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No, D&D started there (casting in combat was suicide, aging effects for casting certain spells, etc)....
The first, yes. Aging effects came in w/1eAD&D, and among the people I played with back then they were universally loathed as an attempt to nerf [1] spellcasters. Our expectations were conditioned by the three booklets plus supplements, and aging effects (seriously, a year for a Haste spell? For the caster and all recipients?) seemed really hamfisted.
Now, if that's what you expect, it's a lot easier to deal with, so I can understand if AD&D was the first version you ever saw it'd just be part of the background.
[1] We didn't call it that back then, but the concept was the same.
I am really surprised that no one has brought up the casting system from Warhammer Fantasy (the 2nd ed, not the new one. And that's the RPG not the armies one). In that casters had unlimited spells per day of every level they had access to, but in order to cast them they had to succeed on a variant of a caster check. The check was based on an attribute that mages had, and the more powerful spells had much higher checks that were sometimes almost impossible to hit.
The thing was, if you didn't make the spell check it just fizzled, and your turn was wasted. If, however you rolled all ones on your check, you got hit with the spell's damage. If you rolled doubles or triples on the check dice the spell worked as per usual, but something terrible happened to you. Mutations, sanity loss, demons breaking through to this world, the usual.
There were a number of special feat style talents that allowed you to boost your dice pool when making the checks, but it was absolutely never a sure thing. It fit the feel of that world perfectly.
And that is just it, it fit the feel of That world perfectly. I have always wanted to transfer it into D&D, and I had a way that worked really well in 3.5, with home made feats and everything, but in Pathfinder, it is almost unnecessary. What with the mages already getting unlimited scaling spells per day (that 0 or 1st level one they get, you know). Sure you could brew up a world where you used a system like that, but for me at least, it doesn't seem necessary this time around. Give me a few years to get bored with the system, and then I might try putting in the Warhammer idea again.
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I am really surprised that no one has brought up the casting system from Warhammer Fantasy (the 2nd ed, not the new one. And that's the RPG not the armies one). In that casters had unlimited spells per day of every level they had access to, but in order to cast them they had to succeed on a variant of a caster check. The check was based on an attribute that mages had, and the more powerful spells had much higher checks that were sometimes almost impossible to hit.
The thing was, if you didn't make the spell check it just fizzled, and your turn was wasted. If, however you rolled all ones on your check, you got hit with the spell's damage. If you rolled doubles or triples on the check dice the spell worked as per usual, but something terrible happened to you. Mutations, sanity loss, demons breaking through to this world, the usual.
There were a number of special feat style talents that allowed you to boost your dice pool when making the checks, but it was absolutely never a sure thing. It fit the feel of that world perfectly.
And that is just it, it fit the feel of That world perfectly. I have always wanted to transfer it into D&D, and I had a way that worked really well in 3.5, with home made feats and everything, but in Pathfinder, it is almost unnecessary. What with the mages already getting unlimited scaling spells per day (that 0 or 1st level one they get, you know). Sure you could brew up a world where you used a system like that, but for me at least, it doesn't seem necessary this time around. Give me a few years to get bored with the system, and then I might try putting in the Warhammer idea again.
I got a bit irritated with Warhammer RPG though it did introduce some good ideas, I felt it lacked depth and was rather the red-headed stepchild of the mass combat Warhammer. I'm not sure if you managed to read my post above on a solution to including consequences for magic going awry, unfortuantely it was rather long and came slap in the middle of a heated argument between the "for" and "against" folks and was probably ignored. I do tend to write too many words (it's a failing of mine). I am also happy with the system as it stands and my players have no beefs with high level wizards. After all, they are supposed to be dangerous and the tanks know it. It just requires the party to rethink tactics when such encounters occur.
No, I had read that; I was just trying to suggest some already published (and therefore I can only assume already playtested) mechanics that could back up the suggestions you put forth. Not many people like the d10 system they use, but I enjoy it from time to time, and the way that world is built just makes me happy.
First, I felt this could go in the rules section, but I am looking for philosophical discussion as well as potential rules adjustments. That said...
Should magic have consequences/limitations(beyond the numerical)?
No. Screwing players by either GM's fiat or random chance is bad. And you should feel bad for even proposing this.
As about putting systematic restrictions on magic - this never, ever, ever works. And never can possibly work. The only restriction that can effectively offset power that basically does everything is making this power effectively unusable, in which case why it is even in the game? Newer saw a system that does actually does this, though. In any other case, there will be ways to immediately or eventually negate all restrictions or drawbacks and rule the roost. See: Mage the Ascension/Awakening, WHFRP, Dark Heresy, GURPS and so on.
