D&D 5E Sword & Sorcery / Low Magic

[Scott Christian]

If we want to do S&S with D&D we use our standard house rules (revisions to Hit Points, Rest, & Healing; heroic surges), but we also eliminate or severely restrict casting classes. As some else posted up thread, in S&S the villain is the sorcerer - not the heroes. I almost always run a low magic campaign (magic and magic equipment are rare and mysterious) and I think that is part of the Conan style too. It also helps if most of your encounters are with mook types and only a few really difficult "elites," or I guess legendary encounters.

To me S&S is: heroic martial characters and rare & mysterious magic. We don't find that difficult to do in D&D.

I agree with the ruleset changes to match S&S, but I have a question: do you have players that still choose any of the caster series, including bard, even though they are significantly hampered?

 

[dave2008]

I agree with the ruleset changes to match S&S, but I have a question: do you have players that still choose any of the caster series, including bard, even though they are significantly hampered?

We don't play casters typically when we play S&S. Heck we rarely play casters when we are not playing a S&S game! Right now the only magic user in or group is a wizard. No other 1/3, 1/2, full, or multiclassed casters.

 

[squibbles]

I'll reiterate it... if anyone actually wants to do a "low-magic" kind of game... you really can't have ANY spellcasting classes available for purchase (at least at Level 1). Because even if you cut down the number of spellcasting classes you make available to a smaller number... that's most likely not going to change the number of spellcasting classes actually played at the table. You could cut down the available casters to just cleric and wizard (stripping away bards, druids, sorcerers, warlocks, paladins, and rangers)... and when it came time to create a party, you'd get at least one cleric and at least one wizard. And voila... 2/5th of the table are playing spellcasters. And thus your desire for "less magic" is now gone. Heck... even if you made both those classes into half-casters... once they gain a couple levels they're STILL going to be casting 3 to 5 spells each every single adventuring day. That is PLENTY of magic. Eight to 10 spells cast each and every day. You as the DM are not going to get ANY real feeling of your "low-magic setting" if you have that.

If you really want "low-magic"... then only allow a party of barbarians, fighters, and rogues so you as the DM can at least get a sense of what having a no-magic party actually feels like in play (for probably the first time ever for you.) Just roll with that feeling for several levels at least. See what it feels like, what the experience is. How have the players changed their actions in-game by not having magic at their disposal. [...]

[...] As some else posted up thread, in S&S the villain is the sorcerer - not the heroes. [...]

[...] If you're going to make a class super annoying to play, just ban it. Penalizing casters to disincentivize playing them just tends to frustrate everyone.

So that's a lot of opposition--from three totally different perspectives--to including ANY caster class, or watered-down version thereof in an S&S game.

I doubtless have considerably less experience running an S&S game than you all, but my suggestion to the OP would be to build your game around what the players want to be in it once you get their buy-in. So, if everybody wants to play barbarians, fighters, and rogues, super cool, no work for you. On the other hand, if someone does want to play a caster class (and makes an effort to appropriately integrate it), try working out with them what they want out of the class mechanics-wise and/or theme-wise. Put the onus on them to make it S&S enough, while being able to live with it--maybe that devotion paladin of Mitra only uses spell slots to smite, and that's a good enough halfway point.

The best theme-enforcing way to limit an S&S caster is its spell list. World of Xoth (which others have mentioned) uses the following criteria:

• No artillery spells: fireball & friends.
• No convenience spells: rope trick, leomund's tiny hut, water breathing.
• No healing spells or resurrection magic: these things need dark and unsavory costs.
• No instant transportation: teleport, dimension door.
• No low-level divinations: detect magic, comprehend languages.
• No superhero spells: invisibility, fly.

Of those, I think the prohibition on convenience spells is the most important one; an S&S sorcerer that allows the group to rest safely, and subsist on goodberries will ruin the theme a lot more than one that fireballs mooks or sometimes turns invisible. To compensate the player for taking those options out, you could add more S&S friendly spells from other classes spell lists, from Xoth's additions, Primeval Thule, Mythos Magic from Kobold Press, or other supplements.

The upside of this is that you don't have to straitjacket the broad strokes of your gameworld until after you know what the players want to do. Are monks sufficiently S&S? It doesn't matter if nobody wants to play one--and if one of your players does, he/she can write a thematic setting background about them for you to riff on. Spend no effort overhauling character options unless there is a need at your table.

Also, @dave2008 : Elric of Melnibone is the greatest sorcerer of his age and still works great as an S&S protagonist, so does Elak of Atlantis (and the Gray Mouser to a lesser extent) by naive falsificationism I have proved you wrong

Gritty Realism really works wonder for a low-magic feel, forcing spellcasters to be sparse and cautious with their spells. Frustratingly so for many players actually, so be sure everybody is on the same page for that. It also makes the "magical cold war" much more believable, whereas high-level wizards don't go out of their tower much because if they do, they'll have to cast their spells and thus be vulnerable to rival wizards for a whole week etc, explaining why the world isn't run by spellcasters yet nobody dares to piss them off.

