Diogenes

Sensuki plays in a different way to a lot of people so his thoughts on the matter are coloured by that. Not to say that he's wrong its just something to keep in mind.

You don't have to play completely optimally 100% of the time.

Might is both physical and spiritual strength. So its not just being a muscle wizard, though you can play it that way if you so desire.

We live alongside cats and they are probably smart than us. They live in our houses and sleep all day except when we bring them food. Obviously intelligent species can co-exist. I think you'll just have to accept that its a genre convention that you are going to have different races/species living together in the same world. You might find any explanation for why they haven't wiped each other out to be artificial because obviously it is since its a story Obsidian made up. It's a fantasy RPG so you gotta have humans, elves and all that to choose from. I suppose since Obsidian favours a more grounded setting it seems more out of place to you?

It's genre convention basically.

That's reasonable.

You get X focus for Y damage.

Gender is not binary fyi

You won't be able to make all checks with one character, don't go crazy trying to do it. Just make a character however you would normally make it and go along with the choices you wuld normally make. Resolve checks etc aren't going to be better than any other option in general they are most for flavour.

Traps are supposed to surprise you right? So you trigger one and then scramble to check around if there are any more? I only check for traps where I think they might be there otherwise, like suspiciously unguarded narrow hallways or treasure chests. You don't need scouting for that. If you are sneaking around and step in a trap then well done game, you got me good. You probably won't come across traps in the wild when scouting, just in dungeons so you don't need to worry about it then. I think you are making a big deal of the importance of scouting and disabling traps, I'm guess it won't be mandatory because then you are forced into certain party makeups for certain areas. Unless you just want to make sure you are doing everything to the best of your ability and not make any mistakes then thats cool and your prerogative. Don't stress too much, thats all.

Kick your opponent in the balls then leg it, Arnold J. Rimmer style.

You don't always need to be searching for traps when scouting or scouting when looking for traps.

Have a madman NPC standing next to the first set of gravestones you find. "Have you seen these messages? People say they make no sense! I'll figure it out... I'LL SHOW THEM ALL!"

Theres intelligence for making dialogue based on your brains and Rational for making logical choices. Clever is being snarky basically yeah. I suppose you could consider it a euphemism so instead of getting a reputation for being a giant tool, people are like "Oh did you hear about Bob the Chanter. He's.... clever"

Well it's the original intended meaning. I still don't understand why Pillars triggers your suspension of disbelief but stuff like DnD is fine? They are still different species there. Also there HAS been dark in the past of this world and there are no empires that have lasted thousands of years. Theres been infighting. There still is. Also as Flaryn said, people who lived back in the day didn't feel the same way as we did. Back in the Roman Empire for example people of lots of different skin colours lived together, being all chill (at least as chill as a Roman can be heh). It didn't matter if you were born in Africa or right in Rome, if you were a Roman citizen and followed the ideals of society then you were cool. Being culturally/legally Roman was what was important, not being Italian/born in Rome. This wasn't 100% perfect all the time, they had some problems with the Germans for example in the WRE but overall the idea that people of different races or skin colour being the enemy is very recent, it was all about hating on the different countries/tribes/city-states etc. Who cares if Johnius Smithicus has dark skin, all that matters is that he's not a bloody Carthaginian!

The popular saying "blood is thicker than water" is actually comes from another proverb "the blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb." Rather than "blood" shared by family, the original interpretation of the term was literal blood. In other words, the blood that is shed by soldiers on the battlefield makes for stronger bonds than those of the family you happened by chance to be born into.

Aluminum

It's every grandma's name.

Don't name your character Ethel unless its an 80 year old woman.

Who cares about the key, wheres my collectors book?

My favourite part of twitch streamers is the need to have an obnoxious graphic and sound effect go off every 2 minutes for some pointless thing.

WHATS WITH YOUR FACE!?! Burn!

Considering Avellone was involved in this game I have no doubt there will be several really messed up things you can do. He probably snuck into the offices at night to sneak more in.

Inhale, count to 4…exhale, count to 4

Greek philosophers.