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Old 07-02-2022, 05:55 PM   #31
Agemegos
 
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Default Re: Attributes Distribution over Populations

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Originally Posted by Daigoro View Post
I think that's more of a problem with how defaults work than with IQ levels.
Skill defaults are what GURPS IQ is.
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Old 07-03-2022, 03:09 AM   #32
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Default Re: Attributes Distribution over Populations

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Originally Posted by KarlKost View Post
And no, I dont think Bruce Lee or Einstein have just high levels of skills. Some people just simply are more gifted, and can get without any sort of effort to the same levels as someone who spend years trying.

You can try spending your life time improving your martial arts skills, you'll still not get to the level of Bruce Lee - and he died young.
Bruce Lee had a lot of Charisma, which is a big reason why we even know of him. While he was certainly a gifted martial artist, there's no indication that he was that far beyond everyone else in skill (or even raw natural talent) and he also trained a lot.
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There IS a measure of skill that is pure gift, and that has no relation to effort.
And Talents are better at modelling this than stats. Talents being capped at 4 by RAW is probably the biggest issue with this entire discussion. Some people just have so much talent focused on their specific field that this restriction makes it hard to accurately model them. Giving those people high IQ or DX just raises too many questions about their life.
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Old 07-03-2022, 09:55 AM   #33
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Default Re: Attributes Distribution over Populations

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Originally Posted by KarlKost View Post
Well, maybe Bruce Lee was an expert pilot, he just simply never tried to race on a Formula 1 race.

This would enter the question of "using your gifts" that I brought above. Maybe mister Lee could've been a master climber and break records climbing high mountains, maybe he could've been a world renowned acrobat from the Cirque Du Soleil, or maybe he could've been the best sniper on human history. But instead he took interest in Martial Arts and never tried those others.

Or, indeed, he had 13-15 DX and high levels of skills. Who's to say?

The thing is that, aside from cinematic characters from movies or RPG tables, hardly anyone will be driving full speed in a car while shooting a full auto rifle and trying to hack the NSA from their phones at the same time. So, MAYBE there could be people insanely gifted that could do a ton of different things, but hardly anyone is ever pressed to do so.

And no, I dont think Bruce Lee or Einstein have just high levels of skills. Some people just simply are more gifted, and can get without any sort of effort to the same levels as someone who spend years trying.

You can try spending your life time improving your martial arts skills, you'll still not get to the level of Bruce Lee - and he died young.

There are many people who study physics their entire lives - and despite that, and despite being very knowledgeable, they still are no Stephen Hawkins or Albert Einsteins.

There IS a measure of skill that is pure gift, and that has no relation to effort.
The problem is not to know what the truth is. The problem is the suspension of disbelief.

GURPS is just a game and as long as it simulates the reality you want to play (no matter whether it is the true reality), everything is fine. Now, if something weird suddenly occurs, problems begin to rise at the gaming table.

If you come up with a Bruce Lee character who want to flee his foes and is able to climb a cliff, to get involved in a car chase, and drive like an expert pilot, the players will inevitably tell: “Hey! Weren’t we supposed to play in a realistic game world? How can Bruce Lee be able to do all those feats without the least hour of training?” It will immediately break the suspension of disbelief. While it won’t at all with Indiana Jones, Lara Croft or Walter O’Brien, because we know we are in a cinematic genre and that those characters are able to drive any kind of vehicles, use any kind of weapons and always remember the good knowledge at the most appropriate moment.

I studied karate for 24 years and go on studying it. I also study kobudo (Okinawan traditional weapons). I’m not as skilled as Bruce Lee was, but I know several men and women who trained much more than me and certainly are. They have a different manner of fighting than Bruce Lee, of course, but would be as effective in combat. Are there able to use any kind of weapon, and to pilot any kind of vehicle (like a plane, or a helicopter for instance)? Certainly not.

Yes, innate talent helps you a lot and even make you reach peaks that people without that talent won’t probably ever reach … But talent doesn’t make you magically able to perform outstanding feats without a minimum of serious training. Bruce Lee did train a lot. As did Einstein and Mozart. They even lived a life so devoted to their art that the question of their innate talent remains a question (does it really exist? Isn’t it just such a passion, to the limit of obsession, that makes them work far much more than anyone else?). And all of these famous people ever claimed it: talent may be important, but without work, you go nowhere. Einstein even said that talent represents just about 10% of the skill, the 90% remaining being work.

That is why someone who would be able to do everything without serious training sounds so unrealistic. Such human being may exist somewhere, of course, but until proven otherwise, one can legitimately doubt it. Like my grandfather said: “With some well-chosen what if, you could put Paris in a mere bottle.”

But anyway, at the gaming table, it would break the suspension of disbelief. And admit that if you met someone who suddenly was able to pilot a helicopter and a fighter just after watching Supercopter and Topgun, you would be very surprised too. And you would hesitate a lot if he suddenly told you: “I never flawned an airliner, but come in that Boeing 777, I'm taking you to Tokyo!” Your “suspension of disbelief” would immediately be broken.

