The extreme proliferation of magic in D&D

[mhacdebhandia]

Take Arcana Evolved, and pretend its just someone's homebrew for a second, not a published book. It has changed the classes around, the spellcasting, etc. If you were a Player in that game, would you consider yourself to be playing D&D or would you consider yourself to be playing something else? Take Iron Heroes instead. It has no magic built in (except for the arcanist). If that was someone's homebrew, would it be D&D?

I don't have an answer for that.

I do! They're not D&D, they're d20 fantasy games which hew close to the D&D model.

Other d20 fantasy games don't - Grim Tales is further away from the D&D model both stylistically and mechanically, for instance.

Then there are d20 games which are even further away - I have d20 versions of White Wolf's Adventure! and Aberrant on my shelves, for instance. Mutants and Masterminds is another example.

Now, I think it's harder to answer questions about campaign settings. Midnight changes a great many assumptions of the game - so is it a D&D setting or a d20 setting? What about Oathbound? What about Ravenloft?

 

[SkidAce]

I do! They're not D&D, they're d20 fantasy games which hew close to the D&D model.

Other d20 fantasy games don't - Grim Tales is further away from the D&D model both stylistically and mechanically, for instance.

Then there are d20 games which are even further away - I have d20 versions of White Wolf's Adventure! and Aberrant on my shelves, for instance. Mutants and Masterminds is another example.

Now, I think it's harder to answer questions about campaign settings. Midnight changes a great many assumptions of the game - so is it a D&D setting or a d20 setting? What about Oathbound? What about Ravenloft?

We changed all that stuff since first edition and all the way up to now...it's still DnD and always will be. I remember the debate about "Monty Haul" games...very similiar to what we hear in this thread.

My campaign world is low magic...because the peons are still in awe of clerics and distrustful of wizards..since magic is so rare. Battles between armies are normally decided by tactics and numbers....HOWEVER...the adventuring party has their loot and spells...they and their nemesis...one PC has the artifact that counters the artifact the BBG has...at 10th level. So am I high magic or low magic....?

I reckon it doesn't matter

 

[Sundragon2012]

I think that we should tread carefully when saying that anything outside the base assumptions of D&D isn't D&D. This kind of thinking makes it seem like up until now D&D wasn't D&D either. Call me crazy but 0D&D, AD&D, 2e, 3e and 3.5e are very different systems.

Does the purity and perfection of 3.5e and its assumptions and rules retroactively remove the title D&D from previous versions of the game? Time was when folks happily added variant concepts from Dragon Magazine for example, when settings like Athas and Ravenloft were released and no one would ever have said they weren't D&D. Now, with 3e and 3.5e it seems that purists are crawling out of the woodwork like roaches thinking to dictate what is and what is not D&D.

No other versions of the game, barring that one ridiculous Gygax quote, supported such RAW elitists.


Chris

 

[WayneLigon]

No, but John can certainly spank those deer and moose with his Heavy Crossbow, can't he! He can sure hit them from far off, every time!

Sure, but he can only do it twice since he's prepared the spell twice. He might fell a deer with one shot, but not a moose, even if he crits. Bob can still hunt much better than the wizard.

 

[Merlion]

I think it is a perception issue, which is why I said it is all in people's heads. To some, what you suggest might as well be banishing all magic, because you eliminate 99% of it as compared to what others might consider average magic. To others, what may seem like only a handful of magic items to some is considered cheesy high magic by them (such as your example above of a handful of low power magic items - armor, shield, misc items, and a few scrolls).

If you want to avoid that, you need to establish common ground, or at least common terminology. Perhaps an explicit chart of the amount of magic at various levels and a label next to each as to just how 'high' the magic is. Then you can use that as the basis for a discussion. Without that, you will be doomed to further frustration.

What I think your missing somewhat here is that there is a standard, a common ground, in standard D&D. Their are wealth charts that define the "norm" for Dungeons and Dragons. And I think some of the posters here, myself included to a certain point, are expressing displeasure with that norm, that level of magic...at least as far as magic items.


That, and the fact that that assumption is built into other parts of the game, like the CR system.

 

[Altalazar]

Sure, but he can only do it twice since he's prepared the spell twice. He might fell a deer with one shot, but not a moose, even if he crits. Bob can still hunt much better than the wizard.

Pity the poor wizard who prepares spells all day, then rolls a '1' and misses anyway.

The wizard would not stand a chance as a hunter (compared to Bob) if all he had was the 'true strike.'

 

[Andor]

Sure, but he can only do it twice since he's prepared the spell twice. He might fell a deer with one shot, but not a moose, even if he crits. Bob can still hunt much better than the wizard.

You're in Alabama. Go to any sporting goods store and ask the guy behind the counter who's a better hunter, the guy who can make one perfect shot, or the guy with a pocketfull of ammo.

 

[Agback]

What's the difference, anyway, between a well crafted sword that is completely non-magical, but is +1 to hit and damage and a +1 magic sword.

Are masterwork weapons +1 to damage now? That must really make that first +1 enhancement bonus suck: but you have to start with masterwork to enchant a weapon, don't you?

Answer to your question: the first is much less effective against 10/+1 DR, but much cheaper.

 

[Altalazar]

I think that we should tread carefully when saying that anything outside the base assumptions of D&D isn't D&D. This kind of thinking makes it seem like up until now D&D wasn't D&D either. Call me crazy but 0D&D, AD&D, 2e, 3e and 3.5e are very different systems.

Does the purity and perfection of 3.5e and its assumptions and rules retroactively remove the title D&D from previous versions of the game? Time was when folks happily added variant concepts from Dragon Magazine for example, when settings like Athas and Ravenloft were released and no one would ever have said they weren't D&D. Now, with 3e and 3.5e it seems that purists are crawling out of the woodwork like roaches thinking to dictate what is and what is not D&D.

No other versions of the game, barring that one ridiculous Gygax quote, supported such RAW elitists.

Just for the record, I'm far from a purist. I've played Basic, Expert, I've played 1E, 2E, 3E, 3.5E. I've played in all sorts of different home brews with all sorts of strange variations. I've played Spelljammer and Ravenloft. I'd consider all of the above to be D&D. For me, it is what all of that has in common is what makes it D&D, not any one thing exclusive to any one of them. What specifically relates to this thread is magic, and how it has ALWAYS been core to D&D. Not a single adventure did ended without the distribution of magic items found at the end. Sometimes the pickings were very meager. Sometimes there was only one or two minor items to consider, but there was always something. Magic is central to D&D, like it or lump it. Who could forget all of the magic items in those old, dusty modules, since they were always in bold. What random encounter in the wilderness would be complete without some rotting remains and a dagger+1 hidden in an old tree stump.

So while I'm no purist by any means, reading a module with no bold text anywhere to be found would not be D&D.

 

[Altalazar]

Are masterwork weapons +1 to damage now? That must really make that first +1 enhancement bonus suck: but you have to start with masterwork to enchant a weapon, don't you?

Answer to your question: the first is much less effective against 10/+1 DR, but much cheaper.

If it is a low magic world, there won't be hardly any 10/+1 DR to worry about. So functionally, the masterwork blade in the low magic world is the same as the magic blade in the normal magic world, at least when it comes to hitting. So really it is more a question of flavor than impact on the game mechanics. In other words, it is all in the head.