The only workable ways to balance magic is to either abolish the distinction between those charactes who have mojo and those who don't, or to abolish the concept of Swiss omnitool magic, instead restricting magicians to narrow themathic niches (like 3.5 did with Beguilers, Dread Necromancers and other classes known for their balancedness). Or both.
I was proofing a friend's book and realized his characters, potent magicians, still cook and clean by hand. Why wouldn't they use magic to quickly prepare their meals, and clean up afterward? Because magic in his world is chaotic and unpredictable, rather than the perfect computer accuracy with which spells are cast in D&D. One can cast a simple spell, lose control, and annihilate an entire college campus.
Stuff like this can only work in books, when there is no actual unpredictability whatsoever (any mishaps occur right when it is plot-appropriate) and no players to control the characters. Not in RPGs.
Moving forward, how could this be handled from a rules perspective? I'm interested in providing a consequence to spellcasting, partially for balance purposes, but mainly to create a world in which magic is valuable and rare.
Then you should be interested in playing a game other than DnD, because in DnD magic is commonplace since forever.
In fact, permutations of DnD wizards are a perfect example of how trying to balance Swiss Omnitool magic by putting restrictions on it never works. Compared to stuff most protagonist magicians in various fantasy books (never mind other various media) pull off, DnD magic is burdened with a ****ton of restrictions. Spell memorization. Easily caused (at least for a first few levels) spell failure. Strictly defined, inflexible effects. Severely limited number of spells per day until high levels (before 3E). Severely limited scope of spell effects, with a few high-level exceptions (3E or after). Constant decrease in relative (and sometimes even absolute) value of their direct damage effects, meaning that by 3.5 blasting people with metal-melting flames is mild annoyance, rather than instakill the direct damage magic usually is in fantasy. And so on. But we all know exactly how much all of this failed to ever balance wizards.
No, D&D started there (casting in combat was suicide,
No, it wasn't. There were no AoOs, and low-level spells had way better Speed than most monsters and weapons used by enemy mooks. And one SoL spell had much better chances to end the whole encounter at low levels. Past low leves, the wizard had Stoneskin on 24/7, plus Improved Invisibility and whatever when actually expecting combat, and often was the most durable party member.
aging effects for casting certain spells, etc)
Which you simply did not cast, because Lightning Bolt wasted everything just fine anyway.
and has moved away from that stance as collective mary sue storytelling eclipsed any kind of game elements, eventually leading to the 3x paradigm of Wizards OWN the Game after level x.
No, just no. 3.X attempted to go away from this paradigim, which was explicit and official before (because "high-end wizards rule the roost, muggles can only compete with McGuffins, cunning and plot help" was a general paradigm in most sources of inspiration for DnD, after all), and to make everyone equal at all levels. Except, it did not succeeed. It succeeded at making wizards less self-sufficent and more inclined to use cooperative tactics, such as casting buffs and save-or-suck/battlefield control spells, though.
First, I felt this could go in the rules section, but I am looking for philosophical discussion as well as potential rules adjustments. That said...
Should magic have consequences/limitations(beyond the numerical)?
No. Screwing players by either GM's fiat or random chance is bad. And you should feel bad for even proposing this.
As about putting systematic restrictions on magic - this never, ever, ever works. And never can possibly work. The only restriction that can effectively offset power that basically does everything is making this power effectively unusable, in which case why it is even in the game? Newer saw a system that does actually does this, though. In any other case, there will be ways to immediately or eventually negate all restrictions or drawbacks and rule the roost. See: Mage the Ascension/Awakening, WHFRP, Dark Heresy, GURPS and so on.
The only workable ways to balance magic is to either abolish the distinction between those charactes who have mojo and those who don't, or to abolish the concept of Swiss omnitool magic, instead restricting magicians to narrow themathic niches (like 3.5 did with Beguilers, Dread Necromancers and other classes known for their balancedness). Or both.
I totally disagree with you here. Adding negative effects to using magic works well in many systems, just not necessarily D&D. Mage, Amber, Conspiracy X, Ars Magica, Star Wars, all have DM aritrated negative effects associated with magic, just to name a few. These systems can be a lot of fun.
Now, doing this to D&D is not necessarily the best idea, but you can certainly put some restrictions on magic and keep a ballanced game where players enjoy playing casters.
Moving forward, how could this be handled from a rules perspective? I'm interested in providing a consequence to spellcasting, partially for balance purposes, but mainly to create a world in which magic is valuable and rare.
