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Back in October 2005, James Jacobs was commenting on Warlocks and was asked by Saern why James has a problem with the Wizard class. James replied:
I do use different rules in my home campaigns for wizards and sorcerers. (I'm one of those DMs who has a home-brew that fills dozens of notebooks).My main problem with wizards boils down to the following concerns.
1: They get too few hit points.
2: When a wizard (or sorcerer) runs out of spells, he stops being a wizard since he has NO other abilities that set him apart from the rest of the classes. He turns into a commoner. No other class aside from these two has this problem
3: Among the four spellcasting classes that get spells up to level 9, the wizard gets the stingiest amount of spells per day. A 20th level wizard has only 4 spells per day of each level before his Int bonus, compared to a sorcerer's 6 per day, or a cleric's or druid's, for that matter.
4: The "benefit" of potentially being able to cast every spell in the game is a hollow, false benefit. Clerics and druids get this already, plus all their other abilites. And see #5 for the hidden kicker of this supposed "benefit."
5: Finally, the kicker. All of the wizard's abilities require them to spend money, time, and XP. His bonus feats are often item creation feats. Learning new spells can be prohibitively expensive (to say the least of paying to scribe them). Even his familiar costs money to get, and if (WHEN) it's killed, yup. It costs XP. In a campaign that doesn't allow for down-time, the wizard turns into a limited version of the sorcerer.Where wizards shine is as NPCs or as PCs for one-shot adventures, since they can sidestep much of these issues and build their spells and abilities from scratch. Still... I think that just brings them close to being viable with other classes.
In every campaign I've seen a wizard played (which hasn't happened often—they're not popular choices for campaign play), that player has hit all five of the above problems and it's been a MAJOR source of concern.
My gaming group has ignored wizards in the last several campaigns, choosing sorcerers instead. In two of the last four campaigns, no one could be enticed to play a wizard or sorcerer at all. Eventually one person in each of the last two campaigns ended up multiclassing as a mage to fill the critical role simply because completing Dungeon adventures was nearly impossible without the abilities an arcane caster brings. However such multiclassing was done out of necessity rather than desire and the overall character suffered for it.
I posted James' comments to my gaming group and asked for their input on the issue. I learned that people pretty much are in agreement with him, especially when the wizard is compared with the cleric (such comparison was done in another thread here but the cleric is clearly superior in many though not all ways). I then went through as many archives here as I could looking for a solution to this problem. I reviewed Spell Point (Unearthed Arcana) threads, house rule threads and general comments on Warlock vs. Wizard vs Sorcerer. I could not find anything that seemed to be "the answer".
My question to the community is this: has anyone managed to fix the wizard class so that it is comparable to the other classes without breaking the game in some way? Or conversely, are James and those in my group just off base in some way and the wizard is a fine class to play?
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Not that it helps, but another problem with wizards is that non-specialists are treated like red headed step children. Want extra spells per day, be a specialist. Want bonuses to learn spells, be a specialist. Want save modifiers, be a specialist. etc. etc.
Sure, you lose access to some schools, but since most people build a concept specialist, what they lose is often minor, to them at least.
I've seen both extremes, but I'd say it breaks down to-
25% no arcane caster at all
45% one arcane caster, but only after it became obvious it was needed
20% arcane caster from the begining
5% multi arcane casters
5% all arcane casters (high starting level)
I think the difficulty in campaign play is that Wizzy's really do suck until 8-10th level, when they begin to pull ahead in theoretical power. But how many of us honestly run long term campy's into the low teens if you start below 5th level? Especially with Warmage as the new blaster, and Sorc being SO much easier to run and not having the achilles heel of a spell book, The wizzy takes the hit. Mind you, having only one key stat should give the wizzy plenty of extra spells, but their durability suffers. And often DMs do not allow enough downtime for the scroll scribing and spell research that a mid to high level wizzy needs to do (I know I'm guilty).
To "fix" it? DMs have to allow downtime in thier campaigns, and Wizzy players need to stop trying to compete with sorcs and other blasters. A blaster mage will get boring, while an enchanter, illusionist, etc can come up with cool and unusual ways to over come challenges without resorting to a reflex save. and wizzy's need to overcome thier "beardy" GAndalfian image. I personally want to run a Charlie Weasley, dragon tamer type of wizzy, but I am "stuck" dming for now.
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I've done a couple of things in my current campaign:
1) I use spell points. I've modified the number of points per day to not require a chart and played around with a few other things. I don't use psionics, but wherever a spell has a boostable psionic equivelant, I use that as the spell description. I made cantrips free, so that they can cast them endlessly, meaning a wizard always can cast acid splash or ray of frost. (I ditched cure minor wounds and replaced it with 'stabilize' which brings a dying charcter to zero hit points and stable).
2) I let wizards cast any spell they know. They still have to study their book or they start losing access to spells over time, but they don't have to prepare. I let them use metamagic with no increase to casting time.
I find this works pretty well. Disrupt undead has become a hugely popular spell.
I have another idea I'm working on. Stealing another page from psionics, I'm thinking of making spellcasters have a special arcane/divine focus. A special state of concentration they need to be in to cast spells. What I'd like to do is have a level of focus rating based on a concentration skill roll. So, if you get a 20 on your concentration check, you are focused at 0. A 25 gives you focus 1, going up by 1 for every extra five you roll higher.
Then, I will give out fewer spell points, but allow casters to deduct their current focus level from the cost of any spell they cast, minimum 0. I'd also allow them to expend their focus to gain special benefits, like metamagic or free boosts.
