Quick Question: Wizard from D&D transports to our world. Can they still do magic?

[Sunseeker]

Judgement call.

Depends on how you view the universe and where your wizard draws his power from.

Does his power come from local magic? Ie: the more magical energy in an area, the more spells he can cast? Or does his power come from a link to the magical "ether", the plane of magic, or some other kind of trans-dimensional link to a power source?

The first case requires a secondary clause: how does magic exist within the universe? Are all planets equally linked to the magical plane, and their inhabitants are simply more, or less capable of utilizing it? Or do some planets/planes exist nearer or further from a magical "core"? At this point it's up to you to determine which one our Earth is. Are we magical, but inept? Or are we non-magical?

If we are magical and inept, your wizard draws magic as he normally would.
If we are not magical, your wizard has no power to draw from.
--To this end, you may scale down his spell slots, ie: Our Earth is not devoid of magic, but so dry, nothing higher than a 1st level spell can be cast
If you wizard possesses a trans-dimensional link to the forces that empower him (or said forces are internal), then he draws magic as usual.

 

[steelsteve]

In my world, magic can only be directly used by mortals via use of something like the Faerun Weave, though mine works a lot more like a magical field. However, Deities, devils, demons and other such immortals must use Souls of the dead in order to use magic, but they are immortal so their understanding of magic, though temporary, allows them to use that ability to it's fullest (interesting when the cleric finds this out, they usually freak out)

So for my world, the answer is that magic is different in different worlds. If the wizard can learn how to use magic in a different world, then they can use magic. It's just a learning curve

 

[haakon1]

I haven't done a scenario like this in about 20 years, but in the game I ran, yes, magic worked normally in the Real World. Which means there were some few, rare spellcasters and magic items lying about, which made sense of the Indiana Jones-esque scenario I was running.

I also decided guns work in the D&D world, but new ammo can't be created there, and electronics are destroyed by the electroshock of entering D&D world.

But you, of course, can do whatever you like.

Another idea would be to have magic only work in certain areas . . . I would choose Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, and perhaps obvious "magical" places like Stonehenge.

 

[Greenfield]

We had a creative team running our D&D campaign for many years, and on a few occasions our characters found themselves in the "Magic Kingdom", aka Disneyland.

It was an odd experience. There used to be an assay office in Frontierland, and it was an actual, legal assay office which could assess the purity of gold or gold ore, and pay you for it. Later, the bank on Main Street was set up to do currency exchange for travelers, and there are a few coinages that are legal tender, and are precious metal based. The South African Krugerand, the Chinese Panda and the Canadian Maple Leaf are all gold or silver coins, legal tender whose exchange rate is based on the current gold or silver fixings.

Or characters were offered two types of money in exchange for their gold and silver: One was a gray-green paper money, and the other was a colorful and artistic form of paper money. Not being dummies, we elected for good stuff (aka Disney Dollars). At the time, a gold piece was equal to about $100, American, so we were well funded.

We determined that the place was created by the Arch-Mage Disney, and expanded upon by someone known as Sleeping Beauty (she apparently built the castle). Current king was named Arthur, and the court wizard was someone named Merlin (There's a show where a guest gets to draw a sword from a stone, to be temporary king while Arthur is away.) We also figured out why there were only seven Dwarves know to reside in the entire kingdom: There's no beer available, anywhere.

We figured that the kingdom was under siege, because apparently the entire countryside had taken refuge within the outer walls of the town. Either that or it was a festival of some sort, since the people didn't seem scared and there was no one attempting to pace food or drink consumption to survive a long siege.

Our Cleric (devotee of Bachus, and therefore always a bit drunk) managed to get himself onto the Pirates of the Carribean ride and came out in a near panic. He'd seen talking Skeletons that he couldn't Turn, they were selling some of the women, and the whole foundational sub-layer under the town was on fire. And worst yet (from his point of view) they'd had wine and rum that wasn't available anywhere else in the town.

