Magic : How streamlined do we want it?

[Branduil]

There are too many similar or redundant spells. Consolidating certain spells and making others multi-level could help reduce some of the spellbook bloat.

 

[Moon-Lancer]

I think that might effectively be a free-form magic system.
If not, you might run into the problem that you will often come up with interesting ideas fitting the "theme" of one of your magics, but no place in the levels that they fit in. (Unless you give multiple abilities per level - but what if you have more good ideas for, say "Fire" then for "Air" - is this fair or balanced?)

well i was thinking that water lets say, would be very clearly defined. each level gives you more control, equivalent to a spell, something like m&m but different. this system would work best with mp, and casting create water would use very low mp, but waterball (fireball with water) would use more mp.

I guess they would be like domains or some such, dono, still working on it in my head, but I really like the idea of 1 power being used throughout with strong and weak variations.

so wind spells could bullrush, create tornadoes, fan fires, perhaps even cut people.

sorry for jacking thread. If I comment on this again, I will just make my own thread about it.

 

[The Human Target]

I like flavor text. :\

Well its lucky for you that not including it in a book doesn't mean its banned from DnD for all time.

 

[The Human Target]

I agree for the most part. Most attack spells are just variations of range, AOE, damage, and damage type. We don't need individual spells for that...just a mix-and-match based on level. Someone (forget who) made exactly this for an Iron Heroes add-on, and I thought it was sweet (but forgot to save the link.)

For instance, assume that each level is worth 1d6 of damage, with range 0. But you can trade in damage dice to 'buy' modifiers.

Assume for sake of this discussion that each 5 squares is worth 1d6 and a circular blast is worth 3d6 (bear with me, just making it up as I type.) If so, a 5th level wizard could do 5d6 damage touch, or 4d6 at 5 squares range, or 2d6 circular blast centered on himself or 1d6 blast at 5 square range. Not balanced, I know, but it illustrates the idea.

A balanced appraoch like this would probably get rid of half the spells in one fell swoop, while seriously opening up flexibility.

Yeah, thats the kind of idea I'm talking about.

 

[The Human Target]

Two comments:

First, I think it makes perfect sense that a wizard character should look things up in books during the game. If you don't want to think about what you're doing, play a warlock.

Second, I like my spells quirky and dangerous. One thing I absolutely detested about 3/3.5 was the dumbing down of magic. No reversible spells, no multi-function spells, and all the spells that used to have dangerous consequences were suddenly idiot-proof. Casting Dispel Magic ends all other spells, but changes your Fly spell to Feather Fall--because falling just wouldn't be fair. Bah!

So I say, let the Vancian spells (whatever remains of it, anyway) be creative, flexible, odd, quirky, and dangerous--just as magic should be.

Cheers!

Looking things up is fine and should be expected in any game of moderate to high complexity. The question becomes- how much time will it take you to understand and apply what you've looked up? And how easy is it to remember the odd/quirky minutiae of the glut of Vancian magical spells in the core books alone- let alone splat books?

And I agree with you that spells should be multi-functional. And I do like dangerous magic. But its very easy to make that not only an core option, but very easy to use.

 

[Nebulous]

The AE system isn't bad. While most spells are short in their descriptions, there are the different effects of the spells (least,most, etc) depending on how you cast it. Problem is you're back to looking up constantly.

I'll chime in. AE and the Spell Treasury is probably my favorite take on the d20 spell system. It's not perfect, but it was fun. If anything was broken, i'd say it was just the problem that plagues all spellcasters; you blow all your magic and force the party to rest until you're useful again. Well, that and the fact that there were just TOO many spells to pore over; even a mid-level caster got to be a pain the ass. High level was practically unplayable, in my opinion. If you didn't have your nose in the book researching a spell for the next round, constantly, you would hang the game up.

As for what i'd like to see in 4e, as far as streamlining, something similar to Arcana Evolved, but taken even further. I would like to see metamagic built into the spell description itself, with scaling options. And probably less spells, at least initially, with a system for logical extensions or options onto the core magic system in future supplements. So that styles of magic actually make a gameplay difference and are thematically unique from their peers.

