stoneback. And, ofc, props to Stoneback's wife for helping Stoneback with the accuracy.

Caveat: I agree with the aforementioned sentiment that this is all very silly. Ability scores are the simplest simplification in a game that tries to boil down a very complicated reality into a bunch of tables and charts and addition. Taking that and applying it to real life, magnitudes more complex than the mechanics, is slipping decidedly in the direction of the arbitrary.

Personally, I usually rate in the top 10% of large groups (like my rather difficult private high school) in terms of Intelligence, and my Wisdom is about as high (and some days, much higher:smallwink: ). Usually I think of this as being in the 16 range.

My stamina sucks, but I rarely get seriously ill and am in decent shape despite considerable neglect on my part; this just points out the weakness of Constitution as an ability score, because it affects so many disparate things that may or may not correlate in the average person.

My Dex is decent, I almost never lose my balance or fall down, and while my twitch reflexes aren't top-notch, they improve dramatically with practice. I think this one is vague mainly because I don't do many things that would allow an accurate gauge of this.

I'm pretty strong and do some calisthenics on a regular basis, so that's probably a 13-14 or so. Strength is actually the easiest one for most people to agree on, since the encumbrance chart is pretty easy to reference and fairly conclusive.

I'm not particularly Charisma-based, but my Int and Wis do make me pretty good at understanding and befriending people whenever I talk to them (I am very empathetic). I usually think of this as skill ranks in something like Diplomacy, but, again, it really reflects a vagueness in Charisma itself, as "good at interacting" can cover a huge range of things.

OldTrees1

2014-03-16, 03:40 PM

Who says we're not PCs? :smallconfused:

I adventure. It seems like a lot of people in this thread do as well.

By that definition of adventure, so do NPCs. So you are an NPC.

Togo

2014-03-16, 03:57 PM

By that definition of adventure, so do NPCs. So you are an NPC.

Sorry to take issue, but that really is your own assumption at work. Is there some reason why what people on this thread do can't be adventure in the PC sense? Is there some reason why they can't be PCs?

OldTrees1

2014-03-16, 04:03 PM

Sorry to take issue, but that really is your own assumption at work. Is there some reason why what people on this thread do can't be adventure in the PC sense? Is there some reason why they can't be PCs?

The majority of the population is NPCs (accroding to RAW) so it is foolish to presume everyone in this thread is a PC. Furthermore if we compare the difference between a regular PC and an NPC soldier, it becomes very improbable that anyone in this thread is a PC (since we almost all live civilian lives).

So I find it unreasonable to assume everyone in this thread would be using 4d6k3 rather than 3d6.

Yanisa

2014-03-16, 04:22 PM

The majority of the population is NPCs (accroding to RAW) so it is foolish to presume everyone in this thread is a PC. Furthermore if we compare the difference between a regular PC and an NPC soldier, it becomes very improbable that anyone in this thread is a PC (since we almost all live civilian lives).

So I find it unreasonable to assume everyone in this thread would be using 4d6k3 rather than 3d6.
DnD is build on the idea that are about 4 PC's... ever. In our world these 4 may already have been born and died, or still need to born and we are just NPCs for the background story of the world. They could be born now, but what makes our age so special, and why would they be on this forum instead of questing?

At the flip side we are the Main Player Character of our own story. We are more special to ourselves then to others, and should be stronger in our lives then in someones else life. It explains the high stats here, everyone is special and powerful, but only when related to the important events of their own life.

Amphetryon

2014-03-16, 04:24 PM

STR 4
DEX 3
CON 5
INT 6
WIS 3
CHA 4

I'm a superstar.

Kurald Galain

2014-03-16, 04:32 PM

So I find it unreasonable to assume everyone in this thread would be using 4d6k3 rather than 3d6.

It doesn't really matter though, considering both methods give scores in the range of 3-18. Unless you want to mandate that everybody has exact average rolls on their abilities, but there's really no reason to assume that.

Phelix-Mu

2014-03-16, 04:41 PM

Perhaps the goal of this DnD campaign is to create a long-distance community based around meta-level discussions of the mechanics of the world in which we live. The DM assigns ad-hoc awards based on our accomplishments, our post-count, and the general contributions that we have made to the campaign, known colloquially as "the Playground." There are many, many people that are npcs, from lurkers to google misdirects, to the evil spambots that are fended off by the valiant moderators and the god-level npc "Administrator." All of us posters are pcs, and so qualify for 4d6b3.

In short, there is no reason to assume that, just because our community is large, that we can't all have pc stats and just be part of a larger group of people (say, human beings on the internet). Also, while the above campaign is certainly not typical, it can just as assuredly operate by many of the standard mechanics as any kind of custom setting.

OverdrivePrime

2014-03-16, 04:49 PM

By that definition of adventure, so do NPCs. So you are an NPC.

I.. what? It has been at least 15 months since anyone's said anything this insulting to me. :smallyuk:

Who are you to presume you know how the rest of us spend our time when we're not on a (very highbrow) internet forum? I'd thank you not to project your own life experience onto the rest of us.

OldTrees1

2014-03-16, 05:06 PM

Vrock_Summoner

2014-03-16, 05:07 PM

I don't really need stats. All my skill modifiers are "success", my HP is "too much", my attack bonus is "yes" and my AC is "no". I'm exactly as capable as the plot needs me to be.

Sir Chuckles

2014-03-16, 05:24 PM

I don't really need stats. All my skill modifiers are "success", my HP is "too much", my attack bonus is "yes" and my AC is "no". I'm exactly as capable as the plot needs me to be.

Plot armor will always put epic level equipment to shame. :smalltongue:

nyjastul69

2014-03-16, 06:11 PM

Where does the 100,000+ number of board members come from? The site itself claims 79,844 members. This doesn't change the math by much however, so those points still mostly stand.

