AvatarVecna
2021-08-07, 01:36 PM
Approaching things scientifically is probably fairly viable, if XP is something that can be earned by NPCs.
Let's start with a few facts that are probably fairly uncontroversial general knowledge, but are also extremely vague:
The Principle Of Depth: If a weak mage and a strong mage use the same spell, the stronger mage's version will be the stronger of the two.
The Principle Of Width: If the difference in power between a weak mage and a strong mage is significant enough, the stronger mage will have access to options the weaker mage is incapable of replicating.
The Principle Of Power: If a weak mage defeats enough enemies in combat (for some currently not understood value of "defeats" and "enemies"), they will become noticeably stronger from one day to the next. This is not a gradual process that takes place over time, but at some point after "defeating enough enemies", their abilities will improve in some fashion.
That all seems vague enough that it's going to be understood as fact by scholars, at least. Let's say we're playing a scholar incapable of magic, but who is well-versed in magical theory and understands enough to know what he's looking at, and see how we could go about figuring out the relative power of mages. Investigating will take some time and be rather expensive, but since this is important research your scholastic guild has your back. Because this kind of research will cost a great deal of time and money to perform, it's probably more of a guild task than a personal project - the kind of information that gets gathered over the course of decades working with mages in the city.
The principle of power indicates to us that the lines between different "levels" of capability among mages are clear-cut and observable facts. Thus, our investigation into the principle of depth should be figuring out the difference between mages who are using the same abilities but at different levels of power. Your research indicates that more powerful mages can hit targets that are further away. At first you figure this must be a result of pure experience teaching them to aim better, but then you come across reports that this is also true for spells that require no aiming at all - primarily, Magic Missile, an iconic combat spell. You go about setting up your testing environment: a long field with targets interspersed. Since magic missile can't miss, all you'll have to do is tell the prospective mages which to aim for, and then see if the missile impacts the target or disperses before reaching it.
While working on the field, your side-research yields an interesting result: mages are capable of building items that replicate spell effects they know, and the spells will (generally) match their own capabilities. The most useful items for your purposes are wands, as each charge in a wand will be just as capable as any other charge in the same wand, giving you a nice level playing field instead of having to hope that you can figure out which of 100 mages are at the same level of power as each other. You cast a wide net using guild contacts, looking for wands of magic missile, and you find them 5 different kinds, at all kinds of different prices. Because this is being done via guild contacts, even though you're not knowledgeable enough to know what a good deal is, your guildmates are able to make sure you're not wasting money on cursed items just because they're cheap, or buying overpriced items from scam artists trying to take advantage of your naivete. Thus, you end up with 5 wands costing 18750 gp:
50 charges that each cast one missile (750 gp)
50 charges that each cast two missile (2250 gp)
50 charges that each cast three missile (3750 gp)
50 charges that each cast four missile (5250 gp)
50 charges that each cast five missile (6750 gp)
Already, you've realized something important for your research: the appropriate market price for more powerful items isn't just more costly, it follows a set pattern. The wands your guildmates pointed to as being neither under nor overpriced follow a reliable pattern in their market price, with the first missile being worth 750 gp, and each additional missile per charge being worth 1500 gp. Thus, one could say the formula is "market price as measured in gold pieces is equal to 1500 times the number of missiles per charge, minus 750" (or "MP = 1500m - 750").
You put a call for mages capable of casting Magic Missile (who, based on your research, should be able to use the wands without any difficulties or accidents), and get 88 candidates: 55 capable of 1-missile "barrages", 21 capable of 2-missile barrages, 8 capable of 3-missile barrages, 3 capable 4-missile barrages, and 1 capable of 5-missile barrages. None of these mages are particularly knowledgeable about magic, they just understand how magic works. You take the 88 mages to your 300-ft field filled with targets, and get to work. Starting off, we have one of the mages use the "one-missile" wand:
1st charge is aimed at 300 ft. Failure.
2nd charge is aimed at 150 ft. Failure.
3rd charge is aimed at 75 ft. Success.
