D&D (2024) Playtest 6: Spells

[Maxperson]

Ah, so the spell school system is entirely clear and easy to understand... as long as you allow some spells to be in two schools at once. Which isn't how it works. So it would need to be changed.

It worked just fine in the past. No good reason for it not to work just fine now.

 

[Yaarel]

To organize the spells by theme helps to distinguish flavors for character building and world building.

I like the idea of spell schools, but the execution needs revamping. A school like Enchantment that focuses on the influence of the mind is clear and works well. For example, if I want a telepath concept, I know to look to see what the Enchantment school can offer. But other schools, like Transmutation are inconsistent. The concept of causing a "change" is pretty much the definition of any spell and magic in general. Which changes via a spell get counted as the Transmutation school and which dont is arbitrary and inconsistent.

I like the Abjuration category, but it isnt a "school", per se. It is a purpose, rather than a means. Any means can be used for a protective (defensive, restorative) purpose. For example, Protection from Energy, would have the purpose of Abjuration, but involve the school of Evocation. So Abjuration works better as a tag, than a school. That said, it is an important tag. In Norse magic, the masculine warrior magic is pretty much identical to Abjurations − magically shielding, warding away spirits, healing, resurrecting, improving memory, dispelling fear, and so on. These kinds of magic are useful in combat, but still allow the warrior to fight up close and personal rather than snipe from a safe distance away.

There can also be useful tags for dual-use utility spells − namely mobility/barrier spells and stealth/detection spells − as well as for the opposite of Abjuration spells that inflict damage/debuff.

 

[Yaarel]

Regarding the spell schools, every spell in the D&D game can clearly belong to one of following spell schools, when each school is defined as follows.

Conjuration: Astral Plane with Celestial, summoning, thoughts and dreams.
Dunomancy: Ethereal Plane with Fey, force damage, gravity, telekinesis, flight, quintessential ether as the fifth element.
Necromancy: black magic, ethereal Shadow, Undead, astral Fiend, Aberration.

Evocation: Elemental Energy Planes: Air (Lightning-Thunder), Water (Cold), Fire (Fire, Radiance, light, darkness), with primordial matter (Acid).
Transmutation: Material Plane, Elemental Earth Plane, Plant, making objects (stone, metal, wood, ivory, etc.), Beast, shapeshifting, healing.

Illusion: alteration of reality, wish, force constructs, quasi-real objects made out of ethereal force.
Enchantment: mind magic, telepathy, charm, fear, morale, alertness, domination, subjective mental phantasm.

Divination: space-time, such as precognition, timelines, fate, blessing, luck, and such as teleportation, chronomancy temporal distortion.

Abjuration, in addition to an other school: spells that have a protective purpose, such as shielding, warding away foes, healing, resurrection.
Execration, in addition to an other school: spells that have a hostile purpose, such as debuffing, targeting, damage, preventing resurrection.
Marshalcy, in addition to an other school: spells that enhance positioning or impede it, such as speed/slow, teleport/wall, flight/grounding.
Apparence, in addition to an other school: spells that avoid detection or detect: such as invisibility, disguise, true sight, locate target.


Some spells are complex with several moving part, where each part might belong to a different school. Generally, only one part is the main theme. However, some spells work better as belonging to more than one school, especially for the practical purpose of granting access to it in more than one spell school list.

Here, the Transmutation school represents magic involving Earth, Plant, and Beast. These are disparate but are the main of the 2014 transmutations, and are inseparable as substances that objects are made out of. For example, a spear is made of Earth and Plant, and a fur cloak is made of Plant and Beast. Whether medicinal chemicals, herbal remedies, or shapeshifting into a healthy body, healing is mainly transmutations, where even the soul is an aspect of animal life.

 

[Chaosmancer]

It worked just fine in the past. No good reason for it not to work just fine now.

Of course it will work just fine, all you have to do is convince everyone to agree with your definition of how things work and how they should be organized. And we all know, people always agree about how to interpret things. After all, once we list a spell as Divine Abjuration Arcane Evocation Primal Transmutation there can be no confusion about what the purpose of the spell if.

 

[Maxperson]

Of course it will work just fine, all you have to do is convince everyone to agree with your definition of how things work and how they should be organized. And we all know, people always agree about how to interpret things. After all, once we list a spell as Divine Abjuration Arcane Evocation Primal Transmutation there can be no confusion about what the purpose of the spell if.

Do you honestly think that the bolded is a valid response?

 

[Chaosmancer]

Regarding the spell schools, every spell in the D&D game can clearly belong to one of following spell schools, when each school is defined as follows.

Conjuration: Astral Plane with Celestial, summoning, thoughts and dreams.
Dunomancy: Ethereal Plane with Fey, force damage, gravity, telekinesis, flight, quintessential ether as the fifth element.
Necromancy: black magic, ethereal Shadow, Undead, astral Fiend, Aberration.