I'm the only PC on this board. You are all NPC's, as I am to you.:smalltongue:

Togo

2014-03-16, 08:25 PM

The majority of the population is NPCs (accroding to RAW) so it is foolish to presume everyone in this thread is a PC.

RAW gives guidelines for world creation. It does not specify what the numbers of levelled individuals in a game setting must be, or how many PCs it can contain. Given that many people in this setting have skill ranks well in excess of what is available to 1st level NPCs we must assume that this is a non-standard setting. If nothing else, I'm in it, and I'm clearly too overpowered to be in a standard campaign setting.

Furthermore if we compare the difference between a regular PC and an NPC soldier, it becomes very improbable that anyone in this thread is a PC (since we almost all live civilian lives).

Not seeing the connection at all. You think a solider would somehow have better stats than me? Why? I'm pretty sure I'm better at mounted archery than most soldiers.

Many skills and abilities and stats in the D&D system have little or nothing to do with military training.

So I find it unreasonable to assume everyone in this thread would be using 4d6k3 rather than 3d6.

Well they clearly aren't using the commoner array, or the elite array, which would be normal if they were really NPCs.

OverdrivePrime

2014-03-16, 08:38 PM

I apologize.
However, NPCs do exciting things too. Not everything happens to the plot infused player characters.
So it is not so much me projecting my life experience, as it is me comparing our civilized society to the much more dangerous and exciting medieval fantasy setting and remembering the majority of those individuals are NPCs.

No worries. I wasn't actually offended. More indignant than anything that someone would call me a NPC. I can't think of much worse than to not be a player character in ones own life.

And a bit of hubris on my part. I do go on adventures where I'm forced to push myself, and where failure has dangerous consequences. That's not what NPCs do. If they do wind up in a situation like that, they start taking class levels.

OldTrees1

2014-03-16, 08:47 PM

RAW gives guidelines for world creation. It does not specify what the numbers of levelled individuals in a game setting must be, or how many PCs it can contain. Given that many people in this setting have skill ranks well in excess of what is available to 1st level NPCs we must assume that this is a non-standard setting. If nothing else, I'm in it, and I'm clearly too overpowered to be in a standard campaign setting.
Increased skill points is a symptom of real life. However I do not see why that would be evidence of everyone using 4d6k3 rather than 3d6. Also I do not see why some people in the forum being on the high end of 3d6 would be evidence against 3d6. In fact, assuming you have accurate self evaluation, you being OP is evidence of 3d6 over arrays.

Not seeing the connection at all. You think a solider would somehow have better stats than me? Why? I'm pretty sure I'm better at mounted archery than most soldiers.

Many skills and abilities and stats in the D&D system have little or nothing to do with military training.
I did not say that so I should clarify what I did say. I was comparing a combat focused NPC with a combat focused PC (default PC). I was using this to show that even NPCs have adventures so adventures are not evidence of being a PC.

Well they clearly aren't using the commoner array, or the elite array, which would be normal if they were really NPCs.
Why would NPC populations be restricted to arrays?

No worries. I wasn't actually offended. More indignant than anything that someone would call me a NPC. I can't think of much worse than to not be a player character in ones own life.

And a bit of hubris on my part. I do go on adventures where I'm forced to push myself, and where failure has dangerous consequences. That's not what NPCs do. If they do wind up in a situation like that, they start taking class levels.

You simultaneously cushion your NPCs (not have them face challenges) and dehumanize them (devaluing characters running their lives rather than players running their lives).
I can see how offending that implication would be. I merely meant you were part of a population with a normal chance (3d6) of being exceptional or unexceptional rather than having a plot enforced higher chance at being exceptional (4d6k3, reroll if under +0 or no score higher than 13).

Errata

2014-03-16, 09:14 PM

So, to sum it up:

1 Str = each 10 pounds you can bench
1 dex = try your best to gauge it
1 con = the ability to bicycle 1 mile in a day
1 Int = 10 IQ
1 wis = try your best to gauge it
1 cha = try your best to gauge it

For me, my stats would about be as follows.

str 10
dex 9
con 30
int 14
wis 20
cha 35

This just shows that people aren't good at math and/or self awareness. The SRD tells us how to translate strength to lifting ability, and it's much less linear than this. The others are similar, where double the con would mean being able to do way more than just double the exertion.

Riding a bicycle 30 miles a day isn't even particularly hard, it just takes the patience to do it. Maybe doing it under a certain time limit would up the difficulty, but a day is a long time, and a bicycle is a very energy efficient mode of transportation. I've ridden on long distance trips like this before, including back to back multiple days, and I don't consider myself athletic. It might take maybe 4 hours, or longer if you break it up some, and isn't even that exhausting of a day. The Tour de France guys do 100+ miles per day. On the other hand a 1 con probably can't ride a bicycle for even a short distance.

Our world doesn't have magic spells or artifacts, nor does it have level 20 heroes, since that level of ability puts them firmly in the realm of fantasy regardless of class. We're all just a bunch of low level humans, mostly NPC classes.

I'd consider the 3d6 to represent the normal distribution of attributes for real life, non fantasy heroes. That would put natural 18s at a rate of about 0.4% of the population. Maybe exceptional people who dedicate their life to something get the +2 from levels to an attribute. So around a 20 would represent the pinnacle of human perfection (maybe 22 if you're a Pathfinder human). The Nobel prize winners, Olympic athletes, A-list celebrities, etc.

Using your own system, if there were people with 35s in an attribute walking around, that would suggest there are people with an IQ of 350, which is way off the charts, well beyond any official score ever given.

Immabozo

2014-03-16, 11:16 PM

All surveys like this accomplish is showing everyone that the majority of people on the site VASTLY overestimate their abilities.

Simple odds say say no one on this entire site has over a 13 Int but just about every person on the first page apparently divides their time between D&D and Mensa meetings.

