D&D lovers who hate Vancian magic

[Aldarc]

For D&D? IMHO, never: its part of what makes D&D D&D and not some other FRPG.

Wasn't that true for many mechanics that were dropped by D&D over the course of its life?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Wasn't that true for many mechanics that were dropped by D&D over the course of its life?

Note that acronym: "IMHO"- this is opinion, not objective fact.

I don't think many of D&D's mechanics are all that iconic except for Vancian magic, possibly the 9-fold Alignment system. Maybe a couple of others.

And guess what- their absences are on my list of reasons why I say that 4Ed- despite being a very good FRPG- does not feel like D&D to me.

 

[Hussar]

Note that acronym: "IMHO"- this is opinion, not objective fact.

I don't think many of D&D's mechanics are all that iconic except for Vancian magic, possibly the 9-fold Alignment system. Maybe a couple of others.

And guess what- their absences are on my list of reasons why I say that 4Ed- despite being a very good FRPG- does not feel like D&D to me.

Oh, totally agree that it's a point of view issue. For me, Vancian magic hasn't really been iconic to D&D in years. Even core 3e wasn't really Vancian after a level or two because you could craft wands. And, before you say it DannyA, I realize your group didn't do that.

However, I'm not sure how representative that is. I've never seen a group that didn't start crafting/buying wands as soon as they could. In my naval campaign back in 2003, the first thing the group bought after they got a ship was an enlarged wand of fireballs. Healing wands became standard equipment in any game where it was possible.

Heck, the first 3e character I ever played was a summoner and I took craft wand ASAP specifically to get around the daily limit.

If you look at the math, even a 10% expenditure of character wealth would let you carry around about 100 scrolls by the time you hit 7th level. Certainly more than you could ever use. Since scrolls by and large only take 1 day to make, it's not that hard to rack up dozens of the things and save spell slots for the stuff you need right now.

So, long story short, while I understand where you're coming from DannyA, your experience is very, very far from mine.

 

[Celebrim]

Oh, totally agree that it's a point of view issue. For me, Vancian magic hasn't really been iconic to D&D in years. Even core 3e wasn't really Vancian after a level or two because you could craft wands.

I note that the standard of what is Vancian keeps getting higher and higher. If the presence of wands is sufficient to make the system non-vancian, then no version of D&D has ever been Vancian because they've all had the assumption that M-U's would pick up wands that would allow them to do something other than sling darts and poke things with a staff. IME, it was a rare published module or DM that didn't place a Wand of Magic Missiles or a Staff of Striking with a few charges somewhere to give spellcasters additional options. Even before easy crafting, scrolls where also one of the most common treasures, both in published modules and on the random table. They were also one of the more accessible crafted items even in 1e, and one of the few sorts of items that I found 1e DM's would allow players to buy from shops/temples in limited quantities.

 

[Hussar]

Really Celebrim? You're going to put 3e's crafting rules in the same category as random treasure generation for magic items found while adventuring? One set of rules is pretty much entirely controlled by the players and is freely available to anyone who wants to do it. The other is entirely controlled by the DM and would vary drastically from campaign to campaign depending on a host of factors.

It's not a case of shifting goalposts. The rules are quite different and quite different in play.

 

[Mallus]

I feel I've made my peace with Vancian magic. Finally. It took a while. Heck, even my formative D&D experiences were with AD&D using spell-point system cribbed from various sources back in the 80s.

Vancian -- actually, I prefer the term "shopping-listian" magic, since it resembles a shopping list more than the system of magic present in the Dying Earth stories-- is simple, it's gameable, and it works.

These days I'd rather spend my time and energy reflavoring/reskinning the default Vancian system, rather than cooking up, stealing, or implementing alternatives which better fit the setting assumptions/flavor.

 

[Celebrim]

Really Celebrim? You're going to put 3e's crafting rules in the same category as random treasure generation for magic items found while adventuring? One set of rules is pretty much entirely controlled by the players and is freely available to anyone who wants to do it. The other is entirely controlled by the DM and would vary drastically from campaign to campaign depending on a host of factors.

That may well be true, but it doesn't change the system. It only changes the assumptions of who at the table is empowered and to what extent, but the fact remains that a Vancian caster with a wand is a Vancian caster with a wand.

While I agree with you that it depended on the group, wands were reasonably easy to craft in 1e as well, as they didn't require the permenancy spell which was the really tight (unreasonably tight in my opinion) restriction on 1e crafted items. In practice, a 1e DM could as empower the wand maker as much as a 3e DM - maybe more so because there was no 'feat' entry requirement - by making wand making techniques readily available (or as found treasure in moldly tomes, which was more my practice) or simply by having magical shops available where players could readily trade gold for wands (as some others did) or by being free with placed treasure (as many were). And in practice, a 3e DM could disempower a 3e wand maker by, for example, listing specific rare magical ingredients as a requirement to make a wand rather than assuming that ingredients are always readily obtainable simply by spending fungible gold resources or that wands can not be readily bought in the store.

Which of the four theoretical DMs here is 'breaking the rules'? None by my meaure.

It's not a case of shifting goalposts. The rules are quite different and quite different in play.

Assumptions and guidelines are not rules. The same rules can play quite differently from table to table. But while that's an interesting subject, the point remains that a Vancian spellcaster that has obtained a few wands is a Vancian spellcaster that has obtained a few wands regardless of which system we are talking about. If 'you can have a wand' is sufficient to make the system non-Vancian, then I don't have a Vancian game, because wands of Ray of Frost (and other attack cantrips) are readily obtainable in my game and appear on the adventuring gear price list even though magic items in general can't be bought in shops in my game and for more powerful items I would require specific rare items to be obtained before the item could be created and not assume that for example, fresh manticore liver and giant black pearls were readily obtainable on the market for anyone who had some gold. And for that matter, if the obtainability of wands is sufficient to render something non-Vancian, Gygax didn't have a Vancian table either based on his published modules and the character sheets which have leaked from the early days.

 

[jmucchiello]

However, I'm not sure how representative that is. I've never seen a group that didn't start crafting/buying wands as soon as they could. In my naval campaign back in 2003, the first thing the group bought after they got a ship was an enlarged wand of fireballs. Healing wands became standard equipment in any game where it was possible.

Heck, the first 3e character I ever played was a summoner and I took craft wand ASAP specifically to get around the daily limit.

If you look at the math, even a 10% expenditure of character wealth would let you carry around about 100 scrolls by the time you hit 7th level. Certainly more than you could ever use. Since scrolls by and large only take 1 day to make, it's not that hard to rack up dozens of the things and save spell slots for the stuff you need right now.

The math there is perhaps the turning point on wizards becoming artillery (as I mentioned above) when in the past they were not artillery. Is this true of your pre-3e gaming? Did wizards prior to 3e play as battlefield control/emergency butt-savers/deus-ex-machina as I propose or did you always try to use them as artillery? And if the latter, how did you handle the 5-minute adventure day problem?

 

[gamerprinter]

how did you handle the 5-minute adventure day problem?

Never saw it happen. I hear this argument all the time, but have never seen it in practice. Casters never 'nova' in our games.

 

[jmucchiello]

Never saw it happen. I hear this argument all the time, but have never seen it in practice. Casters never 'nova' in our games.

Neither have I. I'm trying to figure out when it started happening and whether it was a shift away from "thinking" wizards to "blasting" wizards.