Toning Down the Magic

[twofalls]

A bit ago I started a thread talking about high level play. I was expressing my dismay about how difficult it's been for me to run my Forgotten Realms game now that the players have reached the 13th level tier, and it's looking like it will just continue to get more difficult. They are laden with abilities and treasure and just rock in any encounter.

I've found my reaction in my Kalamar game has been to really (really really) tone down the magic awards. It works for Kalamar better perhaps because the setting itself is much more level headed about it's approach to magic than Faerun is, however the group has reached 4th level and not every character even has a single magical item yet. Not even a potion. They have acquired some masterwork items as rewards, they have a Merchantman (Cog), and there is a ranch and some other nonmagical material rewards, but magic is downplayed. So far the characters seem satisfied with this arrangement (at least I've not had any complaints so far). Their first magical item (a +2 Scimitar) was sold to buy out several merchant's vested interests in the Cog.

Has anyone else knee jerk reacted this way to dealing with a power game, did you take the low magic game to high levels, and how did it work out for you?

 

[Crothian]

knee jerk no, but purposely gone to a low magic game Yes. It worked fine, I switched settings and made sure the players understood it going into the game. But you have to understand, in the past I've run games were a 9th level fighter stood up and yelled graces when he got a hold of a light crossbow. So, my players were much more used to the grittier side of things. I miss those days.

 

[reanjr]

Low magic to high levels works fine for me. I've never been one for the magic item system in 3e. I would NEVER hand out a +3 longsword. It would have some kind of strange ability, too (glows when orcs are nearby to steal an idea). Usually, the items will have something that requires research to discover (identify does not allow you to activate effects, just know about them). The more powerful the item, the more likely it is cursed (something fun and avoidable).

The more interesting the magic item is, the less people care about having a slew of them.

 

[A'koss]

I've been running LM games for a while now and I think the biggest difficulty for us has been finding interesting ways to reward characters without magic over the long term. I think it's good in a way that it forces you to be a little more creative than just pacifying the PCs with another magic bonbon.

On the other hand, higher level play tends run much, much smoother in a LM game. In our game, the best spellcasters have access to a slightly tweaked Bard's spell list. No "setting-breaker" spells to worry about. You just have to be careful of what you throw at the PCs, it's easy to misjudge the capabilities of a LM party when you've been conditioned to regular levels of magic for so long. I've found that Reserve Points from UA work really well if you don't have a lot of healing magic. I also give the PCs +1 to all ability scores every 5th level instead of the usual (similar to Conan). I liked how that's worked as well as giving out an additional feat at 4th level and every 5 levels thereafter.

All-in-all, I greatly prefer Lower/Scarce Magic games over the magic-saturated ones like FR or Eberron. Iron Lore has certainly got my attention lately, if it's as good as I'm hoping I'll convert over my campaign wholesale.

Cheers!

 

[monboesen]

Scarce magic games (where magic items are rare but spellcasting classes are not changed) have the direct downside that spellcasters will dominate the game at medium to high levels (at about 7+). Unless all they encounter are non-magical foes the fightertypes will be reduced to meatshields. Utterly dependent on the casters to control the game and the battles.

To pull it of somewhat more fair you need a low magic game. You get that by limiting spellcasters in some way in addition to doling out less magic items. The simplest approach is to only allow them to have half their levels as casters. The forces them to have other talents and delays acces to new spell levels.

 

[twofalls]

Hm... this is true, I hadn't considered it. I will have to think on this one. I may have to alter the lists for priests and make certain spell unavalible to the Mageblade. He won't like it, he's a munchkin at heart. His wife plays the Cleric and I haven' seen her play in D&D enough to judge her interests yet.

 

[S'mon]

The simplest approach is to only allow them to have half their levels as casters. The forces them to have other talents and delays acces to new spell levels.

If you do this though I strongly recommend letting the spellcaster caster level = their character level, not their class level, otherwise they will be underpowered vs single-class non-spellcaster PCs. So a Wiz-5/Ftr-5 should cast 10d6 fireballs not 5d6 fireballs.

A campaign where you get a +2 scimitar before reaching 4th level doesn't sound particularly low magic BTW.

My solutions for low magic game:

1. Spellcaster can only take 1/2 levels in any 1 spellcaster class (can be Wiz/Clr if desired), but their casting level = the lower of their character level or TWICE their highest spellcaster class level, so Wiz-4/Ftr-6 casts at 8th level (eg 3 magic missiles).

And/or:

2. Alter the level distribution so Low is 1-3, Medium 4-6, High 7-9, Very High/Legendary 10th+; have NPCs fit into this (basically 1e/2e) distribution. This raises zero balance issues and has a huge effect on eliminating 3e's OTT campaign-wrecking magic. Campaigns can run 1st-10th rather than 1-20th, with 10th level being for legendary heroes (Arthur, Beowulf), mighty conquerors (Caesar, Alexander et al) etc. If you award XP at 1/2 standard rate, then campaign will take the same amount of time; if you play less than 1/week standard XP is probably fine though.

 

[S'mon]

Other things I do are to give PCs +1 (Inherent) stat bonus every even level rather than 1/4 (so +1 at 2nd, 4th, 6th, 8th etc) and use Conan-style Fate Points, which eliminate the need for Raise Dead etc.

 

[the Jester]

One thing I have contemplated doing for a low-magic game is making a list of 12 spells or so of each level that are the known spells for each class. For instance, if the only spells available as 1st level sor/wiz spells are:

Mage Armor
Magic Missile
Burning Hands
Jump
Detect Secret Doors
Mount
Tenser's Floating Disc
Silent Image
Summon Monster I
Feather Fall

...and two homebrewed spells, then suddenly the options for dominating the game are drastically reduced. Spellcasters become very good at some very specific things.

This also allows you to eliminate spells that are problematic for a low-magic game (you might get rid of the teleport subschool entirely, for instance!)

 

[twofalls]

A campaign where you get a +2 scimitar before reaching 4th level doesn't sound particularly low magic BTW.

Thats a relative statement. I'm not particuarly going for a low magic world, I'm going for one that is toned down. It's a pain in the behind to deal with 13th level demigods in my FR campiagn where I left everything open and was awarding fairly standard treasure. I've allowed spells from the Arcane and Divine Pocket Guides, as well as numerous other sorces and have left the PrC options wide open. In general the players in that game aren't rules lawyers and so the charaters are reasonable given the huge parameters they have. My Kalamar game has two rules lawyers in it and one is a munchkin. The game will get very out of hand if I take the same approach, so I'm toning it down... a lot.

One +2 item as the only magical item the entire party has doesn't seem so excessive to me, but again, thats relative.