What spells would you ban to avoid a war?

[Tura]

I’d like some input / advice for a setting, but I’m not posting in homebrew because this is purely a “what if” situation.

Suppose all arcane magic in the world comes from one country (a volcanic island in this case). All magic components are either chunks of lava or plants indigenous to the island. This obviously means that the island (if it has reliable defenses, which of course it does) can rule the world.

But what if, against all odds, the islanders don’t want to rule the world (the setting’s history explains why). What if they are content to be left in their prosperous, isolated peace. What if they are willing to normally trade their magic components for other goods. Their first priority would be to make sure they don’t give away too much power and/or offensive advantages to the other countries. Because then, the other countries would want nothing more than to conquer the island and effectively rule the world.

Assuming that each spell has a different component, the islanders can choose which ones to sell and which ones to keep for themselves. Which spells would they ban?

Suppose that the island is adequately fortified, has the benefit of en Elder Fire Elemental (and some water elementals) constantly defending it, and that there are no epic characters around (and extremely few people above 15th level).

I wonder if the remaining spells would make a caster playable…

PS- Magic items are another story, to follow if we first get somewhere with the spells question.

[sonofzeal]

Gate
Wish
Miracle
Fabricate (so they can't make more lava itesm)
Locate City (just 'cause of the Locate City Bomb)
True Strike

I'd also have them not hand out any major damage-dealing spells, or charm/compulsions that work on humanoids (Charm Animal is fine). After all, a lot of magic is very useful in such a civilization, but there aren't very many "legitimate" uses for charm/compulsion, or attack spells. I'd make an exception for Heat Metal though - that'll revolutionize the smithing industry right there.

(edit - if the countries try to claim they need evocation to deal with monsters, the island can hire out some of its mages to deal with them as an extra source of income.)

[Darrin]

Assuming that each spell has a different component, the islanders can choose which ones to sell and which ones to keep for themselves. Which spells would they ban?

1) Continual Flame:

Feudal societies depended on serfs and laborers who worked from sunrise to sundown. An inexhaustable source of illumination that uses no fuel would allow a 24-hour workday. Agricultural output could be increased dramatically by requiring serfs to work the fields at night. Construction and manufacturing could also be done throughout the night. And unlike electric light bulbs, you wouldn't need power plants/electrical grids with large fossil fuel costs. Slave labor would go from mildly repugnant to sacred institution.

2) Create Food & Water:

As Napoleon discovered, an army marches on its stomach. Standing armies are horrendously expensive, because while you might get away with buying for a soldier's weapons and equipment once, he has to eat every day. Spells like goodberry or create food & water would reduce food costs to the point that raising a large standing army becomes trivial.

3) Plant Growth:

One spell that increases all your agricultural output within 0.5 miles by 33%? Similar to create food & water, increasing how much food your nation can produce means expanded population growth (more soldiers), more food (keeps the soldiers fed), and a lower portion of your population tied up with agricultural work (more soldiers, or more leesure time and thus more opportunities to find things to fight over).

If an island had sole access to these spells, and let some other nation get ahold of them, then they might find themselves getting conquered within a year, if not months, no matter how many fireballs or meteor swarms they held on to.

[lord_khaine]

that doesnt make sense, banning those 3 spells would in no way help another nation invade the island, and 2 of them is divine spells, so they cant even ban them.

actualy, considdering the island have no impact on divine magic, then even if they didnt trade any components at all it would still be possibel for a bigger nation with enough divine casters to take over the island.

i think it would make more sense with 2-3 major powers who each dont want the others to gain control of the island, and therefor will fight to keep it neutral.

[Artanis]

To simply prevent a takeover of the island, and not enforce Pax Volcanolandia?

First, I'd ban the really broken stuff like Wish, Gate, etc. Second, I'd ban any sort of teleportation or Flight. Third, I'd ban any sort of invisibility and anti-scrying methods. Fourth, I'd ban Control Weather. Anything else is fair game.

Why? Without the broken stuff and without teleportation and flying, they need to take a boat to the island, and they can't try something tricky because they'd be scryed and countered. If all your enemies need a boat to get to you...can you say "hurricane on demand"?

[PlatinumJester]

Scring - most people don't like to be spied on

Charm/Hold Person and Suggestion - hello Mr King of Some Powerful Country (cast one of the above spells), how would you like to get your entire amry. and start a war. Doesn't that sound fun? I'm glad you agree.

[F.L.]

Rope Trick
Teleport
Wind Wall
Freedom of Movement

Really, consult the Logic Ninja's guide to wizards for the real powerhouses.

Oh, and duh, Dominate Person. Can't believe I forgot it.

[sikyon]

Rope Trick
Teleport
Wind Wall
Freedom of Movement

Really, consult the Logic Ninja's guide to wizards for the real powerhouses.

Oh, and duh, Dominate Person. Can't believe I forgot it.

While these are all good spells, they may not factor into what spells an entire world should ban.

The batman wizard guide is a guide for one person. It allows great versatility and power, but on a huge planet changing scale, it is not. Many spells which would be exceptionally valuable to a mass of people are near worthless to a batman wizard, who is intrestested in himself or a party of 4 people.

So the guide is worth a glance but you need to evaluate spells on a spell by spell basis, the way that in real life a unit dedicated to controlling the output of spells would be interested in.

[Severus]

What about divine magic?

If there isn't some limitation on divine magic, then there is no reason that a theocracy couldn't invade with their army of priest-warriors.

