Where Has All the Magic Gone?

DracoSuave · Dec 12, 2008

I think the main design for 4e wasn't that you didn't get magical items with nifty powers, but that you had magical -characters- with nifty powers. Used to be in previous editions that if you weren't a wizard, you described your character by -what he had.- Fighters were distinguished by their gear and their randomly rolled attributes, not by any selections or uniqueness of the player; this was a failing of how fighters used to be handled because they were solely the result of luck or DM capriciousness. The player had little input at all as to where his character would develop.

Now, characters decide their own path of development, and items don't play as prominant a role as to the -abilities- a character can bring.

In 1e you described your fighter as 'I have a vorpal sword and magical plate armor that lets me teleport across the field, plus a shield that casts fear on my enemies.' In 4e, you're a 'sword and board fighter who specializes in mobility and tactical deployment. I have this cool maneuver that hits a guy, runs, hits another guy, then runs more...'

In the end, 4e is designed more around character than a shopping list.

Herschel · Dec 12, 2008

EroGaki said:
I think some of my favorite items were the cursed ones. I miss cursed items a lot. Not because they messed around with the players ( I admit that that aspect can be fun), but because they represented a facet of magic that has been lost in 3rd and 4th edition: magic can be unsafe, It can be unpredictable. It can have results that were not intended. That, in my opinion, is what killed much of the mystery and mysticism of magic items, and magic itself, in the current editions. Magic has had all of the bugs worked out of it, for better or worse. It is now safe and entirely predicable.

I agree with many points made by the OP and others, but WHAMO! This one knocks it straight out of the park! Some of the BEST magic items for pure fun were the Wand of Wonder, Deck of Many Things, Bag of Beans, etc. My son and his friends play in a group I've run for years and these are BY FAR their favorite items.

The Wand of Wonder has saved them from TPK more than once but also made some more mundane encounters hilarious and fun, albeit more challenging at times.

The shear paranoia when picking from the deck is an absolute blast.

I think it also changed when magic items became a commonly traded commodity, but man, some of teh great chaos is just snuffed out of teh game and thrown to the Munchkins. I do feel 4e is trying to find a balance that 3e demolished, but it's just not there yet.

Allister · Dec 12, 2008

I think it all comes down to "not being able to sell those items".

Take for example, this post detailing items from classic modules

If the same modules was run in 3e/4e, without a doubt, most of those magic items would be sold and used to finance more mundane but more consistent/powerful items like +2 swords/armours/cloaks etc...

billd91 · Dec 12, 2008

Allister said:
I think it all comes down to "not being able to sell those items".

Take for example, this post detailing items from classic modules

If the same modules was run in 3e/4e, without a doubt, most of those magic items would be sold and used to finance more mundane but more consistent/powerful items like +2 swords/armours/cloaks etc...

When run in 1st edition, a lot of those items were also, without a doubt, sold using the gp values of the magic items in the DMG. And in 1e, there wasn't even a distinction between making something to sell and finding it in a hoard to sell... the GP sale value was the same either way.

The difference between 3e and 1e wasn't the ability to sell items, but the ability to easily make (or commission) them.

Herschel · Dec 12, 2008

DEFCON 1 said:
I dunno... it seems pretty simple to me. 1E magic item were more "mysterious" because we had never seen them before.

In 1982... "Bracers Of Ogre Power raises my strength to 18/00?!? What?!? Are you kidding me?!? That's the greatest thing eve-- wait what-- Girdle of Hill Giant Strength raises my strength to 19?!? Oh my freakin' god!!!".

But now... we've had 30 years knowing what Bracers of Ogre Power do. So of course the mystery is gone. And when your DM says "you find a pair of bracers that infuse you with the power of the ogre...", we're all ho-hum.

And let's be honest here... even if all of you decrying 4E magic item design were to suddenly start playing 1E campaigns again... how many times would a DM hand you a supposedly "mysterious" magic item, only for you to discover that you already know what it was because you've had the rules for them for 30 years?

You are all looking for a nostalgia that you cannot get back, because you know Dungeons & Dragons. And it doesn't matter if you play 1E or 2E or 3E or 4E or Basic or Rules Cyclopedia or any of that stuff... because the "magic" of the game is gone. You already know everything.