4th charge is aimed at 115 ft. Failure.
5th charge is aimed at 95 ft. Success.
6th charge is aimed at 105 ft. Success.
7th charge is aimed at 110 ft. Success.
The target 110 ft away was hit and the target 115 ft away was missed. For the sake of scientific surety, targets are slightly moved so that you can target at 111, 112, 113, and 114 ft away - all failures. Unless we're going to start getting into inches, this wand can't hit further than 110 ft. We have expended 11/50 charges of the "1 missile" wand. Let's move on to the "two missile" wand:
1st charge is aimed at 285/300 ft. Fail/Fail.
2nd charge is aimed at 140/155 ft. Fail/Fail.
3rd charge is aimed at 70/85 ft. Success/Success.
4th charge is aimed at 110/125 ft. Success/Success.
5th charge is aimed at 130/135 ft. Success/Fail.
6th charge is aimed at 131/134 ft. Fail/Fail.
7th charge is aimed at 132/133 ft. Fail/Fail.
Unless we're going to go into inches, this wand can't hit further than 130 ft. We have expended 7/50 charges of the "2 missile" wand. We now have two points of reference, and an existing pattern in the wand's market prices, so we can take a hypothesis: the "three missile" wand will succeed at 150 ft, and fail at anything more distant, while the "4 missile" and "5 missile" wands will have their farthest points at 170 and 190 ft respectively. Let's test it:
"3 missile": 1st charge is aimed at 150/151/155 ft. Success/Fail/Fail.
"4 missile": 1st charge is aimed at 170/171/172/175 ft. Success/Fail/Fail/Fail.
"5 missile": 1st charge is amied at 190/191/192/193/195 ft. Sucess/Fail/Fail/Fail/Fail.
That's our hypothesis confirmed, and we have our range formula: maximum range as measured in feet is equal to 90 plus 20 per missile fired (or R = 20m+90). And now we know where to tell the mages to aim, to see how they compare with the wands they should be comparable to. Each of the weakest mages only has a couple slots per day to cast the spell with (frustratingly, the number of slots available seems to be mildly random?), but we can pretty reliably get at least two out of each one. Targets are placed at the 110 ft line, and the 55 mages are lined up and told to target the one in the same lane as them. All of them succeed. The targets are moved back 5 ft, and the mages are told to do it again.
...34 fail, 21 succeed. This is a problem, that wasn't expected to happen. Something about your assumptions is wrong. You take note of the 21 that succeeded at 115 and notice something odd in your notes, so you start doing a bit of math. You average the slots available to those who failed to hit the 115 target, and then separately average the slots of those who succeeded in hitting the 115 target, and find that the latter average is approximately 1 point higher than the former. The mages who hit the 115 are, on average, more powerful in more than just maximum range. We have the 21 mages who still have a slot fire their last missile at the 120 ft targets, and they all succeed.
Since the 55 are now tapped out for the day, you set them to the side and turn to the 21 capable of "2 missile" barrages. We line up targets for them at the 130/135 marks. 13 of them succeed at the first but fail the second time; 8 of them succeed both times. We move targets to the 140/145 marks, and have them shoot again. This time, all succeed at 140, and fail at 145. We make a note and move on.
We have the 8 "3 missile" mages shoot their shot. Targets are placed at 150/155/160. 5 mages succeed/fail/fail, while the other 3 succeed every time. Targets are moved to 165/170/175, and the 3 fail each time. However, this time both groups average the same number of slots per mage. Strange.
Now we have the three "4 missile" mages shoot their shot. Targets are placed at 170/175/180/185. 2 of them succeed at 170, but fail at the others; 1 of them fails at 185, and succeeds at the others. Once more, each mage has about the same number of slots. Strange.
The last mage steps up and shoots his shot: 5 missiles aimed at 190/195/200/205/210 ft. All but the first fail to hit their targets. There is nobody else to compare slots with at this point in your experiments.
