A simple balancing of magic [Archive] - Wizards Community

A simple balancing of magic [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
smileypete
11-02-06, 08:43 AM I've seen plenty of posts in this forum about limiting magic or balancing classes. Everyone seems to ignore one simple idea.

Instead of spellcasters "magically" getting all of their spells/spell points back just by sleeping, why not make them recover slowly over time. As in slower than recovering them in one night.

I've noticed the same descrepancy in my games. Frankly, wizards aren't all that powerful unless you use the UA spell point system (which I like).

This way it turns into a trade off for the spell casters. The immediate gratification of getting spell points back without having to sleep while at the same time not giving them a fresh cake every morning.

Can someone suggest a good speed for spells/spell points to regenerate.
Szatany
11-02-06, 02:26 PM I can = you recover a number of spell levels equal to your caster level+casting stat. For example a wizard 17 with Int +6 recovers 23 levels of spells overnight, like 9th+9th+5th slot. How about that? I actually really like that idea.
Obviously, since this is D&D, there is now room for some new feats ;)

Mysticism
You can recover your magical powers faster than others.
Prerequisites: Caster level 1.
Benefit: You recover spells after good night's sleep as your caster level was 2 points higher.

Greater Mysticism
You can recover your magical powers faster than others.
Prerequisites: Caster level 10, mysticism
Benefit: You recover spells after good night's sleep as your caster level was 4 points higher. This bonus stacks with the one granted by mysticism.
Seerow
11-02-06, 02:36 PM Frankly, wizards aren't all that powerful unless you use the UA spell point system (which I like).

You've never seen a well played Wizard before.
Szatany
11-02-06, 02:44 PM Another one: Every character recovers overnight one spell slot from each level of spells he can cast. For example, a wizard can cast spells up to 5th level. After sleeping he regains one 0, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th level slot.
smileypete
11-02-06, 03:26 PM You've never seen a well played Wizard before.

I've played plenty, seen plenty and run plenty of games with them. If a wizard is locked into the rules as listed in the handbook, then their defences (while formadible) are easily overcome.

The problem really shows with magic items. Too many scrolls and potions can be frustrating. A GM should always keep a good eye on the stock piles and throw in the occasional spoiler that'll burn through those things.

Those ideas are both good, but I want to give something to the caster as well as get something. The idea might be to split up the day and figure out how much the caster gets ie. 1 hour per spell level/point. Or different rates for different classes based on atts.

This would be a little hard for the GM to track, but I think it might pay off in scenarios where the casters could run amok.

smiles
OneWinged4ngel
11-02-06, 04:36 PM You've never seen a well played Wizard before.

I agree. If you see a well played wizard past level, say, 15... they can be damn near invincible, and able to deal with any challenge fairly easily with pretty much no risk to themselves.

You can basically make it almost impossible to kill the wizard, you can make him immune to most things, and he can always be ready for any contingency. Things like Foresight should prevent him from ever being surprised. Things like Hide Life and Clone pretty much guarantee you won't have a permanent death. Things like Contingency can be crazy enough to prevent an enemy from ever having the chance to roll initiative. And do we even have to mention scry and die? Don't forget the new spell from PHB II: Celerity! That'll let you act again as an immediate action... during the other guy's turn! Let's see... so we can get a swift spell or a quickened spell, a normal spell, and a celerity spell to react perfectly to the enemy and interrupt him if he's somehow not already obliterated. Then throw in all the appropriate buffs and the fact that you can put most of them on all day or in complete safety with all the time you need, the fact that your rest cannot be interrupted thanks to things like Rope Trick and Mordenkainen's Magnificent Mansion, your DC 30-40 mass save or dies, your variety of spells and options that work just fine in antimagic fields, your variety of spells that *don't* allow a save and just screw the enemy, your permanently dominated, powerful minion(s)... need I go on?

Oh, and then you can try to actually optimize instead of just using spells intelligently... and it gets real ugly.

Honestly, the only ones that compete with other (intelligently played) high level spellcasters are other high level spellcasters (or monsters with very powerful SLAs). And you know how these battles are decided? By who is the most paranoid. If you're not paranoid enough and you lose your defenses for an instant, the other guy'll scry and die you ;)
Rowan_Whispercloak
11-02-06, 05:22 PM I think somewhere casting a quickened spell became a swift action, but I could be mistaken.

