Anonymouswizard's Spell Energy System (3.5)

[Anonymouswizard]

Looking at all the spell point systems floating around, here is one I would like to implement if possible. I must say, Dragoonwraith's is my favourite out of the ones I have seen. However, I believe that magic should be a simple system with little book-keeping. I also believe that casters must have a limit on ULTIMATE ARCANE POWER that can be unleashed in the day. And why do we need two classes for full casting? So here is my system of spellpoints, which uses two main classes: the wizard and the priest. Not to be confused with this (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=135164) area based mana system.

Spell energy
A spellcaster cannot cast forever, the strain on their bodies is just to much. For this reason each caster has a pool of spell energy which is used to cast spells. A spellcasters energy pool is equal to his caster level+his wisdom modifierxthe highest spell level he can cast. A characters wisdom modifier for bonus spell energy is never higher than his highest spell level, or two, whichever is higher.
In order to cast a spell a spellcaster must spend energy based on the spell level. The cost is decided by adding the spell's level to the cost of the previous spell level, with 1st level spells costing 1 point. The costs are set out below:
{table]Level|Cost
0|0/1
1|1
2|3
3|6
4|10
5|15
6|21
7|28
8|36
9|45[/table]
A character can cast a number of 0th level spells for free equal to 1/4 of his class level+his primary spellcasting stat. All 0th level spells after that cost 1 point.
Spells automatically scale.
Arcane spell drain: Arcane casters no longer suffer arcane spell failure chance for wearing armour. Instead armour increases the points cost by the arcane spell failure percentage, rounded up. So a 10th level mage wearing leather armour needs to expend 17 points of spell energy to cast a spell, while a 1st level fighter/9th level mage in full plate with a tower shield must spend 28 points to cast the same spell.

Metamagic
As all spellcasters now cast spontaneously metamagic no longer increase the casting time of spells. It otherwise works as described with the following exception: heighten spell is automatically gained, and it's benefits are a +1 bonus to the save DC by spending a number of points equal to the spell's level.

Now that is all out of the way I would like to present the first class: the mage.

Mage
Hit die: d4
Skill points: 4+int
{table]Level|BAB|Fort|Ref|Will|Special|Spells discovered|Max spell level|Cantrips
1|+0|+0|+0|+2|Art of magic|2|1|1
2|+1|+0|+0|+3||2|1|1
3|+1|+1|+1|+3||2|2|2
4|+2|+1|+1|+4||2|2|2
5|+2|+1|+1|+4|Bonus school|2|3|3
6|+3|+2|+2|+5||2|3|3
7|+3|+2|+2|+5||2|4|4
8|+4|+2|+2|+6||2|4|4
9|+4|+3|+3|+6||2|5|5
10|+5|+3|+3|+7|Bonus school|2|5|5
11|+5|+3|+3|+7||2|6|6
12|+6|+4|+4|+8||2|6|6
13|+6|+4|+4|+8||2|7|7
14|+7|+4|+4|+9||2|7|7
15|+7|+5|+5|+9|Bonus school|2|8|8
16|+8|+5|+5|+10||2|8|8
17|+8|+5|+5|+10||2|9|9
18|+9|+6|+6|+11||2|9|9
19|+9|+6|+6|+11||2|9|10
20|+10|+6|+6|+12|Bonus school|2|9|10[/table]
Weapon and armour proficiency: All simple weapons but no armour or shields.
Art of magic: a mage begins play with the ability to cast arcane spells from the sorcerer/wizard spell list. The mage begins play being able to cast spells from the Universal school, as well as any other 2 of his choosing. At 5th level and every 5 levels after a mage gains access to another school of magic.
A mages save DCs are based of charisma.
Spells discovered: a mage begins play with the knowledge of two spells of 1st level, and then gains two spells of any level he can cast. A mage can only cast a number of unique spells per level per day based on the table below. Whenever a mage casts a spell he uses up one of his available unique slots for that level, unless it is already in that slot.
{table]Level|1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9
1|2|-|-|-|-|-|-|-|-
2|3|-|-|-|-|-|-|-|-
3|3|1|-|-|-|-|-|-|-
4|3|2|-|-|-|-|-|-|-
5|4|3|1|-|-|-|-|-|-
6|4|3|2|-|-|-|-|-|-
7|4|3|3|1|-|-|-|-|-
8|5|4|3|2|-|-|-|-|-
9|5|4|3|3|1|-|-|-|-
10|5|4|4|3|2|-|-|-|-
11|6|5|4|3|3|1|-|-|-
12|6|5|4|4|3|2|-|-|-
13|6|5|5|4|3|3|1|-|-
14|7|6|5|4|4|3|2|-|-
15|7|6|5|5|4|3|3|1|-
16|7|6|6|5|4|4|3|2|-
17|8|7|6|5|5|4|3|3|1
18|8|7|6|6|5|4|4|3|2
19|8|7|7|6|5|5|4|3|3
20|9|8|7|6|6|5|4|4|3[/table]
Mages can also learn new spells freely by spending the time and resources a wizard would.

