How do you play a character that's smarter than yourself?

Ask questions that no-one else thinks to ask. It is not intelligence per se, just cautiousness, but it would feel like it.

People here are trying to come up with lofty ideas for this question but honestly there is a simple method that isn't really all that pretty.
Rely on mechanics and have an agreement with GM that your character is supposed to be smart. As long as you aren't a jackass, people will fill the blanks with intelligence.

Just make them more mischievous and more trickster than other.
Smart doesn't equal intelligent.

>Smart doesn't equal intelligent.
Nope
thats it
weve come full circle here folk
we a re through the looking glass
this is like "Fun is a BUZZWORD'

Talk less than you normally would.

Good answer.

You need a dictionary.

Small amounts of metaknowledge.

You'd be surprised...

>Huh? Oh, sorry. I wasn't paying attention. I was goofing off on my phone or trying to think of funny memes related to D&D... Now what were you saying about the trapped door and a snap decision?

Basically take a longer time to think, I guess.

Maybe its like those spiders that sit there and basically meditate for 2-3 hours and then can solve entire mazes and shit.

I'd say you can fake knowledge (as in always sounding like you know what you are talking about (because fantasy knowledge)) but you can't fake cognitive abilities. I like to play wizards, so what I do is take anything that I'm just not good at, and make him or her unimpressive in said area. If you judge a fish by his- blah, blah, etc.

Get smarter.

Well, most RPGs seem to specifically avoid the issue by making the core aspects of intelligence, like abstraction and creative thinking part of what the player does.

Memory is a lot of what intelligence stats represent, and that can be done by notes.

The other option is time domain switching, as and others have mentioned.

But yeah, the most important is agreements with the GM and other players.

Have me as a DM, make rolls and ask me to think for you when you succeed them.

most player i know activate their brains only when the dm call their turn, not fun

Use Fate Points to retroactively manipulate events. Just as Planned.

make decisions and act beyond your current understanding

Easy, just say what a smarter person than you would say in each situation.

You don't.

>Never pay a wizard ever.

Magic eight ball

Rollplay

Oh, sorry. I meant 'Some people' as in NPCs.

If you and an NPC need to react to something at the same time, you've got more time to think than him.

Then do whatever you or your party members do already when playing a wizard

Poorly

>DM wants to roleplay even the most mundane conversations

>Expects me to roleplay a character more charismatic than myself

fml

How do you play someone physically stronger than yourself, or more charismatic than yourself?
Sometimes, just use the rules as they lay. You don't have to make some grand convincing argument that sways the GM for your diplomacy roll. You can make an investigation roll or equivalent for your smart guy to have an idea.
Hypothesize on what a more intelligent person might be capable of in whatever circumstance, then ask your GM if it's alright for them to do that even if you specifically don't know how to do it.

Rub your beard often, and answer any question with another question. Works like a charm.

>How do you play a character that's smarter than yourself?

You can't. The only way to write a character smarter than yourself is to have more than one writer.

A good example is Dr Who - the writer, Moffat, is not intelligent but his main character is meant to be hyper-intelligent. The end result is some of the dumbest writing ever to grace television. Every episode needs a deus ex machina resolution because the characters need to overcome problems with brains they can't have.

However, bear in mind that the average intelligence in contemporary RL dwarfs the average intelligence of any medieval community (for example). A hedge wizard could rule a village, but we'd think he'd had a head injury.

Get domain knowledge in areas your character is ment to shine. You don't need to come up with solution on your own if you can remember them. Help from your DM would be nice, he might give you 'homeworks' between sessions.

Use OOC knowledge, really. The game gives you things that your character wouldn't know, but you do.

That won't work. Any fucker can write down E=MC2, or know what it stands for, but to have the know-how to actually explain, apply, or understand the laws and theories and physics that make it E=MC2 is another ballgame.

But you don't need to be particularly smart to get that know-how.

GM using intelligence/knowledge rolls to hand over information you haven't figured out, or confirm hypothesis you create.

By adding more points in your intelligence

To expand the question kinda - how do you GM someone/something smarter than you?

For example, I always wanted to use a Lord of Change as a supervillian in the Black Crusade game I GM, but I never touched the thing because I cannot imagine how I would play portray such a creature.

Like, I know I can prepare a lot of riddles and other tzeentchian stuff beforehand, but to portray it properly when it converses with my players I would have to be similaliry witty. Which is impossible. As in, how the fuck do I do "it knows what you will say before you say it" part.

How do you play a character that's more Dwarf than yourself?

By getting drunk

Abuse insight-type rolls.

If your character has a high intelligence stat, use it to get the GM to tell you things that your character may have picked up on, but you didn't.

roll for it, like you do with stronger or more dexterous characters.