Magic and Common Sense

[Angelalex242]

How would a campaign world change if every city had a citywide Forbiddance on it, and every temple was completely Hallowed (or Unhallowed, if an evil deity) from top to bottom. Presumably graveyards are also Hallowed to make sure the dead stay that way. All Hallow spells also have a 'hung spell' in them as appropriate to the deity.


Since Forbiddance does things to teleportation, every city may also have an official teleportation circle just outside the front gates where the guards/watch can keep an eye on whoever's teleporting in that day.

[Man_Over_Game]

How would a campaign world change if every city had a citywide Forbiddance on it, and every temple was completely Hallowed (or Unhallowed, if an evil deity) from top to bottom. Presumably graveyards are also Hallowed to make sure the dead stay that way. All Hallow spells also have a 'hung spell' in them as appropriate to the deity.


Since Forbiddance does things to teleportation, every city may also have an official teleportation circle just outside the front gates where the guards/watch can keep an eye on whoever's teleporting in that day.

For those who don't have the books in front of them:


40k square feet and 30ft high is warded. No teleportation can be made into the city (but can be teleported out, RAW). Upon the casting of this spell, you can choose any or all non-humanoid, non-beast type. They take massive damage when they enter or start their turn in the warded area, or they can speak a specific password and ignore this. Level 6 spell, can technically be dispelled but likely can't in OP's campaign.


Similar to Forbiddance, with a 60 foot radius ward. Blocks out ALL non-humanoid non-beast creatures, and those creatures can't charm, frighten or possess anything in the Hallowed area. You can also choose a special benefit for the area, such as a permanent Tongues or Darkness effect. Level 5 spell, can normally be dispelled but likely can't in OP's campaign.

[Mr.Spastic]

First, I think that magic would become more widely practiced. Everybody would probably have one or two cantrips and maybe a first level spell.

Secondly, Warlocks and Sorcerers would probably experience more discrimination as the didn't get their magic through study or service of a deity.

Third, magic services would be cheaper. If there are enough casters to have the whole city covered in forbidence, why wouldn't it be common to revive dead family members, or have giant castles made for yo at your command.

Your players would need at least one person with arcane spell casting. If you think about it why wouldn't everybody have arcane lock on their doors and alarm in their store rooms.

General NPCs would be different. If you have an NPC fighter, they're probably an eldritch knight. A rogue would be an arcane trickster.

Divination would be everywhere. Higher level NPCs would easily be aware when the party reaches new heights. They can commune with divine entities.

Druids would be more disconnected from society, along with Barbarians and Rangers

[Man_Over_Game]

First, I think that magic would become more widely practiced. Everybody would probably have one or two cantrips and maybe a first level spell.

Secondly, Warlocks and Sorcerers would probably experience more discrimination as the didn't get their magic through study or service of a deity.

Third, magic services would be cheaper. If there are enough casters to have the whole city covered in forbidence, why wouldn't it be common to revive dead family members, or have giant castles made for yo at your command.

Your players would need at least one person with arcane spell casting. If you think about it why wouldn't everybody have arcane lock on their doors and alarm in their store rooms.

General NPCs would be different. If you have an NPC fighter, they're probably an eldritch knight. A rogue would be an arcane trickster.

Divination would be everywhere. Higher level NPCs would easily be aware when the party reaches new heights. They can commune with divine entities.

Druids would be more disconnected from society, along with Barbarians and Rangers

A valid point on that last bit. Considering Fey and Elementals are commonly associated with the Ranger and Druid spell lists, they wouldn't be able to use a number of their spells in those regions.

It would mean that, without the special password, there would be no divine intervention or demonic plots involved in those cities. No more sewers with undead. It'd be an extremely high-fantasy world, and likely the outside world would be barren. Small villages that couldn't be protected would likely be raided by demons and the such, since they can't influence much inside the cities.

With a severe lack of teleportation abilities, wizards that had any stake in owning the teleportation circles to the cities would be wealthy, if not being the mayors of that city. Expect them to be cruel, callous, or crazy, as many wizards have found ways to extend their lifetime, and emotion generally goes with your mortality.

---------------------------

As a DM, I'd be hard-pressed to find too many plot twists inside of these large cities. Where the temples are obviously safe or dangerous, where the cities can't have demons, undead, or monsters. Where the best form of travel is out in the open, likely controlled by a powerful lord, and teleportation into the city is impossible. While in the city, things would be a little...easy. And once the players discovered the wonders of the city and spent their gold...now what? In some cities, I can build entire campaigns, but this one would be kinda hard to come up with to sustain itself.

The biggest plot twist I can think of is if a demon managed to find a way inside and found out the secret password, planning to use it to get the rest of his buddies inside, convert a temple to be theirs, and create a cult from the innermost part of the city. After that....I got nothin'.

