Spell Point System to Replace Standard Spell Progression?

[Sundragon2012]

Also The Elements of Magic.. authored by a board resident here named Ranger Wicket. It can be bought from RPGnow.

Does The Elements of Magic deal with non-wizard casters? I like the freeform magic idea but I would like if for all casters in my setting. The reviews I have read thus far seem to indicate that The Elements of Magic is focused on the magic of wizards.


Chris

 

[Jack Simth]

With a handful of exceptions, until after about level 17, the increase pattern is 3, 3, 5, 5, 7, 7, 9, 9, 11, 11, 13, 13, 15, 15, 17, 17, et cetera. A simple case of "each level, you gain 1+Your New Caster Level spell points" would fit fairly closely, starting with 5 points at level 1 (note that there is a fairly strong divergence at the last few levels, due primarily to the lack of a new spell level for the wizard to gain naturally after about 18th):
1--5
2--8
3--12
4--17
5--23
6--30
7--38
8--47
9--57
10-68
11-80
12-93
13-107
14-122
15-138
16-155
17-173
18-192
19-212
20-233

 

[boolean]

Level --Points
1--5
2--8
3--11
4--16
5--20
6--27
7--34
8--43
9--52
10--63
11--74
12--87
13--100
14--115
15--130
16--147
17--164
18--183
19--191
20--201

There is one major problem with copying the PHB progression with a spell point system, and it's that a wizard can use his entire spell point allotment on his highest level spells.

By the PHB, a 17th level wizard can cast one 9th level spell per day. Maybe one extra for 24+ Intelligence, and one for specialization.

With this system, he can burn all 160 points for sixteen 9th level spells.

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

TEOM, at the core mechanical standpoint, is a purely classless system.

Caster Level drives how many spell points you gain, how many lists you may know, and how many 'free' cantrips you get.

In order to replicate a class, you limit the spell lists available. How the caster actually casts the spells are entirely fluff. If you want to keep the arcane/divine divide you can easily set up the Mage as not having access to the Heal list. Most of TEOM: LA {the second book} is dedicated to fleshing out various versions of casters and includes a write up of how to handle all the Core DnD classes in the system.

One of the best aspects, IMO, of the system is that it seperates the fluff from the crunch. The descriptions of the spell effects can vary widly based on the character casting it even tho the mechanics are exactly the same.

An example of this is the following spell, named either Heat Object/Emolation...

Evoke: Fire 4/ Gen 1
Short range {30 feet} attack deals 1D6 damage to target for 1 minute. Fort save for half damage.

Described as either:

The Druid gestures and barks an ancient, gutteral sound. Suddenly your weapon, armor, clothes.. and even your skin become red hot. Your blood boils in your veins as pain lances through your very being.

or

Tim the Enchanter gestures.. a bolt of Fire lances across the battlefield striking Sir Robin. The flames cling and grow, ungulfing Sir Robin.. his screams of pain joining the crackling of flesh and almost drowning out his bardic troupe.

..eh.. the spell is the equivilent of a 3rd level spell and highlights a couple of the different things. First is the duration Second is their is usually only an attack roll or a saving roll, not both. Third.. power of preparation...Resistance to Fire 5 pretty much negates this spell.

You would have to be a 5th level caster to cast this, as the system caps spell point cost in normal casting to your CL. Ritual spells, which can take days or even years, can exceed this.


One of the other great things about TEOM is the available support. Take a peek in theEnworld Publishing Forum and you will find numerous threads discussing TEOM and how far we can stretch it

{edit.. noticed last line of above post}
Any spell point system will allow the caster to burn max power spells... the balance to this is a matter of pacing. If you have 1 encounter a day the spell point caster can burn points at will.. appearing massively overpowered. OTOH, if your player knows that there will be more encounters, potentially harder ones... they will conserve points as much as possible... appearing weaker overall. A good game will burn them out of points occasionally, but leave them with a small amount of excess most of the time.
The other balance to this is reducing the power of the spells in question.

 

[Cheiromancer]

Well, this is the system that fits the chart in the book (roughly speaking- Jack Smith does it better), but it doesn't have the properties I remembered it having. It nerfs low level wizards, and gives you 17th level wizards with 16 9th level spells.

I think the variant I wanted was the following: same point value for spells (cantrip = 1, 9th level spell = 10), but wizards get a flat 5 points per level.

Up until level 9 or so the power will be about the same as the current wizard, but it will start to drop behind at higher levels. The 17th level wizard has 85 points, and so can cast 8 9th level spells if he likes. But if the DM throws 4 encounters at his group between rests it will make him very short on spells. Especially if there are any buffs, rope tricks, teleports, etc. between encounters.

Sorry for the memory lapse; I remembered that the power of the PHB wizard (expressed in spell points) increased like a quadratic (gets steeper as time goes on), and I remembered that my spellpoint system matched the PHB at low levels but was weaker than at high levels, but I forgot that the two weren't the same.

 

[Sundragon2012]

There is one major problem with copying the PHB progression with a spell point system, and it's that a wizard can use his entire spell point allotment on his highest level spells.

By the PHB, a 17th level wizard can cast one 9th level spell per day. Maybe one extra for 24+ Intelligence, and one for specialization.

With this system, he can burn all 160 points for sixteen 9th level spells.

I believe that the problem of a hypothetical 14th level mage using 115 availavble points on 7th level spells could be solved by a simple cap on the number of spells usable per level. For example, maybe said wizard would be limited to 6 spells of each level per day maximum. This would allow for the desired flexibility and yet would impose reasonable limitations on the use of any given spell level.


Chris

 

[Tatsukun]

I believe that the problem of a hypothetical 14th level mage using 115 availavble points on 7th level spells could be solved by a simple cap on the number of spells usable per level. For example, maybe said wizard would be limited to 6 spells of each level per day maximum. This would allow for the desired flexibility and yet would impose reasonable limitations on the use of any given spell level.


Chris

Or perhaps, one might say, limited to "2 7th level spells, 3 of 6th and 5th, 4 each of the rest". Of course, that's the PHB right there.

-Tatsu

 

[Thanee]

There is one major problem with copying the PHB progression with a spell point system, and it's that a wizard can use his entire spell point allotment on his highest level spells.

By the PHB, a 17th level wizard can cast one 9th level spell per day. Maybe one extra for 24+ Intelligence, and one for specialization.

With this system, he can burn all 160 points for sixteen 9th level spells.

Exactly. It makes them much more powerful.

Sure, if you do this for all classes, you retain the balance between the spellcasters.

But what about the balance between non-spellcasters and spellcasters?

The latter already overshadow the first at higher levels *without* the added flexibility!

Sorry to say so, but there is no simple way. You need to completely rework the system to make that work.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Sundragon2012]

Or perhaps, one might say, limited to "2 7th level spells, 3 of 6th and 5th, 4 each of the rest". Of course, that's the PHB right there.

-Tatsu

I think that there is a big difference between a broad limit of perhaps 6 spells of any level then the more restrictive PHB system.


Chris

 

[dcollins]

Does anyone know of such a system?

Another way of looking at it is that the "Sorcerer" was the 3rd Ed. authors' attempt to insert a "spell-points" something into the core rules. You might consider allowing only Sorcerers in your campaign world, no Wizards.