Why does 2e have spells go up to 10 rather than 9?

[Yqatuba]

I assume because the max level is 20, and full casters get spells roughly every 2 levels. Is this right?

[NECR0G1ANT]

I think it's becasue base-10 is more elegant.

[Verdyn]

By the same token why did 3.0 change it so that divine spells went up to level 9 when 2e capped them at 7? It's a change that makes sense and allows PF2 to keep a couple of spells that couldn't squeeze in even as 9th level spells.

[FowlJ]

You're pretty much correct, in PF1 there was a gap after getting 9th level spells at 17th level, so now it's filled in with 10th level spells at 19th level.

[Deriven Firelion]

Same reason these go to 11.

[PossibleCabbage]

10 divides 20 nicer than 9 does.

Also carving out a "this is the apex of magical power" level lets you separate the very powerful but fundamentally straightforward spells (e.g. meteor swarm, shapechange, disjunction, weird, etc.) from the ones that are effectively cheat codes (e.g. wish, time stop, gate, anything that just rewrites the terrain of the surrounding area, etc.)

So now the answer for "why would I prepare meteor swarm when I could prepare wish" is not "wish has an inconvenient monetary cost as a balancing factor" it's "wish is fundamentally in a different tier of power." You might notice that Wish now doesn't cost anything (except a slot) to cast.

[Zaister]

Why not?

[Lucas Yew]

I like it enough to wonder why 5E never even thought about this thing. The weird break in 19th character level always seemed off.

Although I think that PF2 missed the opportunity to either renumber spell levels to match character levels (though some non-players getting spells at accelerated/decelerated ratio might make this option hard);
or rename "spell levels" to some other word to avoid confusion (while I can get it straight, there's no guarantee a random new young reader could distinguish character level and spell level), like "spell circles" or something else.

[graystone]

I blame the metric system. ;)

[Exocist]

I think 10 is way too many, but I also thought 9 was way too many as well.

Why do 1st and 2nd level spells suck so much? It's because stretching out gradual increases over 10 tiers without becoming broken at the highest tier, while still making the next tier feel like a meaningful upgrade is difficult without making the starting tier garbage.

IMO game would be much better off with only 5 or 6 spell levels.

[Ubertron_X]

Exocist wrote:

I think 10 is way too many, but I also thought 9 was way too many as well.

Why do 1st and 2nd level spells suck so much? It's because stretching out gradual increases over 10 tiers without becoming broken at the highest tier, while still making the next tier feel like a meaningful upgrade is difficult without making the starting tier garbage.

IMO game would be much better off with only 5 or 6 spell levels.

Well...

...for starters it would surely help low level spells if the majority would not be rendered irrelevant (in a low level slot) by general or specific game / spell design (damage scaling, incapacitation, counteracting and spells like magic weapon that go from OP to never cast again after level 4). On the contrary many buff spells manage to stay at least somewhat relevant.

[Perpdepog]

PossibleCabbage wrote:

10 divides 20 nicer than 9 does.

Also carving out a "this is the apex of magical power" level lets you separate the very powerful but fundamentally straightforward spells (e.g. meteor swarm, shapechange, disjunction, weird, etc.) from the ones that are effectively cheat codes (e.g. wish, time stop, gate, anything that just rewrites the terrain of the surrounding area, etc.)

So now the answer for "why would I prepare meteor swarm when I could prepare wish" is not "wish has an inconvenient monetary cost as a balancing factor" it's "wish is fundamentally in a different tier of power." You might notice that Wish now doesn't cost anything (except a slot) to cast.

This, plus, and this is just a suspicion, that 10 next to a spell's name just looks better. The difference of an extra digit helps to hammer home "this is some apex spell-castery, right here" a little bit more, which can raise the already high cool factor of spells a little higher.

[Lawrencelot]

Lucas Yew wrote:

Although I think that PF2 missed the opportunity to either renumber spell levels to match character levels (though some non-players getting spells at accelerated/decelerated ratio might make this option hard);

or rename "spell levels" to some other word to avoid confusion (while I can get it straight, there's no guarantee a random new young reader could distinguish character level and spell level), like "spell circles" or something else.