[Angelalex242]

Oh, a city in a forbiddance spell still has the worst monsters of all still running around in it.

Humans. (And elves, dwarves, gnomes, halflings, etc)

It also makes raiding the evil temples rather difficult, because those Unhallow spells are nasty for invading Paladins and Clerics.

[JMS]

Well, in 3.5, we would see something like the Tippyverse, and while some of the things that let that happen don’t exist in 5e, I feel like teleportation and high level characters will result in a similar compactness for response speed design

[Man_Over_Game]

Oh, a city in a forbiddance spell still has the worst monsters of all still running around in it.

Humans. (And elves, dwarves, gnomes, halflings, etc)

It also makes raiding the evil temples rather difficult, because those Unhallow spells are nasty for invading Paladins and Clerics.

Quick mention, a Charisma check can void the additional effect presented by Hallow, so, interestingly enough, Paladins would be less impacted by Clerics.

[JackPhoenix]

It would mean there's a ton of high-level casters with resources to do that sort of thing. And nycaloths would get more mercenary contracts, because their at-will Dispel Magic means they can just brute force the spells. If you don't need the wards removed *right now*, you can also get casters with access to the spell and just let them try until they break it. They'll succeed eventually, even if they have only limited number of attempts per day.

Hallow is actually worse than Forbiddance, as it's area is circular, and can't overlap, which means you either have to fit everything inside one 60' radius circle, or have holes in your protection that could be used against you. At least Hallow's embeded spell may give you a warning that the effect was dispelled... with Forbiddance, you may suddenly find that the defense you've been depending on isn't there.

[Angelalex242]

More probably, temple layouts will just start conforming to fit in 60 foot spheres. Pay an architect enough money, and temples will start looking like a bunch of circles woven together with solid marble or whatever in the 'dead zones' :P

[Man_Over_Game]

It would mean there's a ton of high-level casters with resources to do that sort of thing. And nycaloths would get more mercenary contracts, because their at-will Dispel Magic means they can just brute force the spells. If you don't need the wards removed *right now*, you can also get casters with access to the spell and just let them try until they break it. They'll succeed eventually, even if they have only limited number of attempts per day.

Hallow is actually worse than Forbiddance, as it's area is circular, and can't overlap, which means you either have to fit everything inside one 60' radius circle, or have holes in your protection that could be used against you. At least Hallow's embeded spell may give you a warning that the effect was dispelled... with Forbiddance, you may suddenly find that the defense you've been depending on isn't there.

There are items that create permanent areas with Zone of Truth. They're rare, and powerful, but they exist. I'd imagine a similar thing was true for Forbiddance. On top of that, you could up-cast it as a level 9 spell. As a DM, I might add a clause that level 9 spells can only be dispelled by a level 9 Dispel Magic. Otherwise any level 9 spell can be trumped by a few low level castings of Dispel Magic.

[Anonymouswizard]

How would a campaign world change if every city had a citywide Forbiddance on it, and every temple was completely Hallowed (or Unhallowed, if an evil deity) from top to bottom. Presumably graveyards are also Hallowed to make sure the dead stay that way. All Hallow spells also have a 'hung spell' in them as appropriate to the deity.


Since Forbiddance does things to teleportation, every city may also have an official teleportation circle just outside the front gates where the guards/watch can keep an eye on whoever's teleporting in that day.

Note that we've seen examples of such worldbuilding before, especially for 3.5 (the Tippyverse is a particularly well known example that relies on a handful of high level wizards per city of thousands and lots of item crafting).


If we're industrialising magic, we need to begin at 1st level spells. Assuming there is a deity willing to allow it we might have thousands of people with access to one or two Cleric cantrips and the ability to cast Purify Food and Water once per day, which makes feeding your settlement that much easier. Now as I remember there's a handful of cantrips which perform situational effects if you're adventuring but rather useful effects if you're trying to build a civilisation, you'll see people able to cast one or two of those cantrips related to their jobs and nothing else.

At this point I feel like I need to address the High Elf issue. Every High Elf getting a wizard cantrip of choice and the tendency for elves to be druids over clerics means that they are the race most likely to exploit low level magic.

Now, before we get into using the big spells let us ask, what 1st level spells would change life if say 1% of the population could cast them once a day. It's actually quite a big list, and if we can just get ten of those spells going off once a day in a village then we can start to raise the standard of living nicely.

On this note I have to mention that one of the characters I want to play is an anarchist wizard, who goes around villages teaching Magic Adept (Wizard) to anybody who wants to learn it in order to try to create a post-scarcity society.

We can then get into magic item production. There's quite a lot of low-level items that would be game changers, so we need to find a way to get the material costs below the 'annual income of an average kingdom' level. If we work under the assumption that we're using body parts from magical beasts there is only one logical solution. Monster farming.