Back to the topic at hand. I would think instead of increasing the time that it takes to magic to be recovered which could give NPC caster an advantage over their PC counterpart perhap just lower the ammount of spells slot/prepared are available to the casters.
mlasater
11-02-06, 09:09 PM Don't forget the new spell from PHB II: Celerity! That'll let you act again as an immediate action... during the other guy's turn! Let's see... so we can get a swift spell, a quickened spell, a normal spell, and a celerity spell to react perfectly to the enemy and interrupt him if he's somehow not already obliterated.

NO, NO, NO, NO. Its amazing how may "overpowered" problems are from NOT READING THE RULES.

A quickened spell is a swift action. You cannot take both a swift action & a immediate action in the same turn (PH II, page 4 and many other places), as they are the same basic type of action. So in your example the caster would get 2 spells (technically three including the Celerity, but since all it does is let you cast the other spell, it doesn't really count) - the same effective number of spells as casting a standard spell & a quickened spell.
OneWinged4ngel
11-02-06, 10:06 PM Darn double posts... *snip*
OneWinged4ngel
11-02-06, 10:09 PM I think somewhere casting a quickened spell became a swift action, but I could be mistaken.

Back to the topic at hand. I would think instead of increasing the time that it takes to magic to be recovered which could give NPC caster an advantage over their PC counterpart perhap just lower the ammount of spells slot/prepared are available to the casters.

Yes, a quickened spell is a swift action. It should say "A quickened spell *or* swift spell." This was a typo on my part, and has been fixed.

NO, NO, NO, NO. Its amazing how may "overpowered" problems are from NOT READING THE RULES.

Oh man, I agree with that. Tons of statements of overpowered come from not reading the rules. However, your opposition to this claim comes from just that: not reading the rules. Not only that, it focuses on a relatively minor facet of the argument. Scry and die is definitely more powerful than an extra spell. And Celerity's most powerful function isn't even that it adds a free unadjusted quickened spell, but that it gives a free, flexible, undeclared ready action. It's much, much better than just a free, unadjusted quickened spell that doesn't have to be prepared (which is damn good).

Anywho, let's look at the rest of your ridiculous post, and examine why it's so ridiculous. I find it quite funny, really, because your own reference verifies that I'm right.

A quickened spell is a swift action. You cannot take both a swift action & a immediate action in the same turn (PH II, page 4 and many other places), as they are the same basic type of action. So in your example the caster would get 2 spells (technically three including the Celerity, but since all it does is let you cast the other spell, it doesn't really count) - the same effective number of spells as casting a standard spell & a quickened spell.

*goes to check*

Funny, it looks like the resource you pointed out to prove me wrong supports my side. Oh wait... I'm not surprised. Looks like you're the one who doesn't read the rules carefully, mlasater. And you're a bit quick to shout based on a thin grasp on the D&D rules.

Now, here is the section you referenced. Please actually read it this time, since you clearly didn't look too closely the first time.

"Using an immediate action *on your turn* is the same as using a swift action, and counts as your swift action for that turn. You cannot use another immediate action or a swift action until after your next turn *if you have used an immediate action when it is not currently your turn.* (Effectively, using an immediate action before your turn is equivelent to using a swift action for the coming turn). You also cannot use an immediate action if you are currently flat-footed."

Using a Celerity during your turn would take up the swift action. Using it after your turn takes up the action for the next turn. Which doesn't even matter since you'll be stunned. But you can avoid being put in danger from that thanks to things like Contingency. Or that your opponent will be obliterated.

Also funny is that you ignored everything else for something absolutely trivial. I don't actually need to nova and blast all my spells to be nigh-invincible as a wizard. Celerity doesn't even matter in my overpowered variants, and I would never claim that it was the reason the Wizard was unbalanced, because it's not core. The Wizard is nigh-invincible at higher levels with core material if played intelligently.

The most powerful aspect of Celerity is not giving you another spell! By far, the most powerful aspect of Celerity is giving you an undeclared readied action to use whenever you feel like it. THIS is powerful. A free quickened spell with no level increase is also powerful. Together it makes for a very powerful spell, even if it didn't let you add anything to Quicken.