I think this is why we have the rule about needing to have a high enough attribute to cast the spell, now. (Level 7 spell? 17 int/cha/wis/whatever..)
It seems kinda dumb to me that someone with 17 charisma casts without error and someone with 16 can't do it at all.
So, I think you could easily argue for some form of attribute check for spells --- allowing for automatic success if you're smart/wise/charismatic enough for some spells (because this, too, is common in books, you have the magical prodigy kid who just "understands" magic and can hold complex spell patterns in their heads, etc..)
I mean, it seems to flow from the current spirit of the rules.
Of course, on the downside, how many casters don't have at least a 16 or 17 in their primary stat at level 1 -- but you could easily give it teeth by double the level of the spell for the purposes of the necessary attribute, or start from 15 (or 13) instead of 10, or...
I was proofing a friend's book and realized his characters, potent magicians, still cook and clean by hand. Why wouldn't they use magic to quickly prepare their meals, and clean up afterward? Because magic in his world is chaotic and unpredictable, rather than the perfect computer accuracy with which spells are cast in D&D. One can cast a simple spell, lose control, and annihilate an entire college campus.
That got me thinking: There don't seem to be ANY consequences for casting magic in the D&D/Pathfinder construct(excepting certain spells).
Sidenote:
Also, this is another example of how the economics in 3.x don't work. Tell me that even slightly wealthy nobles wouldn't want, say, a portable clothes cleaner, mending device, etc, etc. [Or that a powerful wizard wouldn't want to give such a thing to his dear ol' aging mom with the arthritis... I know, all PCs tend to have tragic, nasty, orphanning backstories, but surely *some* casters have families they still love...]Anyhow, they're relatively cheap and quick to make *now* under the current rules, as most of these effects are level 0 or 1 spells.
So, there'd be a market for new ones (meaning you'd likely have people going into the making-crap-items business), and old ones would be heirloomed down the way (or stolen by the commoners, either via robbery or revolution)...
As more and more devices exist, the cost would drop, and taa-daa.
(Some other high-magic games, at least, deal with this by having affordable magic items that cook food, stay clean, etc, etc.)
A different application might be to make the spellcasting require a roll (Spellcraft?) and if the roll fails, the lesser risk is taken (nonlethal damage) and if the roll botches, the nasty effect takes place (spell out of control, ability damage, temporary possession, etc.). DC is based on spell level, and at a certain point a 1 becomes merely an auto-fail and not a botch, so that cantrips don't wipe out archmages (perhaps two or three spell tiers after you gain a tier of spells, so that a 3rd or 5th level wizard can cast cantrips safely, and nobody ever becomes able to cast (7th) 8th or 9th level spells with 100% impunity).
Since I'm a fan of adding with the other hand, if I'm taking away with this one, perhaps the spellcaster gains the ability to attempt to cast spells over and above his spell slots / spells prepared for the day, at steep penalties to the spellcraft check (and with no protection from disastrous fumbles, no matter how low level the spell is). Allowing a spellcaster to gamble on a few extra spells per day increases the chance that the new mechanic will see some use, as some will take the chance.
A variant metamagic system could allow the spellcaster to metamagic a spell on the fly, at an increase to the Spellcraft DC, and, thus, an increase in chance of something going horribly wrong. (Perhaps the flavor text for this setting is that spells represent 'tools of creation' left behind by the gods, or some powers older even than the gods, and that arcanists have learned the words of power necessarily to echo these ancient arts of creation. Modifying these ancient tools is akin to messing with dynamite, so that as the 'tools' themselves aren't entirely safe to use, enhancing or changing them on the fly becomes even more ill-advised, at least, for mere mortals...)
Two thumbs way up!! I love these ideas. Spellcraft checks for casting spells mirrors attack rolls for swinging swords. To counterbalance the limit on spells/day versus no limit on sword swings, consider that swords only do one thing: cut. Spells do lots of different, useful, and interesting things. Alternately, you could increase the spells/day or even revert to a points system.
Regardless, I have always toyed with requiring Spellcraft checks to cast spells successfully.
Magic is a very dangerous and chaotic thing in the Warhammer fantasy setting. The more you cast, the harder it becomes to control and can eventually blow up on you.
And in 40k psykers can become possessed every time they use their powers.
In Dragonage, you draw magic from the fade and make yourself vulnerable for possession by demons.
These are some things you could incorporate. Perhaps a percentage chance or some sort of table to check to see what happens.
