I've never been a wizard before, so when I picked up my Familiar, a Kite (using the rules for hawk), I had a few questions.
So my question--how smart is Intelligence 6? Does anyone have any rules-of-thumb about how smart they are? Where does it fall between a human "whoa, there's 5 zombies coming through the woods at my master, 4 from the northeast and one from the west" and a regular hawk "squirrel looks like good food"
Just looking for some guidance so I don't make my familiar too powerful or too weak. That +12 to perception for a hawk is pretty money.
Thanks!
On a human scale, it's probably best to think of every point of intelligence as 5 points in IQ, with 10 int = 100 IQ. This keeps the normal intelligence scores of 3 - 20 within a reasonable range (65-150). Which means an intelligence of 6 equates an IQ of 80. Dumb as a log, but quite able to function within a human society.
Yeah, that sounds about right. I was going to train him to pick up small logs and rocks to rain down on the enemy. He can hold up to 20lbs so that seems like it'd do some damage. Any ideas on rules for that, or has anyone figured out something that works well (damage, to-hit, etc.)
IQ isn't an accurate representation of intelligence.
Int is always one of those funny things to translate into actual RPing for my group. Come to think of it, the same can be said for charisma and wisdom at times..
However, an Int of 6 for a bird seems quite intelligent in regards to what it can do and how it processes problems. If you are looking for a real world comparison, a dog only has an Int of 2 and dogs are generally considered intelligent and empathetic creatures.
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"My name is Doug. I have just met you, and I love you... SQUIRREL!"
IQ isn't an accurate representation of intelligence.
I kinda lol at this, since IQ is supposed to be Intelligence Quotient and all.
Its also somewhat true. A trained dog (animal companion) has an IQ of 2 according to PF. A working dog IRL is more functional (ability to preform simple tasks with minimal direction) than many people. Chimps, squirrels and some birds have better problem solving potential than many people who hold jobs in certain fields (you know its true if you ever have had to deal with some bureaucrats or customer service reps, Apologies to those who are actually competent in their field). Heck some birds have better command of the English language than some of the celebrities these days.
One idea is that they could understand the general concept, but not its subtleties. For example, you could teach them to drive a cart, but they wouldn't understand when to signal or why, or how to read a map.
They could attend a formal dinner, but wouldn't know what questions to ask or why, and would be limited in their understanding of most topics.
You would also need to pick out the clothing for attending the dinner, and tell them "this is appropriate for this occasion." They could understand "dressing nicely" and have a general concept of it, but as for putting the details together and understanding and making sense of the context, which allows them to make the appropriate decisions--they would fall short.
So, their version of "dressing nicely" might involve some hilarious (to the outside world) effects, though they would be quite serious and putting forth their best efforts.
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IQ may stand for intelligence quotient, but as someone who works in psychology (and with people with mild- to profound-rated mental retardation on a daily basis), I can attest to it not being particularly useful to diagnose or rate the qualities that society generally terms 'intelligence' beyond a certain point. Especially since IQ decreases arbitrarily over time, as it is effectively a quotient (hence the IQ) of 'mental age' and 'physical age'. A potential genius without knowledge is as stupid as the rest of us.
That bird has an INT score of 6. For a human, which is supposed to possess the capabilities for higher-order thinking, that's not terribly good. However, it's still enough for survival. Higher-order thinking, such as philosophical meditation on the nature of good and evil or the understanding of numbers and mathematics (perhaps the singularly most abstract concept that we, as a species, have ever created or discovered, save certain nebulous deity concepts), is what you use the INT score for. Knowing stuff and casting magic, in in-game terms. What this means is that your hawk does not possess the capacity to believe that killing a mouse for dinner is wrong. Thus, your bird cannot be a vegetarian; it doesn't possess the ability to understand right and wrong, can't second-guess itself, etc. It probably can't do math or read, though it could learn to respond to certain stimuli that might pass for performing math or reading activities to the uninitiated. As far as anything but sentient species are concerned, that bird is incredibly smart. It likely has reasonably advanced memory capabilities, and maybe even some concept of planning over time. It can be trained to do all manner of things, especially attack and hunting techniques. It can tell friend from foe, and can recognize individuals from each other. It can lead you to sources of water, and can warn you when danger is afoot. It likely has the capability to understand more than we might give it credit for, since it lacks a medium to communicate.