Fully agreed. With a better system than ever for heightening spells, it's a really missed opportunity. There are still so many spells that do similar things even though they are separate spells. We could easily have 20 levels of spells corresponding to item levels and character levels and basically all other levels in the game, where most spell effects would be defined by heightening.

Illusory creature/object could be the same spell, many damaging spells could be the same spell, but once you heighten it to a certain level something cool happens for example.

[Charlie Brooks]

With the lingering inelegance of spell level being the only type of level that runs on a different scale, it's easy to teach that spell level = character level/2, rounded up.

[Tarondor]

Deriven Firelion wrote:

Same reason these go to 11.

I came here to make this same joke.

Well done sir.

[Verdyn]

Exocist wrote:

I think 10 is way too many, but I also thought 9 was way too many as well.

Why do 1st and 2nd level spells suck so much? It's because stretching out gradual increases over 10 tiers without becoming broken at the highest tier, while still making the next tier feel like a meaningful upgrade is difficult without making the starting tier garbage.

IMO game would be much better off with only 5 or 6 spell levels.

I actually agree. If the goal is tight balance and making every spell feel good when upcast it's easier to design some really cool spells that come online more than a single level apart. You could also do stuff like spreading when each level hits out differently rather than needing to stick to every odd level.

A caster might still get 2nd level spells at level 3, but then need to wait until 6 for 3rd level spells, then until 10 for 4th level spells, and 15 for 5th level spells with 6th level spells coming online at 20th level. You'd need each spell to scale with character level as older editions used to, but each new level could really feel distinct in such a system.

[Unicore]

What if there was one 11th level spell, just called, "turn it up to 11" that just did an obscene amount of sonic damage to a large area and deafened everyone in the area as well, that was only accessible to 20th level bards?

[Themetricsystem]

graystone wrote:

I blame the metric system. ;)

Thanks, bud, it really was my fault after all though so you're right.

[S. J. Digriz]

I think it was the recognition that there are 9th level PF1e spells that are just more powerful than anything else-- timestop, miracle, and wish, specifically. By making those level 10, and limiting the number of times they can be cast per day, the designers probably hope to make high level play more interesting.

[Staffan Johansson]

Lucas Yew wrote:

I like it enough to wonder why 5E never even thought about this thing. The weird break in 19th character level always seemed off.

Pretty sure they did, but decided not to on account of nostalgia. Remember that while 5e turned out to be enormously successful, it came on the heels of 4e which was... not. So they played it pretty darn safe when it came to things like that.

Quote:

Although I think that PF2 missed the opportunity to either renumber spell levels to match character levels (though some non-players getting spells at accelerated/decelerated ratio might make this option hard);

Both 4e and 13th Age have spell (and other power) levels correspond to character level.

Quote:

or rename "spell levels" to some other word to avoid confusion (while I can get it straight, there's no guarantee a random new young reader could distinguish character level and spell level), like "spell circles" or something else.

Mandatory reference: L-E-V-E-L.

[Ellias Aubec]

I remember reading that at some point spells in DnD went up to level 13 (maybe not in game but in the expanded stories etc). Apparently protective shields around some cities were one of these types of spells.

[Staffan Johansson]

Ellias Aubec wrote:

I remember reading that at some point spells in DnD went up to level 13 (maybe not in game but in the expanded stories etc). Apparently protective shields around some cities were one of these types of spells.

This would probably be the Arcane Age sourcebook (or box set? can't recall) about Netheril for 2e Forgotten Realms. It was a supplement about a past empire in the setting, sort of like if Paizo released a supplement about Azlantl. At that point in the setting, the world was higher magic, and allowed up to 13th level spells (theoretically higher). Unfortunately, the one wizard that managed to get to a level where they could cast 13th level spells started by inventing one that would drain the divinity from one god into the caster. And of course he used that spell on the goddess of magic, which didn't work out well for anyone—he was not prepared for that kind of power, so the whole thing ended in the fall of the empire in question (hard to keep those flying cities running when magic isn't working as it should), the goddess of magic reincarnating herself and in her new incarnation putting the kibosh on level 10+ magic.

