New Challenge.....

[Tygerkitsune]

Okay Playground, here's a new challenge. I am getting ready to run a campaign for some friends (both new and returning players), and though I do not doubt my ability to run a successful campaign; this one introduces a rather unique challenge: No natural magic. The idea is that the magic in the world is slowing fading from existence, and all that remains comes from the Grand Magi Council in the form of scrolls. The story itself is pretty stable, and the idea of no magic is pretty interesting, but the scrolls part...... that's where things get tricky. I can convert (rather easily) all the spells from the allowed books into scrolls, and have developed a way to allow spell casters to actually obtain spells (or scrolls in this case.) The problem is.... How am I going to handle things like class abilities (magic ones, of course) such as Turn/rebuke dead? Should I allow familiars at all? If so, what about sharing spells? Magic is pretty much dead in the campaign, but I don't want to remove the class specifics just because I am killing magic. Also, just because I am making it harder for spells to be cast, doesn't mean that i want to remove the ability to cast altogether. I want my players to be able to use magic, but it's a much much harder thing to do.
Any help on this matter is greatly Appreciated. OH! We will be using 3.5e Rules and basically the only books allowed will be absolute core. (phb, mm, dmg basically)

[XionUnborn01]

So...you are allowing spellcaster PCs? Because if so, I'm really not sure how this will even come close to working except maybe wizards who can copy the scroll.

Is divine magic 'natural'? It seems like you're counting it.

I guess I just need more information to really form an opinion on what exactly you're saying.

[Octopusapult]

All I've gathered is that you want a low-magic campaign, but how low, and to what ends, are not quite there.

We need to know how you stand on Divine Magic and what classes you're allowing.

Keep in mind, that keeping things core and removing all magical elements, severely narrows your players options. Think about it, the Bard, Sorcerer, and Wizard classes are basically entirely out. And if you decide Divine is just as gone then Cleric, Paladin, Ranger, and Druids also take large hits. Your PCs are basically left to play Fighters, Monks, Rogues and Barbarians...

[Tygerkitsune]

Yes spell-casters will be available, and I have that part covered. Yes I am classifying divine as "natural" for this. What we have:
Magic in the world, in it's various forms, is growing more and more difficult to use, no one is really sure of why. This is not limited to one type, and encompasses all spell-casters from Pally's to rangers, and everything in between. The Grand Magus Council (eventually) becomes the only ones able to cast great magics. The council has developed a way to grant knowledge to anyone (just about) through magic scrolls. Great libraries have been constructed to maintain these scrolls. While most people lack the ability to creat/cast magic naturally, the ability to read it has not been lost. That being said, librarians are able to replicate any scroll they have access to, to make a near infinite supply of scrolls that function the same way their spells would have. Once the scroll is cast, it dissolves away to nothing. In order to cast a spell multiple times, I.E magic missile, you would need several scrolls. These scrolls are to become the core for spell casting in this campaign.
I suppose I could just have clerics "pray" to their god for things like turn/rebuke rather than cast it themselves.....

[Nettlekid]

I think what people are getting at is that if magic is so limited, no one will want to play a caster class. Imagine a Rogue who has to get a special, one-use knife every time he wants to Sneak Attack someone. It would suck. So no one will play a caster, except that the campaign is quite magic-themed (it's conspicuous in its absence) and so if no one plays a caster, then a lot of plot hooks become less interesting. If your party is a band of (no UMD) Rogues and Monks and Barbarians, the scroll library's request to search for the ancient artifact that can scribe new scrolls is going to seem like "Meh, we can't use them anyway. Get your dudes to deal with it."

It's a shame that you're only allowing core, because this is a perfect chance for alternate magic users to take the limelight. Binders, Shadowcasters, Truenamers, Incarnum users, etc. But no.

Your best hope is for classes that can use magic without being all about it, like Rogue with UMD and Rangers who get spells but are more about the hunt. Paladins and Druids are tough because a lot of their non-spell class features are also magically inclined. But by making it so that you need a scroll to cast spells, you basically remove anything special from the classes that are all about casting, like Clerics, Sorcerers, and Wizards. Spell lists and Domains? Spells known, and spells per day? The ability to copy scrolls into a spellbook (or even having a spellbook at all)? All gone.

[Octopusapult]

The part I'm missing now is the part where a Fighter just learns how to read the scrolls and can cast spells like a wizard without multi-classing. Maybe I didn't read it correctly, but that sounds totally plausible in this setting.

[Telonius]

I would have a few questions - for you to think about if not to answer quickly.

Are Magical Beasts and Fey going to start fading away, or is this only an "active-magic" sort of thing? Would Doppelgangers be stuck in their regular form?

