Just a question about the Wisdom stat

[Rapple]

I'm guessing this question has been asked before, but anyway.  If wisdom is the primary stat in the Cleric class, why are the 2 highest wisdom classes not allowed to be Clerics?  Also, why do the other races not have higher wisdom that are allowed to be a Cleric?  Intellect is a primary stat for mages and a vast majority of those races are given a high Int stat.  Myself not being a moderator ever, I assume it would be due to balance reasons?  The highest wisdom you can have as a clerical class is 21, while mages are allowed up to 25 on intellect and wisdom.   

[mya]

FL does not follows D&D mechanics rules. WIS is the Human stat for the Cleric class (what you call primary stat). It has, to my knowledge, no other impact in the game.
That's it.
Now regarding Illithiad, I understand why they can't be communers. But I don't understand why they can't be BMG's.
And Gnomes are neutrals and since FL doesn't allows neutral clerics, we don't have gnome clerics. I'm of the opinion that neutrals should be allowed to be clerics. For me this a thing that stays the same because it has been this way for so long.

 

[Magick]

For the record, this is the first time I've heard this question.  Let's explore this together.  If you don't want to, there's a TL;DR at the bottom.

 

I believe that the primary reason is balance.  The races with the two highest WIS scores are Illithids (23) and Gnomes (25), all others have 21 and below.

At this point in time you cannot have a neutral clerics, and while the though of neutral clerics have been proposed in the past, it's unlikely to happen any time soon.  For balance reasons.  Of course, this debate of neutral clerics has been a long one with people arguing valid points for both sides.  For this question though, gnomes can't be clerics as they're exclusively neutral.  

Illithids are another balance reason.  They are only allowed to be necromancers (and the qclass Psi), so that obviously excludes clerical duties.  Their history/RP also lends more toward being a mage and purveyor of the mind over those of a more pious nature (even their models from D&D), but you can always write RP to cover balance mechanics.  Illithids through game mechanics can't hold any weapons and if memory serves, get a slightly better hand to hand parry than your average pleb (outside monks) to compensate.  Thus giving them Holy Hands would be ... interesting.

There's seven of the twenty standard races that can't be clerics for a total of nine, a little less than half that cannot be clerics.  Three of those (Minotaurs, Stone Giants and Werebeasts) are exclusively neutral.  Sliths and Ogres can't be any caster/communer class.  This leaves us with Avians and Faeries, both of these (coincidentally or not ... I'm thinking not) have autoflight.  Flight is a very powerful spell that reduces movement as you travel but more importantly, makes it to where you can't be tripped.  Clerics get protective shield which cancels bash/bodyslam and the autoflight will basically make them unlagable without extra effort.

So yeah, balance all around.

 

INT affects more than WIS.  WIS gives practices and managain (recovery) while INT deals with skill/spell learning, mana gained per level, managain and how much you gain when you practice (up to 75% with 23+ INT).  Giving them more WIS makes those high INT mage races better.  More/faster mana recovery means less downtime.  There's also practices in which a WIS score of 18-21 gives three per level and 22-24 gives four.  That's 49 extra practices which turns into almost 5 trains.  Each train is 10 health or 20 mana giving us a maximum potential of 50 health or 100 mana.  A fair chunk either way, and both mean they can take yet more damage either through actually soaking more or more heals able to be cast, not to mention that converting more pracs for a mage is huge as they've got a lower health pool by design.

So what does that leave us with concerning high INT races that are also mages?  Elves (25 INT/20 WIS), Drow (24 INT/20 WIS) and Half Elves (21 INT/20 WIS).  They all get a higher mana pool so a 21 WIS for a human helps with their already low manapool in recovering said pool.  Half drow are on par with human clerics with (20 INT/21 WIS).

Leaves us with halflings, dwarves, duergars, storm giants and fire giants, all with INT's lower and WIS scores equal to or less than human.  They get compensated with magic resistance or physical resistance and all but one get a larger health pool.  Halflings compensate for the higher health with high dex.

So yeah, still the balance issue, but I hope this explains why rather than giving a one word answer.

 

TL;DR: Balance.  It's almost always balance.

[Manual Labour]

22 int also lets you prac to 75% in one shot, but nobody naturally has 22 int.

[Magick]

22 INT lets you practice to 70% unless the table has changed, but you're right in that nobody has a natural 22 INT.

[Kyzarius]

What? Naturally?

You confuse me.  Elves, drow, illithid, faeries....

[Pali]

I think they meant a natural max int of 22.

[Magick]

Ky, he means base stats.  There's not a roll-able race in FL that has 22 INT.  Gnomes are 23, drow are 24 and illithids, elves and faeries are 25.

[Kyzarius]

Oh oh you meant right on 22.  Not above 22. 

[Manual Labour]

22 does give 75% iirc. A long time ago I rolled an avian invoker and shelved it until the int and wis got +1 at the cost of -1 str and dex. Anyone remember when that used to be part of the game?

[Magick]

The earliest instance of this table that I have is November 11, 2005.  It hasn't changed (to my knowledge) since.  Avians also had a 19, 21, 21, 23, 19 stat spread since that time, too.  So it's before that.

const   struct  int_app_type    int_app         [26]            =
{
/* practice , learn, manap */
    { 20, 5,  0 },
    { 20, 5,  0 },                
    { 20, 5,  0 },
    { 20, 5,  0 },               
    { 20, 5,  0 },
    { 20, 5,  0 },     /*  5 */
    { 20, 5,  0 },
    { 21, 5,  0 },
    { 22, 5,  0 },
    { 23, 5,  0 },
    { 24, 6,  0 },     /* 10 */
    { 25, 6,  0 },
    { 26, 6,  0 },
    { 27, 6,  1 },
    { 28, 6,  1 },
    { 32, 7,  2 },     /* 15 */
    { 34, 7,  2 },
    { 38, 8,  2 },
    { 41, 8,  3 },   
    { 43, 9,  3 },
    { 46, 9,  3 },     /* 20 */
    { 56,10,  4 },
    { 69,11,  4 }, 22 INT.  69% +1% for being unpracticed.
    { 82,12,  5 }, 23 INT, caps at 75%
    { 85,13,  6 }, 24 INT, caps at 75%
    {100,14,  7 }      /* 25 */
};

If you're wondering, practice is the percentages you get from practicing at a guildmaster, learn is how quickly you learn skills/spells and manap is the extra mana you get per level based on your INT.