Cantrips: a mage begins play with knowledge of a single cantrip, which he can use like any other spell. At 3rd level and eveery 2 levels after the mage gains knowledge of an extra cantrip. Cantrips are 0th level spells.

Priest
The priest calls upon the power of his deity to fulfil acts beyond those of ordinary men and women. She can heal the sick, call up foul demons, or create a plague of locasts. A priest has less overal versatility than a mage of the same level, but enjoys more flexibility when casting spells.
[Table]Level|BAB|Fort|Ref|Will|Special|Max spell level
1|+0|+2|+0|+2|Holy art, turn undead, 4 domains|1st
2|+1|+3|+0|+3||1st
3|+2|+3|+1|+3|Domain|2nd
4|+3|+4|+1|+4||2nd
5|+3|+4|+1|+4|Domain|3rd
6|+4|+5|+2|+5||3rd
7|+5|+5|+2|+5|Domain|4th
8|+6|+6|+2|+6||4th
9|+6|+6|+3|+6|Domain|5th
10|+7|+7|+3|+7||5th
11|+8|+7|+3|+7|Domain|6th
12|+9|+8|+4|+8||6th
13|+9|+8|+4|+8|Domain|7th
14|+10|+9|+4|+9||7th
15|+11|+9|+5|+9|Domain|8th
16|+12|+10|+5|+10||8th
17|+12|+10|+5|+10|Domain|9th
18|+13|+11|+6|+11||9th
19|+14|+11|+6|+11|Domain|9th
20|+15|+12|+6|+12||9th
Weapon and armour proficiency: priests are proficient with all simple weapons, as well as all armour and shields. Priests can cast in armour without penalty.
Holy art: at 1st level a priest can cast divine spells drawn from a number of domains. At 1st level a priest can cast spells from any 4 domains of their choice, and recieve 1 new domain at every other level, up to a total of 14 domains at 20th level. A priest can cast any spell from one of their domains at any time, as long as they have enough spell energy.
Turn undead: this works as the cleric ability of the same name.

[Surgo]

Why is this good?

Seriously, you haven't answered that question at all. It looks like you just threw around some darts and copied down the numbers and stats they landed on and now you have your system. So, uh, why? What's good about this one? What mathematical properties does it have that's desirable?

[Zaydos]

Let's see it introduces MAD into a wizard.
At level one limits him to at most 5 spells per day (6 with a race with a Con bonus; assuming 18 Con), while at 20th level it lowers there maximum spells per day (9 x 30 = 270 = 6 9th level spells if they don't cast any others, and assumes a +10 Con).
Also no specialization so no focused specialists and how they gain schools makes them only start with 2 schools and until 20th they have no more than 5 schools.

So all in all it retains Wizard's flavor while reducing their Spells per Day and spell list while allowing them to cast any spell in their book spontaneously.

Personally I'd make them choose say 3 or 4 spells per spell level at the start of the day as their spells known for that day. That might be because I like Vancian Casting, or possibly because even with a reduced number of spells/day a sorcerer with all spells from 6 schools is incredibly powerful. Although look at Beguiler/DN/Warmage and they might be balanced regardless.

Either way it would be a nerf to wizards that isn't "Don't play wizards".

[Anonymouswizard]

Let's see it introduces MAD into a wizard.
At level one limits him to at most 5 spells per day (6 with a race with a Con bonus; assuming 18 Con), while at 20th level it lowers there maximum spells per day (9 x 30 = 270 = 6 9th level spells if they don't cast any others, and assumes a +10 Con).
Also no specialization so no focused specialists and how they gain schools makes them only start with 2 schools and until 20th they have no more than 5 schools.

So all in all it retains Wizard's flavor while reducing their Spells per Day and spell list while allowing them to cast any spell in their book spontaneously.