Spellcasting is pretty clearly not going to happen for PCs. You get at this a bit with part of your question, but I'd narrow the question a bit: will Spell-Like abilities, or Supernatural abilities be allowed? Making a decision on that would cover most of the other stuff (class abilities, familiars, etc). Be advised that some classes would be hurt much worse than others (Paladins would pretty much cease to exist if Su abilities are turned off, for example).

How would this interact with monsters? Some monsters (thinking of Rakshasas particularly, but other things as well) are threats mainly because of their spellcasting or Supernatural abilities. If they can't use them, you would probably need to take a second look at their CR.

Will you be allowing Artificers? From what you've described, magic items are going to be an extremely valuable thing, and the ability to create them could lead to some unusual power imbalances.

EDIT: just saw the PHB-only... anyway, any item crafting feats at all are going to be very valuable - I'd suggest you figure out how you're going to handle any of that.

If you're using the standard Greyhawk deities, how are the Clerics of Boccob and Vecna reacting?

[XionUnborn01]

So, if the scrolls can be replicated infinitely, what's stopping them from just spending all their time replicating them?

If I'm a wizard, can I just reliably buy 5 scrolls of detect magic, 5 scrolls of magic missile, and 5 scrolls of mage hand? Because if that's the case there's not really any change other than wizards all require one hand free at all times (or two? I forget if it specifies for scrolls).

Really that it comes down to is: What are you trying to accomplish with your setting and how do you want it accomplished? Getting that answered will alleviate some confusion I think.

[Tygerkitsune]

I want very low magic, but not to kill classes completely. I am trying to make a world, where magic is extremely valuable, no matter how small the magic is. Magic items would be like finding the holy grail or the lost city of Atlantis in terms of how valuable they are. I'd like to have spells be more than just "my character knows this" and more of "i've earned this!" I do not, by any means, want spell casters to be forgotten. They are just as important as melee characters for this campaign. As for magic beasts and the like, yes they too will slowly begin to fade. Think of it like this: The world of old is filled with magic (items, spells, you name it) like a normal dnd campaign would be. Over time it goes from that, to a real world setting where magic is nothing more than a hoax or an illusion. This campaign should take part just before the last magic is gone from the world for good. If not via scrolls, my next question is how does one reduce magic in a magic filled game, without killing spell casters entirely?


The positive side, is that I will be building the characters my self, so it's guaranteed that someone will have a spell-caster....

[Nettlekid]

Yeah, I think we get what you're trying to do, but what I'm saying is that in this world of yours, magic IS completely nerfed. Let's take the Sorcerer for example. Look at the Sorcerer's class features. All of them. Did you count them all? All one of them. And oftentimes that's traded out for something to boost their magic more. Spells are what they DO. They know a few spells, and have flexibility in casting them without having to decide "I'll cast three Fireballs today, two Polymorphs, a Magic Missile..." etc. In your system, there is none of that. They can cast only which scrolls they have, and only as many as they have. There's no point in being a Sorcerer because the Sorcerer's selling point is its flexibility through the day, and you've robbed it of that.

Look at the Wizard. The Wizard's selling point is that although it has to decide which spells it wants to prepare, it can gain more and more spells to its spellbook and so it has a huge variety of choices each day. If there's a problem to be solved, give him a day at most and a Wizard can have it solved. In your system, none of that variety, because the Wizard is stuck with the scrolls they have. The Wizard and the Sorcerer are exactly the same. And what good is that?

Look at the Cleric and Druid. Because they pray for spells, they have their entire spell list available for them. The ultimate in options. They can also spontaneously cast either Cure or Inflict spells or Summon Nature's Ally from their prepared slots, giving them a level of flexibility there as well. In your system, they do not have their whole lists to choose from, they have a few scrolls. They cannot change the scrolls into Cure/Inflict or Summon Nature's Ally. They are stuck with what they have. The Sorcerer and the Wizard and the Cleric and the Druid are ALL THE SAME in this system.

And the Rogue, with a bit of UMD, puts them all out of a job because it can do all they can do by activating scrolls, and also stab people's kidneys.

If you want a world where magic is dead (except for mythical artifacts) then start it that way, and tell people not to play casters. Then, when they actually get the artifacts, it's special. It's not just a pale and shallow reminded of what they should have always been able to do if they were playing by normal D&D rules.

By the way, what do you mean that you're making the characters? You're not building the characters on your own and just making your players play those that you assign them, are you? Because that sounds...terrible, especially in this campaign setting. Good for like a one-night one-shot, but not for a long-term campaign without magic.

[Tygerkitsune]

The idea is that I choose the initial class, and that was it. Everything after that is player choice. They still choose race/gender etc, but I get what you are saying. I feel that there is a way to do this without dropping entire classes though, I just need to figure out how to achieve that.