Time to go over your range notes:
MAX RANGE
34: 110 ft
21: 120 ft
13: 130 ft
8: 140 ft
5: 150 ft
3: 160 ft
2: 170 ft
1: 180 ft
1: 190 ft
Clearly, you need to amend your formula; basing it on the number of missiles is having some things catch you off-guard. You come up with a concept you'll refer to as "caster level" in your notes (marked as "c") until you can figure out a more concise way to differentiate between the power levels of different mages. Thus, the new range formula for Magic Missile is "R = 10c + 100". Looking back at wand pricing, you see that the number of missiles and ranges line up with some of the mages, but only the ones that are at caster level 1, 3, 5, 7, and 9. Looking back at market price, you realize that the market price is equal to 750 gold pieces per "caster level" the wand should have. You make a note of this possible alternate formula (MP = 750c).
You have the 88 mages rest while you seek out an item that can improve their casting in some respect. After asking around the guild for some time, you hear tell of an Ioun Stone: an orange prism that floats around a caster's head and makes all their magic slightly more powerful. You purchase one and prepare for the next day's regimen.
You give the stone to the most powerful mage and have him explore his range limit again. He's still casting 5 missiles, but now he's able to reach 10 ft further. You hypothesize that this magic crystal effectively gives +1 to caster level, and that it will have a similar effect on every other caster. If it does, this will confirm your ideas about caster level and also about this particular magic item. You give it to each of the mages one at a time, and something interesting happens: while all of them find they can reach another 10 ft with their missiles, those that were at an even caster level before the item and an odd caster level after the item also were able to summon an additional missile. This held true for all such mages. Thus, you are able to conclude that the number of missiles is also tied directly to caster level in some fashion.
You give the wands to your guild - partially used though they are, you have only used up 795 gp worth of magic missile charges for your experiment, there's no need to let the rest go to waste.
Having learned what you could about "caster level" (at least for the moment), you then go about thoroughly figuring out what slots each mage has available - how many times they can cast this or that spell per day, and what spells the various mages have available to prepare. You realize that more powerful mages don't just tend to be able to perform more magic, but the quality of the magicks they have access to is also greater than their lesser peers. After some time asking questions, you have sorted the spells these mages have available into groups based on what you've decided to call "spell level". The most powerful mage you met is capable of 6th level spells, and the weakest were capable of 2nd lvl spells and 1st lvl spells (which all the mages refer to as "cantrips", and seem to have complete overlap on - every mage has the same cantrips as the others). You wish the mages a good evening and get to work researching via the market, since market prices were a dependable way to measure things before. You will represent "spell level" as "s" in your notes going forward.
You find that most wands capable of casting a 2nd lvl spell follow the "MP = 750c" formula you previously deduced. You also find several 1st lvl (cantrip) wands, which look like they run for half that price (MP = 375c"). Thus, it seems to you that the actual formula is "MP = 375sc". Since s=1/c=1 wands sell for 375, and s=2/c=1 wands sell for 750, s=3/c=3 wands should sell for 3375 gp, s=4/c=5 wands should sell for 7500 gp, and s=5/c=7 wands should sell for 13125 gp. You look for 3rd-5th lvl wands and are dismayed to find that they tend to cost 4500 gp, 11250 gp, and 21000 gp. That's much more expensive than you were expecting! Clearly your assumptions about something were incorrect - probably Spell Level, since you feel pretty solid on Caster Level so far. You consult your notes on the actual market prices to see if a pattern reveals itself...
Spell Level
Caster Level
Market Price
MP/CL
1?
1
375
375
2?
1
750
750
3?
3
4500
1500
4?
5
11250
2250
5?
