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View Full Version : Weird Idea for Spell Access Mechanic



Maat Mons
2021-11-10, 07:16 PM
Trying to design a way a single class could mix-and-match between being given spells based of Bloodline/Domain/whatever, choosing individual spells known, and getting to prepare new spells every day.




Magical Affinity

Choose two lesser affinities or one greater affinity from the list below.

Adaptable
You have the ability to prepare a certain number of spells each day.
Lesser: You can prepare a number of spells each day equal to one-half your Mage level, rounded down.
Greater: You can prepare a number of spells each day equal to your Mage level.

Custom
You gain a number of spells known.
Lesser: You gain a number of spells known equal to three-fourths your Mage level, rounded up.
Greater: You gain a number of spells known equal to one-and-a-half times your Mage level, rounded up.

Specific
You gain more spells known than those who choose the custom affinity, but you do not get to choose your individual spells known. Instead, you pick a specific affinity from those listed in the following section, and gain the indicated spells known at the indicated levels.
Lesser: Choose one of the specific affinities listed in the following section. You gain the spells listed in the associated table, from the column labeled "Lesser" as spells known when your Mage level reaches the indicated values.
Greater: Choose one of the specific affinities listed in the following section. You gain the spells listed in the associated table, from the column labeled "Greater" as spells known when your Mage level reaches the indicated values. Alternately, choose two of the specific affinities listed in the following section. You gain the spells listed in both the associated tables, from the columns labeled "Lesser" as spells known when your Mage level reaches the indicated values.



Does this have potential?

Jervis
2021-11-10, 09:22 PM
Kinda vague and hard to judge as is. Besides that it’s kinda just Chameleon or Generic Spellcaster but worse from the sounds of it.

Maat Mons
2021-11-10, 10:58 PM
I didn't specify an edition, because I'm contemplating variations on this for more than one edition, but the version I wrote up in the original post is for 5th edition.



5th-edition Wizard gets a number of spells prepared each day equal to his Wizard level plus his Intelligence modifier. With ability scores more-or-less being capped at 20, a 20th-level Wizard winds up with 25 spells to prepare each day.

So if you take the Adaptable (Greater) option, you basically wind up being a slightly-worse Wizard, with only 20 spells prepared at 20th level.

5th-edition Sorcerer spells known don't follow any pattern I can discern. But you wind up with 15 general spells known at 20th-level. Some Sorcerer Bloodlines give 10 bonus spells known.

So if you take the Custom (Lesser) + Specific (Lesser) option, you'd have, at 20th-level 15 general spells known. And I was figuring I'd aim for 20 spells known for each of the lesser Specific options. That would make you a kind-of better Sorcerer.



For a Pathfinder version, I might implement it as a series of archetypes for Arcanist. Each one would cut your number of spells prepared in half. But the custom one would let you pick some spells that would always be castable, as if prepared, but wouldn't count against your (newly-reduced) number of spells prepared. The total number of (unchangeable) spells you'd gain would be 50% more than the number of (reselectable-daily) spells you'd give up.

The specific ones would add even more spells, but they'd be a Beguiler-style list of pre-selected spells.



Basically, I'm trying to figure out how to design a single class that can work like Pathfinder Arcanist, or like a typical spontaneous caster, or like the 3.5 fixed-list casters, or like a hybrid between any two of those, depending on which options you pick.

Jervis
2021-11-10, 11:41 PM
to be honest this sounds overly complicated. As written it doesn't seem very far thought out. It seems like you're going for a weird combo of casting mechanics that aren't designed to work together.

Adaptable is a choice between a worse wizard or a mini wizard

Custom is a choice between a worse sorcerer and a better sorcerer

Adaptable is a choice between a domain and a full list caster like war mage

There's some domain space there, you could be a mediocre prepcaster or decent learncaster with a domain. But honestly the greaters are kinda just treading the same ground as other classes. I'm not sure how this could work in 5E's subclass system and Pathfinder kinda doesn't need it. Ideally when designing a full class you want to find a area of design space that isn't taken up by something else already. I would honestly just try to lean into the domain spell selection choices for 5E, in that system those are mostly subclass based.

Edit: I realize i came off a little rude there. Not trying to be overly blunt but i do recoment trying to narrow your scope a bit. If someone wants one of those other casters they're more likely to just play one of those.