I have IQ 142, technically, I think Mensa is 145 (I could easily be wrong)

There are over 100,000 members of this site, including numerous people with advanced degrees. I don't know where you get the idea that nobody has over 13 intelligence from, as simple odds don't produce that unless it's the sort of statistic held only by the smartest people in entire cities.

The standard array has a 13, and is for totally non-exceptional people. If we assume that everyone here used the standard array (which I wouldn't), and that the maximums are evenly distributed (unlikely), 1/6 of the people here have 13 int.

For that matter: MENSA tries to restrict their membership to the top 2% of the population as measured by IQ (which is a terrible metric, but whatever). With 100,000 members, assuming an average intelligence distribution there are still 2,000 people who would fit in that.

And to complicate thinks, Joe Redneck that parties and drinks and gives D&D players, all wedgies, is not going to be attracted to joining a site such as GITP, but many to most D&D-ers, are. So by the very nature of the subject matter of this site, it skews the odds, probably beyond one's ability to calculate

Oh, okay. I'm on the other end of the scale; I can't use standard fitness advice because it's all geared toward weight loss and that will kill me. So for the reverse, putting on a bit of bulk, requires 90% don't eat like a stereotypical American, and only 10% lift heavy things.

Check out nerdfitness.com, it's a fun read and can help for starting from. Scratch. :smallsmile:

Thank for the tip! I definitely will! I am doing very well (my girlfriend looks at me like I am a top sirloin) but more information never hurts!

I don't remember the details, but, hasn't IQ been adjusted annually to account for the nature of the scale? The more technology and education we have disseminated, the higher the average intelligence of people is and so the more effort required to reach average IQ. So wouldn't it actually be a less accurate scale?

I am pretty sure the IQ test was originally made toward women and things they would know better, so to even the field, men were given a +3 to their score, only by virtue of what dangles between their legs. I do believe that men still get a +3, even though this education factor is non-existent in modern society.

We already have a winner for the most accurate entry, way back on page 1. Congrats, Stoneback. And, ofc, props to Stoneback's wife for helping Stoneback with the accuracy.

Caveat: I agree with the aforementioned sentiment that this is all very silly. Ability scores are the simplest simplification in a game that tries to boil down a very complicated reality into a bunch of tables and charts and addition. Taking that and applying it to real life, magnitudes more complex than the mechanics, is slipping decidedly in the direction of the arbitrary.

I agree, a great post!

A thought though on the accuracy of translating the real world into numbers, reverse engineering it back to the real world makes you really see the flaws in a new way, haha

I.. what? It has been at least 15 months since anyone's said anything this insulting to me. :smallyuk:

Who are you to presume you know how the rest of us spend our time when we're not on a (very highbrow) internet forum? I'd thank you not to project your own life experience onto the rest of us.

For the record, Overdrive, I think you are a beautiful human being and I admire you obvious intelligence for liking such an intellectual game as D&D and finding such an intellectual forum online for it and responding intelligently to a thread that is all about intellectual debate. Thank you for your participation in our community and you are awesome.

Fun fact, I have never used the word intellectual and intellectually, in an intellectual way, so much in one intellectual sentence. Or even an intellectual sentence explaining it.

Our world doesn't have magic spells or artifacts, nor does it have level 20 heroes, since that level of ability puts them firmly in the realm of fantasy regardless of class. We're all just a bunch of low level humans, mostly NPC classes.

There are many pages of people ripping me a knew one for having my numbers so off. It is just a fun exercise, please ease up. Its not like I am asking for controversial political opinions or something.

That would be bad news bears.

But if I have a level in a NPC class, when can I take chicken infested?

Drelua

2014-03-17, 01:36 AM

I.. what? It has been at least 15 months since anyone's said anything this insulting to me. :smallyuk:

Who are you to presume you know how the rest of us spend our time when we're not on a (very highbrow) internet forum? I'd thank you not to project your own life experience onto the rest of us.

You know, 15 months is a rather specific figure. Someone must have really gotten you angry sometime towards the end of 2012. :smalleek:

Anyway, I really think people need to stop telling other people what their stats are. It's just silly to say that everyone fits in the same small range, or that you know anything about people you've never actually met. For all you know, my stats could all be 16+. I'm quite certain they aren't, but you never know, I could just have a very low evaluation of myself. Statistically speaking, there are people with scores like that.

Unless someone says something that's just plain silly, like they have an ability score that's way outside of the human range, you're in no position to be telling them what their stats should look like unless you know them very well. There's a lot of room for interpretation a lot of different ways to look at how exactly stats relate to real life, so you can disagree without either person being wrong; that's how opinions work. Just except that some things are unknowable to you. If you disagree, say as much, but don't tell someone they're wrong when you really can't know that.

TuggyNE

2014-03-17, 01:46 AM

You know, 15 months is a rather specific figure. Someone must have really gotten you angry sometime towards the end of 2012. :smalleek:

An argument about the end of the world that went bad?

SiuiS

2014-03-17, 04:01 AM

Nitpick: You are not a PC, you do not get 4d6k3. Since you get 3d6, your average is 10.5.

Ah, no. NPCs are still capable of getting the elite array, unfortunately, which is a handy shorthand for the same generation as players. Everyone is a PC in their own story by technicality of what a PC is.

As for the insinuation that I should be an NPC class, aye, probably. But I've survived a few things that strongly hint towards monk and a moderately positive wisdom bonus, if only because statistically I should be hideously scarred or scalped and I'm not. :smalltongue:

The majority of the population is NPCs (accroding to RAW) so it is foolish to presume everyone in this thread is a PC. Furthermore if we compare the difference between a regular PC and an NPC soldier, it becomes very improbable that anyone in this thread is a PC (since we almost all live civilian lives).

So I find it unreasonable to assume everyone in this thread would be using 4d6k3 rather than 3d6.