Now, explain to me why my claim of overpowered is based on a lack of understanding of the rules. Especially since your objection was an irrelevent nitpick that turned out to be *wrong* by the source you yourself cited. Thanks for saving me the trouble of having to rifle through my books to find the reference to refute you, however.

Or have you realize you're mistaken yet?

Or do you want to make a bigger fool of yourself by giving another self-defeating argument?

Another one: Every character recovers overnight one spell slot from each level of spells he can cast. For example, a wizard can cast spells up to 5th level. After sleeping he regains one 0, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th level slot.

Not a bad idea Szatany, but there's a bit of a problem with this idea. Unless it's adjusted a bit, it's going to punish the casters with more spells per day, like Sorcerors, in many cases.

I've seen plenty of posts in this forum about limiting magic or balancing classes. Everyone seems to ignore one simple idea.

Instead of spellcasters "magically" getting all of their spells/spell points back just by sleeping, why not make them recover slowly over time. As in slower than recovering them in one night.

I've noticed the same descrepancy in my games. Frankly, wizards aren't all that powerful unless you use the UA spell point system (which I like).

This way it turns into a trade off for the spell casters. The immediate gratification of getting spell points back without having to sleep while at the same time not giving them a fresh cake every morning.

Can someone suggest a good speed for spells/spell points to regenerate.

Well, first, I would suggest a certain variant on these boards that apparently redoes the vancian system with spell points, but with some actual thought (as opposed to the UA system, which just tacks it on and doesn't really work well.)

I'd have to search for it a bit to find it...
kadeity
11-02-06, 11:44 PM Ive been working on an alternative spellcasting system... and despite alot of flaming, misunderstanding and uproar, its coming along nicely.

you can get a look at it here, but be sure to read all of MY posts before making up your mind about it.
http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=728831
Szatany
11-03-06, 12:34 AM Not a bad idea Szatany, but there's a bit of a problem with this idea. Unless it's adjusted a bit, it's going to punish the casters with more spells per day, like Sorcerors, in many cases.

True, but easily remedied:

Every spellcaster recovers half of his total slots from each spell level (round up and calculate each level separately) after good nigh's sleep or after daily divine prayer. Psionic characters recover half their total PP at every dawn.
OneWinged4ngel
11-03-06, 01:17 AM True, but easily remedied:

Every spellcaster recovers half of his total slots from each spell level (round up and calculate each level separately) after good nigh's sleep or after daily divine prayer. Psionic characters recover half their total PP at every dawn.

Yep, like I said... just a bit of adjustment :D
DIESCUMDIE
11-03-06, 05:24 AM (Finally someone else on this forum whose seen a caster played inteligently).
The massive gap between casters and non casters starts long before lvl 15.
I support anyone who tries to house rule a solution to casters.
But slower recovery will just slow the game down. Not to mention make a tight-rope class even more of a tight rope. The real power of the class will not be effective, just its playability for beginners.
No I'm not saying my ideas are better.
To my mind look at the dragonfire adept, warlock, incarnate and other alternative sane casting classes and try to bring other casters more in that direction. Just off the top of my head.
'No more than one spell in duration at once. No more than one spell every other round. Regain one spell if you damage the eneamy'
(You can cast fireball while flying, but you cant cast invisability while flying. You can quiken a fireball, but not while casting one normally. You will not run out of spells as long as your fighting rather than buffing or planning.)
OneWinged4ngel
11-03-06, 03:58 PM (Finally someone else on this forum whose seen a caster played inteligently).
The massive gap between casters and non casters starts long before lvl 15.

Agreed. I was just saying that that's the point they tend to be practically invincible if played intelligently and are suitably paranoid. ;)

I support anyone who tries to house rule a solution to casters.
But slower recovery will just slow the game down. Not to mention make a tight-rope class even more of a tight rope. The real power of the class will not be effective, just its playability for beginners.

