Too much magic in DnD - lets do something about it !

[kenjib]

kenjib - your alternate spells have a problem you are perhaps not considering - ease of use.

If every single spell has a quirky, unpredictable result, your players and DMs will be havign to refer to the book constantly. Clunky, irregular mechanics mean lots of time at the table spent referencing. That's not fun. The also tend to cause problems in rules interpretations.

Those are really good points. I agree that it's a problem. By making all of the spells really similar to each other the way they are in the PHB the rules are more streamlined, which is perhaps the tradeoff for losing mystique. You don't have to learn different spells for cat's grace, bull's strength, and endurance. They are all exactly the same spell but you just insert a different meta-game ability score. Similar for all of the combat spells. They all work the same, just substitute damage die, area, and damage type and give the spell a new name. It's just so boring.

 

[Willtell]

Here are My rules, tweak 'em if ya like:

Spellcraft checks vs. the Spell Save DC to successfully cast, otherwise they fizzle, or worse, rebound.

The spellcasting classes use the Witch spell list (DMG). There is only two spellcasters; Wizard and Druid.

"Black Magic," which is any offensive magic, causes a Will save or take 1 point of Wisdom drain. Every day, the character can make a Will save to shrug off the drain and restore their Wisdom score. However, with each point of drain beyond one, it adds +1 to the DC, which has a base of 15 for neutral characters, or 12 for good characters. Evil characters are already evil, so they don't have to worry. When a character reaches Wisdom 0, they are completely insane (DM assumes control at this point.).

You really have pc's who play these kinds of wizards and druids from 1st lvl?. A first lvl wizard with int 14 has a 25% of failing to cast each spell, and a chance that a failed spell affects them!.

"Good" wizards casting black magic find it easier to strug of the
problem caused by casting a spell than a neutral wizard would?.

 

[Willtell]

Low magic is fine but why this?

We used casting rolls, rolling a d20 + spellcraft skill trying to beat a DC to cast a spell (10 + 2x spell level). If you roll over the DC the spell works as normal, but roll under the DC, and the spell might botch completely, go off at lower strength, or do something really odd (depending on how much lower the roll was than the DC). This makes magic a lot less predicatable, and adds back a certain element of mystery to the game.

This is the second time i've seen something like this on this subject. Why would someone what to play a wizard or cleric with a rule like this. "Whoo..oo!, the wizard just cast a spell". It failed to work correctly. "What did he do? - turned himself blue. Whoo..oo, thats amazing!".

If magic is not a source of power, far less useful or reliable than sticking someone through the heart with a sword, nothing more than "he's a misterious stranger who, does things, with the farm animals" - why would any dnd child want to be like the misterious stranger?. "Mon - when I grow up I want to be like the mysterious stranger and play with the farm animals!". Why would there be any wizards at all?.

If casting spells requires a minumum of a minute why would you want a wizard along soaking up xp and gold and doing nothing useful. If the wizard casts spells but they keep backfiring and frying the party,why would you want a wizard along?. If magic is mysterious and powerful but the best your wizard can do is say "Whoo..oo, I'm mysterious and powerful", why would the party want to have a wizard along. If low lvl wizards are almost useless there arn't going to be many of them around.

If you want a low magic world try this. Being a mage is not a trade, a craft or a profession. You are paid because some else wants you to cast specific spells. If you train other wizards they are going to compete against you. If you teach them a spell others will pay them to cast, you will get fewer jobs, less money and have to eat gruel with the peasents in the windy cottage with the rain dripping through the rotting roof!.

Do not give wizards automatic spells per level - they have to find or research them. Make wizards research how to create a magic item, even if they have the right feat and the right spell. Have a relatively poor world.

For clerics enforce the religion obligations. "No sam!, you cannot go off with your friends and loot the tomb of the dead king - you're going to spend the next month helping your flock harvest the wheat so they do not stave this year. Your're the only freeking cleric of the church of ___ for 10 miles Sam!".

Or "your're staying here and going to try and raise the number of his worshipers!". Or "Hello Sam. Now that you're back from looting the tomb of the dead king lets work out what taxes you ow the king - its only 10%!. Now about the tilthe - only 10% and its a religious obligation!. Thanks Sam, here's your 10gp for being the deacon for this month, and fix the church roof Sam! - you've got the money!".

Bing a priest is a job. Churches pay there priests from revenue from land they own or from donations. They are not going to create priests who have nothing better to do than wonder the land getting into trouble and making money for themselves.

