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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 6999057" data-attributes="member: 996">That just strikes me as odd, I guess it illustrates how varied concepts of 'low magic' can be.  To me, taking away slots, leaving cantrips and rituals, gives a more 'low-magic' (and more low-fantasy genre) feel to D&D casters.  A caster who has a few tricks, one of them deadly (but not wildly more so than a knife in the heart), that he can pop off with more or less instantly (in combat), and anything more takes time and preparation, not ticking off some imaginary quanta of power.  Though, if it's the at-will issue of cantrips that bothers you, getting rid of them is just as easy.  The result isn't really what I'd call /low/ magic - magic is very powerful, readily usable, and systematically available on a daily basis - but it is limited within a short enough time frame, and, with a typical D&D adventuring day, that limitation can be felt, FWIW.Sure, if that's the kind of 'low magic' you're going for - low magic in the background setting, high magic readily available to the PCs (and, presumably, equally high-magic, equally 'rare' challenges waiting for them).  Like the 'superhero' analogy I made, above.   Or like Harry Potter.  The world is low-magic, filled with muggles, the characters, the story, and the challenges they face, high-magic.   You don't need to change the mechanics, because you're not changing the high-magic default of the game, just the backdrop.  Same actors, same plot, same F/X - different matte painting.OTOH, if the idea of 'low magic' soaks through to the party and the challenges they face, adjustments may be a good idea.  If the low-magic ignorant/distrustful-of-magic muggles of a low-magic setting are to provide any of the challenges in the campaign, you have to factor in how much more powerful magic becomes when enemies are unprepared for it.   'Nerfing' magic makes it a little easier to get a party composition that's more representative of casters being 'rare' (truly representative would be no casters in a sample of 5 or 6 people, of course), the rare and more special magic is, the more attractive a character option it becomes - both in terms of RP and power.  Nerfing it - beyond the point of merely back into balance with the challenges being faced - can help make up for that, avoiding the 'who gets to be the caster' issue. That does not surprise me.  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />  I expect many campaigns are all-caster, that way, regardless of whether the setting is high or low magic.  The PH makes it clear that magic is an expected/vital part of the game, and presents many more magic-using options.  If you were to test party compositions against the communities they're drawn from, for instance, the iconic Fighter/Mage/Cleric/Rogue party would be 50% caster.  Even in a high-magic setting, 50% of people probably aren't running around casting spells!</blockquote>

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