How the world(s) work...

[Fwiffo86]

Due to the nature of some posts I have responded to today, I get the impression that many players are not taking into consideration how their world works. In some cases I can easily see how they come to that opinion. Worlds like Eberron or FR are super high on the magic stuff.

I am not one of those GMs. I only bring this up because it seems to me that many seem to think that just because its written in a book, it is deserved or dictates how the world should handle it.

Example)
I would expect there to be wizard colleges and centers of magical learning in high magic worlds. I also expect these worlds to be populated with all sorts of dangerous magical creatures.

But what about worlds where there just isn't that many wizards? Or clerics who actually can cast spells? I would expect worlds such as this to NOT be populated with world shattering spell casters, or easily located magical monster A.

My point is this.... It seems many people are running off of the idea that HIGH magic is the default. The system leads me to believe the exact opposite is true. With reduced spell casting, rare magic items, and only so many attunement slots to use combined with bounded accuracy, I would say that a spell casting wizard would have a hard time locating another of his kind. I would think the population would avoid magic for the most part, quite possibly fear it (even from a divine source).

Dropping a fireball conjured out of thin air would be extremely scary to people in this environment, to say nothing of returning someone from the dead. Does no-one take into consideration what this means? If you have someone who can return the dead, don't you think they would be swarmed by people asking that character to return their dead relative everywhere they go? Its not like the deeds of heroic characters go unnoticed.

It seems we spend alot of time arguing mechanics, and absolutely no time arguing impact of X, Y, or Z. Why aren't we doing this? We are all here to get better at what we do? Wouldn't some threads on world impact and what it means to actually have a 20th level character means to the rest of the world be useful? What about some threads on how rare is rare? How often should X spell be allowed to characters if at all? What does being able to cast wish actually mean? Stuff like that? I'm probably addressing a dead room, but there you are. Why aren't we doing this?

[Tintenseher]

Because it depends entirely on the world, and has little to nothing to do with actual game mechanics.

Elnor the wizard lives in a high-magic world. He goes to Wizard College and casts high-level spells just to get his neighbor's cat out of the tree. He buys his magic items at the corner mart and has weekly parties with the clerics from Pelor Sigma Sigma.

Elnor's identical alternate-universe counterpart, Ronle, lives in a low-magic world. He keeps to himself in a hut at the edge of town and only uses magic when nobody is around to see it. He has never met another magic user in his life, arcane or divine, because they are all shunned and feared.

Same wizard (uh, sort of), same mechanics, different worlds.

[Gritmonger]

Players have access to the books. And the books are the things that most of the worlds are going to have in common, especially those things not explicitly marked as "optional."

Anything else ends up being houserules or homebrew, so it's not as hot a topic of discussion.

The discussion where I detail how elves are not really in my world not because I don't like elves but because it's a chaos-sieged world, anybody remotely chaotic is seen as being tainted or allied with the enemy, and a series of purges have removed most of them from the city that the players are starting in is just not going to spark the kind of discussion you get over interpretation of Rules As Written. There are no rules as written for generally ostracizing one demihuman type. It's not something that is going to come up in many people's games.

I use this as a point towards why there are not more discussions of Rules As Written over things like low magic - it's going to be more of a function of how the rules are implemented in your world, so it's not as open to discussions of Rules As Written.

Many players if confronted with a low magic world will presume it doesn't apply as much to their character individually, and it generally won't unless the GM makes a point of it. It can change the availability of scrolls and potions and other magic items, but that just moves the cost and time burden for players above 3rd level, since Rules As Written they can start crafting common and uncommon magic items as soon as they hit that level.

It is up to the GM in a lot of cases - so those points don't seem to get as much airing as the Rules As Written interpretations of players and GM's. The discussion about what a Silent Image can do with regard to disbelieve is not as mired in high versus low magic, but it is affected by players and GM reading rules and interpreting them for something as open-ended as an illusion.