Merging AU's spell system

[ender_wiggin]

AU's spell system presents some obvious balance and cohesion problems when trying to use it in a world you are already playing in. You can switch completely to AU, ignore AU completely, or find some middle ground, which I'm trying to do.

If there's a thread on this already (probable but not definate), please guide me to it.

Otherwise, I would like to discuss how to integrate AU's rather ingenious and refreshing spell system into a stable and working DnD 3.5 system.

Some points to begin with:

--> I would like to keep the wizard and sorceror classes (probably ignoring Magistar and Mageblade for now). I really like the contrast of formulaic vs. spontaneously spellcasting.

--> I would like to keep the differences between Divine and Arcane spells. I am willing to merge all divine lists and merge all arcane lists, but there must be certain exceptions (most notably the exclusive druid/ranger/greenbond spells).

--> I would like to use AU's "ready spell" feature. Having traditional wizard spell slots is getting tedious, and discourages on-the-fly tactics and increases general frustration. However, if you look at the magister's high-end "spells readied at a time" table, he can memorize about 70 or 80 spells total. This makes him extremely powerful -- he is essentially a sorceror with the known-spell list of a wizard. Of course, this isn't exactly the case, but what I would like to see is a stricter "spells readied" chart, perhaps half the number of known spells a sorc. would have.

 

[Khorod]

I think your desires are probably more trouble than their worth. You can play 3.5 and AU side by side, but trying to smash them together is going to be a headache.

That said... <sigh>. No, this mostly just hurts my head, sorry.

I honestly think the easiest thing would be to transition your campaign. I can easily think of ways to do that.

There are many tricks if you want to separate out certain specific spells if you want rigid controls. Just make the specials Exotic, and give Exotic Spell feats out to the appropriate classes.

 

[Geron Raveneye]

Uhm...that's all a question of how flexible you want to be. You can easily just port the spellcasting system out of AU into D&D, and use the wizard/sorcerer spells for it. No "laden" spells, though, or spells with heightened or diminished effects.

About the "spells readied" table...I wouldn't think it needs to be cropped that much, definitely not below sorcerer levels. I'd also import some of the spell variations AU has for standard D&D spells, like the glowglobe spells for light, etc...just for the flavour. Of course, if you want to keep the distinction to divine magic, you have to leave out a lot of those from AU that mimick divine magic.

All in all, I've taken the whole magister class and tacked it on the elves in my campaigns, as well as the runethane on the dwarves, and left the wizard with the humans. Took away a little from the magister, added a little to the wizard, and that's all for balance. If a spell from AU seems more "elvish", I import it, complete with heightened/diminished effects. Left out ladened spells. Works fine so far.

 

[ender_wiggin]

There's no way to transition the campaign. Elves are here to stay. Dwarves are here to stay. Wizards and Sorcerors and Clerics are here to stay. I can't just obliterate everything -- then I might as well start a new campaign.

*

Hmmm...racial differences. That's a very good idea.

What if the entire AU spell list were used for a specific race. High elf? Although that race hardly needs any more motivation to play...

 

[Arkhandus]

For the wizard, use their spells per day table as their spells readied table too, but add perhaps one extra spell per spell level to the spells readied, at the time that spell level is acquired. I.E. an extra spell readied of 0-level and one of 1st-level at the 1st wizard level, then at 3rd-level they'd gain an extra spell readied of 2nd-level. So a 1st-level wizard readies 2 different 1st-level spells each day, and casts 1 of them, or 2 likely with their high Int's bonus slot. If he's a specialist, he has another spell slot of 1st-level that can only be used for his specialized school, so it's unusable if he doesn't ready a spell of that level and school. Unless you want to give specialist wizards an extra spell readied of each spell level, exclusively for their specialized school, but that's your prerogative.

Then decide how often you want wizards to be able to change their 'spells readied'. I'd suggest at least that you let them keep some 'spells readied' slots open when desired, to be filled with 15 minutes of studying their spellbook, for each spell they want to ready in an open 'ready slot'. Then perhaps, they may have the option of changing their spells readied by spending 1 hour studying their spellbook, but perhaps they can only do so after, say, 4 hours of sleep? Or simply 4 hours of light activity? Or just say that they can only change their set of ready spells once every 4 hours, or once every 8 hours, because it takes time for their minds to recover after preparing so many readied spells.

The sorcerer of course wouldn't need any list of spells readied, but should perhaps be given one extra spell known of each spell level, to make up for the fact that the wizard now shares some of the sorcerer's flexibility (and really, that's all the sorcerer has!).

Bards likely don't need any adjustment, since they're already improved a bit in 3.5.

