Running my first specialty mage

[Greenfield]

Funny story there.

Our fighter7/Halfdragon3 fighter and our Rogue/Wizard came in together, and their arrangement is that the Fighter works for that mage. Officially, he's a hireling.

My Beguiler1/Wiz4/Ultimate Magus3 fully approves of this sort of arrangement. As mentioned earlier, his schtick is "I get others to do my dirty work for me".

In fact, his own backstory is that he was the sponsor of another party member, the Wizard/Cleric. And when asked, he admitted that he hooked her up with this party specifically with the idea of getting her to do his dirty work for him.

So while the don't like the frankness of his admission, he's not telling them anything that they didn't already know and agree to. It's just one of those truths that they'd prefer not to think about.

The players are perfectly fine with the character's attitude. It makes for some interesting in-game interactions, of course. The Fighter is wondering, if the other mage pays him to fight, why aren't I paying him?

And my answer is, of course, that when something attacks us, it's not as if he wasn't going to fight the thing anyway. And he hasn't asked anyone else in the party to cough up. So he'll get my buffing spells, and he'll get my summoned monsters as his allies in combat, and he'll also have to put up with me saying, "I have every confidence in you, lad!" when he's in the thick of it.

Oddly, he has a Runestaff that contains Polymorph, Alter Self, Shrink Item, and both Enlarge and Reduce person. Something you'd expect more from a Transformation specialist.

 

[Greenfield]

Okay, new question:

Presume that you're a hard-nosed DM, skeptical of the Decanter of Endless BS (tm) that one or more of your players seems to own. One such player has a new character that starts to play with Monster Summoning spells, Alter Self and Polymorph.

He wants to turn someone into an Anis Hag. Do you question how he knows about such a creature? If so, how do you decide whether he does?

Similarly, he wants to use Alter Self to turn into an Avarial Elf (winged) to scout around. How do you adjudicate whether he has any way of knowing that such a creature exists?

Do you presume that he knows what a Yeth Hound is when he wants to cast Summon Monster IV? Does that knowledge come intrinsic to the spell, or does he have to make some Knowledge check first?

 

[xigbar]

Okay, new question:

Presume that you're a hard-nosed DM, skeptical of the Decanter of Endless BS (tm) that one or more of your players seems to own. One such player has a new character that starts to play with Monster Summoning spells, Alter Self and Polymorph.

He wants to turn someone into an Anis Hag. Do you question how he knows about such a creature? If so, how do you decide whether he does?

Similarly, he wants to use Alter Self to turn into an Avarial Elf (winged) to scout around. How do you adjudicate whether he has any way of knowing that such a creature exists?

Do you presume that he knows what a Yeth Hound is when he wants to cast Summon Monster IV? Does that knowledge come intrinsic to the spell, or does he have to make some Knowledge check first?

Wizards even have the edge in metagame. With a high intelligence, knowledge of whatever lets you know of the oddities. Most of the best combat forms are things that would be well known, such as aforementioned troll forms, and a related knowledge check can otherwise be made.

 

[RUMBLETiGER]

He wants to turn someone into an Anis Hag. Do you question how he knows about such a creature? If so, how do you decide whether he does?

Similarly, he wants to use Alter Self to turn into an Avarial Elf (winged) to scout around. How do you adjudicate whether he has any way of knowing that such a creature exists?

in one campaign ruled that one needs to have studied the anatomy of the creature in question to Polymorph, which usually meant you needed to kill one first and have time to poke at the remains. The PC's first forms were a Deer, a Pelican and a Dog. As adventures progressed, more forms were acquired from experience. Studying books with notes on anatomy also counted.
As for assuming the forms of Humanoids like with Alter Self, having seen the creature at least once before was sufficient.
No Knowledge checks, Role Played experiences.

I've only tried that once, all other times assumed you Polymorphed whatever.

Do you presume that he knows what a Yeth Hound is when he wants to cast Summon Monster IV? Does that knowledge come intrinsic to the spell, or does he have to make some Knowledge check first?

Now this I've never ruled on, I just assumed the casting of the spell allowed you to reach out and know what your options were, like reaching into a Haversack lets you pull out what you were looking for, and you already know all the options of things within the bag. However I'd assume you could come up with a ruling like my take on Polymorph.

