this is a questions for D&D veterans (I only know D&D having just played D&D from 1st ed. through 3.5 and Pathfinder, and no other pen and paper rpg's).
Do you find you researh your own spells less and less lately?
I know I do. Even with the abundance of spells they had in AD&D ( I remember fondly the many volumes of both Priest's and Wizard's Spell compendiums published by TSR). I think in those days maybe half my memorized spells where reasearched by myself.
Nowadays though I never research spells. Is it just me getting lazy, or is this a trend other people see?
If you do have the same experience, any thoughts as to why?
looks like it might be just me getting lazy then...
what is network play?
For a number of us, play in PFS, eliminates the possiblity. I used to research spells for my wizard character but now I just go with what is published.
ah I see, I only play over an actual table :-)
|
ah I see, I only play over an actual table :-)
Me too, Morain. I'm pretty sure that these forums have a much higher proportion of Pathfinder Society players than the entire Pathfinder customer base has.
So I would guess that network play/organized play probably doesn't affect things all that much for most folks, though it might very well affect a lot of the folk who might respond here.
As to your actual question: Sorry, but I'm such a new player that I have no idea how things compare between now and older editions. Since I'm just starting out as a GM, I pretty much rely on the written spells and haven't started getting creative with new ones yet.
I haven't played an arcane spellcaster in a while, but the last time I did (~7 years ago, 3.5 game), I did research a bunch of spells. About half got approved by the GM. (He should have approved more-- three that he didn't approve ended up showing up almost identically in one of the later splat books.)
Actually, I think that could be the big reason for lack of spell research: the huge number of new official 3.5 spells that proliferated over the years. So many good ideas for new spells got codified in some way or another.
I know that official spells that were very similar in theme, flavor, or effect to my researched spells ended up being published in the intervening years. I'm guessing that there are so many more spells to choose from, that players don't feel the need to research spells as often.
Another reason for lack of spell research could be the nature of the campaign in question. If the plot is deadline driven (i.e. the PCs are racing against time), or if the PCs are stuck in the wilderness or a frontier area without access to an arcane library, they aren't in a position to do spell research.
I have a "Core Rulebook Only" policy on spells. If you want a spell from a source other than the core rulebook, you need to use the spell research rules. I'm hoping that this will encourage my players to engage in a little independent spell research.
I still research spells. In fact my witch and druid are researching spells in campaigns right now.
But I've never had more than a handful of researched spells for any given spellcaster.
There are two main reasons.
1. I can't assume those spells will travel to any other campaign, even campaigns run by the same GM.
2. It's a whole lot of time and effort for both me and the GM. And while that was not a huge deal back in college, it's a pretty big deal now that my gaming group has families, jobs, vacations and a life outside of gaming...
I did this quite a few times in v3.5, but not so much in Pathfinder. I've found the established spells do pretty much what I want most of the time.