“Games” by Design_Miss_C via Pixabay.com; Licensed for Editorial use only under CC0.

You learn something new every day, and today’s example was a small factoid: IQs are increasing so rapidly that the average person today would have scored an IQ of 130 a century ago, qualifying as “gifted”.

Projecting Forwards

Since the average back then was defined as a score of 100, that’s a rise of 3 points every ten years, which enables some forecasts (assuming current trends continue): Fifty years from now, the average will be about 145 relative to the then 150-years old standard, and the average person will be a “genius”, but the century-prior average will also have risen by 15 points, so the relative-to-a-century-ago comparison is still only “gifted”. But 50 years after that, a century from now, when the average IQ score is 160, and the average score from right now is 130, it will be true to say that “the average person is a genius relative to the norm of a century ago”.

Think about that for a moment. A century from now, on current trends, the average person will be be a genius by our standards.

Looking backwards

Next, let’s extrapolate backwards. Go back 200 years, and the average person would be considered “below average”, maybe even “slow”, by the standards of a century ago, and would certainly be “slow” by modern standards.

Quite obviously, the trend can’t continue in a straight line or we’ll get to an average score of 0 somewhere in the 15th century. But if we assume that the rate of increase has been accelerating, we can reverse that and assume that the rate of decline is slowing – 400 years, 1600 years, 6400 years, and 25,600 years between 15-point declines, and starting from a date of 1900.

So in 1500 AD, the average would have been about 85, which is the minimum considered sufficient to function independently in modern society according to the standards of the early 20th century. In 100 BC, the average modern person would have been “gifted”, relative to the populous at large, while the average person would be considered a high-level disabled by 20th century standards.

In 6500 BC, Britain became an island and humans were hunter gatherers using stone tools, fire, and group tactics. The average person in that era would be “severely disabled” by the standards of the 20th century – capable of learning simple practical skills by rote and practice, and of cooperating in groups, and of simple communications with a profoundly limited vocabulary – while even the rare “genius” of the era would have trouble keeping up in the early 20th century, even afforded every advantage.

And, way back in 32,100 BC, around the time of the invention of cooking, the average IQ would have been 35, and the average person would be profoundly limited by the standards of the 20th century, while a “genius” would be a “slow learner” by those same standards.

RPG Significance

This is something that I’ve never seen mentioned in any RPG – sci-fi games for the projections forward, and fantasy games in terms of the retrospective (doesn’t mean it hasn’t been, just that I haven’t seen it).

Think about those abilities in that context. While they typically borrow from many different eras, in terms of the social, technical, and political concepts, that 15th century standard would not be too far off the mark. Your brightest and best – INT 20 mages and paladins and the like – are “gifted”, NOT “genius”-level intellects. The best of the Gods, INT 25 or so, are the “genius” thinkers, capable of thinking in purely abstract and theoretical terms.

Now, all that’s interesting enough, but it makes a fairly broad assumption, and one that I’ve been deliberately and willfully challenging for the last 44 or 45 years – that an IQ score is in any way relevant to, well, anything other than your ability to score well on an IQ test. And it makes another assumption that I’ve been fighting for about 35 of those years, and that is a corollary of the first – that an INT score has any relationship to an IQ score.

IQ Score? What is that, really?

At best, I consider an IQ score to be an oversimplification. That’s a view that science has slowly come around to over the last 50 years or so; when I was first tested, it was considered an “ability score” that measured the totality of potential, and defining of one’s future. As I was in 3rd grade at the time, making the year 1971, I resisted strenuously that interpretation. For a start, the test made the (hidden) assumption that each person attempting it would put the same degree of effort into it, and that was inherently laughable on the face of it. Those predisposed to a lackadaisical attitude toward scholastic achievement would inherently under-perform in such tests. Consequently, I was seriously opposed to the use of IQ testing as a means of distribution of educational resources.

To be fair, as other forms of reasoning and rationality have become recognized as something only peripherally related to IQ, and the qualities tested by IQ tests have been better defined (if only by exclusion), the tests have become better. There is far less contamination from the capacity to read English fluently, for example.

These days, IQ Tests are measurements of the capacity for abstract thinking at speed.

You’ll note that I didn’t say simply “abstract thinking”; the mere fact that you don’t have effectively unlimited time to come up with an answer means that the speed of the testee’s logical processes is directly relevant to their final score.

IQ tests attempt to compensate for that variable by presenting problems in a sequence that rises in difficulty and instructing participants to skip problems that they can’t solve, but the sequencing is imprecise and the degree of compensation involved is subjective.