 

[Rakin]

Streamline spells=simpler spells=boring

I guess it's ok if all you really care for is beating up that bad guy, seeing how strong you can get, and getting all the phat loots(might as well just play an MMO at that point), but interesting and sometimes complex (but only complex and long because people try and find loopholes in spells to cheat and some GM's aren't advanced enough to stop it from happening) spells make for interesting as well as fun and creative ways of dealing with situations adn encounters.

 

[ruleslawyer]

I'd argue that itemized spells=looking stuff up in books=boring.

That said, I can see not wanting a full-on change to free-form spell effects, but it boggles my mind that people really find it "flavorful" to have hundreds of different individual spells to represent a range of ways to deal energy damage, gain numerical bonus to stuff like AC, saves, attacks, etc., or accomplish any number of things that can be achieved by a simple sliding-scale generic mechanism. At the least, it would be nice if standard blasting spells and stuff like mage armor, resistance, protection from spells, etc. could be genericized.

 

[fuindordm]

I'd argue that itemized spells=looking stuff up in books=boring.

That said, I can see not wanting a full-on change to free-form spell effects, but it boggles my mind that people really find it "flavorful" to have hundreds of different individual spells to represent a range of ways to deal energy damage, gain numerical bonus to stuff like AC, saves, attacks, etc., or accomplish any number of things that can be achieved by a simple sliding-scale generic mechanism. At the least, it would be nice if standard blasting spells and stuff like mage armor, resistance, protection from spells, etc. could be genericized.

You're right, all this variation really isn't necessary for the direct damage spells--it wouldn't be hard to put a nice subsystem in the DMG, for example, that tells you what level any conceivable damage-dealing spell should be--there aren't that many options, really.

Damage: XdY
Energy: (Fire, Cold, Acid, or Electricity), Sonic, Force
Shape: single target, cone radius R, burst radius R
Range: touch, close, medium, long, line of sight
Flavor: add a minor advantage balanced by a minor disadvantage for free.

Heck, it's only 4 variables, it shouldn't be hard to find a function that fits the available data.

I wouldn't want to lose attack spells like Evard's Black Tentacles, Otto's Dance, Maze, and Prismatic Spray, however--or even Sleet Storm.

Ben

 

[Irda Ranger]

I'd argue that itemized spells=looking stuff up in books=boring.

Ruleslawyer: What part of "lawyer" isn't clear to you?

That said, I can see not wanting a full-on change to free-form spell effects,

Count me in that camp. Once I have Magic Missile memorized, done. I don't have to think about it at the game table.

Heck, it's only 4 variables, it shouldn't be hard to find a function that fits the available data.

I wouldn't want to lose attack spells like Evard's Black Tentacles, Otto's Dance, Maze, and Prismatic Spray, however--or even Sleet Storm.

Lucky for you, 4e wizards have at will, per encounter and per day abilities. The only solution that make sense here is that Evard's Black Tentacles is a per encounter ability or per day spell, and that the wizard has two at will abilities that scale with level called "Feel my wrath, heathen!!" and "Not in the face! Not in the face!". Pretty much all of Evocation will be boiled down into the former, and half of abjuration will be a few formulas in the latter. Because they're "controllers" though (they've got to keep control) they'll probably have a third (or fourth) at will ability like "take a jump to the left" or "you're under sedation."

If they're really smart, WotC'll just do without "+x to variable a" buff spells entirely, and build the classes and monster tables in such a way that the game doesn't need them. Everyone "knows" that certain buffs are "no brainers", which drains the fun out of a lot of being a spellcaster. We're better off without them.

No more "Melf's Acid Arrow" and "Snilloc's Snowball Swarm."

Just "Ranged Magical Attack" with the acid damage description and "Ranged Magical Attack" with the cold damage description.

Flavor text is not needed in the spells section.

Clarity is.

Your words have the cold, clear logic of a Soviet street map.

Just because the rules should make sense doesn't mean they can't do it with style.