Have they tackled Anti-Magic yet?

[Turtlejay]

Rather than modify defenses, I would go with resist 5 arcane (or primal, or whatever). I know there is no precedent for this, but as a house rule I don't see a problem. Just watch out for the Warlock, he is pretty close to useless already. Make compensations for the limit on the Arcane in some other aspect of the game.

Ritual magic is easier. Just limit the availability of ritual components. If the PC's want an arcane ritual, they have to beg, borrow, or steal to get it done.

Jay

 

[Stuntman]

I've played in a campaing back in 2E when the plot called for all magic (arcane and divine) to be somewhat unreliable. I cannot remember exactly what mechanics the DM used. I think he may have just decided whether or not it worked an how well it worked.

If the plot points where magic or arcane powers fail don't happen very often or do in a non-combat situation, you can simply say that it doesn't work there. If you want to make it unreliable, just have the character make an ability check to beat 10 + (1/2 x level of the power). If he succeeds, the power works, if he fails, the power does not work. For at-wills, I would make the check 10 + (1/2 x level of the character).

 

[lukelightning]

I've played in a campaing back in 2E when the plot called for all magic (arcane and divine) to be somewhat unreliable. I cannot remember exactly what mechanics the DM used. I think he may have just decided whether or not it worked an how well it worked.

The problem is that in earlier editions, magic is generally more powerful than anything else, so it was more acceptable to nerf it.

Now-a-days, the same situation would end up nerfing the weakest classes.

 

[LostSoul]

I could see something like an anti-magic trap:

XP elite
Anti-Magic (immediate interrupt, when a character uses an arcane or divine power)
close burst 10, +x vs. Will; the power has no effect. The trap can make any number of anti-magic attacks per round.
Countermeasures:
Arcana or Religion DC x: By spending a standard action to channel magical energies into the right place, the anti-magic zone can be overtaxed and disrupted. 4 successes are needed; each failure means the arcane energies feed back to the character, and he suffers xdx+x damage! Each success gives the trap a -2 penalty to its attack roll until the end of your next turn. If encounter powers are so used, count it as an automatic success (or 2 if it's rolled for); if a daily power, count as 2 automatic successes (or 4 if rolled for).
Thievery DC x: Because thieves rock.

 

[Stuntman]

The problem is that in earlier editions, magic is generally more powerful than anything else, so it was more acceptable to nerf it.

Now-a-days, the same situation would end up nerfing the weakest classes.

I do not understand how arcane classes are the weakest classes. All power sources seem more or less to be the same strength to me.

In any case, I'm not familiar with Ptolus, but it seems that for story reasons, the arcane power source is shunned. There are effects in the campaign in question that nerf the arcane power source. As the OP said, it was for story reasons and he doesn't mind being unfair. Arcane powers are going to be nerfed one way or another. Players know this going in.

The 4E rules inherently do not have any mechanics that can potentially shut down a class or power source for balance reasons. For the OP's purpose, the story is what is important here and trumps balance as long as everyone has fun.

In the campaign I played in, we had two wizards who were screwed a bit. This is 2E, so wizards with no spells are even more useless then compared to 4E wizards now with no access to spells. We all had fun regardless of the fact that wizards were temporarily screwed during that one story arc.

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

Looking for something else.. I ran across an example of WoTC's approach to anti-magic!


Eberron Players Handbook, page 116: the 'Banish Illusions' ritual

short version:
Level 11, duration 24 hours
Create a ward in a Burst 4 that:
> makes visible any invisible creature/object within the burst
> illusion powers suffer a -2 to attack rolls
> creatures in the warded area gain +5 bonus to Insight vs illusions

 

[Mort_Q]

In any case, I'm not familiar with Ptolus, but it seems that for story reasons, the arcane power source is shunned. There are effects in the campaign in question that nerf the arcane power source. As the OP said, it was for story reasons and he doesn't mind being unfair. Arcane powers are going to be nerfed one way or another. Players know this going in.

To be fair, I may be going beyond what the official materials do. myPtolus isn't exactly Monte's Ptolus.

 

[DracoSuave]

Well, if you have a campaign where _______ power source is nerfed, then you end up with a campaign where _______ power source is not used by players, which means the impact of ______ power source as nerfed as a story and campaign device is made into something that is unimportant and effects 'those other guys.'

The easier way to accomplish the feat of setting up a specific power source as a whipping boy is to hit NPCs with it, and make rituals rarer and harder to cast, but leave PCs alone, for they have taken far longer to get where they are. Arcane users have to start years older than others to represent the amount of effort needed to attain their power.

 

[Chimerasame]

I've come across the same issue in a homebrew world I've been trying to port over from 3e to 4e. Initially I had antimagic as a significant part of the world's setting, and why certain things worked the way they did. But it's prohibitively difficult to implement antimagic without severely unbalancing the classes. I think I'm going to end up just scrapping the idea and saying magic works everywhere now.

One thing that's occurred to me--assuming no multiclassing and no martial-esque feats, a pure wizard is probably actually less nerfed by antimagic in 4e than in 3e. A pure wizard in 3e is left with nothing but not-even-all-simple-weapons, and a BAB that falls further and further behind fighters the higher you go (and antimagic's usually pretty high up.)

4e, all your powers are nerfed except basic physical attacks and second wind, but at least you keep your 1/2 level to everything, which is the same 1/2 level that the fighter gets. Your strength will be lower, granted, but it's not as huge a delta as the old 1/2 BAB versus 1 BAB issue.

The thing is, 4e is designed with much tighter balance than 3e, so although nerfing magic for an encounter would be a nuisance to a wizard in 3e ("sigh, i guess i suck this encounter"), it's almost unprecedented in 4e because so very few things generate the "you suck this encounter" effect.

 

[Inigo Carmine]

I think its a bad idea for reasons already mentioned higher in the thread. However, here's my two-cents if you're that determined:

Don't flat-out deny arcane magic. Make it more difficult to use, or have some cost associated with it. For example: using a daily power requires you to make a DC [15 + Power Level] Knowledge Arcana check or you burn a healing surge. Or maybe instead it puts a save-ends daze on the caster (no arcana check to avoid), etc. You could modify the DC so that it makes it almost impossible to use one's highest level abilities unscathed, but still allows use of at-wills and lower level powers.


Reducing anyone to just basic attacks is not very fun, especially when the character has no recourse for avoiding it (ie, a roll).