Last edited by Gollum; 07-03-2022 at 10:39 AM.
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Old 07-03-2022, 09:56 AM   #34
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Default Re: Attributes Distribution over Populations

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Originally Posted by WingedKagouti View Post
B

And Talents are better at modelling this than stats. .
Not tremendously. There are too many cases where the Real World excellence involves only one Skill (or at msot multiple spcilizations of one skill). Talents are still broadly-based aptitudes.
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Old 07-04-2022, 12:31 AM   #35
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Default Re: Attributes Distribution over Populations

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Originally Posted by Agemegos View Post
Skill defaults are what GURPS IQ is.
I'd say they're secondary to actually buying skills, but I take your point. It's just changing the question to whether putting 1 pt into a skill and getting it at an expert professional level is realistic for high IQ characters.
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Old 07-04-2022, 01:53 AM   #36
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Default Re: Attributes Distribution over Populations

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I'd say they're secondary to actually buying skills, but I take your point. It's just changing the question to whether putting 1 pt into a skill and getting it at an expert professional level is realistic for high IQ characters.
For GURPS yes, realistic no. In GURPS a high IQ PC can often be better with his default than some professionals in their home turf. Not to mention your example. GURPS is nearly totally about high DX or IQ, unless you want to play a PC who is just very talented in one skill, than buffing that skill is pointwise cheaper instead a high attribute. But changing that would mean the end of the current game system and totally rewriting it.

Normally a very smart person should have a bonus in learning IQ related skills especially how much time is needed to learn, and maybe a very little in DX skills because he gets the underlying ideas faster. Same goes for high DX folks learning DX related skills, they are just very talented. In the praxis most progress comes from CP you earn while playing not from time sheets you fill out to see what your PC does while not adventuring, so itīs ok.

Making the default level of a skills related to the main attribute is a very early design decision from SJG, and itīs better than most other systems handle it.

Last edited by Willy; 07-04-2022 at 02:04 AM. Reason: added text
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Old 07-04-2022, 09:22 AM   #37
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Default Re: Attributes Distribution over Populations

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Originally Posted by Daigoro View Post
It's just changing the question to whether putting 1 pt into a skill and getting it at an expert professional level is realistic for high IQ characters.
By the GURPS definition of IQ, "high IQ" is probably not realistic, itself. Skill defaults are just an extension of that.

I find understanding GURPS to be way easier if you dispel any notions of nature vs nurture from the mechanics.*

GURPS attributes are not just talent or genetics. They include training and education as well (in fact, I'd generally say that you can't get high GURPS IQ without formal or informal education, and you can't get high GURPS DX without training and practice).

GURPS skills are not just training. You can be "born with" points in anything. GURPS talents are just somewhere in between attributes and skills.

...

* I know that the nature/nurture split is a longstanding tradition in RPGs. It's just a very unhealthy tradition, and leads down the road of bad/unscientific things like biological determinism, bioessentialism, etc.
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Old 07-04-2022, 11:59 PM   #38
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Default Re: Attributes Distribution over Populations

Yes, I fully do agree with that. Without entering in debates about biological determinism vs educational determinism (which, in my humble opinion, are often problems of extremism on both sides), humans (as well as many animals) are determined by their nature as well as their culture.

A skill is not just what you learned. It is what you are good at. And you are generally better to learn some skills than some others. Is it due to innate ability, special gifts, or just unconscious desires which makes you love that rather than something else? Who knows? And it is not important.

The fact is that we can see it in real life, especially with high level of skills. People who are very good at doing something trained a lot, but are still better than other people who apparently trained as much as them. And if they are very good in their field of activity, they are rarely as good in another one. Some people sound to be very good in several fields of activity, though. But they still rarely reach the same level of performance. Einstein was good as playing violin, but he was just a good amateur, not an expert like Nicolo Paganini. And if they never learned something, they just don’t know it, as everyone.

All roleplaying games have to deal with those two components of a skill: the innate and the acquired.
  • Some do it following the simple manner: no link between attributes and skills (Call of Cthulhu …). If you want a character that is a genius and an expert scientist, just spend points in his intelligence and in his scientific skills.
  • Some others use the governing attribute as a limitation to the skill (Savage World, Shadowrun …). Improving your skill higher than the linked attribute cost more points.
  • Some others use the governing attribute (or an average of several attributes) as a starting level for skills (Runequest…).

GURPS is in that third category. And it does it extensively because it allows to create cinematic characters very easily. While, in call of Cthulhu, you would have to put a lot of points in a lot of skills (just try to create Sherlock Holmes), it is very simple with GURPS: IQ 18, and that’s almost done. But it is unrealistic, of course. Nobody knows everything about everything like that.

Likewise, we all have some background in a lot of skills at low level. All of us can try to take a sword and swing it, or a gun and shoot, even if we didn’t train to do that … GURPS allows it very simply.

Now, as masters of karate often said, training is specific. Being very good at something doesn’t make you very good at something else. Even what seems much simpler than IQ or coordination, pure strength, shows it. Yes, muscle training is very specific. A weightlifter is not good at climbing. One can say that there is a difference between pushing and pulling, but that doesn’t solve the problem. A weightlifter is not a good puncher, and a good climber is not a good judoka.

So, what does it mean? Just that a skill is not just training. It also includes very specific muscle and coordination training, specific manner of thinking, and so on.

To be perfectly realistic, a game should have a lot of attributes (strength should be split in a dozen of ones, if not more), these attributes should make skill faster to learn (not just give a starting level), and training in skill should also improve attributes, because when you learn something, you develop your whole personality. Those who learn sciences, for instance, get faster at learning other sciences, those who learn music get faster at learning to play other musical instruments, and so on.

But it would be a mess, and a computer would be required.

GURPS allows to do that very simply: few basic attributes, the possibility to have talents, skills which are linked to attributes and also linked among them thanks to the default system, and so on. But since it also allows to play unrealistic characters as well as realistic ones with the same rules, the GMs have to be very careful with the basic attributes level they allow.

Do I take IQ 18 for Sherlock Holmes? It depends on the level of realism I want. With IQ 18, he will know everything about everything without getting bored with all the skills he is supposed to know … But Dr Whatson won’t ever laugh because he doesn’t know Jupiter (and don’t even care about knowing whether the earth is round or flat).

Last edited by Gollum; 07-05-2022 at 12:05 AM.
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