Variant Wizard Spellbook

[gamerprinter]

So what happens when your wizard runs out of useful spells for the day, and the session's encounters aren't over yet? Does the rest of the party have to rest, because the wizard is out of spells? As if you wizard's resources are all that matter to your gaming group.

In our gaming sessions there is almost guaranteed, at least 3 encounters. If the wizard scrys, teleports, goes nova and teleports out, how many times can he do this before he is out of: scry, teleport and nova spells?

In my experience this isn't a wizard problem, rather a DM problem - somebody doesn't know how to effectively run monsters/BBEG against your party.

The problems you speak of don't exist in my games. As I said before, more wizards die in our campaigns than any other player class - they will be the hardiest class if they survive to high levels, but most never get to high levels, because they are too easily hit and killed at lower levels.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

So what happens when your wizard runs out of useful spells for the day, and the session's encounters aren't over yet? Does the rest of the party have to rest, because the wizard is out of spells? As if you wizard's resources are all that matter to your gaming group.

In our gaming sessions there is almost guaranteed, at least 3 encounters. If the wizard scrys, teleports, goes nova and teleports out, how many times can he do this before he is out of: scry, teleport and nova spells?

In my experience this isn't a wizard problem, rather a DM problem - somebody doesn't know how to effectively run monsters/BBEG against your party.

The problems you speak of don't exist in my games. As I said before, more wizards die in our campaigns than any other player class - they will be the hardiest class if they survive to high levels, but most never get to high levels, because they are too easily hit and killed at lower levels.

I am another that has never had that problem, and I really don't see how this 'fix' helps anything. If anything, it makes the supposed 15 Minute Adventuring Day more likely.

The Auld Grump

 

[N'raac]

Count me as another poster who thinks this is a non-problem. I'm not sure why you are having the issues you are having, since I don't sit in your games.

My point was that all classes have to spend money on gear.

1A. The fighter has to spend money on gear to do his primary thing.
1B. That the wizard doesn't. He just casts. Naked.
2. If the fighter has to spend 30 k gold to bring up his numbers and the wizard has to spend 0 k in the same measure that it is unfair.
3. That the wizard needs more "rings of protection,etc." than the fighter then I highly disagree. ALL classes need these basic protection items. Wizards are the ones who get more gold to spend on them because they get their bigger spells for free vs the fighter who has to pay an exponential rate to copy it - at higher levels.

It costs a lot more for a wizard to get an AC of 20 than it costs a fighter. A wizard wanting to average 10 damage with a weapon is spending a lot more than a fighter too.

My point was that the wizard can create extra-dimensional spaces, reinforcements or not, to hide out in and the non-casters can't. A wizard can make these extra-dimensional places in addition to throwing fireballs, casting divination (to know what spells to prepare or what to expect later), and any other number of contingency and utility effects. FOR FREE!

And having purchased his sword, the fighter can swing it an unlimited number of times per day. The wizard can't. Seriously, do your games really consist of "Wizard scries, then teleports, then blasts the opposition, then teleports back, the Knocks the door and the treasure chest; repeat until out of spells, then rest in extra-dimensional space"? If so, then I think you should put some time pressure on the group. "Well, while you were resting in your extradimensional space, the Lich King moved the kidnapped princess (or sacrificed her to his Dark Gods) rather than waiting around for you to get around to locating him."

Which is great if the party can perform a valuable function instead of wizard casting scry to see room, wizard teleporting in, wizard nuking whatever is there, wizard teleporting out.

That's two spells of at least 4th level (Dimension Door) per encounter. My wizards would be out of spells pretty fast at that pace. What does he nuke them with? I find few spells that kill off a group of reasonably challenging opponents in a single shot.

It also has a range of (100+10ft/level) so.. min 110 feet. A fighter or ranger (at best) is going to have to fire a composite longbow, 1d8+STR. In order to require a concentration check the attacker would have to be within melee to provoke an attack of opportunity.

Alright, yes, one good hit and the wizard is dead. One failed save and the fighter is dead. About even, sure. Except the fighter has no guarantee to make the WILL SAVE against a practiced wizard on the first try and every guarantee he'll die if he fails.