[Nettlekid]

There is no way to make a world that is severely limited in magic but does not make spellcasters useless. The problem with spellcasters is that they're overpowered right now, but there's no middle ground between that and powerless. Either they cast spells, or they don't. If you can cast, you can do amazing things. If you can't, you're nothing. You could try to enforce some sort of mana-esque system, like maybe if in order to still use spells you need some kind of magic crystal that runs out of charge, meaning that you still have your normal spells per day and all but also like 25-50 charges in the crystal, and you lose a charge with each spell you cast. It can be recharged through some *means* but that's difficult, and casting with the scrolls doesn't use up crystal charges. So the player could decide to use up all their charges at once and feel like a real spellcaster, shooting spells everywhere, or ration them out and just use a little at a time.

Or you could be a Psion and do the exact same thing.

[maniacalmojo]

if its core only i would change the way the classess cast spells.

The wizard starts with one first level spell in his spellbook and has to use multiple checks to transfer a scroll to his spellbook but at a higher DC then normal. At additional levels he does not get new spells but must add them to his spellbook.

The sorcerer always has an arcane failure chance of 10% (or if you feel nasty 20) When he cast a spell he has to make a spellcraft check to cast it properly as well (I would say 12+ spell level no taking 10)

The cleric would have to not disobey his god at all and would make daily tributes to his god or would have to visit a church of his diety to regain his spells for the day. He would also have to take a move action to chant or call to his diety (i would require the player themselves to do it for hilarity) So in essence all spells are using verbal components.

The paladin i would beef up his normal class abilities and lower his spells known (extend his ability to use lay on hands and smite and all of that)

The ranger i would lower spells known

The druid would choose a climate zone that they can freely cast in and anywhere outside of that have a high spellcraft to be able to use their spells (Dc 12+spell level outside of temperate climate and additional +4 to dc in a city)

This is what i would do if i started a game like this.

[Metahuman1]

Are Psionics Magic for this? Pact Magic? Incarnum? Factotum's Opportunistic Piety and Arcane Daliadant? Swordsages Shadow Hand and Dessert Wind and Crusaders Devoted Spirit Maneuvers? Shadow Mysteries?

If not, that helps you out a great deal making this work.

[XionUnborn01]

Are Psionics Magic for this? Pact Magic? Incarnum? Factotum's Opportunistic Piety and Arcane Daliadant? Swordsages Shadow Hand and Dessert Wind and Crusaders Devoted Spirit Maneuvers? Shadow Mysteries?

If not, that helps you out a great deal making this work.

He's Working with core only.


I just don't see a way to reduce magic to such a limited resource and still have casters be a viable option to play. If you were to make the only casters into bards or something it would be different, you could just change the spells and power up the other abilities but a wizard is just a bag of nothing with a few bonus feats.

Just as an example, if I were to play a wizard what would my spells/ day, spells known, and spellbook look like in this campaign. Maybe if you can give an actual character example I could understand better.

[1pwny]

This sounds cool.

By chance, do you read Fairy Tail? Because this world sounds a lot like Edolas, the alternate universe.

So a way to do this, would be to give various spellcasters different scroll-related abilities. For example:

Wizards can scribe a limited number of scrolls a day
Sorcerers can use scrolls 2-3 times before they disintegrate, but can't scribe them
etc...

[roguemetal]

Perhaps you could give casters a large allotment of gold to spend on scrolls, similar to an Artificer's Craft Reserve. It needs to be enough to compensate them until the next time they resupply, for any spell they want or need, and the scrolls must be easily available. (Be they obtained through some secret underground connection, archival group, etc. that's your choice.)

Allowing casters to use scrolls without expending the use of the scroll by some other means (such as through alchemy reagents which by your flavor could be something only casters are trained to make) might also work.

If no suggestions appeal, why not just tell players to use non-casting classes, and grab UMD?

[BowStreetRunner]

The simplest way to do this mechanically is to have every spell (arcane or divine) and spell-like ability to now have an additional material component of a scroll. You still have to have the ability to cast the spell or use the spell-like ability, which you would obtain from your race, class, etc., but regardless of the source of your ability you still need to scroll component in order to release the magic.

In essence, you are doubling the source of magic. Caster + Scroll = successful spell. A single caster could not produce a spell by herself. A non-caster with a single scroll could not produce a spell by himself.

An interesting option would be to also allow two casters (or two non-casters using one scroll each) to create a successful spell through simultaneous casting.

[Tygerkitsune]

That's not a bad idea at all. I do like that. I may work with it and see how it turns out. We are currently trying to finish a campaign now, then it will be time to run this one. Thanks for the ideas and assistance everyone!

[Fouredged Sword]

Prepared Casters

- These characters carry a spellbook (even druids, clerics, and such) that they copy scrolls from at the start of a day. These scrolls last 24 hours before the magic fades. Clerics and Druids are casting spells copied from the holy orders, but the chains of faith are now broken, and anyone can copy the spells if they have the personal reserve faith to cast them.