If I was going for a Conan style game I would not make natural healing harder.

Pulp S&S heroes are supposed to be hamfisted and over the top--not grittily realistic. If you balance the long rest to short rest pacing using the frequently discussed 5-minute short rest, but only twice per day house rule, the main problem with spellcasting is how much of a universal toolbox it is; how many exploration and environmental problems it trivializes. That's not a problem if you take out the worst offenders in the toolbox--fly, detect magic, goodberry, and so on.

To me it would have to be human-centric. With variant human and the wide range of available feats, you could easily account for various human cultures. I'm not sure the non-human races could be reskined in a good enough way to make them feel right for sword and sorcery but also satisfy a player wanting to play a non-human.

I think a bunch of player races could be quickly reskinned as human or as S&S-trope creatures that can pose as human without being detected. The ones that jumped out at me on a half-baked first pass were:

• Goliath--northern barbarian
• High Elf--decadent melnibonean
• Tabaxi--closeted werejaguar
• Yuan-Ti--diabolical serpentman spy (or obnoxious drizzt-alike exception)
• Goblin--dread pygmy
• Tiefling--human warped by irresponsible sorcery
• Changeling--eldritch body-thief

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I think the key to a magic user in a S&S game is to have a limited scope, and some sort of theme. Invisibility is fine IMO as long as it’s the only “superpower” spell the character has, or is the centerpiece of their magical prowess. The sorcerer (term used generically) who can turn invisible isn’t out of line with S&S, so long as that is the amazing thing about them.

 

[Laurefindel]

Pulp S&S heroes are supposed to be hamfisted and over the top--not grittily realistic. If you balance the long rest to short rest pacing using the frequently discussed 5-minute short rest, but only twice per day house rule, the main problem with spellcasting is how much of a universal toolbox it is; how many exploration and environmental problems it trivializes. That's not a problem if you take out the worst offenders in the toolbox--fly, detect magic, goodberry, and so on.

I agree that S&S =/= low magic high-fantasy. Conan and LotR are, in many respect, opposites in the spectrum of influences that made D&D. The post you quoted was all about that, and why I wouldn't necessarily use AiME for a sword and sorcery game. For that, I'd want the 1-hour short rest/8-hours long rest for a more fast-and-furious play, among other things.

 

[overgeeked]

I agree that S&S =/= low magic high-fantasy. Conan and LotR are, in many respect, opposites in the spectrum of influences that made D&D. The post you quoted was all about that, and why I wouldn't necessarily use AiME for a sword and sorcery game. For that, I'd want the 1-hour short rest/8-hours long rest for a more fast-and-furious play, among other things.

I’m not sure I would. The REH Conan stories are episodic highlights of Conan’s career with vast gaps between them. There’s no indication there that Conan quickly heals from his wounds and is immediately ready to deal out death after an 8 hour rest. I haven’t read them all, so it could be in there, I just haven’t come across it yet.

 

[squibbles]

I agree that S&S =/= low magic high-fantasy. Conan and LotR are, in many respect, opposites in the spectrum of influences that made D&D. The post you quoted was all about that, and why I wouldn't necessarily use AiME for a sword and sorcery game. For that, I'd want the 1-hour short rest/8-hours long rest for a more fast-and-furious play, among other things.

Ah, sorry about that. I didn't mean to quote you as saying the opposite of what you meant--I was bundling quotes on similar topics together and snipping them to fit my overlong post.

I do appreciate you making that distinction. S&S and low magic get mixed together a lot in discussions like this one; I didn't used to be able to recognize the difference before reading the 20s pulp sources.

 

[Laurefindel]

I’m not sure I would. The REH Conan stories are episodic highlights of Conan’s career with vast gaps between them. There’s no indication there that Conan quickly heals from his wounds and is immediately ready to deal out death after an 8 hour rest. I haven’t read them all, so it could be in there, I just haven’t come across it yet.

D&D doesn't do well with injuries. In a S&S game, I wouldn't narrate wounds healing overnight, but I can accept that, as an abstract resource of "not dying" points, hit points can replenish fully after a good night's rest, and short-rest abilities refreshing after a 1-hour breather.

Healing from wounds, for a lack of better mechanics, would be a downtime activity if I were to play a pulpy S&S game.

I think, anyways. I never gave that much thoughts about putting up a S&S game and how to balance the gritty, bloody feel of Conan and the mechanics reflecting pulp-fantasy fiction.

 

[GlassJaw]

S&S and low-magic have many more similarities than not, especially when discussing rules and mechanics. No reason to not lump them together for ease of discussion.

The "grittiness" of LotR vs Conan comes from the scale of the heroes vs the threats and challenges, not from a distinction of the rules themselves. Gandalf would fit in just fine in Hyborea, and Conan and Aragorn are comparable on the "hero scale".

 

[tetrasodium]

I made this thing recently, it might be useful for converting creatures that are resist/immune & giant bags of HP to things with flat per hit damage reduction numbers that feel right for your group