Right away, then, we have two traits that are measured by both IQ and form aspects of INT – abstract reasoning and speed of thought.

Two qualities that are not measured by IQ tests are the ability to associate abstract reasoning with the real world, and the converse ability to analyze the real world in abstract terms. These functions of Intelligence relate directly to the relevance of IQ tests, which is why the part of me that is occasionally intrigued by conspiracy theories finds their omission a little curious. But it might well be that they are simply very hard to test qualitatively, and – to be honest – I can’t think of a way of doing so that doesn’t reintroduce a bias towards written comprehension.

My Early INT Breakdown

One of my first attempts at breaking INT down divided it into three equal contributors:

• Abstract Reasoning,
• Memory, and
• Capacity to learn.

This breakdown was actually used in an appendix of my superhero rules to enable players of non-human characters to determine what their PCs INT scores should be on the human scale. This enabled them to choose their scores to reflect the character’s abilities relative to their native population and then convert those values to the “standard scale” – a subject for another article. The following is based upon my notes of the time (1985-6).

Abstract Reasoning

(From 1985:) When you actually look at the definitions in place, it’s clear that this is the familiar “abstract reasoning at speed” typically measured by IQ tests. Using distance as an easily-understood analogue, it suggests that thinking speeds are not greatly variable, and recommends a value of 0.9 – 1.1 as “normal”. Furthermore, each 0.1 below 0.9 was then used to cap the maximum possible result and as a factor in Capacity to learn. The normal human with appropriate mental exercises performed on a regular basis was defined by the system as 20 (25 with such exercises), and each 0.1 less than on thinking speed reduced those limits by 3. A character with a thinking speed of 0.5, who was literally “slow”, therefore had a limit (without mental exercises) of 20-12=8, and with such exercises, of 25-12=13. Since the ‘typical human’ value was defined as 10, this bracketed those values perfectly.

The character’s IQ could then be converted to an INT contribution. This was a little bit trickier; INT scores of 0-10 essentially covered the IQ range of 60-100, scores of 10-15 covered 100-120m scores of 15-20 covered 120-140, and scores of 20-25 covered 140-160. Each additional point of INT thereafter (possible for GM-created alien races and AIs) added +1 to the IQ.

Multiply one value by another and you got the Abstract Reasoning score for the character, relative to his native population.

Memory

(From 1986:) Memory is actually a far more complex phenomenon than the rules simulated. A simple score out of 20 reflected the character’s capability to remember something – eventually. In reality, we have short term memory, intermediate filtering and buffering, long-term memory, muscle memory, visual memory, and non-visual sensory memory (tactile, scent, auditory).

Short-term memory is the memory of events that have occurred in the last ten minutes or so. Some say 15 minutes. These memories are more or less instantly available to us, with only small losses due to forgetfulness and memory lapses. This memory is like a water tank with pressure-relief valves all over the surface, with new memories continually being pumped in at the bottom and those that reach the top being siphoned off for additional processing. Sensory overload produces memory overload (i.e. over-pressure) and the system responds by “leaking” some of it’s memories, especially those of the event causing the “over-pressure”. Instead of details, general impressions are retained.

Adrenalin and Excitement actually diminish the capacity of the tank,
so that when total attention on the here-and-now is required for survival, we aren’t distracted by what happened five minutes ago, or the grocery shopping list, or whatever.

The intermediate buffering and filtering memory is the traffic manager for long-term memory. Not everything in there is going to be readily accessible, and many memories will have certain triggers that bring them to the fore. Those need to be readily accessible through long-term memory, but that means that the memory itself can be relatively buried. Intermediate buffering holds the memory while it is being processed, and filtering selects where in long-term memory it should be stored, what triggers are involved, where they should be stored, and so on.

Triggers function because of Associations, which connect the trigger to the memory; access the trigger, and the memory gets transferred temporarily back into short-term memory, from whence the cognitive systems of the brain can process it. But associations tend to form between all memories, including triggers, and for that reason it is necessary to subdivide them into visual and non-visual sensory memories. The Visual group connects images and shapes and colors and lighting patterns and motions all the other things that we associate with a visual impression with similar visuals. When you look at a photo or movie sequence and think “I’ve seen that, or something like it, before”, you are trying to access your visual memory.