Ah, no. You mean PC classes, again.
The majority is a meaningless term on it's own; we've already established that fluff doesn't really count for anything. So we look at the population charts for cities, and compare the DMG population guidelines, and see how relatively common those classes are. And that would be enough to disqualify us, if there was anything even remotely akin to a 'only these people qualify for the elite array' rule somewhere. But there's not.

It's perfectly possible for Joe commoner to have the elite array – shorthand for 'rolled PC dice but I am lazy as a DM'

Socksy

2014-03-17, 06:17 AM

I don't remember the details, but, hasn't IQ been adjusted annually to account for the nature of the scale? The more technology and education we have disseminated, the higher the average intelligence of people is and so the more effort required to reach average IQ. So wouldn't it actually be a less accurate scale?

I got my IQ tested in 2013, so I don't think either I or the scale have changed that much since then.

If you mean modern compared to olden days, we're all probably even smarter than before, which would give the average person, say 14.5 INT rather than 10.5, especially with widespread education. Which would start pushing the genius IQ towards Epic-wizard levels (which is silly.) STR and CON would also suffer the same problem. Well, not suffer, but you know what I mean c:

Any ideas for a way to fix the scale?

Frozen_Feet

2014-03-17, 06:33 AM

Bad premise, friend. Not only has the rubric changed since the 1e days, but this is specifically a third edition stats guesstimating, not a general D&D guestimating.

It's not a premise, it's an observation. All numerical figures I've used have been strictly 3.5/d20. I used 1ed only to give additional historical context which is missing from the SRD and newer versions.

Even if you disregard the additional context, it still stands Strenght and Intelligence are easiest to map, because there still aren't as good rules on how to do so for Dex, Con, Wis or Cha.

Not true. Having a single 18 in one attribute is a 1.62% chance; better than 1:100 odds. Remember, we are asking "in a world of 4d6k3, with an average score of 12.5, what are your attributes?", all this 'human average is 10, you're over exaggerating' stuff is a holdover from people remembering fluff inertia. It's as accuracy as weak mystic Druids being scouts with their shapeshifting, and clerics being old wise healers who were lucky to give the fighter good backup.

4d6k3 approximates the Elite array. It's only used for those people in exceptional professions. Normal people use Average and Non-expectional arrays, which average to 10.5 and are derived from 3d6. Hence, 3d6 is the correct generation method for large populations, and 1-in-216 is the occurrence rate for a natural 18.

We are not all Elites, remember.

I don't remember the details, but, hasn't IQ been adjusted annually to account for the nature of the scale? The more technology and education we have disseminated, the higher the average intelligence of people is and so the more effort required to reach average IQ. So wouldn't it actually be a less accurate scale?

Yes and no.

In 1st world nations, there has been a steady rise in IQ test results. This is known as the Flynn effect. However, there has not been a commesurate rise in actual effective intelligence, so IQ tests have been calibrated so that gaining a very high score has become increasingly more difficult.

So if you scored poorly or averagely in a past IQ test, your score would likely remain the same. However, a very high score might get corrected downwards.

I'll write more on this later.

SiuiS

2014-03-17, 06:37 AM

It's not a premise, it's an observation. All numerical figures I've used have been strictly 3.5/d20. I used 1ed only to give additional historical context which is missing from the SRD and newer versions.

Even if you disregard the additional context, it still stands Strenght and Intelligence are easiest to map, because there still aren't as good rules on how to do so for Dex, Con, Wis or Cha.[/wuote]

It does stand that STR and INT are easiest to map. I only quibbles the numerical basis.

[quote]
4d6k3 approximates the Elite array. It's only used for those people in exceptional professions. Normal people use Average and Non-expectional arrays, which average to 10.5 and are derived from 3d6. Hence, 3d6 is the correct generation method for large populations, and 1-in-216 is the occurrence rate for a natural 18.

We are not all Elites, remember.

Some of us are, without a doubt, though. What are the ratios? I am away from DMG. But the numbers aren't as far off as people think. A 1:216 chance for one attribute out of one, but better odds for one out of six, plus the number of people, plus the (admittedly unknowable) biases of selection for this forum... Low balling is equally as likely as highballing.

Yes and no.

In 1st world nations, there has been a steady rise in IQ test results. This is known as the Flynn effect. However, there has not been a commesurate rise in actual effective intelligence, so IQ tests have been calibrated so that gaining a very high score has become increasingly more difficult.

So if you scored poorly or averagely in a past IQ test, your score would likely remain the same. However, a very high score might get corrected downwards.

I'll write more on this later.

That's it, yeah. Thanks! :)

Togo

2014-03-17, 07:42 AM

In 1st world nations, there has been a steady rise in IQ test results. This is known as the Flynn effect. However, there has not been a commesurate rise in actual effective intelligence, so IQ tests have been calibrated so that gaining a very high score has become increasingly more difficult.

???
(Bold mine)

And we're measuring 'actual effective intelligence' how exactly?
I really want a citation for this...:smallconfused:

Frozen_Feet

2014-03-17, 09:34 AM

Simple odds say say no one on this entire site has over a 13 Int but just about every person on the first page apparently divides their time between D&D and Mensa meetings.

Spoken like a person who has no comprehension of odds.

Here, let me break your brain a bit. I am a Finnish man. There are roughly 5,000,000 of us Finns, compared to 7,000,000,000 people alive. As only half of us are men, this means the overall odds of me being here are 1-of-2800.

Meanwhile, MENSA accepts everyone with IQ in the top 2%. In other words, the chances of any given person being qualified for MENSA are 1-of-50.

Statistically, my claim of being a Finnish man is 56 more unlikely to be true, than any claim of belonging to MENSA would be. That's something I didn't claim in the first place, BTW. I estimated my INT to be 15, as my IQ is 91th percentile. Ironically, this score is evaluation from MENSA psychologist. To qualify for MENSA, one would need INT 17 in D&D terms.