If I had to RP this hawk due to the use of a speak with animals spell or something similar, I would play it as very capable pertaining to its areas of expertise, such as hunting, flying, and the like. It might not understand philosophical concepts, but would try to break down the world into its own relatively simple worldview. It would understand that destruction of its home is bad, and that those who would destroy its home be fought and killed if they can't be warded away, but it wouldn't understand it if you tried to explain how the destroyer is morally wrong or evil. It might understand that two mice are more than one, but not that six mice can be divided into three meals of two mice apiece.
Hope that helps.
I believe you make the mistake of equating knowledge with intelligence. Something that many "civilized" people have had when dealing with "barbarians".
This would be a JOY to role-play, as 6 int is well enough to have it's own personality, but low enough for it to have definite limitations. What I think would be the most humorous would be how it negotiates it's master's limitations just as the master negotiates it's limitations.
Things I fancy it might say:
"No idea why we are killing all those things, but they seem to wear similar uniforms... so... they're like your prey, basically?"
"you worry that I don't understand. That's ok... I worry that you might be blind. The range at which you begin to detect movement is truly horrible."
"You don't drink enough water, you seldom if ever fly, and despite your age and social standing I don't think I've ever seen you perform a mating display. You seem happy, but are you ill?"
Remember also that in this game, an intelligence of 1 or 2 means your an animal. A 3 or above is enough to be considered a setenint creature, at a 4, you could still be considered capable of thinking and reasoning, but you are not good at it. A 7 is about the lowest you can go and still be in the average, a 6 is probably stupid, but incredibly smart for an animal and, really, just below the lower bracket of average. Thinking about how stupid humans can get, this does not say much....
If i remember from the movie Forrest Gump was around 75-80 IQ and he became a miilionaire. So maybe treat it like a mute Gump?
I personally treat my goat familiar like one of the non speaking animals from a Disney movie, able to make its own decisions and communicate through body language, nudging and what have you.
Also, it's a familiar, so due to its empathetic link with the player, The familiar can have moments of a unique sort of insight. I'm playing a sorcerer in Skulls and Shackles with a Thrush (can speak) and while my familiar may not fully understand the subtitles of some higher level interpersonal interaction, it can respond to exactly how my Sorc feels about an interaction.
It's learned that when the character starts acting a certain way, he often gets into trouble with the people around him, and starts pecking his head.
same with trying to manipulate someone bigger than him, and getting cocky. Birdy doesn't know that pride comes before the fall, but it does recall that when the character starts getting too confident, someone trys to kill them before too long.
I believe you make the mistake of equating knowledge with intelligence. Something that many "civilized" people have had when dealing with "barbarians".
I've no idea who you were responding to, so forgive me if I wasn't your addressee.
In my case, I'm not equating intelligence to knowledge; anybody who can repeat a taught phrase could be considered to have knowledge, regardless of their intelligence. Likely, a highly intelligent person can lack knowledge, while still possessing intelligence. I believe you are responding specifically to my statement that a potential genius without knowledge is as stupid as the rest of us. This was in reference to the supposed IQ, and to how the tests generally work. There not much we can do to test intelligence outside of knowledge. After a point, you can't test problem-solving skills without assuming certain levels of knowledge; one of the principal parts of many IQ tests are vocabulary-based. Given such a test, somebody with the capacity to understand the words but without the specific foreknowledge of the words prior to the test will still score as poorly as one without the capacity to understand them.
Furthermore, 'barbarians' as we see them in fantasy literature don't have much of a real-world counterpart. The native Americans (all the known groups) had developed intact civilizations, and some even had fairly advanced capabilities; they simply had different ways than the invading Europeans and were called 'savages' for it. In many cases, these 'barbarian' cultures did not lack intelligence, and they had impressive mechanical engineering capabilities that we don't fully understand to this day.
In summation, intelligence is not knowledge; it is the capacity to understand knowledge, to act on it, to manipulate it, to investigate it. I do not offer this as an encompassing definition, merely as an alternative to the one that has been put in my mouth. Good luck with the hawk.
Ha, I never thought about the kite being sentient enough to have a personality--and considering he's wiser than his master, that ought to make for some fun situations. I'm thinking if I ask him to do something he knows is not the wisest choice, he'll do it but he'll give me a damn hard time about it later. I'll have to ponder that. I can only imagine what he thinks of our low-INT, low-WIS barbarian.
Very helpful observations. I'm glad I picked this over a bonded item--seems like it'll add a lot of flavor to the campaign.
