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D&D New Edition Design Looks Soon?
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<blockquote data-quote="Staffan" data-source="post: 8692033" data-attributes="member: 907"><p>That's because different spells care about different aspects.</p><p></p><p><em>Shield</em> vs <em>mage armor</em> are fairly balanced when you need to cast them. <em>Mage armor</em> is a little better than wearing studded leather armor (AC 13+Dex, lasts all day long), and <em>shield</em> gives you +5 AC for one round and is cast as a reaction. One is a preparation spell, the other is an emergency button with limited charges (that it shares with other spells). But if you can cast <em>shield</em> at will, that's essentially a permanent +5 AC boost and that won't do. For what a balanced at-will <em>shield</em> would look like, see <em>blade ward</em>: one action to cast, resistance against physical damage for one round. A version that instead gave +5 to AC would be fine.</p><p></p><p>Healing spells are likewise limited as a resource, because otherwise you have infinite hit points as long as you survive the fight. The level on healing spells is there as a resource management detail: healing lots of damage takes up a lot of your magic power. <em>Speak with dead</em> on the other hand is primarily level-limited to keep it out of the hands of low-level characters. It's a rare occasion that you would <strong>need</strong> to <em>speak with dead</em> multiple times in a day. <em>Speak with dead</em> could probably have been a ritual, to be honest.</p><p></p><p>Speaking of which, that's a thing I'd love to see but recognize that I probably won't: a return to 4e rituals. Rituals and the healing/attrition model are the main things I miss from 4e. For those who don't know: 4e took almost all non-combat magic and turned it into Rituals. Rituals could be cast by anyone with the Ritual Caster feat (which clerics and wizards got for free, but not paladins or warlocks). Rituals would take time and cost money (in the form of components) to cast, and covered things like <em>animal messenger</em>, <em>knock</em>, <em>teleportation circle</em>, and so on. Long-term condition recovery was also ritual-based (like <em>regeneration</em>, <em>cure disease</em>, or <em>raise dead</em>). Rituals were split up into a few different groups, based on different skills (arcane/Arcana, divine/Religion, primal/Nature, healing/Medicine... I think I'm missing one), but not all of them required skill checks.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Staffan, post: 8692033, member: 907"] That's because different spells care about different aspects. [I]Shield[/I] vs [I]mage armor[/I] are fairly balanced when you need to cast them. [I]Mage armor[/I] is a little better than wearing studded leather armor (AC 13+Dex, lasts all day long), and [I]shield[/I] gives you +5 AC for one round and is cast as a reaction. One is a preparation spell, the other is an emergency button with limited charges (that it shares with other spells). But if you can cast [I]shield[/I] at will, that's essentially a permanent +5 AC boost and that won't do. For what a balanced at-will [I]shield[/I] would look like, see [I]blade ward[/I]: one action to cast, resistance against physical damage for one round. A version that instead gave +5 to AC would be fine. Healing spells are likewise limited as a resource, because otherwise you have infinite hit points as long as you survive the fight. The level on healing spells is there as a resource management detail: healing lots of damage takes up a lot of your magic power. [I]Speak with dead[/I] on the other hand is primarily level-limited to keep it out of the hands of low-level characters. It's a rare occasion that you would [B]need[/B] to [I]speak with dead[/I] multiple times in a day. [I]Speak with dead[/I] could probably have been a ritual, to be honest. Speaking of which, that's a thing I'd love to see but recognize that I probably won't: a return to 4e rituals. Rituals and the healing/attrition model are the main things I miss from 4e. For those who don't know: 4e took almost all non-combat magic and turned it into Rituals. Rituals could be cast by anyone with the Ritual Caster feat (which clerics and wizards got for free, but not paladins or warlocks). Rituals would take time and cost money (in the form of components) to cast, and covered things like [I]animal messenger[/I], [I]knock[/I], [I]teleportation circle[/I], and so on. Long-term condition recovery was also ritual-based (like [I]regeneration[/I], [I]cure disease[/I], or [I]raise dead[/I]). Rituals were split up into a few different groups, based on different skills (arcane/Arcana, divine/Religion, primal/Nature, healing/Medicine... I think I'm missing one), but not all of them required skill checks. [/QUOTE]
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