And your system solves this how? A first level wizard simply selects Sleep as his one first level spell. Then he loots the fighter's body and sells all his gear to buy scrolls.

Making them buy scrolls in order to learn more spells means that they have to find them and it hurts their overall standing (in terms of gold and time) to learn those spells. Certainly with some players that expense will not matter but with many of the players in my area this will be something they don't want to expend their time and money on and they'll have a reduced list because of it.

So? Based on your comments above, he doesn't need much of a list. Scry, Port and Blast. So he buys three additional scrolls every two levels - is that all that crippling? Of course, you can make those scrolls tough for him to find, but I find it hard to credit a world where a fighter can order a +5 Keen Ghost Touch Great Sword, but a wizard can't find anyone willing to make a scroll of Dimension Door!

To summarize, I don't perceive the same problem you perceive, but if I did, I don't see how your approach is going to solve it.

 

[IronWolf]

My point was that all classes have to spend money on gear.

Right, including wizards.

The fighter has to spend money on gear to do his primary thing.

Or he could start with a club and sling and upgrade weaponry from the foes he kills along the way.

If the fighter has to spend 30 k gold to bring up his numbers and the wizard has to spend 0 k in the same measure that it is unfair.

This ignores that a wizards has things to spend gold on to bring up their numbers.

That the wizard needs more "rings of protection,etc." than the fighter then I highly disagree.

I didn't say that.

My point was that the wizard can create extra-dimensional spaces, reinforcements or not, to hide out in and the non-casters can't. A wizard can make these extra-dimensional places in addition to throwing fireballs, casting divination (to know what spells to prepare or what to expect later), and any other number of contingency and utility effects. FOR FREE!

A wizard is not doing that spending 0 gold making themselves better. They simply don't have enough spell slots in a day to handle all of these things you want them to do without the aide of scrolls, pearls of power and stat boosting, metamagic items to help them reach these levels of power.

Yes there are a lot of tactics the party could encounter if the enemy is at the same level and without going into a huge side tangent - the party can become annoyed if the enemy constantly uses their own Wizard related tricks to avoid the fight every time.

Then use these tactics. As the levels increase it is only sensible that villains of appropriate level are going to have some of these protections in place as a matter of course. To disregard this tool as a GM is likely leading to your difficulty in handing the wizards you GM for. Using these tools effectively will do much more for you than playing with how many spells a wizards gets at level up.

The whole "reputation" thing only arises if they leave survivors, which is often unlikely, or if they're being watched already.

Stories will still spread, power vacuums will form and questions will be asked. At the higher levels, what NPC that has made it that far *isn't* watching events occurring around them. Either from the perspective of watching the PC themselves *or* being the one that was watching the group the PCs just took out. If an NPC group of some sort is just flat out eradicated, someone is going to notice whether they were watching or not.

If the fighter and rogue came with then they can deal with a couple in the corner.
Meanwhile the wizard has dealt with the rest of the room and still be able to use knock on the locked door or teleport through.

As noted by another poster, an appropriately challenging group is going to be hard pressed to be eliminated in one round - fry and scry or not. If nothing else the wizard is going to need the fighter around to keep from getting creamed when multiple enemies are still standing after the first attack.

And again, this ignores a multitude of defensive measures NPCs at this level would certainly have employed to some degree.

A wizard can blow them up, trap them, disintegrate them, unlock them, seal them, create a portal in them, etc.
See where I'm going with the "multiple options" thing?

All of which consume spell slots. Slots that if the wizard uses to get past a simple locked door would have been much more valuable in an actual combat against a worthy, thinking foe.

Let's see the fighter can smash the door down with a hammer, hack it apart with an axe, crush it with his shoulder, set it on fire and more to get by. The game is full of options for lots of classes. The brute melee types just don't have to waste a spell slot on it.

Right, but the class most likely to be able to handle such tactics against them are OTHER WIZARDS. Not the non-casters. The non-casters have few defenses or contingencies against them.

This ignores an entire world full of magic items. Even the upper level NPC types that are fighters, rogues, etc are going to realize that wizards are a threat and take appropriate precautions against common wizard-like tactics.

