Vancian magic and 4e

[FireLance]

Frankly, if I want to elicit certain types of behaviors from players, I would rather present them with an interesting choice which subtly rewards the behavior I want instead of imposing restrictions or penalties.

If I wanted to encourage arcane characters to use less encounter spells and more daily spells, for example, I might institute the following house rule:

For each encounter attack spell that is unused at the end of an encounter, the character gains a cumulative +1 bonus on damage rolls with daily attack spells until the next time he takes an extended rest.​

This rewards arcane characters who are more conservative with encounter attack spells with more powerful daily attack spells, which were a hallmark of arcane spellcasters in previous editions, anyway.

Do be aware of the implications of this and similar house rules, though: fights in which the arcane character does not use encounter or daily spells will be relatively longer and harder, and fights in which he uses daily spells will be relatively shorter and easier. You will need to decide if this is the kind of feel you want for your games.

 

[El Mahdi]

deleted

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

What would a Saving Throw vs Fort be? A Spell Level attack vs Fort? We don't have saving throws of different types anymore.

But this doesn't make it feel more "Vancian" to me. You seem to be looking from the wrong direction.
Major themes of Vancian Magic
1) Spell Preperation. A caster can select a number of spells he knows to cast at a later time. He needs to prepare spells.
2) Limited Spell Capacity. A caster can prepare only a limited number of spells.
3) Spells gone once cast. You can cast a prepared spell only once.
4) Limited Spell Regeneration. A caster needs time or rest to prepare new spells.
5) Spells often have unique, complex abilities. Spells that are basically jsut "Deal Damage as with Spell X, but more" are often the exception, you get stuff like "conjure a hand to grab a foe" or "create 4 meteors that strike down your opponents" or "Ray of several types of magical energies that zaps everyone in an area" or "Spell that creates multiple magical projectiles" and "create a protective zone" or "teleport to a remote location" or "transform into any type of creature" or "fly" or "create a number of magical eyes to spy the area" or "create a door that leads into an awesome building where you can rest".
6) Spell names often hint at caster origin and are typically "non-generic". (Bigby's Grasping Hand, Mordekainen's Magnificient Mansion)

I think that the daily powers from the Wizard basically work pretty close to all this already. The spellbook is more limited than it used to be. A big difference is that all this is still expressed in the same base mechanic, the "fluff" behind it is just different.

Your ideas don't seem to improve much on the "Vancian" properties. It just changes the mechanics, but they get even further away from the flavor.

 

[erf_beto]

I think that the daily powers from the Wizard basically work pretty close to all this already. The spellbook is more limited than it used to be. A big difference is that all this is still expressed in the same base mechanic, the "fluff" behind it is just different.

Agreed. So how about making the spellbook class feature a bit more Vancian, and making it available (or mandatory) for clerics, druids, shamans, warlocks...? Could this help achieve the OP's goals?

 

[Piratecat]

Technically speaking this should be in 4e House Rules, but let's leave it here for now and broaden the discussion of Vancian magic. Carry on!

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Agreed. So how about making the spellbook class feature a bit more Vancian, and making it available (or mandatory) for clerics, druids, shamans, warlocks...? Could this help achieve the OP's goals?

Hard to know with the OP, but I think that is an interesting take... Though to be honest: Ultimately I think an ability to swap powers could also make sense for non-spellcasting classes.

From a gameplay perspective, I tend to think the whole preperation business in 4E is overrated. Unless you really know one day beforehand what you will need tomorrow, any power choice is as good as any other. The only difference is that you have to account more powers on your character sheet.

To improve the impact, changing after each short rest might be a good solution. Of course, this type of flexibility probably increases the power of the spellcaster.

And, the other issue is - too many power choices lead to decision paralysis and an overly large character sheet. I think it distracts from the easy of playing D&D 4 offers. But - not everyone needs that.

The upside is - if changing your power selection is easier, it rewards smart planning and scouting. Let the rogue sneak and spy out the enemy, and then pick the ideal spell combination for the type of enemies you find. This is a "mini-game" part that has been lost to a great extent in 4E - you act in the moment and have to adapt to a situation as you encounter it, which rewards improvisation and adaptation. You have the tools to do that, too. But there is little benefit most of the time to know beforehand whether you will meet a firebreathing dragon or a medusa. You either know a fire resistance spell or you don't, or you know a petrification-counter effect or you don't. Foreplanning is not cruicial.

 

[jaerdaph]

Vivian Vancian Magic

Ah, Ethel Mertz. She was pretty magical, wasn't she?

 

[Danzauker]

My quick house rules (yet untested):

Vancian Mage class feature (extends Spellbook)

Each time you gain a level that lets you select an encounter spell you select 3 encounter spells.
All your encounter spells are usable only once per extended rest (effectively, they are now "minor daily" spells).
After an extended rest, you can prepare 4 encounter spells from each level. You can prepare the same spell more than once.
Everything regarding regular daily spells (let's call "major dailies") from the Spellbook feature remains untouched.

It needs a lot of tweaking, but basically the idea is that.

 

[Stuntman]

If a saving throw is failed then the caster must rest before being able to cast again. Kinda a way to represent the magical energies being expended taking a toll on the caster's system.

What counts as a caster?

How would you deal with a level 30 wizard casting Magic Missile as his first spell of the day and rolling a 1?

Why would a non-caster be able to continue using all of his available powers while a "caster" has a chance to utterly fail and resort to throwing stones for the rest of the day?

Why would I choose to play a class that has this limitation when there are other classes that use the same power framework and have no such limitation?