 

[Li Shenron]

I am getting completely lost in this discussion of polymorphing spells...

[MENTION=6669384]Greenfield[/MENTION], do you want to play a Summoner or not?

Realize, that even if you select the "wizard specialization: conjuration" mechanical option, this is not going to make a conjurer/summoner. What makes you such wizard, is selecting a good array of summoning spells plus some other spells that gives good synergy, then actually using those spells during the adventures.

 

[kitcik]

Unfortunately, logic would say that wizards make notes on the best polymorph forms, in as much detail is necessary to polymorph into them, then put the notes in books which may be sold, stolen, or otherwise transferred (especially upon death).

Therefore, a good argument can be made that wizards can learn the best polymorph subjects.

Of course, if you have no Anis Hags or Avarial Elves in your world...

Another tactic is to add a material component - a piece of a body that you have killed yourself (similar to [MENTION=6674868]RUMBLETiGER[/MENTION] 's suggestion).

 

[Greenfield]

I am getting completely lost in this discussion of polymorphing spells...

@Greenfield , do you want to play a Summoner or not?

Realize, that even if you select the "wizard specialization: conjuration" mechanical option, this is not going to make a conjurer/summoner. What makes you such wizard, is selecting a good array of summoning spells plus some other spells that gives good synergy, then actually using those spells during the adventures.

I'm not the one who started the Polymorph discussion.

Like I said, though, this is my first Specialty wizard, so I'm still poking around a bit, exploring my options.

Summoned critters have their uses, in combat situations. But because their effective life is so short, they're less than useful for other applications.

By the same token though, Polymorph doesn't last very long either, so discussions of turning into a Lurker in order to get flight are kind of pointless as well. Fly lasts just as long, and is a lower level spell. Alter Self lasts ten times longer, and includes the Avarial as an option, if I want to fly. Much more useful in most situations.

But a Conjuration specialist is more than just Summon Monster XXVII. It's a whole school of magic, with dozens of other options. I'm just kind of exploring everything that that school includes.

But that doesn't exclude the use of most of the other schools, and we shouldn't pretend that it does.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

Yeah, conjuration has a lot of spells. I like battlefield control, so fog/cloud spells, evard's hentai nightmare, wall spells, etc... are all cool. Group needs to be on board, though. Tried playing my BFC sorcerer in one game where the party was melee heavy and LOVED to rush into combat as fast as possible and got very vocally angry when my spells prevented them from doing that, regardless of how much it turned the battle in our favor. *sigh*

Teleportation also has uses other than taxi service. Dimension Step from PHB2 is great to move the party into position, for example. Benign Tranposition (from a wand, there's no save and you'll seldom care if it's 150 ft instead of 110 ft or whatever) is handy, as is Baleful Transposition against enemies with weak will saves.

 

[Greenfield]

This makes me think we should start a few new threads to explore this...

 

[Li Shenron]

I'm not the one who started the Polymorph discussion.

Like I said, though, this is my first Specialty wizard, so I'm still poking around a bit, exploring my options.

Ok, cool What I meant to say is that in general you don't have to think that your Wizard is really a specialist just because you have chosen the Wiz specialization school. In fact, it's only a bonus spell per level, and actually when you choose that mechanical option, the choice of barred schools IMHO ends up often being more important, to the point that when I want to play a "specialist", I usually don't pick this option but I just pick my known spells mostly from my chosen school, but without restrictions.

But a Conjuration specialist is more than just Summon Monster XXVII. It's a whole school of magic, with dozens of other options. I'm just kind of exploring everything that that school includes.

But that doesn't exclude the use of most of the other schools, and we shouldn't pretend that it does.

Definitely. However I would advise you that IMHO the beauty of playing a specialist lies exactly in focusing on some types of spells that fit together in a theme, whether they belong to the same school or not. Conjuration has a lot of different stuff, perhaps second only to Transmutation, but even if you choose only Conjuration spells your Wiz may not "feel" much a specialist exactly because maybe those spells have not enough in common beside their "Conj" label

You're right however that Summon Monster X is quite unfortunately limited to combat, and a few other quick things. But there are also longer-term summoning spells to be found, take a look also at non-core books.