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View Full Version : [3.5] Cantrip Stories



RaggedAngel
2011-03-20, 07:06 PM
I was reading a thread that concerned the fact that the game designers seemed to have a distaste for cantrips (no bonus cantrips from abilities scores, etc.). I just wanted to hear some stories of characters using cantrips to do something awesome.

I'll start it off with one of my favorite stories, a tale of the often neglected Arcane Mark:

Watcher, a level 7 warforged sorcerer, was the night watch for our party, both due to his race and the cross-class Spot and Listen I had invested in. Every night he sat up, but I hadn't had the skill points to give him any interesting Craft skills to occupy his time with. I also noticed that he normally had about 4 or 5 cantrips left over at night, and that I had selected Arcane Mark as one of his spells known.

He proceeded to draw all over everyone's faces while they slept.

Not just their faces, mind; every night that we went to sleep he would expend all of his cantrips marking all of our equipment and gear. After a week or so, everything we had was covered by his mark, which was the maximum size of 1 foot. He then used his spells every night to cover everyone with the marks head-to-toe.

Now, this was meant to be a silly little way for him to be a bit more flavorful and to amuse myself and the other players. However, our party was attempting to enter a large castle, and we needed a cleric of Boccob to help us. Now, my warforged happened to worship Boccob, and I had previously decided that his symbol would be a stylized version of Boccob's holy symbol.

Arriving at a Church of Boccob, the head cleric demanded proof that we were worthy of Boccob's aid. My warforged smiled and requested that the cleric "look upon us with the eyes of a mage."

One Detect Magic later, the head cleric was packing up to come with us personally.

Welknair
2011-03-20, 07:22 PM
I have a favorite GMPC of mine that started at Level .25 Wizard, with a single Cantrip a day. He has done many things with these few 0-level spells. The following are just a few examples:

Dazed a cart-owner so the PCs could "Borrow" it (He made sure that the owner was repaid afterwards, but they were in a rush)

Stuck a squirrel to the pants of a mook, causing said mook to run off screaming. This inadvertently led all the nearby mooks to run after him. The PCs just walked in.

Mage Handed the keys off of a ring while the guard was asleep, allowing the group to escape

Launched a disarmed wizard's staff out a window

Cast Dancing Lights to amaze a group of savages (Not Barbarians. That would be offensive)

Used Prestidigitation to summon flowers, momentarily impressing a princess while the PCs snuck out.

Note: We've been playing quite a while. This character doesn't actually pull them out of every situation. He's just been at it for a while. And I really should get around to posting my homebrew "0-Level Progression" rules...

~Nye~
2011-03-20, 07:53 PM
We were fighting in a castle owned by an evil wizard and a thrall of his, a troll came rushing towards us. having just came through a trap door to reach the secret abode of the wizard, I used Open/close to open the trapdoor imeaditely infront of us, the troll fell and took like 7d6 falling damage. I then cast acid splash to finish him. Best Cantrip combo to date <3

onthetown
2011-03-20, 08:26 PM
Traveling through the Underdark, being the only person in the party that can cast Flare leads to some Crowning Moments of Awesome... 'nuff said.