Banning Fly, Improved Invisibility, Dimension Door, and Teleport

[Zaruthustran]

I'm DMing the Savage Tide adventure path, and have banned the party arcanist from taking Fly, Improved Invisibility, Dimension Door, and Teleport.

Why? In my opinion, those spells spoil the game by killing the drama of challenges like cliffs, raging rivers, stealth, and long-distance travel.

Where's the fun when the party can just pop away from the enemy, rest and rearm, and return at their leisure? The cliche of a flying, Improved Invis wizard is just that: a boring cliche. So in my continuity of Greyhawk, those four spells haven't been researched*.

What I'm wondering now, however, is if my denying those spells will break the game. D&D assumes that certain magic or abilities are available. Is the lack of those spells a sure-fire recipe for PC death? Or can a party survive without them?

-z

* regular Invisibility, swift Fly (1 rd duration), Jump, spiderclimb, shapechange spells that grant wings, and so on are all still available. I suppose this reveals that my beef is with those specific spells, not the party's ability to enact their effects.

 

[Patlin]

Whatever floats your boat, I guess. I happen to like all of those spells, but rule 0 is there for a reason.

It shouldn't break your game... unless you intentionally include challenges that need those spells. There are a few levels at which your rogue will be very dissapointed by the lack of an improved invisibility from the mage, but otherwise you ought to be OK.

 

[Sejs]

Your ire seems imbalanced. It seems to mostly hinder an arcanist while leaving many other classes alone.


Druid can still wildshape into a flying form, alter self can let you fly, many classes can achieve near-invisibility via ridiculous hide checks (particularly with HiPS as a factor). Phantom Steed does an amazing job as a transit spell later on. Wind Walk is universally better than casting Overland Flight on the entire group.

Fly seems fine for your purposes, given its new (shorter) duration. Want to bypass that cliff? You can either start venting 3rd level spell slots, or you can break out a rope and start taking 10 on climb checks.

Normal Invis isn't much of a problem - there's still the spot and listen checks involved (remember to enforce the fact that invisible doesn't mean inaudible). A possible fix for Improved Invis: do what the Infinity Engine games (Baldur's Gate, etc) did with it - you're invisible invisible up until you would break invis from an attack or such, after that the spell grants you 50% concealment but people can still tell where you are by your hazy, ghostly Predator-esque outline.

Teleport: enforce a You Must Have Been There restriction on extradimensional transportation magics. No blind teleports. No seen-once teleports. No scry-n-fry, unless you've personally been to the location before. Probably continue to allow short range teleports to areas you havn't been to, but can physically see from your current location. Across the chasm? Sure. Into the Dark Warlord's inner sanctum, where you have never tread? No. Back to your home city? Okay. To a far distant city based solely by where it's depicted on a map? Nuh-uh. Also, always remember the joys of the Forbiddance spell. Or have a house-rule where an area can be sealed against extradimensional travel by means of a certain process or material, sort of like how a thin sheet of lead is the bane of many detect spells.

 

[Piratecat]

Yes, I'll agree with Sejs; it appears that you're targeting the arcanist and dealing with only a handful of cases. I'd be really cautious about that. I personally don't care for axing signature spells like these, but every DM is different.

In addition, high level play is possibly going to slog. D&D modules assume that PCs can travel extremely quickly. Without that, higher level adventures based on time tables become FAR more difficult.

 

[hong]

I find greater invis annoying as all heck.

Removing teleport cuts down on the buff/scry/teleport routine, although IME that's not as big a problem as is sometimes made out to be. The players know that anything they do can be done back to them, so it results in a detente situation. Spells like wind walk, overland flight, etc still allow fast travel, without the possibility of landing in the BBEG's bedroom.

Dim door I don't have much of a problem with. It's short range so you can't b/s/t quite as efficiently; and it also gives a way for badly-hurt characters to escape a fight (both PCs and NPCs). Good for avoiding TPKs, or if you want an ongoing villain to survive.

 

[Hammerhead]

Lame. Why not just ban the fighter from hitting things, or the rogue from doing sneaky stuff?

Besides, this spell-less wizard is utterly and fantastically screwed if he's ever grappled, unless he's prepared appropriate stilled countermeasures. One Evard's could very easily spell the end for him. Where's the "drama" in getting your guts squeezed out while you're unable to do anything?

 

[hong]

Stilled grease is actually pretty good for getting out of a grapple....

 

[Nail]

I'm DMing the Savage Tide adventure path....

Here's the relevant issue.

That is: you are DMing a published adventure series which - when written - assumed the PCs would have access to all the core spells. You've removed several key core spells. There could be problems.

 

[AnonymousOne]

There could be problems.

There could also be Fantastic Flying Monkeys that pelt the PC party with fist-fulls of flaming feces ...
Hey, I'm just saying.

Personally, I'm not a fan of just arbitrarily picking some spells that you don't like/think are too powerful/overused. Personally, I'd provide an XP incentive for an arcanist to use ... shall we say unorthodox means to his ends.

 

[Piratecat]

There could also be Fantastic Flying Monkeys that pelt the PC party with fist-fulls of flaming feces ...
Hey, I'm just saying.

Funny, but not relevant. The Paizo adventure paths are designed assuming that these spells are available. I'd be tremendously surprised if the adventures' flow weren't substantially affected by removing these spells.