D&D (2024) Here's The New 2024 Player's Handbook Wizard Art

 

[Thommy H-H]

Some of the wealthiest and most successful people in the world today wear glasses. I don't know why, in a D&D world that has theoretically developed magical solutions to impaired vision comparable to modern laser surgery, there needs to be some elaborate reason that a wizard that is theoretically rich and powerful wouldn't adopt the simplest and vastly more common solution to their sight problems just like any random bespectacled billionaire, of which there are doubtless many.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Some of the wealthiest and most successful people in the world today wear glasses. I don't know why, in a D&D world that has theoretically developed magical solutions to impaired vision comparable to modern laser surgery, there needs to be some elaborate reason that a wizard that is theoretically rich and powerful wouldn't adopt the simplest and vastly more common solution to their sight problems just like any random bespectacled billionaire, of which there are doubtless many.

Why would one of the most powerful wizards in a world where bones can be regrown over night wear glasses? I don't know. But they do:

 

[Cadence]

Some of the wealthiest and most successful people in the world today wear glasses. I don't know why, in a D&D world that has theoretically developed magical solutions to impaired vision comparable to modern laser surgery, there needs to be some elaborate reason that a wizard that is theoretically rich and powerful wouldn't adopt the simplest and vastly more common solution to their sight problems just like any random bespectacled billionaire, of which there are doubtless many.

Is it comparable? D&D magic doesn't usually have any risk of failure, Lasik can be catastrophic. Maybe near/far is just human variation and the magic fix would be disspellable?

 

[Thommy H-H]

Is it comparable? D&D magic doesn't usually have any risk of failure, Lasik can be catastrophic. Maybe near/far is just human variation and the magic fix would be dissprllablr?

Even if one of a number of healing spells would work to 'heal' what is, as you say, normal human variation, who's to say everyone who might benefit from it can access it? We have to assume there's a functioning magical healthcare economy for that, which is by no means a given in every setting, and that there isn't something better to spend the gold on (which I know is an issue in 5e, but you get what I mean).

Glasses are a simple and perfectly functional solution to minor eyesight defects, which basically all human beings in our world will make use of at some point in their lives - even with laser surgery, you'll still probably require reading glasses in old age due to normal deterioration. Do we need a specific reason for a D&D character to have minor 'defects' that are common even in our world with its modern medicine? Is it 'unrealistic' to see receding hairlines or someone with the sniffles? Does someone with a limp or recurring lumbar pain really ruin our suspension of disbelief?

I don't know how magical healing and the like works in all of your games, but I certainly don't have apothecaries or herbalists, or even temples, toting a ready supply of potions that can cure literally anything. Healing potions, healing spells, etc. do stuff like restore hit points, an abstract measure of a character's ability to keep fighting. They don't just wipe out every imaginable physical problem a creature might have. The world-building implications of that are too profound. People still get sick. People still have scars. And yeah, people wear glasses.

 

[Warpiglet-7]

I don’t particularly like the idea of easy access to magic for the populace. I do like warriors missing eyes, characters with war related limps and so forth.

I like torches over ubiquitous continual flame spells in most mundane places. I like the atmosphere.

Likewise I like the possibility of blind or deaf characters. It seems magic has gottten cheaper in some ways but if it’s my turn to DM, I can set the norms and how frequent spells are granted in the world.

This in response to some of the above. I think each world can have unique expectations of course! Variety is a feature not a flaw

 

[Cadence]

Even if one of a number of healing spells would work to 'heal' what is, as you say, normal human variation, who's to say everyone who might benefit from it can access it? We have to assume there's a functioning magical healthcare economy for that, which is by no means a given in every setting, and that there isn't something better to spend the gold on (which I know is an issue in 5e, but you get what I mean).

Glasses are a simple and perfectly functional solution to minor eyesight defects, which basically all human beings in our world will make use of at some point in their lives - even with laser surgery, you'll still probably require reading glasses in old age due to normal deterioration. Do we need a specific reason for a D&D character to have minor 'defects' that are common even in our world with its modern medicine? Is it 'unrealistic' to see receding hairlines or someone with the sniffles? Does someone with a limp or recurring lumbar pain really ruin our suspension of disbelief?

I don't know how magical healing and the like works in all of your games, but I certainly don't have apothecaries or herbalists, or even temples, toting a ready supply of potions that can cure literally anything. Healing potions, healing spells, etc. do stuff like restore hit points, an abstract measure of a character's ability to keep fighting. They don't just wipe out every imaginable physical problem a creature might have. The world-building implications of that are too profound. People still get sick. People still have scars. And yeah, people wear glasses.

I assume most people would still get sick and have accrued scars anyway. And a world where it was easy or common (even among the powerful) to overcome the IRL near-inevitables of old age would certainly change things!

