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Old 01-16-2021, 10:10 AM   #11
Anders
 
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Default Re: Meaning of stats compared to real world

Remember that GURPS is not a reality simulator.
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Old 01-16-2021, 10:23 AM   #12
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Default Re: Meaning of stats compared to real world

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Originally Posted by Sam Baughn View Post
Each level of GURPS IQ being very roughly one standard deviation from the mean (which tends to give plausible results) puts the smartest people ever at about 16-17 and I can see plenty of geniuses 'getting by' with IQ 12-14 and 3-4 levels of an appropriate talent.
Actually 2.96 is the standard deviation for a 3d6, since for humans 10 is the middle and Standard deviation follows the 66-95-99 rule this makes the "off the napkin" math easy.

So for a human on a 3d6 curve, one standard deviation would cover the 8 to 12 range, two gets you the 5 to 15 range and three covers 2 to 17. Assuming normal distribution only 14.5% will be in the 12 to 15 range and only 0.5% in the 15 to 17 range.
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Old 01-16-2021, 10:40 AM   #13
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Default Re: Meaning of stats compared to real world

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That's always the problem with these discussions. Who in history without any real training is professional or even expert level in literally every IQ based skill?
Could Einstein dabble in the guitar and instantly rival famous players?
Could Newton dabble in medicine and instantly rival the best doctors of his time?
Could either instantly spot a butterfly at extreme distances and resist torture assuming you don't separate Will and Perception from IQ as the houserule?

High Gurps IQ isn't just genius at X category of mental endeavors like some real people. It's essentially incredible at literally everything mental.

There's also the very big issue of GM style and genre. One may invoke a difficulty penalty of -5 when another would give -8 for the exact same harrowing conditions. Those are massive differences in the 3d6 curve of the game, but neither is wrong.
I one time tinkered with treating DX and IQ as potential rather than accomplishment, effectively skill caps (Attribute + Talent + 2 seemed to work) with skills starting at extremely low values. The issue was it always resulted an extremely bloated skill list
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Old 01-16-2021, 11:03 AM   #14
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Default Re: Meaning of stats compared to real world

I want to note that the "standard deviation" for a 3d roll (approximately 2.96) and the standard deviation of GURPS stats (ST, DX, IQ, HT, Will, Per) need not have anything to do with each other. "You are in the top 2% of the human population on this characteristic" and "you succeed 98% of the time on tasks for which this characteristic is the only important relevant factor" need not have any connection with each other. And for the first, in any case, GURPS stats are not randomly rolled, so there is, for example, effectively no chance that a GURPS character will have IQ 4 (whereas if IQ were randomly rolled, about 2% of the population would have that).

One of the defects of the GURPS treatment of stats, skills, and defaults is that for IQ up to 20, skills mostly default to between 14 and 16, which really doesn't seem very plausible (and likewise for other stats up to 20). I suppose you could imagine that IQ 20 means you are not merely natively bright, but (unless you are Uneducated) you have had a comprehensive education in all knowledges, skills, and professions, from which you have profited fully (see R.A. Lafferty's "Primary Education among the Camiroi" for what this might be like). But I'm going to say that if I wanted a more realistic treatment, I would start by saying that your skill defaults were not affected by raising any stat above 16. That way, a really smart person could play a game at skill-12, practice most occupations at skill-11, and have knowledge of the sciences at skill-10, which is at least marginally believable for a few people (take for example John von Neumann, a mathematician and physicist who wandered into economics a couple of times and achieved significant results, including inventing game theory).
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Old 01-16-2021, 11:05 AM   #15
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Originally Posted by Tyneras View Post
I one time tinkered with treating DX and IQ as potential rather than accomplishment, effectively skill caps (Attribute + Talent + 2 seemed to work) with skills starting at extremely low values. The issue was it always resulted an extremely bloated skill list
I've played with the idea of a variant on that, where skill costs go 1, 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, and so on. If you have IQ-12, then Mathematics-12 costs 4 points, Mathematics-13 costs 8, Mathematics-14 costs 16, Mathematics-15 costs 32 . . .
This would make Talents a lot more worthwhile.
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Old 01-16-2021, 12:05 PM   #16
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Default Re: Meaning of stats compared to real world

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Originally Posted by Flyndaran View Post
Could Newton dabble in medicine and instantly rival the best doctors of his time?
That does not seem impossible, but that's because of the state of medical knowledge at the time. Someone with Newton's ability who started looking at medicine systematically might make rapid progress.
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(see R.A. Lafferty's "Primary Education among the Camiroi" for what this might be like).
Story here.
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Old 01-16-2021, 12:13 PM   #17
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Default Re: Meaning of stats compared to real world

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I've played with the idea of a variant on that, where skill costs go 1, 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, and so on. If you have IQ-12, then Mathematics-12 costs 4 points, Mathematics-13 costs 8, Mathematics-14 costs 16, Mathematics-15 costs 32 . . .
This would make Talents a lot more worthwhile.
My first iteration was like that. All skills started at 3 and cost 1 point per level up to Attribute+Talent, then doubled per level past that. I had about a half dozen different variations on that before setting it aside.
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Old 01-16-2021, 04:18 PM   #18
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Default Re: Meaning of stats compared to real world

If you want IQ20 (and DX20) to have sane defaults without completely destroying the defaults of the IQ10 average, there's Doug Cole's By Default (Pyramid 3-65). In essence, you substitute IQ/2+5 for IQ when calculating defaults and skill levels.
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Old 01-16-2021, 06:54 PM   #19
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Default Re: Meaning of stats compared to real world

I really have no issues with someone with a 20 having defaults at 13-16. They spent 200 CP for the privilege. You could purchase Independent Income 5, Status 7, and Multimillionaire 5 for the same amount of CP. While IQ 20 is great, earning $10 billion/month is probably more fun, especially since you could probably hire the IQ 20 individual as your advisor for an inconsequential $10 million/month.
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Old 01-16-2021, 08:35 PM   #20
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Default Re: Meaning of stats compared to real world

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I really have no issues with someone with a 20 having defaults at 13-16. They spent 200 CP for the privilege. You could purchase Independent Income 5, Status 7, and Multimillionaire 5 for the same amount of CP. While IQ 20 is great, earning $10 billion/month is probably more fun, especially since you could probably hire the IQ 20 individual as your advisor for an inconsequential $10 million/month.
From a point-value standpoint, I have no argument with you. But, we're talking about the realism of someone like this existing. Someone who can walk into basically any (non-adventuring) setting and succeed just as well as a trained professional because of their raw intellect. And I'm not buying it.

Also, your thought of hiring the IQ20 person presumes that they exist in the world.

Now, in a semi-realistic DF setting, sure. In even a low-power supers game where we have tinkers creating super-suits, sure. But not in the real world.
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