What (PHB) Spells have you banned/altered?

[Meatboy]

For my HB setting I have had to drastically alter spells to get the feeling I want for the setting.
I have removed a lot of the more mechanicaly obtuse spells such as wish and miracle and spells that make travel effectively redundant like teleport, though I have retained some other ones such as the one that lets you walk through shadows. Also gone are the spells that return the dead to life. I want characters to fear death. I feel that is half the fun.
Most other spells have been changed somewhat because I use a modified psionics system with magic spells so instead of gaining power by level you must invest spell points to advance the spells power.

 

[ender_wiggin]

I find that lots of people remove teleport.

It was phase I went through too. Though I think it's important whether to realize whether you are removing the spell because its flavor doesn't fit your world, or whether it's because you're scared of PC abuse.

Imho if it's the later, it's the DMing mentality that should change, not the spell that should get banned. Handling teleport is something that's daunting, but it definately can be done magnificently.

The first step is to stop making scenarios that depend on the PCs going through a dungeon to fight a BBEG at the end and rescue a maiden in a locked cell at the bottom of the dungeon. They'll just tp in. Once you realize that, the rest falls into place.

 

[Captain NeMo]

Banning spells is like stealing away class abilities. If any of my co-dms ever tried to ban spells Id ban feats that allow fighters to improved their combat skills. True balance comes only from good DMing and mutual respect between players and DMs. If you lack these two key things you may as well stop playing altogether.

Hehe. When you consider A) the hundreds (if not thousands) of spells availiable to casters and B) the general imbalance between the power levels of casters and non-casters, I can't help but feel your statements are a tad silly. We're talking banning a handful of spells here, not reworking the entire magic system.

 

[Spatzimaus]

I find that lots of people remove teleport.

Well, a couple campaigns back, we were faced with the whole Buff-Scry-Teleport combo, and we came close to removing the teleport spells altogether. But in the end, what we did instead was create a bunch of custom spells dealing with this sort of thing. They all fit into the world just fine, because there was an organization in-game that was exactly the kind of people that'd be researching this stuff to begin with.

There was a 2nd/3rd-level spell that scrambled scrying, forcing the scryer to make spot/listen checks to draw any information from a 5' area around one target. (Duration was 1 hour/level, so even though it doesn't sound like much of an effect, it made scrying just unreliable enough that people stopped depending on it.)

There was an AoE dimensional anchor. There were scry trap spells, scry detection spells, teleport redirection spells, and triggered area dispels (really handy vs buffs). Plus items for quite a few of these, of course.

And then at one point, the PCs met the guy who had actually researched all of these spells, and found out he had also made a really nasty 9th-level custom spell called reality anchor that shut down all teleportation, scrying, summoning, planar travel, etc. within 60' of the caster. It also tried to banish any outsiders within the area, if the caster spent a round concentrating. The best part was that you wouldn't know it was there until you tried something, at which point it'd not only interrupt, it'd deal 1d6 damage per spell level.

Anyway, you don't need to design custom spells, really; just realize that the splatbooks and such are loaded with spells or items designed to counteract many of the PHB spells. So, all the DM needs to do is throw a few of those into the campaign.

 

[Buttercup]

For my upcoming game I've removed all travel spells because I want to emphasise travelling and the comradeship of journeying. It also places more importance on the artifact monoliths that actually allow instantaneous transportation.

I'm working on a new campaign that will do the same thing for the same reasons.

I've also never allowed raise dead spells, because I want death to be final.

 

[Thanee]

While I don't usually ban spells (except maybe for flavor reasons in specific campaigns), I do have changed many of the spells (even in the core rules), altered durations, slightly altered effects, stuff like that.

Bye
Thanee

 

[vulcan_idic]

As for jump, the only reason the spell is so powerful compared to the skill is that the skill is just plain weak. On a skill point-by-skill point basis, it's just not worth the expenditure of points. Frankly, I wish they had rolled Jump, Climb, Swim, etc. into one skill (call it "Athletics" and change Endurance to its Skill Focus). Spells like jump would only modify one specific type of Athletic check, but now the skill wouldn't be hopelessly outclassed.

Consider this "yoinked".

 

[Li Shenron]

I gave a Fortitude (Negate) ST to Harm in a couple of campaigns.
I added Fatigue/Exhaustion as a drawback to Haste in another campaign.

Otherwise everything is as the 3.0 PHB.

However I often adjudicate on the fly some extra effects depending on the circumstance. And when the spell description doesn't cover something, I rather do as I please than trying to extrapolate from the RAW with some convoluted explanation.

 

[Sound of Azure]

I'm working on a new campaign that will do the same thing for the same reasons.

I've also never allowed raise dead spells, because I want death to be final.

Cool. Glad I'm not the only one.

On resurrection magic, I'm undecided at the moment. I'm leaning towards having it necessary to travel to the spirit realm to bargain for the person's life.
There may be a custom spell to temporarily give a person who has died (now a spirit creature) the ability to exist in the middle world.
Or possibly the spells require a "Quest" component instead of those listed.

On the whole I agree that resurrection magic can be problematic, and that death should be a true threat, not a trivial risk.

 

[dante58701]

When I want a character to stay dead, I just have a demon trap their soul. you cant ressurect a trapped soul. Magical spells are their own balancing factor. For every spell you hate, there is one to counter it's effectiveness. Dimensional Anchor also being one of my favorite traps.