You want to truly be surprised and filled with magic and wonder about an RPG again? Get your DM to pick up a game that none of you have ever played or even read... and have him run it for you. And make sure none of you players read the rules/setting/game. Then (and only then) will you have this nostaglic "magic and wonder" that you seem to crave.

Sure, nostalgia plays a part in it, but it goes far beyond that. Your overly simplistic presentation leaves out acknowledging the vast majority of information already posted. Then again, maybe you haven't really played much in the older editions.

They are GAUNTLETS of Ogre Power. Sorry thief and somatic spellchuckers, you are out-of-luck. They rocked, but also had a major drawback for anyone but the fighters.

Sir Brennen · Dec 12, 2008

Herschel said:
They are GAUNTLETS of Ogre Power. Sorry thief and somatic spellchuckers, you are out-of-luck. They rocked, but also had a major drawback for anyone but the fighters.

Which was probably a good thing, since fighters also had a major drawback: that they were fighters

Joking aside, what drawbacks did the more powerful girdles of giant strength have for non-fighter classes?

(Hint: none.)

Herschel · Dec 12, 2008

Harlekin said:
If you consider published adventures this is actually false. If you go back and look at any of the 1st ed classics, you will find that players will be veritable Christmas trees after surviving those scenarios.

This assumes a party searched every single room in the joint. In many of them, the goal was to get to the goal and get out alive. I've run "Against the Giants" a few times and all the Giants are never killed. Snurre got mega-critted early once and our sneaky little nemesis took a scroll of Raise Dead when the party holed up to heal and he grabbed some reinforcements and had some nasty surprises ready for them. They got through that alive, but didn't have much left for the chase and had to be careful heading for the Underdark. That Drow ambush I set in the cavern was downright wicked while not causing death, dropped two of the five to unconscious and some of the drow retreated to set traps if they tried to retreat back up themselves.

In the "House of Strahd" you just try to annoy Strahd enough to escape with your life. You don't get to do a concerted search of his castle to loot it.

Herschel · Dec 12, 2008

Sir Brennen said:
Which was probably a good thing, since fighters also had a major drawback: that they were fighters

Joking aside, what drawbacks did the more powerful girdles of giant strength have for non-fighter classes?

(Hint: none.)

Girdles were a bit whack. I never let any of those out until double-digit levels, and rarely even then.

Harlekin · Dec 12, 2008

Herschel said:
This assumes a party searched every single room in the joint. In many of them, the goal was to get to the goal and get out alive. I've run "Against the Giants" a few times and all the Giants are never killed. Snurre got mega-critted early once and our sneaky little nemesis took a scroll of Raise Dead when the party holed up to heal and he grabbed some reinforcements and had some nasty surprises ready for them. They got through that alive, but didn't have much left for the chase and had to be careful heading for the Underdark. That Drow ambush I set in the cavern was downright wicked while not causing death, dropped two of the five to unconscious and some of the drow retreated to set traps if they tried to retreat back up themselves.

In the "House of Strahd" you just try to annoy Strahd enough to escape with your life. You don't get to do a concerted search of his castle to loot it.

Well, every gm runs his game differently. To get the best evaluation at the level of magical items expected to be looted from an adventure, you really only can look at everything that is available. Dependent on the GM, you will get some proportion of that. And even if only half of all the magic available in these adventures is handed out, the players will still be laden with magic by level 6.

Raven Crowking · Dec 12, 2008

Harlekin said:
Well, every gm runs his game differently. To get the best evaluation at the level of magical items expected to be looted from an adventure, you really only can look at everything that is available.

Not so.

The 1e DMG has rules that tell you how long it takes to search a given area, and how often wandering monsters occur (unless the module specifies otherwise). If a module has a time limit, you can determine exactly what percentage of the area can be searched within that limit. If the module does not specify that there are no wandering monsters, you can determine roughly how may additional encounters prolonged searching will cause, and what the average effects of those encounters will be.

A more in-depth analysis of any 1e module will show that the odds of finding all the treasure in most modules (while succeeding/surviving) is virtually nil, so long as the DM uses the searching times in the rules, and makes wandering monster checks in accordance to the rules/module text.

RC

Where Has All the Magic Gone?

DracoSuave

First Post

Herschel

Adventurer

Allister

First Post

billd91

Not your screen monkey (he/him)

Herschel

Adventurer

Sir Brennen

Legend

Herschel

Adventurer

Herschel

Adventurer

Harlekin

First Post

Raven Crowking

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