To take it even further, I'm thinking of allowing a short meditation to allow them to regain points. The efect of this would be that characters would have the ability to enter almost every encounter at peak capacity, because at the end of every encounter they could hela everyone up and then regain all their spell points. This would speed up play (I think), because characters wouldn't need to 'go back to town' so often. It would also reduce those whacky TPKs that happen when a party says 'just one more room,' when they are low but not tapped out. And conversely, it would prevent stuff like the party deciding not to do 'just one more room' when the only room left is actually the cell with the prisoners who need to be rescued.
Of course, this bit I haven't actually played with, so I don't know for sure how it will work.
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Not that it helps, but another problem with wizards is that non-specialists are treated like red headed step children. Want extra spells per day, be a specialist. Want bonuses to learn spells, be a specialist. Want save modifiers, be a specialist. etc. etc.
Sure, you lose access to some schools, but since most people build a concept specialist, what they lose is often minor, to them at least.
I totally agee. Oddly, a friend of mine says it's never worth it to play a specialist and loose the two schools. I think he's on crack.
As far as the XP cost of the Wizard's bonus feats, you may consider giving them a pool of craft points (like the Artificer class in the Eberron setting). If you don't have the book, the idea is that this is a pool of points the increase per level and are meant exclusively to be used to replace the XP cost on crafting magic items. You get a fixed amount per level, which means that you can't carry unused points over from level to level to make something big and extravagent too early.
Maybe to put them on the same level as the cleric class, one could give them something similar to the domain spell/spontaneous casting ability. Perhaps each wizard has a preferred school of magic that they have a special connection to and once per day, they can switch out a prepared spell for a spell of that school (in their spellbooks) of equal or lower level. Kind of keeps with the theme of being the more adaptable class between sorcerer and wizard. But it does throw a monkey wrench into specialist wizards, to an extent.
I like wizards: Part of their problem is that classes like Warmage and Warlock have been printed to displace them. Between just wizard and sorceror, sorcerors are easier to run, but there are plenty of reasons to play a wizard. Yes, they become commoners when out of spells, but Clerics and Druids become experts. And you shouldn't use up all your spells.
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okay, this is from scratch, and mostly plucked from my nether regions on the fly.
Low level hit point issues.
Level 1 wizards get d6 hp, level 1 sorcerors get d8. After level 1 d4.
Level 1 wizard bonus feat, make it a choice like the other wizard bonus feats. If they won't have time to scribe scrolls, don't saddle them with something useless
Instead of a bonus spell of each level, a specialist may use their intelligence bonus spell a second time for their specialized school. So if they get 4 first level from class level, and +1 first level from int, they get 5 +1 specialized.
None specialists gain their bonus spell twice (yay non-specialists)
Number of zeroth level spells = class level for wizards, minimum as it is now (2 or 3 i don't remember)
Level 3, spontaneous cantrips (0th level) for wizards
Level 5, arcane assistance I, a wizard can lose a cantrip for a +2 circumstance bonus on any physical skill check as an immediate action.
Level 7, arcane assistance II, a wizard can lose a cantrip for a +2 circumstance bonus on any non-physical skill check as an immediate action.
Level 9, arcane assistance III, a wizard can lose a cantrip for a +2 circumstance bonus on any physical action as an immediate action.
Level 11, arcane assistance IV, a wizard can lose a cantrip for a +2 bonus on any roll of a d20 as an immediate action.
Level 15, arcane assistance V, a wizard can lose a cantrip for a +2 bonus to any damage roll as an immediate action bonus damage is of the force type.
Sorcerors would get the above at a slower rate...
The idea is that you can use something like mage hand to help you climb, or a trick of shadow to make you more intimidating.
Doesn't make wizards horrible powerful, but lets them participate, and especially not need to be carried up cliffs and such.
Oh and it is deliberately not limited to 1 cantrip per roll, want a +20 on your climb check, burn 10 of your daily cantrips.
like i said, yanked from a dark place spontaneously
I say a wizard shouldn't be fixed unless he has more than six kids.
Then it's time for the snippers.
I never seen most of that list as real problems, nor have I ever seen players eschewing the wiard class in campaigns that I run... my monday night greyhawk campaign has 2 wizards in the group presently (Well okay, a wizard/argent savant/archmage and a wizard/elemental savant). The wizard/elemental savant player started with a sorcerer, but found the limited spell selection to restrictive depite the high number of uses per day, so he created a new character after only a few sessions.
I play a wizard almost exclusivly, and yes there are some drawbacks ie. HD d4, limited skill points (I agree with you Daigle) etc. But, my philosophy has always been, good things come to those who wait. Stock up on those scrolls for when you are out of spells. A Wizard is far more versatile than any other class, we can fight, we can heal, we can buff other players, the list is endless. Patience is a virtue, and a high level wizard is quite a force, especially if they are not limited to one or two schools of magic.
Pray tell, dear lady, how doth a wizzy heal? (I'm usually a cleric or fighter plaer, so I'm curious :))
Pray tell, dear lady, how doth a wizzy heal? (I'm usually a cleric or fighter plaer, so I'm curious :))
Quick potion from SC? and I seem to remember a spell that lets you channel healing enegry per level of spell I can remember the spells name at the moment. I could be making this up...
Fizz
Of course there's the ever popular False life, not much but it has brought me out of quite a few pinches. Bears endurance grants weakening allies the added oomph they need, and now, the wonderful Spell Compendium offers me, thanks to some very tough spellcraft checks, Healing touch. Wizards rock man.
