Crazy thought 'bout Fighters, Wizards, and progressions

[Mattachine]

Older editions also had segment casting, which made higher level spells more likely to come at the end of he end of a round, and monsters could hit and disrupt it.

Though, in older editions, higher level casters were more likely to cast while invisible, with stoneskin (which was much better in earlier editions), mirror image, etc., to simply avoid getting disrupted. The flying, invisible caster was a common occurrence in my 1e games.

 

[Khaalis]

Wouldn't it be simpler to make magic act as its own niche? Simply don't create spells that allow wizards to become another class outright. Wizard spells should focus on things that only the wizard can do, like casting energy spells, charms, far-seeing, etc. They shouldn't focus on spells that make them abetter at being another class than someone of that class, such as True Strike, Stoneskin.

Could there still be a Knock spells? Sure, but it should never allow the wizard to be better at opening a lock than a rogue of the same level. So for example, spells that replicates skills should only grant, for arguments sake, lets say a bonus equal to half what the average "trained class" skilled user would get in that skill. If a rogue (the class who can Train in Open Lock) should have an average +8 to Open Lock at level X, then Knock should only grant a +4 bonus to a Wizard's Open Lock check at level X.

Spells that replicate another class's shtick should allow a Wizard to attempt to make up for a missing skill-set (following the idea that you don't have to have the "Core 4" party of Fighter, Cleric, Wizard, Rogue) but should never be able to completely replace another class's function.

I think this in itself would go a long way to re-bridging the gap between casters and other classes. From here, you have to expand the other classes, like the Fighter to be more "epic" at high levels, just in different ways than a wizard is.


On a side note - Another wizard spell controlling idea as mentioned above, would be to bring back multi-action casting. Higher level combat spells could require full round casting, or even say 3 Standard Actions to cast (technically a round and a half). This would also help control high level casting, and at the same time it could allow for a new style of casting. If a spell requires 3 standard actions, it doesn't necessarily have to be consecutive. You could cast, move, cast, move, cast - for instance.

 

[Minigiant]

Well in my homebrew d20 game, casters don't get HP and attack bonus increases. Spellcasting was treated like a 3e template that gave no HDs. So after a few levels, it did have a few effects.

Every caster commits 50% of their spells into defense because they have more spells that hit points. This meant they didn't have a lot of free spell slots for Win spells. They were to busy casting buffs for AC, HP, DR, saves and immunities. Anytime a fight started, the casters would cast Shield on instinct as they rarely had double digit HPs until mid levels.

It made warriors and skill monkeys more important by warping the game. Every Win spell casted meant one more chance of dying. Polymorphing into a giant still got you clobbered by an actual fighter as they had a better attack and more HP. Invisibility and flight weren't flung around nonchalantly.

But it didn't feel like D&D. Cause it wasn't.

 

[Bluenose]

Well that kind of depends how far back you go in western fantasy. Beowulf swan across a fjord in chainmail with a broadsword in his teeth and ripped off a trolls arm with his bare hands.

An Officer of the Batavian cohorts swam across the Danube in armour, and back, to impress the Emperor. And recorded it on his tombstone, which survives. It's hardly bending reality. Beowulf swimming the Skaggerak, or fighting and beating Grendel's mother while underwater, might go further. And that's hardly the only - or most extreme - example of beyond-human-capability displayed by Fighter-types in Western tales.