I think my wizard is going to be poor
- Thread starter fl8m
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GuardianLurker
Adventurer
Thanee said:He's right.
BTW, we dropped the scribing cost to one tenth (10gp per page), because it's ... well ... ridiculous!
Bye
Thanee
Ridiculous is an understatement - I worked the materials cost for scribing a spell into a spellbook and it's only... (drumroll)...3sp!
Now, I don't know where the rest of the 100 gp goes,
{humor}
but I figure it's experimentation, insurance, and bribes. After all, imagine what trying to learn fireball must be like.
{/humor}
As for finding another wizard's spellbook, if you're using only the core rules, it's actually a punishment, because you *still* have to scribe the spells into your book, and you receive no discount in cost OR time.
And the BBB is the single best magic item for a wizard, but it costs 9500 gp (or 4750 gp + 380 xp if you make it), and is a tad out of reach for a long while.
The core rules for scribing spells suck.
Jondor_Battlehammer
First Post
The Feat that gives you your INT in spells per level is in the NetBook of Feats, an online source. It may be in others.
http://www.datadeco.com/nbofeats/index.html
http://www.datadeco.com/nbofeats/index.html
Frankly this has all been caused by the introduction of the Sorcerer class. Without the cost of spell copying/research, the Wizard class would just out-power the Sorcerer class too much. They just needed some pain in the ass rules so the Wizard won't know every single spell in creation.
The 3ed Wizard is now the money hog of D&D
The 3ed Wizard is now the money hog of D&D
Thanee
First Post
Well, that's why we changed the scribing rules for our campaign... there is just no reason for the high cost except for creating some kind of unnecessary balance (not saying that balance in general is unnecessary, but that in this particular case there is not really a balance problem with a reasonable scribing cost).
Bye
Thanee
Bye
Thanee
Saeviomagy
Adventurer
No - the sorceror gets extra spells a day and can spontaeneously choose which ones to cast, and what metamagics to use with them - I don't think scribing costs are necessary to balance the two classes.
Scribing mechanics was developed for a wizard to balance him with sorcerer.
Sorcerers get really few spells, which don't cover every possible need. Without scribing cost wizard would know all known spells and would cover all possible situations with their spells, so they would be stronger. Sorcerers have number of spell slots higher than wizards, but they can only cast 3-5 different spells per spell level.
Also every metamagic feat takes sorceror full round action (more if you combine a few metamagic feats), and quickened spells can be cast for full round action...
Metamagic feats are wizards domain, because he can prepare them in advance and then cast them like normal spells.
The main statistics for wizard is intelligence, so he gets a lot of skill point, but sorcerer gets a few skillpoints (2+int) and CHA is usually not such an important statistic in game.
In my opinion wizard (especially specialist) is stronger character than sorcerer, but still balanced. With scribing cost lowered sorcerer would be just too bad compared to wizard.
Sorcerers get really few spells, which don't cover every possible need. Without scribing cost wizard would know all known spells and would cover all possible situations with their spells, so they would be stronger. Sorcerers have number of spell slots higher than wizards, but they can only cast 3-5 different spells per spell level.
Also every metamagic feat takes sorceror full round action (more if you combine a few metamagic feats), and quickened spells can be cast for full round action...
Metamagic feats are wizards domain, because he can prepare them in advance and then cast them like normal spells.
The main statistics for wizard is intelligence, so he gets a lot of skill point, but sorcerer gets a few skillpoints (2+int) and CHA is usually not such an important statistic in game.
In my opinion wizard (especially specialist) is stronger character than sorcerer, but still balanced. With scribing cost lowered sorcerer would be just too bad compared to wizard.
Lord Pendragon
First Post
Actually, Death, I believe that scribing costs were created to balance Item Creation. Without scribing costs, a wizard with a few weeks on his hands can turn out a Headband of Intellect and make some serious money. The cost to learn the spell helps to balance possible money issues. In fact, even with scribing costs, a wizard only needs to craft a single pair of Gauntlets of Ogre Power for his fighter buddie, charge the standard rate, and cover both his own costs, and that of his own Headband as well...
