Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;973449Don't like memorizations and fire-once spells?

Don't use them.

Okay, we're done here.  Somebody get me a beer.

Personally, choosing my loadout of spells ahead of time is the best part of playing a magic user.

I'd like to buy you a beer.

Quote from: Simlasa;973466But I still go back to a number of other ways of doing it, including DCC's trick of having spells be reusable until you botch it somehow.

Which I think first came from Dragon Warrior's mystic class - make a roll each time you cast. When you fail the roll, no more spells until the next day. Something like that.

Quote from: The Exploited.;973272So, I've no real issue with that per se. However, having to choose the spells for that day is a right pain. So, yes, that totally needs to go IMO... How did you generally house rule it?

er... its supposed to be a pain. It forced the caster classes to prep loadouts and work with what they have. Also unless you get lucky you tend to not have much more than you can cast in your book anyhow for a while, possibly the whole campaign if spells other than your own research are few and far far between. And there will be spells you possibly just cant ever learn anyhow.

As for house ruling it. We never did. It works fine as is.

If I want something else then theres 5e D&D. No more fire and forget. And slots are now more like pseudo spell points.

Think of the spells as specialized shells in a rifle. Each day the casters load up what they hope will be useful and go. That might mean they selected badly and either have to make do or get creative.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;973450The only "story" is "what happened."  "Balanced characters" means "it's fun to play any character type."  It does not need to be the same sort of fun.

Nope... What's 'happening'.

Okay, we're done here, someone get me a Jameson.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;973449Don't like memorizations and fire-once spells?

Don't use them.

A tad late there... Wasn't that established a few pages ago?

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;973449Personally, choosing my loadout of spells ahead of time is the best part of playing a magic user.

Oh... That's nice.

Okay, we're done here, someone get me a Jameson.

Quote from: Omega;973490er... its supposed to be a pain. It forced the caster classes to prep loadouts and work with what they have. Also unless you get lucky you tend to not have much more than you can cast in your book anyhow for a while, possibly the whole campaign if spells other than your own research are few and far far between. And there will be spells you possibly just cant ever learn anyhow.

As for house ruling it. We never did. It works fine as is.

If I want something else then theres 5e D&D. No more fire and forget. And slots are now more like pseudo spell points.

Think of the spells as specialized shells in a rifle. Each day the casters load up what they hope will be useful and go. That might mean they selected badly and either have to make do or get creative.

Sure, that's true of course... However, We've already discussed the 'whys' of restricting magic users.

I'm really interested in the 'hows'. By that I mean, moving away from the traditional 'you must pick 'x' spells today'. But there are other restrictions to be imposed (when decided on), such as fatigue, HP cost, etc.

I probably should have stated, that the idea of this homebrew, is a low fantasy setting. Therefore, no one would EVER go beyond level 10. Gaining experience will be a very slow affair and with virtually no magic items. Now, this might sound a bit boring to the traditional D&D player, and I totally get that. But our group likes low fantasy games. Yet, we still want to go the OSR route instead of WFRP (1st & 2nd editions) which we love but have played them to death.

So, the magic user would be quite underpowered for quite a while. So, I'd like to at least give him a few spell choices. The setting's tone is heavily based off 'Beyond the Wall OSR RPG'. That is to say, that a Level 5 fighter is considered one of the best in the And at Level 10 your character is probably some kind of King (and is already looking at character retirement).

Quote from: Psikerlord;973470Which I think first came from Dragon Warrior's mystic class - make a roll each time you cast. When you fail the roll, no more spells until the next day. Something like that.

I remember the Mystics from Dragon Warriors. Great little game that...

I do like some kind of 'spell burn out' system. In WFRP (2e) if you botch your roll you could be in some god awful trouble. Personally, I like magic to always come at a price (a la the S&S genre). This is handled very well in Symbaroum. A caster will get temporarily corruption every time a spell is cast. Should he go beyond his threshold (without waiting to recover), then he can gain mutations, etc. Even worse then that though, he could turn into an abomination and the character is lost forever as a midless killing machine. So, you've got to be exceedingly carful when using any type of magic.

Of course, that is applicable to Symbaroum given the origin of magic within the game, so it may not be suitable for every other setting. But I like it in the context and suits the game's dark tone.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;973452Then the rest of us have the right to think your opinion is worth even less than that.  Don't spew shit out of your mouth and expect it to be taken as truth.

Thank you for finally convincing me you are no longer worth listening to.  The express lane from your tongue to my asshole has been installed.

Well, if I've convinced you that I'm not worth listening to, then I've done my job. Happy days! I'll truly miss your insightful comments. Bye bye...

Oh, but before you toddle off, I should point out that my comments to Black Vulmea were in response to his snarky comments at the beginning of the thread - So, just to put it in a bit of context and all.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;973452Don't spew shit out of your mouth and expect it to be taken as truth.

Haw haw... I don't expect anything from anyone. And anything I say should be approached with skepticism, just like everyone else.

Quote from: Simlasa;973394The 'forgetting' never sat well with me but I liked LotFP's fluff that each spell cast is a unique work of art... that each casting is a solitary creation that is lost as it completes its purpose. Just a different bit of flavor text but I prefer it.

In general I prefer systems with 'spell points' of some sort. The Last Gasp blog has a system of casting using spell points, and then desperate casting without them, that I liked a lot and worked well in our Lamentations games before I moved everything over to Renaissance.

Cheers for the link! I'll take a gander.

I like spell points as well. It's a good simple way of managing spells as a resource, and you know exactly what you limitations are. I like in RQ the way you can store magic points in Staffs, etc. Always give a wizard an excuse to carry a staff! And add to that some kind of botch system and you got some good gaming fun there.

