D&D 5E What is required to copy a spell into a spellbook?

[Colmarr]

'sucking chest wound,' but hey, it takes all kinds...

I don't think this sort of game is badwrongfun but I do think springing it on players without warning is sort of cruel.

I once saw a painted miniature belonging to another player. The miniature had clearly had a hand removed. When I asked the player why, he told me that the character had lost a hand fighting a dragon. I thought (and still do) that was a cool thing to happen in a game, but I'd be livid if my DM tried to plop it on me out of the blue without a previous discussion that it was possible.

Edit:

I could imagine a world where items were /so/ rare...

I'm less worried about this aspect, but still think that a player should be told if one of their character's abilities (item creation*) is going to be changed by the DM.

However, I singled out wizards in particular for a reason. They are a normally understood to be a studied tradition and are usually taught (as opposed to sorcerors or warlocks). I find it strange that you might be apprenticed to someone for long enough to learn how to cast spells but they never thought to tell you how wands work.

* I'm historically a 3.X and 4e player. I assume arcane casters can still create wands in 5e.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Not badwrongfun, just not how I usually envision 'sense of wonder.'

 

[JRedmond]

I appreciate the responses but let's try to keep it on topic. I'm looking to hear how other people are running this in their 5E games. Thanks.

 

[Staffan]

I don't have a wizard IMC, but if I did I'd be running it by both books.

A spellbook is written in a generally understandable form. You might need to experiment a little to reach your own understanding of the spell (which is why it takes a few hours and costs a bunch of gold to transcribe a spell), but it's pretty much a sure thing.

A spell scroll is something different, both greater and lesser. It is lesser, in that it does not contain the full description of how to cast and prepare the spell, mostly only the part when actually casting it. It is greater, in that the ink and paper is charged with magic that allows you to actually unleash the spell, not just prepare it. But you can't just read a spell scroll and transcribe it into your spellbook. Instead you need to essentially reverse-engineer the spell from both the limited description on the scroll itself, and from understanding the underlying magical pattern embedded into the item. Doing so requires a process that ends in the destruction of the scroll, and success is not certain.

 

[bgbarcus]

I have always house ruled that scrolls come in two flavors. One is a single page spellbook containing just one spell. It is, in every way, just a spellbook. The other is a consumable magic item that can be used to cast the spell stored in the scroll. Since the second form contains the energy of a spell ready to be released it is not the formula that would be written in a spellbook and cannot be used to add the spell into a spellbook.

When a spellbook (book or scroll) is found I let wizards transcribe the spell to their book with just the time and cost in the PHB.

 

[steeldragons]

There is nothing "either/or" about these quotes.

PC finds a scroll. Wants to copy it into their spellbook. PC's a wizard. Pretty normal thing to do.

Player rolls an Arcana check.

If it fails, the scroll is ruined. You get no new spell.

If it succeeds, you have shell out 50gp for the special inks and gilding and whatnot that goes into the transcription. And the whole process takes you 2 hours per spell level to complete...the scroll is "used up" in the process and you have it in your spellbook to prepare at your leisure forevermore.

Why is this even a question? They are not contradictory statements.

 

[Ranes]

If it succeeds, you have shell out 50gp for the special inks and gilding and whatnot that goes into the transcription.

Bingo. Except, not quite in my world. You don't get to attempt to scribe the spell unless you shelled out the gp last time you where anywhere that had the required materials available and you made a point of doing it. Magic is powerful. I think this is a reasonable constraint. I dislike retrofitted expenditure and see no reason not to make players consider these sorts of requirements when their PCs set off in search of such things. Apart from anything else, the requirement to actively acquire ingredients (beyond the utterly trivial splurge of guano, natch) serves to pace adventures and introduce potential hooks or tangents that help prevent a game from becoming routine.

In the interests of abbreviation, YMMV.

 

[Staffan]

I thought of another analogy, based on music.

A spellbook is like sheet music - it tells you how to perform a melody, but it is not the melody itself. Copying a spell from a spellbook is like making a new arrangement for a melody to match a different orchestral setup. It takes time and effort, but if you know what you're doing it's not something you could really fail at.

A scroll is like a one-time recording of the melody. You can play it whenever you want, and BOOM! You have the music right then and there. But you only get to do it once. Trying to copy from a scroll is like listening to the melody, possibly pausing to get things right, but not going back, and then writing down the sheet music based on what you heard. It can be done, but it's by no means a certain thing.

 

[Ed_Laprade]

More power to you, but I'd hate that approach.

If the rules of the game don't tell me that combat might cause my PC lasting injuries, IMO the DM better tell me before he imposes that as a rule.

Ditto with magic item use. I'm pretty sure wizards would have figured out in-game that wands can't be recharged and that information would have become common knowledge among trained/organised arcane casters.

That's my problem. The characters LIVE in the world, so unless there's a good in-world reason for them not to know something that should be common knowledge, they should know it.

"Yeah, ol sarge Previn was tough, but not tough enough to survive when his leg had to be amputated and turned bad. What a stink, and then he died. Too bad the Bard Frollo's wand that could have saved him had run out of magic just that morning."

 

[JRedmond]

There is nothing "either/or" about these quotes.

PC finds a scroll. Wants to copy it into their spellbook. PC's a wizard. Pretty normal thing to do.

Player rolls an Arcana check.

If it fails, the scroll is ruined. You get no new spell.

If it succeeds, you have shell out 50gp for the special inks and gilding and whatnot that goes into the transcription. And the whole process takes you 2 hours per spell level to complete...the scroll is "used up" in the process and you have it in your spellbook to prepare at your leisure forevermore.

Why is this even a question? They are not contradictory statements.

The reason it's a question is because it doesn't say that in the PHB. Everything rules the players need to follow should be in the PHB but it's not. If it was a variant rule sure but a regular common thing for a Wizard to do should be in the PHB. Before we had the DMG and only the PHB there would have been no arcana check.