I'm running Legacy of Fire. The PCs are a group of 6 PCs of 5/6 level right now. Down time is rare. And there's not a lot of opportunities built in for a Wizard PC to pick up lots of spells. The Wiz's player has expressed interest in researching an alt Fireball spell (ie. Lightening Ball or Snowball).
First a question from a RAW/RAI standpoint. The rules say that a wizard can add two spells to his spell book every time he gains a level as in he's been researching "between adventures." But it also gives in the same section of the rules the "alternatively" a wizard PC can research and design new spells to add to his spell book. Should a spell such as a snowball or lightingball spell, that for all effects is a Fireball except it does a different energy type, be allowed to be added as a free spell for a wizard when they go up a level?
My other question, would be do you think it would at all be unbalancing in favor of the wizard to drop a scroll of Snowball or Lighteningball for the wizard to find and just let it be?
Thanks in adavance.
In general the two free spells are usually existing spells from a source book allowed by the DM for that campaign. As 3.5 material is usable in PFRPG to a greater or lesser extent there is nothing wrong with a DM and Player finding something like that and letting it be a "freebie" at level up.
The way I would run it in my game is to have the player write up the spell the way they would like it. Then they submit it to the DM for review. If needed the spell is tweaked by both folks until it is approved. Once it it good to go the DM sets the cost and time required to research the spell per the PFRPG core book. The player then pays his money and spends his time making the spell to add to his book. If needed you can use the alternate rule of allowing two hours of progress per day on tasks while adventuring. (I think that is covered in the GMG.)
Personally I think a player will enjoy having created "Wizard Bob's Icy Ball of Frozen Death" way more then if they were just able to pick a spell from the 3.5 Spell Compendium.
Given that this is a wizard, if he's gaining a feat soon, point him in the direction of Energy Substitution (3.5 feat from Comp Arcane). I haven't seen it in PF yet but metamagic still works. It doesn't have the coolness factor of making his own spell, but it might be of greater use at higher levels. Another feat of interest is Elven Spell Lore (PHB2), which would give him more versatility with a single signature spell.
Pathfinder equivalent of Energy Substitution is Elemental Spell.
Based on your guys input, I think I will probably just drop it as loot. It still costs $ to scribe the spell. But researching a new 3rd level spell by guidelines is 3,000 gp in treasure and 3 weeks of work, plus he could fail 1 of 6 checks and lose materials. That seems a big cost for a spell that is the same as an existing one, but with a different energy type.
And it's not like he's getting better benefits of a feat that lets him apply it to all of his spells. It's one spell and one time. So, I think I'll just drop it and give a low/mid level wiz a boost. Besides the guy is in sixth place out of six PCs on xp.
Another alternative is to let him inquire about any local wizard's guilds or buy a scroll and scroll it in his spellbook, basically leaving the initiative to him. Later on, he may also want to look into Dragon's Breath (Advanced Player's Guide, level 4 spell) which allows you to pick the elemental damage.
I would allow it, but only if he came up with a cool spell name and attached his wizard's name to it.