D&D 5E D&D Magic the Gathering alternate magic system

[CubicsRube]

I was hoping to retainer magic cards as spells rather than using another system, but I'm having a hard time finding a concise list as there's so many damn magic cards now.

I'm thinking that most spells need to be found in instants, interrupts and sorceries. But even these have a super heavy focus on creatures and summons.

 

[CubicsRube]

I like the idea of a planeswalker being the level 20 culmination of a wizards power. Perhaps a limited format of plane shifting at lower levels and an at will ability at level 20.

 

[Fanaelialae]

I've given this some thought over the years.

I think what I would do would be to let the player choose their colors (as if they were building a deck). Each color would have a special ability, probably based off of the low-cost spell for each (Healing Salve for white, Lightning Bolt for red, etc).

If you choose one color (specialist) you'd get the strongest version of that ability, whereas if you choose all 5 colors (generalist) you get all 5 abilities but in their weakest incarnation. Obviously, you could only use gold spells for colors you chose.

 

[cbwjm]

I like the idea of a planeswalker being the level 20 culmination of a wizards power. Perhaps a limited format of plane shifting at lower levels and an at will ability at level 20.

Maybe not just a wizard. Looking at the current line up of planeswalkers, we have plenty of wizards, sure, but they also have warriors, rogues, and maybe a druid/priest or two.

Maybe make full planeswalking a boon for level 20 (if you want to wait until then) that is taken by anyone at level 20 and then the game moves onto high powered planeswalking stuff for a few sessions.

 

[Steampunkette]

I mean...

Rather than building an entirely new class/set of classes, which don't really account for the variety of planeswalkers and spellcasting characters we see in Dominaria and other worlds, how about making it all into a secondary progression Feat-Tree?

Give everyone a "Free Feat" at level 1. And allow them to grab one of several feats. Each feat has it's own requirements but the most basic one is this:

Magicaster (Walker)
Choose one of the five primary colors of magic (Black, Blue, Green, Red, or White). You gain a number of Mana Points of that color equal to your Proficiency Bonus, plus the number of Walker feats that you take. You can use these mana points as part of a special action called the Arcana action to create effects based on your access to a given color. Taking this feat gives you access to the Tier 1 Arcana of your chosen Color.
You recover your entire mana pool at the end of a Long Rest.
You can take this feat up to five times. Each time you do, select another color. Doing so does not increase your mana pool, but allows you to use your pool to create mana of any color you have access to through the Magicaster feat.

Then have a "Tier 2 Arcana" feat for every color. Tier 3. Tier 4. However high you wanna go. And create a bunch of different spells and effects with different casting costs... Make "Gold" spells that use multiple colors requiring greater investment into your mana pool... Each one a "Walker" Feat.

Maybe throw in a feat that allows you to regain Spellcasting Modifier in Mana Points on a Short Rest?

Now everyone can be a Planeswalker.

 

[cbwjm]

For a while I was working on a couple of planeswalker classes, full-caster and half-caster to account for the clerics, wizards, and druids and the rangers, barbarians, paladins, and rogues. Each class drew from a number of, effectively, invocations with abilities based on the colours.

 

[DEFCON 1]

DMs Guild has at least one 5 color mana variant spellcasting system designed and built and available for purchase.

Do a search under 'Tap Untap Burn' and you'll find the CORE MECHANICS plus other additions for the system.

 

[Aelryinth]

DMs Guild has at least one 5 color mana variant spellcasting system designed and built and available for purchase.

Do a search under 'Tap Untap Burn' and you'll find the CORE MECHANICS plus other additions for the system.

There ya go. Someone already made a system for it, exactly what the OP wanted.

 

[Stormonu]

I wonder if using the Warlock spell progression, but the Wizard spell list might fit to represent Magic's casting system. Pacts/Patrons might be the mana sources, with Invocation options to add extra colors.

It would restructure the potency of magic in the game, but I wonder if you could directly map the mana pips (and the cards) to spell levels. Something similar might be doable with the power/toughness/damage (maybe each point being one or more 1d6 or 1d8).

Perhaps:

Mana/Power/Toughness	dice
1	1
2	2-3
3	4-6
4	7-9
5	10-12
6	13-15
7	16-18
8+	+3 dice/point

 

[Aelryinth]

I wonder if using the Warlock spell progression, but the Wizard spell list might fit to represent Magic's casting system. Pacts/Patrons might be the mana sources, with Invocation options to add extra colors.

It would restructure the potency of magic in the game, but I wonder if you could directly map the mana pips (and the cards) to spell levels. Something similar might be doable with the power/toughness/damage (maybe each point being one or more 1d6 or 1d8).

Perhaps:

Mana/Power/Toughness	dice
1	1
2	2-3
3	4-6
4	7-9
5	10-12
6	13-15
7	16-18
8+	+3 dice/point

Instead of calling them Pacts and Patrons, you could just call them ties to lands