Auto-Quicken Spell + Multispell + Time Stop + Wish = Cheese (Time Stop+Wish Argument)

[Celebrim]

You cannot wish for anything you want and expect to recieve it. It is somewhat ridiculous to discuss a spell combo in terms of house rules and expect to recieve useful advice on the effects. Wish does not involve a Wisdom check, nor is thier a limit on wishing for the same thing in a certain time period. Other than the dubious wish request, as far as I can tell the rest of the combo is legal in every respect. What would you expect of 45th level characters anyway?

The wish usage is utterly broken. When adjudicating a wish I take into account two things:

1) Who is granting the wish.
2) How reasonable is the request for a 9th level spell.

The first point is important for adjudicating unsafe wishes. If the granter of the wish is basically hostile to the caster, an unsafe wish will _always_ be interpreted in the most malicious way possible.

The caster is assumed not to be hostile to himself, so if you are the 'granter' of your own wish the wish is always interpreted by me in the spirit that the wish was made. If in your cosmology all wishes are granted by spirits, and the 5000 XP paid is merely the payment to those spirits and not the energy that powers the wish, then obviously how the wish is going to be interpreted depends on how the spell caster stands in relation to his patron powers.

But that's another story. For now, we will assume that despite the 'unsafe' nature of this wish, the wish won't go disastrously wrong because it is the caster who is powering the wish and not some genie or demon bound to serve him.

The second area of interest in who is granting the request is the power of the spirit in question. The lower the rank of the spirit, the more likely the wish is to run out of power before fully completing the request. In other words, just because you wished for something and the interpretation of the spell is benevolent, does not mean that you will fully get what you wanted. You could wish 'I wish to own all of the world's wealth', but that doesn't mean that a mere 9th level spell has the power to grant you such a request. Even a greater deity would be unable to fulfill such a request -- too much of the world's wealth is owned indirectly by other greater deities and powers which he cannot balk. And, even if it wasn't there is a limit to how much he can accomplish even with multiple applications of wish. You could wish, "I wish I was a god.", but that doesn't mean a 9th level spell has the power to grant you a Divine Rank. Is not the power of a divine rank worth more than 5000xp?

So, if one of my players wished ""I wish to have all of my spells restored as if I had re-memorized them, although I do not actually take the time to do so; I am simply able to cast as normal the spells I have already cast today." I would make two comments. FIrst, that all wishes really should contain just a single clause, otherwise you are trying to get two wishes out of one. Therefore, I'm ignoring everything that follows after the semi-colon, BUT that because the request is being interpreted benovolently that it won't alter the meaning of the spell.

Therefore, I would try as best as I was able to fulfill the request "I wish to have all of my spells restored as if I had re-memorized them, although I do not actually take the time to do so."

My first recourse would be to look at other spells and see if any of them allow you to rememorize spells. And indeed, there are spells that allow you to rememorize spells: Rary's Mmenomic Enhancer being one example.

From the SRD:

Mnemonic Enhancer
"Transmutation
Level: Wiz 4
Components: V, S, M, F
Casting Time: 10 minutes
Range: Personal
Target: The character
Duration: Instantaneous
The character prepares or retains additional spells. In either event, the spell or spells prepared or retained fade after 24 hours (if not cast).
Pick one of these two versions:
Prepare: the character prepares up to three additional levels of spells. A cantrip counts as one-half level for these purposes. The character prepares and casts these spells normally.
Retain: the character retains any spell up to 3rd level that the character had cast up to 1 round before the character started casting the mnemonic enhancer. This restores the previously cast spell to the character's mind.
Focus: Worth at least 50 gp."

"Lucubration
Transmutation
Level: Wiz 6
Components: V, S
Casting Time: 1 action
Range: Personal
Target: The character
Duration: Instantaneous
The character instantly recalls any one spell of up to 5th level that the character has used during the past 24 hours. The spell must have been actually cast during that time period. The recalled spell is stored in the character's mind as through prepared in the normal fashion. If the recalled spell requires material components, the character must provide these. The recovered spell is not usable until the material components are available."

I'm going to state this in all caps because it is very important. WISH IS A 9TH LEVEL SPELL. WISH IS NOT MORE POWERFUL THAN OTHER 9TH LEVEL SPELLS, IT IS SIMPLY MUCH MORE FLEXIBLE. WHEN A WISH IS INTERPRETED THE EFFECTS OF THE SPELL, WHETHER BENEVOLENT OR MALIGN, SHOULD BE APPROPRIATE IN POWER FOR A 9TH LEVEL SPELL. Wish is not all powerful. If you want effects that are more powerful than a 9th level spell is capable of, you should use a spell that is higher than 9th level. Therefore, the appropriate interpretation of this wish is that the character recieves effects equivelent to what would be appropriate were there a 9th level spell that allowed quick spell recall. My first inclination as a DM would be therefore to allow the character to recall any combination of spells of any level totalling 9 spell levels (with cantrips counting for as 1/2 level), or any combination of spells that are 5th level or less totaling 15 spell levels or any combination of spells that are 3rd level or less totalling 27 spell levels, or some similar effect. I'd allow the player to choose the one he most liked, after all, he is the one making the wish. Where the wish being granted by another being that didn't particularly like the caster, but wasn't necessarily hostile to him, I'd probably stick to the most limited interpretation (the first one).