Pray tell, dear lady, how doth a wizzy heal? (I'm usually a cleric or fighter plaer, so I'm curious :))Quick potion from SC? and I seem to remember a spell that lets you channel healing enegry per level of spell I can remember the spells name at the moment. I could be making this up...
Fizz
Dang it, I gotta type quicker.
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Well Maybe I'm in the minority but the wizard's only limit to me is the spell slots running out. Most Wizards, and sorcerers for that matter, are going to be loading up on scrolls, wands, staves, etc.
I'd like to see the wizard (and the bard for that matter) get an additional spell cast per level. The problem all four core casters have is that there's no reason for them to not prestige out ASAP. This is a flaw of class design, and prestige class design IMNSHO.
The Beguiler makes the bard pretty much obsolete, sorry.
Wizard: I lose a few bonus feats, and familiar advancement, wheeee
Sorcerer: I lose familiar advancement.
Cleric: I lose turn undead power, but not attempts, and turn undead loses its oomph at higher levels
Druid: I lose the cool wild shapes, that is a toughie.
Rogue, Monk, and Bard, are the only ones who benfit from not prestiging out, and even the bard loses very little.
If the prestige classes took a hint from psionics and lost at least an additional caster level (I'll exempt Mystic Theurge/cerebromancer from this) it might be more of a choice. If the core classes got a few nice capstone abilities in the 17-20 level range it would be moreso.
If you have to stop and weigh if a prestige classes perks out weigh the costs, that's balance.
So if the ability to scribe scrolls is so potent a force multiplier for wizzy's, why do I not see them use it more often? Most of the time, they hoard their gold for the Headband of Intellect, or bracers of armor. Is it spells duration that is the issue? (as raised int he Cook article linked above)
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So if the ability to scribe scrolls is so potent a force multiplier for wizzy's, why do I not see them use it more often? Most of the time, they hoard their gold for the Headband of Intellect, or bracers of armor. Is it spells duration that is the issue? (as raised int he Cook article linked above)
Yeah, I hear the scribe scroll cited a lot as an advantage of the wizard, but I don't buy it. First there's the whole time/xp/gp mentioned above. A cleric, sorcerer, or druid could just as easily have the same advantage, but pay more gp and not lose xp or time (which is generally a good trade in most campaigns). Scrolls suffer from having a low caster level unless you want to pay out the nose, which makes them mostly good only for non-combat spells that you don't need to have a long duration.
It's a tad odd but I often find myself disagreeing with James in terms of how good or bad classes are. Its not that I disagree with his well thought out points its usually that I disagree with his opinion due to points that are not raised. As per usual I think he is probably closer to correct if we are talking about the core books alone. If its just core the wizard does face some issues. But with just core alone the fighter eventually runs out of good feat options and the Sorcerer has few spells that really cater to his strengths. So I figure its more or less fair all around.
Once we get beyond core I think the wizard, for all their weak points, is a phenomenal class. Maybe not exactly great at the really low levels but by the mid levels the wizard should have enough treasure to overcome the main problem of actually running out of spells through the use of wands, scrolls or magic items that grant more options - either spell casting options or other good options. Anything that has the wizard doing something that does not involve casting one of their basic spell slots extends the length of time the Wizard can viably effect encounters.
Wizards are the ultimate in versatile casters and they do pay for that with, generally, less castings but by the mid levels this becomes less and less of an issue. The wizard simply does not run out of spells any more though he does run out of the highest level spells.
By the time one is moving into the high levels the wizard has ceased to be even comparable with the rest of the characters in the party and is clearly the most powerful force at the table. In the last few levels before 20th the party has morphed into a group whose job description might as well read 'we keep the wizard going so he can defeat the bad guys'. The fighter protects the wizard and the cleric heals the wizard while the wizard lays the smack down on the enemies.
Personally, I highly dislike the Vancian magic system, and have from nearly day 1 of my introduction to D&D in 1st edition. I find it is too restrictive. If you memorize a less-used spell there is a chance it will be completely useless to you that day and so you've wasted a spell slot. The only way to be sure you will have a useful spell is to memorize a spell with combat applications.
To fix that my solution is actually a combination of what Rambling Scribe and James Keegan mentioned above. I use a modified spell point system that gives the caster a pool of points to use any way they see fit. If they have 6 spell points they could cast 6 1st level spells, or 3 2nd level spells, etc. (provided they have the level requirement to cast those higher level spells). And the caster has access to the full repertoire of the spells in his spellbook.
Something I started doing in 3rd edition is I allow craft points for crafting magic items if the caster is so inclined. Often that caster will be creating items that are of use to his entire party or specifically one member requested the item. It is a shame to penalize the wizard some of his hard-earned experience to help out another party member. Pretty soon you have a wizard that is a full level or two lower than his other party members. I still penalize xp for the higher spells like wish or big magic items, but my players don't normally do those types of items, just scrolls or lenses of darkvision, etc.
I haven't noticed that the wizard is all that more powerful because of these changes, just more useful and more fun for the player rather than sitting there at the end of a combat and unable to do anything (extreme example). Though obviously it has put a damper on the sorcerer class. I'm currently working on a fix for that involving a modified form of the bloodline traits from the UA. We'll see how that goes.
Best bet, pay out the nose for the higher level scrolls. And once you reach high enough level, set some of your xp aside in a sort of bank, to be used on scrolls or spell creations. I agree mostly with what Cook says, however, I don't like his idea of limiting the spells a wizard can have in effect at one time, as we are already limited by the stacking rules.
