Ringo
Here’s a Trash Take. Wisdom is a shitty stat that makes D&D a worse game and it should be abandoned. It wants to be a dump stat but few one can quite afford to take hits passive perception, despite not really adding much to the game outside of noticing shit. The connection between having deep intuition, common sense, and lived experience all makes a little sense, but it also functions as a stand-in for Willpower and that makes less sense than Heavy Armor and Super Sweet Matix Moves having the same in game effect. Seriously the way Armor Class and Hip Points stack is an abstraction not only makes no sense, but makes narrating actually harder to link to mechanical results.
In case I haven’t made my feelings on D&D clear to anyone reading this, I believe it’s a mediocre tabletop RPG that is out performed by a host of other games in pretty much every aspect. Well every aspect except Brand Recognition and Loyalty, which sucks, but like most things quality is not the same as popularity. Hence HMB. EH EH? This is the point I make Finger guns and give a shit eating grin, pretending I said something clever, while understanding it was a cheap easy joke that actually does nothing but expose my need to be a hipster nerd.
All that said, I still have played a fair amount of D&D, for the past 3 editions, including the knock off brands Pathfinder and 13th age. (For more hot takes I think 4e does D&D better than any other edition and is better game from a game design perspective) I regularly consume D&D media, look up optimization builds, and participate in rules discussions on forums, Reddit, and Stack Exchange RPG. I actively engage in the game for the same reasons a lot of people do. Not only its greater market share but it was my first experience really Role Playing with rules and will always hold some nostalgia.
All this set up to make it clear that while I may be a D&D hater, I don’t HATE D&D. I have an appreciation for the game as a fun high fantasy romp or a beer and pretzel dungeon crawler. I love sword and sorcery and D&D is foundational not just to RPG’s both video and tabletop but to that genre of literature. It is however deeply flawed, primarily because a need to keep tropes, aesthetics, and mechanical holdovers from previous editions that just do not make sense and are surpassed in modern game design.
This specific flaw comes from a lot of things but primarily it is that Wisdom is kinda the Hufflepuff of mental abilities. It just gets all the leftovers. I mean how is medicine a skill related to intuition or lived experience? That’s a fucking study that requires memorization, problem solving, and FUCKING SCIENCE! And like Animal Handling? Survival? Hell even Perception, probably the most rolled skill in the game and first thing that comes to mind with wisdom checks, doesn’t really make sense. Being good at keeping your cool or knowing philosophy or whatever has literally nothing to do with how good one’s eyes work.
It really feels like with skills they got to the end and said uh Wisdom needs some shit and like we haven’t done anything with these. Insight is the only one that clearly fits. It’s not just skills though. Wisdom saves come in one of two flavors, not being deceived and holding your mind together under assault. Basically having a strong will. And like those aren’t really correlated, let alone causally linked. Lots of people have the strength of mind to push through adversity only to succumb to scams like a fucking rube.
Speaking of, Cleric doesn’t make that much sense as wise. I mean, sure we can talk about spiritual elders and such being fonts of wisdom people go to seek advice from and there are plenty of examples of spiritual teaching that holds wisdom that has lasted the test of time. But also, blind faith is kinda the opposite of wisdom. Just trust. Wisdom often comes with cynicism and skepticism. Monk makes sense for sure(though why cleric and monk are still different classes feels a little..uh…Orientalist I guess) because it’s associated with the eastern monks who study but Cleric is not associated western monks that did the same. It’s associated closer to the Templars. I guess Druids could fit, in the whole strong will thing, but like not sure why channeling power from nature has to do with your personal will, and not your connection to nature. Which again, doesn’t feel like a thing related to wisdom…unless I guess we’re going with the wisdom of the woods or some such hippy bullshit?
The point is Wisdom is one of the points of vaguery where the system gets very messy and the mechanical abstraction has no clear map onto the narrative. How do you play having high wisdom? As skeptical of everything? As blind faith in your rightness? As always having the answer? Or knowing not to talk? Mechanically a gullible strong willed person is the same as a sharp witted one with no backbone.
The really annoying part though is this is an easy fix if the designers are willing to say, we don’t need to keep the same 6 stats. People act like that’s a core part of D&D but why? What does having 6 rather vague stats add that having 7 like Fallouts SPECIAL would destroy? Hell even just making Wisdom Will would be better. And it maps better to the physical mirror too. Will becomes the mental endurance feet, similar to con being the physical. Intelligence stays as the mental power house, similar to strengh. And we could keep Cha as an analog for Dex…or we could make it Quick Witted/Wits. Your ability to charm and talk is in general all related to how fast you can make things sound good.
Intuition becomes a Cha/Wits Skill. Detecing Illsuion wisdom saves become wits/cah. Animal Handling Stays Will as that’s generally about projecting the right thing though body language, and dominance is often the thing projected. Medicine goes to Int. Survival can maybe stay Will, even though its about tracking and such, generally its having the patience to sit and learn that shit that you get it. Bards, Warlocks stay Cha/Wits, While I would say Druids should join them. Monks should become int based and also It should be less about kung fu and more just about studying, meditation, etc. Clerics and Paladins fuse and become will, cause lets be real, they are just the same class.
There are plenty of other ways to make Wisdom make MORE sense. Obviously there will always be issues as the game is an abstraction meant to emulate a story not to simulate the real world. And yes I get bitching about realism in a game about Elves that can summon literal fireballs using their minds is stupid. It is not stupid however to try to get mechanics to serve the narrative by mapping to specific identifiable and understandable outcomes. That is the job of mechanics after all, the help inform the story and the role play. That’s why rule 0 exists, so we can adjust rules to fit the story, game, and experience we want at the table. Because at the end of the day it’s about telling a good story and mechanics that don’t serve that end…aren’;t good mechanics.