Worlds of Design: How Subtle is Your Sorcery?

Game designers of tabletop fantasy role-playing games know that spellcasting is a key part of both the game’s mechanics and the world setting. Which is why it’s important to understand a simple but critical concept in a fantasy world: the noticeability of spellcasting. Not many RPG rulesets explicitly state all the conditions for casting a spell. In particular, how much sound volume and movement does spellcasting involve?

spellcasting.jpg

Picture courtesy of Pixabay.

How Much Blast to Your Cast?​

In my days as a Dungeons & Dragons Dungeon Master, I’ve always ruled that spellcasting requires a noticeable, obvious, effort. If there’s an oral component, it must be spoken loudly; the spell must be more or less proclaimed in a grandiose manner. It would rarely be mistaken for anything other than spellcasting.

Why rule this way? Because I don’t want spellcaster specialists to dominate play. It’s enough that they can blast the enemy into smithereens, let alone be sneaky in their actions! In a different set of rules that don’t enable spellcasters to dominate, there may be reasons to rule differently.

Contrast my ruling with a situation (game or fiction) where a spellcaster can twitch a finger or mutter something to cast a spell. The requirements of casting become very important in stealth. Can a spell be muttered or whispered so that stealth isn’t lost, how much chance is there for someone to notice the spellcasting? Think how much “stealth casting” increases “the power of magic.”

More importantly, a spell that can be cast without anyone noticing is a spell that can’t be easily detected. This makes the spell harder to disrupt as well as trace to who cast it.

Cloaked Conjurations​

Spells that can be concealed bring up important questions. Can the enemy who becomes aware of the casting react soon enough to stop it? D&D specifies casting time, but many games do not. Some games have implemented stopping opposing casting before it’s finished. The ways of counterspelling in older editions of D&D were a bit murky (chiefly revolving around dispel magic).

Even in games with established rulesets like Fifth Edition D&D, noticing and disrupting spells can be a little vague. For example, in Xanathar’s Guide to Everything, page 85 “Perceiving a Caster at Work,” there's recommended rules about perceiving a spell being cast and what’s required for it to be perceptible, but the difficulty for the Perception check largely up to the DM. Which is why it's important for both game masters and players to be clear ahead of time of just what's involved in casting spells.

Who Cast That?​

A spell’s “noticeability” has two major parts, sound and vision, though I suppose in special cases there could be a smell associated with casting, or even a “feeling in the air." That is, you can hear a spell being cast, or you can see it being cast, or you can smell or feel it being cast. And you must then recognize that it’s a spell.

In other words, how well can casters disguise what they’re doing, so that it doesn’t appear to be casting? Do opponents/targets need to hear a spell in order to be affected? Spells that affect the opponent’s hearing or affect them through sound probably need to be heard by the target(s).

As we discussed in “How Lethal is Your Magic?” there are serious implications for characters who can be easily identified as spellcasters; spellcasters who can cast spells undetected are an even bigger concern for civilized societies. You could imagine a setting where spellcasters are required to wear certain clothing (think the magician’s pointy hat). This could be by law or by the “rules of magic,” or even hubris as caster's who wants other to know their power hold the item like a badge of honor. The caster might need an arcane focus like a staff; alternately it could be some piece of clothing that every caster is expected to have on their person.

And if an item is involved in casting, that surely extends to magic items that create spell effects. They may well need to be tagged or registered. Given the variability of magic items, some magical detection might be required upon entering certain areas—it’s one thing to peace knot your magic sword, it’s another when a handkerchief or a brooch can cast fireballs.

This has combat implications as well. In a battle, would opponents even recognize that someone was using a magic item? You might think that a wand of fireballs or lightning bolts would be easy to spot in use, but what about more subtle effects, especially ones where you don’t have to point at a target?

Implications of Incantations​

How spells are expressed—be it through sight, sound, or even smell—has wide-ranging implications for fantasy cultures and on the battlefield. Thinking about how your casters cast can change everything, from the complexity of your spell system to how polite society deals with pranksters and assassins. It’s important, but could amount to a lot of rules unless you make it quite simple, as I do.

Special thanks to my wife Sue always for asking the tough questions as I drafted this article.

