D&D lovers who hate Vancian magic

[Hussar]

Let's scale that back to "Very few will ever memorize Illusory Script before Fireball." because I know people who will....like me.

Really? Your 5th level wizard, with 1 (or maybe 2 depending on edition) 3rd level spell per day, will, without prior knowledge of what he will need, memorize illusory script before fireball?

Honestly?

Your group is the weirdest bloody thing I've ever heard of. If I did that with a wizard, the rest of the players would beat me senseless for being so useless.

So, I have to ask, why? Why, unless you knew beforehand that you would need this spell, would you ever memorize a spell that lets you write in code before fireball? And, really, why wouldn't you just... oh, I don't know... write in code?

I've never even seen this spell used by a player, let alone memorized before general purpose spells.

Janx- we did the same thing with clerics in our 2e games. It worked great actually. Granted, in 2e, clerics didn't have quite so many offensive power spells as they do in 3e, so, it might be a bit more problematic there, but, my experience mirrored yours. Having free rein meant that all sorts of spells got cast (including Snakes to Sticks - the only time I ever saw that one) cast that I never saw before.

Which rolls me back to why I think the sorcerer and favored souls work better. I'd say they need a few more Spells Known, but, honestly, not that many. And, if you gave them basic powers that let them attack, then spells could be reserved for actual effects, rather than just damage dealing.

Sort of combine the 3e warlock with the sorcerer and having at-will combat spells, and then Spells Known for the rest.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Really? Your 5th level wizard, with 1 (or maybe 2 depending on edition) 3rd level spell per day, will, without prior knowledge of what he will need, memorize illusory script before fireball?

Honestly?

Sorry, you were misled by my admittedly unclear post.

I haven't used that spell...but in 30+ years in D&D, I may have played one single arcane caster with Fireball. My casters' spell selection is always linked to the nature of the PC. The last Wizard I played was a multiclassed specialist Diviner...and when that PC got retired at 10th level, one of his best (read only) offensive spells was Orb of Electricity.

He was retired because RW pressures left the party with no healers. So now I run a "Swamp-Thing" inspired Sorc/Clc/MT/Geomancer. His arcane spells tend towards the..."earthy"...side. No fireballs, no lightning bolts...

And looking forwards, there will be no such spells. They don't fit him.

Your group is the weirdest bloody thing I've ever heard of. If I did that with a wizard, the rest of the players would beat me senseless for being so useless.

Did I say everyone was 100% happy with my PCs? They aren't. But neither does anyone else's PC meet with a 100% approval rating.

The closest anyone does is the guy who plays Wizards 85% of the time since 1986, and who only altered his spell list when the system forced him to. Which I find utterly booooooooorrrrrrriiiiiinnnnng. It also means that unless we have a big sign-up for a game, nobody else really gets an opportunity to play a Wizard.

But as for critiquing the choices of other players? It happens, but it's extremely rare beyond the PC generation stage since other people's PCs are none of our business.

Besides, even people not casting Fireball can contribute. Which my PC did. I can speak without fear of contradiction that my Diviner was the sole reason certain PCs in that campaign are still alive. Being "useful" depends a great deal on how you play what you have.

Final point on this: my specialist Diviner was in the same party as my buddy's umpteenth cloned Wizard. I proposed- in character- that our party would be stronger overall if we copied each others' spells into our respective spell books. Not only would it have boosted my PC's punch the spells in my book, it would have improved overall flexibility, and made it virtually impossible for the DM to do a "steal the spellbook, screw the Wizard" plot line.

He refused.

 

[Gentlegamer]

If I did that with a wizard, the rest of the players would beat me senseless for being so useless.

Tell the other players you're just playing your character and to stop meta-gaming.

 

[Hussar]

And, fair enough I suppose DannyA. But, would you say that given the choice between one spell that has a very narrow effect, and another spell that can be repurposed for a number of situations, which would most likely be chosen?

Tell the other players you're just playing your character and to stop meta-gaming.

Yeah, well, it's all very well to say that, but, when Bob dies because you memorized Phantom Trap rather than Web, even the most ardent role player tends to get a bit testy.

And, really, is it even playing "in character"? Given that you have the choice of spells in 3e, deliberately choosing something like Phantom Trap when you're an adventurer going off to the Dungeon of Nasty Bad isn't really all that defensible as part of "roleplaying"... unless, I suppose, you had a wizard with a wisdom of 6 or so.

 

[Janx]

in support of Danny's special wizards, In one 3e campaign, I ran a pure conjurer. every spell of his was from the conjuration school. I do remember one player suggesting spells to cast to take out a bad guy and being baffled that I didn't have the spell.

But overall, he was pretty effective, given that he was always summoning something to help in fights. celestial badgers are mean because they don't give a .

 

[Desdichado]

Well, I'm sorry my hastily assembled prose disappointed.

Hah! Really? I thought you were actually quoting a passage from some D&D novel. It sounds exactly like the prose that most of the ones I've read have.

Did I say everyone was 100% happy with my PCs? They aren't. But neither does anyone else's PC meet with a 100% approval rating.