It also has a range of (100+10ft/level) so.. min 110 feet. A fighter or ranger (at best) is going to have to fire a composite longbow, 1d8+STR. In order to require a concentration check the attacker would have to be within melee to provoke an attack of opportunity.

You and I can come up with 1001 scenarios of how this could play out and get nowhere. So much depends on the roll of the dice, who acts first, who sees who first, whether the opponent is an elf, etc, etc.

As for the concentration check, again check the casting time on sleep. It isn't a standard action, it is a full round action. That means if the caster takes damage from the time he starts to cast until the next round when the casting is complete he gets to make a concentration check. No AoO required.

Plus, as I repeatedly state, this is just one spell the wizard has in his array. Others stop the fighter from finding the wizard, getting to the wizard or killing the wizard. All at level 1, all without buying a stick of equipment or spending a single gold piece beyond their spellbook.

Again - he has a limited number of spell slots. He can't be prepared for everything for every single battle. And if he gets lucky and rocks the first encounter, what about encounter number two? Number three?

The caster doesn't NEED to buy the staves and wands because they do have spells.

No, he doesn't *need* to buy these wands and scrolls. But he is going to be much less likely to pull off these amazing feats when needed if he is limited only to his spell slots per day.

 

[Bloodspoor]

I've been watching this thread since I responded to it and it's quite amusing how it seems as though you're defending your decision to alter wizards rather than see the advice and insight others have tried to impart. Maybe you should step back a bit and see it from a different perspective. Do you play or just DM? Maybe try playing a wizard for a bit and see how someone else handles the reigns.

I've also come up with a few suggestions for your game that you may like.

First off, the general feeling I get from your players is that THEY think being a caster is their best option. The easiest way I can think of to make casters a less common class is to have the governing bodies of your world decide that magic is evil. A big problem many people can have with casters is divination. Have the powers that be decide that all diviners be put to death for depriving the common people's right to a private life via arcane trickeries. This could have been onset by royalty being kidnapped by a sinister mage who used your own players' method of scry and fry. Furthermore, anyone caught practicing the arcane arts will be given a trial by the local magistrate. This might end in death, but more often than not, something more crippling such as having their tongue removed or by crushing their hands with a mill stone. If this happens to your players, they will be forced to take feats that allow them to cast without semantic or verbal components. The smart ones will simply avoid using spells in public, but remember this: There is ALWAYS a survivor.

Another way to balance the playing field would be to simply offer the fighter classes some kind of heirloom piece that suits their particular class. An example would be a barbarian getting a +1 Anarchic Mammoth Jaw (Greatsword or Greatclub). Maybe that paladin's father was a great paladin himself who died in service of his church and wanted his son to one day don his +2 Adamantine Breastplate. Thieves who join the local guild are given Handy Haversacks, etc. Just so mages don't feel left out in the cold, give them a ring of protection +2 or a necklace of fireballs. That necklace will be powerful at first level, but for how long? Also, it may make them feel like they can handle a fight and choose other spells.

My last suggestion for the moment is to keep wizards as they are, but make it known that evocation directly opposes divination in your world. If they specialize in one, the other is off their radar. Conversely, you could make it so that they still get two spells, but only one of their free spells can be boom spells. It's your game, they answer to you. Make it so they have to tell you the level prior what spells they are researching so that when it comes time for them to level, you're adequately prepared. perhaps make their automatic spells every two levels automatic attempts at learning a spell. Use the rules for copying from a scroll to learn, but lower the dc by half their level. Again, I personally only use that in all Mage campaigns, but do with it whatever you like.

Again, I hope my input proves to be helpful. Also, to everyone else slapping him with redundant slams about how he's a bad GM (mostly all implied) or that he's doing it wrong, give him a break. It's pretty obvious that he's a bit stuck on the whole 'Wizards don't have to pay for equipment' thing, so let's try to feed him our ideas for when wizards throw a wrench in the gears. I know some of you already have, but they're not being proposed in a constructive manner, so he's taken a bit of a defensive stance. To the OP, lighten up. This doesn't need to be a flamewar. Your defensive position is making you come off as a tad stubborn and unwilling to hear good reason.