-Spontaneous casters

- These characters attune themselves to a fixed number of scrolls each day. They can use these scrolls to focus their magic. They use internal reserves of magic to use scrolls without expending them. Spontaneous casters can change what scrolls they are attuned to at the start of the day.

Sha'ir - The Gen fetches a physical scroll.

[Grod_The_Giant]

How would this interact with monsters? Some monsters (thinking of Rakshasas particularly, but other things as well) are threats mainly because of their spellcasting or Supernatural abilities. If they can't use them, you would probably need to take a second look at their CR.
More than this, you're going to have to look really carefully at every monster in the book. Anything that needs magic to fight or recover from is going to be a lot more challenging than normal. DR/Magic is effectively DR/-. Mummies? Good luck dealing with Mummy Rot without a friendly cleric. Healing? Healing without magic is going to be slooooooow.

As for magic... I'm not sure why you're insisting on keeping casters around when you're removing their entire purpose for being. Instead, I'd homebrew an entirely mundane "Sage" class (Factotum - Arcane Dilettante - Opportunistic Piety + the Archivist's Dark Knowledge?), and make UMD into an Int check.

[zilonox]

Let the PC spell casters gain and use spells as normal (after all, the PC's are better than everyone else). Instead, create a "Banality Score" for your world (I'll call it BS* for short from here on out). BS starts at 0 and caps out at 20 - as magic drains away, this score increases. You can set this at a higher starting value to show magic has been draining away for some time.

Here are some ideas on how you could then use this (I probably wouldn't use all these at once, this is just to get the creative juices flowing):

Creatures with SR gain the BS as a bonus to their SR. Any creature without SR gains SR 10 + BS.
For any spell that allows a saving throw, the targets gets to add the BS as a bonus on their roll.
Subtract the BS from range/area/target values for spells.
Subtract the BS from to hit/damage rolls for spells.
Spells of level higher than 10 minus 1/2 BS cannot be cast.


*No pun intended!

[Zweisteine]

I have a few suggestions:

1. Make the campaign about restoring magic to the world. Maybe travel to the outer planes and keep the gods from leaving. Maybe travel to the Source of all Magic and have the casters sacrifice themselves to restore it. there are so many ways to do this.

2. You could make the party special, in that they are some of the very few people who still, for no obvious reason, still have full magic ability (besides the more powerful casters in the realm, like the Grand Magi Council you mentioned). This would also set them up perfectly for a "restore the magic" quest. (And casters with spells known would be limited to the spells they learn normally, i.e. no buying spell from other wizards).

3. Make sure to give out at least some magic items. Most characters won't stand a chance at mid- to high-level encounters without the items they are expected to have at those levels (fighter 10 without a +whatever sword will be a whole lot weaker than other ones). In the situations from my previous points, this can be solved by them meeting and defeating others who still have magic, but aim to use them for evil.

4. The Alien Skies sign (Elder Evils, page 9) is a good way to describe the early stages of failing magic. Just don't skip straight to the strong sign, even if it's what you want. Lower-level characters would need much lower DC (DC of their caster level might work) to be able to operate at all.

This is important:
Don't make the characters yourself unless specifically asked by the players, or unless you talked it over with them and they were fine with it. I can't think of anybody who would want to have a character handed to them, and be unable to make any of the important choices in character creation.
What if you make a rogue focused on trap-breaking and daggerfighting, and the character wanted to focus on social abilities and archery? What if you make a healbot cleric, and the player wants to be a buffer? What if you make a sword-and-board fighter for a player who wants a greataxe? What if you make an Evoker?
Even for a new player, you should just be walking them through character creation and telling them all of their options, and giving them warnings when they make a bad choice (like trying to play a primary caster as their first character, in a low-magic campaign, or like trying to play a heavily armored elf paladin).
Don't do it.

Or, you could wait a few months, then buy the new edition. Judging by the playtest, it's set to be low-magic relative to what you see in the earlier editions (i.e. its specifically stated that there is no Magic Mart by default, and magic items don't have prices (only recommendations for prices by item rarity), because you can't just go out and buy them, because they are so rare (except for potions of healing).

I do have one question: While I understand why you might want to do this, what are you hoping to accomplish by severely lessening every character's power level?

[Metahuman1]

He's Working with core only.


I just don't see a way to reduce magic to such a limited resource and still have casters be a viable option to play. If you were to make the only casters into bards or something it would be different, you could just change the spells and power up the other abilities but a wizard is just a bag of nothing with a few bonus feats.

Just as an example, if I were to play a wizard what would my spells/ day, spells known, and spellbook look like in this campaign. Maybe if you can give an actual character example I could understand better.

Ok. Um, listen, I HATE to suggest this, but, maybe this isn't the system you need to run for this? Game kinda falls apart in low/no magic mode I'm afraid in 3.5.