W.A.N.D: What a Noob Design

[Skylivedk]

So... I've done something atrocious and rolled magic items. Normally, I design my own. As a result, my players got wands. A fireball and a web wand. Luckily, they are on a player who is not playing very tactically.

I remember wands with limited charges. I used them extensively in 3e and they obliterated the daily power ceiling, but at least not for many sessions.

Enter the 5e wand. It recharges 1d6+1 charges pr day.

How is that a good idea?

I nerfed it to: at dawn roll a d6, of you get a 6 recharge 1 charge. My player group still found them extremely powerful. Anyone else played with them? Anyone who knows what's the idea behind the crazy amount of spell power they give? (I know most of you would just guess... But I'm hoping someone used a Detect Thought on a game designer).

[Man_Over_Game]

So... I've done something atrocious and rolled magic items. Normally, I design my own. As a result, my players got wands. A fireball and a web wand. Luckily, they are on a player who is not playing very tactically.

I remember wands with limited charges. I used them extensively in 3e and they obliterated the daily power ceiling, but at least not for many sessions.

Enter the 5e wand. It recharges 1d6+1 charges pr day.

How is that a good idea?

I nerfed it to: at dawn roll a d6, of you get a 6 recharge 1 charge. My player group still found them extremely powerful. Anyone else played with them? Anyone who knows what's the idea behind the crazy amount of spell power they give? (I know most of you would just guess... But I'm hoping someone used a Detect Thought on a game designer).

Usually, randomly generated magic items are balanced for specific levels rather than a giant pot of OP randomness. For example, for level 0-4 characters, the Treasure Hoard has a 12% chance to have you make 1d4 rolls on Table F, which results in a 2% chance of getting a Wand of Magic Missile before level 5.

They're designed to be strong, but rare. My team got their first recharging wand around level 6/7.

I'm not sure what methods you used, but I might recommend double checking it to see how balanced or accurate it was.

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As for why, you guess is as good as mine. Likely, it's to follow DnD 5e's design plan to have fewer magical items to mess with the balance of things. Rather than just giving someone an expendable wand every level that your players blow on a major boss fight, they instead get a minor wand that's consistent but not overpowered that they use 2x a day.

[Calimehter]

My guess would be so that wands feel like more like their own kind of item rather than just a Costco-esque bulk-value deal on scrolls like the 3.x versions did. "Get 25 scrolls for the price of 8!" never did much for me from a thematic perspective.

The designers didn't *seem* to think there was a huge power difference between the old way and the new, since they list the old way as a variant in the DMG with no alteration recommended for the wand's rarity or power level

[Jerrykhor]

I don't know about you, but i hate disposable magic items. A powerful magic item with finite charges just means you'll never use it, because you're always saving it for 'the time when you really need it', which is the 'next fight that is harder than this', which is ultimately, never.

So no, i dont think its a noob design. Magic items shouldn't be rolled for IMO. If you do, it should be selective rolling. Wand of Fireballs is meant for parties of martials who struggle against hordes of weak mobs, not to be given to a Fighter so that he can cast more Fireballs per day than the Wizard.

[Rukelnikov]

I don't know about you, but i hate disposable magic items. A powerful magic item with finite charges just means you'll never use it, because you're always saving it for 'the time when you really need it', which is the 'next fight that is harder than this', which is ultimately, never.

In 3.x you could recharge wands for half the price of a new one you got it filled again, with the 3.x extreme focus on magic items, by RAW access to someone who could recharge such a wand was a given in any decent sized city. If not by the very wizard using the wand himself, and sice a depleted wand still had half value, you could pawn it once its wasted to craft a new one with a more appealing spell/at a higher CL, it worked wonders.


So no, i dont think its a noob design. Magic items shouldn't be rolled for IMO. If you do, it should be selective rolling. Wand of Fireballs is meant for parties of martials who struggle against hordes of weak mobs, not to be given to a Fighter so that he can cast more Fireballs per day than the Wizard.

But thats the point, most martials cannot use most wands since they require attunement by a spellcasters.

In 5e I've only ever used 1 wand, and not really myself, I gave a wand of MM to my familiar, and my character's DPR increased substantially.

[Finback]

But the Will Always Negates Defeat!

(just noting what I suspect is your reference in the title)

[sithlordnergal]

So... I've done something atrocious and rolled magic items. Normally, I design my own. As a result, my players got wands. A fireball and a web wand. Luckily, they are on a player who is not playing very tactically.

I remember wands with limited charges. I used them extensively in 3e and they obliterated the daily power ceiling, but at least not for many sessions.

Enter the 5e wand. It recharges 1d6+1 charges pr day.

How is that a good idea?

I nerfed it to: at dawn roll a d6, of you get a 6 recharge 1 charge. My player group still found them extremely powerful. Anyone else played with them? Anyone who knows what's the idea behind the crazy amount of spell power they give? (I know most of you would just guess... But I'm hoping someone used a Detect Thought on a game designer).

