D&D (2024) Memorize Spell is one of the most obnoxious abilities I've ever seen, despite being perfectly on-theme (Packet 7)

[Dionysos]

It's great at offering pretty much zero reason to ever not have a Wizard in ones party.

No, the Wizard companion definitely feels very useful in the game, but most of the companions do. He’s good but other companions have their own strengths that he doesn’t have. I’ve been rotating him in and out, periodically, like all the others.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

What’s funny about this is that an extremely popular video game, Baldur’s Gate 3, did implement it. It works great.

LOL it works great in a videogame I agree, but huge swathes of Wizard spells are just not present or got nerfed. Whereas melees generally got significantly buffed. Also Known spells based casters can respec entirely for 100g, which is insanely good for them, and far better than the 5E situation.

There's no "spotlight stealing" in a videogame, either, not in the kind BG3 is anyway.

He’s good but other companions have their own strengths that he doesn’t have.

Given they can all be respec'd to any class and any statline at any time for 100g, that's not very accurate.

Wizards are certainly one of the top problem-solving classes in BG3.

 

[Dionysos]

LOL it works great in a videogame I agree, but huge swathes of Wizard spells are just not present or got nerfed. Whereas melees generally got significantly buffed. Also Known spells based casters can respec entirely for 100g, which is insanely good for them, and far better than the 5E situation.

There's no "spotlight stealing" in a videogame, either, not in the kind BG3 is anyway.

Given they can all be respec'd to any class and any statline at any time for 100g, that's not very accurate.

Wizards are certainly one of the top problem-solving classes in BG3.

Just for your reference going forward, your posting style throughout this thread has been so toxic that this will be the last time I ever respond to you. I just wanted to make sure you know why you are being ignored.

 

[Scribe]

No, the Wizard companion definitely feels very useful in the game, but most of the companions do. He’s good but other companions have their own strengths that he doesn’t have. I’ve been rotating him in and out, periodically, like all the others.

Really?

AOE, 'no miss' Single Target, Utility, Counterspell, Control?

Sure, Gale may not drop the most damage unless he can fireball or something, but I struggle to think of a companion I would bring instead. He (unless I am playing a Sorcerer) is pick 1, every time, because he Wizards can just do it all.

And thats in a game where magic items drop from the sky, scrolls are all over the place, and most everyone can use them.

Why would I ever not from a min/max perspective, have Gale in the party?

 

[Ruin Explorer]

What I think they should do is give MORE spells the Ritual tag. A lot of those utility spells make sense as rituals anyways. They should also add on additional riders to spells by taking more time to do a ritual. Instead of spending 10 minutes to cast detect magic, take 1 hour and it gives you additional info, or has a longer duration or does something nifty.

Honestly they should rework ritual magic to be more like 4E's approach.

 

[TaranTheWanderer]

Honestly they should rework ritual magic to be more like 4E's approach.

I've never played 4e but I've played lots of games with rituals and rituals tended to be the coolest thing about spellcasting. Pretty powerful but difficult and time consuming and potentially dangerous.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Why would I ever not from a min/max perspective, have Gale in the party?

I can think of two legit reasons:

1) If your main PC is a Wizard.

2) If you're exploiting the hilariously OP 1-level dip in Wizard letting you learn any Wizard spell you have a slot high enough to cast. So say you're Bard-11 or Cleric-11 and Wizard-1, you can learn any Wizard spell. Now you still cast with INT so if you use attack spells you probably want to wear the Headband of Intellect or something, but it's wild. It's so OP and broken that I actually won't do it!*

But generally because Wizards can just flick to any spells they know, it is extremely advantageous to have a Wizard in the party at all times. Moreso than any other single, specific class.

* = If I was playing a Cleric of Azuth or Mystra I might, but otherwise...

 

[mamba]

he flavor of short rests make more sense for casters - magic is fatiguing to cast. A rest can refresh.

The flavor of per long rest actually makes no sense.

if SR make sense, then so do LR, not sure where that distinction comes from

 

[Ruin Explorer]

if SR make sense, then so do LR, not sure where that distinction comes from

I don't think anyone is disagreeing that LR should also recover slots. Just that in terms of fantasy fiction, SR should recover some slots - that's part of why Warlocks are popular - they line up with fantasy fiction tropes (both in terms of books and TV/movies, even games kinda) better than other 5E casters.

 

[bert1001 fka bert1000]

Or Dying Earth. However, I think the point was intended to be that outside the context of the books that initially inspired EGG's spell system or the novels directly stemming from his resultant game, there aren't a lot of iconic fictional magic users who use that model. Whether a a fatigue model is all that much more common (outside of tv shows and such, where it's easy to depict), I'm not sure (I'd say the grand majority just don't have magic be quite as overall convenient--slower to cast, more constrained to a single theme per caster, etc.; or just intended to be just-that-good which is fine because only the primary pro-/antagonists are the magic users and the supporting cast aren't being played by other players at the game-table).

Yep, almost all magic systems in fantasy fiction have more constraints. D&D magic is reliable, plentiful, low cost, versatile, and powerful.

Not even D&D fiction depicts it this way. I may be wrong since it's been a while since I read Dying Earth but I remember people memorizing like 4 spells at a time in Vance. The only medium that seems to come close is comic books like Dr. Strange.