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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Corathon" data-source="post: 3099159" data-attributes="member: 22238">I think the intent in 1E is that a spell with a casting time of less than 1 round will go off the same round that it is cast, regardless of the throw of initiative.In 1E AD&D, the initiative roll doesn't affect when a spell goes off. Casting, for example,  a magic missile spell takes 1 segment to cast, and the will go off unless the magic user casting it takes damage in the 1st segment.  If that magic user is being attacked by, say, a fighter with a longsword, the attack will come in the segment given by the difference between a longsword's speed factor (5) and the losing initiative die (considered to always be a positive number). So the losing initiative die would have to be a 4, 5, or 6 for a fighter in melee to get a chance to interrupt the magic missile spell in the example above. The losing initiative die tends to be a low number, so casting a magic missile (or other short spell) is a good risk, even in melee.On the other hand, if the magic user was casting cone of cold (5 segment casting time), the spell will be interrupted if he is hit in segments 1-5. The same attacker with a longsword will alwaysalways get an attack at the magic user in this case, as the difference between 5 and the losing initiative die will always be a number between 0 and 5. Of course, in either case, the attacker might miss, in which case the spell would go off anyway.</blockquote>