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If you have Paizo's Crit hit and Fumble decks then a simple way to do it is to make each casting of a spell require a DC 5 spellcraft roll where a 1 auto fumbles and a 20 auto crits. The spells still go off as cast no matter what (unless you roll below 5, but I've never seen a caster with less than a +5 bonus to spellcraft at first level), but if you roll a 1 you take the penalty of the fumble and if you roll a 20 you get the rider benefit.
I totally disagree with you here. Adding negative effects to using magic works well in many systems, just not necessarily D&D. Mage, Amber, Conspiracy X, Ars Magica, Star Wars, all have DM aritrated negative effects associated with magic, just to name a few. These systems can be a lot of fun.
In Ars Magica mages >>> muggles setup is offical. So it is not even relevant.
In Mage (both versions) you can break the game right in half without even trying, precisely because attempts to balance free-style reality warping by restrictions are doomed. And doomed not only because "everything" naturally incudes ways to mitigate or negate these restrictions.
In Star Wars d20 there is no magic. The Force is not a Swiss Omnitool, it is severely limited, thematically and in power scale, by what it does in the verse. Still, Jedi (at least in d20 versions) > non-Jedi, even though the game tries to fool you into thinking otherwise.
Never touched the rest of the games you've mentioned.
I totally disagree with you here. Adding negative effects to using magic works well in many systems, just not necessarily D&D. Mage, Amber, Conspiracy X, Ars Magica, Star Wars, all have DM aritrated negative effects associated with magic, just to name a few. These systems can be a lot of fun.In Ars Magica mages >>> muggles setup is offical. So it is not even relevant.
In Mage (both versions) you can break the game right in half without even trying, precisely because attempts to balance free-style reality warping by restrictions are doomed. And doomed not only because "everything" naturally incudes ways to mitigate or negate these restrictions.
In Star Wars d20 there is no magic. The Force is not a Swiss Omnitool, it is severely limited, thematically and in power scale, by what it does in the verse. Still, Jedi (at least in d20 versions) > non-Jedi, even though the game tries to fool you into thinking otherwise.
Never touched the rest of the games you've mentioned.
And that totally misses my point. My point is that these systems all have DM arbitrated ballancing factors on the casters. Abuse the system too much and the system fights back. You say this would be a horrible travesty to do in D&D, and that it never works, but many other systems do it quite well and make a fun game. The trick is ballancing the nerf with something else to maintain the ballance that currently exists (unless of course you are like the many people who feel magic is just too powerful anyway and it needs a greater nerf).
Edit: and don't tell me SWd20, where players can throw starships into suns at mid levels doesn't have a magic system.
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If you have Paizo's Crit hit and Fumble decks then a simple way to do it is to make each casting of a spell require a DC 5 spellcraft roll where a 1 auto fumbles and a 20 auto crits. The spells still go off as cast no matter what (unless you roll below 5, but I've never seen a caster with less than a +5 bonus to spellcraft at first level), but if you roll a 1 you take the penalty of the fumble and if you roll a 20 you get the rider benefit.The biggest issue I have with this is getting effects that apply equally across all spells. Random effects don't translate well between direct damage - buffs - utility - save or die spells. Random effects are amusing for a time, but tend to break down into silly or annoying over time.
I'm also not happy with any check that is entirely about not rolling a 1 as any other result is irrelevant. It really screams being entirely about forcing a failure. Having a critical success on the other end mitigates this somewhat, but that just turns this rolling to see if you get a coin toss for a good/bad effect.
I did say it was simple, you're right, in fact 90% of the time it's a roll that does nothing, but if you want a simple system that makes magic more risky so that people aren't casually casting spells as if they were mundane but at the same time isn't so draconian that the players never pick spellcasters, this provides balanced risk that won't break your game, and is simple and easy. However, if it's not for you, more power to you. I was just offering something simple that I had been contemplating doing in my own games. Granted in my games, it would also come with rules to allow you to cast spells outside of you level, and other such things that would of course increase the DCs. Quick and easy, non-broken way to add what the OP was looking for. Although for what its worth, I agree with you about the breakdown between random effects and type of spell. However, good storytelling can mitigate that somewhat.
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In my games, I utilize a home-brewed table of 400 random spell effects that can occur when a spell is interrupted or a magical item destroyed. In essence, when you're messing around with magic and control is lost, unpredictable things can happen. It's 100% with magic items being destroyed and 10%/lvl of the spell being violently disrupted.
But beyond that, I wouldn't penalize any caster for playing a caster, unless it's aesthetic or moral (like aforementioned Dark Sun, where the environment is punished by defilers).
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I won't deny it does have simplicity going for it.