Edit: I almost forgot. Have you ever heard of a variant rule set called E6 or Epic 6? Basically, it suggests that players stop advancing traditionally after 6th level. After 6th, PCs will get an additional feat for every 5,000 experience they earn. This allows wizards to get fairly powerful spells, but never the power of gods and full BAB classes get their second attack. It's out there, so look it up. I'm thinking about running a game like this for kicks.

 

[afstanton]

I guess the only thing I have to say is that if I ran into a game with a variant rule that nerfed a core class like this, I'd play.

Once.

And then only if I had nothing better to do that night.

 

[gamerprinter]

I guess the only thing I have to say is that if I ran into a game with a variant rule that nerfed a core class like this, I'd play.

Once.

And then only if I had nothing better to do that night.

Well that's more times than I'd play it...

 

[Aaron L]

Tovec, it really seems to me that you don't have a problem with the Wizard class specifically, but that you have a problem with the very idea of magic in general. Your complaint that Wizards can make extradimensional spaces for the party to hide in, in addition to throwing fireballs and the like? Well, that is the nature of magic, I'm afraid.

The very nature of magic is to break the rules of the game. Indeed, while the rulebooks define the way the game works (the "physics" of the Pathfinder universe, so to speak) in intricate detail, the spell descriptions are in fact really nothing more than explanations of how magic creates specific exceptions to the rules. Each spell is a specific exception to how the rules of the game work in general. Characters cannot normally cause large balls of fire to explode out of nothingness. But, with the spell Fireball, they can. Characters cannot normally see and/or hear events that aren't in their immediate vicinity. But, with scrying spells, they can. Characters cannot normally unlock doors without a key or a set of lockpicks and skill in lockpicking. But, with the spell Knock, they can.

This is the nature of magic. This is the PURPOSE of magic. To do otherwise impossible, MAGICAL things. If you don't like that, I would suggest that Pathfinder/D&D is the wrong game for you. But that's a bit drastic, as you don't seem to have any other problems with the game as written. I WOULD suggest, however, that you might prefer a game where magic-users are not allowed as Player Characters. As you pointed out, Gandalf was an angel and FAR above the power-level of the other members of the Fellowship. He was, in terms of an RPG campaign, the perfect example of an NPC who was along with the party, there to confront the Balrog and then gone. He was a plot device, essentially. (The webcomic DM of the Rings illustrates my point perfectly.) That's why he barely used magic to help the party and instead allowed them to solve the problems they encountered themselves using their own talents. Otherwise, if he would have used his full power, the entire battle with the cave troll and orcs in Moria would have been over in a minute. But that was the NATURE of the Istari; they were restricted from using their full power and instead were in the world to guide and shepherd the people of Middle-Earth; the perfect description of a more powerful NPC that the GM has accompany the party.

If Gandalf and the amount of magic he used is your ideal of how a Wizard should be in an RPG, than I really do heavily suggest that you limit spellcasting classes to NPCs, or at least primary spellcasters.

Since the problem you seem to have is really that spellcasting characters can have access to spells that allow them to eventually do almost literally ANYTHING (which is the nature and very purpose of magic in the first place), no amount of restricting spells known is ever going to fix that for you; spellcasters will eventually gain a spell that you hate because it gives them the ability to do something that no other character will ever be able to do.


I'm not trying to criticize you or put you down; if you don't like a style of game, that's your preference, and these games are supposed to be fun for us to play and if you aren't having fun playing them then there's no point to keep playing them. But you really seem to have a problem with a basic tenet of the game itself, that Wizards (and other magic-using characters) can use magic to do things that are impossible for anyone else to do. You don't seem to have a problem with Wizards casting Fireball or Magic Missile to do damage, but when it comes to them using utility spells to teleport, scry, open locks, or anything other than direct damage, you seem to hate the very idea of it. Wizards in this game are built to be versatile, that's one of their foremost abilities. Take that away from them and you'll be hurting them so much that you might as well simply remove the class.