7
21000
3000
The part of your notes that hold a pattern is the lvl 2-5 spells, where it seems to increasing by 750 at each step, except then it's only 375 going from 2nd to 1st lvl spells. You recall that no other spell level had a custom name the way 1st lvl spells did, nor was there such significant overlap between the mage's spell lists at any other spell level. This level of spells is clearly different in some way, so the formula should be derived for the others, with the outlier being measured weirdly in some fashion. After looking at your table, you decide that the simplest way to do it is to have the formula be "MP = 750sc", and then the "cantrips" are effectively spell level 0.5 - it's crude, but it makes the market prices work. And after a bit of research into scrolls, potions, and spellcasting services, you're able to find a similar formula pops up for them - except instead of 750sc, it's 50sc for potions, 25sc for scrolls, and 10sc for spellcasting services (each time with cantrips effectively counting as a 0.5 level spell for the purposes of determining market price).
Additionally, your research into spellcasting services and scrolls reveals to you that there are spells more powerful than the 5th lvl spells that one mage was capable of - spells appear to go up to 9th level, at least within the markets you're able to access. And they seem to follow the formulas you've deduced. You hypothesize that a mage of CL 11/13/15/17 would be capable of spells of level 6/7/8/9, but without access to a large number of such mages, this is pure conjecture on your part.
So now you've got the basics of a "level progression" coming together, admittedly a little bit based on hypothesis. It looks something like this:
Caster Level
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
0.5th lvl slots
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1st lvl slots
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2nd lvl slots
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3rd lvl slots
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4th lvl slots
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5th lvl slots
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6th lvl slots
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7th lvl slots
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8th lvl slots
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9th lvl slots
?
You want to start filling in those question marks, but numbers for slots seem to vary over a small range even among those of the same caster level. Your immediate first thought upon reviewing your table is to remember your experiment with the ioun stone, where spells became more powerful. If spell level available is tied to caster level, perhaps the same trick will allow weaker mages to cast more powerful spells than they normally could?
Alas, this experiment fails: when you attempt it, the mages still don't actually have any higher level spells written in their tomes of knowledge. When you ask the stronger mages to share their own tomes, they oblige, but the weaker ones still can't make heads or tails on how to even begin learning such things. This is dependable enough all the way to the CL 8 mages that you give it up as a failure. That's not to say you didn't learn something, though! It seems that the granular spell effects are tied to Caster Level, but Spell Level is not affected by outside changes to CL even if there is a correlation between SL and CL for the most part. You make changes to your notes - what you used to call Caster Level is now split into Caster Level (which includes items and determines the basic effects of spells) and Mage Leve, which determines your item-less Caster Level and determines what Spell Levels you have access to. The ioun stone increases caster level, but not mage level, and thus it cannot grant spell level access.
As part of the process for determining who could successfully learn what spells, you stumbled across something you weren't aware of: mage specializations. Apparently, the way some mages learn magic, they dedicate themselves to a particular school of magic in exchange for being more or less blocked off from some others (usually two others?). Comparing specialists with your notes, you realize that specialists seem to have one extra spell slot per spell level at every spell level. When this change is accounted for, it turns out all mages except for CL 1 mages have the same number of base cantrip slots. There's still a bit of variation among higher-level slots, but now it seems to be falling into patterns - a number of the mid-level mages have almost identical slots once specialization is accounted for. But not all of them...there's some other factor causing variation in slot totals.
You talk with the strongest mages to ask if they have an idea what this is about, and they indicate to you that book-learning is a big part of learning how to do magic - and the smarter you are, the better you are at it. They also indicate this is why they've been so helpful: they're all scientifically-minded and are already dedicated to improving academic understanding of magic, this is just a different avenue than their normal approach. You're a little skeptical, because you're pretty smart and yet have no talent for magic, but you decide to see if you can put some kind of number to intelligence, at least as far as magic is concerned. You start by calculating how many additional spell slots are resulting from this "intellect number" per level. You already know that intellect has no effect on cantrip slots, so that's something. The first obvious conclusion: intellect isn't giving anybody access to spell slots that their mage level wouldn't allow them to cast. You're already pretty sure that base spell slots are tied to mage level, so you hypothesize that even phenomenal intellect can't grant access to spell levels you couldn't access before.