However, it is clearly beyond the power of a 9th level spell to duplicate the effects of more than one 9th level spell, THEREFORE it ought to be equally clear that it cannot recall multiple 9th level spells to the mind of the wisher no matter how it is worded. The best the spell can do is _try_ to fulfill that request, but it will clearly fall way short and run out of power before the spell intention can be completed.

 

[Cloudgatherer]

Didn't I state mine would be the unpopular opinion?

Originally posted by Celebrim WISH IS A 9TH LEVEL SPELL. WISH IS NOT MORE POWERFUL THAN OTHER 9TH LEVEL SPELLS, IT IS SIMPLY MUCH MORE FLEXIBLE. <snip>

<sarcasm>It's not! Holy hand-grenades, Batman. I'm making me a spell that grants inherent bonuses to ability scores and ditch the XP cost.</sarcasm>

Seriously, I disagree. Wish isn't more powerful than other 9ths? Um, ok, then what are we paying the XP cost for? True, Wish is very flexible, but if you want flexibility, then limited wish is what you are looking for. For a 9th level spell called Wish, which *costs* 5000 XP just to cast, it should be remarkably more powerful than 9th level spells that do not have an XP cost.

Originally posted by Celebrim However, it is clearly beyond the power of a 9th level spell to duplicate the effects of more than one 9th level spell, THEREFORE it ought to be equally clear that it cannot recall multiple 9th level spells to the mind of the wisher no matter how it is worded.

I still don't know about this. Wish does things other spells just don't do.

Assuming TS isn't such an abusive spell in 3.5e, if the situation were to come up in my game, I'd allow the re-memorization effect to happen (minus the Wish). If a Wish were made to completely restore a character to full strength, then I think the used spell slots become "available" again, but the spellcaster needs to prepare the spells normally. I just can't see myself denying such a Wish, which would probably be made during a battle or in one of the darkest moments for the party. Let's face it, it takes one of these moments for a PC to actually contemplate casting Wish

 

[Angcuru]

I agree with everything you say cloudgatherer, except for this:

If a Wish were made to completely restore a character to full strength, then I think the used spell slots become "available" again, but the spellcaster needs to prepare the spells normally.

I don't really see the logic in this. What it basically means is that you can now take the time to prepare your spells....so...why would you need a Wish to do that? You could just as easily take the time to simply...prepare your spells. Unless what you mean is that they are able to prepare their "Spells per day" more than once per day, which is powerful, but not worthy of a Wish IMO.

 

[Celebrim]

"<sarcasm>It's not! Holy hand-grenades, Batman. I'm making me a spell that grants inherent bonuses to ability scores and ditch the XP cost.</sarcasm>"

You could create a 9th level spell that granted inherent bonuses to ability scores, it would simply need to have a similar XP cost or a non-permanent duration.

It is worth noting that compared to the normal creation cost of an item (in XP), wish is not very efficient. The most valuable item you can safely create with a wish is worth 15,000 gp. Such an item normally costs 3,000 XP to make. Therefore it is reasonable to suggest that by comparison with other more specialized means of spending XP wish is inefficient.

"Um, ok, then what are we paying the XP cost for?"

You might as well as why 'Animate Dead' has an XP cost even though its only a 5th level spell. Is 'Animate Dead' more powerful than other 5th level spells? Would it be fair to have a 7th level version of animate dead that didn't have an XP cost? Is the XP cost actually tied directly to the power or level of the spell?

"True, Wish is very flexible, but if you want flexibility, then limited wish is what you are looking for."

Well, arguably wish is more flexible. But, I suspect you mean that wish is too flexible for reutine use. But that is also beside the point. Wish is more flexible and more powerful. But its also a 9th level spell, so what do you expect?

"For a 9th level spell called Wish, which *costs* 5000 XP just to cast, it should be remarkably more powerful than 9th level spells that do not have an XP cost."

Ok, I'll buy that. So lets see, wish is a spell that generates permenate effects, allows spellcasters to cast spells that they do not know, allows spellcasters to cast spells that they have not memorized, allows spellcasters to cast spells that they cannot cast, allows arcane spellcasters to heal or revive the dead as if they were a divine spellcaster, undo the effects of virtually any other spell, apply metamagic feats that they do not have, apply metamagic feats to spells spontaneously, produces items on demand of up to 10,000gp value, create items without creation feats and without spending time and materials on them, and alter past reality up to several seconds into the past. I would say that without even ammending that list, that it is a spell that lets you do some pretty remarkable things.

