Making Magic Magical Again?

[Felon]

Do you even think it can be done? If so, how?

This is rather vague. What are we talking about? Is this about spells and magic items being too obtainable? Or is this one of those "sense of wonder" threads?

In broadest terms, something stops being magical once you understand how it works. As a child, the DMG was a boundless tome of lore that I could dig into on any given day and unearth some cleverly hidden revelation, be it a chart for diseases or some awesome artifact. Today, the 1e DMG is just an incohesive mess of poorly-organized tables and utterly capricious rules. There's no mystery to spells or magic items because I can see behind the fourth wall to the design proces at work. Understanding gained, sense of wonder forfeited.

I can't wait for senility to set in.

 

[CM]

Eliminate the need for +x weapons, armor, and neckpieces (4e). Give items meaningful static properties or powers instead. Unfortunately I fear this sacred cow may be too large to slay.

 

[Raith5]

Eliminate the need for +x weapons, armor, and neckpieces (4e). Give items meaningful static properties or powers instead. Unfortunately I fear this sacred cow may be too large to slay.

I think this is great area for modularity. I think + weapons will be the core assumption but the could be more official room for stuff that has particular properties or levels with the PC.

But I must say that I though the +2 wands in 4th ed were a pretty cool addition, despite feeling that 4th ed magic items were pretty bland in general.

 

[fuindordm]

I think the spells themselves have a lot to do with making magic interesting.

"Magical" spells:
* sometimes have limitations (only at night, only works on certain targets, requires a rare component that might have nothing obvious to do with the spell) suited to the theme of the class
Poster child: Entangle
* sometimes have serious consequences for the caster or his allies (insanity, aging, calling unwanted attention to the party)
Poster child: ADD's Contact Other Plane
* sometimes combine more than one effect
Poster child: Monte Cook's "Ride the lightning" from Arcana Unearthed, combines LB and D-door.
* imitate mythological ideas
Poster child: Pathfinder's "Beguiling Gift" (witch spell, target accepts and immediately uses an item). Another: ADD's "Binding".
* have their effects described in somewhat vague terms, so that inventive players can use them in numerous situations
Poster child: ADD's "Command", Stone Shape
* have serious implications for the game world
Poster child: 3E's "Awaken"

Now, I'm not saying every spell in the book should be like this. There's plenty of room for "bread-and-butter" spells too. But just because there is a spell to increase Strength, doesn't mean there has to be a spell for every attribute, plus higher-level versions to increase the attributes for longer periods or for multiple targets. Maybe no one's figured out a spell to increase Con yet, or if they have it causes warts to sprout all over the target's body.

When a class's spell list contains many spells that meet one more more of the above criteria, then I find myself wanting to play that class so I can use those spells.

When most of the spells provide clearly laid-out mechanical benefits, have narrowly defined uses, and magic has no appreciable consequences for its users, I find myself playing fighters and thieves instead.

Ideally, the spell list should imply that magic-users do not fully understand the source of their power, because the spell list doesn't cover every need and because there are still undesired consequences to using magic. On the other hand, spells that are tricky to use in some way should be a little more powerful than the "bread-and-butter" spells.

Ben

 

[Hassassin]

I think this is great area for modularity. I think + weapons will be the core assumption but the could be more official room for stuff that has particular properties or levels with the PC.

The problem is that you can't simply take out +X items from 3e or 4e after the fact. All the math assumes them and there are no guidelines to altering challenge ratings for a low-magic-item campaign.

 

[Tuft]

To me, Magic is about wish fulfillment, and exploring its consequences. Going beyond the mundane, doing the impossible, without being hindered by thos pesky laws of nature.

Look at what people wish for *outside* gaming:

"if I could fly, I would..."

"If I was invisible, I would..."

"if only could have been a fly on the wall, when..."

"if I could be at more places than one..."

I used to play the MMO City of Heroes. The combat grind paled and grew old (and ultimately killed off the game for me), but what never got old was standing on top of a scyscraper, facing the sunrise, and stepping over the edge... Just in the right time I would hit "fly", fold out my wings, and soar through the cityscape. Pure, primal wish-fulfillment joy. If there had been more such moments, and not just an increase of ever-more-complicated drops, maybe they could have kept me as a subscriber.

