New Design: Wizards...

[Wormwood]

Making magic items special and meaningful is a job for the GM and the players, not for the rulebooks.

You said it better in one sentence than I have in three bloated posts.

Repeated in bold.

 

[Simplicity]

For the surreptitious caster, it really depends on how effective "still effective" is, doesn't it?
I suppose it can't be that much worse than the old metamagic "give up a spell level if you don't want to have a component" way of doing things.

I do really like the flavor of this. As a wizard in 3.5e, I want to have a quarterstaff, but I'd sure be an idiot to ever use it. When the magic is gone, it's crossbow time. And that just seems weird. Having a staff-wielding wizard who can USE his staff. That's yummy.

Tomes are so applicable to all schools though, I'd personally prefer if they were a form of meta-wizard item. And something else were used for that last item. What kind of wizard doesn't want to carry around a book?

 

[stonegod]

Seems very Hermetic, which considering the wizard is the apex of Western Tradition Magic users, makes sense (thus the similar tools in LoTR, HP, etc, etc). I agree with them being helpers (the tome example previous was spot on)---think of them as potential foci that may nor may not be required.

It would be good to see either (1) A way for wizards to move beyond such limitations or (2) another arcane class (sorcerer/warlock?) that does not have dependence on such tools and does magic inherently.

 

[Rechan]

It does give you the option to have magic items beyond just +x in case you didn't notice.

Because you know for a fact that 4e won't.

 

[Wormwood]

It does give you the option to have magic items beyond just +x in case you didn't notice.

And if 4e doesn't provide a similar option to customize wands, orbs and tomes I would be STUNNED.

But I am wholly confident that they will.

 

[Charwoman Gene]

Sorry, but I am of the old school that magic items, even the most minor ones, should be special, have a history, and do something that makes them a useful tool more than just a bonus to a die roll.

Wow, that REALLY doesn't sound like D&D! Home of the +1 Sword, +1 Shield, and +1 Platemail that fits both Elf and Dwarf.

 

[Sun Knight]

Making magic items special and meaningful is a job for the GM and the players, not for the rulebooks.

However it needs to be both for the aethetics and game mechanics of the magic item in question. You can have the most elaborate backstory of a magic item, but a +x item is still a boring +x item.

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

I can see both sides of the argument for tomes.

On the one hand, books have enormous symbolic weight and are certainly iconic tools.

On the other hand, the primary function of a book is never to be a symbol, but to hold knowledge.

So at a minimum, I would hope that tomes always give bonuses only to specific spells. But the question is always this:

"If what's written in a book gives me +2 to spell X, then why do I have to keep carrying the book around to get that +2 after I've read it?"

Ben

I could see it if the tome is used for longer casting time spells, such as full round spells or longer ritual type spells. The idea could be these kinds of magic tomes contain blank pages. When the wizard casts one of the spells using the tome, his incantations magically inscribe in the tome, providing a focus for the spell. Where spoken words fade into nothingness, the tome provides a place for the magic to gather and strengthen before it is released. Casting the same spell a second time does not inscribe new pages, but reactivates the magic in the pages previously inscribed. When a new caster finds or acquires a tome, they must attune it to themselves. This wipes the inscriptions of the previous caster from the tome.

 

[Aage]

My staff-wielding elven mage-fighter is loving this. Now, not only is it a totally awesome weapon, but it helps her casting as well? Go WotC!!

 

[Piratecat]

It's ironic to see people fretting about these changes and saying "It's too different, it's not D&D!" To them I would ask: do you consider 3e to be D&D? Because that exact same complaint was made hundreds of times on this site in 1999 and 2000, as we waited for 3e to launch.

3e's changes were far more extreme than I expect 4e's to be, and I'm pretty happy with how 3e turned out. For me, it's definitely D&D. I expect 4e will be the exact same way.