"I still don't know about this. Wish does things other spells just don't do."

Yes, and I just listed them.

Please note that duplicating the effects of even _one_ other 9th level arcane spell is a 'unsafe' request. Normally, wish will only duplicate the effects of a spell of 8th level or below. That isn't to say that wish can't necessarily do it, but that doing so by inference strains the power of the spell. Doing things that are clearly beyond the power of a 9th level spell and which are not listed as a standard effect of the spell ought to be _clearly_ to any PC a misuse of the spell.

"I just can't see myself denying such a Wish, which would probably be made during a battle or in one of the darkest moments for the party."

I see. You grant Wish's based off whether or not you feel that it is helpful to the story. If you think that the wish is a real need of the party, then the wish is granted. If you think that the wish is not helpful to the story, that is to say in your opinion 'abusive' then it isn't granted.

How hopelessly arbitrary. How are your players supposed to know what you as a DM are going to do? How are your players supposed to know whether or not even attempting the wish is going to be worth it, or whether or not you are going to nerf them because in your opinion the wish is something that you should deny? At least under my interpretation, a player can know basically what he can expect based on how spells work - including those published in other sources but not existing in my campaign.

Third edition is very clear on how wish works. It lists all the generous and nifty things that wish can do to get you out of a jam. It suggests that it can do other things in line with those effects, but (bold text added):

"You may wish for greater effects than these, but doing so is dangerous. Such a wish gives you the oppurtunity to fulfill your request without fulfilling it completely. (The wish may pervert your intent into a literal but undesirable fulfillment or only a partial fulfillment.) For example, wishing for a staff of the magi might get you instantly teleported to the precence of the staff's current owner. Wishing to be immortal could get you imprisoned in a hidden extradimensional space (as in imprisonment), where you could "live" indefinately."

Note that ALL of the perverted effects of unfulfilled spells are in line with the power and effects of other 9th level spells, and/or they are literally the application of another 9th level spell. I don't feel that this is remotely accidental.

 

[Cloudgatherer]

What it basically means is that you can now take the time to prepare your spells....so...why would you need a Wish to do that? You could just as easily take the time to simply...prepare your spells. Unless what you mean is that they are able to prepare their "Spells per day" more than once per day, which is powerful, but not worthy of a Wish IMO.

The thing is, what if the character does not have that time? As far as "worthy of a wish", I'm only referring to how it would affect spellcasting. If a Wish were used to completely "restore" a character, it would also heal HP damage, ability score damage, cure negative levels, remove diseases/poisons, and so on (in addition to spell slots being restored). Sure, a cleric can do most of this with a single Heal spell, but I feel this should be well within the realm of a Wish.

 

[Cloudgatherer]

<snip>
I see. You grant Wish's based off whether or not you feel that it is helpful to the story. <snip>

Uh, I didn't say that. I said I don't see myself denying such a wish, and gave circumstances under which the spell would most likely be used. Restoring a single character to full strength seems to be on par with the other listed "safe" effects, in my opinion (like I stated earlier, others will disagree).

How hopelessly arbitrary. How are your players supposed to know what you as a DM are going to do? <snip>

Oh, I dunno. They could always ask me if such and such a wish falls under the "perversion" clause of the spell. The answers range from "yes", "no", and "your character doesn't know."

At least under my interpretation, a player can know basically what he can expect based on how spells work - including those published in other sources but not existing in my campaign.

My players can also know what to expect. I'm saying for this particular request, I feel it is on par with the listed "safe" effects of Wish. I'm sure there are numerous effects one might want to apply a Wish, but are not covered by the Wish text or by spells (from the PHB or elsewhere). So, as DMs we make judgment calls. My call is that a "restoring wish" would be acceptable. You and others are free to rule how you would like.

 

[Celebrim]

"Unless what you mean is that they are able to prepare their "Spells per day" more than once per day, which is powerful, but not worthy of a Wish IMO."

I think that is exactly what he means, and I'd like to know what you do think such an ability is worthy of if not a wish? I think that is a perfectly reasonable interpretation, in line with a ramped up mnemonic enhancer, and as such much more likely to be liberally granted. Of course, a ramped up lucubration (recieving the spells back instantly in memory) is also perfectly fine, but in neither case do I see how you justify returning ALL spells to memory.

 

[LokiDR]

Wish can only chage time in a limited fashion.

Look at the wish effect that states it can undo misfortune. You only get to reroll, and you have to take the new result. Compare that to "restore all spells I have used today" and I think it is clear which one is more powerful.

I think it is pretty clearly out of the listed "safty range" for wish to ask for all spells back.

Then again, wish is by definintion open to interpretation by the DM.