As for the "rules to allow you to cast spells outside of you level, and other such things that would of course increase the DCs", I could see something like free metamagic effects being used for this. Perhaps a d4 roll to determine how many levels of increase you can apply for free and granting an equal caster level boost for that spell. If the potential benefits outweighed the potential drawbacks (without becoming broken), then that would definitely tip the balance regarding my assessment of your suggestion. In other words, the carrot has to be worth risking the stick. I like random chance, but tend to walk away when it's clearly a game of lose vs break even.
Well I don't know if you have the decks, but in general the fumbles are more minor inconvenience stuff and the critical effects are more powerful effects, so even without the rest of the system it weighs more in the PCs advantage depending on which ruleset you use from the cards.
But yeah I've played in the back of my mind with a system for years (never setting it down on paper) that would allow players to try things, the only negative being that failure causes the spell to fizzle and the spell slot to be lost, and possibly take a fumble if you failed with a nat one (if you had a high enough Spellcraft to succeed at the task even when rolling a one, the spell would go off, but you'd still get the fumble). It does allow for using spellcraft to modify spells even without the relevant metamagic feat, the DC increasing for every level the feat would increase the spell by. You've got me thinking enough about it that I might write it up and post it in the houserule section.
And that totally misses my point. My point is that these systems all have DM arbitrated ballancing factors on the casters.
And these factors do not work. They do not stop people who have mojo, even relatively limited mojo, like the Force, from being Just Better than those who don't. They do not stop mages from demolishing the game with various win buttons and adventure bypasses and crazy exploits too.
Edit: and don't tell me SWd20, where players can throw starships into suns at mid levels doesn't have a magic system.
No, I tell you that the Force is incredibly limited in theme compared to magic of DnD or MtA type that does basically everything. But, as you can see from your own example, force-users still are far from being balanced with the rest.
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No, D&D started there (casting in combat was suicide,No, it wasn't. There were no AoOs, and low-level spells had way better Speed than most monsters and weapons used by enemy mooks. And one SoL spell had much better chances to end the whole encounter at low levels. Past low leves, the wizard had Stoneskin on 24/7, plus Improved Invisibility and whatever when actually expecting combat, and often was the most durable party member.
Stoneskin is, IIRC, a 2nd Ed spell. AD&D1 wasn't really big on melee defense spells for magic-users. Also, I'm probably misremembering, but I don't think straight AD&D1 magic-users got Improved Invisibility--it was an Illusionist spell. In my experience--and I played 1st Ed MUs for a few years, back in the day, and DM'd for them as well--trying to cast in combat *was* suicide. Or at least an invitation to a world of hurt. Especially when HP bonuses for CON topped out at +2 for everyone except Fighters (and their subclasses), so the L10 MU has *at most* 60 HP, or a hair over what the average fighter w/no CON bonus would have.
(Of course, to compensate there were no damage caps on things like Magic Missile, so rushing the lich meant eating eight or nine missiles, or a 17d6 fireball.)
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The best way I've found to add consequence to casting is to apply a set of world specific physics to the game.
Summoning critters - they come from somewhere, and some of tehm aren't going to be happy about it. Eventually people start coming to look for the caster who keeps calling their pets away (imagine a group of druid like organisations working in the celestial/fiendish realm actively trying to prevent creatures from their realm being abused by the material plane).
Summoniing other stuff - Wall of iron, stone wall etc has to come from somewhere. Two possibilities here.
1st, similar to the critters above. You draw the materials from another location. Eventually people start looking for the magic users who keep stealing their walls and stonework.
2nd option - the material is remade from molecules in the surroundings. Not such a problem the first time this happens, but imagine an area where lots of people are casting this type of thing. Suddenly the other parts of the world get "thinner" or more crumbly as molecules get stolen and rearranged to form magic. This has big implications for laws in cities and where colleges of magic may form. This one is particulalry good for teleportation too. Work on the whole Star Trek idea of mlecular deconstrctiona and reconstruction at the other end.
Big Blasts - Fireballs and lightning bolts effect the environment too. Make sure that gets mentioned. Have the world react accordinly. Fire spells in a sewer is always risky, Lightning spells near metal and things arc out in strange ways, Acid may splash people near by, causing stinging pain with no mechanical disruption but certainly attitudes may shift.
Finally the way I've used most often to make my players think long and hard about what to cast and when is the fear of the unkown. Roll random dice, ask them "are you sure you want to cast that?", have summoned creatures stare at them intently for a brief moment before they follow the casters commands, people get uneasy around casters after tehy see them destroy things through the casual use of massive firepower.