[Perpdepog]

Was that wizard a character who was originally someone's character who made it into the lore? I don't know much about D&D proper lore, but that totally sounds like something a PC would try.

[Exocist]

Ye, that wizard is called Karssus, and the whole ban on level 10+ magic and death of the goddess of magic is the given reason for the mechanics switch from 2e to 3e dnd.

[Staffan Johansson]

Exocist wrote:

Ye, that wizard is called Karssus, and the whole ban on level 10+ magic and death of the goddess of magic is the given reason for the mechanics switch from 2e to 3e dnd.

No. There was no reason given for the mechanics switch between 2e and 3e, and the Karsus incident happened over a thousand years in the past. 2e to 3e was given a non-explanation, along the lines of "the game is an imperfect translation of what's 'really' happening in the Realms, and 3e is a different translation that in many ways is closer to the intent."

There were explanations of the 1e to 2e transition (the Time of Troubles, again including the death of Mystra and the ascension of a mortal to fill her role), and for the 3e to 4e transition (Shar's attempt at usurping the Weave, the Spellplague, and a hundred-year time jump), but none for the 2e to 3e transition.

[glass]

Ellias Aubec wrote:

I remember reading that at some point spells in DnD went up to level 13 (maybe not in game but in the expanded stories etc). Apparently protective shields around some cities were one of these types of spells.

Almost....

Staffan Johansson wrote:

This would probably be the Arcane Age sourcebook (or box set? can't recall) about Netheril for 2e Forgotten Realms.

It was indeed a boxed set, but the spells only went up to twelve. Actually, they mostly only went up to eleven - there was exactly one twelfth-level spell, Karsus's Avatar, which is the spell that accidentally offed the then goddess of magic as mentioned by Exocist.

Although, it had nothing to do with the 2e-3e transition though (as Steffan notes that was mostly unexpained in lore) - it was the explanation why the super-powerful magic of Netheril was not still around in "modern" AD&D 2e Forgotten Realms.

_
glass.

[Fumarole]

NECR0G1ANT wrote:

I think it's becasue base-10 is more elegant.

20 spell levels would have been even more elegant as then we wouldn't have to worry about the 1/2 level rounded up business.

[TheGoofyGE3K]

It's really because high level play has changed. Since the game is better balanced at high levels in this edition, to be able to do the most powerful spells justice without breaking the game at level 17 meant they had to be separated out. The whole level thing never really bothered me, thoughninkinda wish they were notated with Roman Numerals. I also like the idea of calling them Tiers over Levels, though I get tradition winning out. Plus one name for multiple things to keep things simple (ish) like they did with Feats kinda makes sense

[Lawrencelot]

TheGoofyGE3K wrote:

Plus one name for multiple things to keep things simple (ish) like they did with Feats kinda makes sense

The thing is that all feats work the same. You can get a feat of a certain level only if your character is that level or higher, no matter if it's a class feat, general feat, skill feat, etc. It makes no sense that it doesn't work this way for spell levels too, instead relying on an arbitrary formula just like the archaic ability scores->modifier formula (which also should've been removed in my opinion).

[AnimatedPaper]

Some of the devs wanted to (notice NPCs no longer have ability scores), but the first round of players didn’t like it and the idea was backed off before it got as far as the playtest.

I imagine spells had some of the same “But tradition!” pushback.

[The Gleeful Grognard]

Fumarole wrote:

NECR0G1ANT wrote:

I think it's becasue base-10 is more elegant.

20 spell levels would have been even more elegant as then we wouldn't have to worry about the 1/2 level rounded up business.

Elegant isn't the word I would use, fiddly and hard to balance would be the phrase I would attach to 20 levels of spells. Even if they moved to a spell point system. Tracking it in play, with a heightening system and on a character sheet would be a nightmare.

Not that every two levels is easy to manage, just easier than literally double that.

