D&D (2024) Martial vs Caster: Removing the "Magical Dependencies" of high level.

[Micah Sweet]

I believe the claim has been that all PC humans in D&D have magical potential, and that potential is all that is required to justify any 'magical' abilities they gain as a result of levelling up.

A claim supported by the ability of all PC humans to learn the magic necessary to become wizards or bards.

No one has said anything about "PC humans". That's the first time I've seen that phrase here. Humans in general are referred to, and that is a question of worldbuilding, not strictly character creation as you appear to be trying to characterize the discussion.

 

[Micah Sweet]

So if they don't take the class they aren't magical, well... what if they multi-class? What if they take a feat? Also, what about wizards?

See, wizards are actually a huge problem for this view. Because a wizard can be created (and we have canonical, official proof of this in Xanathars) by stealing a spellbook and reading it. Or by finding a spellbook in an old ruin and reading it. No training, no magical infusion of power, just picked up a book and started self-teaching magic. Now, you can shrug and say "well, clearly they had magical potential and just got lucky" but... we know that EVERY PC therefore has magical potential. All of them. You cannot create a PC to whom magic is not an option during your career. Sure, you can declare "my PC is completely non-magical and will take no magical abilities!" but if you change your mind... nothing mechanically about your PC changes.

So, why isn't everyone innately capable of magic? The only possible reason to say so is because not everyone learns how to use their magic, but by that logic you can declare that not everyone is innately capable of being a car mechanic, because not everyone learns how to fix and care for a car. But that isn't an issue with lack of innate ability, that is an issue with a lack of KNOWLEDGE.

Its not THEIR magic. The magic is in the setting, and a person can learn to use it, or have it given to them. That does not make everyone innately magical.

Now someone like a sorcerer is an exception, but that's because their narrative is different, not because they come from a magical race necessarily.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Ok..one of those instances is the cosmological establishing of a "material plane" which is, whole cloth, a cosmological different model for reality.

So that one specific instance covers like..any of the potentially earthlike parts of the setting..and is explicitly and fundamentally different from life on earth.

We aren't calculating these differential mass of the Forgotten Realms and the objects that dwell there and distances between them to arrive at any "realistic" portrayals of gravity. We are handwaving it to avoid tedious and pointless physics exercises to arrive at basic predictable consequences of physical actions in a fantasy world.

It doesn't make real true actual narrative sense. We just do it because it makes the game easier to run.

As such, when we depart from that convention, we aren't committing any great sin, it's just the way the world works for that setting.

Heck, if we DID calculate it... turns out gravity isn't gravity.

Earth gravity is 9.8 m/s^2

DnD tells us in Xanathars that to fall 500 ft takes 6 seconds (a full turn). Put that into a free-fall calculator and it spits out a gravity of 8.46 m/s^2

What do you know, a fantasy world that doesn't match with real world physics. And before it is claimed that the world might be smaller to account for this... Abier-Toril is specifically supposed to be equivalent to Earth in size.

Whoops

 

[Micah Sweet]

And here we see why this entire conversation is so SO frustrating. Monks can non-magically teleport because we decided they are supernatural. Fighter's can't non-magically teleport because we decided they are not supernatural, and the only way to change that is to answer the same question ten million times until people accept that maybe they can be supernatural.

No, the only way to change that is to provide a narrative, in the product where the rules appear (whether that be WotC, 3pp, or homebrew) that says that fighters are or can be supernatural outside of subclass, or to make a new class where that is true in the narrative. Do that, and Bob's your uncle. Its not that difficult. You guys have already done it.

I'm not sure what you are continuing to argue about at this point. I thought we got there.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Point of order, while I would never do this, I'm sure there are DM's who may refuse to grant a PC the ability to multiclass into Wizard, et. al., because they don't have magical ability; that's their right, especially since multiclassing and feats are all optional content anyways. So unless you clear it with your DM ahead of time or include it in your history, the DM could just say "yeah, sorry, you're a Muggle, you can't learn magic."

Please no comments about whether such a DM is good/bad; again, I wouldn't do this, but it might be perfectly logical for some campaign settings, and some groups may be entirely on board with this. As long as everyone is having fun, there's no wrong way to play.

Sure, but the game setting doesn't assume homebrew as the baseline. So the baseline is that this isn't true.

 

[Minigiant]

Oh man, let's not get into the great hit point debate, lol. Hp is also supposed to include morale, yet a guy at full hit points can be frightened, and someone at 1 hit point can decide to fight to the death.

I can't wait for Sixth Edition where the bloodied condition return and certain effects only affect creatures with the bloodied condition or if under X HP.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Its not THEIR magic. The magic is in the setting, and a person can learn to use it, or have it given to them. That does make everyone innately magical.

Now someone like a sorcerer is an exception, but that's because their narrative is different, not because they come from a magical race necessarily.

... huh?

So, sorry, let me get this straight. Wizards aren't magical. They can grab a book and learn to use magic, but that is because magic is in the setting, not in the wizard.

Fighter and humans aren't magical. But they can learn magic, because it is in the setting.

Fighters can't do what wizards do, because fighters aren't magical...

I'm getting 1+1 = water buffalo here, if neither of them are magical, and both of them can learn magic... then what is the difference that needs to be explicitly spelled out?

 

[HammerMan]

... huh?

So, sorry, let me get this straight. Wizards aren't magical. They can grab a book and learn to use magic, but that is because magic is in the setting, not in the wizard.

Fighter and humans aren't magical. But they can learn magic, because it is in the setting.

Fighters can't do what wizards do, because fighters aren't magical...

I'm getting 1+1 = water buffalo here, if neither of them are magical, and both of them can learn magic... then what is the difference that needs to be explicitly spelled out?

I think it just goes round and round like when people make the LotR Gandalf argument… “how do we know Gandalf is powerful, because he beat the belrog .” “How do we know the belrog is powerful it took Gandalf to beat him”

 

[Yaarel]

Just like some Humans are innately Psionic, some Humans are innately magical in other ways. All Humans have souls, whence magical effects.

For them, a spellcaster class, including the Wizard class, helps them develop their innate talent, similar to how athletes develop an innate talent.

The Sorcerer class emphasizes the innate magic, but many other Humans are innately magical as well.

 

[HammerMan]

double post