Well hope that was useful (and what teh op was after)
Cheers
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But yeah I've played in the back of my mind with a system for years (never setting it down on paper) that would allow players to try things, the only negative being that failure causes the spell to fizzle and the spell slot to be lost, and possibly take a fumble if you failed with a nat one (if you had a high enough Spellcraft to succeed at the task even when rolling a one, the spell would go off, but you'd still get the fumble). It does allow for using spellcraft to modify spells even without the relevant metamagic feat, the DC increasing for every level the feat would increase the spell by. You've got me thinking enough about it that I might write it up and post it in the houserule section.
There's a certain mad internet logic to the fact that some of the most on-topic discussion is going on behind an 'Off-Topic' spoiler.
IIRC, Sword and Sorcery had an Advanced Players Guide with skill-based spellcasting that worked like this. You'd make some sort of skill check when you wanted to boost a spell, and if you failed, get some botched result, and if you succeeded, some heightened effect from a chart of effects based on the school of the spell. (I don't recall most of them, but one of the worst Necromancy botches was causing undead to rise up around you and attack you, while one of the more spectacular effects made the undead appear and serve you for an hour!)
IIRC, Sword and Sorcery had an Advanced Players Guide with skill-based spellcasting that worked like this. You'd make some sort of skill check when you wanted to boost a spell, and if you failed, get some botched result, and if you succeeded, some heightened effect from a chart of effects based on the school of the spell. (I don't recall most of them, but one of the worst Necromancy botches was causing undead to rise up around you and attack you, while one of the more spectacular effects made the undead appear and serve you for an hour!)
Yeah, I've got that book, and it's actually got a number of really interesting things mixed in with the crap. I think the spell critical failure/critical success charts are my favorite part of the book. My only problem with the idea is the added die rolls and table consultation required--there's a different table for each school of magic, each with different bonuses and penalties. There's nothing that'll necessarily alter the overall paradigms or feeling of magic in your world, but it's still definitely worth picking up if you're looking to work some uncertainty into your spellcasting. If I didn't have two cats sleeping in my lap right now, I'd grab it and give some more specific details...
Just to throw something into the mix --
We use a simple campaign based theme to make casting magic spells and the like have consequences --
Thaumavores!
Creatures that are attracted to, can sense and feed on magic and magical things, persons and the like.
It's been done before in a number of ways and for us it really worked -- we used the Far Realm as their plane of origin.
Basically, magic stretched static reality allowing Otherworldy Denziens to break through.
In game terms it was handled by increased encounter chances from a tailored Magic Encounter list and GM story spinning.
:. :: :.
My 2 cents:
- 'Magic with consequences' doesn't really work in any of the default D20/3.5E fantasy settings. It can be approximated through rules such as exhaustion etc., but they just discourage people from playing casters.
- It works fine in books.
- It works fine in settings with the default assumption '95% of the world's population are unable to cast spells'. It works in Conan, it works in Midnight, it works in Iron Heroes, it works in Dark Legacies, and to a lesser degree, in Iron Kingdoms. It's fine if used for NPCs only (if the PCs all play non-magical characters). For magic-using PCs, you cannot integrate a system of consequences into the current D20/PFRPG classes. Instead, you'd have to rework them from the ground up, so that magic has always worked a certain way from the beginning.
- The real difficulty is one of game balance. Take a 3.5/PFRPG wizard. If you just tell him that he's going to take nonlethal damage for each spell cast, he will (of course) refrain from casting all spells that he could 'normally' cast. This will impact game balance with regard to melee classes. The viable solution would be to give casters less spells per day as a default, but increase their individual potency. The result: glass jaw syndrome. Spells either work and wipe out everything, or they don't and the character is relatively worthless and certainly not fun to play.
Leave 'magic & consequences' to fiction, or use a setting with a meta-reason (such as Midnight). Otherwise, it's too much trouble to be worth it. YMMV :).
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The best way I've found to add consequence to casting is to apply a set of world specific physics to the game.
Summoning critters - they come from somewhere, and some of tehm aren't going to be happy about it. Eventually people start coming to look for the caster who keeps calling their pets away (imagine a group of druid like organisations working in the celestial/fiendish realm actively trying to prevent creatures from their realm being abused by the material plane).
Summoniing other stuff - Wall of iron, stone wall etc has to come from somewhere. Two possibilities here.
1st, similar to the critters above. You draw the materials from another location. Eventually people start looking for the magic users who keep stealing their walls and stonework.