I may have an admittedly unusual take on that particular question, but I hate it and resist most strongly the notion that I should play a character of a certain type because it's suggested that I "need to" in order to have an optimal or balanced party structure, or for tactical efficiency, or anything else like that which I find boring beyond belief. If I can't play the character that I want to, then I might as well not play at all, since that's a big part of what makes the game enjoyable to me--I've always approached gaming from an almost "authorial" perspective in terms of how I approach it, how I want the game to unfold, and what I find enjoyable. I'm also a strident and in fact rather zealous and vocal proponent of the idea that it's the GM's job to bring a game suited to the characters he gets, not expect matching the game and the characters to be the player's responsibility.

This doesn't always go over as well as I'd like in my group where most of the other guys besides me, when they GM, run prepackaged adventures, but it's an ideal that I certainly strive to uphold as a GM, and I strongly believe that the best games have to be structured that way in order to go over the top from being "pretty good" to "excellent" even if everything else is working very well. In fact, recently, some of the more tactically minded players started complaining quite a bit more about our rather lamentable performance in some of our combats, and tossing around terms like "DPS" and "tank" and stuff that is totally not at all what I ever want to hear in conjunction with any roleplaying game I ever play.

But I strongly believe that the recent collapse of our last campaign and the need to start another one was largely driven by the GM's inability or unwillingness to adapt a Paizo adventure path in any way from what was written to accomodate the group that he has, leading to general frustration in some degree with everyone all around.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

But, would you say that given the choice between one spell that has a very narrow effect, and another spell that can be repurposed for a number of situations, which would most likely be chosen?

For sane people? The flexible one.

For me, though, I think it still depends on the PC.

Example: I have a PC who is one of my Mage-Brutes. He a Sorc who wears Scale armor and swings a Maul. Most of his spells are really what most would call "utility/non-Combat spells...because if he wants to use arcane attacks in combat, he's channeling spell slots into a lightning breath weapon or Arcane Strike.

...with one caveat...

In this campaign, the DM is letting us learn metamagically altered spells as if they were completely new spells of the adjusted level instead of learning & burning feats*. For example, while Fireball would be a 3rd level spell, a Still Fireball or Silent Fireball would be learned as a 4th level spell, and a Stilled, Silent Fireball would be learned as a 5th level spell.

So of the PCs actual offensive spells, almost all have one thing in common: they are lightning spells. (Some few are also Stilled.) If an attack spell is available for him to choose that is not either already lightning based or can be made lightning based, he won't choose it because he is all about lightning. That perforce means he is utterly useless as a spellcaster against something immune to lightning.







* which, BTW, I think is a better way to go for a lot of casters.

 

[SteveC]

I think the dislike for Vancian magic has been with us for a long time, basically since the beginning of the hobby. The very first alternatives to D&D, Tunnels and Trolls and Runequest, both had a spell point system to them.

For me, I was playing D&D back in that day, and didn't like Vancian magic at all. I played both Tunnels and Trolls and Runequest, and games like In the Labyrinth, but none of them really worked for me as well overall as D&D did.

Then, in 1982 I came across Champions, the first effects based system, and when I started to play Fantasy Hero I saw no further need for D&D. I still played it because it was the big dog on the street, but I was much happier with everything else.

When 3E launched, I found that it addressed a lot of the other problems I had with D&D, even if it still had the vestiges of the old Vancian system, and it of course took off light wildfire. I found myself enjoying the game despite the magic system, since for a D&D style game, 3E was a very nice system (especially before the splat books).

Towards the end of the 3X period, I again started playing other games because the system's flaws were becoming more evident to me. Then there was 4E, and the problem was finally solved: I could play a wizard right from the start that didn't need to carry around a crossbow or darts! Heck, I could play a martial character who didn't have to be second fiddle to spellcasters! It only took about 30 years for the game to catch up with what I had been looking for my whole life.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

If I can't play the character that I want to, then I might as well not play at all, since that's a big part of what makes the game enjoyable to me

I wouldn't put it quite so strongly, but I basically agree.

Part of the reason I wouldn't take that position exactly is that I have hundreds of PC concepts lying around to play. So if the party really needs a particular kind of PC, or there is enough grumbling, I may change what I'm playing.

However, I will build the PC and play it 100% my way. Which is why the healer I'm playing in that 3.5Ed game isn't a straight Cleric, but a "Swamp-Thing" themed Sorc/Clc/MT/Geomancer.

Yes, people grumbled...until they saw him do his thing. Since then? The only peeps have been on grocery store candy aisles.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Then, in 1982 I came across Champions, the first effects based system, and when I started to play Fantasy Hero I saw no further need for D&D. I still played it because it was the big dog on the street, but I was much happier with everything else

Like I said upthread, HERO has been my personal fave since then too.

Still, I still love Vancian casting: not only in D&D, which I think really needs to retain it as part of its product identity, but even outside of it on occasion. I have actually run Vancian casters in HERO, and at one point, could run a D&D game in HERO using all of D&D's various magic systems side by side.

(Which, BTW, was easier to do in HERO than in D&D since the character building system pretty much handled issues of power balance.)