I also agree here... as I mentioned, the main thing this fix is likely to do is increase downtime, and make casters even more downtime dependant than they already are. Unless the caster has some reason he really needs to hurry, he won't really care incredibly much... and the spells when used will still be just as powerful. You just don't have so many of them readily prepared (Then again, it's an easy matter to just make scrolls)

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
smileypete 11-02-06, 08:43 AM	I've seen plenty of posts in this forum about limiting magic or balancing classes. Everyone seems to ignore one simple idea. Instead of spellcasters "magically" getting all of their spells/spell points back just by sleeping, why not make them recover slowly over time. As in slower than recovering them in one night. I've noticed the same descrepancy in my games. Frankly, wizards aren't all that powerful unless you use the UA spell point system (which I like). This way it turns into a trade off for the spell casters. The immediate gratification of getting spell points back without having to sleep while at the same time not giving them a fresh cake every morning. Can someone suggest a good speed for spells/spell points to regenerate.
Szatany 11-02-06, 02:26 PM	I can = you recover a number of spell levels equal to your caster level+casting stat. For example a wizard 17 with Int +6 recovers 23 levels of spells overnight, like 9th+9th+5th slot. How about that? I actually really like that idea. Obviously, since this is D&D, there is now room for some new feats ;) Mysticism You can recover your magical powers faster than others. Prerequisites: Caster level 1. Benefit: You recover spells after good night's sleep as your caster level was 2 points higher. Greater Mysticism You can recover your magical powers faster than others. Prerequisites: Caster level 10, mysticism Benefit: You recover spells after good night's sleep as your caster level was 4 points higher. This bonus stacks with the one granted by mysticism.
Seerow 11-02-06, 02:36 PM	Frankly, wizards aren't all that powerful unless you use the UA spell point system (which I like). You've never seen a well played Wizard before.
Szatany 11-02-06, 02:44 PM	Another one: Every character recovers overnight one spell slot from each level of spells he can cast. For example, a wizard can cast spells up to 5th level. After sleeping he regains one 0, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th level slot.
smileypete 11-02-06, 03:26 PM	You've never seen a well played Wizard before. I've played plenty, seen plenty and run plenty of games with them. If a wizard is locked into the rules as listed in the handbook, then their defences (while formadible) are easily overcome. The problem really shows with magic items. Too many scrolls and potions can be frustrating. A GM should always keep a good eye on the stock piles and throw in the occasional spoiler that'll burn through those things. Those ideas are both good, but I want to give something to the caster as well as get something. The idea might be to split up the day and figure out how much the caster gets ie. 1 hour per spell level/point. Or different rates for different classes based on atts. This would be a little hard for the GM to track, but I think it might pay off in scenarios where the casters could run amok. smiles
OneWinged4ngel 11-02-06, 04:36 PM	You've never seen a well played Wizard before. I agree. If you see a well played wizard past level, say, 15... they can be damn near invincible, and able to deal with any challenge fairly easily with pretty much no risk to themselves. You can basically make it almost impossible to kill the wizard, you can make him immune to most things, and he can always be ready for any contingency. Things like Foresight should prevent him from ever being surprised. Things like Hide Life and Clone pretty much guarantee you won't have a permanent death. Things like Contingency can be crazy enough to prevent an enemy from ever having the chance to roll initiative. And do we even have to mention scry and die? Don't forget the new spell from PHB II: Celerity! That'll let you act again as an immediate action... during the other guy's turn! Let's see... so we can get a swift spell or a quickened spell, a normal spell, and a celerity spell to react perfectly to the enemy and interrupt him if he's somehow not already obliterated. Then throw in all the appropriate buffs and the fact that you can put most of them on all day or in complete safety with all the time you need, the fact that your rest cannot be interrupted thanks to things like Rope Trick and Mordenkainen's Magnificent Mansion, your DC 30-40 mass save or dies, your variety of spells and options that work just fine in antimagic fields, your variety of spells that don't allow a save and just screw the enemy, your permanently dominated, powerful minion(s)... need I go on? Oh, and then you can try to actually optimize instead of just using spells intelligently... and it gets real ugly. Honestly, the only ones that compete with other (intelligently played) high level spellcasters are other high level spellcasters (or monsters with very powerful SLAs). And you know how these battles are decided? By who is the most paranoid. If you're not paranoid enough and you lose your defenses for an instant, the other guy'll scry and die you ;)