It’s my experience that the other types of sensory triggers tend to get all lumped together, perhaps because they are all connected with what we consider the sense of ‘taste’. When you think of or remember, for example, the taste of an apple pie, you also find the smell of one cooking, and the tactile sensation of baked apple chunks on the tongue. Similarly, the flavor “lemon”stands alone in isolation, but as soon as you associate that with a particular dish – Lemon Meringue Pie, Lemon Cheesecake, Lemon Chicken – all the other associations that come with each of those dishes flood into memory. And something similar happens when you think of something else that has the same scent, but isn’t a food, such as Lemon fabric softener.

Slightly different again is “muscle memory”, in which a particular set of motions gets repeated so often that the motions become automatic, leaving the mind relatively free to contemplate other things. Artists can free their minds to be creative, designers can free their minds to design, craftsmen can free their minds to produce masterworks, and so on.

With each of these types of memory, there are at least three attributes to consider. The speed of learning, the accuracy of retention, and the speed of retrieval of memory. But – again speaking from experience – each of these is actually more complicated than that. Speed of learning is different for different subjects for different individuals; accuracy of retention can vary over time and by subject; and some people “revise” their memories less than others, though we all do it to some extent without even realizing it; and speed of retrieval of memories is a complex subject that is not fully understood – sometimes it can be quick, and sometimes slow, even on the same subject; some subjects are more accessible than others, as well, but that also varies from individual to individual.

Memory is clearly a far more complex subject than that simple score suggests.

Capacity To Learn

The capacity of an individual to learn was one of the analyses that I was proudest of. From 1985:

Every individual has an optimum method of learning. Some respond best to tutoring and one-on-one interaction, others thrive in a lecture environment, self-education works best for others, the hybrid approach of the school classroom suits still another group, and for some, techniques that we have yet to imagine will be the optimum, such as computer-based interaction, direct RNA injection, study under hypnosis, telepathic transfer or who knows what.

On top of that, degree of immersion, periods of greatest intensity, and the interval between such periods, all complicate and compound the degree of individual differentiation.

It’s fair to say that each individual would also have one particular method that they struggle with more than any others, too.

Every society adopts a different system for different stages of education and provides minimal flexibility in that choice, though some institutions may do things differently. Actually earning a higher degree in the western world tends to require successfully adapting to each of them to at least some extent before you can progress to the next stage of your education

Reasoning Ability Analysis

The next distinctive elements of Intelligence that I became aware of was an analysis of my reasoning abilities. This was part of my testing to qualify for the intensive course in systems analysis and computer programming that was to earn me my professional degree – a full Bachelor Degree equivalent in just 12 weeks. In order to be able to complete that brutal course, you needed to test in the top 4% of the population in Numeric, Verbal, and Abstract Reasoning, to have Clerical “Aptitude” of 90% or better. So let’s run through those, and see how they relate to the facets of Intelligence that I had identified a few years earlier.

Numeric Aptitude was the ability to perform basic mathematical operations. They didn’t care what support tools you had to use to get the correct answers, just that you did so – whether that was pen and paper or using a calculator. As the test proceeded, the complexity of the problems grew, and you needed to be able to recognize trends and patterns of numbers – geometric expansions, exponential expansions, trigonometric curves, estimating first and second differentials from a list of raw data, and so on. A small amount of that is to be found in the standard IQ test.

Verbal Reasoning is the item I have the least memory of, but I think it was about interpreting written and verbal speech into logical terminology to identify the correct solution from amongst four presented.

Abstract Reasoning is the traditional IQ test of pattern recognition and determining which item would logically come next.

Clerical Aptitude was the ability to compare two lists and find items that matched, or items that were different, the ability to put a list of items into the correct order, and so on.

So, none of these really tested memory very much, or the capacity to learn; but only part of what was tested corresponds to IQ testing.

The Plastic Brain

Virtually everyone learns one language, but it was surprising to a lot of people to find that the most difficult language to learn was the second. Once you had leaned a second language, it became relatively easy to learn a third, and a fourth, and then a fifth, and so on. Investigating why this was so (and whether or not the phenomenon was real or entirely anecdotal) revealed the surprising fact that those who had learned a second language and those who had not had different brain structures! Until this discovery, it was unquestioned that the human brain didn’t change once development was complete.

Fast forward ten years or so, and the new buzzword is “plastic brain”. People who have learned to use hearing like a bat in order to replace sight. People who have recovered brain functions that once would have been thought permanently lost or damaged by injury. Amnesiacs who have found new pathways of association to recover much of their memories.