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Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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One suggestion regarding crafting and xp expenditure is to add treasure of some form that can be used for crafting. It's an idea I stole from Ars Magica/Mage where you can find magical power in physical form. You could have it be something like the tears of a basalisk, which can be used as the equivalent of 50xp, but only for the purposes of crafting items relating to stone to flesh/flesh to stone. This makes crafting more palatable.
One suggestion regarding crafting and xp expenditure is to add treasure of some form that can be used for crafting. It's an idea I stole from Ars Magica/Mage where you can find magical power in physical form. You could have it be something like the tears of a basalisk, which can be used as the equivalent of 50xp, but only for the purposes of crafting items relating to stone to flesh/flesh to stone. This makes crafting more palatable.
That's actually a really good idea, and one I plan on convincing our DM to put into practice.
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I wanted to get others' input before I added my own, but I always felt the wizard was just fine as a class. That is, I thought so until I gave up the DM chair and had a choice to play any character I wanted. I thought hard...a wizard...and then after a time decided against it. None of the other six players chose either wizard or sorcerer. I went with a psion (telepath) with an aim toward the Thrallherd PrC. However, by 3rd level, it became apparent we needed or soon would need some kind of arcane caster but everyone refused to take on the role. So, for the betterment of the party, I did, combining a (non-specialized) mage with my psion and switching to working toward a Cerebremancer. The character was of course gimped (not to mention my 20% xp penalty I paid for differences among clases for one level) from the outset and never amounted to much in the group. When he was slain in a battle some time later, I created a 6th level wizard, sure that I would be effective in the group now that I was single classed and of higher level. I soon ran into the HP, gold and XP problems James describes above, though as an "old-school" player used to conserving spells at all costs, I did not often run completely dry of magic. I also think the group suffered from the problems Monte Cook mentions in his article, namely that the wizard spells became so essential to the group that they were cast early and often and the party did not want to press forward unless the wizard was fully rested with his best spells ready.
This experience, coupled with my players comments is what concerns me.
Random question WRT scrolls/ potions, etc- Does wizzy end up spending as much on these single use items as a fighter does on weapons and armor? If you use static wealth by level, does that take into account these purchases? Do your higher level wizzy's often take donations form party members to get party beneficial scrolls, wands, and the like, in the fashion of a cleric and a wand of CLW? Or does the wizzy go it alone?
EDIt- LL: Well, you went from playing a Psion (overpowered? YMMV) to a wizzy (the bench mark). Its like you took the supercharger off a rcae car. Its still goes fast, just not as fast :)
In my group, yes, party members will help out monetarily for something that is beneficial for us all, just as our Cleric and I would help the fighter to get the weapon/armor he needs.
I'm going to go over each of James points and make some commentary. Obvously this is all just my opinion, but then why else do we come to message boards but to read other peoples opinions?
1: They get too few hit points.
It is true that wizards have low hps but my experience has been that this is almost not relevant. Low level monsters rarely have abilities that can get past the fighter and cleric so the Wizard is mostly safe just by virtue of being in the back. Notice how awesomely dangerous the animals and vermin are in the APs? Look at who is dying from these death machines on the Obituaries threads. You don't see the wizard on the endless wall of names of players that have succumbed to the Boar in 3FoE or the Raghossa(Sp?) in TiNH or even that nasty raptor in BWG. In each of these cases the creature tears apart the front line. Its more or less the same with a very high percentage of low level encounters. The wizard is only in trouble when the entire party is being shredded and in this case he is the last person that is going to be in trouble and the one most likely to still be in a position to run away.
By the later levels the wizard remains low on hps but this really just translates in vulnerability to things like Symbol spells. Even if its now the case that the enemy can get to him that does not really interact with hps very much. By this point the wizard should have a fair number. No by the later levels it will be all about saving throws and the wizard is not particularly worse then many other classes in this department and will hopefully be able to use magic defences to protect himself in a way that is really just not an option for the fighter.
2: When a wizard (or sorcerer) runs out of spells, he stops being a wizard since he has NO other abilities that set him apart from the rest of the classes. He turns into a commoner. No other class aside from these two has this problem
True. But this is only really a problem for the lowest level arcane casters. By about 5th level there should be a pretty impressive stockpile of spell slots and maybe a wand to fall back on when even these begin to finally run out. The wizard, in this case, certainly will see a pretty dramatic decline in power as the encounter wears on but he won't run out of power except in the most extreme situations and the very occasional case where he does run out of power? Well consider it a challenge - I mean your DM has to have set you up to get here. Obviously your supposed to use your wits or something to survive when the combat has gone on beyond round 28.
3: Among the four spell casting classes that get spells up to level 9, the wizard gets the stingiest amount of spells per day. A 20th level wizard has only 4 spells per day of each level before his Int bonus, compared to a sorcerer's 6 per day, or a cleric's or Druid's, for that matter.
If we are talking about just core I somewhat agree. Not fully but partially at least. But once one starts using lots of splat books I can't agree any more. The wizard has gotten way more extra spells then the druid or cleric.
Sorcerer has just as many new ones (and some great spells that work better for the sorcerer then the wizard as well) but everyone has already realized that the wizard vs. the sorcerer is a case of trading some advantages and disadvantages. In fact it would seem to me that many players consider a wizard far more powerful then a sorcerer. I've certainly spent some time arguing that a sorcerer is competitive class compared to a wizard. I don't recall arguing with anyone that a wizard was sub par versus a sorcerer.