More thoughts and a bit more development on getting a D&D-post scarcity society off the ground tomorrow after work, I've put a lot of work into it but don't have time to dig out my notes.

[jiriku]

In both folklore and in various past D&D editions, there are various sorts of urban fey. Household spirits and the like. These fey could exist in villages and small towns, but not in cities. When a town grows large enough to get its forbiddance ward, you might see resistance from people who don't want their helpful household spirits, many of which have perhaps been associated with a home or farm for generations, to be evicted into the wilderness. They may complain. They may protest. The fey themselves don't understand human politics but are likely to create disruptions in small ways among those who are planning to dispossess them.

Likewise, there are occasional benevolent hauntings. Ancestor spirits and the like. When you burn incense and pray at grampa's shrine, suddenly grampa won't be able to hear you and know about your devotion, because now there's a forbiddance warding the city and granmpa's spirit can't come in. The haunts may or may not be able to do anything about it, but their descendents sure will raise a stink.

Now, if the world faces a demonic infestation or the wilderness is teeming with monsters, there may seem to be justification. Some people will say the ward is a small price to pay to keep their families safe. But others will ask why the local militia is costing so much in taxes if it can't handle the monsters, or why the town leadership doesn't just hire adventurers to clean out the nearby wilderness.

People will be on both sides of this issue. It will be a political topic. Even if the wards go up, there will be people who like it and feel safer at night, and people who complain and are nostalgic for a time when the household spirit would keep your hearth warm at night and grandpa's ghost would bless your livestock if you kept to tradition and asked him to.

[JackPhoenix]

There are items that create permanent areas with Zone of Truth. They're rare, and powerful, but they exist. I'd imagine a similar thing was true for Forbiddance. On top of that, you could up-cast it as a level 9 spell. As a DM, I might add a clause that level 9 spells can only be dispelled by a level 9 Dispel Magic. Otherwise any level 9 spell can be trumped by a few low level castings of Dispel Magic.

But then we're purely in the realm of houserules, and anything is allowed there.

Which items, by the way? I can't remember any off-hand.

[Lunali]

More probably, temple layouts will just start conforming to fit in 60 foot spheres. Pay an architect enough money, and temples will start looking like a bunch of circles woven together with solid marble or whatever in the 'dead zones' :P

Hallow has a small oddity that could mostly fix this, the area of effect is up to 60ft radius. The efficiency of the spell goes down considerably, but you could fill in some of those dead zones with smaller hallows.

That said, if I were DMing, I would allow the radius to overlap, but the overlapping section wouldn't be considered part of the new spell's area. This allows for more reasonable constructions, but will have odd shaped areas if some of the hallows get dispelled.

[Lord Vukodlak]

3.5 had an item called a Wierdstone it blocked, astral and etheral travel, teleportation and divination targeted within a six mile radius. It also cost in the neighborhood of 250,000gp

I personally think that in a world of magic and such, that if a major city bothers to build a wall around it for protection that wall should probably have enchantments or wards that stop people from teleporting into the city or other circumvention.

If magic renders walls and castles irrelevant then either such magic needs to be super super rare. Or magic to foil those things and protect walls and castles needs to be more common.

[Angelalex242]

Note that we've seen examples of such worldbuilding before, especially for 3.5 (the Tippyverse is a particularly well known example that relies on a handful of high level wizards per city of thousands and lots of item crafting).


If we're industrialising magic, we need to begin at 1st level spells. Assuming there is a deity willing to allow it we might have thousands of people with access to one or two Cleric cantrips and the ability to cast Purify Food and Water once per day, which makes feeding your settlement that much easier. Now as I remember there's a handful of cantrips which perform situational effects if you're adventuring but rather useful effects if you're trying to build a civilisation, you'll see people able to cast one or two of those cantrips related to their jobs and nothing else.

At this point I feel like I need to address the High Elf issue. Every High Elf getting a wizard cantrip of choice and the tendency for elves to be druids over clerics means that they are the race most likely to exploit low level magic.

Now, before we get into using the big spells let us ask, what 1st level spells would change life if say 1% of the population could cast them once a day. It's actually quite a big list, and if we can just get ten of those spells going off once a day in a village then we can start to raise the standard of living nicely.

On this note I have to mention that one of the characters I want to play is an anarchist wizard, who goes around villages teaching Magic Adept (Wizard) to anybody who wants to learn it in order to try to create a post-scarcity society.

We can then get into magic item production. There's quite a lot of low-level items that would be game changers, so we need to find a way to get the material costs below the 'annual income of an average kingdom' level. If we work under the assumption that we're using body parts from magical beasts there is only one logical solution. Monster farming.

More thoughts and a bit more development on getting a D&D-post scarcity society off the ground tomorrow after work, I've put a lot of work into it but don't have time to dig out my notes.