Rowan_Whispercloak 11-02-06, 05:22 PM	I think somewhere casting a quickened spell became a swift action, but I could be mistaken. Back to the topic at hand. I would think instead of increasing the time that it takes to magic to be recovered which could give NPC caster an advantage over their PC counterpart perhap just lower the ammount of spells slot/prepared are available to the casters.
mlasater 11-02-06, 09:09 PM	Don't forget the new spell from PHB II: Celerity! That'll let you act again as an immediate action... during the other guy's turn! Let's see... so we can get a swift spell, a quickened spell, a normal spell, and a celerity spell to react perfectly to the enemy and interrupt him if he's somehow not already obliterated. NO, NO, NO, NO. Its amazing how may "overpowered" problems are from NOT READING THE RULES. A quickened spell is a swift action. You cannot take both a swift action & a immediate action in the same turn (PH II, page 4 and many other places), as they are the same basic type of action. So in your example the caster would get 2 spells (technically three including the Celerity, but since all it does is let you cast the other spell, it doesn't really count) - the same effective number of spells as casting a standard spell & a quickened spell.
OneWinged4ngel 11-02-06, 10:06 PM	Darn double posts... snip
OneWinged4ngel 11-02-06, 10:09 PM	I think somewhere casting a quickened spell became a swift action, but I could be mistaken. Back to the topic at hand. I would think instead of increasing the time that it takes to magic to be recovered which could give NPC caster an advantage over their PC counterpart perhap just lower the ammount of spells slot/prepared are available to the casters. Yes, a quickened spell is a swift action. It should say "A quickened spell or swift spell." This was a typo on my part, and has been fixed. NO, NO, NO, NO. Its amazing how may "overpowered" problems are from NOT READING THE RULES. Oh man, I agree with that. Tons of statements of overpowered come from not reading the rules. However, your opposition to this claim comes from just that: not reading the rules. Not only that, it focuses on a relatively minor facet of the argument. Scry and die is definitely more powerful than an extra spell. And Celerity's most powerful function isn't even that it adds a free unadjusted quickened spell, but that it gives a free, flexible, undeclared ready action. It's much, much better than just a free, unadjusted quickened spell that doesn't have to be prepared (which is damn good). Anywho, let's look at the rest of your ridiculous post, and examine why it's so ridiculous. I find it quite funny, really, because your own reference verifies that I'm right. A quickened spell is a swift action. You cannot take both a swift action & a immediate action in the same turn (PH II, page 4 and many other places), as they are the same basic type of action. So in your example the caster would get 2 spells (technically three including the Celerity, but since all it does is let you cast the other spell, it doesn't really count) - the same effective number of spells as casting a standard spell & a quickened spell. goes to check Funny, it looks like the resource you pointed out to prove me wrong supports my side. Oh wait... I'm not surprised. Looks like you're the one who doesn't read the rules carefully, mlasater. And you're a bit quick to shout based on a thin grasp on the D&D rules. Now, here is the section you referenced. Please actually read it this time, since you clearly didn't look too closely the first time. "Using an immediate action on your turn is the same as using a swift action, and counts as your swift action for that turn. You cannot use another immediate action or a swift action until after your next turn if you have used an immediate action when it is not currently your turn. (Effectively, using an immediate action before your turn is equivelent to using a swift action for the coming turn). You also cannot use an immediate action if you are currently flat-footed." Using a Celerity during your turn would take up the swift action. Using it after your turn takes up the action for the next turn. Which doesn't even matter since you'll be stunned. But you can avoid being put in danger from that thanks to things like Contingency. Or that your opponent will be obliterated. Also funny is that you ignored everything else for something absolutely trivial. I don't actually need to nova and blast all my spells to be nigh-invincible as a wizard. Celerity doesn't even matter in my overpowered variants, and I would never claim that it was the reason the Wizard was unbalanced, because it's not core. The Wizard is nigh-invincible at higher levels with core material if played intelligently. The most powerful aspect of Celerity is not giving you another spell! By far, the most powerful aspect of Celerity is giving you an undeclared readied action to use whenever you feel like it. THIS is powerful. A free quickened spell with no level increase is also powerful. Together it