Turanil said:
What do you suggest? Make a Constitution attribute check whenever a spellcaster is hit in combat while casting a spell to see if he finishes his casting or not?
The first problem, though, is how to hit the spellcaster when he casts a spell. There are no rules in the PH for readying actions to swing at the spellcaster when he begins casting a spell or for spellcasters provoking an attack of opportunity when they begin to cast a spell. Only a spell that has a casting time of greater than 1 round will result in the spellcaster casting past his turn in the initiative and there are very, very few of those. So you have to decide if you will allow a readying action and if a spellcaster casting a spell with a CT of 1 can be interupted, and if so, how.
I don't want to introduce any kind of attack of opportunity to my C&C game, nor do I want to have everyone declare actions before initiative like in AD&D, so I am considering introducing some kind of "ready" action for this and other scenarios. So if you want to ruin the spellcaster's spell you must win initiative. Then you must "ready" yourself to attack the spellcaster when he begins casting his spell. You may make a melee attack or a ranged attack, but you cannot move first. You may move up to half your move before readying your attack. If the spellcaster decides not to cast a spell, or whatever action you readied against does not happen, you may still make your melee or ranged attack, but only against the original target and not until the end of the round. If you cannot make the attack for some reason, you forfeit your attack this round.
If the spellcaster is hit in this way, he must make either an arcane magic (Int) or divine magic (Wis) saving throw, depending upon which type of magic he casts, or lose the spell. The CC for the save would be 12 + half the damage + the level of the spell. Thus, a 5th level wizard wants to lightning bolt the evil knight. The knight assumes the wizard is gunning for him, moves within striking distance and gets ready to run the wizard through when he starts to cast his spell. The wizard risks it and begins casting his lightning bolt spell. The evil knight's broadsword almost runs the wizard through, but the wizard dodges at the last moment, only taking a minor cut along the ribcage. But this has forced the wizard to concentrate on something else besides his spell, so he might lose the spell. The damage from the broadword was 6, so the wizard adds half of that and the level of the spell to 12, getting 18. He must make an Int save against 18 or lose the spell. If his Int modifier is +2, then he must roll an 11 or higher on a d20 or lose the spell.
This is not written in stone or anything, just some thoughts on how to do this with a ready type action. Any thoughts?
