Should Wizardry Require Player Intelligence?

[Arilyn]

Ars Magica magic takes some effort to learn but it's more creativity than intelligence I think. You get better at it, and there are a good selection of premade spells you can learn and fire off. Ars Magica wizards are above doing too much "grubby adventuring" anyway.
You've got your companion characters and grogs for that!

 

[Mallus]

If you make people playing spell casters calculate something hard every time they cast a spell, they should occasionally be rewarded with a made-up token worth an astronomical amount of real money for some inexplicable reason.

 

[Oryzarius]

First of all, this is one reason why there are different types of spellcasters. Magic should feel a bit different for wizards vs. sorcerers vs. warlocks, maybe even a bit more different than it already does.

Second, if a player wants to play a wizard but doesn't have an encyclopedic knowledge of the general rules and specific spells, then they should be encouraged (either gently or firmly, depending on the needs of the group) to have some play-aids handy. When I'm playing a spellcaster, I print out a private grimoire of my spells so that I don't have to flip pages in the full rule-book. Other folks use spell-cards (commercial or home-made) to indicate spells available and/or prepared. If I'm refereeing a group and someone might be subject to analysis paralysis, I'll often give them a substantial heads-up early on in the initiative sequence, to get them to look up options ahead of time rather than just starting the process when their number comes up.

So, yes, it's partially a rules question, but also a cultural / user-interface question. We can all look like master tacticians on the tabletop, where we have an overhead view and plenty of time to assess the situation. Wise use of time and play-aids can also make a mage look smarter and more organized than the player might be.

 

[GMMichael]

Wise use of time and play-aids can also make a mage look smarter and more organized than the player might be.

Oh, so wizardry should require player wisdom instead?

 

[Oryzarius]

Oh, so wizardry should require player wisdom instead?

Engaging productively in a cooperative activity with any group of people requires wisdom....

 

[Arilyn]

Oh, so wizardry should require player wisdom instead?

Definitely. Player wisdom would solve so much...

 

[Count_Zero]

The Ars Magica-derived Mage: The Ascension has rotes -- pre-designed spells to use rather than making stuff up on the fly for this reason. (Ars Magica may do it as well; I don't own the game.)

That said, once mages get used to combining elements -- and no mage will have access to all elements of magic at all power levels -- things do speed up. In the example, Stephen would know that he has power over matter and distance, but not time, energy or entropy, for instance, and would be planning to dissolve an enemy's armor or rusting it solid, for instance, or spying on them at a distance.

The magic style allows more flexibility than Vancian casting, but it's still constrained.

I was thinking more in terms of "Oh, to cast a spell you have to solve this puzzle otherwise you can't cast it, or it takes longer based on how long it takes to solve the puzzle." That's a crappy thing to do at the game table.

 

[bloodtide]

Yes.

Though taking part in a Role Playing Game also requires player intelligence.

The player needs the bare minimum intelligence to understand things like "Don't shoot a fireball at a fire giant" or "don't try and put the zombies to sleep". Spells have ranges and areas of effect, players need to understand math and spacial factors.

Plus the "don't shoot the troll Bob is fighting with a fireball as you will hit Bob too".

Plus the bigger picture of don't waste all your expendable magic on the first encounter, type things.

 

[overgeeked]

Should mage players be forced to do extra work to play? No.

The reward for players thinking and solving puzzles is they survive and gain whatever reward was on the far side of the puzzle. In that sense everyone should be thinking. It’s a core part of the game.

 

[sevenbastard]

The Sorcery game books by (UKs) Steve Jackson required players to memorize the three letter names of the spells. When you got to a part in the book where you could cast a spell it would give you a list of what page you would turn to cast which and hopefully you rembered what did what.

Fun ways you could do this is arange a bunch of cards on the table. Some have spells others are blank and some have mishap bad effects. Give the player a minute to memorize then flip them over. When a player casts a spell they have to remember where each spell is. Then you shuffle them back up rearrange them and they have a minute to memorize again.

It would slow the game down but could be fun for a one shot.