The nature of High/Low Magic

[Wulf Ratbane]

One ought to point out that there is not necessarily any disconnect between mourning death and believing that the dead people have passed on to a new and better life. Both of those have been standard Christian practice and theology for nearly two millenia. I'm not really up on literature on the subject but you might find C.S. Lewis's A Grief Observed instructive as an example of how one might reconcile mourning with the faith that the dead individual has a better life now than before. I haven't looked at them but the standard Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox funeral liturgies might be helpful too.

An interesting observation, but not exactly a perfect analogy-- not the least because, well, that's REAL.

In real life, the dead are really, really, gone, and you can't cast a spell to talk to them from beyond death to ask them how things are going and whether or not they'd enjoy resurrection of the flesh at the moment or whether the party ought to just start divvying up their magical knick-knacks.

Wulf

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

This is, in my opinion, a *lot* more dramatic and emotional than Dwarfy McDrunkenpants and his daily struggle against the powerful orcish horde. When you have to use the powerful magic at your disposal just to protect the ones you love, who are now depending upon you as a hero to rescue them, and the ones who die blame you as a hero for not rescuing them.

Yep, this is what I'm hoping to acheive in my campaigns. I have to thank too many people on these boards for helping me see that you have to take the characters and make them feel like real people, with real concerns beyond their own life or death. And I think this applies both to low and high magic campaigns if you want the campaign to have the something - excuse the expression - magical about it.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Either way, people are either darn good at forcing pegs into holes or you just haven't had a set of experiences conducive to realizing that it's not a square peg.

Well, I seem to remember I called you on it, and your solution was to... (wait for it...) nerf the high-magic abilities of the characters. But I really don't want to go back down that road with you again.

By way of trying to avoid an argument, I think you have siezed on the solution, but as I said before, I've yet to see it well and truly implemented. I think the point is that unless you fundamentally change the rules of D&D (and that includes allowing the characters access to all of the things they are supposed to be able to do) it won't work. You have to round off the square peg.

EDIT: And for what it's worth, you have to do the same if you want a low-magic game. D&D isn't a good engine for dramatic games of any kind, be they low or high magic. It's a predominantly gamist engine.

Wulf

 

[francisca]

First things first: Great post, Hong. Really, really, super good.

Now on to my insignificant contribution:

You could even nerf resurrect, or at least make it harder to survive, but this can have repercussions for an ongoing campaign; it's stupidly easy to get killed at high levels, and without some means of coming back, continuity can get shot to heck.

Here's my suggestion:

When you are resurrected, roll a d20. If you roll higher than your character level, you don't get resurrected. That way, higher level characters have a much better chance of staying in the game.

Of course, as you went on to point out, this is only one aspect of high magic play that needs to be considered.

 

[mmadsen]

In my perspective, once you reach high levels, there's more at stake here than just your piddly little lives. You may be heroes, but not everyone is, and it is the world your are trying to save, not just your own asses. Failure can come in flavors without a gravestone, after all. That is the challenge of high levels and high magic -- you're not fighting skeletons who are coming through the town, the farmers and constubalry cna fight them just as well. You're putting an end to the *origin* of the skeletons, a necromancer who knows where you live and brings the battle to your doorstep and does not relent.

I don't think this refutes your point at all, but I couldn't help but think of the not-at-all-high-level Hobbits putting an end to the origin of the dark hordes, a necromancer (the Necromancer) who knew where they lived and brought the Black Riders to their doorstep and did not relent.

 

[Aaron2]

From lurking around these boards, I've witnessed a vocal group (Minority? Not sure.) of folks who prefer low magic games. And, after reflecting on my 2 year high magic rollicking Forgotten Realms game which is now drawing to a close, I think I may be permanently beginning to side with the low magic group.

I used to be solidly in the low-magic camp but then I realized what I liked wasn't low magic, it was low level. I prefer to DM a group from 1st to around 10th level. I cut the XP per encounter by 1/3 to extend the sweet spot. One thing that bothers me about 3e is this obsession with 6th level; prestige classes and the Leadership feat (which I like) picked that level for when a character is suddenly "developed". After 10th level, even a fighter with no magic items starts to get super-powered. Making the world low-magic won't help this at all.


