D&D General Wishing Away The Adventure

[ichabod]

It depends on the edition, I guess. In 5E it's not a big deal, because the wish spell is limited. If they wished they had the Plot Sword, I would just have them teleported to the Plot Sword, not the other way around. Now they have to get out of the dungeon rather than into it. I wrote one adventure with an ancient red dragon, and figured any wish to kill it would take them forward in time to the point when the dragon dies, as recommended in the spell. Of course, that would be right at the end of the ceremony to make it a dracolich ...

But to some extent, high level play is about letting players doing insanely powerful stuff. So you let it happen and deal with it, and write your adventures so that you have the flexibility to deal with it.

 

[LordEntrails]

No. At least not since we were pre-teens.

It's really easily solvable as a DM... So now they have the sword, big deal, move to the next adventure. Wish is a limited resource, as well as if the players do this, their adversaries can and will as well. "As you take a swing at the BBEG, your magical sword of badness suddenly disappears from your hand!" Eventually they find that their adversary wished it away from them.

Or you teleport back to the town, you get to sit there while everyone else plays out the dungeon, gets the treasure, has fun and gets XP, while you spend money on ale and entertainment and get to sit there and watch everyone play. I've seen it happen once, and never again. Even from the player with a character with a helm of teleportation and a fear of danger. The player soon found a way to justify their character sticking around.

 

[darjr]

Yea. Last time was in Mörk Borg. One player had earned a boon. They could ask these ghostlike assassins to kill someone. Anyone. Anytime. Only caveat is they’d get the blame.

I had a whole thing about being in an army and dealing with the bizarre lich generals that waged their own internal secret war with the PCs involved.

One night they found out the howler was going to try and kill them. They used that boon.

Suddenly the campaign was about them fleeing an entire eldritch army h*ck bent on seeking revenge.

 

[darjr]

Huh? Now that I think about it I nicked more of the Black Company than I intended.

 

[Seramus]

In one article of The Wizards Three, from Dragon Magazine, they wisely comment something along the lines of:
"The first wish any wizard makes is immunity to wish."

 

[Micah Sweet]

Inspired by the High Level Adventures thread, but focused on a particular thing.

There seems to be a concern that high level PCs, or even lower level ones in possession of a wish, would use a wish to just not go on the adventure. If the quest is that they retrieve the Sword of Awesome from the Tomb of Badness, they will just wish the sword into their hand. Or otherwise use powerful magic to circumvent play.

Has anyone ever actually done this, or seen it in play? Is it a valid concern? Why would players choose to avoid playing?

Well to my mind, dungeon-delving for cool gear is something you should be moving on from long before wish is an option. By then, if you need epic gear you should be making it, taking it from your enemies, or receiving it as a gift from an august personage (political/religious leader, world's greatest smith, actual deity, what have you).

 

[Micah Sweet]

I've never seen it. Then again I rarely see wish used in 5E other than to replicate other spells.

I've never seen anyone use it to replicate spells. Folks IME seem to think there's no point in using wish at all if you're not going full genie.

 

[Reynard]

Well to my mind, dungeon-delving for cool gear is something you should be moving on from long before wish is an option. By then, if you need epic gear you should be making it, taking it from your enemies, or receiving it as a gift from an august personage (political/religious leader, world's greatest smith, actual deity, what have you).

It was just an example, but one in which the McGuffin was in some perilous place. Your post sort of misses the point.

 

[Mort]

I've never seen anyone use it to replicate spells. Folks IME seem to think there's no point in using wish at all if you're not going full genie.

But there's a BIG downside to trying a more powerful wish (in 5e). 25% chance of losing your spellcasting ability. How often is the caster willing to court that?

And if it's from an item? Well, that's on the DM for giving it to the party.

 

[TwoSix]

For high level games, I generally make it clear in the narrative that 9th level spells are not the be-all and end-all of magical effects. There are plenty of magical sources in the narrative that can trump wish.