How Important is Magic to Dungeons and Dragons? - Third Edition vs Fourth Edition

[Mouseferatu]

Rituals are too expensive to cast, and they take way too long to cast. Most of the great utility spells from 3.5E will never be used in a stress situation because of the casting time.

In my opinion, what needs to happen is to in some way merge rituals into cantrips, with perhaps a cost involved.

But if you allow all the utility spells to be used in stressful situations, you're right back to the problem of spell-casters outshining the skill-users.

I actually agree that a little more--not a lot, but a little--differentiation between classes, or at least between power sources, would be a good thing. I'd love to see classes get more utility powers, and have more utility powers be focused on non-combat applications. But it's a very fine line to walk, because it has to be done in such a way that the skill-users don't feel marginalized.

 

[Hereticus]

But if you allow all the utility spells to be used in stressful situations, you're right back to the problem of spell-casters outshining the skill-users.

First of all, I would have no problem if Wizards had zero combat ability.

But they do.

In fact they have the exact same combat bonuses that Fighters and other martial classes get.

So instead of limiting spells to Wizards, how about giving all classes some spell casting abilities?

Magic (spell casting) is fun, it's the reason I started playing.

 

[Mouseferatu]

So instead of limiting spells to Wizards, how about giving all classes some spell casting abilities?

Magic (spell casting) is fun, it's the reason I started playing.

Some people don't want to play classes with spellcasting ability. When I play a rogue, it's because I'm looking to play a different sort of character than when I'm playing a wizard. I want to use skills, not spells.

It seems to me that giving everyone spells worsens the sense of "all characters are alike," rather than helping it.

That said, everyone can have spellcasting ability, if they want it. Anyone can get the Ritual Caster feat, after all.

 

[Gort]

Count me as another who never saw the big horrible disparity in 3.5.

I'm not going to spend loads of time on it, but you can make a party entirely out of clerics and they'll be better at your average D&D adventure than 90% of "balanced" parties - the problem gets worse and worse as you get higher level and clerics start to get blasting spells comparable to wizards, and the horrible buff system means that clerics can buff themselves to be better fighters than fighters.

I played a fighter in 3.0 and 3.5 who went from level 3 to level 20 over the course of about three years realtime - by the higher levels he himself was simply a template for cleric and wizard buffs, and was a mere shadow of himself without at least a dozen spells from those classes running on him.

I am glad that that's gone at least. Keeping track of all those effects just got very tiresome.

 

[Rechan]

Some people don't want to play classes with spellcasting ability. When I play a rogue, it's because I'm looking to play a different sort of character than when I'm playing a wizard. I want to use skills, not spells.

Except that 'skills not spells' is how it's described. It's all in the fluff.

For instance, 'Blinding Barrage' is a close blast 3 that blinds everyone it hits.

The only thing that makes it "Skill" and not "Magic" is because you say "The rogue does it" and "Rogues use skills, not magic".

If I wanted to say, "But my rogue is using magic to do it", and describe it in a magical manner, I'm not wrong. Because it being magical has no baring on it.

I could play a character who fights with a chemistry set. Just becuase I use a Wizard class to do it, doesn't mean that that fireball isn't just a proper combination of chemicals I happen to hurl over there.

Even if you say "But the rogue is in the Martial power source", again, the martial power source is just fluff and flavor. Magic means only what is made of it.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Except that 'skills not spells' is how it's described. It's all in the fluff.

For instance, 'Blinding Barrage' is a close blast 3 that blinds everyone it hits.

The only thing that makes it "Skill" and not "Magic" is because you say "The rogue does it" and "Rogues use skills, not magic".

Sure, but now you're talking combat. We're talking about non-combat applications.

If a trapped door requires an intricate skill challenge to penetrate--using Perception to find the mechanisms, Thievery to dismantle them, Acrobatics to avoid the counter-attacks, and so on--do we want a wizard to be able to bypass all that because he can cast knock? What purpose does the rogue serve, at that point?

Remember, I'm agreeing that I'd like to see a little more differentiation between classes. I want to see more non-combat utility spells for casters, and powers for non-casters.

I just also want them not to step on each others' toes, or to mitigate the need for actual skill use.

 

[Rechan]

If a trapped door requires an intricate skill challenge to penetrate--using Perception to find the mechanisms, Thievery to dismantle them, Acrobatics to avoid the counter-attacks, and so on--do we want a wizard to be able to bypass all that because he can cast knock? What purpose does the rogue serve, at that point?

I can see the distinction I'm making going further. Just because you're using skills doesn't mean it can't be magically described (or vice versa).

After all, wizards have skills too. Granted, Rogues have more.

 

[Mouseferatu]

I can see the distinction I'm making going further. Just because you're using skills doesn't mean it can't be magically described (or vice versa).

After all, wizards have skills too. Granted, Rogues have more.

Sure, you can reskin anything to be anything else. I'm not arguing that; in fact, I'd say that's a feature, not a bug.

It doesn't change the fact that a different class should offer (IMO) at least a slightly different play experience. At the moment, the classes do that primarily by offering a different selection of powers, and via a different focus on mechanics like skill use. I'm simply arguing for a slight increase in such minor but significant differences, and against any system that allows a class whose play experience is focused on X to do better at Y than a class whose play experience is focused on Y. And giving wizards more utility spells akin to those in past editions without significant cost would, I think, allow them to solve skill-oriented challenges more easily than rogues or other classes that are built to focus on skill-oriented challenges. It would have the effect of making classes more homogeneous rather than less--or else of once again making the wizard "better at everything."

 

[Rechan]

Ah yes; giving them more utility powers, or more power, etc, would be bad, yes. I was just picking nits, and lost my focus.

 

[Mouseferatu]

I was just picking nits, and lost my focus.

No worries. It's the Internet; it does that to people.