Alternate Wizard Spell Rules.

[papastebu]

I don't know if this posted before, but please forgive me if it has; I hit the wrong button, I think, when I tried to send it last time.
Anyway.

Wizards cast spells as skills.
Each spell is a separate skill, with each rank another positive point to casting checks. The skill cap still applies.
DC for these skills is 10 + spell level.
Spell DCs go down by one point for every 6 Wizard levels gained.
Roll for the skill check is 1d20 + Intelligence modifier + skill ranks + Wizard class level.
Spell levels can be increased at each wizard level gained. It takes one "level-point" or whatever you want to call them, times the level gained to do so.
The Wizard gains these points at a rate of two plus intelligence modifier points per level.
There is no cap on the number of times a given spell can be cast in a day.
There is no potential limit on the number of levels a given spell can attain, but things could get impracticable after a time.
Modifications?
Other suggestions?
I suck and should go away, never to return?

 

[Pyrex]

Hmm. Let's do a couple quick checks here with our good friend Joe-Bob the Wizard.

At 1st level, Joe-Bob isn't a particularly quick study (Int 14) and wants to cast Magic Missile, which, at 1st level he only has 1 rank in.

So, 1 (Caster Level) + 1 (Skill Rank) + 2 (Int) = d20+4 vs DC 11. So Joe-Bob needs to roll a 7 or higher Magic Missile meaning his cast will fail roughly one round in three. Not too bad.

Later on in his career around L8 (having increased his Int to 16) Joe-Bob decides to add Ice Storm to his spellbook at rank 1. In the meantime, he also really likes Magic Missile and so has continued to train it up to it's max rank of 5*.

To cast Ice Storm Joe-Bob is at 8 (level) + 1 (Rank) + 3 = d20+12 vs DC 14. Wow, things have gotten *much* better for Joe-Bob, as with his best spell he now only fails to cast 10% of the time. If he was either a little smarter (either naturally or by casting Fox's Cunning his failure rate drops to Natural 1.

Next round he wants to cast Maximized Magic Missile at 8(level) + 5(rank) + 3(Int) = d20+16 vs DC 14. Huh, assuming he still fails on a natural 1, it turns out he doesn't really need 5 ranks of Magic Missile after all, he only needs 2.

Net result: Your scaling is way out of whack. What you need to do first is decide how often you want spells to fail (I'm going to go out on a limb here and say your highest level spell should never fail more than 50% of the time) and then re-jigger your difficulty curve.

In order to make adding ranks to a spell meaningfull, you might also consider a scaling difficulty where each time you've cast a particular spell in a day the DC increases by 1 or 2.

*Even though he should have a theoretical max of Rank 11, given your scaling cost factor for increasing spell-skill ranks, and that he only gains 5 spell-ranks per level by L8, he can only ever increase it to 5...

 

[papastebu]

Sorry about not replying sooner, but my internet access is at the library, which is about 20 minutes away from my house in the woods.

Anyway.

1st-level wizard, 14 intelligence score, can have maximum class-skill ranks (level plus three) because, guess what? wizard spells are class skills for him!
Roll is 1d20 + 2 (for int mod) + 4 (for ranks) + 1 (for one wizard class level). Total mods are at +7.
DC is 10 + (lets say he wanted to get three levels of magic missile with three of his "spell points", or whatever you like to call them) 3 (cast at full strength), for a total of 13. He'd only need a 6 or higher to succeed, and he'd be able to try again next round, and the next, and the next.
And he can have a first-level Fireball (1d6 damage instead of 3d6 starting, shorter range and area, but he gets to cast it with a DC of 11, as many times a day as he wants, and it's a fireball at 1st-level).
Or he could learn four spells at first level, each with a DC of 11, because of the four level-points he gains--until his intelligence goes up enough--each level, any of which he could cast at any time. Metamagic feats are still going to raise the operational level of a spell, but it will raise the DC, not take up a higher slot.
As far as adjusting DCs, though, I might go as far as lowering all spell DCs each 5th wizard level, instead of sixth, so the above magic missile would be even easier to cast.

Fighters miss quite often. Their compensation is that they can try as often as they like, and can do a great deal of damage when they actually hit. They also get to add their class levels to attacks. To me this idea seems to level the playing field for these two classes at low levels.

I'm not sure why you don't like the idea, but it seems to have something to do with the chance for failure. I hope what I wrote above clarifies things a bit, and would value anyone's opinions on this.

 

[Vrecknidj]

Whenever I think about a new system for PCs, I try it out with a min/max character at 1st, 4th, 7th, 10th, 13th, 16th and 19th level. If the character is not balanced somewhere, I seek a fix.

So, you could try out your plan at several different levels, assuming that the player takes the maximum ability to tweak his spells. If the net results make you happy, then use it.

Dave

 

[papastebu]

This response is more what I was hoping for when I posted, and it sounds like a good idea. I will try it. I should have realized that I wouldn't really get any results without doing my homework.