Essentially there are enough boosts out there that I don't think its true that a cleric with 9th level spells can do what an arcane caster can do. Not to say that a 17th level Cleric is not a great class - but its no wizard.
4: The "benefit" of potentially being able to cast every spell in the game is a hollow, false benefit. Clerics and druids get this already, plus all their other abilities. And see #5 for the hidden kicker of this supposed "benefit."
Once a lot of splat books are in play I don't think its false any more. The Cleric and Druid can cast any spell from their spell list but their spell list is not as long as a wizards and it does not contain spells that cover so many different areas and can do so many different things. Its the wizard that players of high level campaigns turn to in order to use magic to solve their problems. Clerics are great and have some nifty spells but a good wizard potentially has a spell for every occasion one could think of and some left over for those occasions that nobody thought of. Simply saving a spell slot at each level (at higher levels) can mean that a wizard with a good spell book can overcome nearly any obstacle. Its an extremely potent ability that no other class can emulate.
5: Finally, the kicker. All of the wizard's abilities require them to spend money, time, and XP. His bonus feats are often item creation feats. Learning new spells can be prohibitively expensive (to say the least of paying to scribe them). Even his familiar costs money to get, and if (WHEN) it's killed, yup. It costs XP. In a campaign that doesn't allow for down-time, the wizard turns into a limited version of the sorcerer.
All true - but this is a price tag associated with great power. Without this the wizard would be far more powerful and I'm not sure anyone wants that. This Achilles heel keeps them somewhat in check in my opinion.
Scrolls suffer from having a low caster level unless you want to pay out the nose, which makes them mostly good only for non-combat spells that you don't need to have a long duration.
Of which there are lots and a good wizard should keep one or two of most of them around in campaign play just so he does not have to always have stuff like knockmemorized. The price tag in XP is minor and if you use up enough to actually loose a level then you start to get bonus XP from the system. It does cost gold but the point is that it costs a lot less gold and one still has access to the power. In my campaign this is part of a tactic to get at that headband of intellect as soon as possible, without having to memorize a lot of spells that might be useful but probably won't most of the time.
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Of which there are lots and a good wizard should keep one or two of most of them around in campaign play just so he does not have to always have stuff like knockmemorized. The price tag in XP is minor and if you use up enough to actually loose a level then you start to get bonus XP from the system. It does cost gold but the point is that it costs a lot less gold and one still has access to the power. In my campaign this is part of a tactic to get at that headband of intellect as soon as possible, without having to memorize a lot of spells that might be useful but probably won't most of the time.
I'm not saying scrolls in general aren't useful, and knock is the best example of a spell that is best relegated to a scroll, I'm saying the marginal benefit of being able to spend xp instead of gp to create scrolls is not a significant ability. If the wizard received a crafting pool akin to the artificer, that would make this ability much more relevant, though the expenditure of time would still be problematic in many campaigns. But as it stands, the fact that the wizard can purchase scrolls for 1/2 gp is not much of an ability, and certainly not sufficient to support the claim that the ability to create scrolls is one of the wizard's significant powers.
I'm not sure I'm following Jeremy's line of reasoning on # of spells- A wizzy only gets so many per day is the issue, not the variety of spells available. How does one increase the # of spells available to cast? And since wands, scrolls, etc are options for all classes, keep it to things that actually increase a wizzy's base spells/day/level, please? :)
Random question WRT scrolls/ potions, etc- Does wizzy end up spending as much on these single use items as a fighter does on weapons and armor? If you use static wealth by level, does that take into account these purchases? Do your higher level wizzy's often take donations form party members to get party beneficial scrolls, wands, and the like, in the fashion of a cleric and a wand of CLW? Or does the wizzy go it alone?
Among my players all 'utility' scrolls are a party expense. That knock spell was something that everybody wanted cast becasue of a deep conviction among the players that if the DM was not letting them through a door by making it near impossible to just bash the walls down then treasure, in unimaginable quantities, must reside on the other side.
EDIt- LL: Well, you went from playing a Psion (overpowered? YMMV) to a wizzy (the bench mark). Its like you took the supercharger off a rcae car. Its still goes fast, just not as fast :)
Actually Lich-loved said that he felt his Cerbermancer was gimped. Not really sure how he came to that conclusion. I think its a great class myself. Especially the Telepath version.
I think Psions in general are not as strong (with splat books) as is often thought mainly because they are so crappy at overcoming SR and everything at higher levels has SR. But the Cerbermancer overcomes a significant amount of that problem by having mage spells to fall back on if the Demons SR is making ones psionic powers fizz out.
I think th egimped part was becuase he could do alot of stuff, just not well. Sub optimal multiclassing, not the classes them selves.
I'm not saying scrolls in general aren't useful, and knock is the best example of a spell that is best relegated to a scroll, I'm saying the marginal benefit of being able to spend xp instead of gp to create scrolls is not a significant ability. If the wizard received a crafting pool akin to the artificer, that would make this ability much more relevant, though the expenditure of time would still be problematic in many campaigns. But as it stands, the fact that the wizard can purchase scrolls for 1/2 gp is not much of an ability, and certainly not sufficient to support the claim that the ability to create scrolls is one of the wizard's significant powers.