Your Turn: How sneaky can spellcasters be in your games?
 

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Lewis Pulsipher

Lewis Pulsipher

Dragon, White Dwarf, Fiend Folio
For me

Arcane spells are dramatic. You are making motions and saying words that aren't natural to you while channeling mystical energy. You have to be part magical (a sorcerer or magic creature) to shortcut enough of it to cast it in a natural motion.

Divine magic is momentary possession. You speak the voice of your god, oath, or creed. You have no casting by yourself. The waifish little elf is bellowing the deep voice of Thor or Pelor or the 4th Millian Creed by the Agatan Boys Choir of 350BE.

There is no subtlety without magical character cost.
 
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Depends on the spell.

Message says it's V,M,S

The descriptions says, "You point your finger toward a creature within range and whisper a message. "

So, you use the copper wire (M) to point at the target (S) and whisper the message (V)

Seems pretty subtle if no-one is looking.

VMS should actually be an indicator for how obvious a spell is but I think lots of spell descriptions have dropped the fluff.

OTOH,
I'm pretty sure Tasha's Hideous laughter required you to throw tarts at your target(or stuff them in your face?) and tickle your opponent under the armpits with a feather. Not too subtle.
 
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I'm pretty sure Tasha's Hideous laughter required you to throw tarts at your target(or stuff them in your face?) and tickle your opponent under the armpits with a feather. Not too subtle.
What if THL were based on a human sense?

Vision range. Requirement: make a funny gesture within sight.
Sound range. Tell a joke loud enough for the sound to reach the target.
Smell range. Emit a "laughing" gas that reaches around corners near you, unless there's a breeze.
Taste range. Put a layer of oil on something the target will touch or taste.
Touch range. You must be able to touch (tickle) the target.

The lower ranges are more subtle, but also more difficult to target.
 

What if THL were based on a human sense?

Vision range. Requirement: make a funny gesture within sight.
Sound range. Tell a joke loud enough for the sound to reach the target.
Smell range. Emit a "laughing" gas that reaches around corners near you, unless there's a breeze.
Taste range. Put a layer of oil on something the target will touch or taste.
Touch range. You must be able to touch (tickle) the target.

The lower ranges are more subtle, but also more difficult to target.
This is the kind of magic we need more of
 


I legit go the Neverwinter Nights 1 or Eternal Darkness: Sanity' Requiem in visual spectacle when it comes to non-subtle spellcasting.
 

all standard casting is inherently conspicuous (so barring stuff like subtle spell and innate componentless casting), you can't whisper or make some dinky little finger wiggles and expect your spells to work, you've got to proclaim this rewriting of reality and gesticulate with force and intention.
 

In my D&D games I leave that it up to the players. I let them whisper verbal components and be subtle with their somatic components.

In Warhammer Fantasy (4e), there are more explicit rules for this. Casting magic requires a Language (Magick) test. Most wizards have to speak their spells at loudly. If they want to try to speak quieter, they can do so, but get a penalty on their role. Wizards of lore Shadow, however, may cast spells subtlety without a penalty to their roll.
 

First a few questions: Do spell related objects retain any sounds, colors, vibrations, stirrings, etc.? What of background noise, all those spells taking place around cast by others or that may occur naturally? And what about cleric spells?

It can get confusing.

In my games, spells create a vibration (for lack of better term) that can be felt within the proximity, it is what attracts bad things to people and places. Detect magic helps inform on nature of the spell and possibly who or what caused it and will show any byproduct or waste material. Objects help in the reduction of vibrations, so many wizards and clerics use them.
 

I loved the idea of spell components when I first read the Dragonlance Chronicles (not realizing at the time what D&D was or that the books had anything to do with it). The need to have specific, bizarre items in order to make magic happen just seemed so . . . realistic, and was a novel concept for 11-ish year old me.

When I started running [2nd Edition A]D&D a few years later, I was a stickler for spell components. My players were game enough, and we kept careful track of who had what and in what quantities. But as time went on (and once I obtained and read the Basic D&D Rules Cyclopedia), I started to care less and less about it. And these days, some 30 years after I started, that level of pickiness and micromanagement just seems like whole lot of work.
 

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