D&D 5E Am I too strict?

[Helldritch]

For the first time, a player called me too strict for a ruling I made.
Here is the ruling:" Although the wizard learns too free spells to add to his spell book, I ruled that the wizard still have to pay for the materials (inks) to write it in his spell book." I also ruled that you can only add spells during downtime unless you want to risk a failure in case you are attacked during the transcription.

My reasons are two folds.
1) By Raw, the spells are free to add. But right in the side bar they say that whenever you find a new spell you have to copy in your spell book.

2) The spells do not appear out of nowhere. You have to have the special inks to put them in your spell book.

I gave the following example: A group is in the desert. They barely have enough food to get by. They have a weapon, an empty backpack (almost, the dried camel is stored in their backpack) and in case of caster, they have a spell focus. The group rise in level, they are now level 3! Yeah! The wizard adds two spells to his spell book but where did the ink came from? Did the spell appeared out of nowhere?

Nope, the new spells are a sudden inspiration. The wizard knows them, he gets them in his mind but now if he wants to change them, he needs to find ink to copy them in his spell book. Yes, they were free as in he did not buy them from an other wizard, he did not have to capture the spell book of an enemy, he did not have to make a quest to know it. But otherwise, he has to abide by the side bar.

I am a bit old school. Spells costs a lot in my campaign. First and second level spells cost 50 gold pieces per level just to copy. You still need to have the inks to copy them.
third through fifth level cost 250 gp per levels and 6th to 8th level are 1000 gold per level. A single spell of 9th level costs 15,000 gold and that is IF the other caster is friendly, very friendly to you (as in, (s)he owes you BIG TIME).

Is this too strict? Money to copy and acquire spell is a big money sink in my games and that is at all levels.
I have the feeling that he wants them totally free only to make more low level scrolls during downtime.

 

[iserith]

Was how you handle this made clear at some point earlier in the game? Because this sounds to me like it wasn't and really the player is objecting to being blindsided by the ruling, not the particulars of the ruling itself.

 

[Oofta]

Well, the DM is always right, but I've never charged for the spells gained while leveling. I think the PHB is fairly clear on this one " add two wizard spells of your choice to your spellbook for free."

Your ruling is like saying the spell is free but the shipping is 100 GP/level.

 

[Helldritch]

Was how you handle this made clear at some point earlier in the game? Because this sounds to me like it wasn't and really the player is objecting to being blindsided by the ruling, not the particulars of the ruling itself.

It was perfectly crystal clear from the beginning of 5th edition. This is the first time this player makes a wizard. This is the first time the ruling is brought to question.

 

[prabe]

PHB, page 114: "Each time you gain a wizard level, you can add two wizard spells of your choice to your spellbook for free." I'd say your player has the right of it here.

 

[Helldritch]

PHB, page 114: "Each time you gain a wizard level, you can add two wizard spells of your choice to your spellbook for free." I'd say your player has the right of it here.

And what about the side bar? It does not say:"Except those you had free from leveling."
Like Oofta said. Free of charge, but not of shipping.

 

[iserith]

It was perfectly crystal clear from the beginning of 5th edition. This is the first time this player makes a wizard. This is the first time the ruling is brought to question.

If your player was aware of your house rule and agreed to it, then that's on them. People should be held to their agreements.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Well, the DM is always right, but I've never charged for the spells gained while leveling. I think the PHB is fairly clear on this one " add two wizard spells of your choice to your spellbook for free."

Your ruling is like saying the spell is free but the shipping is 100 GP/level.

The DM is definitely not always right, and in this case, I think OP should have informed the player of this rule before the game began.

The OP has made the game more restrictive than it's intended to be, for one character, in a way that taps into a second increase in restriction, making it...very undesirable to play a wizard, after the player has already started playing a wizard.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

And what about the side bar? It does not say:"Except those you had free from leveling."
Like Oofta said. Free of charge, but not of shipping.

No, you've clearly gone into houseruling territory.

The sidebar is the general rule for adding spells to the spellbook, the 2 spells per level is a specific rule that overrides that general rule.

 

[prabe]

And what about the side bar? It does not say:"Except those you had free from leveling."
Like Oofta said. Free of charge, but not of shipping.

So you're saying that "add to your spellbook for free" doesn't mean "add to your spellbook for free"? I just want to be clear that's what you're saying.

I think the sidebar is general, and the leveling-up feature is specific, and specific beats general. I suspect that's how roughly every player wanting to play a wizard is going to interpret that and how they'll expect it to play. Trust me, you can hose a wizard pretty hard, just by reducing or eliminating access to spells beyond what they get for leveling up; there's no need to resort to this.