Well we are now down to arguing about what qualifies as significant. I agree that being able to get a certain amount of scrolls without having to spend gold or XP on them is more powerful then just getting them at a reduced rate, but presuming that there is no way to get them free, getting them at a reduced rate is really pretty sweet. YMMV but I find that the item creation feats in general are maybe a bit to powerful and that includes making potions and scrolls. Essentially its a way of pretty much doubling the wealth per level guidlines and only paying with a small amount of XP. That's a pretty awesome feat really. Oh sure there are limitations on what one can spend this but a wizard that can only spend this on spells is not really being all that punished. Now this feat is not better then a 'free feat of any type you want' but you are getting a fairly useful feat nonetheless.
I'm not sure I'm following Jeremy's line of reasoning on # of spells- A wizzy only gets so many per day is the issue, not the variety of spells available. How does one increase the # of spells available to cast? And since wands, scrolls, etc are options for all classes, keep it to things that actually increase a wizzy's base spells/day/level, please? :)
The fact that they are available to all classes does not really make them irrelevant to the discussion. The problem with the wizard is that, at low levels, they run out of spells more often then say the druid. OK that is true but after a level or two the wizard can go and buy a wand of sleep and a wand of magic missiles. Not great wands considering the low level that they were bought at but for the next few levels the wizard will always be able to fall back on them and therefore will never run out of spell power. The point is that this mitigates the weak point of the low number of spells that a wizard has to start with - and that low number of spells is one of the big weak points of a wizard.
I'm not sure I'm following Jeremy's line of reasoning on # of spells- A wizzy only gets so many per day is the issue, not the variety of spells available. How does one increase the # of spells available to cast? And since wands, scrolls, etc are options for all classes, keep it to things that actually increase a wizzy's base spells/day/level, please? :)
An increased Int. score gives you bonus spells, there are also other useful items such as the ring of wizardry.
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Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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Well we are now down to arguing about what qualifies as significant.
Indeed. I know that the ability to convert one resource type to another (e.g., xp into, effectively, gp) can be a very broken ability in a game. Not sure if you follow Magic much, but one category of cards that traditionally cause problems are those that allow the conversion of one resource into another (e.g., life points into extra cards). That being said, I also know that when Magic first came out, nobody would play cards with disadvantages even when the card yielded a net benefit. I suppose it's entirely possible that most players, including myself, place too high a value on xp, and are making an irrational choice in not converting it into gp with the Scribe Scroll feat.
Out of curiosity Jeremy, where do you and your players come out on things like the Pearl of Power? It always strikes me as a useful item which is almost an extra spell slot, and yet I rarely see players making use of it.
It all depends on the campaign. If you're doing endless-combat dungeon crawls, then wizard has very little to recommend it, compared with sorcerer. If you include a lot of espionage-type adventures, in which the ability to learn and prepare *just* the right spell is critical, a single-classed, non-specialist wizard quickly becomes totally indispensable.
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My take on this is still the wizards is at a defecit as a class, and it isn't because of spell counts or spell lists.
It is because there is no reason to stay a wizard. There are two dozen oodles of prestige classes that let you keep all or most of your spell progression, and give you something useful and flavorful.
So explain to me why someone would take levels 16-20 of wizard instead of 16-20 as an archmage? If you prefer a different example, go ahead and use it.
Yeah a level 17 wizard rocks the house, but so does a level 18 or 19 eldritch knight (I forget how many spell levels they loose).
Two automatic spells per level ain't worth it.
An increased Int. score gives you bonus spells, there are also other useful items such as the ring of wizardry.
Ok, I was looking more for feats/ class tweaks than items. Saying a wizzy gets bonus spells from a high INT is almost meaningless, as so does every other caster with thier casting stat, you know?
RE: Pearl of Power- #1 most requested item in most of my games, by casters anyway. Much cheaper than rings of wizardry :)
I'll admit I've never considered the wizard's weakness since I'm almost exclusively a DM, but this threat and others has got me to thinking.
I don't think the sorcerer vs wizard thing is a problem. The sorcerers I've played with have no problem keeping up with the other classes. In fact, in one of my current groups the sorcerer is the only character who hasn't died and had to be replaced. That particular character doesn't even have a familiar or one single metamagic feat. He chose his spells carefully and, while he's a bit bland as a personality, he rocks in most situations. Spell resistance has stopped him on a few occasions, and he's weakened when there's an antimagic field or something like that, but he chose various feats to help him overcome those weaknesses.
I prefer to define wizards as "scientists of the arcane". In other words, they more than any other class study to understand the mechanics of magic. While they have no innate magical ability in the way that a sorcerer does, they should know more about what happens when a spell goes off.
With that thought in mind, I brainstormed the following ideas. I haven't tried any of them, but if any of you get the chance, let me know what you think.
1) One of the complaints about wizards is the xp cost to so much of what they do. This is a problem primarily at low levels. How about giving wizards a break on this, say 1 xp/level to help pay the cost of making scrolls and such. Thus, a 5th level wizard would be able to make any scroll costing 5 xp or less with no xp loss. Maybe this number could be increased slightly. Most xp penalties can also be offset somewhat by including special materials as mentioned in several different sources, including Dragon. I still think wizards deserve a break greater than just being able to trade gp for xp, though.
2) Perhaps wizards could pay a reduced level cost when using metamagic feats (say, -1 per five levels or so). Thus, a 10th level wizard could use the Empower Spell feat without needing to use a higher-level spell slot. Such a character could use Maximize feat as normal, but would have to use a spell slot only one level higher rather than three levels higher.