And we're measuring 'actual effective intelligence' how exactly?

For example, reading comprehension tests, school success, job success - basically, any way of measuring cognitive skills besides a straight IQ test.

Don't get me wrong - in developed nations, all of those have increased as well. People in well-off nations today tend to be smarter than their forebearers. But the increase has not been commensurate. It is not as high as mere IQ results would suggest. I will spare myself a few hours of writing and just link you to the Wikipedia article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flynn_effect); you can then go and read the references, like the original writings of James R. Flynn.

TrueJordan

2014-03-17, 09:59 AM

Frozen_Feet

2014-03-17, 09:59 AM

As a side-note, I found a way to include the Run feat and +10ft speed increase into my 12 minute running test calculations. The complete table is below. As noted before, the normal result at Con 10 is based on 30ft hustle speed. Normally, the Run feat doesn't affect hustling, but it gives a +25% speed increase when running. So, I thought it fair to multiply the normal results with 1.25. I then converted hustle speed for 40ft base speed into meters and followed the sampe procedure with them:

{table=head]Constitution | 12 minute running test result (meters) | With Run feat | With speed increase | With Run feat and speed increase
1| 400| 500| 750| 937,5|
2| 600| 750| 1000| 1250|
3| 800| 1000| 1250| 1562,5|
4| 1000| 1250| 1500| 1875|
5| 1200| 1500| 1750| 2187,5|
6| 1400| 1750| 2000| 2500|
7| 1600| 2000| 2250| 2812,5|
8| 1800| 2250| 2500| 3125|
9| 2000| 2500| 2750| 3437,5|
10| 2200| 2750| 2900| 3625|
11| 2400| 3000| 3150| 3937,5|
12| 2600| 3250| 3400| 4250|
13| 2800| 3500| 3650| 4562,5|
14| 3000| 3750| 3900| 4875|
15| 3200| 4000| 4150| 5187,5|
16| 3400| 4250| 4400| 5500|
17| 3600| 4500| 4650| 5812,5|
18| 3800| 4750| 4900| 6125|
19| 4000| 5000| 5150| 6437,5|
20| 4200| 5250| 5400| 6750|
21| 4400| 5500| 5650| 7062,5|
22| 4600| 5750| 5900| 7375|
23| 4800| 6000| 6150| 7687,5|
24| 5000| 6250| 6400| 8000|
[/table]

Now, where it gets really interesting is the Endurance feat. As it gives +4 to run checks, it's equivalent to having 8 points higher constitution than normal.

So normally, even a person with Fast Movement and Run feats would need at least Constitution 14 to achieve the world record, but if you add Endurance on top of that, you can achieve the same with Constitution 6!

Of course, now we have to decide which is more fantastic: a sickly barbarian devoting both of their feats to endurance running, or an expectionally healthy person gaining a few levels of Human Paragon.

OldTrees1

2014-03-17, 10:12 AM

Ah, no. NPCs are still capable of getting the elite array, unfortunately, which is a handy shorthand for the same generation as players. Everyone is a PC in their own story by technicality of what a PC is.

As for the insinuation that I should be an NPC class, aye, probably. But I've survived a few things that strongly hint towards monk and a moderately positive wisdom bonus, if only because statistically I should be hideously scarred or scalped and I'm not. :smalltongue:

1) 3d6 is still capable of getting an elite array, or higher, or lower.
2) PC means player character as in the character is being controlled by a player that is not the character. Everyone is the main character of their own story, nobody is a PC in their own story.

3) Sidenote: They might have PC classes like lots of NPCs do

Ah, no. You mean PC classes, again.
The majority is a meaningless term on it's own; we've already established that fluff doesn't really count for anything. So we look at the population charts for cities, and compare the DMG population guidelines, and see how relatively common those classes are. And that would be enough to disqualify us, if there was anything even remotely akin to a 'only these people qualify for the elite array' rule somewhere. But there's not.

It's perfectly possible for Joe commoner to have the elite array – shorthand for 'rolled PC dice but I am lazy as a DM'
It is perfectly possible for Joe commoner to have more than the elite array if they were lucky on the 3d6 generation. However none of us had the plot enforced exceptionalism (4d6k3 reroll if total modifiers are +0 or less or if the highest stat is 13). So yes you(this forum) as a population will probably have an average that barely deviates from the average of 3d6 generation. Some of you will be higher and some will be lower, but it is reasonable to expect an accurate average to be close to the 3d6 average.

Seharvepernfan

2014-03-17, 10:17 AM

I'm trying to think of someone with 18s in all categories, assuming we're dealing with percentages (as in, an 18 means 1/216), and I think I got one:
Anyone ever heard of Dolph Lundgren? He was an A or B list actor in the 90s, body builder and pro boxer. His strength was definitely in the top .5%, he has an IQ somewhere around 160, has degrees in chemistry and chemical engineering, he sent Sylvester Stallone to the hospital accidentally and was an international karate champion. So that covers all bases, except perhaps Wisdom, which I don't know how to measure, but he's also a movie writer and accomplished musicion, so... Yeah. Dolph.

He's a good example, though yeah, I question his wisdom score. I think somebody with those ability scores would be wasted as an actor. I suspect most of the people with all 18's are going to be people you don't know about, in high-level science/corporate/military; where the power is.

Anyway, my estimation of my own stats is here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=14842283&postcount=68). Though today, I'm most likely neutral, and several of my abilities/skills have likely atrophied. As a D&D character, though, you typically start young(er).

I'll say that I'm not really very sure when it comes to con/wis/cha; any of those could be a few points higher or lower; I just don't know how to judge those. I strongly suspect wisdom is my lowest score, however.

KnotKnormal

2014-03-17, 11:51 AM

Ok I think I'm grossly underestimating myself based on what I'm reading. Do you guys mind helping me out here?