Thanks

Steve

 

[Pyrex]

I'm not sure why you don't like the idea, but it seems to have something to do with the chance for failure. I hope what I wrote above clarifies things a bit, and would value anyone's opinions on this.

The major issue I had is with the scaling of your DC's. As posted in my example above, by 8th level or so the roll is meaningless because with DC's of 10+SL with a check modifier of IntMod+SkillRank+CasterLevel a competent caster will only ever when rolling a natural 1.

A 4th level spell is DC 14.

A 7th level caster with one rank in a brand new 4th level spell and a 16 Int under a Fox's Cunning spell rolls d20+13 against DC 14 to cast his new spell.

Like I said, you need to figure out how often you want spells failing first, then build a DC curve to match.

 

[papastebu]

Ah!

O.K. I see now what you're talking about. I wasn't sure whether you were bothered by the ease of spellcasting checks or their difficulty.
Looking at your second post, I see my error. Maybe if I added something kind of arbitrary, such as increased difficulty for consecutive castings?

If the wizard casts magic missile one time, then doesn't cast again for a round or two, then the DC wouldn't rise, because the resistance would not come into play, but if the wizard chose to cast the same 1st-level spell each round, then its difficulty would rise by one every time until he gave it a rest.

Every round without casting (need an opinion here) {any spells} or [that particular spell] would lower the last spell's DC by one. If any magic used would keep the DC of that spell at its elevated level, then the players might start depending on other abilities to supplement spellcasting, which would vary the texture of the game quite a bit.

If it's just a given spell whose use elevates the spell's level, then that would probably cause the player of the wizard to utilize more of the character's other spells, having a similar variegating effect, but in a different direction.

What do you guys think?

 

[Pyrex]

Yeah, I'd increase the DC's per-spell by 1-per cast; but I'd adjust the cooldown to -1/min with no casting to leave a little tension in run-and-gun situations.

You still need to figure out how you handle the base DC's though, as as it stands your average 7th level wizard could easily cast a 4th level spell each round of your average combat and never have more than a 10% chance of failing any of the casts.

 

[AbeTheGnome]

this is the system i'm using in my game:

casters must succeed at a caster level check (1d20+caster level) vs. DC 10+(spell level x 2). cantrips are DC11.

in this system, wizards fail to cast their highest level spells about half of their attempts, but spells they've been casting longer have a higher success rate. the great thing about this system is that it doesn't require extra rolls to overcome spell resistance or determine spell failure due to armor. i simply add spell resistance to the DC, and add armor check penalties to spell rolls.

i don't increase DCs for multiple castings, but magic is illegal in my campaign, so most material components are very expensive, placing a limit on the frequency that my casters are willing to attempt to cast (as long as i keep them poor, which i love to do... makes for better roleplaying). i'm thinking about incorporating something like nonlethal damage equal to the spell level on failed castings, to add a risk factor... still undecided.

i know this isn't quite like your system in that individual spells aren't different skills, but it does add the random chance flavor to spellcasting that i think you may be trying to achieve.

i was thinking about making a system based on skills in individual schools (i.e. 11 ranks in evocation, etc.), but it screwed up the 50/50 check that i was going for, because it's much harder to regulate skill ranks, what with ability modifiers and level +3 and whatnot. if anyone has any ideas, i would love to incorporate school-specific rolls, but i haven't figured it out. questions and comments are welcome.

 

[Vrecknidj]

this is the system i'm using in my game:

casters must succeed at a caster level check (1d20+caster level) vs. DC 10+(spell level x 2). cantrips are DC11.

in this system, wizards fail to cast their highest level spells about half of their attempts, but spells they've been casting longer have a higher success rate. the great thing about this system is that it doesn't require extra rolls to overcome spell resistance or determine spell failure due to armor. i simply add spell resistance to the DC, and add armor check penalties to spell rolls.

i don't increase DCs for multiple castings, but magic is illegal in my campaign, so most material components are very expensive, placing a limit on the frequency that my casters are willing to attempt to cast (as long as i keep them poor, which i love to do... makes for better roleplaying). i'm thinking about incorporating something like nonlethal damage equal to the spell level on failed castings, to add a risk factor... still undecided.

Without having taken the time to really look this over, it nevertheless looks very good.

i know this isn't quite like your system in that individual spells aren't different skills, but it does add the random chance flavor to spellcasting that i think you may be trying to achieve.

i was thinking about making a system based on skills in individual schools (i.e. 11 ranks in evocation, etc.), but it screwed up the 50/50 check that i was going for, because it's much harder to regulate skill ranks, what with ability modifiers and level +3 and whatnot. if anyone has any ideas, i would love to incorporate school-specific rolls, but i haven't figured it out. questions and comments are welcome.

I was thinking of something similar, but instead I was thinking about making each school its own class, and going through all the mandatory tweaking to make it work, and then having an "arcanist," something like the present wizard, as a prestige class (i.e. it would allow the combining of spellcaster levels in the other classes, to some degree). And, included in all of this, would be, effectively, a Spellcraft (evocation), Spellcraft (conjuration), etc. But, it all seemed way too much work with too little payoff.

Dave