[3.5] Casters in Leadership

[Absynthyne]

Hi all!

In an epic 3.5 game, my character has recently acquired the leadership and epic leadership feats. I've already put quite a bit of time into developing it, but my DM proposed a very important question for which I have been unable to find an answer.
In a traditional 3.5 campaign setting, how many spellcasters would be reasonable to find within someone's leadership? Or for any regular town or city, for that matter? Just how rare are casters?
1/100? 1/1,000? Even less?
Any and all opinions welcome.

Thanks in advance!

[Saint GoH]

Really, its up to the DM. I know that's always said but look at it this way.


In Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth series, it is probably fair to say there is 1 Spellcaster (i.e. Wizard/Sorceress/Witch) per 10,000 non-casters. This could be considered a "low-magic" world as far as the majority of the population is concerned, it just seems "high-magic" because the story revolves around spellcasters.

On the other hand, it isn't uncommon in fantasy (or reality even. Look at the Hun's for instance) for each village/tribe to have a local shaman. Now if a village has a few hundred people, and a shaman is there plus his apprentice, thats like a 100:1 commoner to caster ratio.


Its the DM's world. His/Her call. I'd say 1:1000 is a pretty lean estimate, given Epic Leadership, so 1:100 seems good to me.

[Absynthyne]

You're right, it is definitely relative to the series/campaign in question.
My DM generally likes to weigh his input vs. that of other experienced players and DMs before making final decisions, so I figured I would ask here :)

1:100 is around what I was thinking...as I said, our campaign is fairly traditional D&D (the only sources we do not use are Eberron books - they are implemented sparingly).

Great avatar btw! :D

[DeltaEmil]

Heck, if you're epic, your spellcaster cohorts and followers could even come from another plane of existence, like another material prime.

[Saint GoH]

Given the fact that things can get out of hand very quickly if you arent careful in epic (shoot, even if you are careful) with stuff like Legendary Commander and massive Cha bonuses, I agree its wise to iron this out now rather then later.


DM: WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU HAVE 1000 WIZARDS AS YOUR FOLLOWERS?
PC: *Insert Troll Meme Here*

[Jergmo]

I believe it's generally a given that 5% of the population is worthy of a PC class, and there are a lot of different PC classes. So, eh...I dunno. Maybe 1 per every few hundred might be an arcane spellcaster.