13 STR: I can only bench about 100lbs but my legs are strung enough that 3 friends and I were able to lift a 1500lb car out of a ditch. (not pushed, picked it up, moved it, set it down.)

12 DEX: My reflexes are slow-ish, and I'm not very agile, but I can hit a half dollar at 100 yards with my rifle.

13 CON: my cardio sucks, but I'm very quick to recover from Injury and Illness. I've never broken a bone, not for lack of trying, and I rarely get sick.
16 INT: I have a 162 IQ

10 WIS: commonly fail certain WIS based checks, but I know tomatoes don't go in a fruit salad.

14 CHA: Fairly well liked, good sense of humor, good with acting, role-playing, lying, accents, etc.

Seharvepernfan

2014-03-17, 12:21 PM

Ok I think I'm grossly underestimating myself based on what I'm reading. Do you guys mind helping me out here?

I would lower your Str/Dex/Con/Cha by 2 each, based on what you've told us.

Kurald Galain

2014-03-17, 12:29 PM

16 INT: I have a 162 IQ

I didn't know IQ tests went that high, but this is easily a 19 int in D&D terms.

(the idea that IQ = int * 10 is patently absurd, and not found in any of the rulebooks either)

Phelix-Mu

2014-03-17, 01:00 PM

I just know that I would have max ranks and a good modifier in the real world version of Lucid Dreaming. Not quite as cool as the game version, but good fun nonetheless. I guess that is Wisdom-based, so I should be able to get a +6 or +7 just from 4 ranks, methinks.

TrueJordan

2014-03-17, 01:00 PM

Assuming we're dealing with 18 as the max (though there's no real reason we should; although it's the max you can innately get, you can always train yourself to make it better), rolling an 18 has about a .46% chance, and having an IQ of 162 is roughly 1/37328 or so... I'd definitely say you deserve at least an 18 in INT

Kurald Galain

2014-03-17, 02:12 PM

bekeleven

2014-03-17, 02:52 PM

OverdrivePrime

2014-03-17, 03:29 PM

STR: 9 (Standard Array) 8 (Estimation)
DEX: 12 (Standard Array) 13 (Estimation)
CON: 11 (Standard Array) 10 (Estimation)
INT: 13 (Standard Array) 13 (Estimation)
WIS: 8 (Standard Array) 7 (Estimation)
CHA: 10 (Standard Array) 10 (Estimation)

As for Wis: I'm nearsighted. That seems the most concrete way to measure a low wisdom (although good eyesight could be attributed to skill ranks rather than a high wisdom).

I wouldn't sell your wisdom short (or oversell it) based on vision and hearing. Spot/Listen/Perception are skills that many people cultivate. Even tremendously unwise people can have pretty good vision if it's a class skill for them that they've put points in and maybe taken a feat to help out.

You don't suddenly become wiser if you put glasses on (even if you might feel like it).

Wisdom would be much better gauged by others around you determining that you consistently demonstrate good judgement and insight. It's usually coupled with practical experience, as opposed to intelligence which is generally related to academic and conceptual understanding.

If you shouldn't be left alone with electricity or sharp objects, if you routinely get mugged or are always a learning the wrong lesson from life experiences, you probably have a poor wisdom score.

Seharvepernfan

2014-03-17, 03:37 PM

Even tremendously unwise people can have pretty good vision if it's a class skill for them that they've put points in and maybe taken a feet to help out.

Like me. Spot is my best skill, by a fair margin.

Errata

2014-03-17, 04:28 PM

Assuming we're dealing with 18 as the max (though there's no real reason we should; although it's the max you can innately get, you can always train yourself to make it better)

Yes, but they can't train it up 5 points like a level 20 PC, because level 20 is superhero stuff. And they have no access to the various magic or supernatural class abilities that people use to increase it beyond what they get for levels. So that's why I'm assuming that an exceptionally dedicated and well trained human could get about a +2 from levels. That would make the pinnacle of human perfection around a 20 (or 22 in Pathfinder). But it would be very rare for people to actually have that much experience, so actually having a 20 would be much rarer than just rolling an 18 on a 3d6.

Of course, this is ignoring age categories. Humans over age 70 would get +3 to int, wis, and cha. I don't know about this one. I don't think I believe that it is common for septuagenarians to be by far the most intelligent human beings anywhere on the planet. You could make an argument for wisdom, but at least for intelligence and probably charisma, people peak much earlier than that. Mathematicians, Physicists, Computer Scientists, etc, all regularly put out their most iconic work in their 20s and often burn bright young and then start to burn out before hitting 40. Most people are starting their cognitive decline by 70. There are exceptions of course, but on average I don't think people are hitting their intellectual stride in old age.

I'm not complaining about the game mechanic, though, even if I don't think it's necessarily true to life. I usually play a caster, and usually make them at least middle age. My current character is an old witch.

Invader

2014-03-17, 07:57 PM

Spoken like a person who has no comprehension of odds.

I already said I was wrong and corrected myself so calm down a bit.

The Grue

2014-03-17, 10:45 PM

I already said I was wrong and corrected myself so calm down a bit.

FF's post seems quite calm to me. Perhaps it's you that needs to take a step back?

KnotKnormal

2014-03-17, 11:17 PM

I didn't know IQ tests went that high, but this is easily a 19 int in D&D terms.

(the idea that IQ = int * 10 is patently absurd, and not found in any of the rulebooks either)

They go a lot higher, how ever my IQ is comparable to stephen hawking. Leonardo da Vinci has an estimated IQ of 180-190. And the highest on record is between 225 and 230. The highest estimated was 250-300, set by William James Sidis, who went to Harvard at the age of 11 and knew over 40 languages before he reached adulthood. He ironically died of brain damage in 1944.

Immabozo

2014-03-17, 11:26 PM

Fun fact. 1 in 5 people make up 20% of the population.