Personally I'd make them choose say 3 or 4 spells per spell level at the start of the day as their spells known for that day. That might be because I like Vancian Casting, or possibly because even with a reduced number of spells/day a sorcerer with all spells from 6 schools is incredibly powerful. Although look at Beguiler/DN/Warmage and they might be balanced regardless.

Either way it would be a nerf to wizards that isn't "Don't play wizards".

The cost came around of wanting 9th lev el spells to be: do I need to cast this? Assuming a con of 14 wizards can cast 3 spells at 1st level and 4.4 9th level spells (4 9th level, 1 5th level and 1 2nd level) at 20th level, so it would be better for you to cast 5th-7th level spells, and keep back energy for when it is needed. As spells scale, you are better of casting a Fireball or Lightning bolt if it would substitute a Cone of Cold.

The reason I chose energy off con and spell level was because having higher level spells directly influences your power, so make it work in two ways. Con was chosen as you have to channel magic through/from your own body, and so can only take so much.

If you want a "don't play wizards" fix to wizards, Surgo, it isn't here. The mage is not meant to be a suboptimal blaster, instead it is a specialist-style caster who later on broadens his field to include many schools.

I hope to get the priest up later, who casts from the cleric or druid list and slowly gains domains or druid powers (including wild shape, except with a limited number of forms).

[Surgo]

I didn't mention anything about wanting a fix. What I want to know is why is this system worth using? What mathematical properties does it have that makes it desirable to use over other systems? That sort of thing.

[Anonymouswizard]

I didn't mention anything about wanting a fix. What I want to know is why is this system worth using? What mathematical properties does it have that makes it desirable to use over other systems? That sort of thing.

The system had it's costs worked out so 9th level spells were not thrown around like theres no tomorrow: in most cases a 15 minute adventuring day would let you cast 4-5 spells. Not very satisfying.

The other reason for the system was to make casters more MAD: they don't lose anything for having average con, but now they are not single ability powerhouses. Mages (and to a lesser extent priests) also gain more versatility as they grow in power, due to the fact they can learn more spells. To some people it will not worth be using. For some it will be. It entirely depends on the groups mentality: overpowered wizards? this is not quite what you want. A more balanced set of casters? That is what this should be.

[Surgo]

Your system focuses on the high end at the extent of the low end, where it breaks down very badly.

Let's take level 3. Your mana pool suddenly doubles from level 2, and you can just say "screw it" to your second level spells and just spend the day casting Color Spray, which is still deadly effective, and cast it way more times than a normal mage could.

[lesser_minion]

MAD isn't necessarily the best thing to add - I'd suggest looking into the concept of VAD and how you might implement it. One way:


Charisma for save DCs (handy, but you can use no-save spells)
Wisdom for extra juice (keep this limited enough, and you're still OK)
Intelligence for more spells known and skill points (a cute bonus)
Constitution for hitpoints (nice)
Dexterity for spell attack rolls, initiative, and AC (nice).
Strength for ...


Even if you stick to MAD, I'd suggest Int for spells known, Wis for juice and Cha for DCs - using Con for juice actually makes the wizard SAD problem worse.

[Zaydos]

Personally I'd say Cha for DCs and Int for juice (to keep the whole bookworm fluff). It would make the choice between DC and spells per day more well painful. They still need Con for hp, and so have 3 ability scores they needs and only one they can dump without consequence (Str) where melee have 3 stats they need (Str, Dex, and Con) and can dump Cha readily.

[lesser_minion]

Personally I'd say Cha for DCs and Int for juice (to keep the whole bookworm fluff). It would make the choice between DC and spells per day more well painful. They still need Con for hp, and so have 3 ability scores they needs and only one they can dump without consequence (Str) where melee have 3 stats they need (Str, Dex, and Con) and can dump Cha readily.

I was suggesting trying to achieve 5- or 6-ability VAD rather than MAD - i.e. all ability scores grant cute bonuses if pumped, but they don't have to be.

[Zaydos]

There's no "Spells Known" for this system, though. Other than that I just say make Int be more important for Wiz/Sor than Wis because... well it always has been. I do think there should be some limit on daily spells known for both balance and flavor I normally associate with Wizards and if so they could be made to be based on all three, although personally from an RP viewpoint I don't like the idea of being unable to make a viable spellcaster without having all mental stats above average (I like the high Int low Wis mage).

