Why Won't Some People Play Spellcasters?

[Iron Sheep]

My wife falls into the category of people who don't like playing casters.

She will, reluctantly, play sorcerers and other spontaneous casters, but she refuses to play wizards, clerics or druids.

What she doesn't like is having to pick spells on a regular basis: she feels that constantly having to evaluate the relative merits of spell selection takes up too much brain time and detracts from her enjoyment of the game. The limited and/or infrequent choices that sorcerers and similar have to make suit her much better. Evaluating which spell to learn can be done in a relaxed manner when levelling, rather than while other players are waiting for you to tweak your spell list for the day; and it's easier in combat to pick from a smaller palette of spells to know what you want to cast ("should I use fireball or scorching ray this round").

She also feels that whatever she selects for a day is often the wrong thing as events play out ("I should have taken 3 flame strikes today, not 2"), where although sorcerers have a more limited selection of spells they can cast, you can use all your 3rd level slots for fireball if that's what you need in a given adventure.

And yes, the latter problem can be overcome with proper preparation of scrolls and wands, but that's an additional level of complexity that she doesn't want to deal with.

I can see her points. I prefer the flexibility that non-spontaneous casters have, but I don't usually have the time to put together "standard selections" for typical situations which would cut down the required game time to prepare.

So, in short, although she's one of the smartest people I know and could play a very effective character from a non-spontaneous caster class, she simply finds that the effort required detracts from her enjoyment of the game.

I suspect that many people who don't like playing casters (other than those who don't like the Vancian magic system on more general grounds) have issues along these lines, although perhaps more extreme.

Corran

 

[Timeboxer]

What she doesn't like is having to pick spells on a regular basis: she feels that constantly having to evaluate the relative merits of spell selection takes up too much brain time and detracts from her enjoyment of the game.

Y'know, my way of dealing with this is that I have a "regular" spell selection that's my default, and I just replace certain elements if necessary for the day.

She also feels that whatever she selects for a day is often the wrong thing as events play out ("I should have taken 3 flame strikes today, not 2"), where although sorcerers have a more limited selection of spells they can cast, you can use all your 3rd level slots for fireball if that's what you need in a given adventure.

Does she know that you can leave some spell slots unprepared, and then spend a half-hour or so filling them later? This adds versatility, and it pretty much completely removes most of the advantages of having a sorcerer; you just can't do it in the middle of battle.

 

[Altamont Ravenard]

For people who don't like having too many choices, the Warlock seems to be a good idea, but IMO, the Warmage is an interesting concept for a spellcaster, in the sense that:
- you don't have to prepare spells.
- you don't have to choose the spells you know.

Before the Warmage came out in the MiniHB, I had an idea to make "specialized" sorcerers, ie sorcerers with pre-determined spell lists and additional abilities to compensate for their lack of flexibility. What I came up with was:

- The Mentate: sorcerer that had access to all sorcerer/wizard spells from the enchantment and divination schools. I also gave this caster a limited "Mental Blast" attack (use a spell slot of level X to make a mental blast attack that did Xd6 points of damage).
- The Lifemage: conjuration & necromancy. Could use spell slots to heal himself (for very little damage. I know I know I crossed the line...)
- The Battlemage: evocation and abjuration. Spell on the Run. Armor proficiencies
- The Meldmage: Illusion and Transmutation.

AR

 

[Steverooo]

Hello everybody,

While playing D&D, I've encountered a couple of people who don't like playing spellcasting characters. Generally, their reasons all boil down to the same thing: they don't like it because it's too complicated. Typically they're just not rules people, and they don't like having to decide which spells to use in a particular situation, or even going through the rules and figuring out which spells they can cast.

In fact, one of these people even said they don't like D&D 3.0/3.5 because Feats are too much like Spells; one more thing they have to choose and memorize!

Never try to force your round players into square holes of equal volume. Not only will they object, but something will break!

I hate being a PC with only a few spells, weak, wimpy, no armor, and only a few weapons... and that's what low level Wizards are! They are too weak at lower levels, and too powerful at higher ones. While they may be balanced with themselves, they are not, with their party.

Personally, I prefer to play Rangers, as I have always liked stealthy woodsmen. I look for a class which fits my type. My PCs never get to be powerful, and are always "Also-Rans", but oh well... Of the D&D classes, this one fits me best.

So don't try to make your players play any class they don't like. Someday, if their PC gets killed off somewhere after level 10, you might suggest trying the Wizard, telling them he's more able, by this point... You never know, they might try it, and be hooked! In any case, they're going to have to come to it on their own, and they'll do it in their own time (if they ever do). They can't be forced.

 

[just__al]

I played a wizard in a campaign that STARTED at 12th level. I did this because the only one of my fellow players I believed knew the spell system well enough to full as crucial a role to a high level party wanted to play a monk.

I really held up the group every time the group headed out for the day because I had to pick all my spells.

I finally had to make up several sets of spells I would take on a given day and put them all in word with a check list. I had

Typical Spells
Travelling Spells
Meele Heavy Combat
Magic Heavy Combat
Investegative

I updated the sheet every time I added to my spell book.