You ask around your guild for advice on how to proceed and find out that whatever "intellect" is, it's more or less a measure of your ability to retain information about things. It's necessary for this style of magic because the mages are essentially memorizing most of a spell's formula, and then finishing the spell later in the day (where their morning preparation casts most of the spell and holds it, ready and waiting to be finished). If intellect is a measure of information retention, then the way to measure information retention is a written exam of some kind. However, you don't want their knowledge of the subject tainting the results: you want to minimize variables, so "time spent studying the subject" should be as identical across the participants as possible. You decide to put together a very long quiz full of very basic legal questions - any one of these is something the average person might or might not know the answer to even without looking into the local laws very much, so it's just a question of how much second-hand legal information these mages have picked up over the course of growing up. You work with your guildmates to put together a 1000-question exam, and set up an exam room. The room can fit 300 "students", and you want to get good results generally, so you have your guildmates seek out 212 common folk to sit the test as well (just so you can get a good idea of how intellect compares to those incapable of magic).
After compiling the results, you find that most participants seem to be hovering around 5% intervals (going from 35% to 80% for most of them). There higher-level mages tended to score higher, although among low-level mages the results were more spread out. The two outliers are a pair of 1st level mages who somehow scored 90% and 95% respectively. When asked about it, each admitted they were studying to become barristers. Thanks for skewing my results, ya rules lawyers. Whatever, you're getting good data even without them. Still, comparing test scores to bonus slots isn't giving you as concrete information as you'd like. You do some research and find that there's magic items capable of improving one's intellect, and they are known for allowing mages to remember more facts from throughout their life, and to memorize more spells. One of the high-ranking members of the guild has a spare one that you can borrow for your experiments. You have your guild put together a new huge exam, this time about weapons and armor and stuff - once again, basic questions, but hopefully this time a subject none of them will be particularly knowledgeable about. You have one mage test at a time, using the borrowed headband of intellect. This takes a great deal of time, but eventually you have test results and new slot totals. And now that you can compare all this data, you've got some actually good results:
1) There were no outliers on the second test, so scores should generally line up with the first test (being composed of a similar questions in both quantity and difficulty).
2) Every mage performed ~15% better on the second test than the first test (with this consistency likely attributable to the headband of intellect).
3) Mages with similar scores had similar changes in their spell slots, after accounting for maximum spell level.
Sifting through the data, you're ready to assign an approximate number to intellect. You have Int values going from 0 to 8. The headband seems to increase Int by 3, and the bonus slots per Int are as follows:
Int
1st
2nd
3rd
4th
5th
0
1
1
2
1
1
3
1
1
1
4
1
1
1
1
5
2
1
1
1
1
6
2
2
1
1
1
7
2
2
2
1
1
8
2
2
2
2
1
That seems to be following a reliable pattern so it's probably right. And if Int would give a bonus slot for a spell level you don't have access to, you don't gain that bonus slot. There's a couple outliers, but they're a little weird: there are some 5th level mages incapable of casting 3rd lvl spells, and a 7th level mage incapable of casting 4th lvl spells. Both of them are gaining only a single 1st lvl bonus slot, and yet the latter is capable of 3rd lvl spells where the former isn't. You look at test results to see if you can find any patterns that could explain something like this, and you find something that might be useful: after averaging scores, testers of level 4-7 scored ~2.5% higher than testers of level 1-3. This isn't exactly in line with the 5% points, it's more like half of them got 5% better while the other half remained the same? You ask the mages in question, and some of them admitted that just as part of becoming more powerful mages, they could feel themselves becoming smarter, even if there weren't objective results to show it (with the level 8 and 9 mages confirming they've experienced this twice each). You theorize that there is some measure of Intellect gained at levels 4 and 8.
You amend your chart to account for this more granular approach to Int, and find a way to explain why some are incapable of casting spells they otherwise should be capable of casting:
Int
Max Spell Level
1st
2nd
3rd
4th
5th
0
0.5
1
1
2
2
1
3
3
1
4
4
1
1
5
5
1
1
6
?
1
1
1
7
?
1
1
1
8
?
1
1
1
1
9
?
1
1
1
1
10
?
