Alternatives to XP costs for spells

[Rackhir]

In Shilsen's campaign, he's essentially tossed the XP rules out the window. What it basically comes down to is we level when he feels like it (or dealing with it). This however causes some complications for burning XP for spells. Since if we applied it strictly, it would essentially mean that my character the Wizard of the party, would simply be falling further and further behind, since it would mean it would take longer and longer for him to hit a level after the rest of the party. Making it worse is the substantial number of Wizard spells that have an XP cost, while there are almost no spells for the other casters in the party that have an XP cost.

So the question is what is an appropriate "penalty" to replace an XP cost. After all my character shouldn't be tossing around Limited Wishes like they are fireballs.

Cash isn't a great solution since Shilsen essentially treats the money we have in a similar way to XP.

The one thing that occurs to me is some sort of a stat drain. Probably Con, perhaps 1 pt/100xp cost of the spell. Probably not subject to restoration spells that has to be healed as per normal healing. That would impose a significant penalty, that would make it untenable to use a large number of XP cost spells in combat, but doesn't permanently handicap my character.

Of course that does still leave the question of how to handle stuff like Permanency. Since they would either kill the character outright or be almost no penalty given sufficient time to recover in a non-combat enviroment. Perhaps a "buffer" of XP earned by time and/or level akin to how Sepulchrave handles XP costs for epic spells in his campaign (Most epic level casters in his campaign have a pool they can draw on to pay XP costs for spells).

 

[Pyrex]

Both are actually reasonable approaches, and could even be implemented simultaneously.

Stat Drain:
Firstly, it'd be easier to list it as a penalty to the stat, instead of some sort of special damage/drain.

Next, I'd probably split the penalty between Str and Con, as just putting it against Con is going to trash your caster too quickly.

Thirdly, it needs to be on a sliding scale, as Wish needs to be survivable.

You might also consider starting off with Fatigued, then Exhausted, then move on to stat penalties as the XP cost increases.

 

[Kerrick]

I did something similar (this is from a document of revised spells):

For those of you who don’t wish to use XP as a component for spells, I’ve borrowed “ability burn” from the XPH (see below) and applied it to the handful of spells that have XP costs.

Ability Burn: This is a special form of ability damage that cannot be magically or psionically healed. It is caused by casting certain spells. It returns only through natural healing.

Awaken: 1 Int

Atonement: 2 Wis

Limited wish: 1 Con/3 Con*

Miracle: 3 Con/5 Con*

Permanency: 1 Con/3 levels of the spell being made permanent (L1-3: 1 Con, L4-6: 2 Con, L7-9: 3 Con)

Planar ally, et al: No cost (I don't see the point of having an XP cost when you have to "request your deity to send you" something in the first place).

Simulacrum: 1 Con

Wish: 3 Con/5 Con*

*All lesser versions of the spell (duplicating other spells, undoing harmful effects, healing damage, creating lesser items) cost 3 Con; creating magic items and altering reality is 5 Con. If a spell being duplicated has ability burn, it’s added in.

 

[Li Shenron]

If you want to experiment something original:

"A spell with XP cost cannot be cast again before a number of days equal to the XP cost."

Spells in PHB with an XP cost are:

Lesser planar ally (100)
Atonement (500, voluntary deeds only)
Commune (100)
Planar ally (250)
Greater restoration (500)
Greater planar ally (500)
Gate (1000, calling only)
Miracle (5000, advanced requests only)

Awaken (250)

Permanency (500-1500)
Vision (100)
Simulacrum (1000 or more)
Limited wish (300 or more)
Wish (5000)

Most of these spells produce effects whose potential problem is abuse through multiple casting, like using those powerful divinations to nullify a mistery around which the story is based, or use the permanent allies to build a small army. The time cost has more or less the same effect as an XP cost: it reduces the number of appearances of these spells in the game.

The only spell for which I believe this rule is unfair, is Permanency. I think waiting more than 1 year between each casting is unfair, considering that often the effects of permanency are dispelled. I would rather convert the XP in GP cost for such spell.

OTOH, I think the time restrictions would work well enough for resurrection-type spells too.

 

[Folly]

A problem with the time between castings is that certain spells have options that require casting multiple instances all at once (Wish).

I like the idea of burning con instead of xp. To resolve the issue of diversity in xp cost have it scale. So something like:

Up to 100 = 1 Con
101 to 500 = 2 Con
501 to 2000 = 3 Con
2001 to 5000 = 4 Con
5001 to 10000 = 5 Con
10001 to 17500 = 6 Con
17500 to 20750 = 7 Con

Not to say exactly that (that was off the top of my head) but a system simular to that. Another option might be you get an xp pool equal to an equation. A common equation in 3.5 is (Bonus^2)*Constant. Once again a quick set of numbers might be 400*Con^2. This would mean that it would cost 4 con for the expensive spells (5k).

 

[Li Shenron]

A problem with the time between castings is that certain spells have options that require casting multiple instances all at once (Wish).

Is that a problem? You have 2 solutions already:

1) Disallow those uses of the spell

2) Allow, and simply stack the times together

 

[iceifur]

Never much cared for xp costs.

We've replaced the xp costs for spells with "special materials and reagents" worth (spell's xp cost x 5) gp. Hasn't been a problem, so far, and (more importantly) nobody has fallen behind in the progression. It basically turns xp-intensive spells into party gp expeditures.

 

[Mechnomancer]

I just had the spells take up more than one spell slot. 2-3 slots usually makes the players think about its usefullness v. the other spells that can fill those slots.

 

[starwed]

Multiple slots wouldn't work very well for things like permanency.

A simple solution is just to get a reserve pool of XP each level, which can be used for crafting/spell casting.

If you wanted to throw non-casters a bone, it could also be used for buying action points.

 

[Rackhir]

I just had the spells take up more than one spell slot. 2-3 slots usually makes the players think about its usefullness v. the other spells that can fill those slots.

While this is a useful idea, it does nothing about spells that are non-combat (such as permanency) or where there is plenty of time to regain spells. Getting to cast Wish on a daily basis, even if it took up all your slots, would really ruin things. Unless you're going to have the characters attacked on a daily basis no matter where they are.