Sorcerers and Wasted Spell Slots

[Arnix]

Is there a way that a sorcerer could get rid of one of their known spells and replace it with another spell?

Desc: A sorcerer takes a spell early in his career and later discovers that the spell is pretty "useless" to him at higher levels. He wants to replace that first level spell with another first level spell that will be more useful at this high level.

Ex: Sorcerer takes magic missile at 1st level. At 9th level he finds that shield spell would have been more useful.

Is there any way to change some of the spells? I know that there are "chains of spells" that can be replaced with feats, but I am curious about non-chained spells.


Thanks,
Arnix (tm)

 

[KarinsDad]

No, not without a house rule.

However, Metamagic feats are a Sorcerers best friend since they can cast them on the fly with a full round action.

For example:

Empowered Empowered Sleep

Empowered Empowered Magic Missile

Heightened Heightened Empowered Empowered Sleep

 

[mikebr99]

And there are feats in T&B to add extra known spells or extra castings of existing spells.

Or... you could pick up one of the PrCs with the spellpool class ability, and never have to worry about which spells you have in your head ever again!!

 

[Henry]

Heightened Heightened Empowered Empowered Sleep

Say goodbye to that horde of kobolds...

One house rule which actually has WotC precedent is using limited wish and wish spells to permanently remove spells from a sorcerer's repertiore, allowing them to add others. In the FRCS, and the Epic Handbook, The Simbul from the Realms does it all the time...

 

[Uller]

Is there a way that a sorcerer could get rid of one of their known spells and replace it with another spell?

I allow players to make reasonable changes to "permanent" choices like spells know and even skills and feats. It isn't explicitly denied by the rules...but I don't really want a debate...so call it a house rule if it makes you happy.

Why? As a DM, I generally don't pick spells, feats and skills for NPCs that have been rendered useless by level or other choices. If I give high level sorcerer improved invisibility, I'm unlikely to give him insivibility unless I think the character really has a use for both spells (maybe sometimes he doesn't want to waste a 4th level spell to be invisibile). This frees me from having to think what the NPC was like when he was lower level and allows me to build him the way I want. So I afford my players the same freedom. At 3rd level, they don't have to worry too much about what they'll be like at 8th. So they can pick abilities that are fun NOW as opposed to having to wait several levels.

Like I said, though...this has to be REASONABLE. I wouldn't allow a rogue who is constantly using diplomacy to suddenly swap out ranks in that in order to gain ranks in a skill he never uses just to qualify for some prestige class or something. But at the same time, if a player is unhappy with a particular aspect of his character because of a bad choice that has lead to a useless ability or spell, I'll let him change it. After all, the game is supposed to be fun and if a player feels his character is not fun and/or would be more fun with a small change then that's a good thing.

From a RP perspective, I figure people change over time. For instance, I played hockey as a kid. I haven't played any serious hockey in 12 years and now most of my hockey related skills have attrophied. Sure...they're not gone and if I worked at it, I could gain them back, but in the interim I've gained new skills. PCs probably do this too. A sorcerer who relied on a sleep spell for his first several levels might find at high level he doesn'y use that any more and has been practicing a new spell. So he "forgets" or "loses" his sleep ability and gains magic missile or some such...

As long as players are reasonable about it, I haven't had a problem with it.

 

[Pielorinho]

I agree with Uller -- it's a very reasonable houserule.

For myself, I'd probably only allow them to swap out for more powerful versions of their given spells: an 8th-level sorcerer with summon monster III on her spell list might swap it out for summon monster IV, and fill the 3rd-level slot with a fireball. She couldn't, however, swap SMIII for fireball if she were taking Otiluke's Resilient Sphere for her 4th-level spell.

Daniel

 

[IceBear]

I agree it's a reasonable house rule (and one that Bioware seems to play with ), but the DM must be careful. The main disadvantage of the sorcerer over the wizard is the fact that their spells could become "useless" at a later time. If all of these difficult choices are removed from the sorcerer, it *could* be unbalanced to the wizards. Again, depending on the group this could be a moot point.

IceBear

 

[Uller]

The main disadvantage of the sorcerer over the wizard is the fact that their spells could become "useless" at a later time. If all of these difficult choices are removed from the sorcerer, it *could* be unbalanced to the wizards. Again, depending on the group this could be a moot point.

Maybe. But theoretically (maybe not in practice), a sorcerer and a wizard of the same level and wealth should be balanced regardless of their history of choices. So as long as you don't let the sorcerer go repicking their spells everytime the wizard is preparing spells from his spell book you should be fine. In other words, I wouldn't allow the sorcerer to pick new spells based on knowledge of what's going to happen in the short term ("The next adventure is going to be against fire giants? Can I switch ghost sound for ray of frost?" "No."). But if they want to base it on long term trends, I don't have a problem. ("All we ever fight is undead. Can I switch Daze for Disrupt Undead?" "Sure.")

 

[IceBear]

Oh I know Uller. You seem to be a very reasonable DM and I know that any house rule you use would work well in your group (I actually tend to agree with just about everything you post). Just pointing out possible issues to "the rookies" - not that there seem to be any of those on here

IceBear

 

[Li Shenron]

As a DM, I generally don't pick spells, feats and skills for NPCs that have been rendered useless by level or other choices.

I am curious about which spells become "useless" at high levels, can you please give a few examples? We are still stuck at low levels ...

Do you mean spells which have a cap, like a HD limit on affected creatures, which are rarely useful when your foes are now all big and ugly? BTW, there is a nice meatamagic feat somewhere which moves the cap up, but if I remember right it's very expensive in terms of spell slot.