Level Adjustment for Spontaneous Casting?

[Soulsong]

Oh no. Somebody died. The spot. caster casts...raise undead. Which is also something the vanilla caster has memorized.

Just curious as to how many people actually play games where Clerics that are capable of it, actually prepare Raise Dead or Resurection as part of a daily default/standard allotment. This just seems ridiculous to me. My experience is that this is never a spell (like many that are normally associated with the concept of the Cleric) that is part of a default preparation list. In addition to the point below, this probably speaks to the nature of the campaign. If you use it enough to have it prepared anywhere close to regularly, either you and/or your DM are doing something suboptimally or your group's enjoyment of the game is atypical.

Most of the time, vancian mechanics break my suspension of disbelief regarding spellcasting expectations. When I am encouraged by the mechanics to make the decision not to be able to cast spells like cure blindness/cure disease/cure deafness/gentle repose/delay poison/neutralize poison/light/etc... (as a Cleric) or read languages/read magic/detect magic/mage hand/levitate/scrying/see invisible/produce flame/light/etc... (as a wizard) so that I can take other spells that will proove "more useful" in the campaign, the concept of my caster and the game suffers.

 

[Quartz]

Just curious as to how many people actually play games where Clerics that are capable of it, actually prepare Raise Dead or Resurection as part of a daily default/standard allotment. This just seems ridiculous to me.

I'm astounded at this. Once the cleric gets 6th level spells, Raise Dead + Heal is next to automatic, and has been since 2e days. With 3e you don't even need the Heal (but it's advisable). In 2e days, if your party had two divine spellcasters (including a rogue faking it with a scroll), then the dead character could be returned to front-line duty in one round. The one minute-casting time for Raise Dead is a bit of a bummer these days, but it still allows for a strategic retreat then escape. The 10 minutes required for True Resurrection is a bummer but you'd use Miracle in battle. If the casting time were a standard action, then True Resurrection would be the divine spell of second choice.

If you use it enough to have it prepared anywhere close to regularly, either you and/or your DM are doing something suboptimally or your group's enjoyment of the game is atypical

It's not so much that it gets used but that it's there so it can be used. The fighter types can wade into battle knowing that even if they get killed, the cleric can pull them back. Think "He's not dead, he's only resting."

 

[Rhun]

It'd break the game. I just woulldn't allow it.

It wouldn't break the game. I've allowed clerics in my games to do this before, and it is fine. An LA of +1 or +2 would be fine as a balancing factor. It isn't as over-powered as everyone seems to think.

 

[JiffyPopTart]

An alternate balance would be to lower the number of spells the cleric could cast per day to pay for the increased utility.

I don't think I would allow a person to do this with EVERY cleric spell printed, but if only using the PHB spells, I would let them with a +2LA to use the cleric as-is but with not picking spells ahead of time.

ALTERNATELY just make all spell casters spontaneous and have a ball.

DS

 

[HeavenShallBurn]

All this vehemence and certainty that its all SO HORRIBLY BROKEN, come on people calm down a little?

Doesn't take much to fix it, just have them learn spells in the same fashion as the wizard or the Archivist so that they don't automatically have access to everything.

I remember when the Netheril setting came out no one had done a spontaneous caster before in D&D(for a player character) and I loved the way their arcanist carried it out so I have all casters spontaneously cast. I limit it by making them all learn spells as wizards do, both divine and arcane. It also has the side-effect of reducing the number of classes a bit, since sorcerers are no longer needed.