[Dragonlance] Rebuilding the Towers of High Sorcery Cost?

[Demon of Death]

I am asking you all on what your opinion is on what it would cost/take for a 15th level Wizard to remake one of the Towers
The GM has said he will let me do this. by the way.

I have roughly 900,000 gold also.

Thanks in advance.

[Human Paragon 3]

That's a good start, but I think it would require epic spellcasting. As a 15th level wizard, you should have some clout. Use your gold and renown to find another wizard to go in on it with you, preferably two wizards (so you have a red, white and black) and research the necessary rituals together.

[Demon of Death]

That's a good start, but I think it would require epic spellcasting. As a 15th level wizard, you should have some clout. Use your gold and renown to find another wizard to go in on it with you, preferably two wizards (so you have a red, white and black) and research the necessary rituals together.

Ok, I do know a Black robe that is over 20th level, (I am a white robe, also forgot to mention that we changed the current age a little bit so that the Orders haven't yet been reformed, basically ignore the stuff in the Towers of High Sorcery book for current info)

[Tvtyrant]

Cast Move Earth to make the shape of a massive tower, then saturate with water, then mud to stone. Then cast Shape Stone to make windows, and cast Wall of Stone/Shape Stone over and over again to make little towers, floors, and the like. It would take a while but you could make the whole thing for practically free. Wall of Iron stacked on itself could make the scaffolding for the tower if you are worried about the mud corroding before it becomes stone. If you make the whole thing a Icosagon you can make it pretty round (and very large) with all straight sides.

[Hecuba]

That's a good start, but I think it would require epic spellcasting. As a 15th level wizard, you should have some clout. Use your gold and renown to find another wizard to go in on it with you, preferably two wizards (so you have a red, white and black) and research the necessary rituals together.

Epic spell-casting would actually be explicitly not an option in Krynn without the knowledge of the key. There is however canonical support for something along the lines of circle casting or city casting in the novels (and very slight support in the rules).

[Bhaakon]

Building the tower itself is no problem, it's the protecting grove that's the real issue. I have no idea how you'd go about making an artifact-level enchanted forest. Usually such things are explicitly beyond the power of PCs to create.

[Human Paragon 3]

That's why I suggested the team up / ritual magic

[Hecuba]

Building the tower itself is no problem, it's the protecting grove that's the real issue. I have no idea how you'd go about making an artifact-level enchanted forest. Usually such things are explicitly beyond the power of PCs to create.

If we put it on par with making the dragon orbs, then it would require all members of the orders (which is to say all non-renigade wizards on the continent capable of casting level 3 spells) working together on the Night of the Eye. The forests probably aren't quite that grand, but it gives a good base pattern.

[Tvtyrant]

There is a spell known as Nightmare Terrain that lasts a year that could work; you would simply making a renewing trap of it.

[Drachasor]

Making the tower and any related facilities itself is easy enough. As others say, it is the magic protecting the tower that isn't trivial. Heck, the physical facilities doesn't even necessarily have to cost any money to create, though some good materials can help. Get a Lyre of Building and someone who is awesome at Perform to make this go quickly, efficiently, and with fewer hands involved.

This will require work with the DM on making the enchantment using a large circle of mages. Both the grove itself and for strengthening the tower, keeping out unwanted intruders, etc.

[Bhaakon]

There is a spell known as Nightmare Terrain that lasts a year that could work; you would simply making a renewing trap of it.

A protecting grove that could be disabled by a high-level rogue? I think not.

[Emmerask]

Cast Move Earth to make the shape of a massive tower, then saturate with water, then mud to stone. Then cast Shape Stone to make windows, and cast Wall of Stone/Shape Stone over and over again to make little towers, floors, and the like. It would take a while but you could make the whole thing for practically free. Wall of Iron stacked on itself could make the scaffolding for the tower if you are worried about the mud corroding before it becomes stone. If you make the whole thing a Icosagon you can make it pretty round (and very large) with all straight sides.

Move earth does not really do what you want:

This spell does not violently break the surface of the ground. Instead, it creates wavelike crests and troughs.
Also if you saturate it with enough water to actually become mud (ie semi fluid or fluid) it will flatten further to the point where even the wave-like formation you have created is nearly gone.

[Tvtyrant]

Move earth does not really do what you want:

This spell does not violently break the surface of the ground. Instead, it creates wavelike crests and troughs.
Also if you saturate it with enough water to actually become mud (ie semi fluid or fluid) it will flatten further to the point where even the wave-like formation you have created is nearly gone.

Which is fine; you make the wave like this http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/41377000/gif/_41377391_giant_wave_inf416.gif in a big circle, and build a scaffolding around it before you make it into mud. The end result if extremely broad, true, but its also all rock. You basically just made an artificial caldera.



A protecting grove that could be disabled by a high-level rogue? I think not.
Lots of people got through it in the book, so I don't see why not. Just stick an undead army in there and you have the one from the books down.

[Gavinfoxx]

Here are the main 'get building done' spells as a Wizard you might want to look at:

Wall of Iron
Wall of Stone
Stone Metamorphosis
Greater Stone Metamorphosis
Transmute Rock to Mud
Transmute Mud to Rock
Transmute Metal to Wood
Transmute Stone to Sand
Transmute Sand to Glass
Soften Earth and Stone
Bones of Earth
Move Earth
Unseen Servant
Unseen Crafter
Shape Metal
Metal Melt
Stone Shape
Fabricate
Greater Stone Shape
Magecraft
Planar Binding

Of course, Lyres of Building.

