Alternate cost for limited wish?

[schreier]

In our game, we have been leveling without really using experience points - basically, just make a call regarding style and length of play and when it feels right. A lot less book-keeping.

For crafting, we have an artificer, so no need to spend xp on items (he breaks down existing items for the xp component).

We just hit level 13 though, and I am taking Limited Wish, which has a 300xp cost. Trying to come up with an alternate cost ...

Suggestions so far:
Limited use (1/week?)

Ability damage (2 Wis? 2 Con?) --- possibly with a condition that prevents healing other than rest (sacrifice to magic, can't be healed by magic)

Any other ideas? Do either of those make sense?

[Rebel7284]

Gold component instead of XP component seems like the most straightforward way of doing this. Whatever the usual conversion rate is. 1->5 if I recall correctly.

Edit: this makes Limited Wish cost the same as Force Cage which seems fair.

[icefractal]

A material cost is what I'd use, but there's also the "temporary negative levels" approach from the DSP version of Psychic Reformation (https://www.d20pfsrd.com/alternative-rule-systems/psionics-unleashed/psionic-powers/p/psychic-reformation/).

[Fouredged Sword]

A cool effect would be casting stat burn. It would be temporarily spending your magic and mind itself in the casting. You would recover over time, but in the meantime would suffer a noticeable but not crippling reduction in your primary casting stat.

[schreier]

Those all seem to work well - thanks!

The simplest is gold, and I might be tempted to make it a 1500gp sapphire (per 1e DMG for Aids understanding of problems, kills spiders, boosts magical abilities)
(https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?607310-Knowstones-Which-gems-for-which-schools-of-magic&highlight=gems+spells)

[Jack_Simth]

Those all seem to work well - thanks!

The simplest is gold, and I might be tempted to make it a 1500gp sapphire (per 1e DMG for Aids understanding of problems, kills spiders, boosts magical abilities)
(https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?607310-Knowstones-Which-gems-for-which-schools-of-magic&highlight=gems+spells)

Pathfinder has a similar issue (they dropped XP costs entirely), and they switched the cost out for 1500 in diamonds - see see here (https://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/l/limited-wish/).

[MaxiDuRaritry]

A cool effect would be casting stat burn. It would be temporarily spending your magic and mind itself in the casting. You would recover over time, but in the meantime would suffer a noticeable but not crippling reduction in your primary casting stat.If you want to ban the spell, just ban it. Don't make casting it hurt so badly that nobody that hasn't been taking mind-warping drugs would ever use it.

[KillianHawkeye]

Yeah, don't nerf it too hard.

In my experience, once my wizard got limited wish, he used it practically every day because it's just so useful and versatile! We play with the regular XP rules, and spending a little XP on spells or items never really bothered me.

But in the OP's case, I'd recommend using the standard gp cost conversion.

[Fouredged Sword]

If you want to ban the spell, just ban it. Don't make casting it hurt so badly that nobody that hasn't been taking mind-warping drugs would ever use it.

Ability burn heals.

You could cast it once a day at essentially no cost. You burn one point of int, only to heal it as soon as you sleep for 8 hours. If you bed rest for 24 hours you can heal 2 points a day. If someone has the heal skill those numbers can be doubled.

It's only when you want to cast the spell more than once per day without breaks between days that you run into an issue.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Ability burn heals.

You could cast it once a day at essentially no cost. You burn one point of int, only to heal it as soon as you sleep for 8 hours. If you bed rest for 24 hours you can heal 2 points a day. If someone has the heal skill those numbers can be doubled.

It's only when you want to cast the spell more than once per day without breaks between days that you run into an issue.It also hits you where it seriously hurts if you have an even-numbered ability score. And since even/odd ability scores last at least 4 levels at a time, your chances of simply abandoning the spell as too ridiculously costly to use are pretty high. That, or it forces you to forgo boosting the one ability score that actually matters to you, which is even worse.

As I said, if you want to ban something, ban it. Don't make it so costly to use that people won't want to use it.

[sreservoir]

-1 even when you have an even ability score is, at worst, -5% to your success rates on spells that require saves and maybe you lose high-level spell slot depending on where your score lies on the bonus spell table.

It's a very light penalty, less impactful than a negative level and easier to circumvent. You're making far too big of a deal about it.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

-1 even when you have an even ability score is, at worst, -5% to your success rates on spells that require saves and maybe you lose high-level spell slot depending on where your score lies on the bonus spell table.

