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General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Why are we still stuck with divine casters knowing all spells?
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<blockquote data-quote="Li Shenron" data-source="post: 6129497" data-attributes="member: 1465"><p>Yes, this is why I admitted that the players may not be able to find alternatives against a curse like they do against a locked door, because the latter is something realistic while the former is made-up, and you have little way around a made-up thing when the rules codify it, because you have little to base your reasoning upon except the RAW (while instead, a locked door isn't just a line in the rulesbook, it corresponds to something belonging to reality, so the players have all their experience in reality to help them). But this is also why I said it will then be up to the DM to be creative, and receptive of player's attempts, i.e. if the players start discussing at the table whether e.g. the ranger's Herbalism could help, then a receptive DM can steal the hint and compensate the unavailability of <em>Remove Curse</em> with ruling that against this particular curse it is said that herbs X and Y mixed together... you get the point! The DM can spawn a mini-quest which takes a week of action instead of a night of inaction to lift the curse.</p><p></p><p>Such ideas of course can also be used in a game where clerics have all the spells they ever need, in which case the DM will make an exception to actually <em>prevent</em> using the same Remove Curse spell for the 342nd time. </p><p></p><p>My point is that having all remove-condition spells is not the major issue here, but neither is the best reason for giving all spells to clerics by default. It is indeed a gamestyle issue... in a game totally focused on combats after combats, long-lasting conditions are usually hated by players who just want to get rid of them asap so in this gamestyle serve only the purpose of giving a short-term penalty (possibly already over before next combat). If the gamestyle also enjoys resource management, then having them as daily spells is fine, but it is also possible that instead their style focuses on combat but dislikes resource management, in which case it would be better to just expire all those curses and conditions with a short rest and forget about them (spells would then remain only to be able to anticipate the expiration to when the combat is still ongoing). There are other gamestyles however, and I just know that for my own tastes there is few things more boring than "automatic reset" spells, so I would actually want that those came at a price i.e. for each spell of that kind you know, there is another spell you could have known but you don't. After all, the Wizard is limited in this way, would if be better then to just let Wizards also know all spells in their list? </p><p></p><p>BTW, the <strong>ritual</strong> suggestion was quite interesting. 5e rituals are a different thing however, so they are not going to help. 4e rituals IIRC are available to everyone but have to be learned (i.e. you don't know them automatically) so they could definitely be an example of how to deal against not having the right spell for the job. This made me think of a middle ground, which is <em><strong><u>scrolls</u></strong></em>. They could serve exactly the same purpose, without needing a completely separate set of rules like rituals. The DM has total control over how easily scrolls can be acquired in the game, so in a gaming group which does want easy "condition resets", the Cleric doesn't even need to learn all those spells if the DM wisely has plenty of those scrolls for sales, while another gaming group which prefers the challenges will have their DM make scrolls unavailable.</p><p></p><p>Thus maybe a reasonable compromise for my issue would be this: limit the number of divine spells known <em>but</em> suggest the availability of divine scrolls if needed.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Li Shenron, post: 6129497, member: 1465"] Yes, this is why I admitted that the players may not be able to find alternatives against a curse like they do against a locked door, because the latter is something realistic while the former is made-up, and you have little way around a made-up thing when the rules codify it, because you have little to base your reasoning upon except the RAW (while instead, a locked door isn't just a line in the rulesbook, it corresponds to something belonging to reality, so the players have all their experience in reality to help them). But this is also why I said it will then be up to the DM to be creative, and receptive of player's attempts, i.e. if the players start discussing at the table whether e.g. the ranger's Herbalism could help, then a receptive DM can steal the hint and compensate the unavailability of [I]Remove Curse[/I] with ruling that against this particular curse it is said that herbs X and Y mixed together... you get the point! The DM can spawn a mini-quest which takes a week of action instead of a night of inaction to lift the curse. Such ideas of course can also be used in a game where clerics have all the spells they ever need, in which case the DM will make an exception to actually [I]prevent[/I] using the same Remove Curse spell for the 342nd time. My point is that having all remove-condition spells is not the major issue here, but neither is the best reason for giving all spells to clerics by default. It is indeed a gamestyle issue... in a game totally focused on combats after combats, long-lasting conditions are usually hated by players who just want to get rid of them asap so in this gamestyle serve only the purpose of giving a short-term penalty (possibly already over before next combat). If the gamestyle also enjoys resource management, then having them as daily spells is fine, but it is also possible that instead their style focuses on combat but dislikes resource management, in which case it would be better to just expire all those curses and conditions with a short rest and forget about them (spells would then remain only to be able to anticipate the expiration to when the combat is still ongoing). There are other gamestyles however, and I just know that for my own tastes there is few things more boring than "automatic reset" spells, so I would actually want that those came at a price i.e. for each spell of that kind you know, there is another spell you could have known but you don't. After all, the Wizard is limited in this way, would if be better then to just let Wizards also know all spells in their list? BTW, the [B]ritual[/B] suggestion was quite interesting. 5e rituals are a different thing however, so they are not going to help. 4e rituals IIRC are available to everyone but have to be learned (i.e. you don't know them automatically) so they could definitely be an example of how to deal against not having the right spell for the job. This made me think of a middle ground, which is [I][B][U]scrolls[/U][/B][/I]. They could serve exactly the same purpose, without needing a completely separate set of rules like rituals. The DM has total control over how easily scrolls can be acquired in the game, so in a gaming group which does want easy "condition resets", the Cleric doesn't even need to learn all those spells if the DM wisely has plenty of those scrolls for sales, while another gaming group which prefers the challenges will have their DM make scrolls unavailable. Thus maybe a reasonable compromise for my issue would be this: limit the number of divine spells known [I]but[/I] suggest the availability of divine scrolls if needed. [/QUOTE]
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Why are we still stuck with divine casters knowing all spells?
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