2
1
1
1
1
11
?
2
1
1
1
1
12
?
2
2
1
1
1
13
?
2
2
1
1
1
14
?
2
2
2
1
1
15
?
2
2
2
1
1
16
?
2
2
2
2
1
With Int this granular, you have an explanation: the 5th lvl mages incapable of 3rd lvl spells are at Int 2, while the 7th lvl mage incapable of 4th lvl spells is at Int 3. both of them have the same number of bonus slots, but the latter is capable of 3rd lvl spells.
In any case: with your understanding of mage level, intellect level, and specialization, every mage who came to you now has fully consistent spell slot totals. You look around for other mages who are willing to share how many slots they have available of their highest level (both before and after the headband), and you're reliably able to guess how many slots they have at each other level. Your research has paid off and now you have a few different methods of determining what level a given mage is (using total slots, Int, range, and missile count). Now now that you can determine if somebody's level has increased, it's time to start testing how long it takes to gain a level.
You do a bit of research into the principle of power. You find that, very generally, defeating tougher enemies grants new levels of power quicker than weaker enemies. You also find that the more people who take part in a fight, the slower the process goes - that is to say, three people will "level up" about twice as fast as six people will. All this makes sense. You take 21 of the lvl 1 mages you've been working with and have them face down boars. One group will go 6v1, one 5v1, one 4v1, one 3v1. You attempted to get two mages to face it 2v1, and one mage to go 1v1 against a wolf, but they refused. Where's your academic integrity, young men?! Eh, whatever, who needs them? Each group that isn't filled with cowards will face one boar per day, and then the next day you'll test to see if their slots, range, or missile count has improved as expected of an increase in level. They will stop fighting wolves once they hit level 2.
After 10 days/wolves, the 3-man group is lvl 2. After 14 days, so is the 4-man group. After 17 days, so is the 5-man group. After 20 days, so is the 6-man group. So 5b=3x, 7b=4x, 9b=5x, and 10b=6x. These aren't mathematically consistent across the board, so there's probably something you're missing. The 3-man and 6-man groups are consistent with each other, so that's something. You decide that you need a better measuring stick than wolves, and decide to seek out the weakest monster possible that still gives some measure of power. You land on bats, who are more or less incapable of harming people in a 1v1, but are still enough of a nuisance that people seem to think they can give some measure of power. You repeat your experiment with groups of 3-6 mages, and this time it takes 100, 125, 166, and 200 days for them to level up. It looks like 3-man groups and 6-man groups are consistent with each other at least. The former has fewer factors, so x/3 is more likely to divide evenly than x/6, whatever x happens to be. You decide to call the amount of power gained from killing a monster the amount of "experience" it gives ("XP" in your notes), which is then split among all those that contributed to its demise.
You put together a bunch of 3-man lvl 1 groups and test you "1 wolf = 20 bats" theory by substituting boars and bats at various amounts per group. You find that this holds up: the group that faced 4 boars and 20 bats leveled up at the same time as the group that faced 80 bats and 1 boar, and so on. So it seems that bat XP is 1/20th that of boar XP, pretty consistently. Additionally, either the creatures are worth less XP to higher-level mages, or higher-level mages require more XP to continue gaining levels, or both. You continue your bat/boar experiments up to the next couple levels, and you reach lvl 5 without hitting anything that disproves what you've collected so far. But then things break down: based on your notes, a 3-man band of 5th lvl mages should level up after facing either 500 bats or 25 boars, and yet...while it takes one group 500 bats to level, the other group takes 30 boars to level. Something has changed about boars it seems...
...
...
...
...after a good deal of experimentation, with countless groups of 3 and trying it out with various monsters, you're able to put together a rather massive chart of XP by...what you've decided to call the "challenge rating" of a monster. Monsters of the same challenge rating will give the same amount of XP to characters of the same level. Additionally, characters of level 1-3 get the same amount of XP from a given encounter as each other; after that point, higher-level groups tend (tend) to get less XP from facing the same challenge. You've also determined a few interesting things about particularly wide disparities in power between mages and monsters: if the mages are enough stronger than the individual monsters, it doesn't matter how many monsters there are, they can't give XP. The opposite is true as well: if the mages are weaker enough than the monster, it doesn't matter how many mages there are, they can't get XP from the monster. One fun thing you find is that, past a certain point, any group of 3 can level up by facing 120 of the weakest encounter they can possibly get XP from. This is consistent from levels 8 and up.