'course, this does tend to move wizards more into crafting, 'cause they need to craft to beat the scribing costs. But I suppose some would say that's a good thing. More differentiation from the sorcerer.
'course, this does tend to move wizards more into crafting, 'cause they need to craft to beat the scribing costs. But I suppose some would say that's a good thing. More differentiation from the sorcerer.
Gez
First Post
I just want to say that there's even better than BBB for a spellcaster. If you have Magic of Faerûn, look at the Kiira, or "spellbook in a gem".
But yes, writing in a BBB (or in a Kiira) is free. You just have to move your quill on the page, don't even need ink. It wouldn't be magic otherwise, would it be ?
Oh, and sorcerers suck. I know it, I play one.
But yes, writing in a BBB (or in a Kiira) is free. You just have to move your quill on the page, don't even need ink. It wouldn't be magic otherwise, would it be ?
Oh, and sorcerers suck. I know it, I play one.
Shard O'Glase
First Post
Personally I think it costs way too much, and with the ways around the cost like BBB it's actually just a silly restriction.
I remember way back before 3e came out and a lot of how sorcerers worked was described. On the wizards board I asked, well why would anyone play a wizard then. The respose from one of the designers was because a wizard could easily know all the spells in the game.
So sometimes I wonder how much the cost was playtested. Was this one fo the things added in at the end. Something like a playtester asked is there a cost for scribing spells into your spellbook or is it free. And they said, hmmm I guess there should be a cost, lets go with 200gp a spell level that seem fair. But there wasn't time for the extensive playtesting to show exactly how expensive that really is.
If you just want 3 additional spells per spell level at level 10, you have 1/2 the money to spend as other characters. That puts you for 2nd, and 3rd level spells with not many more known than the sor, but a decent number more known of 4th and a lot more known of 1st and 5th. But that sorcerer can double the amount of equipment you carry, those little things in such an equipment heavy game that really decide whether you live or die, and usually save your life a lot more often than a few spells in your spellbook will. But then quickly after level 10, the money for the PCs jumps up dramatically, and the amount spent on the spellbooks for the wiz is just a small fraction of his total income. So were they just trying to balance things with the sor from levels 1-10 and after that just wanted to let the wiz run wild.
The end result is the limit only limits the wiz until level 5-7(or level 11ish if they don't get a BBB) until the wiz makes himself a BBB and then starts learning spells left and right. So either it was meant as a big balancing factor and they just failed miserably at it, or they just added a relatively arbitrary cost for some kind of internal game logic or something and again probably failed miserably.
I remember way back before 3e came out and a lot of how sorcerers worked was described. On the wizards board I asked, well why would anyone play a wizard then. The respose from one of the designers was because a wizard could easily know all the spells in the game.
So sometimes I wonder how much the cost was playtested. Was this one fo the things added in at the end. Something like a playtester asked is there a cost for scribing spells into your spellbook or is it free. And they said, hmmm I guess there should be a cost, lets go with 200gp a spell level that seem fair. But there wasn't time for the extensive playtesting to show exactly how expensive that really is.
If you just want 3 additional spells per spell level at level 10, you have 1/2 the money to spend as other characters. That puts you for 2nd, and 3rd level spells with not many more known than the sor, but a decent number more known of 4th and a lot more known of 1st and 5th. But that sorcerer can double the amount of equipment you carry, those little things in such an equipment heavy game that really decide whether you live or die, and usually save your life a lot more often than a few spells in your spellbook will. But then quickly after level 10, the money for the PCs jumps up dramatically, and the amount spent on the spellbooks for the wiz is just a small fraction of his total income. So were they just trying to balance things with the sor from levels 1-10 and after that just wanted to let the wiz run wild.
The end result is the limit only limits the wiz until level 5-7(or level 11ish if they don't get a BBB) until the wiz makes himself a BBB and then starts learning spells left and right. So either it was meant as a big balancing factor and they just failed miserably at it, or they just added a relatively arbitrary cost for some kind of internal game logic or something and again probably failed miserably.
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