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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 9886237" data-attributes="member: 4937">One interesting question is could you port Sorcerer into 1e AD&D.  But your solution misses the point that fundamentally the power level of low level M-U's is not excessive.  M-U's only get to be a real problem when the 5th and 6th level spells come online, and they can start doing really game breaking things. They are generally balanced with the other classes between say 3rd and 8th level, and if anything are on the weak side to that point barring the lucky (and allowed) acquisition of some game breaking item like a Wand of Flame with a lot of charges or a Staff of the Magi.  This is even more true if you start applying the whole of the RAW to them, like weapon vs. AC modifiers (the discussion that really launched my series of essays).  I feel sometimes in this thread like the time I met my future brother in law's (then a little high school munchkin) and the friend was telling me about his 30th level Paladin who could kill anything and was currently working his way through the Deities and Demigods, and I was like, "Let's just have a little practice game and let's see if I can kill you with just the Monster manual.", then I proceeded to just murder the Paladin with a pit trap and an eye of the deep, before the then naked Paladin and half-dead Paladin was eaten by a roper.  It didn't take much, just making the game something other than duels on a tournament surface.  I assure everyone, a low level M-U does not survive.  If I ran a game for a party and one had a low level M-U, they would die to something simply from me not trying to avoid killing them; not even vengefully targetting the M-U.  I'm pretty much OK with recharging wands forever, just as long as you put in the time and appropriate spell slots.  I wouldn't let you recharge a wand of polymorph with a 1st level spell, but I would let you say recharge a wand of magic missiles if you knew magic missile. provided you were willing to spend an amount of time and money proportionate to the creation of the item and proportionate to the charges regained.But the last thing we need is a class that is only viable if they find early on rare and highly expensive magical items.Which doesn't help you at 1st level anyway, since you have neither the money nor ability to acquire said exotic materials like griffon's blood and giant squid ink.So, this choice is IMO incoherent (not "I wouldn't use cantrips" but "I wouldn't use cantrips to preserve a low magic setting").  What you end up creating is a setting which is high magic where the PCs are, but which is mysteriously clueless and incompetent regarding something that exists and is actually pervasive with respect to how NPCs behave.  What is coherent is that low level magic is common and familiar because all the evidence is that NPCs live in a world where that is true, but high-level magic is very rare and those that master it deemed consequential.  Otherwise, you are dealing with a problem that the king's guards make no allowance for invisible creatures, castles aren't constructed with the assumption of flying creatures, and merchants don't realize they can be magically swindled and have no defenses against it.  "Only the PCs have magic" is an incoherent choice that leads to dysfunctional play.  You don't have to fill the world with magical wonders like Eberron (though that setting is coherent IMO) but you do have to assume that people live day to day in a world of spirits, fairies, magicians, and werewolves because that's where the PC's are going to end up living, and they aren't unique or special.Even with Gygaxian realism, the presence of high level NPCs is pretty darn prevalent.  "Village of Homlet" would not and absolutely does not get passed my own sensibilities because there are vastly too many high-level NPCs in such a small settlement.</blockquote>

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