[graystone]

Clearly, the most elegant solution is for spell levels to be prime numbers: 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19. ;)

[YawarFiesta]

graystone wrote:

Clearly, the most elegant solution is for spell levels to be prime numbers: 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19. ;)

NONSENSE! There are only 10 types of person. Those who understand that binary is the way to go, and those who don't.

[WatersLethe]

graystone wrote:

Clearly, the most elegant solution is for spell levels to be prime numbers: 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19. ;)

My first thought at seeing this is that those are some very interesting level ranges.

2, 3, 5, and 7 act as the "ramp up" where magic users get most of their important toys

Between 7 and 11 you got a range of "steady" capability where you can have multiple levels of baseline expected powers like flight, but you don't suddenly trip into extraplanar stuff. City/country scale stories can be told through this range. Gives several levels where you can give magic users some other class bonuses besides casting.

11 and 13 give you the extra cool toys like teleport and army-killing level spell.

Between 13 and 17 you have stable "high power" campaigns.

17 gives you the rest of the important, high-level stuff like meteor swarm and extra-planar hijinks.

19 gives you your top end stuff like wish.

Not that it's a *good* idea it's just funny how it looks like a perfectly serviceable progression.

[Nyhme]

The best ad&d 2e campaign setting had 10th lvl spells. And it's the only thing wotc could ever produce that I'd actually purchase. Though I don't think they'd be able to get Troy Denning to come back so doubt it would be as good as it was. The 4e stuff they put out for the setting was pretty blah. Never played the 4e stuff, since i havent purchased anything by wotc since before they purchased tsr.

But I think the 10th lvl spells in pathfinder 2e was also to make cantrip auto heightening and scaling more smooth. And since cantrips were going to scale that way. It opened up being able to split up some of the 9th lvl spells. I really like how they've done spells and scaling in this edition.

[Staffan Johansson]

YawarFiesta wrote:

graystone wrote:

Clearly, the most elegant solution is for spell levels to be prime numbers: 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19. ;)

NONSENSE! There are only 10 types of person. Those who understand that binary is the way to go, and those who don't.

Nah. There are 10 types of people. Those who understand binary, those who don't, and those who didn't expect this joke to be in trinary.

[the nerve-eater of Zur-en-Aarh]

The Gleeful Grognard wrote:

Elegant isn't the word I would use, fiddly and hard to balance would be the phrase I would attach to 20 levels of spells. Even if they moved to a spell point system. Tracking it in play, with a heightening system and on a character sheet would be a nightmare.

I am not at all attached to the heightening system, but I would offer The Book of Experimental Might as a 3.5-based counterexample; there are a few individual things in it that represent preferences of Monte Cook's I do not share, or that start from places where PF has built in different directions but on the whole it feels like a solid model for a 20-level set of spells for a game in this genre.

(And there was, at one point, a magazine ad for Marshall amps featuring Nigel Tufnell exclaiming that "now these ones go to 20". So the circle is complete.)

[Verdyn]

Staffan Johansson wrote:

YawarFiesta wrote:

graystone wrote:

Clearly, the most elegant solution is for spell levels to be prime numbers: 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19. ;)

NONSENSE! There are only 10 types of person. Those who understand that binary is the way to go, and those who don't.

Nah. There are 10 types of people. Those who understand binary, those who don't, and those who didn't expect this joke to be in trinary.

There are 10 types of people in this world and each of them has a unique 1's digit. You should see the symbol for 8,974,561 sometime, it's glorious.

[YawarFiesta]

Verdyn wrote:

There are 10 types of people in this world and each of them has a unique 1's digit. You should see the symbol for 8,974,561 sometime, it's glorious.

But, wouldn't that imply that there is one additional type of person than digits for each person?

[PossibleCabbage]

There are 10 types of people: people who intuit this joke is using base 3 numbers but are not named Steve, people named Steve, and people who are not named Steve and didn't intuit this joke was in base 3.

[UnArcaneElection]

i get the idea of level-bumping of the more powerful spells, but I don't think just 1 more level was really enough.

[AestheticDialectic]

Staffan Johansson wrote:

Exocist wrote:

Ye, that wizard is called Karssus, and the whole ban on level 10+ magic and death of the goddess of magic is the given reason for the mechanics switch from 2e to 3e dnd.

