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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 7188400" data-attributes="member: 4937"><p>I read that passage entirely differently than you do.</p><p></p><p>First off, recall earlier my discussion that in 1e AD&D most ability scores had very little effect on your character. Wisdom had a great effect on the viability of a cleric, but only marginal utility for any other class (thus, 9-15 were basically the same). Intelligence likewise has profound impact on the viability of a wizard, but only marginal utility for any other class. And for some of the more pervasively useful abilities like Strength and Constitution, only fighters had any profound reason to desire more than about a 16.</p><p></p><p>So Gygax is not at all worried about getting 'all 18's'. There isn't much utility in 6 18's. What he's worried about is characters with 2-3 18's because he knows such characters can be game breaking. He knows that the increase in power between 16 and 17 or 17 and 18 is roughly as large as the increase between 9 and 15. Ability scores in AD&D don't linearly increase in power, they explode in power as you get past a 15. If a PC were to spend 22 wishes to get all 16's, it would be mostly wasted wishes.</p><p></p><p>So first, Gygax informs his fellow DMs that they should not interpret a wish to increase ability scores as greedy, and respond with perverse or overly harsh interpretations of the wish. If the player wants to spend a wish on such a thing, let him receive a reward. </p><p></p><p>But note that even in saying this, he's already cutting out as ridiculous what might otherwise be seen as a reasonable interpretation by an excited player or a naïve DM - that a wish could at one go raise an ability score to 18. You can't wish to have an 18 STR or 18 INT. It just doesn't work that way.</p><p></p><p>Secondly, he is well aware that if everyone in the party could get multiple 18's, the game will start breaking. So he does a typically Gygaxian thing. Rather than telling the DM to "Just say, "No."", he instead tells the DM to say "Yes", but with such a 'harsh' interpretation regarding what is fair that it effectively is a, "No." </p><p></p><p>It's not using wishes to get all 18's you have to worry about. It's using wishes to achieve, "18, 18, 13, 12, 10, 9", which only takes 5 wishes if you ignore Gygax's ruling - and likely only 2 wishes if you accept the generous interpretation that a player would otherwise argue for if Gygax didn't give the DM this shield to defend himself. And unlike you, I consider Gygax's statement on page 11 to be a rule, and not a guideline, and one you ought to ignore at your parallel. If you really want to deal with powerful PC's and the table behavior suggests that players are chaffing from low ability scores, use Method III or Method V. Because "18, 18, 13, 12, 10, 9" isn't necessarily the worst thing you could end up with by ignoring this passage; you could end up with "21, 15, 13, 12, 10, 9". </p><p></p><p>There is a further consideration. I finally found what I've been looking for since this conversation started, which is that every wish that a M-U casts ages them 3 years. This means that you need to find life extending magic if you are going to abuse your nigh unlimited potential for wishes, which means you are going to need to find a formula for longevity potions quite soon if you aren't to wither yourself to death.</p><p></p><p>As for the rest, there really are only guidelines for making magic items, and very few rules. That's one of the reason that the rules are so inaccessible. But the same sort of pattern is found in Gygax's guidelines. He doesn't advice the DM to say, "No", but when he does provide a guideline it's one that sets an extremely high bar. A ring of spell storing is a desirable item, but it falls into the category of nice to have. It's neither extremely valuable nor particularly 'chase'. It's not part of a game breaking 'kit' of items that a power gamer is going to want. And yet the guidelines he gives for creating this rather ordinary item put the costs at such a level that only the most dedicated to actually making one will actually do so, and then only after obtaining 18th level. Compared to the sort of guidelines he could have provided, which would be that you simply cast the spells you want the item to contain, the whole deal about creating the scroll and then employing a wish (which you yourself have to cast) is extremely - even surprisingly - demanding. And it encourages, along with the entire rest of the text, the DM to be equally demanding. Your suggestions just obviously are very different than the sort provided in the text.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 7188400, member: 4937"] I read that passage entirely differently than you do. First off, recall earlier my discussion that in 1e AD&D most ability scores had very little effect on your character. Wisdom had a great effect on the viability of a cleric, but only marginal utility for any other class (thus, 9-15 were basically the same). Intelligence likewise has profound impact on the viability of a wizard, but only marginal utility for any other class. And for some of the more pervasively useful abilities like Strength and Constitution, only fighters had any profound reason to desire more than about a 16. So Gygax is not at all worried about getting 'all 18's'. There isn't much utility in 6 18's. What he's worried about is characters with 2-3 18's because he knows such characters can be game breaking. He knows that the increase in power between 16 and 17 or 17 and 18 is roughly as large as the increase between 9 and 15. Ability scores in AD&D don't linearly increase in power, they explode in power as you get past a 15. If a PC were to spend 22 wishes to get all 16's, it would be mostly wasted wishes. So first, Gygax informs his fellow DMs that they should not interpret a wish to increase ability scores as greedy, and respond with perverse or overly harsh interpretations of the wish. If the player wants to spend a wish on such a thing, let him receive a reward. But note that even in saying this, he's already cutting out as ridiculous what might otherwise be seen as a reasonable interpretation by an excited player or a naïve DM - that a wish could at one go raise an ability score to 18. You can't wish to have an 18 STR or 18 INT. It just doesn't work that way. Secondly, he is well aware that if everyone in the party could get multiple 18's, the game will start breaking. So he does a typically Gygaxian thing. Rather than telling the DM to "Just say, "No."", he instead tells the DM to say "Yes", but with such a 'harsh' interpretation regarding what is fair that it effectively is a, "No." It's not using wishes to get all 18's you have to worry about. It's using wishes to achieve, "18, 18, 13, 12, 10, 9", which only takes 5 wishes if you ignore Gygax's ruling - and likely only 2 wishes if you accept the generous interpretation that a player would otherwise argue for if Gygax didn't give the DM this shield to defend himself. And unlike you, I consider Gygax's statement on page 11 to be a rule, and not a guideline, and one you ought to ignore at your parallel. If you really want to deal with powerful PC's and the table behavior suggests that players are chaffing from low ability scores, use Method III or Method V. Because "18, 18, 13, 12, 10, 9" isn't necessarily the worst thing you could end up with by ignoring this passage; you could end up with "21, 15, 13, 12, 10, 9". There is a further consideration. I finally found what I've been looking for since this conversation started, which is that every wish that a M-U casts ages them 3 years. This means that you need to find life extending magic if you are going to abuse your nigh unlimited potential for wishes, which means you are going to need to find a formula for longevity potions quite soon if you aren't to wither yourself to death. As for the rest, there really are only guidelines for making magic items, and very few rules. That's one of the reason that the rules are so inaccessible. But the same sort of pattern is found in Gygax's guidelines. He doesn't advice the DM to say, "No", but when he does provide a guideline it's one that sets an extremely high bar. A ring of spell storing is a desirable item, but it falls into the category of nice to have. It's neither extremely valuable nor particularly 'chase'. It's not part of a game breaking 'kit' of items that a power gamer is going to want. And yet the guidelines he gives for creating this rather ordinary item put the costs at such a level that only the most dedicated to actually making one will actually do so, and then only after obtaining 18th level. Compared to the sort of guidelines he could have provided, which would be that you simply cast the spells you want the item to contain, the whole deal about creating the scroll and then employing a wish (which you yourself have to cast) is extremely - even surprisingly - demanding. And it encourages, along with the entire rest of the text, the DM to be equally demanding. Your suggestions just obviously are very different than the sort provided in the text. [/QUOTE]
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