d20 Wheel of Time Magic experience?

[Voadam]

Anybody care to share their views on the d20 wheel of time magic system of weaving and its suitability/balance for a normal D&D game?

I own the d20 book and have read many of the novels but I have not used the d20 mechanics before. I have a PC who wants to make a WoT wilder in a D&D game (starting from level 1 so easing into the alt magic system side by side others) and I'm amenable but want to hear some views and comments on the magic system from people who have used it.

 

[scourger]

Our experience, and that of another group I knew, was that the magic users in Wheel of Time d20 were too powerful. It was unbalanced. The armsman was pretty far above the others classes, too; but not nearly as much as the magic users.

 

[Vigilance]

Yeah, WoT magic is really cool and flavorful, but way overpowered.

I prefer the magic system found in Green Ronin's Thieves World books myself, when I'm looking for magic with a unique flavor to it.

 

[rgard]

Yeah, WoT magic is really cool and flavorful, but way overpowered.

I prefer the magic system found in Green Ronin's Thieves World books myself, when I'm looking for magic with a unique flavor to it.

Yep, the GR Thieves World magic system is fun!

 

[Arrgh! Mark!]

I'd say powered but not over-powered.

I also wouldn't put it with a standard D+D game - it'd unbalance quite a few things. It's quite flavourful and thats probably the biggest problem - effectively quite a few things would have to change.

Now - a couple of things about it to note -

Embracing the source is a full round action; thats a very long time. Often by the time the chanellers had embraced the source the combats were already over.

The over-chanelling system can be overused to a degree; be very careful with it, because PC's (and especially Wilders) can overchannel just a little all the time.

Once mages had the source and know a few weaves (Remember that actually learning weaves requires adventures) things can get hairy really quick.

Basically, for emulating Wheel of time the chanelling classes are great. For making a D+D game with some associations of people being equal in power, I wouldn't bother.

 

[Owen K.C. Stephens]

We didn't design it to work in straight D&D, and in my opinion it's over-powered. I've done it for a few games and allowed it in a few, but it almost always ends up creating problems. If you have house rules that already ramp-up PC power levels (extra feats, higher ability scores, hero points, whatever) you may be able to create balance by not letting the wilder have the boost, but otherwise I suspect you're in trouble if you allow it. There are ways a DM can make sure it doesn't run over everyone, but you have to be pretty familiar with the WotC rules, and it sounds like you aren't particularly.

 

[The Lost Muse]

The other main issue with the WoT classes is that they can fill both the cleric niche and the wizard niche. Sure the healing converts lethal damage to subdual damage, and channelers cannot turn undead. But who needs to turn undead when you can fireball them into oblivion.

If you do run them side-by-side, I'd recommend using some kind of diminishing return on damage dice if you have other casters in the party. And possibly raising the level that the wilder can get rid of their block up a bit.

Also, I did run a wilder in a D&D 3.0 game, and his main comment was that the weaves were all useful, unlike standard D&D spells.

 

[Razuur]

Thing is, it should be overpowered, shouldn't it?

I mean in the books Aes Sedai could wipe the floor. As it should be.

But with that understanding, mixing it with standard D20 stuff, they will be more powerful.

You could always up the level of the other PCs to compensate or as other mentioned, the GM would have to have a firm hand on things...

Razuur

 

[arnon]

I never got to play the game, but i always liked the magic system.

But, I would have gone one further and instead of spell slots use Energy Points (or however you want to call it)... In fact, several years ago I tried my hand at adopting this spell system to my Midnight game... I never actually finished with the conversion.

I suddenly got an itch...

arnon