But would party members of a high level cleric delay setting out to save the world because of food poisoning going through the party? Would their friend fighter lose both arms to something catastrophic and keep them lost? Would their friend the vain bard be left with facial scars? If the party has resurrection and regenerate, it feels like a lot of other sub-death things would have solutions for the particularly well connected.

For Dumbledore's eyes, maybe at some point it is one of the inevitable things that aging brings?

As far as world changing medical assumptions - given the lack of rules for party members and others dying from non-combat or post-combat things that used to kill a ton of soldiers on campaigns, I always kind of assumed there were some differences in what the mundane healers could do compared to anything pre-late 1800s or so equivalent.

 

[Zardnaar]

Some of the wealthiest and most successful people in the world today wear glasses. I don't know why, in a D&D world that has theoretically developed magical solutions to impaired vision comparable to modern laser surgery, there needs to be some elaborate reason that a wizard that is theoretically rich and powerful wouldn't adopt the simplest and vastly more common solution to their sight problems just like any random bespectacled billionaire, of which there are doubtless many.

It's technology levels.

They did have comparatively crude spectacles Renaissance iirc lens weren't that great.

Magic could cure it depending on edition level 5ish not sure about 5E.

Things like heal exist but depends on how one views how widespread access to it is.

Rocket ships exist on earth the average mook has 0% chance of getting on one.

 

[Warpiglet-7]

It's technology levels.

They did have comparatively crude spectacles Renaissance iirc lens weren't that great.

Magic could cure it depending on edition level 5ish not sure about 5E.

Things like heal exist but depends on how one views how widespread access to it is.

Rocket ships exist on earth the average mook has 0% chance of getting on one.

This is part of what is fun about campaign settings and homebrew.

I like a 1300 and earlier aesthetic in terms of common tech.

And as I say that I am tinkering with an artificer for a friends campaign

 

[Zardnaar]

This is part of what is fun about campaign settings and homebrew.

I like a 1300 and earlier aesthetic in terms of common tech.

And as I say that I am tinkering with an artificer for a friends campaign

Generally where I draw the line is setting. Everyone going to have better stuff than say Greyhawk.

Occasional anachronism is fine it might not be readily available or lost technology so you can only find it not build it or buy it.

I've added cartridge loading rules in 5E. Even works with sharpshooter. Shame I only included 6 cartridges though.........

 

[ezo]

In Chaosmancers defense, after reading a lot of both of your posts, your messages very much come across as anyone wealthy enough /powerful enough such as the wizard in the OP wouldn't have glasses, as otherwise doesn't make sense to you, which does leave only those not wealthy enough or powerful enough with glasses.

No, it doesn't. It leaves that FOR ME, which is why when I finally had the means to get lasik I did, eventhough I had to take a long time to do it.

Everyone else can do whatever they want. Just because I say it doesn't make sense to me, doesn't mean I think others can't do what they want, even if that doesn't make sense to me.

Again, the mushroom example. I hate mushrooms, can't stand them. Do I fault other people for liking them? Of course not. I don't understand why they like them, but that is only MY concern, not theirs, is it?

Even in this post you go on to reinforce that people use glasses to resolve their sight issues today, which with your prior arguments implies that if could fully fix without glasses, which you've previously said wealthy or powerful characters could do, would thus fix themselves and not have glasses, leaving us with same point as before.

Yeah, no, I didn't. I said, "if they had the means" which includes access to the magic, whatever it might cost, etc. They might be powerful enough, as in high-level enough, to do it themselves.

Now, I also said that a spell like lesser restoration would be sufficient to help impaired vision, and in AL, for example, would only cost 40 gp. That is hardly "rich" and a 2nd-level spell is hardly "powerful".

If this isn't your intended message, then I think you may need to consider how you are trying to convey your underlying message.

LOL I wasn't trying to convey any underlying message. I just gave my opinion, one of many reasons why I don't care for the image in the OP. People seem to want to imagine there is one, but surprise, surprise, there isn't.

For me, I could afford Lasik or the like, but don't want to, would prefer to stay with my glasses, and I don't bring spare glasses with me when I go out and about, so I can relate to a powerful wizard also choosing to keep wearing glasses for whatever reason, and choosing the risks. It may not make sense to you, but neither myself nor the wizard have to make decisions that make sense to you, only decisions that suit ourselves as such.

See, here's the kicker --- I NEVER SAID IT DID have to make sense to me, did I? I said I don't like it because it doesn't make sense to me. Which is all I've ever said.

then maybe we will never find common ground on this.

I already said we wouldn't.

Why would one of the most powerful wizards in a world where bones can be regrown over night wear glasses? I don't know. But they do:

View attachment 355035

Of course, in HP you can't raise the dead, and do many of the other things that are standard in D&D.

To go with what some people told me, maybe they are magical lens... after all he seems to be able to see Harry and Ron under the invisibility cloak.

Of course, we do know they can fix glasses!!