Where Has All the Magic Gone?

Korgoth said:

Well, that and standardization. I noticed this most clearly with the "Rod of Wonder" in 3E. Why did it go from "Wand of Wonder" in AD&D to "Rod of Wonder" in 3E? Because in 3E, Rods can be used by everybody but all wands can only be used by Wizards. In other words... the Design Cops got mad at the Wand of Wonder for breaking the rules.

Hello... way to miss the point! The Wand of Wonder was all about breaking the rules. Yeah, it's a wand that can be used by a Fighter. So what? It's also a wand that can shoot a rhinoceros at your foe. It doesn't play well with others. What part of "This wand shoots rhinoceroses" suggests that it should play well with others?

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That, and 3e's rule-based insistence that Wands should only be able to copy spells; and I don't know of a spell that fills the room with butterflies.

SPoD said:

Not every person who picks up the game wants Mystery and Wonder.

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I vehemently disagree. They're picking up a fantasy role-playing game...if they're not looking for mystery and wonder, what *are* they looking for?

Lane-"I need to get me another one of those wands someday"-fan

EDIT: With this post, I finally bump to 2nd level (in 1e)!!!

Lanefan said:

I vehemently disagree. They're picking up a fantasy role-playing game...if they're not looking for mystery and wonder, what *are* they looking for?

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To kill things with magical spells and martial exploits that would be impossible in the real world and take their stuff.

Seriously, though - I prefer fantasy role-playing games because it somehow frees up my imagination and creativity. When I play or run games in historical, modern or science fiction settings, I often get sidetracked by what's actually possible and plausible in the real world, and I don't enjoy the game as much. A fantasy setting somehow gives me a licence to not think too hard.

So, for me, it's nothing to do with mystery and wonder, and everything to do with the way a fantasy setting allows me to turn off my inner overanalyst. I'm just weird like that, I guess.

I do wonder why people play fantasy games, if all they want is kick-ass power. Surely this is the kind of thing that is better played out in Sci-Fi with all its metal-gear heavy-powered weaponry.

Having said this, I think the problem goes back to the roots of D&D and is not edition specific; D&D is NOT a mystical game, though earlier editions could be used to portray some mysticism if the DM wanted.

Magic in D&D has always been far too scientific to be truely mystical and far too logical because of the needs of running a game. You simply have to have some structure.

The problem is, now the people running the show think the structure is more important than the experience it is trying to model. This is a mistake IMHO but it is just a logical extension of the process that started with E.Gary Gygax's take on magic.

Felon said:

I honestly wish I could still cling this facile outlook on gaming. Being clever and creative is all you need when the people you're trying to dazzle are guileless and inexperienced. A canny (or simply jaded) player will look beneath the candy coating to see whether there's something of substance.

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Way to totally miss the point.

It's nothing whatsoever to do with 'dazzling' people, 'candy coating', blah blah, rhetoric, blah.

Made me laugh, anyway. Cheers!

This argument has been going on for the entirety of D&Ds lifetime and the answer is always the same: the magic happens at your table, not in the books.

However, there is mechanical support for more flavour in your items in 4e: Artifacts. I'd love to see a whole book of these, including loads for level 1. I'd want to use these, plus the really mundane stuff like alchemicals and reagents, and just cut out the vast majority of ordinary items altogether.

Or I could just play Earthdawn.

Totally agree with the Op. Not only when it comes to magic items but to 4E in general; The magic is gone - the evocative, the fantastic, the odd and the quirky, the sense of wonder. The things that made the rulebooks fun to read - to get a touch of inspiration, or to dream away for a while.

The typical roleplaying campaign plays a night once a week. But with the books of old, you could get something out of your rulebooks at any other time, just by throwing up the spells or magic items pages, and starting to wonder "what fun could I have with this, if I try to find a non-combat situation where it fits"?

My DM recently mailed out the new AV2 excerpts with the tattoos with a "look at these new cool things that are coming", and I got cruelly disappointed: Just a rather convoluted way to trigger the same old "+X damage, move Y squares" that every other power in ED4 has - nothing new and interesting at alls. Nothing exciting, nothing evocative. Unfortunately, I said so, which triggered yet another 4E argument... and bad feelings overall.

At the end of 3.5, WoTC released both the the Spell Compendium and the magic Item Compendium. The Spell Compendium was universally loved by the players in the gaming group. The Magic Item Compendium, which to a large degree embodies what the Op talks about already in 3.5E, was instead shunned, and those that encouraged by the Spell Compendium bough it regretted that decision.

4E mechanics shine, 4E fluff is boring, so magical items are boring on fourth edition.

Most players I know couldn't care less about "cool items" they just want them to make a lot of damage.

That said, I have seen some real nice fluff items on that Bazaar of the Bizarre Dragon Article. Love it.

They're coming!

Mishihari Lord said:

Totally agree. I don't even need to open my 1E DMG to come up with examples. Apparatus of Kwalish? Ring of Shooting Stars, anyone? I looked through the magic item section of 4E and found it incredibly dull, even worse than the Monster Manual.

And whoever said that its easier to put this stuff in than take it out is dead wrong. My 1E DMG has hundreds of cool magic items. It would take me an awfully long time to come up with even a fraction of that number myself. Sure I could do it, but I've kind of come to expect that the game should provide those for me.

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For what it's worth, the Apparatus of Kwalish made it's way into Adventurer's Vault. We need to remember that 4E is still very new, and there's a good chance a lot of the old favorites will find their way into the game eventually. Of course, they may lose a little of that cool factor for the sake of ease of use/implementaion and balance. That said, I was pleasantly surprised with how the Apparatus turned out. (Vorpal Sword? Not so much...)
Later!
Gruns

Brace yourself, people who don't normally agree with me might be about to ;p

Your really can't just pin it all on 4e. It was very much a problem in 3e as well, and they BOTH stem from the same idea of regulating things. 3e killed a lot with it's "Ever wand must have a spell, and every spell must have a wand" rule. I think part of that was due to the emphasis on quantity of magical items; instead of maybe one or two really awesome or creative items, you'd have your standard magic sword, your standard magic item, your Heal Stick, etc, etc. 4e is still very much regulated; a little less in some areas, a little more in others.

The problem with items actually being really mysterious and magical is that, as someone else said, it breaks the game balance wise. Good lord does it break the game balance wise. For some people, that really isn't a problem. For others, it can be.

I guess for me, the biggest disappointment with magic items came from steering away from the random loot table. Man, I loved that random loot table. I think 3e was a good start for that problem too - don't like what you got? Sell it. 4e doesn't take it forward or backwards, it just side steps; have your players tell you what they want! I much perfer rolling the die, grinning, and seeing how the players adapt to the decanter of endless water (Footnote: they set it to geyser when defusing a riot and used it as a water canon). Or what about that wonderful Deck of Many Things? Does anything beat the one surviving party member panicking, threatening the generic monsters not to step any closer, and then playing 52 card pickup? (I am aware there are less then 52 cards) I will give 3rd edition this though, they introduced what may be my favorite item of all time. Why take some boring new sword when you can have...an Immobile Rod! Which seriously has more uses then you could ever fully comprehend.

Tuft said:

At the end of 3.5, WoTC released both the the Spell Compendium and the magic Item Compendium. The Spell Compendium was universally loved by the players in the gaming group. The Magic Item Compendium, which to a large degree embodies what the Op talks about already in 3.5E, was instead shunned, and those that encouraged by the Spell Compendium bough it regretted that decision.

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Why did your group dislike magic item compendruim?
I thought it was the best book yet.