At that point it wasn't that hard during the game as I just said, "I prepare my travelling spells" but I had to sit down and figure out these lists between games putting in more time than I like to when I'm a player and not a DM.

The paladin didn't have much to figure out except what feat to take at 15th and 18th level, when to smite, and how much to power attack (usually full or none)

I can definately see why people wouldn't want to play a spell caster.

It's almost someone elses turn to DM (currently it's me) and I am going to play a cleric. Cleric's rock, even if they do have spells, I have a <i>system</i> now to deal with my spell selection.

 

[Lars Porsenna]

Personally I love playing arcane wizards. Where others see it as being too much to remember, I see it as a huge amount of flexibility. Usually, I'll have a small number of spells that I know I'll normally need...like magic Missile, Shield, Mage Armor, Ligtning Bolt, etc. but then tailor my spell selection to utility spells/spells I think I might need; if we're on a quest to slay a red dragon, having Elemental Resistance (fire) makes logical sense. Sometimes you get it wrong and don't memorize the right spells, but for me that's part of the fun: its sort of like gambling.

BTW, if you're sitting around twiddling your thumbs because you got bushwhacked and only have divinations memorized, I would argue you were neither prepared for contigencies (you're an ADVENTURER! Danger's part of the game!) nor are you exploiting other characteristics of your character fully. In our current campaign, I have a 1st level Elven Wizard. With lots of DEX, a CON bonus, and perhaps shield from a scroll (or mage armor), when I'm out of useful spells I can easily sit in the back and plink away with the longbow. At this level, and with his dex bonus, he might not be as powerful as a straight fighter, but he has enough of a to-hit bonus, and the longbow is enough of a support weapon, that he can usefully support the bruisers up front when need be...

Damon.

 

[Shade]

The warlock sounds even better than I'd hoped!

As far psion, I do think the psionics system is superior to the magic system. But I assumed the thread meant "spellcasters" in the magic sense, not psicasters, if you will.

 

[Desdichado]

Iron Sheep makes a good point as well, and one that irks me when I've played clerics or wizards in the past.

That Warlock sounds intriguing; I wouldn't mind playing that one at all. I also like spellcasters in other systems, from time to time.

But really, it's more about personal taste than anything else. I like someone who can fight, although the fighter class itself, with its reliance on equipment and no skill points, isn't really my favorite manifestation of that archetype.

 

[Felix]

I both like and dislike playing wizards in particular...

I like playing wizards because I think they are the class with the most power potential in the game. And by power, I mean plane-eclipsing, temporal-rift creating, how-dare-you-mortals-interfere-in-my-business kind of power. And I think that's just cool. Let me refer you to a particularly good example of wizardly potential in Mostin, from Sepulchrave's story hour...

"What exactly are you saying, Mostin?"

"I can dimensionally lock an area two miles across, Shomei. Outside of the quiescence – where demons will be forced to manifest – I can invoke a total of seventeen – seventeen – reality maelstroms if necessary. Afqithan is not my world, Shomei. There are no holds barred there. If I rip the spatial fabric of the demiplane to shreds, I don't care. If I can call the Horror, and bind it – as long as I can get away before the spell ends, I don't care. Shomei, even if I gate in Carasch and invoke an apocalypse I don't care. Are we on the same page here, Shomei?"

She looked at him. "Thank-you, Mostin. For a while, I was beginning to lose my perspective. I think you may have restored it to me."

"We are as gods, Shomei. Never forget it."

"You truly are at your best when you're at your craziest," she smiled.

Yeah, so I think that with wizards having this kind of arcane power coursing through their soul's fiber, they'd have a much different perspective on morality, life and death, interpersonal relationships... that sort of thing.

But that is also what I don't like about playing a wizard. They are so utterly different from normals that their attitude towards them must be completely unconventional. The demands of their art must sometimes be more important than the demands of the other party members. And even if this only happens once in four times, the party really can't survive if one of its members refuses to go now for reasons-that-you-people-couldn't-possibly-understand.

So I have metagame trouble playing a wizard because I see it as the solitary pursuit of changing the way reality is formed around you. That doesn't lend itself to traveling hither thither and yon with adventurers every day. Especially when there are 200-year-old tomes discussing theoretical quadra-mechanical mathematics arriving from the elemental plane of law any time now!

 

[Verequus]

The warlock sounds even better than I'd hoped!

As far psion, I do think the psionics system is superior to the magic system. But I assumed the thread meant "spellcasters" in the magic sense, not psicasters, if you will.

Hey, you seem to be a perfect candidate for the following recommendation: Try Elements of Magic Revised at RPGnow. It is a nifty spellpoint system, which addresses virtually all complaints, I seen in this thread (except that wizards have still d4 ) - I could easily double the reasons, what is bad about the core magic system (at least in my view), so I extend the the recommendation to everyone else. BTW, EoMR is going to be updated, so most to all negative things in reviews won't be there or are patched in like the bookmarks.