[Human Paragon 3]

Guys, the issue is not erecting the tower.

The issue is outfitting the tower with its necessary facilities, especially the magical protection of the grove that surrounds the tower.

[Drachasor]

Well, is the DM insisting that you go by the book on this? Because I view this more as something the DM and you should work on what you want and figure out a sensible way to go about it (more so it isn't easily duplicable than anything else).

Also, how do the gods of magic feel about this project? Would they help?

Where is the tower being built?

[Gavinfoxx]

Well... there are several ways to magically protect an area.

Draconomicon has some great area defenses.
Rune Circles are good...
Stronghold Builder's Guide has some options, but those are crazy expensive...
There are actually several permanent area defensive spells in Core, but they are low range...

[Drachasor]

Well... there are several ways to magically protect an area.

Draconomicon has some great area defenses.
Rune Circles are good...
Stronghold Builder's Guide has some options, but those are crazy expensive...
There are actually several permanent area defensive spells in Core, but they are low range...

Being dispellable is also a potential problem.

[Gavinfoxx]

EVERYTHING is Dispellable. Even Epic Magic. It just takes the right spell to do it... use circle magic to get the caster level crazy high...

[Bhaakon]

EVERYTHING is Dispellable. Even Epic Magic. It just takes the right spell to do it... use circle magic to get the caster level crazy high...

You can't dispel an artifact, which is why I said that the groves are artifact-level magic. I'd go farther than that: They're artifacts.

[Demon of Death]

Well, is the DM insisting that you go by the book on this? Because I view this more as something the DM and you should work on what you want and figure out a sensible way to go about it (more so it isn't easily duplicable than anything else).

Also, how do the gods of magic feel about this project? Would they help?

Where is the tower being built?

First off, this thread has garnered more attention than I thought it would, thanks, truly to you all.

The DM has said to spend 500,000 GP to build the tower with like all the extra-dimensional areas and what-not, then another 100,000 for 'Supplies', but I wasn't sure on those.

He said the Gods of Magic don't have a feeling really about it even when I said that they pretty much say if it goes or not.

The Tower is going to be in the area the Wayreth Tower was, I'm just trying to get as close as I can to remaking them how they were.

[tyckspoon]

Find a dragon that is about ready to die a natural death (I don't remember my Dragon Lance well enough to know if this is actually likely to be available- according to Draconomicon, it would need a dragon in excess of 2,000 years old.) Offer it a chance to become immortal as the animating force of the protective forest. The dragon becomes the Guardian of the area (again, see Draconomicon, specifically the end of life/Twilight and ways dragons can avoid going through it section). The life of a ludicrously old dragon ought to be a more than powerful enough reagent to create whatever sort of magic forest you want.

(This is the only thing close to RAW that I know of for doing this kind of thing, aside from maybe the Mythal versions of Epic Spells from the Forgotten Realms.)

[Alleran]

Epic spell-casting would actually be explicitly not an option in Krynn without the knowledge of the key. There is however canonical support for something along the lines of circle casting or city casting in the novels (and very slight support in the rules).
I don't know a whole lot about Krynn beyond the basics of the background, so the only "key" I'm aware of is the one that Astinus tells Raistlin about by accident. Can you explain further?


EVERYTHING is Dispellable. Even Epic Magic. It just takes the right spell to do it... use circle magic to get the caster level crazy high...
Unless you're a 4th level Dweomerkeeper.

[Coidzor]

Negligible. You're a high level wizard and can create wealth. You can also fairly easily create the physical tower so that's moot.

From what I recall, it's some kind of ritual that created the things in the first place, so it seems much less an issue of personal wealth expenditure and more a side-quest to get the ritual and the backup singers once you've got the groundwork done.

How was Wayreth destroyed? Rebuilding it on that site may make it simpler for you in the long run, especially if not all of the macguffin was destroyed and is either partially salvageable or recoverable by murdering in the face the descendants of whoever trashed the original..

[Hecuba]

I don't know a whole lot about Krynn beyond the basics of the background, so the only "key" I'm aware of is the one that Astinus tells Raistlin about by accident. Can you explain further?

That is the one. The "key" is nebulously defined. The masters of the towers generally have the key, and cannonically we know that Paladine and Takhishs can (or could) grant it as well.

Without it certain heights of arcane spellcasting are not possible. Epic spells certianly qualify. Keep in mind that, in 2nd edition, the gods explicitly prevented anyone on Krynn from advancing past level 18. The number of living non-dragon exceptions to this rule capped out at 3, and that was with time-travel involved.

It's highly nebulous though-- annotations and author comments from Weis and Hickman changed as the setting evolved, and where once the key wa suggested as a metaphor for self-knowledge, not it is suggested as self knowledge.

Regardless, without significant changes to the setting, you quite simply don't get much epic spellcasting on Krynn: you're pretty much limited to Rastlin, Fistandantillius, some of the Kingpriests, maybe some High Priest, Masters of the Towers, and heads of clerical orders.