This part of the experiment likely takes place over decades, testing with various groups at various levels against all kinds of monsters, before consistent patterns start emerging. As part of playing around with the high levels, you've become acquainted with tons of rather powerful mages, and have gained a better understanding of how mage level affects high-level slots. Your level table is much more full now. Finally, while it's harder to suss out level among non-casters, there are subtle signs that can be used to figure out level, and once you've figured those out, you're realize that XP isn't just consistent from one lvl 1 mage to the next, it's consistent for all lvl 1 characters regardless of what life path they've taken. Peasants and nobles and mages and town guards, all of them level at the same pace.
It may take quite a bit of time and effort and money, but a big enough scholar's guild can use the scientific method to suss out how levels and XP work in-universe. They may not know why a lvl [A] peron killing a CR A creature gives [A] XP, but they know that it's a consistent result, and that's the basis of all science. There are probably ways that can be used to suss out the effects of feats and the like as well. Given enough time (although at this point, we're talking centuries), real-world rulebooks could be produced in-universe if your scientific experimentation is rigorous enough. These are consistent facts of the universe, and if you observe them enough, you can start to isolate variables and detect patterns and make hypotheses and predict what will happen next and collect data and soon enough, you've got your very own in-universe player's handbook being distributed by the scholar's guild for the benefit of the masses.
bekeleven
2021-08-07, 06:00 PM
AvatarVecna, thanks for the in-depth scenario. It was a joy to read. I think step 3 would be slightly more complex - what if some of the wizards in the trial had a day job adventuring while others had a day job crafting magical items, for instance - but all in all I loved it.
However, while it elucidates my initial premise, it covers less of the areas where I have further questions.
My goal, for the record, is to optimize a caster using variable-XP Wishes. Specifically, a caster wishing for magical items. The "safest" way to do this would be to wish for a 1GP improvement to the item every time you wish, but obviously that's a pretty poor return due to the 5000 XP base cost. You really need to know your "available XP" to do it correctly.
If you overshoot - that is, you make a Wish to improve a magical item by 100GP while you have 5001 available XP - one of two things happens. A DM could argue that your wish moves from the "Create a magic item, or add to the powers of an existing magic item." option to the "greater effects" option, which could end up a disaster. Personally, I wouldn't; Since "add to the powers of an existing magical item" is one of the options, you're not trying to produce an effect greater than the option. Instead, I'd say the wish simply fails, wasting the spell slot. Another DM could say it adds exactly as much GP value as your had available XP for, setting your available XP to zero, and potentially leaving your item with "part" of a new ability that would need further crafting or wishing to complete.
And if you undershoot, then either you can wish to improve the item again but have 5000 fewer XP to do so, which means your total item's value will undershoot by 62.5k, or you end up with between 1 and 4999 available XP, in which case it's wasted.
There is a third option, or at least, an addendum to the previous options. Which is that (similar to Reddir's ideas of feeling "empty") they can hold the blueprints of a specific wish in their mind and know whether they would be able to wish for it. That would be convenient to the character in question, since they could use their aforementioned million ranks in appraise/knowledge skills to pick out items in varying price brackets and zero in on the highest-allowable price, letting them reverse engineer their available XP.
If that's not an option, I still think a magical item of some sort would be the most realistic way. Perhaps an item of Command Word Power Sight + Modify Memory? That would run you 52,200. We'll call that the upper bound; I would price it cheaper for balance reasons. (I chose Modify Memory because it could let the user recall with perfect clarify what events changed their XP. Also, it's used in the creation of the thematically relevant Thought Bottle.)
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