Several of us invested in goods from this obviously rich and magical place. And, oddly, while we'd spend a fraction of a gold piece on some item, they'd wrap it in a piece of paper that, in our world, was worth a gold piece all by itself. We bout good glassware (A dozen goblets or drinking glasses, all adorned with some stylized were-rat image, but all good clear glass, no bubbles, and all *exactly* alike. The work of master craftsmen, obviously.) Blank journals from the book store were also popular. We nearly emptied the shop. (1st edition D&D, paper was 1 gp per sheet, and we were buying bound volumes with 100 or more sheets in each one for one-tenth of a gold piece.) We also went nuts at the candy and spice shops.

One of our adventures sent us the "The city of Saint Francis", or as we know it San Francisco. We had to find our way from the known portal at Disneyland to San Francisco.

We decided to travel by sea, so we tried to get to the harbor. Not hard to find, since Disney Land is on Harbor Boulevard (for those not familiar with the geography). We bought a sailboat (yes, we'd also gotten the drab, gray-green money as well as the good stuff.)

Along the way we leaned the differences in magic. Control was an issue, and some effects were amplified. A Fireball, for example was effectively Widened. We tested it over the water and had the Coast Guard out, thinking we had sent up an emergency signal of some sort. We determined to be careful with magic, since no one here seemed to actually know any. (Even the "wizard" in Disney had demonstrated little more than Cantrips.

Other effects were just plain modified. When, in the Hait/Ashbury district of San Francisco, one of the characters used a Mount spell, they ended up with a VW Microbus (baby blue with flowers), and when the Demon we were chasing tried to summon more demons to his aid he got the local chapter of the Hell's Angels.

Needless to say, our DM had a sense of humor.

 

[gamerprinter]

Of course, any homebrew or specific published setting could have cosmic rules that differ from the other established worlds/planes of D&D. For example my Kaidan setting of Japanese horror (PFRPG) has some similarities to Ravenloft, in being a closed plane. Rather than being a demiplane of shadow, Kaidan is a planar bubble that coexists with another prime material plane (and moves periodically from one prime to another prime material). It physically resembles an archipelago of islands surrounded by sea (and usually appears in the ocean somewhere on an existing prime material plane.) The cosmology of Kaidan is the Great Buddhist Wheel with various prime materials, yomi the land of the dead, and jigoku hell. Note, however, that yomi is a pocket ethereal plane and only connected to Kaidan - one cannot enter the ethereal plane from elsewhere and gain access to Kaidan. Jigoku is one of the planes of the Abyss, and as an abyssal plane gaining access and exit is problematic at best.

Unlike other prime materials, divine magic though accessed through specific deities are filtered through the Wheel of Life construct. However, neither deities nor artifacts can enter Kaidan without 'permission' by the powers that control the Wheel of Life. Conversely, traveling by sailing ship in a given prime material one can travel to and disembark in Kaidan, as well as leaving Kaidan (though like Ravenloft the borders can be closed to prevent this), however, magical means of access: flight, plane shift, teleportation do not function as a means to gain access to or from Kaidan. Within the borders of Kaidan, one can fly and teleport, as long as such movement isn't used to exit Kaidan.

Of course keep in mind, that any given published setting doesn't by default change what is possible or not possible within the canon rules of how planar travel works. Just because this, or a given d20 setting rules guide allows for magic to function in all realms (mentioned by somebody on a previous post) doesn't mean that magic definitely works on every plane, because a 3PP books said it could - that doesn't necessarily change canon rules.

 

[Slippery_Chicken]

[If earth has usable magic, then don't sweat it. Just continue being a wizard]

[Assuming earth is dead magic/null magic]

1. Cast Invoke Magic (this explicitly works in dead magic planes).
2. Cast a spell 4th level or lower to transport out of the plane (several of these exist)
3. Cast Planar Bubble (emulating a plane where magic works), ideally persisted.
4. Return to real world.
5. Use magic like a boss.

OR

1. Take Initiate of Mystra.
2. Go to earth.
3. Make some CL checks.
4. Use magic like a boss.

 

[captnq]

No.

No.

If you use D&D immortal rules, which was the best cosmological explination of dimensional rules that was published, normal dimensions have 5 dimensions, this allows for god-like magic. Dimensions with only 4 dimensional only allow mortal magic, and 3 dimensional planes, like earth, have no magic. Also it's why our technology fails in other dimensions. our technology is only stable in three dimensional universes. Stuff like gas and dynamite tend to explode in magical universes.