Aaron

 

[kamosa]

I used to be solidly in the low-magic camp but then I realized what I liked wasn't low magic, it was low level. I prefer to DM a group from 1st to around 10th level. I cut the XP per encounter by 1/3 to extend the sweet spot. One thing that bothers me about 3e is this obsession with 6th level; prestige classes and the Leadership feat (which I like) picked that level for when a character is suddenly "developed". After 10th level, even a fighter with no magic items starts to get super-powered. Making the world low-magic won't help this at all.


Aaron

Amen....Amen.
Once the play gets into the 15th or so level of play the Hitpoints and damage capabilities of the fighter so out shine any other characters abilities it just gets silly. Add in the spell resistance and high saves and it seems that all the spell casters just, scry, teleport, and then watch as the fighter does the combat.

It just gets old.

 

[hong]

Because "low magic" is all about killing dire rats. In the mud.

I call it "sludgepunk", the opposite of the "magicpunk" label that gets tossed around by certain persons in these parts.

As you point out later, the "high magic" complaint isn't about the power level of the most powerful characters but about the prevalence of magic -- and how D&D magic's flavor (scry-buff-teleport, fly-invis-fireball) doesn't match classic fantasy's flavor.

There's nothing wrong with preferring sludgepunk over magicpunk. But that's also got nothing to do with drama, challenge, tension, or any other similar rationalisation.

 

[Brother MacLaren]

Amen....Amen.
Once the play gets into the 15th or so level of play the Hitpoints and damage capabilities of the fighter so out shine any other characters abilities it just gets silly. Add in the spell resistance and high saves and it seems that all the spell casters just, scry, teleport, and then watch as the fighter does the combat.

It just gets old.

I've never understood your repeated comments to this effect. Typically, a foe of CR comparable to the PCs will have a SR about 10 or 12 greater than the PC's level (less for dragons). That means that the party wizard's spells affected by SR will work about half the time. Hardly useless.
For some of the devastating no-save spells (Enervation, Touch of Idiocy), that's not a bad ratio. There are also numerous spells that ignore SR (summon monster, conjuration damage spells).
The various insta-kill spells remain worthwhile, even if the foe has SR and good saves. Who has the best chance against a dragon? The wizard with baleful polymorph. I'll take that 1-in-8 chance (or whatever) any day if it means winning the fight with a single spell.
A foe having SR to block your wizard's spells is no different than a foe having armor to block the fighter's sword. Suck it up, roll the dice, and do the best you can - or find a way around the SR.

 

[kamosa]

I've never understood your repeated comments to this effect. Typically, a foe of CR comparable to the PCs will have a SR about 10 or 12 greater than the PC's level (less for dragons). That means that the party wizard's spells affected by SR will work about half the time. Hardly useless.
For some of the devastating no-save spells (Enervation, Touch of Idiocy), that's not a bad ratio. There are also numerous spells that ignore SR (summon monster, conjuration damage spells).
The various insta-kill spells remain worthwhile, even if the foe has SR and good saves. Who has the best chance against a dragon? The wizard with baleful polymorph. I'll take that 1-in-8 chance (or whatever) any day if it means winning the fight with a single spell.
A foe having SR to block your wizard's spells is no different than a foe having armor to block the fighter's sword. Suck it up, roll the dice, and do the best you can - or find a way around the SR.

The difference is that unlike the wizard, the 15th level fighter gets 3 or 4 attempts per round to damage the bad guy with an ability that is unlimited. Sure for that single attempt the odds are about the same, but the fighter gets to make many many more attempts to use their ability than the wizard. Plus the fighter only has to over come AC. Where as the wizard must overcome the SR and the Save. So the enemy gets two chances to avert the wizards spells.


In addition these rolls are made by the GM, behind a screen. Wink wink nudge nudge, you never get to take down the main bad guy with your spell in the first round. Seems like every game I play in lately the bad guys start making at least 90% of their saves starting at around 5th level.

I'm not saying you can't be effective as a wizard, but when you crunch out the stats on who does the most in combat at high levels, it is almost always the fighter in almost every combat.