Skill-based magic variants?

[~Johnny~]

Is anyone here aware of skill-based d20 magic variants designed to replace the slot-based fire-and-forget system?

Don't get me wrong, I don't mind fire-and-forget, but after playing Star Wars d20 I feel like a skill-based magic system could be more elegant. I also see a lot of problems, though: maintaining a balance of specialization and diversity, dealing with "spell points," how to allot skill points, allowing more spells per day to account for the increased risk of faulure, and stuff I probably haven't even considered.

Any examples out there to use as a starting point?

 

[Voadam]

Mystic warriors by MEG has a point system combined with a skill roll magic system.

The new dying earth Jack Vance d20 book is supposed to have spell failure rules, I think it is called a Primer on magic.

Spellbound and the Twin Crowns Campaign setting have a ritual magic system that is skill based for high powered magic (also requires special materials).

Relics and rituals has some rules for using a ritual skill to enhance magic given enough time and money. Witch's handbook uses that system but substitutes normal skills (I think concentration or spellcraft) instead of a new ritual skill.

Heroes of High favor Elves introduces ley lines which require skill rolls to tap into.

Epic magic from the epic Handbook or the 3.5 DMG or srd requires lots of spellcraft to use.

I think the Sovereign stone variant magic system also uses some type of rolls in casting.

 

[Speaks With Stone]

Unearthed Arcana had a couple of variations on handling magic based on "power points". I don't remember the details, but it looked fine.

Of course, the magic system in Arcana Unearthed had a similar method that let you divide spell slots that could cast lower level spells on the fly - diminished and heightened effects for every spell and so on. Very cool. I hope to know more about that system soon as we will soon be playing an AU game.

 

[~Johnny~]

One possibility

So far, Mystic Warriors sounds like it has the best chance of having the material I'm thinking of.

Here's an example, one that I'm not sure would work, but which conveys the general concept in D&D terms:

1. All spellcasters gain access to eight new skills: Abjuration, Conjuration, Divination, Enchantment, Evocation, Illusion, Necromancy, Transmutation.
2. For now, for the sake of simplicity, let's assume that they get a separate pool of skill points to apply to these "magic skills."
3. Let's also assume that the key ability for all skills/schools depends on class (Intelligence for wizards, charisma for sorcerors and bards, you get the drill).
4. Spellcasters can use their magic skills to spontaneously cast any spell they know.
5. Each class' spell list is simplified, gathering spells into scaleable trees. So there's one "healing" spell that covers everything from cure light wounds to mass heal, one "mind control" spell with effects that scale from charm person to dominate monster, one "flame" spell that covers everything from burning hands to meteor swarm.
6. Spellcasters roll to cast spells, with DCs set to reflect the scaled effects (to get an effect comparable to burning hands, you'd need to know "flame" and cast it with a DC 15 Evocation check (so an average roll for an intelligent 1st-level caster will have a slightly better-than-even chance).
7. In each spell description table, right next to the DC for a given amount of damage/level of effect/duration of transformation, there would be a "power point" cost. These would be comparable to Unearthed Arcana's spell points, but casters would get twice the number to account for the fact that they can expect to fail about half of their level-appropriate spell effect rolls.
8. Skill Focus feats cannot be applied to magic skills. Individual Spell Focus feats would confer a +3 to rolls. School Focus would only grant a +1.

That was totally off the top of my head, and I'm not sure it's even on the right track. It might be a bit lame that in a skill-based system, each level gained only confers a +1 skill bonus to cast spells, thus making die rolls overly important. It also makes it a lot easier to multiclass into spellcasting: jump into a spellcasting class for one level and you can drop all your points into one particularly useful school. I don't think I've gotten right, but I can't imagine somebody else doesn't have a similar system that they spent more than ten minutes putting together.

 

[DanMcS]

A similar system:

Spellcasting is based on a single skill, call it spellcraft for historical reasons. Runs off of intelligence, see below.

"School", "domain", "sphere", whatever access is granted through feats. Each feat represents access to/usage of a given source of magical energy.