makes for a very powerful spell, even if it didn't let you add anything to Quicken. Now, explain to me why my claim of overpowered is based on a lack of understanding of the rules. Especially since your objection was an irrelevent nitpick that turned out to be wrong by the source you yourself cited. Thanks for saving me the trouble of having to rifle through my books to find the reference to refute you, however. Or have you realize you're mistaken yet? Or do you want to make a bigger fool of yourself by giving another self-defeating argument? Another one: Every character recovers overnight one spell slot from each level of spells he can cast. For example, a wizard can cast spells up to 5th level. After sleeping he regains one 0, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th level slot. Not a bad idea Szatany, but there's a bit of a problem with this idea. Unless it's adjusted a bit, it's going to punish the casters with more spells per day, like Sorcerors, in many cases. I've seen plenty of posts in this forum about limiting magic or balancing classes. Everyone seems to ignore one simple idea. Instead of spellcasters "magically" getting all of their spells/spell points back just by sleeping, why not make them recover slowly over time. As in slower than recovering them in one night. I've noticed the same descrepancy in my games. Frankly, wizards aren't all that powerful unless you use the UA spell point system (which I like). This way it turns into a trade off for the spell casters. The immediate gratification of getting spell points back without having to sleep while at the same time not giving them a fresh cake every morning. Can someone suggest a good speed for spells/spell points to regenerate. Well, first, I would suggest a certain variant on these boards that apparently redoes the vancian system with spell points, but with some actual thought (as opposed to the UA system, which just tacks it on and doesn't really work well.) I'd have to search for it a bit to find it...
kadeity 11-02-06, 11:44 PM	Ive been working on an alternative spellcasting system... and despite alot of flaming, misunderstanding and uproar, its coming along nicely. you can get a look at it here, but be sure to read all of MY posts before making up your mind about it. http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=728831
Szatany 11-03-06, 12:34 AM	Not a bad idea Szatany, but there's a bit of a problem with this idea. Unless it's adjusted a bit, it's going to punish the casters with more spells per day, like Sorcerors, in many cases. True, but easily remedied: Every spellcaster recovers half of his total slots from each spell level (round up and calculate each level separately) after good nigh's sleep or after daily divine prayer. Psionic characters recover half their total PP at every dawn.
OneWinged4ngel 11-03-06, 01:17 AM	True, but easily remedied: Every spellcaster recovers half of his total slots from each spell level (round up and calculate each level separately) after good nigh's sleep or after daily divine prayer. Psionic characters recover half their total PP at every dawn. Yep, like I said... just a bit of adjustment :D
DIESCUMDIE 11-03-06, 05:24 AM	(Finally someone else on this forum whose seen a caster played inteligently). The massive gap between casters and non casters starts long before lvl 15. I support anyone who tries to house rule a solution to casters. But slower recovery will just slow the game down. Not to mention make a tight-rope class even more of a tight rope. The real power of the class will not be effective, just its playability for beginners. No I'm not saying my ideas are better. To my mind look at the dragonfire adept, warlock, incarnate and other alternative sane casting classes and try to bring other casters more in that direction. Just off the top of my head. 'No more than one spell in duration at once. No more than one spell every other round. Regain one spell if you damage the eneamy' (You can cast fireball while flying, but you cant cast invisability while flying. You can quiken a fireball, but not while casting one normally. You will not run out of spells as long as your fighting rather than buffing or planning.)
OneWinged4ngel 11-03-06, 03:58 PM	(Finally someone else on this forum whose seen a caster played inteligently). The massive gap between casters and non casters starts long before lvl 15. Agreed. I was just saying that that's the point they tend to be practically invincible if played intelligently and are suitably paranoid. ;) I support anyone who tries to house rule a solution to casters. But slower recovery will just slow the game down. Not to mention make a tight-rope class even more of a tight rope. The real power of the class will not be effective, just its playability for beginners. I also agree here... as I mentioned, the main thing this fix is likely to do is increase downtime, and make casters even more downtime dependant than they already are. Unless the caster has some reason he really needs to hurry, he won't really care incredibly much... and the spells when used will still be just as powerful. You just don't have so many of them readily prepared (Then again, it's an easy matter to just make scrolls)