Evocation: Elemental Energy Planes: Air (Lightning-Thunder), Water (Cold), Fire (Fire, Radiance, light, darkness), with primordial matter (Acid).
Transmutation: Material Plane, Elemental Earth Plane, Plant, making objects (stone, metal, wood, ivory, etc.), Beast, shapeshifting, healing.

Illusion: alteration of reality, wish, force constructs, quasi-real objects made out of ethereal force.
Enchantment: mind magic, telepathy, charm, fear, morale, alertness, domination, subjective mental phantasm.

Divination: space-time, such as precognition, timelines, fate, blessing, luck, and such as teleportation, chronomancy temporal distortion.

Abjuration, in addition to an other school: spells that have a protective purpose, such as shielding, warding away foes, healing, resurrection.
Execration, in addition to an other school: spells that have a hostile purpose, such as debuffing, targeting, damage, preventing resurrection.
Marshalcy, in addition to an other school: spells that enhance positioning or impede it, such as speed/slow, teleport/wall, flight/grounding.
Apparence (!), in addition to an other school: spells that avoid detection or detect: such as invisibility, disguise, true sight, locate target.


Some spells are complex with several moving part, where each part might belong to a different school. Generally, only one part is the main theme. However, some spells work better as belonging to more than one school, especially for the practical purpose of granting access to it in more than one spell school list.

Here, the Transmutation school represents magic involving Earth, Plant, and Beast. These are disparate but are the main of the 2014 transmutations, and are inseparable as substances that objects are made out of. For example, a spear is made of Earth and Plant, and a fur cloak is made of Plant and Beast. Whether medicinal chemicals, herbal remedies, or shapeshifting into a healthy body, healing is mainly transmutations, where even the soul is an aspect of animal life.

Except for a few things. Like Elemental Weapon and Divine Favor being transumation spells. Neither are working with beast or plant, you might argue they are working with earth because they affect metal weapons, but they create either elemental energy (evocation) or radiant energy, which for some reason you have connected to fire, even though it is divine energy in this instance which would be the Upper planes, which you called Conjuration.

You've also seperate gravity and space-time which is nonsensical.

You have necromancy for summoning fiends, aberration magic is also necromancy despite the fact that all aberration flavor is that of thoughts, dreams, and mind control, which you have also split between Conjuration and Enchantment as though dreams are somehow not related to the mind.

Additionally, "black magic" is a nonsense term. You may as well say "evil forces", which you could attempt to say is balanced by Celestial Conjuration magic, that you didn't label as "white magic" except that the Celestial Planes aren't neccesarily good. Evil Gods exist, and they live in the Celestial planes.

Back to my point, summoning fiends you list as necromancy, summoning angels as Conjuration, summoning Fey is Dunomancy, and yet teleporting yourself to any other dimension where these beings might exist seems to be Divination. It is like renaming a door depending on who walks through it.

Also, you've listed "ethereal" as Dunomancy, Necromacy, AND Illusion. Notably trying to make a distinction between Ethereal, Ethereal shadows, and Ethereal matter... whatever that is.

And in this construction your four primary elements are Fire, Water, Air and Matter, but not Earth which gets its own sub-category.


All in all.... this is kind of a mess.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Do you honestly think that the bolded is a valid response?

If every spell has multiple tags, it has to have the spell list it is from, correct? So that's arcane, divine and primal. If you have Protection from Elements it can be done via "protection" which is abjuration, via manipulating the elements, which is evocation, or via changing your body to adapt to the elements, which is transmutation.

I simply combined the spell type tag with the school that made the most sense for it.

 

[Maxperson]

If every spell has multiple tags

Who on earth ever said that? Not me. I never even implied it. A few spells had multiple schools as appropriate, and I don't recall a spell having more than two. You're divination/enchantment spell would be one of them. Fireball and a million others would not be.

it has to have the spell list it is from, correct?

It would show up on arcane, divine or primal, yes.

So that's arcane, divine and primal.

Those are not schools, so no it wouldn't show up on multiple lists unless the spell is determined by WotC to be on more than one for some other reason that has nothing to do with multiple schools.

If you have Protection from Elements it can be done via "protection" which is abjuration, via manipulating the elements, which is evocation, or via changing your body to adapt to the elements, which is transmutation.

What does any of that have to do with the primal, arcane and divine lists?

 

[Yaarel]

Except for a few things. Like Elemental Weapon and Divine Favor being transumation spells. Neither are working with beast or plant, you might argue they are working with earth because they affect metal weapons, but they create either elemental energy (evocation) or radiant energy, which for some reason you have connected to fire, even though it is divine energy in this instance which would be the Upper planes, which you called Conjuration.

You've also seperate gravity and space-time which is nonsensical.

You have necromancy for summoning fiends, aberration magic is also necromancy despite the fact that all aberration flavor is that of thoughts, dreams, and mind control, which you have also split between Conjuration and Enchantment as though dreams are somehow not related to the mind.