No. There was no reason given for the mechanics switch between 2e and 3e, and the Karsus incident happened over a thousand years in the past. 2e to 3e was given a non-explanation, along the lines of "the game is an imperfect translation of what's 'really' happening in the Realms, and 3e is a different translation that in many ways is closer to the intent."

There were explanations of the 1e to 2e transition (the Time of Troubles, again including the death of Mystra and the ascension of a mortal to fill her role), and for the 3e to 4e transition (Shar's attempt at usurping the Weave, the Spellplague, and a hundred-year time jump), but none for the 2e to 3e transition.

I'm not a big DnD lore guy but 1e and 2e AD&D cap at level 9 spells in the PHBs for magic-users, and 7 for clerics. Unless there is supplemental material that increased it, I don't think Mystra dying explains the transition between any editions. Especially since the default setting was Greyhawk back then, not The Forgotten Realms

[Exocist]

AestheticDialectic wrote:

Staffan Johansson wrote:

Exocist wrote:

Ye, that wizard is called Karssus, and the whole ban on level 10+ magic and death of the goddess of magic is the given reason for the mechanics switch from 2e to 3e dnd.

No. There was no reason given for the mechanics switch between 2e and 3e, and the Karsus incident happened over a thousand years in the past. 2e to 3e was given a non-explanation, along the lines of "the game is an imperfect translation of what's 'really' happening in the Realms, and 3e is a different translation that in many ways is closer to the intent."

There were explanations of the 1e to 2e transition (the Time of Troubles, again including the death of Mystra and the ascension of a mortal to fill her role), and for the 3e to 4e transition (Shar's attempt at usurping the Weave, the Spellplague, and a hundred-year time jump), but none for the 2e to 3e transition.

I'm not a big DnD lore guy but 1e and 2e AD&D cap at level 9 spells in the PHBs for magic-users, and 7 for clerics. Unless there is supplemental material that increased it, I don't think Mystra dying explains the transition between any editions. Especially since the default setting was Greyhawk back then, not The Forgotten Realms

PHB caps at 9 but there’s some expanded FR sourcebooks that go up to 13. I believe the book is called Netheril: Empire of Magic.

[Fumarole]

The Gleeful Grognard wrote:

Fumarole wrote:

NECR0G1ANT wrote:

I think it's becasue base-10 is more elegant.

20 spell levels would have been even more elegant as then we wouldn't have to worry about the 1/2 level rounded up business.

Elegant isn't the word I would use, fiddly and hard to balance would be the phrase I would attach to 20 levels of spells. Even if they moved to a spell point system. Tracking it in play, with a heightening system and on a character sheet would be a nightmare.

Not that every two levels is easy to manage, just easier than literally double that.

Classes are balanced for 20 levels. So are items, feats, creatures and hazards. For some reason, probably just tradition, spells are not, and we end up with the half-level rounded up business. I say do away with it and make the system more consistent. Imagine how much easier, and yes, elegant, the counteract system could be to use.

[Staffan Johansson]

AestheticDialectic wrote:

I'm not a big DnD lore guy but 1e and 2e AD&D cap at level 9 spells in the PHBs for magic-users, and 7 for clerics. Unless there is supplemental material that increased it, I don't think Mystra dying explains the transition between any editions. Especially since the default setting was Greyhawk back then, not The Forgotten Realms

Mystra's death and the new mortal who took her place was part of the Time of Troubles, which as a whole was the explanation for the transition between AD&D 1st and 2nd edition in the Forgotten Realms. You also had things like the avatar of the god Bane eating the souls of all the assassins in order to conquer Tantras as an explanation for why the assassin class suddenly wasn't available anymore.

The level 10+ spells in FR were in a 2e supplement that took place in the distant past, and the death of that Mystryl was used as an explanation for why they didn't have that in the present day. But that wasn't tied to an edition change.

