Sorcerers and Wasted Spell Slots

[Pax]

My preference for Sorcerers is to make small mods

#1 - They do get bonus spells based on CHA stat. This gives a tiny amount more needed versititility and IMO is still balanced.

Sorcerors already get bonus spells for high Charisma.

[EDIT]
Celebrim, bravo to you, sir or madame, your stance is pretty well compatible to my own. Well said!
[/EDIT]

 

[Petrosian]

A sorceror of illusions would likely take Invisibility, but taking Improved Invisibility later also is just too impractical.

We must play in very different games.

In my games, invisibility and improved invisibility are radically different spells used for usually totally different purposes. invisibility has strategic duration and very little tactical use... its primary strength, 10 minutes per level, is lost in combat entirely. its main functions are for scout/recon and stealth penetration.

Improved invisibility has enormous tactical implications and is too short a duration for most stealth/recon uses. Also as a higher level spell, it is not available as frequently or in numbers to allow entire party uses.

As such, i have seen sorcers use both spells, to great effect.

its not an automatic "loss" to take both.

 

[Petrosian]

Is there nothing that you were able to do really well 5 or 10 years ago that you can no longer do or no longer do as well because you've not concentrated on developing or maintaining that skill?

Since you use this as your example question... is this the requirement in your game? Does the character have to have not used the spell or feat for, lets be lenient, a minimum of 3 years game time before they can ask for "chosen amnesia."

Did you the person, not the player or the character DECIDE to one day stop remembering how to sight the rifle thingy? Do the characters in your game keep track of 'how long since" and have to make perhaps INT checks to see if they remember how after say 1 year, then more difficult checks later.

More importanly, if they run into a case where they need that sleep spell, can they sit down with a manual for a day and get it back? if so what happened to the other spell which they have been using?

All in all, while it makes for good sound bites, a SYSTEm where the player chooses at point X that his character swaps out spell X for spell Y DOES NOT do anythoing close to a reasonable job at representing the "did not use it so lost it" memory thing you seem to be wishing to use to justify it.

Perhaps if you were toi give us unenlightend folk the thing your "swapper" system is trying to represent with its mechanics (its clearly not forgetfullness) we can gain insight.

Right now it seems to be trying to represent nothing IN GAME just a mechanical class issue... you want sorcerers to have flexi-slots... and the whole "i forgot riding my bike" thing is not ringing true.

 

[KarinsDad]

Anyway...this was fun.

Agreed.

 

[KarinsDad]

In the case of a newish player with a Sorcerer that wasn't perfectly min/maxed, I'd only worry if the Sorcerer wasn't able to contribute meaningfully to play. If the Sorcerer isn't fully min/maxed, that's actually great because otherwise, he'd look a little cookie cutter. Ok, so Sleep and Mage Armor are some of the 1st level spells you know, and your now 10th level. So what. You don't have to be fully min/maxed to be fun to play, and besides....

Exactly. I feel this way for any player, let alone newish ones.

Besides, Sleep still works great for some things in town encounters and Mage Armor can still be used creatively such as the Fighter's armor gets destroyed by an opponent (which should probably happen more often in games), or you attempt to rescue a damsel in distress who is not wearing armor, hence, you buff her up during the rescue.

Just because spells are not very combat effective anymore does not make them worthless.

2) The second situation is a cunning min/maxer trying his best to weedle every little advantage out of me that he can. This falls into the category of annoying. Ok, so you took Sleep and Mage Armor at 1st level, because at 1st level that's some of the best spells in the game, and NOW, after using those spells to good effect to survive to 9th level you want to drop those spells out for Shield (because you just got Bracers of Defence +4) and Burning Hands (which you intend to drop into your new Sculpt Spell feat). I DON'T THINK SO. Next you'll be wanting to swap out Toughness (after using it to stay alive through levels 1-4), for Greater Spell Focus. The game is not about having the most cewl tricked out character that you can have under the rules. The game is about role playing, and if you are trying to define your character solely by what he can do, you are missing the point.

I think this is the biggest reason why the Sorcerer Swap question comes up in the first place. Joe Minmaxer wants to get his cake and eat it too.

I think your message here expressed my feelings on the topic much better than anything I posted.