ArmoredSaint77
Explorer
I'm bothered to see that keeping lists of specific spells proved more popular than keeping lists of specific equipment.
It seems that some people seem to like the idea of radically simplifying the weapons and armour lists, sometimes even to the point of including only categories of light/medium/heavy armour and using these as catch-alls for all armour types. And we've certainly seen the weapon list considerably stripped down since the old AD&D days.
But one almost never sees a call to radically simplify the spell lists. We still see an enormous chunk of most players' handbooks taken up with spell descriptions for dozens and dozens of tedious pages. I get the feeling that this choice reflects an unconscious favoritism towards spellcasters on the part of the game designers.
I don't think it's fair that half of the book is given over to super-detailed descriptions of the spellcasters' toys, while those of the warriors are kept down to one or two pages. I like having lots and lots of interesting and mechanically distinct choices for my characters' weapons and armours; maybe we don't need all the polearm types AD&D had, but I did like the distinction between, say, the "broadsword" and longsword.
What if we applied the same perspective often taken on the weapons and armour lists to the spell lists? i.e. maybe we can stuff spells into simple, broad categories of deals damage/inflicts status effect/has out-of-combat use, etc. What, after all, is the real difference between the effects of most of these spells in terms of game mechanics other than flavor text?
Alternately, equal space should be given to lavish descriptions of weapons and armour, and numerous rules associated with each individual type, thus equalizing the time, space, and effort that tools and toys of each of the class types. It would be nice if future editions would make such an effort.
It seems that some people seem to like the idea of radically simplifying the weapons and armour lists, sometimes even to the point of including only categories of light/medium/heavy armour and using these as catch-alls for all armour types. And we've certainly seen the weapon list considerably stripped down since the old AD&D days.
But one almost never sees a call to radically simplify the spell lists. We still see an enormous chunk of most players' handbooks taken up with spell descriptions for dozens and dozens of tedious pages. I get the feeling that this choice reflects an unconscious favoritism towards spellcasters on the part of the game designers.
I don't think it's fair that half of the book is given over to super-detailed descriptions of the spellcasters' toys, while those of the warriors are kept down to one or two pages. I like having lots and lots of interesting and mechanically distinct choices for my characters' weapons and armours; maybe we don't need all the polearm types AD&D had, but I did like the distinction between, say, the "broadsword" and longsword.
What if we applied the same perspective often taken on the weapons and armour lists to the spell lists? i.e. maybe we can stuff spells into simple, broad categories of deals damage/inflicts status effect/has out-of-combat use, etc. What, after all, is the real difference between the effects of most of these spells in terms of game mechanics other than flavor text?
Alternately, equal space should be given to lavish descriptions of weapons and armour, and numerous rules associated with each individual type, thus equalizing the time, space, and effort that tools and toys of each of the class types. It would be nice if future editions would make such an effort.