Magic shoul have consequences on the world too; if it does not, it does not feel "real". You know, paraphrasing quantum mechanics: in order to observe someting, both the Obsever and Observed need to be affected... In science fiction we have "sense of wonder": take a (sometimes ridiculous) premise, draw alll the consequences, an wonder at how different that makes the world.

I think that "toolifying" magic, thinking of it only in game terms without further consequences, and mundanifying it (you know, the common meme spread around that magic should not be able to things the mundane cannot do, except with prettier colors) is what is killing the magicness of magic.

It is not about frequency, or availabilty; as someone said, the Harry Potter books are full of magic, but they have a joyful, exploratory view of magic; "let's see what we can do!" which keeps it fresh.

 

[Tehnai]

I would remove the bonuses to Attack, AC and saves from magical items, thus removing the items from combat maths. A +X sword would only give bonuses to damage, armor would give, I dunno, damage resistance, and amulets shouldn't have +Xs anyways.

But a +X sword is boring. Every magic item should do something awesome, add at least 1 new option additionally to the default use of the item (a sword is for hitting things, a flaming sword should be able to do something more than "hitting things with fire damage"), and preferably be vague enough so that a creative player could find more. A flaming sword, to reuse my example, could be used as the occasional flamethrower, a torch, a very impressive lighter, a creative way to smoke out monsters from their dens, whatever the players think of, really.

Also, magic shops should be removed (and so should be the pricing of magical items other than scrolls and potions, we can split them by tier instead). Magical item creation should be initially restricted to scrolls and potions, but their should be a module released within the first year of the game's existence with magical item creation rule (but not as part of the Core Rulebook)

 

[mmadsen]

How would you make Magic "magical again" in 5th Edition?

What many of us want is magic as a plot device -- with rules. So, magic shouldn't be free, it shouldn't be perfectly predictable and controllable, it should depend on context, etc., because you're not dealing with the immutable Laws of Nature; you're dealing with Nature Spirits, who are capricious and spiteful.

 

[Aramax]

keep vancian but....

add crit hit/miss for spells
add 'pushing"w/o metamagic
looser description of spells allowing them to be used in differant situations(feats?)

 

[KarinsDad]

If you thought about the items from any edition that really felt magical, what leaps to mind? Maybe narrowing the field to what work(s/ed) will help.

Outside of the obvious Staff of Power, and Staff of the Magi, I remember being super impressed with Elvencloaks, Elvenboots, and a Ring of Regeneration in 1E.

If one looks at the 1E Ring of Regeneration now, 1 hit point per turn, 6 per hour, or 144 per day seems like a pretty lame item except at really low level when a first level PC can reacquire 48 hit points per day without any powers being used and a 30th level PC can reacquire 450 hit points per day without any powers being used.

As for Elvencloaks and Elvenboots, sure, they gave out too much of a bonus back then. But now, the Elven Cloak is still unbalanced because the higher level versions gain a greater bonus than the lower level versions.

The reason this isn't a good idea is that the super stealthy PC can make it typically impossible for the 99% of foes to detect him and only a small percentage of NPCs have a slim chance, even the super perceptive NPCs. It's the same problem that the 1E items had. For example, Vecna has the highest perception in the game system (TMK) with a +34 (most above level 30 NPCs have about a +25 or so). A 30th level super stealthy PC can easily have +9 dexterity, +15 level, +5 trained, +2 background, +3 skill focus, +6 Elven Cloak or +40. Now, this is not a major commitment here for a Dex PC here (one specific item and feat) and the stealth of the PC is 6 higher than the absolute best perception NPC in the entire game system, an NPC 5 levels higher than the PC. And, we all know that if push came to shove, a player could probably bump this up another 5 or even more.

Game designers need to understand this and make skill boosting items +2 at best, not +6. IMO. On the surface, some players might not see that the Elven Cloak makes a stealthy PC mega-stealthy, but optimizing players will.