Back in 1e and 2e, there weren't really a default setting. Early 1e sort of had Greyhawk as the setting where a lot of stuff came from, but it was sort of expected that you'd roll your own. In 2e, there was definitely no default setting, unless you count the meta-settings of Spelljammer and Planescape (and I wouldn't), but at the same time Forgotten Realms was given an increasing position of prominence.

[pixierose]

Fumarole wrote:

The Gleeful Grognard wrote:

Fumarole wrote:

NECR0G1ANT wrote:

I think it's because base-10 is more elegant.

20 spell levels would have been even more elegant as then we wouldn't have to worry about the 1/2 level rounded up business.

Elegant isn't the word I would use, fiddly and hard to balance would be the phrase I would attach to 20 levels of spells. Even if they moved to a spell point system. Tracking it in play, with a heightening system and on a character sheet would be a nightmare.

Not that every two levels is easy to manage, just easier than literally double that.

Classes are balanced for 20 levels. So are items, feats, creatures and hazards. For some reason, probably just tradition, spells are not, and we end up with the half-level rounded up business. I say do away with it and make the system more consistent. Imagine how much easier, and yes, elegant, the counteract system could be to use.

I would argue that the closest analogue to spells in 2e are class feats, and while they are technically when taken as a whole are balanced around 20 levels, they are only really given at even levels( except for the odd case of 1st level feats which break this rule) Sooo I would argue more powerful more impactful things (class feats and spells) roughly follow a 10 level balance paradigm.

20 levels of spell-casting I feel would have to change a lot about the game. The way heightening works, the balance number of the spells, when spells get heightened. And I just don't really see the benefit of it. I think 20 levels of spells is obtuse. 10 level spells, or heck back in the 1e or starfinder 6th level casters, well it feels nicer in terms of slots to have things bunched together. And the feeling of getting to that new tier of spells is exciting. I don't think level 3 spells will feel as exciting if its the next step in staircase of spells. And that progression feels good, but it only feels good if you get to settle into it for a bit which given a few levels until you get to the next spell level gives you that time. It gives you that time to breathe and appreciate the spells you have and gain. i think all spell levels do that but level 3 spells are the example that most people bring up when they talk about that feeling of *progress*

[AnimatedPaper]

pixierose wrote:

20 levels of spell-casting I feel would have to change a lot about the game. The way heightening works, the balance number of the spells, when spells get heightened. And I just don't really see the benefit of it. I think 20 levels of spells is obtuse. 10 level spells, or heck back in the 1e or starfinder 6th level casters, well it feels nicer in terms of slots to have things bunched together.

I can imagine quite a few benefits, specifically with how it would interact with heightening and the number of spell slots available to a class. First, getting another 10 levels to heighten into would allow even more fine tuning of the power curve of spells. There's several spells with "Heighten +1: add 2d8" or whatever dice size. Making those 1dx per level would be simple enough, as would making the current "Heighten +1 add 1dx" "Heighten +2". Secondly, like feats, I imagine classes would simply give out even level spell slots with the assumption that some would be used for odd level spells (the ability to do so would have to be explicitly stated for spontaneous casting). I could see Multiclass feats and other feats that give bonus or innate spells give out odd level slots.

I wouldn't go so far as to say this is a good idea, but I can imagine several upsides to it.

[UnArcaneElection]

Exocist wrote:

{. . .}

I'm not a big DnD lore guy but 1e and 2e AD&D cap at level 9 spells in the PHBs for magic-users, and 7 for clerics. Unless there is supplemental material that increased it, {. . .}

PHB caps at 9 but there’s some expanded FR sourcebooks that go up to 13. I believe the book is called Netheril: Empire of Magic.

Remember that 1st Edition AD&D also had level tables for different classes that went to wildly different highest levels, with some capping out in the mid teens and others capping out in the high twenties. (And that's not even counting the racial caps for anybody who wasn't Human for almost everything other than Thief.)

[Verdyn]

YawarFiesta wrote:

Verdyn wrote:

There are 10 types of people in this world and each of them has a unique 1's digit. You should see the symbol for 8,974,561 sometime, it's glorious.

But, wouldn't that imply that there is one additional type of person than digits for each person?

That digit is for denoting which universe they live in.