Vrock_Summoner

2014-03-17, 11:38 PM

What are my stats? Hm... What was the layout for your average Great Wyrm Gold Dragon, again?

nyjastul69

2014-03-18, 12:06 AM

they go a lot higher, how ever my IQ is comparable to steven hawking. Leonardo da Vinci has an estimated IQ of 180-190. and the highest on record is between 225 and 230. the highest estimated was 250-300, set by William James Sidis, who went to Harvard at the age of 11 and knew over 40 languages before he reached adulthood. He ironically died of brain damage in 1944.

If you are claiming your I.Q. is comparable to that of Stephen Hawking, you have failed at spelling out how so. Also, caps are your friend. :smallconfused:

Vrock_Summoner

2014-03-18, 12:10 AM

If you are claiming your I.Q. is comparable to that of Stephen Hawking, you have failed at spelling out how so. Also, caps are your friend. :smallconfused:

This is a fairly casual forum, no need to get agitated about somebody not typing with proper capitalization and grammatically correct English. Though misspelling names is a pet peeve of mine, so our rages are aligned with one another in that regard.

Edit: Wait... Caps are friends, not food?

nyjastul69

2014-03-18, 12:32 AM

This is a fairly casual forum, no need to get agitated about somebody not typing with proper capitalization and grammatically correct English. Though misspelling names is a pet peeve of mine, so our rages are aligned with one another in that regard.

Edit: Wait... Caps are friends, not food?

I understand the informal atmosphere of this message board. I didn't mean to come across agitated. I'm bemused by this post and always ammused reading this specific type of thread. It's just funny stuff.

KnotKnormal

2014-03-18, 06:15 AM

If you are claiming your I.Q. is comparable to that of Stephen Hawking, you have failed at spelling out how so. Also, caps are your friend. :smallconfused:

Sorry, I was typing it during the end of my dinner break and didn't have time to Grammar Nazi myself.

Jon_Dahl

2014-03-18, 06:18 AM

1 Str = each 10 pounds you can bench
1 dex = try your best to gauge it
1 con = the ability to bicycle 1 mile in a day
1 Int = 10 IQ
1 wis = try your best to gauge it
1 cha = try your best to gauge it

Let me start by saying that I like the way you have put the together the estimation system :)
Now, the bench press part is funny for me, because I have had my shoulder operated and it's never going to take bench pressing. I can press at least 130 lbs. (probably more), so I'd say 13. I don't agree with that all. I'm not strong. 130 lbs from a grown man is crap. But hey, I'm damaged goods :)
Dex: Stiff as hell... Maybe 8.
Con: I've been in a good shape, but since I started to have knee problems, I've been out of shape. I guess I still have more stamina than an average person. I'd say 12.
Int: My IQ is about 101 or 101 or so. Let's put this to 11.
Wis: I'm absent-minded. Let's say 8.
Cha: No one listen to me. Let's say 8.

Standard array
Str: 12
Dex: 9
Con: 13
Int: 11
Wis: 8
Cha: 10

IMO
Str: 12
Dex: 8
Con: 12
Int: 11
Wis: 8
Cha: 8

Togo

2014-03-18, 07:45 AM

And we're measuring 'actual effective intelligence' how exactly?
I really want a citation for this...
For example, reading comprehension tests, school success, job success - basically, any way of measuring cognitive skills besides a straight IQ test..

None of which are really measurements of 'actual effective intelligence' any more than IQ is. Which is why I was asking how we know anything at all about the movement or otherwise of 'actual effective intelligence'.

Don't get me wrong - in developed nations, all of those have increased as well. People in well-off nations today tend to be smarter than their forebearers. But the increase has not been commensurate. It is not as high as mere IQ results would suggest.

There is nothing particularly wrong with this as a belief, I'm just struggling to see how this could possibly be measured. :smallconfused:

I will spare myself a few hours of writing and just link you to the Wikipedia article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flynn_effect); you can then go and read the references, like the original writings of James R. Flynn.

As someone who is already familiar with the literature, I'm simply suggesting that you don't have a measurement for 'actual effective intelligence' any more than Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray do. The issue of whether g actually exists in any meaningful sense, let alone as a single factor, has been one of the central issues of intelligence and personality testing since Binet.

The D&D system represents mental performance by three uncorrelated measures, intelligence, wisdom and charisma, and assumes that these are each normally distributed. (hence 3d6, and why point buy isn't 1 for 1) It's incompatible with a worldview that treats mental performance as a single factor.

Now whether that's a flaw in the system, or a flaw in the worldview, is another matter. :smallwink: But I'd suggest that the stats we're seeing on this list are quite highly correlated - we're seeing people with mostly high stats, or mostly low stats, rather than the results you can get in D&D like INT 18, WIS 8, CHR 8, or characters with a strength higher than their DEX and CON combined.

More generally, D&D acts to emphasise individual differences between participants. In the real world people are quite flexible, and are typically capable of more than one role. D&D emphasises specialisation, and characters built to fulfil one role at the expense of other roles, encouraging trade-off in character creation, and the creation of a team where people depend on each other. Because of that, what your stats actually are make less difference in absolute terms than what they are compared to the rest of the party.

Which may be why people are relatively indifferent about people's distribution of stats, but pick up on individual stats being vastly higher or lower than everyone else. :smallamused:

Frozen_Feet

2014-03-18, 09:55 AM

None of which are really measurements of 'actual effective intelligence' any more than IQ is. Which is why I was asking how we know anything at all about the movement or otherwise of 'actual effective intelligence'.

The keyword here is effective - meaning those parts of intelligence a person can actually use in a given situation. Measuring it is dead simple: you give a person a problem, and see how well they solve it. In everyday life, effective intelligence is synonymous with skill.

D&D rules give a very useful analogue. A Commoner gets 2 skill points per level. A Commoner with Intelligence of 18 (high IQ) gets +4 skill points, for a total of 6. But an Expert with Intelligence of 10 (average IQ) gets 6 skill points per level just as well, and a better list of class skills to boot.

