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<blockquote data-quote="Crazy Jerome" data-source="post: 5972377" data-attributes="member: 54877">On the wizard memory thing, I've also had a small instance of memory loss, though not as dramatic as pemerton's. Mine was a car wreck that initially knocked out about 30 hours of memory, but gradually shrunk down to about 6 hours that never came back. It's just a hole where everyone around me said that I was conscious for most of it, talking and cracking jokes, but it is all gone. &nbsp;This didn't really change my view of wizard memorization in D&amp;D, though other things have. I initially and for a long time time took it, having read and enjoyed Vance, as very much the imposing of an alien presence in the mind, as pemerton mentioned. But research since about study habits have discovered more about how memory works.&nbsp;One of the reason &quot;cramming&quot; can work for a test but not retain knowledge is that you need repetition over time, and in different environments to readily retain and recall things. For example, they have discovered that some people recall things by (subconsciously) associating the memory with colors--such that a book you read in a well-lighted room with green walls is going to be more readily referenced in your head in similar conditions. If you deliberately study something in different environments, the effect seems to get magnified--and then you finally reach a point where you've &quot;got it&quot; no matter what. &nbsp;So I kind of viewed spells as something so difficult to handle that you are pretty much stuck &quot;cramming&quot; to get it to work in any kind of reasonable timeframe. In this conception, theoretically a wizard could study fireball for a decade or so, in all kinds of environments and dangers, and finally cast it on demand--but who has that kind of time? (If you say &quot;elves,&quot; I'm gonna smack you! <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink&nbsp; &nbsp; ;)"&nbsp; data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />) &nbsp;I've moved more towards a mix of that &quot;cramming&quot; option with the former, as I think the &quot;cramming of alien knowledge&quot; into your brain manages to explain the various spell levels and Vancian &quot;forget&quot; adequately enough, while also allowing some room for minor at-will effects and other such exceptions.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Crazy Jerome, post: 5972377, member: 54877"] On the wizard memory thing, I've also had a small instance of memory loss, though not as dramatic as pemerton's. Mine was a car wreck that initially knocked out about 30 hours of memory, but gradually shrunk down to about 6 hours that never came back. It's just a hole where everyone around me said that I was conscious for most of it, talking and cracking jokes, but it is all gone. This didn't really change my view of wizard memorization in D&D, though other things have. I initially and for a long time time took it, having read and enjoyed Vance, as very much the imposing of an alien presence in the mind, as pemerton mentioned. But research since about study habits have discovered more about how memory works. One of the reason "cramming" can work for a test but not retain knowledge is that you need repetition over time, and in different environments to readily retain and recall things. For example, they have discovered that some people recall things by (subconsciously) associating the memory with colors--such that a book you read in a well-lighted room with green walls is going to be more readily referenced in your head in similar conditions. If you deliberately study something in different environments, the effect seems to get magnified--and then you finally reach a point where you've "got it" no matter what. So I kind of viewed spells as something so difficult to handle that you are pretty much stuck "cramming" to get it to work in any kind of reasonable timeframe. In this conception, theoretically a wizard could study [I]fireball[/I] for a decade or so, in all kinds of environments and dangers, and finally cast it on demand--but who has that kind of time? (If you say "elves," I'm gonna smack you! ;)) I've moved more towards a mix of that "cramming" option with the former, as I think the "cramming of alien knowledge" into your brain manages to explain the various spell levels and Vancian "forget" adequately enough, while also allowing some room for minor at-will effects and other such exceptions. [/QUOTE]

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