2nd option - the material is remade from molecules in the surroundings. Not such a problem the first time this happens, but imagine an area where lots of people are casting this type of thing. Suddenly the other parts of the world get "thinner" or more crumbly as molecules get stolen and rearranged to form magic. This has big implications for laws in cities and where colleges of magic may form. This one is particulalry good for teleportation too. Work on the whole Star Trek idea of mlecular deconstrctiona and reconstruction at the other end.Big Blasts - Fireballs and lightning bolts effect the environment too. Make sure that gets mentioned. Have the world react accordinly. Fire spells in a sewer is always risky, Lightning spells near metal and things arc out in strange ways, Acid may splash people near by, causing stinging pain with no mechanical disruption but certainly attitudes may shift.
Finally the way I've used most often to make my players think long and hard about what to cast and when is the fear of the unkown. Roll random dice, ask them "are you sure you want to cast that?", have summoned creatures stare at them intently for a brief moment before they follow the casters commands, people get uneasy around casters after tehy see them destroy...
For most spells I rationalize that spell powers are forged from the stuff of the energy (pos/neg) and elemental planes, which I assume are infinite. However I have often thought about how summoned creatures may feel, or in the case of celestial/infernal/abyssal creatures, what their masters feel (assuming they have masters) about them being summoned. I would take the stand that the chances of the same creature being summoned by the same spellcaster over and over again (unless it were a specific creature i.e. from a figurine) to be remote if the numbers of that creature were legion. Nevertheless it still could have consequences. For example, a PC gets summoned by a spellcaster to fight for it, it could happen albeit rarely.
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My 2 cents:
- 'Magic with consequences' doesn't really work in any of the default D20/3.5E fantasy settings. It can be approximated through rules such as exhaustion etc., but they just discourage people from playing casters.
- It works fine in books.
- It works fine in settings with the default assumption '95% of the world's population are unable to cast spells'. It works in Conan, it works in Midnight, it works in Iron Heroes, it works in Dark Legacies, and to a lesser degree, in Iron Kingdoms. It's fine if used for NPCs only (if the PCs all play non-magical characters). For magic-using PCs, you cannot integrate a system of consequences into the current D20/PFRPG classes. Instead, you'd have to rework them from the ground up, so that magic has always worked a certain way from the beginning.
- The real difficulty is one of game balance. Take a 3.5/PFRPG wizard. If you just tell him that he's going to take nonlethal damage for each spell cast, he will (of course) refrain from casting all spells that he could 'normally' cast. This will impact game balance with regard to melee classes. The viable solution would be to give casters less spells per day as a default, but increase their individual potency. The result: glass jaw syndrome. Spells either work and wipe out everything, or they don't and the character is relatively worthless and certainly not fun to play.
Leave 'magic & consequences' to fiction, or use a setting with a meta-reason (such as Midnight). Otherwise, it's too much trouble to be worth it. YMMV :).
I couldn't agree more. After all, it is fantasy. Spell casters are hamstrung considerably as it is without introducing further rules to hamstring the only thing they're really good at. To those players who think magic should have consequences let them all play spell casters so they could take advantage of all that power! They would quickly learn that being a spellcaster has enough weaknesses that next time they'd rather be a fighter or barbarian. From my experience with 3.5, playing a spellcaster is still tough, not quite as tough as ed. 1, but still hard going especially at lower levels where you have so few spells that you can't get involved in many battles until you've run out of (offensive) spells and need to rest. The fighters are all on a battle high and shouting:
"Come on Gandalf, we can't stop now! We're having way too much fun!"
To which the spellcaster replies.
"Sorry Conan I'm spent, those four kobolds wore me out!" :)
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My 2 cents:
- 'Magic with consequences' doesn't really work in any of the default D20/3.5E fantasy settings. It can be approximated through rules such as exhaustion etc., but they just discourage people from playing casters.
- It works fine in books.
- It works fine in settings with the default assumption '95% of the world's population are unable to cast spells'. <...>
- The real difficulty is one of game balance. <...>
Leave 'magic & consequences' to fiction, or use a setting with a meta-reason (such as Midnight). Otherwise, it's too much trouble to be worth it. YMMV :).
+1
It's not just balance, which can be futzed with other ways--it's a matter of player expectations. Playing 3.5/3.P (or any other rules set) imposes a set of expectations on all the people involved, and deviating from those expectations too much makes it harder for everyone to have a good time (which is, after all, the whole point of the exercise :-)). It's like the way a lot of us reacted to the introduction of aging effects for spells and material components {1}, back in the day.
