Variant Spell Memorization Rules

[SneakyB]

I've never been truly fond of the way that spell memorization is handled in D&D and the older I get and the more I play, the less I like the fact that both arcane and divine spell casters must "pick" their spells at the beginning of each day. Never in any piece of fantasy literature have I seen such a requirement, the wizard always appears to have access to all the spells which he knows.

What I am thinking of doing as a house rule is the following:

1. Arcane spellcasters still have the same number of spell slots as listed in the PH, but they do not require memorization of spells to fill all available spell slots. The player will be limited to only being able to cast spells in his/her spellbook ONCE per day.

2. Divine spellcasters may cast ANY spell from the list of spells available, up to the max number of spell slots per level. This means that they can choose to cast any spell from the list of acceptable spells ONCE per day. The only exception here is that a spell slot may be "filled" with a healing spell at any time without penalty and healing spells may be cast more than once per day, provided the number of spells the character can cast is not exceeded.

I'd like y'all's input on this. Point out the weaknesses or where you see problems, please. I would like to see if you guys think this may work or seems like a bad idea.

Thanks!!!

 

[Mordane76]

Do you mean to say that wizards and clerics no longer prepare at all, and that a wizard can cast spells from their spell books, but with the limitation that a spell in their book can only be cast once per day? Following this line, a cleric can cast a spell on their list only once per day, except healing spells?

I think you're really hurting preparing casters this way, and you're basically killing the sorcerer, if this rule applies to him as well, if I interpreted your meaning correctly. It takes away the ability to plan ahead for a combat, if you know what to expect -- if a wizard knows his opponent is weak against lightning, he could prepare two or three lightning bolts, but by what I'm reading for your house-rule-in-the-works, that wizard in your campaign could only cast that lightning bolt once, then he'd have to try something else which may not be as effective.

 

[MarauderX]

There would be no distinction between wizards and sorcerers, really, and in order to limit the power of a wizard would become limiting the number of spells he has access to.

I don't like how the memorization works either, so I changed to be a minimum of 4 hours of sleep or 6 hours rest, along with 4 hours of study to memorize spells, assemble components and study spellcraft. In this way a mage can "reload" her spells as necessary to fit a given situation.

Clerics have to sleep 4 hours or rest for 6, then begin prayers for 2 to 4 hours where they are instilled with devine power for the day.

The other aspect is anticipating what is to come. Wizards entering dark caves like to have at least one light spell handy of course, but can't anticipate what is going to be down there, so he can memorize a variety of spells to try to meet them all; sleep for a bunch of goblins, burning hands to finish off a troll, or magic missle to soften up some undead. In that way I agree with you, and the DM can be kind and give an idea of what's down there that goes along with the plot of tracking something to the dungeon. Or he could not, and you just have to go for it, which is much more suited to upper level play.

Clerics are more high powered in 3E and don't need anything else to add to their arsenal since they can already convert any normally memorized spell into a cure/wound spell at will.

 

[Khorod]

A rule of spellcasting: If a wizard or cleric (etc) leaves a slot empty, it takes only 15 minutes of study/prayer to fill that slot.

Add to that a house rule that you can *replace* a prepared spell with another through 15 minutes of study/prayer, and you have a spellcaster that can adjust at least one spell between most conflicts, but is still locked in during battle.

This way as the events change over the day, the spellcaster can adjust what he is doing, but at the same time he is not immediately adaptable, preserving the advantages of the sorcerer.

For example, a wizard is in his lab when one of his aerial guards warns him of a horde of demons attacking a nearbye town. The wizard knows these demons are weak against lightning. So for whatever reason, the wizard takes an hour or so and replaces a bunch of his research spells (like analyze dweomer, legend lore, etc) with lightning bolts, bursts, sheets, or what have you.