Critical Role Critical Role and Material Components

[ccs]

I've never been a fan of material components. They are such a hassle to keep track of.

I'll bet at some point you've also complained that Wizards/Clerics/Druids are overpowered.

 

[Imaculata]

I'll bet at some point you've also complained that Wizards/Clerics/Druids are overpowered.

Eh.... no....

I don't think I've ever complained that a class was overpowered.

 

[BookBarbarian]

I've never been a fan of material components. They are such a hassle to keep track of.

In my game the material component is coin. As in if you cast Find Familiar, just scratch the cost of the material components off of your character sheet. It's boring, but it keeps things moving and is less of a headache for me.

To be fair, in CR I found that Caleb not always having access to his familiar has been interesting to watch.

 

[Burnside]

The use of different material components on CR has absolutely inspired me to have my lore bard use them, whereas previously I'm sure I would have just had him cast everything with his fiddle as his focus.

Also, my bard was impoverished for like 5 or 6 sessions after having to drop 100gp on a pearl so that he can cast Identify.

 

[robus]

I've never been a fan of material components. They are such a hassle to keep track of.

I'm not sure they're worrying about tracking them - certainly Mercer has yet to say "hey - I don't think you have any wire, or bit of dung so no you can't cast that". I think it's just to add flavor to the casting and certainly for my mental imagery works well as I imagine Caleb et al fiddling with bits of stuff as they cast their spells (and the resultant visual aspect of it). More interesting than just "I cast <x|y|z>" over and over in any case IMHO.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

Public Spellcasting Announcement:

If you are keeping track of non-costly material components, you are using a house rule. The rule of D&D has always been that you are assumed to have them (with a component pouch or such), except for an optional rule in AD&D.

So complain to your DM about his houserule, but don't blame the game for a rule that explicitly is not there.

 

[Yardiff]

Public Spellcasting Announcement:

If you are keeping track of non-costly material components, you are using a house rule. The rule of D&D has always been that you are assumed to have them (with a component pouch or such), except for an optional rule in AD&D.

So complain to your DM about his houserule, but don't blame the game for a rule that explicitly is not there.

Citation please.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

5e Player's Basic Rules (p.79): "Casting some spells requires particular objects, specified in parentheses in the component entry. A character can use a component pouch or a spellcasting focus in place of the components specified for the spell. But if a cost is indicated for a component, a character must have that specific component before he or she can cast the spell. If a spell states that a material component is consumed* by the spell, the caster must provide this component for each casting of the spell."

*In 5e only certain costly components are consumed (there might be one non-costly one that says it is consumed).

4e: Of course no components.

3e Player's Handbook (3.0 p.151; 3.5 p.174) "Unless a cost is given for material components, the cost is negligible. Don't bother to keep track of material components with negligible cost. Assume you have all you need as long as you have your spell component pouch."

AD&D 2e Player's Handbook (Revised version, p.111-113): "To cast a spell, the character must first have the spell memorized. If it is not memorized, the spell can not be cast. The caster must be able to speak (not under the effects of a silence spell or gagged) and have both arms free. (Note that the option spell component rule [following section] can modify these conditions.)...
When your character casts a spell, it is assumed that he is doing something to activate that spell. He may utter a few words, wave his hand around a couple times, wiggle his toes, swallow a live spider, etc. But under the standard rules, you don't have to know exactly what he does to activated the spell. Some of this can be answered if the DM uses the rules for spell components...
If the spell components optional rule is used in your campaign, your wizard or priest must have these items to cast the spell..."

D&D Rules Cyclopedia (BECMI) (p.32): "The character must be able to gesture and speak normally to cast a spell..."

Looks like I was wrong about 1e though.

AD&D 1e Player's Handbook (p.100): "As each spell is cast, it is crossed off the character's list of spells memorized for that particular expedition. The same is true for any material components which are required for the spell cast; the components must be ready and then crossed off as expended."

So 1e (and maybe OD&D or Holmes Basic--I have no info on them) is the only edition that expects you to track spell components as the default rule.

 

[MarkB]

I'll bet at some point you've also complained that Wizards/Clerics/Druids are overpowered.

Right, because the most effective way to rein in an overpowered class is to saddle it with tedious bookkeeping.

 

[Chaosmancer]

I think you missed my point. I was arguing that foci cause a form of fatigue that isn't shared by more specific material components.

I think I get what your saying, eventually you run out of interesting ways to describe casting Sacred Flame in the Name of Thor, and you just want to speed up a long running combat.

I do particularly like how Liam describes Chromatic orb though, I had never seen how the diamond worked into the casting, and I like his take on it.


Honestly though, I've never been as interested in the components as I am in the spell effects. My Gnome life cleric's Spirit Guardians was a field of Floating Embers, since he worshipped gods of community and these were the embers of the Hearth that protected the community from the darkness.

Only described it once or twice though, because no one else was and I didn't want my turn to take twice as long as everyone else's just because I was being flowery