Additionally, "black magic" is a nonsense term. You may as well say "evil forces", which you could attempt to say is balanced by Celestial Conjuration magic, that you didn't label as "white magic" except that the Celestial Planes aren't neccesarily good. Evil Gods exist, and they live in the Celestial planes.

Back to my point, summoning fiends you list as necromancy, summoning angels as Conjuration, summoning Fey is Dunomancy, and yet teleporting yourself to any other dimension where these beings might exist seems to be Divination. It is like renaming a door depending on who walks through it.

Also, you've listed "ethereal" as Dunomancy, Necromacy, AND Illusion. Notably trying to make a distinction between Ethereal, Ethereal shadows, and Ethereal matter... whatever that is.

And in this construction your four primary elements are Fire, Water, Air and Matter, but not Earth which gets its own sub-category.


All in all.... this is kind of a mess.

Here, "Necromancy" is the "darkside" of astral thought and ethereal spirit, relating to the Negative Void rather than the Positive Energy. It is mainly a category to represent the reallife thematic tropes of "necromancy" and "black magic", and is intentionally multischool for a specific genre.

If you find it annoying to separate out Necromancy in this thematic way, I am fine with just making: Conjuration be "Astral Plane with Celestial, Fiend, and Aberration", and Dunomancy be "Ethereal Plane with Fey and Shadow".

But for the sake of organizing popular themes, it can be worthwhile to silo the darkside themes into Necromancy, similar to how Warlock is a go-to for darkside magic themes − generally with effects done by dangerous and evil spirits.


Dunomancy is the stuff of ethereal forces, including gravity and telekinesis, and including the spirit world of the Fey (and Shadow).

Divination is space-time, including seeing across space and time during precognition, traveling across space during teleportation, and traveling across time during time travel or other chronomancy effects.

Yes, the Dunomancy such as gravitational force and the Divination such as space-time are separate areas of specialization because the storytelling tropes are so different from each other. If you want a mage with a more scientific flavor, who understands how both fundamentally interrelate, then choose spells from both the Dunomancy and Divination schools.

Illusion is often made out transient ether, namely a construct of "force" and "magical energy", that behaves virtually as if matter but isnt actually matter. Compare the holodeck of Star Trek. However some illusions involve the alteration of reality itself, a blurriness between subjective reality and objective reality, and result in real matter and actual reality. The concept of manifesting illusion is distinctive enough in stories, and distinctive enough mechanically as statting the objects themselves, to merit its own school specialization. Consider, most stories about mages who create illusions (force constructs) dont necessarily have them be able to fly (dunomancy telekinesis and gravity). They are different themes.

Elemental Planes can easily have Evocation responsible for Earth effects as well as the rest of the elements Air, Water, and Fire. However, so far in D&D, earth effects are consistently Transmutation. I can see the logic of linking Transmutation with Earth, Plant, Beast, thus aspects of the Material Plane generally. In this context, Plant and Beast are creatures made out of solid matter. I have made peace with how D&D separates the Earth Element from the other three "energy" Elements.


Most magic weapons are Divination in the sense of being "lucky". But some magic weapons might be Dunomancy relating to telekinetic aim or whatever. Really any school of magic can have its own rationale for why a weapon is more accurate and deals more damage. It depends on the flavor of the magic.

Consider weaponlike spells: Elemental Weapon is Evocation inflicting elemental energy damage, Magic Weapon is Divination being lucky.

Spiritual Weapon is tricky, some aspects are Illusion in the sense of a quasi-real force construct, but it actually deals Force damage and doesnt behave like an actual weapon would. Mainly the Force damage makes it a force effect of Dunomancy. If the quasi-real object dealt weapon damage (Pierce, Slash, Bludgeon), it would be fully an Illusion.

Some spells cover the concept of one school, but the way that the spell description is actually worded makes it belong to an other school. For example, Mage Armor generally the covers the idea of force armor that repels attacks thus would be Dunomancy, but is actually written to be more like a quasi-real Illusion.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Who on earth ever said that? Not me. I never even implied it. A few spells had multiple schools as appropriate, and I don't recall a spell having more than two. You're divination/enchantment spell would be one of them. Fireball and a million others would not be.

It would show up on arcane, divine or primal, yes.

Those are not schools, so no it wouldn't show up on multiple lists unless the spell is determined by WotC to be on more than one for some other reason that has nothing to do with multiple schools.

What does any of that have to do with the primal, arcane and divine lists?

So you are saying Protection from Elements could not be on all three lists? It doesn't make sense to have it be a protection spell (abjuration) and elemental spell (evocation) and a spell that alters the person it is cast on (Transmutation)? You don't think a reasonable argument could be made that the divine version of the spell works differently and on different principles than the Arcane version?

I mean, think of Chaos Bolt. It deals elemental damage so it has to be evocation, right? Except it also does psychic, so it has to be enchantment, because all pyschic damage spells are enchantment. But it could also be conjuration because it summons acid, just like Acid Splash.

So three or more schools can make sense, and then you may have the spell list tags written as well. You seem utterly confused by this, but it was your own suggestion, I just showed how it could be done.