Sorcerer vs Wizard

[UngeheuerLich]

Sorry I didn't mean to imply the keywords would be A B C etc... I was just feeling unimaginative.

I'm speaking like Fireball [Fire] [Damage] [Area] [Ranged] [Evocation]

Or Knock [Manipulation] [Thievery] [Exploration]



Or some better idea than that... But you might give a class access to all [Area] spells or All [Thievery] spells, and not have to worry about making a list that is outdated by the time it's published.

Better, but still more trouble than its worth.

flame strike [area] [holy] [fire]

should the wizard have access to this one? I guess not. So in the end, you are back at some lists.

Wizard has [area] spells, but not those that are [holy].

In the end, new books can list them as [cleric] or [wizard] or if all arcane casters can access them: [arcane], [divine]...

 

[Moon_Goddess]

No no, I think [Area] -[holy] is perfectly the right answer there.

It is no longer 1974, we have computers to track this stuff, and smart phones at the table, we can get complex.

 

[MoonSong]

No no, I think [Area] -[holy] is perfectly the right answer there.

It is no longer 1974, we have computers to track this stuff, and smart phones at the table, we can get complex.

But not everybody uses computer at the game table, and shouldn't be forced to.

 

[Mezzer]

Remember Sorcerers only know two spells of each level!!, how can you break the game with only two spells of each level and being one level behind?

Well, quite simply, by casting far too much of those few spells. Besides, is a 3rd level spell 3 times as good as a 1st level spell? Maybe sometimes, but not very often, and that's where the pricing problem becomes very apparent, particularly when spells aren't directly numerically comparable.

And given that, do you want to further punish the sorcerer by taking away his tactical flexibility and turn the simplest caster into a complexity nightmare? the current Level=Cost is very simple to remember and use, take away that and you get something unplayable.

I never said anything about making them more complex. Besides, flexibility and complexity are entirely unrelated. And how is Level+X remotely harder to remember or use?

The game is looking to have a lot of spell levels, presumably the standard 9 (has anyone said otherwise?), and that makes a spell point system a nightmare to balance. Spells tend to increase in power exponentially, and there's a hell of a lot of variation in individual levels even. You need to have the pool grow in order to actually allow you to cast all the spells you need, but it needs to cap out at one point, prior to max level, otherwise you'll just end up spamming high-level spells.

 

[ZombieRoboNinja]

I think it likely that cost=level only happens to hold true for level 1 and 2 spells. Otherwise, they would have just said "A spell costs a number of Willpower equal to its level" rather than making the silly chart for it. My guess is that it's more like the 3.x psionic rules where spell cost scales up with higher levels.

Anyway, as the OP mentioned, the draconic sorcerer is clearly the "battlemage"/gish build. My guess is the wild magic origin hinted at in the flavor text will be more of a straight evoker with d4 HP, no armor proficiencies, and a +1 bonus to spell attacks/DCs. (Plus bonus spells that are all about nuking things, probably in a suitably wild fashion.) THAT is the sorcerer we'll have to compare to the wizard - or more specifically, to the wizard with an evocation-focused "arcane tradition."

 

[Falling Icicle]

I really like that the spell point cost = spell level. It's simple and intuitive. Keep in mind that spells don't scale with caster level anymore, so I'm not that worried about it creating severe balance issues.

 

[Falling Icicle]

I too would like to see keywords. Even 3.x had descriptors in the spell descriptions, like charm, fear, compulsion, etc. At the very least they should do that.

 

[Bow_Seat]

Okay so when it comes to spell points = spell level there are two things to consider:

1) the spell points cost per effect
2) the effect per casting time

For example. Low level spells are more cost effective than higher level spells, but higher level spells do more damage per round. So if you pay the lower level cost for the most economical spells then you risk falling behind on damage per round, but if you pay the higher cost for more damage then you risk running out of spell points very fast. I feel like the spell points cost = spell level is a very balanced system that makes the player think about what exactly it is that they are trying to do, because they are actually balancing two resources.

as for spells that don't deal damage, the only thing that we can hope for is that the power of the effect is given an appropriate level. I know that is very vague, but I think it can still work without much of a hitch.

 

[Prickly]

I too would like to see spells given keywords and that the overall presentation of spells is improved.

I would really like spells to be arranged by level and then alphabetically in the books aswell.