Funny, I've read quite a lot of the supplements for LoTFP but not the actual core book. But I quite like the idea of how they handle spells from what you've described.

I've just finished reading Death Frost Doom... A rather cheery sort of adventure! Great atmosphere in that supplement though.

Quote from: The Exploited.;973503I like spell points as well. It's a good simple way of managing spells as a resource, and you know exactly what you limitations are.

Another thing I like about Last Gasp's spell point system is that spell points are rolled randomly for the day and the PC Magic User doesn't necessarily know how many points they get for the day. Adding to the vagueries of magic.
Spells generally go off as intended, until you're out of points and pushing it.

Quote from: Simlasa;973518Another thing I like about Last Gasp's spell point system is that spell points are rolled randomly for the day and the PC Magic User doesn't necessarily know how many points they get for the day. Adding to the vagueries of magic.
Spells generally go off as intended, until you're out of points and pushing it.

That sounds very interesting, by varying the spell points. I wouldn't have thought of that, to be honest. As you say, it takes into account the ephemeral nature of magic and the ebb and flow of its nature. It could be interesting too, if they varied again, in different locations as well. For places that were more or less 'in-tune' with magic. So, I could see a lot of dark rituals be practiced at specific locations, and then the heroes being drawn to them in order to stop such nefarious shenanigans.

I think pushing magic should have consequences as well. I mean, who couldn't do with an extra tentacle or eyeball? Muhah!

While not entirely appropriate for a low-magic fantasy game, I also have to recommend the Earthdawn spell-system. It is very tied into the metaphysics of the game-world (& the nasty lovecraftian Horrors that showed up when the mana spike happened). Here's a decent old thread with a good, very basic, summary: https://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?121399-Earthdawn-Splain-the-magic-system!

QuoteIn Earthdawn, some people can cast spells by manipulating magical energy. However, manipulating magical energy directly is dangerous for a number of reasons; the raw power can injure you and it can attract the attention of Horrors, who are a bit like Tribe 8's Z'bri, without being quite as cool.

In any event, you'd like to shield yourself from damage, so instead of manipulating the magic directly, you put it in a "matrix", which holds it for you in a way that lets you manipulate it safely. However, you can only have one spell in a given matrix at a time, and changing the spell that you have in a matrix is a difficult and time-consuming process.

If you want to be able to use a spell in a fight, it's much easier if you put it in a matrix beforehand. It's a bit like memorizing spells from AD&D. Unlike AD&D, once you have a spell in a matrix, you can cast it as many times as you like. This is balanced in Earthdawn by the fact that spells almost always have "to hit" rolls, and that it takes multiple rounds to cast more powerful spells.

The matrices themselves are "Talents", or magically enhanced skills, and if you have a high rank in a spell matrix, you can store more powerful spells. Eventually, as your character advances, he'll get access to more matrices.

Quote from: The Exploited.;973256While I like Wizards a lot especially the Thoth-Amon kind (I personally prefer the term Sorcerers). I've always been bugged about Wizards being rather limited (at the early levels).

But the one thing that really sticks out, for me at any rate, is that whole 'forgetting' the spell after it's cast. So, effectively you can only cast it once per day. Anyone else feel the same on this?

The second part of this thread is asking for advice. Have you got any ideas/suggestions on how to remedy this?

What I have done:

A) Mana Points = Level x Intelligence / 4. Spell cost = Level of spell.

Result: Increased versatility, more low level spells, fewer high level spells. Controlling spells known is very important, other wise you'll wish for LFQW.

B) Spells as standard, but knowledge not tied to spell slots, and lower level spells castable with higher level slots.

Result: Same number of spells as before, but versatility increases. A 7th level wizard can still drop two fireballs and four magic missiles, but the players will actually seek out utilitarian spells, and be able to use them. Sometimes, the tears of a magician sacrificing a 4th level slot for feather fall are tasty.

Also, this effectively turns memorization into "spell points" with a minimum amount of work. The total number of spells doesn't change, it's just that the magician has the skill to use a fraction of his mana more efficiently to cast spells of greater complexity.

Furthermore, at first level I have magicians know their INT bonus in additional first level spells. A useful boost at levels 1-3, but doesn't overshadow the martial types later.

C) Magicians can cast a number of spells per day equal to Level + INT mod. Of these, magicians can only cast 1+ INT mod of their highest level spells.

Result: Just trying this out now. Simplest, with one caveat to stem fireballorrhea.

With all schemes, spell knowledge is restricted to research, barter, or salvage. Magicians don't get automatic spells in their spell book each level.

(Because I'm answering as I read)

Quote from: The Exploited.;973496Sure, that's true of course... However, We've already discussed the 'whys' of restricting magic users.

I'm really interested in the 'hows'. By that I mean, moving away from the traditional 'you must pick 'x' spells today'. But there are other restrictions to be imposed (when decided on), such as fatigue, HP cost, etc.

If it was me, I would let the players decide if picking their spells for the day was tedious or not.

That said, you can just say that learning spell formulae are like learning specialized skills. You don't simply forget how to do an appendectomy. However, if your planning on transitioning from general surgery to something more specialized, you can spend some considerable time an effort performing a fellowship into a different area. You make there be a significant cost to change the spells in the spell book. An extra spells that the character has access to may not be castable, but perhaps they can write scrolls or create items with them.

ACKS is a good example of this.

Saying old D&D's Jack Vance inspired magic is "the wizard forgets spells" is like saying that an archer running out of arrows means he forgets how to use a bow.

Quote from: thedungeondelver;973638Saying old D&D's Jack Vance inspired magic is "the wizard forgets spells" is like saying that an archer running out of arrows means he forgets how to use a bow.

True, but I've found it's not really worth arguing about.