3) The complaint about low skill points is dead on, if somewhat fixed by the bonus skill points gained through high Intelligence. I see no problem giving wizards +2 skill points/level, though, especially given their selection of class skills.
4) One of the most underrated abilities of the wizard is his ability to call a familiar. Since he's a master of magical mechanics, perhaps the wizard could use his knowledge to gain a bonus of +2 to his level when determining the capabilities of his familiar. This could give him a significant boost at lower levels, but not an unbalancing one at higher levels when he's more powerful.
5) While I like Monte Cook's ideas (see DitheringFool's post above), for most DM's such a thing would require far too much effort to design. I think all such "disciples" could be fixed more easily with the above suggestions. However, if anyone comes up with something good along that line of reasoning I'd love to see it posted here.
6) Concerning the monetary costs of some of the wizard's abilities, I see no need for adjustment. I could see giving a wizard or sorcerer his first familiar for free, but not later ones. If a wizard makes a magic item, he's already getting it cheaper than if he bought it. If he makes one for a party member, make them pay the costs. Problem solved.
7) The cost of scribing spells into one's spellbook is too high. I don't think it should be eliminated, but I do think it should be reduced. I think 20% of the cost should be high enough.
Since all this has got me to thinking I might need to institute some changes in my own games, please let me know if anyone out there has any thoughts on these ideas.
I think th egimped part was becuase he could do alot of stuff, just not well. Sub optimal multiclassing, not the classes them selves.
I understand the concept - just not sure I agree with it. Certainly lack of lots of the highest level spells is a pain, but the ability to get the benefits of both the Psion and the Wizard are a pretty sweet deal even if your out your highest spell/power levels. I think these two classes are a much stronger synergy then the Mystic Thuerge. Mystic Theurge means you end up trying to fulfill two different character roles at the same time and don't have enough actions to pull it off. Cerbermancer keeps you well focused on the primary wizards roll but opens up a lot more options – many of which have strengths where the other class has weakness so they cover each others vulnerabilities.
I guess it would depend on what kind of a campaign it was. If this is the sort of campaign where you fight one battle with one enemy of EL +4 each day before sleeping then it would be a really sub-optimal class. All these extra powers would just go to waste. Otherwise, however, I think its at least a comparable build to a straight wizard.
I also think the example Lich-Loved pointed out is something of an extreme. He is talking about 6th level or lower. At the end of the day I agree that at really low levels the other classes are usually better then either the wizard or the Psion and one does pay a penalty to multi-class these characters. At this point. When you stop being a psion and become a 1st level wizard you have a pretty wimpy wizard. You have given up 2nd or maybe 3rd level powers for 1st level spells – yeah that hurts. It is a painful exchange that won't be significantly eliminated until you pick up both practised spell caster and practised manifestor and finally start really picking up those Cerbermancer levels. At that point it will not seem like the Cerbermancer is weaker any more.
I really love the concept of the wizard. I love the versatility and the challenge of thinking of new and creative ways to use spells. It was my very favourite class in 1st edition, and was the first class I tried in 3rd edition, but I'd never play one again.
What I dislike about the 3rd edition version of the wizard is that it is completely dependent upon DM largesse to be effective. Hypothetically, the main advantage that a wizard has over a sorceror is the number of spells that the wizard can know (potentially every spell in the book), which makes the wizard very flexible. However, the cost of copying spells into the wizard's spellbook is punitive. In the campaign that I played a wizard in, treasure was not in abundance and I was always flat broke just trying to copy spells into my book. Ultimately all I ever got for new spells was the two you learn every level so I didn't know many more spells than a sorceror of my level would have. Also that campaign had very little downtime so there was no opportunity for spell research, scroll scribing, item crafting or any other wizard-niche ability.
No other class in the game has to pay huge sums of money to use their abilities. Fighters aren't required to fork over sacs of gold each fight to get their weapons repaired, sorcerors pay nothing for their spells, etc. So in my case, while the other party members were spending their loot to buy magic items and cool gear, I was spending my share to use my class abilities.
Add into the mix the chance of a wizard losing his spellbook. This happened to another player in a campaign I was playing in. The DM had the party captured, the wizard's book was taken and we were permanently sent to a different dimension. All of a sudden, the wizard in the party became a normal person with no heroic abilities whatsoever. It took many, many play sessions for him to become a viable character again, and it was not fun for him.
So, my point is that no other class is as dependent on the DM's generosity, or as vulnerable to his capriciousness as the wizard. In my own game I allow wizards to copy spells to their spellbooks for no cost. I have no idea whether this is an effective fix, though, since I've never been able to convince a player to try a wizard.
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A few random responses / observations on a number of posts:
EDIt- LL: Well, you went from playing a Psion (overpowered? YMMV) to a wizzy (the bench mark). Its like you took the supercharger off a rcae car. Its still goes fast, just not as fast :)Actually Lich-loved said that he felt his Cerbermancer was gimped. Not really sure how he came to that conclusion. I think its a great class myself. Especially the Telepath version.