Hence, despite a wide gap in theoretical intelligence, in practice these two characters end up with similar capability.

This is the meaning behind both my words and Flynn's: increases in actual performance are not commesurate with increases in IQ. People are not as much better at math, or reading, or many other cognitive task we might associate with Intelligence, than their test results would suggest.

This phenomenom was observed even before IQ was a thing, by none other than Charles Darwin. I forget the exact quote, but the spirit was: if natural selection had given us (humans) only enough brains to survive, primitive peoples should have minds far inferior to urbanites - but instead, they are about equal.

The D&D system represents mental performance by three uncorrelated measures, intelligence, wisdom and charisma, and assumes that these are each normally distributed. (hence 3d6, and why point buy isn't 1 for 1) It's incompatible with a worldview that treats mental performance as a single factor.

I brought this up myself before. There is no incompatibility, because theory of g or general intelligence still allows for various s or specialized intelligences to exist. G is simply the one that has statistically highest influence overall. This is absolutely true in D&D 3.5 because of the skill point system. All skills and traits that benefit from Wisdom or Charisma can also benefit from Intelligence. This also means your statement of the three being uncorrelated is untrue.

The real problem is that D&D rules don't give any benchmarks for real-world comparisons for Wisdom and Charisma. So even though the rules make a distinction between g (Intelligence) and two s (Wisdom and Charisma), we lack means to distinquish the latter in real life and translate them to D&D terms.

Immabozo

2014-03-18, 11:04 PM

Let me start by saying that I like the way you have put the together the estimation system :)

haha, thanks. I was rather tired when I got to that part

Scizor

2014-03-19, 03:18 AM

Just to partake in the exercise:
STR 10 (Not strong, not weak, but I never benchpress)
DEX 10 (Difficult to estimate. I'm very agile, yet oh so very clumsy)
CON 7 (This one is easier. I have a terrible stamina)
INT 16 (I can never remember whether my IQ was 145 or 154. I do remember 80% of the stuff I read and get only fives and sixes on school)
WIS 12 (Maybe lower, I'm bad at observation, good at desicions and pretty "wise")
CHA 8 (People are impressed by my intelligence, NOT my looks or speaking skill)

CrazyYanmega

2014-03-19, 06:05 AM

STR 5 (Overhead Carry capacity 100 lbs sounds right)
DEX 7 (Used to be higher, but lack of use means I've atrophied)
CON 3 (Ohhhh, unhealthy diet bought about by lack of income)
INT 11 (Slightly higher than average, I had high SAT scores)
WIS 6 (I am a pretty poor decision maker)
CHA 2 (People say I'm attractive. I tell them they need to see an eye-doctor)

...WOW. Add in the Lawful Evil, and I am a terrible person.

Any ideas on what I could do with this, outside of Chicken-infested?

Togo

2014-03-19, 09:25 AM

The keyword here is effective - meaning those parts of intelligence a person can actually use in a given situation. Measuring it is dead simple: you give a person a problem, and see how well they solve it. In everyday life, effective intelligence is synonymous with skill.

I don't agree. It's entirely sensible to talk about people who are skilled, but not particularly intelligent, and intelligent, but not particularly skilled. The idea of someone who is very intelligent but struggles to apply that intelligence is a well-worn stereotype.

What you are attempting to do is claim the primacy of an abstract concept simply by claiming it to be exactly equivalent to outcomes. It's simpler to discard the concept entirely. We can't measure it, and there's no evidence that it exists.

D&D rules give a very useful analogue. A Commoner gets 2 skill points per level. A Commoner with Intelligence of 18 (high IQ) gets +4 skill points, for a total of 6. But an Expert with Intelligence of 10 (average IQ) gets 6 skill points per level just as well, and a better list of class skills to boot.

Hence, despite a wide gap in theoretical intelligence, in practice these two characters end up with similar capability.

Cool. So BaB. Where does that come in? Because that's capability too, right? And class abilities? What about racial abilities? How about the telescope in my pocket? That's a capability too.

Or are outcomes only mental stats and skills? I would have thought trapfinding, bardsong, spellcasting and feats such as iron will or leadership, would also be mental capabilities.

This is the meaning behind both my words and Flynn's: increases in actual performance are not commesurate with increases in IQ. People are not as much better at math, or reading, or many other cognitive task we might associate with Intelligence, than their test results would suggest.

And I'd agree. What this has to do with IQ, g, or a concept of 'actual effective intelligence' is another matter. If we're talking performance, then we're talking performance.

I brought this up myself before. There is no incompatibility, because theory of g or general intelligence still allows for various s or specialized intelligences to exist. G is simply the one that has statistically highest influence overall.

g would still be correlated with each s, and s would be a subset of g. In D&D, neither are true. In real life, there is no way of measuring g, even assuming it exists at all.

This is absolutely true in D&D 3.5 because of the skill point system. All skills and traits that benefit from Wisdom or Charisma can also benefit from Intelligence. This also means your statement of the three being uncorrelated is untrue.

No, it doesn't. Either perfomance is g, in which case they shouldn't just correlate, they should be identical. Or it isn't, in which case you're not measuring g at all, and any correlation between the things you are measuring doesn't tell us anything at all about g. What you can't go is equivocate between g as a measure of performance, and g as INT.

The real problem is that D&D rules don't give any benchmarks for real-world comparisons for Wisdom and Charisma. So even though the rules make a distinction between g (Intelligence) and two s (Wisdom and Charisma), we lack means to distinquish the latter in real life and translate them to D&D terms.

I'm happy to agree that lack of benchmarks are a problem. However, I don't think INT=IQ works either. The closest real-world equivalent to INT I can find is level of education. After all, it's main effect is to determine bonuses for knowledge checks, and how much learning you've had.