Intelligence is the underdog stat

chimeric

I love my wizards. And I love intelligent and educated and well-spoken people. That's why I'm tired of Int getting back-shelved and dissed as some kind of obscure statistic for bookworms. Whatever class requirements you look at, it's Wisdom, Wisdom and more Wisdom. Rangers? Wisdom. Paladins? Wisdom. Psions? Wisdom. And if any new class with a mental attribute makes an appearance, I bet my ass the required statistic is not going to be Intelligence. #neveragain Somehow this intuitive, clever, practical soil-between-my-toes type gets touted as so much superior to the hoity toity college-educated type. What do they know in those colleges anyway! Culture, science, literature... bah. Obviously logic is only good for a programmer's job. It's when you sit at the wheel of a tractor, a baseball cap turned backwards on your head, plowing through a prairie, that you know what life is all about. Or take the sorcerer class - a straight product for those who don't want to learn their craft but would just rather be born with it.

The original AD&D material seemed to have more respect for Int and more use for it. I don't know if this growing anti-intellectual bent is another reflection of the lowest-denominator capitalism or of the fear of offending the dumb demographic.

ThacoBell

What are you talking about? Wisdom is only a prime stat for divine magic, which isn't granted through study, but from the gods of the setting. Mages and Bards, which focus on acquired knowledge, focus on int.

GreenWarlock

In 3rd edition, Intelligence is a great stat for all classes, as it grants bonus skill points, just as STR, DEX, and CON provide bonuses obviously useful for all. CHA becomes a relevant stat for some casters, like Paladins. so WIS is not the all-in-one stop shop for divine spells either.

Some of these benefits do not play out well in PC games compared to pen and paper, but INT is far from a dump stat in this game - at least when engaging with a certain nasty enemy in BG2...

Grond0

For most character classes wisdom is a total dump stat. Intelligence, however, is useful for everyone due to the ability it provides to use certain magical items.

scriver

r/iamverysmart

Kurona

In the context of the BG games Intelligence is also a good investment for fighter classes as buffer for the Mind Flayers' "Devour Brain" ability.

In retrospect this is likely what @GreenWarlock was referring to.

tbone1

In the PnP games, they had value. Intelligence allowed you to learn more languages. Wisdom gave you bonuses against certain mental attacks like charm, confusion, and the smell of fresh blueberry muffins.

Grum

In BG, wisdom does nothing for Paladins or Wisdom. They just need the minimum. For non-clerics/druids it can be dumped without penalty.

Int is needed for fighting mindflayers. If you dump Int then they will one shot you. A true power player (with insanely high rolling) would start with Int15 for any martial class. With the time for Int16 you can last 4 mindflayer hits.