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Message: <blockquote data-quote="kigmatzomat" data-source="post: 8981827" data-attributes="member: 9254">Yeah, totally agree. AFAIK, earthDawn is the only system that ever leaned into the prevalence of magic. (Of course, in ED magic is actually fading away from the high point where eldritch horrors roam the earth torturing anything & everything for fun & profit)Even if you did need something extra (Ala Earthdawn "adept") where characters with class levels are special people, any "1 in X people are* special" ratio has the implicit asterisk of "*actually, 1 in X find out they are special. Some fall through the cracks".  A kind of universal magic test, even if it only added 1 more caster/year, would almost automatically be worth it.And there should be massive incentives for all special people to take at least one caster level or a caster-emulating feat. I mean, if 1/2 classes are casters, by incentivizing caster multiclassing, you could double the casters.The societal benefits from other cantrips (shape water, guidance, mending, resistance, spare the dying) are immense.Resistance & Spare the dying are on par with an ICU. They keep you alive and gives you a chance to fight off diseases, poisons.  It would justify a level of state sponsorship of multiple religions to have adequate people available to provide basic services.Guidance is like half-proficiency or an 8-level boost to an artisan. I would say on the whole it doesn't really help make better items but it would help reduce the number of failures, which is often a bigger drain on productivity.Mending requires no materials or tools, forge, fuel, needle, glues, etc) and only takes a minute.Shape water is less awe inspiring than mold earth, but it is 1,000 gallons of precision fire fighting. Really more like 3000gal, as a single watershaper could keep 3 block of "ice" in any cart able to hold them (no tank required), then animate them into the fire.  (Note a firetruck has 500-1,000gal of water, so this is like 3 pump trucks from one shaper) (and even an earthshaper isn't bad at stopping fires, and can level blocks if need be to stop a conflagration)From a productivity stand point, watershapers are a powerful pump, enabling mining in areas that would otherwise flood. They could create water pressure by filling roof mounted cisterns.Imagine the city that has hired one each: Earthshaper, Watershaper, Mender, and Deathwatch for the public good.  Their buildings are better built and last longer. Same goes for their tools. Their roads are in fantastic shape. There is rarely flooding.  Few otherwise healthy people die of illness.They are far more productive per capita as so much labor-intensive work is handled by a few people.  Skilled workers are able to ply their trade longer (on average). A mill district is powered by 12,000lb blocks of mobile dirt and 8,000lb blobs of mobile water. Complicated machines remain functioning longer.The city defenses are simple in construction but also large in scale. Fire weapons used on the city don't have the same impact. The moats and berms are backed by trebuchets that fire at ridiculous speeds as tons of earthen or liquid counter weights shift about at great speed.  In some cases the trebuchets fire ice-missiles that don't even give the attackers ammunition for their own weapons.All this from cantrips.Let's just say that my game world never quite looks like what the dnd art looks like. Lots of 4th or 5th level characters retire to live a life of luxury at Smartsylvania, who only asks that they work a few days a week and help out during emergencies.</blockquote>

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