Should Clerics and Druids Be Vancian?

[Mercule]

I don't really care whether clerics are Vancian or not. It's always bugged me, though, that clerics and wizards worked the same -- especially when psions are different.

Actually, I think I'm going to have to go with the idea that clerics should, baseline, be Vancian, just because 5E is supposed to be a unifying edition and changing it would be divisive. Ideally, one of the first "added complexity factors" that would be released would be a shiny way to change either divine or arcane casters that really caught on and became the new standard.

 

[The Human Target]

Not if they want me to play one.

 

[WheresMyD20]

I think the core magic system will be Vancian, since 0e - 3.5e were all Vancian (yes, 3e had the Sorcerer and such, but they were more of an exception rather than the baseline). I think we'll also get at least one non-Vancian optional magic system on release day.

 

[Incenjucar]

I don't really care whether clerics are Vancian or not. It's always bugged me, though, that clerics and wizards worked the same -- especially when psions are different.

Actually, I think I'm going to have to go with the idea that clerics should, baseline, be Vancian, just because 5E is supposed to be a unifying edition and changing it would be divisive. Ideally, one of the first "added complexity factors" that would be released would be a shiny way to change either divine or arcane casters that really caught on and became the new standard.

It's probably safe to assume that 5E will revert everything to the methods common in AD&D as the default, and then add its modularity from there. Heck, in 4E, to this day, they seemed to avoid giving us a non-Vancian wizard, even though they were happy to mess around with everything else.

 

[Jeff Carlsen]

As long as the mechanics and the fluff are well integrated, I don't mind either option. I do think the fluff is more interesting if the cleric is actually praying for his spells at the time of casting, which makes a Vancian system a bit awkward.

I would also like to see clerics go back to the spheres concept. Sure, they know every spell available to them, but they shouldn't know every spell available to every cleric. Domains were a nod this concept, but I'd like to see this developed further.

As an option for grittier settings, I'd like a system where a cleric might be denied a spell, or even punished for being overly demanding of their God.