High Elves would be on the forefront of magical innovations, with WoodElves (And Wood Elf Magic...) not far behind. Beyond that, it's Vumans with magic initiate whatever that will do the rest of the innovating. And of course, in evil land, one may presume the Drow are innovating with their spells. Comes to that, if you erase Human from existence and make everyone a Vuman, that means every single human, even 0 level commoners, have a feat. That will surely make life interesting.

[PhoenixPhyre]

High Elves would be on the forefront of magical innovations, with WoodElves (And Wood Elf Magic...) not far behind. Beyond that, it's Vumans with magic initiate whatever that will do the rest of the innovating. And of course, in evil land, one may presume the Drow are innovating with their spells. Comes to that, if you erase Human from existence and make everyone a Vuman, that means every single human, even 0 level commoners, have a feat. That will surely make life interesting.

One note: V human, feats, and levels only formally exist for PCs. There is no expectation of PC/NPC transparency in 5e.

Doesn't make it wrong to give them feats, but those don't even have to be the book feats (and don't even have to be "feats", they can just be features.

For worldbuilding, you don't have to follow the system's "rules"--they're not the physical law. They're merely a game artifice to make things playable.

[Angelalex242]

Perhaps. But since we're theory crafting, say every single human (because Human was erased and they're all Vumans) does have a feat (and an extra skill proficiency, etc.)

That goes a long way to explaining human dominance in war when all human pikemen have polearm master, all human archers have sharpshooter, all human crossbowmen have crossbow master, etc, all human cavalry has mounted combat...

[PhoenixPhyre]

Perhaps. But since we're theory crafting, say every single human (because Human was erased and they're all Vumans) does have a feat (and an extra skill proficiency, etc.)

That goes a long way to explaining human dominance in war when all human pikemen have polearm master, all human archers have sharpshooter, all human crossbowmen have crossbow master, etc, all human cavalry has mounted combat...

See, I see it differently. Even if we give the benefit of a feat to everybody, they don't have some metaphysical list from which to choose (like we do). They can't optimize, because they don't know what the options are. Most of the armed forces were conscripts. To me, that means most would have (unprinted, as useless for PCs) farming feats. A few might have Tavern Brawler. Many would have Skilled or Alert or Observant. Only the trained-from-early-age professional soldiers might have one of the combat feats--they're useless for 99% of what a farmer does.

Same with spells. Even those who learned to cast spells (Magic Initiate) would probably pick spells that are most relevant to them in their everyday life. In religious areas, that probably means MI: Cleric for cure wounds or healing word + mending and light. A few might have purify food or drink or detect poison. In less religious, more populous areas you might have MI: Wizard for light + X + unseen servant/floating disk/featherfall/longstrider or those other spells we consider "less optimal." And this would depend more on their teacher than on what's "optimal."

Only very rare people would be taking combat spells/feats unless taught by the military (and who came in lacking a feat).

From a worldbuilding standpoint, most spell-casters wouldn't have access (at least if we care about verisimilitude) to the large majority of their spell lists. Someone trained in a fire/evocation/blasty school might not know about the more subtle charm ones. A god of healing and love is unlikely to grant "smite the wicked" spells to most of his clergy/similarly a god of poison and disease isn't going to be granting many healing spells. Specialization is a thing. It's the thing that explains much of the rise of civilization.

[Schadenfreuda]

I disagree with the contention that most spellcasters wouldn't have access to most spells on their list. Divine casters, such as druids, are standardised for a reason, and in a world where demons and monsters are real and common, it still benefits gods of love and compassion to give their followers the tools to defend themselves and others, even if those tools rarely see use. Wizards similarly can learn any arcane spell they can get their hands on, and in a world where magic is mundane and common as dirt, and therefore cheap compared to what the DMG would suggest, low-level combat spells would be available to everyone who wanted them, including in the form of scrolls for the uninitiated. If D&D worlds had the printing press, and a world of industrialised magic would likely have something that could mass produce written words in that manner, then this would be even more true.

It's also worth noting that in places like my own home in America, very few people ever really need guns for defence, but because guns are readily accessible, many people, including almost everyone in my home town, own one anyway. Wizards who had no particular use for combat spells in everyday life would likely want to know a few, if for nothing else than not being caught completely with their pants down.

[Chronos]

A commoner with Magic Initiate would probably actually want to pick Druid. Goodberry for your 1/day spell means that you can guarantee feeding even a family of 10, even in a famine or drought (plus, in an emergency, you can shove one down someone's throat if they fall off a ladder or something and are dying). For your cantrips, good choices would be Create Bonfire (so you never have to gather fuel, which was a really big deal before we started exploiting fossil fuels on an industrial scale), Mold Earth (to do all of the various sorts of agricultural earth-moving much more quickly than a man with a shovel or plow), or Mending (for all of those tools you and your neighbors have that are wearing out).