Are Spellbooks Equivalent to Scrolls?

[gfunk]

If you have a spellbook, can you cast spells out of it like a scroll? I realize that you would lose the spell, but if a Wizard is in dire straits can he do this?

A reference would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Darkness]

If you have a spellbook, can you cast spells out of it like a scroll? I realize that you would lose the spell, but if a Wizard is in dire straits can he do this?

A reference would be greatly appreciated.

No.

For more on spellbooks, see PHB, p. 54 and 155.

 

[gfunk]

Actually I read the relevant sections, but I can't seem to find a rule that explicitly rules out using spellbooks in this way. The only thing I can think of is that the PHB seems to imply that scrolls and spellbooks are in different categories.

 

[Hypersmurf]

If you have a spellbook, can you cast spells out of it like a scroll? I realize that you would lose the spell, but if a Wizard is in dire straits can he do this?

Bear in mind that the materials for writing a spell into a spellbook cost 200gp per spell level.

So writing a 6th level spell into your book costs 1,200gp; a 9th 1,800.

Compare this to 1,650 and 3,825 for the equivalent scrolls.

People would just start carrying books with multiple copies of Teleport Without Error, instead of wasting all that money writing scrolls that did the same thing for twice the price...

-Hyp.

 

[Albereth]

Reading spells out of a spellbook and thus causing the spell to vanish was from the old editions of the game. The way I see it is that reading spells from the spellbook is no longer available since they did not mention that it could be done. If they would have wanted you capable of doing this then it would have been mentioned along with the vanishing of the spell from the spellbook. It is not, however, mentioned at all. If you had never played D&D before and picked up the rules books, which I am sure is happening, then having no mention of the ability would lead one to believe that it is not possible. One must forget what they know of all previous editions and only use what is in the current rules set. And that is the hard part

 

[Bronn Spellforger]

Alberth is right. But the old rule was excellent!

You could read spells out of your spellbook just like scrolls ... but despite the cost savings, you wouldn't want to do it!! There was a percent chance that your entire spellbook caught fire and *poof* was gone.

In one game, we were facing a pretty large dragon ... he was almost dead, but then he breathed on us and our fighters failed their saves and dropped like stones. Our mage, fresh out of spells, started reading spells out of his spellbook (with a tense moment after each spell as we rolled to see if his spellbook was destroyed - it wasn't) and finally killed the dragon.

It was great fun... maybe a house rule is in order!

 

[SpikeyFreak]

Alberth is right. But the old rule was excellent!

You could read spells out of your spellbook just like scrolls ... but despite the cost savings, you wouldn't want to do it!! There was a percent chance that your entire spellbook caught fire and *poof* was gone.

It was great fun... maybe a house rule is in order!

If you keep the costs the same, you could just carry around extra spell books, and that would be a lot better because they don't require XP to write.

The new rules are better and make more sense if you ask me.

--NeoRules Spikey

 

[Tom Cashel]

Oooh! Danger! Bronn's DM here, hunting down his posts.

Very true, Spikey...I was using it as a House Rule harkening back to the old days. But Scrolls are a lot easier to create these days, which compensates for the lack of "spellbook burning."

Think I'll have to put the kibosh on that, Bronn.

 

[gfunk]

Thanks for the help guys. I think the points you raised about writing spells in books requiring less gold and no XP are powerful arguments. I ask b/c our DM routinely has his evil Wizards (tm) cast spells out of books once he has expended his memorized spells.

 

[smetzger]

Reading spells out of a spellbook and thus causing the spell to vanish was from the old editions of the game. The way I see it is that reading spells from the spellbook is no longer available since they did not mention that it could be done. If they would have wanted you capable of doing this then it would have been mentioned along with the vanishing of the spell from the spellbook. It is not, however, mentioned at all. If you had never played D&D before and picked up the rules books, which I am sure is happening, then having no mention of the ability would lead one to believe that it is not possible. One must forget what they know of all previous editions and only use what is in the current rules set. And that is the hard part

You can, however, leave a spell slot open and then spend 15 mins to prepare a spell out of your spell book at a later time in the day.