Is this another aspect of Intelligence? I’ve never seen anyone discuss the question. At first glance, you might say that the answer is no, but then there is the principle of multilingual capability. Does the same hold true with, say, musical instruments? Or Painting Styles? Or types of mathematical concept – algebra vs trigonometry, say? I don’t know – but it suddenly makes a ‘yes’ response seem a whole lot more plausible, doesn’t it?

Other forms of Intelligence

Not long after, new forms of intelligence began to be spoken of. The most commonly mentioned is Emotional Intelligence, which is the ability to project one’s empathic capacity into a future hypothetical situation and use the results to inform what you say to someone now. In other words, it’s the ability to know the right thing to say without finding out the hard way!

Another term that has been used more extensively of late, and that is arguably another aspect of Intelligence, is Social Conscience, the ability to take a situation and not simply apply an existing moral code to it, to evolve that moral code in response to the outcome, and to then undertake some remedial action. Personally, I consider this to be a relatively minor aspect of Intelligence that is amplified enormously by the social media echo chamber, but I have nothing to point at in favor of that position – and nothing to point at in opposition, either.

One term that’s been around for a very long time but that needs fresh attention and to be viewed in a fresh context is Creativity. Long regarded as something completely separate and distinct from Intelligence – in fact, the creative instinct was deemed to be opposed to intelligence for a long time – it’s actually relatively easy to argue the contrary case to that long-held position. Creativity is finding a way to do something when it is commonly accepted that it can’t be done, or seeing the potential uses for something new faster or more clearly or more adroitly than anyone else, or finding new ideas to explore that no-one has considered before in exactly the same way as what you are doing.

The Skill Bonus Question

All this comes to mind every time I see a D&D character’s skills, simply because of the structure of the game mechanics. A skill rating consists of learned ranks, a stat bonus, and any other bonuses, and the questions that flash through my mind (only to be suppressed most of the time) are always, “What does the stat bonus represent?” “What does the Skill itself represent?” “Should there be different structures in place for the creative use of the skill?”

“What does the stat bonus represent?”

Is it innate capability? An aptitude? Or what?

The answer is more important than you realize, because no matter what you answer, the system inherently compromises verisimilitude. That would be fine if it were explained in the text – there are times when it is preferable to compromise the simulation of reality in favor of playability, as I have explained in past articles – but it isn’t; the Player’s Handbook describes “what it is” in purely mechanical terms while never explaining why. Every time I see the text in question, it begs the question, did the authors even consider the question, or did they simply adapt the game-mechanics principle from earlier generations of the rules?

“What does the Skill itself represent?”

To understand the significance of the first question, you need to answer this second one – not for yourself (which is relatively easy), but in terms of what the game designers intended. In the absence of explanations from them, it’s not so easy – you can second-guess the intended interpretation from the game mechanics, and in some cases from the detailed descriptions of some individual skills, but that’s as good as it gets, and – as you’ll see – it’s not good enough.

To demonstrate the truth of that last statement, the simplest way is to look at a specific example or two. “Craft: Silversmith” will do, at least at first. This is an INT based skill and means “you are trained in [the] craft, trade, or art”.

So, you can have DEX 3 and your skill as a Silversmith is unaffected by your manual clumsiness. Or, you can have DEX 300 and still be hopelessly incompetent as a silversmith. And, on top of that, Creativity is defined as something that can be learned.

Every skill has two applications: advancing the state-of-the-art, and execution or technique. Everything in the rule-books describes the skill as conferring the second, and says nothing about the character’s ability to devise a new theory, create a new style or “school”, or create something with originality, something never seen before. In some cases, such as “Fishing,” the dichotomy is better reflected as “Theory” and “Practice” – the latter is “what works in the real world” and the former is “why it works”.

Surely it’s not too stretching of credibility to think that these might be separate capabilities?

“Should there be different structures in place for the creative use of the skill?”

One of the house rules that I routinely put in place in my campaigns was always to separate the “theory” from the “practice”. If the skill wasn’t INT-based, what was described by the rules and listed on the default character sheets was the “practice”, and included a bare minimum of any ancillary capabilities – being a “blacksmith” gave sufficient rudimentary education in the keeping of accounts, and the social mores relating to the profession, such as how to address, and respond to, the different social ranks. But only a lucky accident would advance the state of the art, and 99 times out of a hundred, you would not understand why that lucky accident produced a better outcome, and so could not replicate it.

For that, you could buy “Theory Of [Skill].” This was always INT-based. OR you could buy “Creativity in [Skill]”, which gave a lesser understanding of the past and underlying theories (fallacies and all), but permitted new and exotic applications of the skill that would manifest in a tangible product. NOT both, because they tended to be mutually exclusive – your priority could be expertise or innovation, not both.

