Any way to see the ability scores of an NPC?

[redking]

Is there any way to see the ability scores of an NPC, whether by spells, psionic powers, or skill checks?

[Doctor Despair]

Mindsight gives you their int score.

[Biggus]

Detect Thoughts can also tell you Int scores.

[Particle_Man]

Charm Person or Suggestion if you tell them to carry more and more things until their movement slows down and then reverse engineer their str score from that? With dwarves you need something different like “until you can’t pick up any more” but it could work.

[redking]

It might help to explain what I am trying to do. An order of wizards seeks potential wizards among the children of a country. They are looking for children with the elite stat array, with an Intelligence score of 15 (pretty much the stats of your standard NPC wizard). How would they go about doing this?

[pabelfly]

It might help to explain what I am trying to do. An order of wizards seeks potential wizards among the children of a country. They are looking for children with the elite stat array, with an Intelligence score of 15 (pretty much the stats of your standard NPC wizard). How would they go about doing this?

Detect Thoughts will find people with an INT score of 15, which seems like the main requirement here. Since it's a second-level spell it could easily be made into a wand item or a permanent custom magic item.

[Particle_Man]

To save time and wand charges you might focus your efforts on children that speak at least two more languages than is average for their race.

[redking]

Detect Thoughts will find people with an INT score of 15, which seems like the main requirement here. Since it's a second-level spell it could easily be made into a wand item or a permanent custom magic item.

Excellent. Any ideas about how to detect Charisma scores for the sorcerers/warmages out there?

[Biggus]

Physical scores can be reverse-engineered by physical tests. Particle_Man already mentioned Str; Con could be tested by how long they can run for, and Dex by how accurately they can hit a target (assuming they're too young to have any proper class levels yet). More abstract concepts like Wis and Cha are harder though, all I can think of is setting them a series of different skill tests to give a rough idea.

[Inevitability]

Excellent. Any ideas about how to detect Charisma scores for the sorcerers/warmages out there?

1. Obtain a ton of ungol dust (minor creation?)
2. Expose child to ungol dust.
3. Immediately cast Neutralize Poison on the child to ensure no secondary damage happens.
4. Repeat until child falls unconscious, adjust number of exposures by 75% or so to get the child's charisma score.
5. Cast Modify Memory to prevent lasting traumas from your unethical experimentation, then use Restoration to remove the charisma damage.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by redking
Any ideas about how to detect Charisma scores for the sorcerers/warmages out there?

Establish a leadership institute for young adults. Don’t mention anything about arcane studies; just promote it as a place where promising youth can learn valuable skills that will help them to become leaders in their communities, as well as providing paths to advancement beyond.

Put in some commonsense filters to screen out children whose parents are simply pushing them, and make the entrance competitive based on teamwork exercises. Once admitted, put the students through a leadership curriculum and watch carefully to see who rises to the top, and why—which students dominate through bullying and intimidation, and which through a genuine awareness of how to successfully lead. That latter group should contain a good proportion of your high-Cha targets.

[Rebel7284]

Maximized Augmented Ego Whip would tell you at the cost of a chance of some trauma.

[redking]

Could a skill check accomplish it? Like spend an hour with a person, then after the hour is spent make a relevant skill check to figure out whether an ability score range is?

Example: You spend one hour with young Johnny to determine whether he has what it takes to be a Sorcerer. You make a DC 15 Spellcraft check. Failing the check means that you must spend another hour with Johnny before making the check again. Passing the check reveals whether Johnny has 10 or less Cha, 11 to 13 Cha, or 15+ Cha. Exceeding the Spellcraft check by 5 gives you an accurate measure of Cha from 3 to 20.

[Beni-Kujaku]

Bring all the candidates in a room, have a wizard with 15 Cha cast Mass Charm Person. Then ask them all something harmless but ultimately uncomfortable ("do a duckwalk!", "give me all your lunch money!", "Undress in front of all other people!", "Go to the dentist's!"). Have the wizard take 10 in her Charisma check, keep those who succeed in at least 10 out of 20 tests. Maybe ask them beforehand to try resisting the command so that they take 10 as well (not sure if children would know how to do that, though, so repeating the experiment yields better results).
Costs a 5th level spell for around a dozen candidates and can't be done on the street, but is pretty quick, and doesn't require trauma.

[Telonius]

This would be a minor bit of a homebrew, but: the rules already have an option to make a magic item usable only by characters with certain skills, or of certain alignments. (This is usually used in crafting optimization, to save a few gp). It doesn't seem like too much of a stretch to create a use-activated item of something minor like Light, usable only by characters with the prerequisite Int or Cha score.

EDIT: Oh, found an item! Stunning Surge weapon (from MiC). After you Activate it, it's usable for 1+Cha modifier times per day. You could get a relatively close (within 1) read on how charismatic the person is, by seeing how many times a day they can use it. About half of the people who can use it 3/day will be 14, not 15; but if they can use it 4 or more times, they're fine. (Drawback: you can only test one person per day with it)

EDIT 2: You could further screen out the 3/day applicants if you can get a friendly Fiend of Corruption to grant them +3 to their Charisma score. If their score was 14, they can use it 4/day; if their score was 15, 5/day. (1 day recovery period, when they get a -3 penalty to Charsima afterwards).

[Biggus]

This would be a minor bit of a homebrew, but: the rules already have an option to make a magic item usable only by characters with certain skills, or of certain alignments. (This is usually used in crafting optimization, to save a few gp). It doesn't seem like too much of a stretch to create a use-activated item of something minor like Light, usable only by characters with the prerequisite Int or Cha score.

EDIT: Oh, found an item! Stunning Surge weapon (from MiC). After you Activate it, it's usable for 1+Cha modifier times per day. You could get a relatively close (within 1) read on how charismatic the person is, by seeing how many times a day they can use it. About half of the people who can use it 3/day will be 14, not 15; but if they can use it 4 or more times, they're fine. (Drawback: you can only test one person per day with it)

Oh, good call!



EDIT 2: You could further screen out the 3/day applicants if you can get a friendly Fiend of Corruption to grant them +3 to their Charisma score. If their score was 14, they can use it 4/day; if their score was 15, 5/day. (1 day recovery period, when they get a -3 penalty to Charsima afterwards).

There might be an easier (and less evil) way. Is there a spell or creature which does exactly one point of ability damage? If so you could use it on all the people who used Stunning Surge 3/day the next day and see if they can still do it. They'd be fully recovered by the next day.

I don't have time to check now but I'll have a look later if nobody beats me to it.

Edit: the spell Thin Air (FB p.105) does 1 point of damage to all ability scores for 1 minute per level.

[paladinn]

Become a DM :smallbiggrin:

[Gnaeus]

Establish a leadership institute for young adults. Don’t mention anything about arcane studies; just promote it as a place where promising youth can learn valuable skills that will help them to become leaders in their communities, as well as providing paths to advancement beyond.

Put in some commonsense filters to screen out children whose parents are simply pushing them, and make the entrance competitive based on teamwork exercises. Once admitted, put the students through a leadership curriculum and watch carefully to see who rises to the top, and why—which students dominate through bullying and intimidation, and which through a genuine awareness of how to successfully lead. That latter group should contain a good proportion of your high-Cha targets.

Wouldn't the former group also? Intimidate is just as much a cha skill as diplomacy.

[Biggus]

Thought of a way to measure Wisdom: give them a Monk's belt and see how much better they are at dodging (then cast Thin Air on them and do it again).

I think that's all six ability scores now?

[Feantar]

Wouldn't the former group also? Intimidate is just as much a cha skill as diplomacy.

It's to avoid the strength clause in intimidate, I think.