It's a very light penalty, less impactful than a negative level and easier to circumvent. You're making far too big of a deal about it.So you cast a 7th level spell that could, potentially, also cost you a -1 to all Int skills (which are most of what wizards get), -1 to saves vs all of your spells, a 1st level spell, a 4th level spell, a 7th level spell (for casting limited wish itself), and a 9th level spell. And if you're, say, a wizard/psion/cerebremancer, you lose out on a ton of power points, too. And if you take more Int damage later, it compounds the problem greatly.

Is that worth saving 500 xp?

I seriously doubt it.

And it only gets worse as your Int score increases.

[sreservoir]

You most likely do not lose any extra spell slots, because most of the time you will endeavour to get the benefits of 8 hours of rest before you next prepare spells, which will make the penalties go away. The 7th-level spell used to cast limited wish itself would be used either way, so it's pretty disingenuous to double-count it.

In practice it's just -1 to all Int checks and save DCs for the rest of the day, vs the 600 xp to cast two limited wishes.

Is it worth saving 600 xp in a game following the RAW xp calculations? Absolutely not. Small xp costs are incredibly cheap.

But it worth avoiding xp accounting, in a game where xp isn't otherwise being tracked? That's a very different problem, because not having to do xp accounting for a character eliminates a lot more moving parts than introducing ability burn adds. It can be a pretty solid at-the-table win even if objectively it makes the character less effective.

Now, personally, I think trying to run 3.5e without tracking xp, and especially by replacing xp with wealth costs, is a giant footgun that makes it even easier to screw up what's already one of the most frequently misplayed aspects of the system (handing out treasure!) that, broadly speaking, anyone who couldn't handle xp accounting also can't be trusted to run the system without xp accounting, but ability burn sidesteps that particular problem nicely.

[rel]

Casting stat burn is a significant nerf to the spell.

GP instead of XP is a simple if boring fix.

An option that hasn't been suggested is to give the character free reign to use all XP cost spells but put them half a level behind the party.
In other words, they level later than everyone else.

[Fouredged Sword]

I personally think the idea of a wizard burning himself into a week long stupor after buffing up his int just long enough to cast wish 5 times to give himself permenant +5 to int (and then his other stats) is bitchen cool. The wizard bends himself with magic until he nearly breaks and then rises stronger.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

I personally think the idea of a wizard burning himself into a week long stupor after buffing up his int just long enough to cast wish 5 times to give himself permenant +5 to int (and then his other stats) is bitchen cool. The wizard bends himself with magic until he nearly breaks and then rises stronger.I guess some wizards were just born "special." As in, they rode the short bus to wizard camp during the summers.

Otherwise, they'd be planar binding a few genies and getting wishes that way, without any xp costs brain damage.

[KillianHawkeye]

I personally think the idea of a wizard burning himself into a week long stupor after buffing up his int just long enough to cast wish 5 times to give himself permenant +5 to int (and then his other stats) is bitchen cool. The wizard bends himself with magic until he nearly breaks and then rises stronger.

Look, I enjoy drinking until I black out and having a wicked hangover the next day as much as anyone, but please explain how this is "bitchen cool". :smallconfused:

[rel]

It's very in theme for certain kinds of stories about the price of power but it doesn't match the mechanics of D&D 3.x at all.

Since D&D magic is broken into discrete spells which are in general trivial to access and phenomenally powerful a change that de-powers a certain subset of spells will functionally result in magic using players simply skipping those specific spells in favor of other equally powerful spells.

That kind of rules change doesn't result in magic user players grappling with the costs of power. It results in magic users picking different spells and proceeding pretty much as normal.

[Fouredged Sword]

Look, I enjoy drinking until I black out and having a wicked hangover the next day as much as anyone, but please explain how this is "bitchen cool". :smallconfused:

You obviously are not drinking in the right places.

[icefractal]

It really depends on how you're using it.

In emergencies? Well you're probably retreating afterward, so the ability burn won't be too bad, but neither would the XP cost be since this is a rare situation.

Routinely in combat (making the ubercharger auto-hit, for example)? Yeah, ability burn is worse in this case. Although unless you're quite high level this seems like a tactic you couldn't afford to do often.

In downtime, to access spells outside your list? The ability burn is much better, you can use it as much as needed without racking up permanent costs.