I'm curious; would you prefer it if magic-users were only able to cast damaging and/or healing spells? That's not meant to be a knock on you, I'm seriously curious and trying to understand where you are coming from and what your preferences are. It really sounds to me like you're coming to the game with the mind-set of an MMORPG where Wizard are Direct Damage nukers and nothing else. And I'm not demeaning MMORPGs, I played EverQuest for YEARS and absolutely loved it (and I'm meaning to start playing gain this year, my 70th level Necromancer Achraziel has just been sitting there collecting dust on Brell Serilis for the past year, and I only played for maybe a month that time, but I played religiously from '99 to '05. Man, those were some GOOD TIMES! Anyway... )

No one here is trying to attack you, we're just really confused with the problem you say you have, because Wizards and other spellcasters are the way they are for a reason, and magic in the game is the way it is for a reason, and you seem to have a problem with the very reason for magic. Magic is one of the defining features of the game (it is THE defining characteristic of the fantasy genre, period) and none of the rest of us have ever encountered the problem you say you're having. We can't understand the problem and we're confused.

In fact, I have NEVER encountered the scry-teleport in-nuke-teleport out problem that is so popularly mentioned. Do people actually try to pull off cheesy BS like that? The Teleport spell actually flat-out says: "'Viewed once' is a place that you have seen once, possibly using magic such as scrying." So it's built right into the rules that you only have a 25% chance to teleport if you try that trick. Not something I would risk.

 

[paradox42]

In fact, I have NEVER encountered the scry-teleport in-nuke-teleport out problem that is so popularly mentioned. Do people actually try to pull off cheesy BS like that? The Teleport spell actually flat-out says: "'Viewed once' is a place that you have seen once, possibly using magic such as scrying." So it's built right into the rules that you only have a 25% chance to teleport if you try that trick. Not something I would risk.

Not to threadjack, but the name of the tactic is actually a bit of a misnomer. Most who talk about it refer to using Scrying followed by Teleport, but in fact the two spells mentioned are too restrictive to really allow its use as a tactic. Scrying takes a full hour to cast, and has an expensive focus; Teleport has a range limit, and a chance of error.

IME this tactic really doesn't come into its own until the rarefied reaches of 15th level and above, where few gamers these days actually go. Greater Scrying has no focus component, and takes only a standard action to cast; Greater Teleport has no effective range limit on the same plane (or planet, if you rule that way) and more importantly, no chance of error as long as you're going to a real destination. Using these two spells, a PC Wizard can truly begin to use Scry N' Fry as a battle tactic. By 20th level you can even start doing it across planes, using Gate for travel- before 20th level 9th-level spell slots tend to be too valuable to use on such frivolity.

I've run several games that were in mid, high, and Epic levels, and these are the patterns I've observed. Others' experience may differ. The tactic is real, and can be very difficult to stop, but it only becomes workable at high levels.

 

[Dysturbed]

My problem is when players do end up making wizards they invariably fall into the same trap of having too much power compared to the non-casters in the party. I have been burned by premium built wizards, but the same goes for premium built fighters, rogues and even monks. The difference is when a high leveled wizard gets angry he lays waste to a planet. When a high level fighter gets angry he lays waste to an army. At the very least my proposed rule will limit access to higher level spells.

Granting them only 1 free spell per spell level ensures that they don't have immediate access to every spell under the sun. They can still decide if they want to be a specialist wizard, seeking out spells of one school or another and using their free spell to grab something harder to find. Or they can be a generalist wizard and put their money into everything they find but have less resources available for higher level spells. Either way it means that both the wizard and the fighter will have to spend money on their equipment instead of just getting it for free.



The types of players I have that are the issue will have to work at getting spells. The ones who roleplay to find them will have a much easier time in acquiring scrolls to learn.

Oh and in the case of that dragon, yes if they have fireball facing a white they'll still be set. But in my version they may not have fireball, granting the rest of the party a chance to fight the dragon as opposed to the wizard taking it down in the first turn.

It sounds to me like as the DM you need to have a talk with your players about min/max'ing I mean im sure it's fun for them to do that is probably why they play the game to min/max but if it's killing the enjoyment of the game for the rest of the party that player maybe needs to pull back the reigns or find some monty hall group that wants him. Im sure whoever is min/max'ing in your group is a friend but sometimes not everyone is a great player in every group.