 

[hong]

Re: Re: Too much magic in DnD - lets do something about it !

But there are clear alternatives to spellcasting for healing. First, if you use a system of higher Defenses in place of higher Hit Points, the characters defenses aren't naturally so ablative.

And as I mentioned before, ablative hit points are a necessary part of the "heroic" feel of D&D. A system that replaces hit points with DR risks combats being decided by who gets the first critical hit in.

Really, you would need to make a _lot_ of changes to make a viable, high-level D&D campaign work with low magic. By the time you're finished tweaking, I don't know what you would have, but I'm pretty sure it wouldn't be D&D as we know it. There's nothing wrong with that, but it would seem a lot easier just to go and use one of the other systems out there that's designed for the task.

There's nothing about a wizard's "artillery" that's qualitatively different from a warrior's "beat down". Where the wizard's necessary is in handling magical challenges. If we let mundane skills identify magic items, etc., then even a low-level Expert can serve in that role.

Artillery in D&D isn't limited to slinging fireballs. I'd like to see a fighter polymorph enemies into toads, summon a planetar to fight for you, or lock down a demon with dimensional anchor.

Of course, you can have magic items that serve these purposes. However, that just leads to the question of who's going to _make_ these items. The more you rely on items, moreover, the more you risk them becoming uninteresting; nothing more than tools. Familiarity breeds contempt.

Certainly. They also like playing dark elves. They don't have to be first-level characters though.

Why do you assume that just because someone likes playing magic-users, that means they're in it for the power?

The more I think about this, the more I'm coming to the conclusion that the best solution for you is to start your PCs at 5th level, and award 1/10th the recommended XP for encounters. This will essentially keep the characters at 5th-9th level forever, and you no longer have to worry about them teleporting all over the place, fireballing things, toying with people's heads, or summoning demons from hell.

 

[hong]

Re: Re: Re: Consistent Rules for Mysterious Magic?

Actually, the DM, players, and publisher are all responsible.

As an example of what the rules can do, imagine switching around the spell lists a bit. For example, bump up all evocation (and/or all directly damaging) spells two levels, and reduce Bestow Curse, Polymorph Self, and Polymorph Other to first level. Replace Summoning I through IX with Planar Binding.

Even unimaginative players (and the DM controlling the evil sorcerer) will be playing more like classic wizards, witches, and sorcerers.

Please playtest this for 6 months, and report your findings.

 

[hong]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Too much magic in DnD - lets do something about it !

I'm sure there will be more people taking a similar line to hong and Dougie DeKree. In defense of the thread, I'd like to point out that this is not about arguing the merits of low-magic. It presupposes a desire for low-magic.

To be exact, it presupposes a desire for low magic on the part of _one person in the group_. D&D is a collaborative pursuit. It's well and good to hash out ideas for tweaking the rules so that they're more in line with your tastes, but when you come to actually playing the game, you also have to consider what the other people like as well. And some of those other people may like high magic. Otherwise, you might as well play a computer game.

 

[S'mon]

I think that maybe a few people have missed the point about low magic settings. I love low magic settings, but change little. I know I will get some debate here, but hear me out. Generally speaking, I lower the hp etc of monsters in a very slight way so as to balance more. My npc's don't have a ton of magic, so they are equal in effect to those of the pc's. Say what you will, but a lvl 20 fighter and a lvl 20 wizard even w.o. a ton of magic items will still be a decent match, it depends on how you play them. As far as item creation, I allow it as normal except I require actual components to be gathered. Want to make a potion of water breathing, sure you need this and this and this. Go find it. The system doesn't need an overhaul to change one slight aspect. The pc's are heroes and seem more heroic if they cast fireball and the villagers have seldom seen one. Think about it.

Hear hear!

This is exactly my approach. Although in my games the 20th-level characters do have tons of magic items - it's only natural that the most powerful magic be held by the small number of ulra-powerful people able to get and hold them. But characters under 5th level rarely have any magic at all. Around 10th level most swords, armour etc will be minorly enchanted.
The average village has no PC-class characters, but the average city will have several.

 

[Fenes]

Hear hear!

This is exactly my approach. Although in my games the 20th-level characters do have tons of magic items - it's only natural that the most powerful magic be held by the small number of ulra-powerful people able to get and hold them. But characters under 5th level rarely have any magic at all. Around 10th level most swords, armour etc will be minorly enchanted.
The average village has no PC-class characters, but the average city will have several.