I am sorry if I was misleading. I actually liked the pure Psion (telepath), no one had played one in our group and I wanted to give it a try. There was some concern about the power of the Thrallherd PrC but the character never got off the ground. My 4th level was Wizard 1, so I was a Psion 3 / Wizard 1. The "gimp" I was referring to was that a split-class caster type is rarely as powerful as being a dedicated class, and since the psion is a caster for all intents and purposes, by making the choice to pick up Wizard 1, I had essentially stopped growing as a psion, picked up a not-very-useful Wizard 1 and took on a 20% xp penalty to boot. I made it to Psion 3 / Wizard 3 and thus was stuck at 2nd level powers/spells when our opponents were using 3rd and 4th level magic against us. The character perished before reaching 7th level (the first level of Cerebremancer) so I never got to see the Cerebremancer in action. When this character died, I made the 6th level wizard I spoke about. I am sure that if I would have been a psion (telepath) 3 / Wizard 3 / Cerebremancer 6 I would not be "gimped", but splitting up caster classes to pick up caster classes really diminished the character's ability to contribute to a group of 5th and 6th level single-class characters. Perhaps it pays off in the end, I do not know. We can revert to the Mystic Theurge conversation at that point, where the pendulum has swung from "way overpowered" to "underpowered" and possibly back to "balanced" over time. The use of Schism might be the deal breaker that puts the Cerebremancer over the top, I only wish I could have found out :>
By about 5th level there should be a pretty impressive stockpile of spell slots and maybe a wand to fall back on when even these begin to finally run out. The wizard, in this case, certainly will see a pretty dramatic decline in power as the encounter wears on but he won't run out of power except in the most extreme situations and the very occasional case where he does run out of power? Well consider it a challenge - I mean your DM has to have set you up to get here. Obviously your supposed to use your wits or something to survive when the combat has gone on beyond round 28.
There are a couple of issues with regard to wizard spells levels. It isn't that the wizard runs out of spells in a single encounter. Monte Cook's point was that the wizard becomes so essential that the party is not willing to go on when the wizard doesn't have access to his best spells. It isn't that the wizard runs out of spells in a 28-round battle, but rather uses his haste and fireball and two scorching rays in a battle and the group does not want to go on without him regaining those spells even though he still has some magical power left, albeit the lower level things (a 2nd level spell or two like invisibility and web and a group of 1st levels: a few magic missiles, a shield and a utility spell). From the player's perspective, he doesn't want to go on either, knowing he cannot contribute meaningfully in the next battle. Thus the "funness factor" is reduced and the game is interrupted to regain spells.
The other spell issue is one James Jacobs points out: the wizard has the fewest spells per caster level prepared/available of any core spellcasting class. This, coupled with the lack of options for a wizard that has used all of his "useful" spells means that the wizard can quickly find himself without anything to do. This also limits the "funness factor" of playing a wizard, not to mention that a wizard without spells is just asking to be slain and thus never will see the high levels where the balance starts to tip in favor of the wizard.
Out of curiosity Jeremy, where do you and your players come out on things like the Pearl of Power? It always strikes me as a useful item which is almost an extra spell slot, and yet I rarely see players making use of it.
My players love to use a Pearl of Power. All casters that prepare spells try to acquire these handy gems, especially since they do not occupy an item slot on the character's body.
One possibility to help wizards at low levels is to collapse bonus spells from levels higher than they can cast (which are normally lost) down into the highest spell level they have available.
I.e., a 1st level wizard with a 16 Int normally gets one 1st level bonus spell. Instead, he would have 3 bonus 1st level bonus spells. A 3rd level wizard with a 16 Int normally gets one bonus 1st level spell and one bonus 2nd level spell. Instead, he would have one bonus 1st level spell and two bonus 2nd level spells.
I think this would go a long way toward making wizards work better at low levels, while having a minimal impact at higher levels. Of course, if a wizard had a 20 Int (18 + Tiefling or some such) and takes the Spellcasting Prodigy feat this could get out of hand, but I think it would work well in most cases.
As to the costs – I agree, the wizard really is at the mercy of the DM. I like the idea of copying spells captured for free (why would it take 100 gp per page?), but even then the wizard is often dependent on capturing an enemy spellcaster’s spellbook. After TINH, I can’t think of one to capture in the STAP until the party reaches Scuttlecove.
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I also think the example Lich-Loved pointed out is something of an extreme. He is talking about 6th level or lower. At the end of the day I agree that at really low levels the other classes are usually better then either the wizard or the Psion and one does pay a penalty to multi-class these characters. At this point. When you stop being a psion and become a 1st level wizard you have a pretty wimpy wizard. You have given up 2nd or maybe 3rd level powers for 1st level spells – yeah that hurts. It is a painful exchange that won't be significantly eliminated until you pick up both practised spell caster and practised manifestor and finally start really picking up those Cerbermancer levels. At that point it will not seem like the Cerbermancer is weaker any more.
Agreed. The main point was that when I went to my 6th level wizard when the psion died, it still didn't feel like I was gaining that much over a sub-optimal psion 3/wizard 3 and that is when I started to understand why wizards weren't being played.
Out of curiosity Jeremy, where do you and your players come out on things like the Pearl of Power? It always strikes me as a useful item which is almost an extra spell slot, and yet I rarely see players making use of it.
My wizard player has picked up a Ring of Wizardry II which he adores. Costs a fortune but he is a specialist wizard with a high intelligence so he has 5 2nd level spells doubled to 10. That is more cost effective then the pearl of power (5 extra 2nd level spells would cost 45,000 gp) and a ring of wizardry allows one to pick a wider variety of spells compared to a pearl of power which only allows you to get back a spell you already cast.
That said these items utility is dependent on the situation. If your wizard never feels like spell power is in danger of being exhausted then there is no use for these items. My players often find themselves forced to keep going even after the point where the wizard would really prefer to rest (put another way I'm not adverse to simply trying to kill the players through sheer attrition) and thus things that allow him to just keep casting are at a premium.