The first could be passed on to students, the second could not. But the ability to replicate the results of “Creativity” was an application of “Theory”.

It follows that if you focus your abilities on creativity, you want to attract students of theory, so that they can take your inspirations and spread them far and wide, building your fame and hence the value of your work – but, if you are famed as an innovator, the students you will naturally attract will be other creative types who draw inspiration from you (i.e. potential rivals). If you focus your abilities on theory, your claim to fame is your craftsmanship, and the more creative a student is, the more he is inclined to take liberties with your “perfection” of result, and the less you will want to have him around. The students you want are those like yourself, but the innovator is also seeking them out; if you want any assistants at all, you may have to settle for a creative soul and future rival. But, in the meantime, the quality of your product speaks for itself.

Things do get a little stickier when it comes to skills of education, i.e. to INT-based skills – something like “History” for example. “Creativity In History” is not something to be encouraged! But the distinction between rote learning and understanding is capable of similar distinction, and the latter sounds a lot like “the theory of,” when you get down to it. So the “theory” and “practice” distinction still holds up. The difference is that the theory is the default skill; the “practice” might be based on DEX.

Where does IQ fit in?

The bottom-line is that it doesn’t. I have deliberately, with this approach, bypassed the abstract understanding of how intelligence works and is measured, and focused on its practical applications within the game world. In the process, I ignore the many contaminants of the IQ score, and the many things that it does not measure at all in favor of something more abstract and yet more functional, for game purposes.

Strictly speaking, you would get a truer picture if you were to purchase the skill bonuses both from understanding and from capability and somehow aggregate them to determine the character’s INT. Determining the IQ would be a similar process of extracting the skills whose “understanding” indicated facility in the ability to think in abstract terms – at speed. But why would you bother?

The creativity stat: A Home-brew House Rules Solution for D&D/Pathfinder

The rather vague house rules that I gave earlier can be greatly simplified with a little thought. While I have never applied this particular solution in a game myself, I thought I would present it anyway – what I described earlier is what I have actually used. You can determine their relative merits for yourself.

This solution starts by defining a new stat, Creativity:
     CRE = INT+2d6-2d6

Every skill comes in three varieties. You buy ranks for the skill only once.

• Variety #1 is INT based, regardless of what the rule-book says, and it deals with the history and theory of the subject. Reference books give additional bonuses to this skill.
• Variety #2 is as per the existing rules, and deals with the practicalities of using the skill. Tools give additional bonuses to this skill.
• Variety #3 is CRE based, regardless of what the rule-book says, and it deals with the design of new creations within whatever practical limitations apply. A successful practical roll is also required to actually manufacture the item.

You are not allowed to have equal ranks in any two varieties at any given time.

All skill point allocations are doubled. Note that this effectively reduces overall skill ranks – twice as many split three ways – which further forces inequalities such as that mandated above and choices between the options.

Redefining Intelligence: The Zenith-3 Solution

I took a slightly different tack when creating the rules for my Zenith-3 game.

Based on INT and other stats, a sequence of APTITUDES are determined. Characters can purchase improvements to these aptitudes, up to a hard limit of 50 higher than the base value (all skills are measured on a percentile scale in this system).

SKILLs are based on the net values of the aptitude scores or characteristics considered most relevant.

A key aspect of the system is that it puts a fire-break between stat increases and skills. Put a stat up, and your aptitude increases, but that does NOT increase your skill roll.

That also means that ability-draining attacks don’t alter skill rolls. Before this system was introduced, such attacks necessitated a major game delay, so much so that other (rather fuzzier) ways were found of simulating the net effects of such attacks and abilities. Variations on the Luck game mechanic, in particular, were highly useful at providing an abstract representation of all sorts of abilities, but it suffers from a fundamental problem: the laws of probability state that as the number of dice rise – and that is the primary mechanism for ‘intensifying’ the effect – the probabilities invert such that more substantial results become more common than lesser ones. Yes, the interpretations could be made still fuzzier to compensate, but the whole thing was so counter-intuitive that it threw both players and GM (me) for a loop, time after time.

On top of that, skills were subdivided into three groups: Fundamental Skills, in which everyone had a basic capacity (and which were grouped into “families” according to the aptitude of which they were an expression), common expert skills which required specific training or education, and advanced expert skills which not only required such training/education, but also required the character to have learned specific common skills as a fundamental basis. Each of these levels also constituted a “fire-break” – if you raised your competence in a common skill, the expert skills upon which it were based did not automatically increase, only the capacity for improvement in those skills. Which meant that you could spend character points to raise one skill and get on with play almost immediately.