An aside:
WRT books, comparing the flavor text for spell memorization in the Dying Earth stories to the way it comes across in any of the various (O/A)D&D.x rules is kind of interesting. The act of memorizing a spell is described as being quite difficult, and, e.g., Cugel the Clever can feel a spell stuck inside his head. That gets glossed over completely in the rules, except for the chance that high-level thieves reading scrolls will reverse the spell effects.
{1} In the introduction to the 1E Player's Handbook, EGG decried the use of spell point-based systems in conjunction with AD&D, because he didn't like adding that level of bookkeeping. The addition of material components, though, imposed a system whereby players had to keep track of how much bat guano, gum arabic, eyelashes, goldfish, iron filings, etc. their spellcasting characters had. The irony appeared to have been lost on him.
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Stoneskin is, IIRC, a 2nd Ed spell.
Stoneskin was in 1e.
I -think- it was in UA, but I'm not sure.
Huh...you're right, I'd forgotten about that. Possibly because the groups I played with didn't tend to use UA, except for people who wanted to play Cavaliers. I knew it wasn't in the PH, though, and there was a 7-year gap between the release of the PH and the publication of UA. Given that 2nd Ed came out only four years later, I think it's fair to say that for most of the time 1st Ed was out no one was using Stoneskin.
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I have always liked the Earthsea approach.
Things unravel as the forces of nature become unbalanced. Spellcasting changes things. More experienced casters become more capable of using magic without altering reality in strange and unforseen, perhaps world-ending, ways.
Happily, this fluff perfectly matches PFRPG casting (as long as you decide that cantrips are so minor that they affect nothing).
Also, it should be remembered that there are other reasons why a wizard would do the washing-up. My parents own a dishwasher but my dad still washes up by hand most nights; that's just the kind of man he is.
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One area where this can matter in a big way. Level 20 conjurers can make one Summon Monster spell a permanent cast until they decide to dismiss it. Lets say an evil conjurer.... just because he can decides to summon an Astral Deva to be his pawn in his dirty deeds. While summoned creatures aren't permenently slain when killed under these conditions the angel in question is unavailable to it's masters as long as this prime material arcanist has her has his thrall. Even good aligned characters might face issues about keeping a being from the higher realms from it's appointed tasks for an extended period.
Summoning critters - they come from somewhere, and some of tehm aren't going to be happy about it. Eventually people start coming to look for the caster who keeps calling their pets away (imagine a group of druid like organisations working in the celestial/fiendish realm actively trying to prevent creatures from their realm being abused by the material plane).
Very true. (Note the above text wasn't from my post) I would rule that say a good cleric could only make use of an Astral Deva permanently if the cleric's deity agreed to it. But I wouldn't allow permanent summonings of very powerful outsiders allowable in my game, unless it were done with the blessing of said divinity and that the outsider in question was under the obligation of the deity and not that of the summoner. For example, if the outsider were asked to do something that went against its alignment/deity's inclination, it would refuse and might even be instructed by the said deity to return home forthwith. The same could also go for evil deities who would revoke it's allowance if the evil outsider were asked to do something good or against its chaos/law descriptor.
And that totally misses my point. My point is that these systems all have DM arbitrated ballancing factors on the casters.
And these factors do not work. They do not stop people who have mojo, even relatively limited mojo, like the Force, from being Just Better than those who don't. They do not stop mages from demolishing the game with various win buttons and adventure bypasses and crazy exploits too.
But the point is not to stop people from casting spells or nerfing the casters. The point is for them to not cast them when its not relevant, to make the magic more magical, and less of a science. To create a system where commoners aren't having prestidigitation cast on them every couple minutes to make sure that their suit is pressed. In fact, many of the proposals have increased the base power of the mage while simultaneously adding restrictions. This is because many of us feel that the current casters are ballanced against he fighting classes, so if you add restrictions you should give them something.
And I still claim that, in many of those systems, the casters are not significantly more powerful than the non-casters, unless the systems were designed for the casters to be outright more powerful intentionally. Non-Saga edition Star Wars, for instance, uses your HP to cast spells. Cast too much and suddenly your the first one down in combat. The system works for preventing them from trivially using the force, though lots of people find it a horrible system.
My 2 cents:- 'Magic with consequences' doesn't really work in any of the default D20/3.5E fantasy settings. It can be approximated through rules such as exhaustion etc., but they just discourage people from playing casters.
It works if it is injected sensibly. It already exists in more capacity that has been said here. Four instances off the top of my head: arcane SF w/ armor, casting higher level spells from scrolls than you can cast, Use Magic Device, and teleport consequences. If the OP introduced more consequences, as long as they weren't too punitive and didn't apply to every spell in the game, it can be pulled off.