[Melayl]

Your system focuses on the high end at the extent of the low end, where it breaks down very badly.

Let's take level 3. Your mana pool suddenly doubles from level 2, and you can just say "screw it" to your second level spells and just spend the day casting Color Spray, which is still deadly effective, and cast it way more times than a normal mage could.

His mana pool is equal to his (level + his Con modifier) x the highest level spell he can cast. Let's assume he has an 18 Con. At 3rd level that gives him (3+4)x3. That's 21 points. Each 2nd level spell costs 3 points. That's a total of 7 Color Sprays. Spread over 4 encounters, that's not alot. Plus he won't have points left over for buffs or anything else. Not necessarily a wise expenditure of resources.

[Anonymouswizard]

His mana pool is equal to his (level + his Con modifier) x the highest level spell he can cast. Let's assume he has an 18 Con. At 3rd level that gives him (3+4)x3. That's 21 points. Each 2nd level spell costs 3 points. That's a total of 7 Color Sprays. Spread over 4 encounters, that's not alot. Plus he won't have points left over for buffs or anything else. Not necessarily a wise expenditure of resources.

Acually that is 21 color sprays or 7 2nd level spells. CS is 1st level. But he can spam low level spells until he needs high level spells, it makes him more flexible.

I can see the point of it being VAD, except that I can see everyone taking charisma, then wis, then con, then dex, then int, then str, but it is a good idea, and reflects that they use mental strength, so i'll change it to wis for energy and cha for save DCs.

Also, do we have a good name that isn't mana? nI could call it escence, but if anyone has a better name can they please suggest it.

[Melayl]

Oops. :smallredface: My bad. I goofed on the spell levels.

[Surgo]

So, uh, are you planning on fixing your system to fix this? Easily getting 21 color sprays a day at level 3 is ridiculous, and one of the problems with spell point systems in general -- it's as good as your level 2 spells, but it's level 1 so you randomly get the ability to cast it way more often than you should.

[Anonymouswizard]

So, uh, are you planning on fixing your system to fix this? Easily getting 21 color sprays a day at level 3 is ridiculous, and one of the problems with spell point systems in general -- it's as good as your level 2 spells, but it's level 1 so you randomly get the ability to cast it way more often than you should.

I will see what I can come up with. I am not the best homebrewer, so I am open to suggestions. It is an aspect that requires fixing, although I do not believe every 3rd level wizard will have 18 wis, I will see what I can do.

[Zaydos]

At 3rd level he'd have 14 points (3+4 x2 as he only has 2nd level spells not 3rd). Compared to a focused illusionist (who would have more spell schools open) who would have 5 1st level illusion spells and 4 2nd level illusion spells and higher spell save DCs. So it's not as bad as you think (although 14 is still a lot more than 9, and they'd have much greater flexibility in what way they chose their spells).

I'd still say Int over Wis but that would be an easy enough thing to house rule. The 14 1st level spells at 3rd level needs to be tweaked (or else Color Spray just flat out banned), but I don't know how. I'd also still say a limit to spells known per day would probably help and create more strategic play but that's your call. All in all I like the basic premise and it seems to be good work.

[Anonymouswizard]

At 3rd level he'd have 14 points (3+4 x2 as he only has 2nd level spells not 3rd). Compared to a focused illusionist (who would have more spell schools open) who would have 5 1st level illusion spells and 4 2nd level illusion spells and higher spell save DCs. So it's not as bad as you think (although 14 is still a lot more than 9, and they'd have much greater flexibility in what way they chose their spells).

I'd still say Int over Wis but that would be an easy enough thing to house rule. The 14 1st level spells at 3rd level needs to be tweaked (or else Color Spray just flat out banned), but I don't know how. I'd also still say a limit to spells known per day would probably help and create more strategic play but that's your call. All in all I like the basic premise and it seems to be good work.

Wis was chosen to make wizards more MAD/DAD/VAD (all, in my opinion subcategories of MAD, depending on what they need to function), although it was originally con, it became wis so it was completely mental.

I have also added a unique spells per level table, with 52 total unique spells being better than 11, although not as powerful as 99 (I am looking at you, erudite).

[Anonymouswizard]

Added the priest, and an alternative for arcane spell failure. The wisdom bonus to caster level for spell energy is now capped at your highest spell level, so at 1st level you get 3 spells, and at 3rd level you get no more than 10 colour sprays.