GM help, low magic fantasy setting.

[ZevVeli]

So I'm trying to set up a mid/low magic campaign. Basically there is real magic, but what most people consider magic is actually more along the lines of people with flashy tricks (alchemy of sorts). Think along the lines of the Song of Fire and Ice series. What I was thinking of doing is saying that no one is allowed to take a class that has spell-casting at first level, with the exception of one sorcerer (who would be trying really hard to keep his/her magic secret due to fear that he/she will face accusations of demonic persecution.) Basically I want magic to be present, but not pervasive. The other problem is that some of the dungeons and adversaries I have created have a lot of magical power and I need ideas for how to balance that out.

[Franko a]

What is the source of power, how common is it?
Why cant adventurers use it?

[Gargs454]

I'll echo Franko's questions.

Its not necessarily a problem to have "magic wielding" adversaries. What you can do is reflavor them. That human that is tossing Acid spells around? The spells become vials of acid. Or maybe the human is mutated and is spitting said acid instead.

You need to be careful with allowing one player to be a spellcaster but not others. Are the players cool with this? Why does the one player get to play one? These are issues that can be made to work if everyone is agreeable, just be ready to answer the questions.

Finally, just be sure to make sure you design the campaign, adventures, and encounters such that magic doesn't become a necessity. The most obvious potential problem lies with defenses and attacks. While the fighter might not be a "magic user" he absolutely relies on magic to stay alive and kill things as he levels up. There's a certain assumption in the monster designs as to party resources. If you do away with magic items be prepared to adjust monsters as well, otherwise they'll hit too often and too hard while being hard for the adventurers to damage.

[Kydeem de'Morcaine]

You have to decide how low magic is enough or too much.

Some ideas I've seen or read about being used are:

Magic item manufacturing cost x5 (this makes magic items rare).

Caster loses a hit point for ever spell level cast.

Caster always has to make a concentration check to cast a spell successfully and/or a spellcraft check to make it do what you wanted. Failed checks mean bad things not just nothing happens.

Spell casters only regain their caster level in spell levels for a full nights rest (this will tend to limit the number of spells cast since it could take them weeks to completely recover for a high level caster).

Spellcraft and/or knowledge arcana ranks must be triple the level of the spell in order to learn it.

Characters without any spells, magic, or supernatural abilities have a +3 on all saves vs any kind of spell, magic, or supernatural ability.

Require a level of expert between each level of a casting class to represent the additional study required.

Some fairly common creature that detects, hunts, and eats casters. But it is almost invulnerable to magic. Think like the old psionic intellect devourer or brain mole.

[Crosswind]

I think I wrote a post on how to do this a while ago. You're basically going to run into two problems:

1.) Monsters and NPCs are going to outscale the party, without the party having magic items

2.) How the heck to let PCs play spellcasters?!

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My proposed solution to (1), at the time, were pretty simple:

At level 3 and every 4 levels thereafter, everybody gets +1 to attack and damage.
At level 2 and every 4 levels thereafter, everybody gets +1 to all saves
Every level-up, you gain +1 AC
Every even level, you gain 1 stat point to put wherever you choose.

This is pretty rough, but it basically emulates the power of AC-boosting items, resist cloaks, magic weapons, and stat-boosting items, which are generally the most important things PCs buy.

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(2) is more of a roleplay-y thing, which you've got some good examples on already. Think you have a reasonable handle on this already, but some more suggestions.

a.) Powerful NPCs should seek to control magic-users. Weak NPCs should be terrified of them - lynch mobs with pitchforks and torches

b.) Make magic creepy - describe it well, and even your player will think twice about using it.

-Cross

[ZevVeli]

Okay, backstory then so I can get some more weight, these are good ideas and I'm trying to figure out a good way to incorporate them.

Basically magic has been a lost and forgotten art, some people stumble upon true magic, usually sorcerers, but others try to learn from mythical beasts that have remained in hiding for eons. Others use ancient rituals that draw power from the world around them to summon outsiders to teach them, since such magic is fairly in the territory of demons almost all who use magic are viewed as demon worshipers. The party will basically find artifacts that help connect the word to the world of the Gods (and thereby find true magical artifacts and such.) But until then I need a way to get them to that point.