Game-breaking Spells

[Felix]

@Thanee

Sure. That was a knee-jerk reaction to "Broken". I can very much understand it when a DM alters a game world for flavor reasons - it is their art, after all - but I don't like it when a flavor-motivated change is purported to be a change for mechanical reasons.

It's not that these spells are broken. I think DMs don't like it when they have to restrain their NPCs from Scrying-and-frying only to have the PCs do this exact thing as soon as those spells are accessable. They don't like the inconsistency this creates and they call it "broken". Faulderaul. If DMs can think of a reason the BBEG wouldn't order a Scry-and-fry then these spells cease to be broken.

Throw me a bone, a Bag of friggin Holding is supposed to be a game breaker?

 

[Liquidsabre]

Even without considering, what the PCs can do, some spells just completely alter the way a campaign world will function, and sometimes, this simply doesn't sit right.

Absolutely, it just depends on the setting style and tone of the sort of game you are running. I think other folk just have a hard time with this if you do not mention the particular style of game you are looking for and just talk about nipping this and nerfing that, gets folks hackles up when they see nothign wrong with such spells for example. Instead provide a game style sought and ask for suggestions on how to acheive that feel/style. So say you'd like a gritty-world of undeveloped magical and cultural innovation, a backwater setting where nations are relatively undeveloped and magic itself is still evry mysterious and untrusted. Now there's a great style that I'm sure many folk would love to contribute suggestion for achieving using the core (and other) d20 stuffs.

Though what I'd like to see are a series of small booklets that embrace a particular "feel" or style for a campaign, and suggests an entire series of core d20 mechanics and all the base classes, feats, PrCs, monsters, and spells appropriate/suitable to that type of campaign. As well as some unique mechancis fitting to the niche game-style. So you'd find booklets of:

No-Magic
Low-Magic
High-Magic
Imperial-Rebellion
Invasion-Military
and so on...

Actually, just the development of a list categorizing various campaign styles itself would be quite an interesting project and accomplishment.

 

[StarkRp]

Most of the games I in, I seldom seen any spellcasters prepare or use detect alignment spells, but that just me

However, I do agree that some spells certainly negated all the hard work some of us DMs do for our campaign.
As some had said before, there are always options.
Players too fast teleport and bash in the BBEG?
Voila, a teleport-sucking gem (as described in one of the Wotc free adventures) that transport players into imprisonment or trap.
Players scrying the bad guys?
Voila, players saw an illusion of sleeping and weaponless bad guys while the real ones detected their scrying.
Players windwalked into the BBEG's lair?
Voila, their gaseous form triggered a dispel magic or antimagic trap. (If the players ask about it, just said that BBEG is distrustful of wizards and vampires )
Player trying to resurrect someone you don't want to be raised?
Voila, the dead refused to go back to life or (in case of PC) his/hers/its god don't want that PC to be raised.

For arguementative fun , DnD magics doesn't make the pueso-medieval world unbelievable, it is those that make it fun and believable. The only thing to remember is that most (NPC) spellcasters never even get to cast the 3rd lvl spell, albeit the 5th lvl ones.

 

[Bauglir]

Players scrying the bad guys?
Voila, players saw an illusion of sleeping and weaponless bad guys while the real ones detected their scrying.

Don't you think it's a little implausible that the bad guys stand around all day maintaining this illusion in case they get scried?

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

No mentions of fabricate or wall of iron?

I saw a thread about magical pirates, and the creator of the thread was upbraided for not sending the pirates across the planes (there's more money off the Prime Material plane, but it's also a lot more dangerous) and for not abusing fabricate.

 

[two]

no big deal

When I created my last campaign world, I banned/heavily modified from the start (worked it into the world logic) the most troublesome of these spells. Teleport, scry, the "come back to life" spells, etc.

There were only a handful of major changes, and none of the players had any problem with it at all. Of course everybody, good guys and bad guys, must play by the same rules.

This resulted in a very smooth campaign, where hitting level 10 or so did not drastically alter the way things were done (teleport here, there, etc.).

I'd suggest more people do this sort of prophylactic fiddling; banning/changing as few as 5 spells can make a huge difference and heck, in my opinion, makes for a more fun game.

 

[Pax]

Bauglir, there's a piece of Wondrous Architecture in the Stronghold Builder's Guide that does exactly that - any attempt to scry on the rather largeish area around it automatically returns incorrect information, with no roll possible to resist it.

A very very handy item, which every BBEG with a base of operations should own at least one of. ^_^

 

[reanjr]

@Thanee

Sure. That was a knee-jerk reaction to "Broken". I can very much understand it when a DM alters a game world for flavor reasons - it is their art, after all - but I don't like it when a flavor-motivated change is purported to be a change for mechanical reasons.

It's not that these spells are broken. I think DMs don't like it when they have to restrain their NPCs from Scrying-and-frying only to have the PCs do this exact thing as soon as those spells are accessable. They don't like the inconsistency this creates and they call it "broken". Faulderaul. If DMs can think of a reason the BBEG wouldn't order a Scry-and-fry then these spells cease to be broken.

Throw me a bone, a Bag of friggin Holding is supposed to be a game breaker?

When I said "broken", I meant that it broke the story, not that it was overpowered or anything like that. Effects that can ruin a story. I apologize; I don't use the standard RPG lingo (like crunch and fluff; I say mechanics and flavor).

 

[reanjr]

Though what I'd like to see are a series of small booklets that embrace a particular "feel" or style for a campaign, and suggests an entire series of core d20 mechanics and all the base classes, feats, PrCs, monsters, and spells appropriate/suitable to that type of campaign. As well as some unique mechancis fitting to the niche game-style. So you'd find booklets of:

No-Magic
Low-Magic
High-Magic
Imperial-Rebellion
Invasion-Military
and so on...

Actually, just the development of a list categorizing various campaign styles itself would be quite an interesting project and accomplishment.

Hmmm... it's funny that you mention that...

That's actually why I asked the question. Except I was thinking along the lines of one monolithic book; along the lines of Unearthed Arcana, in that it's got tons of optional rules. But it would start out with guidance and campaign themes with lists of what optional rules to use to support that theme.

 

[reanjr]

Throw me a bone, a Bag of friggin Holding is supposed to be a game breaker?

Can you find a rule that states the Necromancer cannot store 25 skeletons in his bag of holding?