Maybe add some/most of Monte's AU spells to the spell lists of the bard, sorcerer, and wizard though, but the bard should remain focused on enchantments, illusions, sonic spells, summonings, and support magic. The sorcerer and wizard probably shouldn't gain access to any AU spells that have the Plant, Healing, or Positive Energy descriptors (practically all AU spells have a descriptor). Also, you should add a caveat that sorcerers and wizards cannot cast choose Positive Energy for any AU spells that allow that as an option. Lastly, you should selectively go through the Negative Energy and Curse spells in AU, and see if any of them seem inappropriate for arcane casters, and see if any of the Sonic or Mind-Affecting spells would be best made exclusive to bards. I.E. arcane casters are supposed to be less effective at raising undead than divine casters, while bards should have the best mind-affecting and sonic spells at decent spell levels.

However, there are a few Positive Energy spells that may be fine for wizards, such as Permanent Rest (merely prevents the target from becoming undead or being raised, so akin to Trap the Soul and such). Call Outsider may or may not be appropriate for arcane casters, decide for yourself. Some spells like Beastskin should probably be restricted to Druids or something, but you'll have to look for such spells and examine them yourself, I dunno what exactly you're using from AU in your D&D game.

Clerics, Druids, Paladins, and Rangers might be handled similar to wizards with regard to spells readied, but might not have the option to keep ready slots open, and likely might not be able to change their spells readied except at designated times of day/night appropriate to their religion. I.E. good divine casters may be limited to preparing spells at dawn and noon, evil divine casters at dusk and midnight, neutral divine casters at dawn and midnight, for example.

Definately don't include both Bards and Mage Blades in the same campaign, nor Magisters with Sorcerers and Wizards, as Monte's pure casters are better except for their spells (as many of the spells in AU are less potent or simply less save-or-die in nature, but also tend to be more flexible). Runethanes and Witches are probably fine in a D&D game, since they're only slightly better than Bards at spellcasting, and their other traits aren't significantly better than those of Bards, Clerics, or Druids. Runethanes would count as arcane, and Witches divine, of course. Not sure if Greenbonds are good for mixing with Clerics and Druids..... *shrug* Go ahead and use the feats in AU that grant access to spell templates. No problem with ladening a spell or whatnot. With regards to metamagic, the wizard, cleric, druid, paladin, and ranger may be required to apply the metamagic when they ready the spells, so they take up an appropriately higher-level readying slot.

 

[ender_wiggin]

Thanks; you have a lot of very good ideas. Your idea of the wizard, imho, is still too powerful. If you think about it, a 3.5 wizard can have 4 spells readied at a time (per level), with no flexibility whatsoever. Your suggested wizard has 4 or 5 spells readied at a time with the ultimate flexibility. I'm thinking of doing what you suggested except subtracting one from all levels instead of adding one.

Wizards have the option of replacing a single spell that takes twenty minutes (of which they can do a limited number of times per day), or replacing their entire list in 3 hours. Of course, if they rest for eight hours, then study for 1 hour, they can refresh their entire list that way as well.

This option should not infringe on the sorceror's prized flexibility too much. In fact, in many ways it cuts down slightly on the wizard's flexibility, and makes up for some fighter vs. mage balance issues at high level.

I am planning on adding all nondescript (no tags) simple and complex spells to the wizard/sorceror list, then later picking and choosing to add some to the other lists. Bard list will get all the sonic spells. Druid and Ranger list gets all the Plant and Water spells. Ranger list should probably get Earth spells as well. Paladin list gets all "positive energy" spells.

I will throw Greenbond, Mage Blade, Magister out for the time being.

 

[ender_wiggin]

Oh, and bonus spells based on ability modifier should apply to both "spells readied" and "sorcerer/bard/ spells known"

 

[Nellisir]

I think I'll be facing a similar dilemma in a little while. I'm working on a new campaign setting with at least 5 spellcasting classes: a variant druid (more celtic; less wildshape); priests (something different from clerics; still working out details); battle sorcerers (more or less per Unearthed Arcana); wizards ("the" spellcaster); and magicians (charm/ illusion/ divination/ transformation oriented).

I'm taking a hard look at descriptors and the simple/complex/exotic setup. I think this is the best way to merge spell lists, yet allot specific types of spells to restricted casters.

The bugaboo is the choice between coverting all the AU spells to OGL-legal format and distributing them to my players (plus adding some spells), or adding (more) descriptors plus my house rules to all the SRD spells and just letting the player's work off their PH's.

Ach. More work either way.

Cheers
Nell.

 

[ender_wiggin]

I will probably use spells from both lists. Probably Grimoire II, too, if I can get my hands on that. Converting srd rules to AU is pretty simple. Just have all spells start as simple. If it requires more than 2 types of components, then its complex. Afterward, you can go through the list and fix the minor errors by hand, as well as hand-selecting a few spells to be exotic (Magic Jar comes to mind).

Additionally, I'm converting AU spells to srd (not necessarily rewriting them); just labelling them as arcane or divine or possibly both. I'd say 90-95% of the AU spells are arcane -- and only a few divine.