Alternative magic systems

[Yora]

While working on my Pathfinder setting, I am really trying to tone down the homebrew rules to make the whole thing more accessible. But when it comes to adapting the spell lists, it really just doesn't work for me at all. Even with going all spontaneous casting, I really don't like the spells either.
So comming up with something entirely else seems to be the way it has to be.

Now I could very well take the psionic power point system and start making spells that fit the idea that I have in mind. But I'd like to first hear if there are other d20 magic systems that have been introduced that could replace the old vancian spells without alterering the rest of the game too much.
I've seen a couple over the years, but never really got much into them and have no idea how they actually work in practice.

Anything you can recommend to me to look into? Everything that does not store completed spells in the casters mind until he throws them at the target is fair game.

[Waker]

Well, the various subsystems of magic are:
Psionics
Invocations (Warlocks and Dragonfire Adepts. CArc, DrMag)
Pact (Binders, ToM)
Incarnum (Incarnates, Soulborn, Totemists, MoI)
Truenaming (Truenamers, ToM)
Shadow (Shadowcaster, ToM)
And though people would complain about it, you could sorta include the maneuvers from Tome of Battle.

Now all of these systems have their own little quirks, but I think several of them are rather fun. Psionics use of Power Points make far more sense than Vancian casting. If you want to stick to the traditional magic, Ernir is working on a rather nify little alternative with Spell Points.
Invocations are the simplest alternate magic system. Learn a "spell", fire at will.
Pact Magic from Tome of Magic is a rather useful system. You have much of the same flavor of being a mage, but without the phenomenal cosmic power. You let yourself be possessed and gain super powers.
Incarnum is my personal favorite, though sadly the book suffers from poor editing and could have used some rearranging. Simplest explanation though is that you use "soulmelds" which are a mix of items and all-day buffs.
Truenaming is a system which has a lot of promise, but definitely needed some work done. While the Truenamer is playable, it definitely requires a bit of finesse and understanding of the rules. I am rather fond of the Homebrew that Kellus has done on the subject
Shadow is another system from Tome of Magic, but of all the subsystems it is the one that I have read the least about. The general opinion that I've heard from others is that it is weak, but I can't confirm that.

[Cicciograna]

Keep in mind that Ernir made a very good conversion of vancian spells to psionic mechanics. You can find it here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=194002k).

[Grinner]

To be clear, is it the Vancian mechanic that puts you off, or is it the concept of Spells and Spell Lists altogether?

[Yora]

Just vancian. Having distinct spells is a good thing, but in addition to the unneccessary spell preparation of D&D/PF, most of the spells are way too specialized in what they do.

[Waker]

Well, if Vancian casting is the big turn off, all of those systems I mentioned are exempt from it. As for the overspecialization, I think only psionics might be guilty of that, though not as much as arcane/divine magic.

[ericp65]

I've always favored a spell point system over spell slots, but recently a friend said that using something like the psionics system for arcane magic is OP. His concern is that, when the caster gains access to 9th level spells, he/she suddenly can cast a large number of the most powerful spells in the game, whereas in core, the same character can cast only a very small number of the most powerful spells.

He also commented that having points for spells of a given level is more or less the same thing as having slots, so why bother using points. I tried to answer that with the idea that you could use points instead of metamagic feats to modify some aspects of spells. The more I think about it, the more his view makes sense, but I still would rather have a point system *L*

Is my friend's argument valid?

[Elderand]

other alternative (3rd party): True sorcery, The quintessential chaos mage

Both are somewhat pointless "no pun intended".
They turn magic into a skillcheck (therefore you need to be careful of item that raise your spellcraft) for true sorcery or into a sort of caster level check (with wisdom mod) for chaos magic.

The limit of magic with those are either the fact that magic give you nonlethal damage proportional to the spell DC. The difference for the two system is that a chaos mage cannot reduce this damage, while a true sorcerer can. On the other hand true sorcery casting DC can be way way higher so it somewhat balances out.

A key difference between the two system is the availability of the different effect. Generaly speaking a chaos mage as access to all his effects right from the get go but has fewer of them while a true sorcerer need to buy effects with feats and through leveling but has far more of them.

[Waker]

I've always favored a spell point system over spell slots, but recently a friend said that using something like the psionics system for arcane magic is OP. His concern is that, when the caster gains access to 9th level spells, he/she suddenly can cast a large number of the most powerful spells in the game, whereas in core, the same character can cast only a very small number of the most powerful spells.

He also commented that having points for spells of a given level is more or less the same thing as having slots, so why bother using points. I tried to answer that with the idea that you could use points instead of metamagic feats to modify some aspects of spells. The more I think about it, the more his view makes sense, but I still would rather have a point system *L*

Is my friend's argument valid?

This is somewhat dependent on what kind of spell point system that you use. One of the big differences between Arcane/Divine casting and Psionics is that the spells cast by the former scale with caster level in terms of damage, duration and other factors. The latter does not, in order to get the full effect you need to spend extra power points. So if you were to follow suit with spell points, a character could indeed cast their highest levels spells more often, but they wouldn't have their full effect unless you spent more points, which balances things a bit.

[eggynack]

I've always favored a spell point system over spell slots, but recently a friend said that using something like the psionics system for arcane magic is OP. His concern is that, when the caster gains access to 9th level spells, he/she suddenly can cast a large number of the most powerful spells in the game, whereas in core, the same character can cast only a very small number of the most powerful spells.

He also commented that having points for spells of a given level is more or less the same thing as having slots, so why bother using points. I tried to answer that with the idea that you could use points instead of metamagic feats to modify some aspects of spells. The more I think about it, the more his view makes sense, but I still would rather have a point system *L*

Is my friend's argument valid?
It's a pretty imbalanced system, really. For one thing, it gives zero incentive to be a sorcerer at all, because wizards actually have more spell points about half the time. For example, at 3rd level, wizards get 7 spell points, while sorcerers get 8. However, assuming that both have 18 in their primary stat, wizards actually have 11 spell points to the sorcerer's 9. The real source of imbalance is that you're combining the wizard and the sorcerer into an unholy combination of each of their best abilities. So, if you're talking about the UA spell point system, then yes, your friend is correct that the system is not dissimilar to a butt. If you're talking about a different system, then I dunno. I haven't seen it. There's a theoretical spell point system out there which isn't any more imbalanced than the wizard, particularly because psionics exists.

[thorr-kan]

other alternative (3rd party): True sorcery
Based on the Black Company Campaign Setting and redone in True Sorcery, by Green Ronin.

I *love* this supplement, but the only way I'd ever get to implement it is if I DM.

[Mcdt2]

I second (third?) Ernir's Vancian to Psionic (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=10713713#post10713713) system. I've been using it for a while in my campaign, and I really like it. He only has core spells done, of course, but he has a section in the booklet detailing what happened to all the spells and suggestions for replacements involved in item creation if a spell was just written out entirely.

My only suggestion is to make sure to throw enough encounters at your casters such that running out of SP is a threat. spell and power point based systems have the problems of letting the caster go full throttle for longer. If you actually have 3-4 combats per day, then you should be alright, but otherwise be careful.