The Aptitudes, and the fundamental skills that derive from them, are:

Dexterity Aptitude (DEX)	Clinging Draw Weapon Sketch & Plan
Empathic Aptitude (EMPA)	Animal Handling, Elementary Conversation Presence Defense
Linguistic Aptitude (LING)	Barter Clerical Skills Languages, Native Languages, Familiar
Nimbleness (NIMB)	Acrobatics Climbing Missile Defense, Thrown (i.e. Deflection of thrown objects) Running Stealth
Numeric Aptitude (NUMA)	Arithmetic Bookkeeping Gambling Statics
Perceptiveness (PERC)	Analyze Powers Bugging Concealment Disguise Local Knowledges, Common Search Spot Hidden
Scholastic Aptitude (SCHOL)	Botany Chemical Properties Computer Operations History, General Laboratory Techniques Librarianship & Research Practical Law
Physical Aptitude (PHYS)	Brawling Digging Survival, Native Environment Swimming Swinging Tunneling
Scientific Aptitude (SCIEN)	Deduction, Elementary Physics Scientific Method
Social Aptitude (SOCA)	Oratory Basic Culture & Etiquette Teamwork
Technical Aptitude (TECHA)	Construction Maintenance Mechanical Repairs
Vehicular Operation Aptitude (VEHCO) (sometimes referred to as “Mobility Aptitude”)	Machine Operation (includes basic operation of Electronic Devices) Operation, Common Transport #1 (character’s choice, restricted options) Operation, Common Transport #2 (character’s choice, restricted options)
Miscellaneous Aptitude (GENA)	First Aid General Studies Navigation, Land/Sea Wilderness Lore

Most will require no further explanation, and the exceptions are too far off-point.

It’s the Aptitudes that are relevant to this discussion. One way of interpreting them is as different forms of Intelligence. This steps right over the concept of IQ – if you were to try and map it onto the aptitudes, you would find that it’s mostly Logic, which is to say Scientific Aptitude, but with some Numeric Aptitude, a little Numeric Aptitude, and a healthy slathering of Perceptiveness as the “Special Sauce”. Deficiency in any one of them – a relative term – would represent a lower IQ than would otherwise be the case, but it’s the first and last that are the most directly relevant. What’s more, because all the important characteristics of the character are employed in deriving these values, this system avoids the twin fallacies of other attempts that I have seen:

• A character can have an aptitude in something physical, representing how easily the character learns to use what they have got, that is entirely independent of both their INT and their physical characteristic;
• Having such an aptitude does not automatically imply a high score in the physical characteristic that represents how much of the quantifiable capability the character has access to.

Ultimately, what this comes down to is a redefinition of INT itself, one that pushes aside the fallacious notion that IQ and INT are directly related in some fashion. IQ is part of INT, but it is NOT the whole story, and the Aptitudes structure is an attempt to produce a definition by extension: “A holistic abstraction of the character’s capacity to reason, learn, and apply knowledge”. Which explicitly puts IQ scores in their place.

The statistic that I discussed at the start of this article, and its projections forward and back in time, are all very interesting, but only affect one of the three factors that make up INT. If all three are equal in significance, it becomes possible to correct for that. But I have no evidence to that effect. It remains, therefore, an extremely interesting fact, but accommodating it in an RPG involves assumption and interpretation.

That puts the whole question within the purview of the GM, and makes it a part of campaign design – but a question that few would even know to ask. So you have to ask yourself, what is the standard of INT in your campaign?

The metagaming back-door

There’s a back-door solution to the whole mess, a trapdoor down which I expect most GMs to make a hasty escape.

It doesn’t matter what the standards are, because (1) PCs are exceptional, and are therefore exceptions to those standards; (2) the changes in IQ scores are all relative anyway, and so cancel out; and most importantly, (3), the PCs all have to be played by modern-day people, and so that’s the standard that should be employed – with any discrepancies eaten up by point (2).

If that’s your decision, I have no quarrel with it. It certainly negates any need for complicated discussion of the issue, and it neatly grandfathers an explanation into a campaign that’s already underway.

But, when next you are contemplating a new campaign, this is one variable of design that is usually overlooked, and doesn’t deserve to be. So, give it some thought, and – if necessary – adjust the definitions of what any specific INT score really means.