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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Altalazar" data-source="post: 2622014" data-attributes="member: 939">A clever truth that's not true?  That's not entirely correct.  You'd not be playing with the default level of magic, but you'd still be playing D&D.  Ah, but no matter what flavor you play, there is definitely magic.  After all, why would anyone bother to go into a dungeon if not for magical treasures?  And if there's no magic, there are no dragons, either.  There doesn't have to be anything cheesy about a lot of magic.  It is just part of the background of it all.  Without it, it is just medieval europe, and that was not a pleasant place to be.  Either you were a lord playing politics, or you were a serf tied to the land as a virtual slave.  There wasn't much of a middle class.  But then we aren't playing history or realty.  We are playing a fantasy game, and magic is the element that most defines it as fantasy rather than just an alternate medieval Europe.  Giant spiders, sentient beasts, flying dragons, NONE of those things exist without magic.  I think it is more pschology than anything else.  If EVERYONE runs around with a +1 sword, so what?  It isn't all that powerful.  Unless you are very low level, that extra plus doesn't mean that much, and why should anyone get upset at all that "magic" being around if today people generally don't get upset with the technology that permeates our existence FAR more than magic permeates in D&D in all but the most super-high magic D&D games.  (Heck, I'm sitting in a room with four computers in my basement, next to eight phone jacks and a cable modem jack with a total computing power probably exceeding the entire capabilities of the Allies during WWII, and it wasn't like that was a low-tech era).  Really, to me, high magic is more like Hogwarts than a bunch of +1 swords.I still find it utterly fascinating how there seems to be a "movement" that is repusled by magic in D&D and seems to consider a good campaign to be one where everyone is perpetually first level, with no resources, no magic, and thus is easily penned into rather limited courses of action.  Really, what harm would there be in every town guard armed with a +1 Sword (something I've never actually seen in any of the highest magic games I've played in)?  In the end, it is just a sword that is very slightly better at hurting things than an ordinary sword and no better at hurting things than a well crafted normal sword.  Would it make a difference if you said there were no magic swords, just five levels of masterwork blades, made of progressively rarer materials and rarer-talented blacksmiths?  The game world mechanic effect would be identical.  As someone already stated, he found a huge difference in a bunch of masterwork blades and +1 blades, even though game-balance wise, they are IDENTICAL.  So I think it is really just all in people's heads - there's nothing wrong with magic or unbalancing about its presence (or absence) per se.</blockquote>

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