Languages and Spells

[MrStabby]

I am considering adding a language component to spells with a verbal component, especially for new spells.

For example the party discover an Orc wizard doing research, kill him and steals his spellbook. The usual spells are in common/all languages but the new spells he has been researching are in Orc. For a wizard in the party to learn/cast the new spells they must be able to speak orc. Likewise if they discover scrolls, only the characters that speak orc can read the scrolls.

My plan is to couple this with more "heritage" spells in the world. There will be powerful elemental spells that require speaking draconic to cast and others that need an elemental language (ignan, aquan etc.). There will be Orc spells, Infernal spells, celestial spells and so on.

The reasons for this?

1) I think it adds a bit of character/diversity to the world - NPC orc bards are a bit more different to the NPC elf bards.

2) It can help differentiate party members. The warlock that knows infernal can have a few spell choices that are different to a warlock that knows Sylvan or Draconic instead.

3) I provides an small incentive to consider other races that might not otherwise be ideal for a class. You can be a dwarf bard and gain access to the spells that only work in dwarfish. Yes you can learn extra languages from class/backgrounds but this may help a little.

4) It can make some spells a bit more specific - elemental summoning in aquan will only summon a water elemental for example. It lets players build more specific and specialist characters.

5) I like to give access to more powerful spells as "treasure" to casters - It meshes quite well with this system.

Any thoughts?

[arrowed]

This sounds like a good idea. One question, if a wizard finds a spell in orcish and doesn't speak orcish, could they seek out another wizard that does, and get it 'translated'? Second, how does this mesh with the idea of class spells? Can a wizard who speaks Infernal learn Hex from a fiend warlock? Finally, does this affect whether a person can recognise a spell when it's cast? Those are the only ambiguities I can think of currently, apart from that it seems like a fun modification.

[MrStabby]

This sounds like a good idea. One question, if a wizard finds a spell in orcish and doesn't speak orcish, could they seek out another wizard that does, and get it 'translated'? Second, how does this mesh with the idea of class spells? Can a wizard who speaks Infernal learn Hex from a fiend warlock? Finally, does this affect whether a person can recognise a spell when it's cast? Those are the only ambiguities I can think of currently, apart from that it seems like a fun modification.

Good questions.

Regarding translating spells - my first thought is no, you have to learn the language otherwise you lose the distinction between say two wizards who could translate for eachother. I might allow use of spells like tongues to speak a language for the duration to allow casting of the other spells.

Meshing with class spells - there is an element of this. Speaking fiendish wouldn't allow a wizard to learn warlock spells per se, but it would give them access (if they found scrolls, books etc.) to fiendish spells, some of which might be on the warlock spell list.

Does it determine if a player knows what is happening when a spell is being cast? I had not considered this but it sounds like it should. It seems a great extra detail.

[arrowed]

I like the idea of Tongues becoming more useful, would Comprehend Languages get the same treatment for recognising spells? Also, how literal would a spell's wording be? Would Charm Person in common be 'I declare that the person I am pointing at is now my friend and ally'? Or would it be more esoteric and poetic, to the point where the function of the spell isn't inherently obvious?

[JeenLeen]

If you do this, I think there should be an easier way to learn new languages than the large amount of downtime it currently requires. Maybe wizards get a bonus language at a mid-level to represent the research they'd naturally do?

This contradicts the description of how the fluff of magic works in the PHB. It states explicitly that the words of a somatic component don't matter, and thus the language isn't important. This contradiction is fine, but you'd need to make sure any players are aware of the houserules.

Also, if I remember the language list for 5e correctly, the elemental languages aren't separate languages. You either know Primordial (and thus can know/read/speak all the dialects for each element) or you don't. Again, not a problem, but I recommend not breaking it into 4 languages, since languages are so hard to learn in 5e (compared to 3.5). I could see a special flair with, if you know Primordial, you can understand all dialects, but you can only really speak one of them well enough to handle language components of speaks. The nature of the language, and how elements don't align with one another, is that if you learn one dialect well enough to cast spells you literally can't learn another one that way. You're too 'aquatic' to learn the 'fire' dialect.
Likewise Celestial, Infernal, and Abyssal for those summons, and Sylvan for druidic fey summonings (although I could see saying they understand Druidic as well)?

I'd like the idea of a couple unique spells that require Thieves' Cant, for a boost to Arcane Trickster and some unusual multiclassing.

NOTE: All in all, I don't really like the idea and wouldn't want it in a game I'm in, but I do see the cool potential for a deep setting. It lowers spellcasting versatility and power a little bit, and I'm not sure how important that is in 5e since I've only played a rogue thus far.
One quirk I have as a player is loving to know a lot of languages. Since I imagine other folk are like me, that's why part of why I so strongly recommend not breaking up Primordial into more languages. Really, with how 5e works, I wish they had combined Abyssal and Infernal into one tongue.

[Joe the Rat]

Eyes of the Runekeeper. Is that sufficient for casting, or just identifying?

Encourage downtime so people can learn languages. You just need to get teh rest of the party to do something in the meantime.
My party has a NPC Hobgoblin that's spent the better part of 1000 years as a statue, and does not know the current "common" language. Given the long language training, I've been using partial proficiency: Crudely, every 25 days is a +2/10% proficiency in the language (roll for difficult/esoteric/amusing miscommunication), 250 days of training is perfect fluency. It's been a bit over a month, and on simple topics and military action, he speaks with broken Imperial, missing the... little words. The articles. Like bad stereotypical Russian.
You could pair this with dialects to have partial proficiency cover some, but not all dialects (so 25% Primordial covers the basics, but you are only fluent in Ignan. Wood Elvish and High Elvish are different enough to count as dialects. Alternatively, dialects are easy-to-train if you know the root language. Dwarven fluency means it only takes 50 days to master Duergar, for example.