Mine too, although I adhere to the belief that there shouldn't be tons of magic items, but rather several powerful magic items with long histories at higher levels.

D&D without many magic items works very well, as long as you don't use any adventure without adapting it. As I almost never use a bought adventure I tailor any adventure to the party adn so can avoid many pitfalls.

 

[Gothmog]

Re: Low magic is fine but why this?

The reason that I think a casting roll to cast a spell is useful in a low magic setting is because of this: a setting would really only be low magic if magic were in some way difficult/dangerous to deal with. Its fine to use the regular D&D spellcasting rules in a low-magic setting, but that leaves open one large problem in logic- if magic is sure-fire and predictable every time, why don't more people use it? One way is to strongly restrict access to magic, but then you are stuck with the same mechanics and rather dull spell desriptions in the PHB. The other alternative is to make magic less predictable and harder to control, which opens up whole new roleplaying possibilities.

Example: A witch (someone who communes with nature spirits) in my game tried to cast a spell we made up called Contact Spirit World, which basically allows the witch's spirit to roam a limited area in the spirit world while her body remains in a trance. The witch in question botched the roll badly, and instead ended up sending her body to the spirit world, while her spirit remained in the physical world. Knowing that if something wasn't done quickly her body could be inhabited by a wandering spirit on the other side, the witch "haunted" the other characters until they came to the place she had performed the ritual, and the priest cast Dispel Magic to end her spell. I can't even begin to count the number of times, some small (or major) effect like this has happened in the game, but from speaking with my players, I know they all enjoyed it immensely, and they enjoy the unpredictability and role-playing through the possibilities. I know this type of thing may not be for everyone, but if you are using a low-magic world, there has to be a reason magic is difficult to work with.

I do agree that increasing the casting times of spells drastically is generally not a good idea. If you are requiring a casting roll as well as increasing the casting time, many spellcasters become burdens to a group unless they have a lot of time to prepare. More importantly, the player of such a character feels like he can't accomplish anything, and player enjoyment is the most important thing.

Also, I have noticed a reluctance on the part of several posters to use a spellcasing roll to determine if a spell works. I have played probably 30-40 game systems over the years (including Chivalry and Sorcery, Ars Magica, Rolemaster, Runequest, Pendragon, GURPS, Deadlands, etc), and to my knowledge, D&D is the ONLY game system I know of where magic works without some kind of spellcasting roll (barring wearing armor or disrupting concentration). To me, this only adds to the video game feel of D&D, and relegates magic to the level of a technological device, which is often boring. While this mechanic works well in a high-magic world, for a low magic world that is supposed to be darker, it takes away from the suspension of disbelief.

As for why anyone would be a magic-user in a world like this- well, it isn't for everybody. If a player wants to play the mysterious stranger who has superhuman powers, I let him know magic powers don't always work, and the road to arcane knowledge is a difficult one. However, most players in a low-magic setting realize that acting strange because they are magic-users is about the best way to get normal people to pay attention to you, and if we are assuming that in most low-magic worlds people are afraid of magic, this is about the dumbest thing a wizard can do unless he has a LOT of power to back himself up. While it is true that in a low magic world a wizard's spells don't always work, when they do work, they can do wonderous things the normal person could not dream of (view a distant place, bend the will of someone to your desires, call down a curse, etc). And because magic is less common, if the wizard is subtle, people are not as likely to believe that a spell has been cast as they are to attribute the occurance to chance, or some otherworldly power that is not the wizard. To be honest, in a low-magic world, a spellcaster has to be played a lot smarter than in a typical D&D game- magic is no longer fire-and-forget, but something the aspiring wizard struggles to control.

Finally, I have heard many people say that if we don't like the high-magic nature of D&D, why do we use these rules? Simple- although there might be better systems for handling magic, D&D has a huge fanbase and reletively simple mechanics to keep track of, and this means its easier to find players, and not as large of a workload on the DM to run adventures (as compared to something like...Rolemaster). Tweaking the D20 system to handle our tastes is a more viable option than trying to teach people to play a whole new game system, and in most cases the changes that are made don't complicate the game any more, but from experience, I can say they DO add greatly to the atmosphere of the game. Sorry for the book, but I hope this helped to clear up my reasoning, and can maybe prompt more discussion.

 

[Broken Fang]

Excellent point!