From memory, the sources of magic are roughly, good, evil, law, chaos, earth, air, fire, water, illusion, transmutation, nature, summoning, magic, a few others, you can customize to taste pretty easily.

You can select each feat as an internal feat or an external feat.

Internal spheres are used by the equivalent of arcane casters. They use Cha to set their save DCs. External feats are used by the equivalent of divine casters; they use Wisdom to set their save DCs. The external feat is the same as the internal feat, plus you get a domain power and a taboo.

Spells are cast through a skill check, rather like epic spellcasting. Mitigating factors like xp burn, backlash, increased casting time, cooperative casting, and so on add to your spellcraft check (they don't reduce the DC). Duration, save DCs, bonuses, damage dice, etc are all scalable, and add to the DC. The skill point you add every level is definitely useful, because it can be added directly to these things.

Each sphere grants access to certain seeds, basically; the elemental spheres include direct damage type things, resistance to elemental damage, and generally one or two stat-buffs per type (earth lets you buff con and wisdom, fire gives dex and int, and so on). They also grant skill-boosting; air might let you boost jump, water -> tumble. This is customizable depending on what you want each sphere to represent.

Such a system can be broken pretty easily (I'll cast this spell to raise my spellcraft skill, use that increased skill to cast spell2 to increase it further, and so on), so you end up having to put arbitrary limits on some things. For instance, no spellcraft-skill boosting, or skill boosts are limited to the caster level of the spellcaster.

When an internalist casts a spell, he's drawing on his own reservoir of energy. He'll end up making fort saves for each spell to ward off exhaustion.

When an externalist casts a spell, he's calling on another power to cast it for him. Maybe a genie, or a nature spirit, or an outsider on one of the aligned planes. He makes will saves for each spell; if he fails he'll have problems dealing with that spirit later on.

It doesn't end up being as flashy as normal D&D magic; fireballs are harder to pull off, but skill-boosting, stat-boosting, and self-affecting spells are useful and available.

 

[~Johnny~]

Very interesting. I'm still looking for something that's a more direct port of D&D-level magic, and I'm starting to think that the "obvious" approach in my mind maybe hasn't been done yet.

 

[~Johnny~]

The Expanded Psionics Handbook, with its scaleable powers (augmentations) and point-based spontaneous system reminded me of this thread. So I'm just throwing it out there again to see if anyone has any new thoughts.

 

[BSF]

Having recently picked up Green Ronin's Psychic's Handbook, I have been wondering about creating a similar magic system. I think it would be lower powered, but more sustainable through the day.

Honestly, I am not sure that is the best approach overall. There are other game systems that probably emulate that pretty well. But, I am in the theory stage and kind of trying to figure out how entranced I am by D20 in general.

 

[phrakture]

Ars Magica variant?

I had been meaning to do a writeup for 3.5e on a new base class, The Hermetic Mage. Check out a game system called Ars Magica for the origins of this, but here is the basic idea:

The Hermetic Mage gains 2 abilities at 1st level: Techniques and Forms. Both of these are used in spellcasting.
Techniques: creo (I create), intellego (I perceive), muto (I transform), predo (I destroy), rego (I control)
Forms: animal, aquam (water), auram (air), corpus (body), herbam (plant), ignem (fire), imaginem (image), mentem (mind), terram (earth), vim (power).

These forms and techniques function as if they were skills, yet the points are different. I haven't yet decided how many form points, and how many technique points should be gained per level.

Spellcasting would take place based by adding the approprite technique, form, and the Hermetic Mage's spellcraft skill (similar to the Ars Magica skill, Parma Magica). I haven't worked out how the DCs should work or anything, but the idea is that at 20th level, in order to cast a 7th or 8th level spell without much effort, the caster must have specialized in either the form or technique of the spell being cast.

Another thing to note is that the gaining of Technique and Form points would be equivalent to gaining a spell level - in this way this class does not preclude adding on other Prestige classes.

As I said, nothing concrete yet.