So, as a player who started in 3.5, I can see why you might be concerned. In fact, when I first swapped over I thought very little of Wands due to their low amount of charges. However, there are two major differences between 3.5 wands and 5e wands that you need to understand. These rules apply for staffs as well:

1) Most 5e Wands require an attunement slot, where as in 3.5 you basically bought them to use immediately. Off the top of my head, only the Wand of Magic Missile doesn't require an attunement slot to use it. Considering how many amazing items require attunement, this is actually a big thing for Wands and using them.

2) One wand is meant to last your character from the time you got it to the time you finish your campaign. You're not supposed to go out and buy new wands, like you were expected to do in 3.5 Rather that Wand of Fireballs is meant to serve your character all the way till the end, with the only chance of losing it being if you decide to use all of its charges. Since this was the design intent, the 1d6+1 charges per day and lower number of charges actually start to make sense. To put it in perspective, I have a Wizard who is level 13. He got a Wand of Magic Missile at level 3. He has used the same wand for 10 levels, that would be unheard of in 3.x

3) Rolling for treasure is great, but make sure you roll tier appropriate tables. Levels 1 through 4 should really only be looking at the first few tables, like A through F. With F being the absolute BEST stuff you can possibly get. Tier 2, levels 5 to 10, start looking at Table G, and Tier 3 and 4 get into the Very Rare and Legendary things.

EDIT: Note, I roll in the treasure tables. I find it a fun way to give players non-specific magic items. I do limit what tables I roll on though, and outside of one or two items, -cough-FlametonguesAndFrostbrands-cough-, I find the items are pretty balanced between each other on the lists.

[OverLordOcelot]

5e wands are meant to be permanent magic items that give you a limited but consistent power boost, not a consumable that allows a silly amount of nova at monetary expense. A wand is now something that you get and keep using pretty much indefinitely, you usually don't burn them out or manually recharge them. They're also not really built for low-level characters; a wand of fireballs is intended for players at the level where a single caster can can naturally toss 4+ fireballs a day, at least level 6. (For a wizard that's 3 3rd level spell slots plus arcane recovery + up cast slots, for a sorcerer they can use metamagic to recover and upcast slots, fiend warlock gets 6 slots if they get the standard 2 short rests per day. So while it does increase your fireball output.) So you get the ability to throw out several extra fireballs, it stays with you as you level as long as you never spend the last charge, and it doesn't scale as you level.

Also, the only fighter that can use a wand of fireballs is an Eldritch Knight, who's a spellcaster that would be some flavor of fighter/wizard multiclass (or similar prestige class) in older editions.

[Rukelnikov]

3) Rolling for treasure is great, but make sure you roll tier appropriate tables. Levels 1 through 4 should really only be looking at the first few tables, like A through F. With F being the absolute BEST stuff you can possibly get. Tier 2, levels 5 to 10, start looking at Table G, and Tier 3 and 4 get into the Very Rare and Legendary things.

EDIT: Note, I roll in the treasure tables. I find it a fun way to give players non-specific magic items. I do limit what tables I roll on though, and outside of one or two items, -cough-FlametonguesAndFrostbrands-cough-, I find the items are pretty balanced between each other on the lists.

To add to this, consider that when you roll for hoard treasure there no problem in doing it after the fight, and letting the players do the rolls (that's how my group handles it at least). But for a monsters treasure, say you roll a ring of protection, then as long as it has some intelligence it should have it equipped.

The main prob with this is that it means you rolling beforehand which A- means more workload, and B- Players don't get to do the rolls.

I've never found a way to go around this that left me satisfied. So lately, for nameless encounters, I've just been rolling after the battle, or just picking something and equipping the monster with. I've tried having the players do the rolls without telling them what the result was and using it, but it stall the encounter for too long, seemed impractical, and years ago when I had more time/was willing to dedicate more time to preparing adventures, did the rolls myself when prepping, but it took some of the loot fun out of it.

[Chronos]

Quoth Rukelnikov:

But thats the point, most martials cannot use most wands since they require attunement by a spellcasters.
"Requires attunement by a spellcaster" isn't nearly as much of a limit as you'd think. Spellcasters include one of the three fighter subclasses, the most often used barbarian subclass, all paladins and rangers, two of the three monk subclasses (and eventually all three, at high level), one of the three rogue subclasses (and a second one can use wands even without being a spellcaster), plus of course all clerics, druids, bards, warlocks, sorcerers, and wizards, as well as high or dark elves, forest gnomes, tieflings, and anyone who's taken the Magic Initiate or Ritual Caster feats. Of the 16 different 5e characters I've played or been in a party with, only two have been non-spellcasters.

[Zanthy1]

In addition to requiring attunement, I do make a change to make wands a little less potent. I limit how many charges they have and instead of recharging 1d6+1, I just recharge 1d4-1 (minimum 1) at dawn.

[OverLordOcelot]

The main prob with this is that it means you rolling beforehand which A- means more workload, and B- Players don't get to do the rolls.

You know, I've been playing since Red Box, and this is the first time I've heard of a group where players roll for monster treasure instead of the DM. It's a thing that never even occurred to me that someone would do. (I'm not saying 'oh this is terrible', just noting that it's an approach that's completely different than I usually expect).