If your objective is to make the island neutral, I'd give it a benevolent undying mage-king of epic level who only comes out when the island is threatened and destroys the enemy.

Or there is a great curse upon the island by some ancient god that anybody who attacks comes to a great doom.

Or the islanders know a way to turn off all the arcane magic if they're attacked.

or something like that which achieves the goals of a peaceful island without crippling arcane magic.

Because what you'd want to ban if you were the islanders and this was a real threat, is ALL destructive spells, probably most enchantment spells too, and I think that would make arcane casters too weak to be a PC class.

Because if you allow those spells, the right answer for an invader is to spend a couple of decades hording components, then attack when you've got several thousand max fireball scrolls stored away.

[Telonius]

Cloudkill is one I'd ban. It's always seemed like the chemical warfare of D&D, designed to kill loads of low-level mooks (i.e. peasants).

Dominate Person is another one that's easily abused.

Dispel Magic, and Greater Dispel Magic. The island will want to be the only ones that can neutralize magic, should the need arise.

Timestop (for cheese).

[Chronos]

I'll also chime in asking about divine magic. Most of the best warfare spells are on the druid's list, not the wizard's.

But on the topic of arcane magic, you definitely need to add Nightmare. It's the ultimate assassination spell, if your target isn't defended against it: You can cast it at any distance, and you only need to identify your target with an unambiguous description (like, "the king of Volcanida").

[Tura]

1) Continual Flame:
Feudal societies depended on serfs and laborers who worked from sunrise to sundown. An inexhaustable source of illumination that uses no fuel would allow a 24-hour workday. Agricultural output could be increased dramatically by requiring serfs to work the fields at night. Construction and manufacturing could also be done throughout the night. And unlike electric light bulbs, you wouldn't need power plants/electrical grids with large fossil fuel costs. Slave labor would go from mildly repugnant to sacred institution.

...Are you serious? Enforcing a 24-hour workday will simply kill your entire slave force in a week, regardless of illumination.
As for Create Food & Water and Plant Growth, I can see your point, but I don't think they can, by themselves, make a difference. Especially for an island.

i think it would make more sense with 2-3 major powers who each dont want the others to gain control of the island, and therefor will fight to keep it neutral.

And that's exactly the case.

Fabricate
No need to ban this one, I think. "You convert material of one sort into a product that is of the same material. Creatures or magic items cannot be created or transmuted by the fabricate spell." Magic components, even more so.

Locate Object
I've been toying with the idea to make the island hidden and inaccessible, but this is more of a flavour thing. The point here is not to be able to do anything once you get there.

To simply prevent a takeover of the island, and not enforce Pax Volcanolandia?

First, I'd ban the really broken stuff like Wish, Gate, etc. Second, I'd ban any sort of teleportation or Flight. Third, I'd ban any sort of invisibility and anti-scrying methods. Fourth, I'd ban Control Weather. Anything else is fair game.

Why? Without the broken stuff and without teleportation and flying, they need to take a boat to the island, and they can't try something tricky because they'd be scryed and countered. If all your enemies need a boat to get to you...can you say "hurricane on demand"?

That makes perfect sense.

Charm, Dominate etc
Umm.. I'm not so sure. First of all, for practical reasons, it's a small step from there to ban all mind-affecting spells. And while we're there, why not ban illusions, which might deceive you to accept something fishy? And there goes half the spell list. Second, it doesn't have to be completely full proof. (Divine magic is free for all, remember, so it can't be full proof anyway.) The islanders should not allow an obviously threatening spell, but if something not-so-obvious slips their mind, it's not the end of the world. It's a plot hook.

Rope Trick, Teleport, Wind Wall, Freedom of Movement

While these are all good spells, they may not factor into what spells an entire world should ban.

The batman wizard guide is a guide for one person. It allows great versatility and power, but on a huge planet changing scale, it is not.

I agree, but Teleport is scary and will probably go.

If your objective is to make the island neutral, I'd give it a benevolent undying mage-king of epic level who only comes out when the island is threatened and destroys the enemy.

Because what you'd want to ban if you were the islanders and this was a real threat, is ALL destructive spells, probably most enchantment spells too, and I think that would make arcane casters too weak to be a PC class.

Because if you allow those spells, the right answer for an invader is to spend a couple of decades hording components, then attack when you've got several thousand max fireball scrolls stored away.

All these are very valid points. But my objective isn't the neutrality of an isolated island, neither its invincibility. It is precisely the ability of a (neutral, or in any case not imperialistic) island to control the world's access to arcane magic. So, from there, I hope to find a compromise between believable and playable. Storing fireball scrolls is as good a tactic as any, but minimizing the possibilities for an army of casters to get there in the first place, seems better. As a compromise, always.

[Ramos]

Magic has to be learned (for wizards, wu-jens, archivists and a few others). Simply have the nation being the only one that has teaching institutions and every wizard taught there is prohibited from teaching the secrets of magic on any other nation through a powerful geas spell imposed upon graduation using circle magic to get caster level 40, very high save DC and enough metamagic to make it lethal.

Sorcerors can only inherit their powers so it stays in the family-so there's no problem of wizard-armies being made with them.



Therefore any spellcaster outside the island kingdom is either a sorceror-whose numbers are not a problem anyway-or a spellcaster initially taught in the island kingdom-where the kingdom itself prevents them from teaching anyone else.


Control of magic comes through numbers: the island kingdom simply has more spellcasters than all the other countries combined and the other countries can't increase their numbers of spellcasters.



NOTES:

The geas method also applies to divine magic.
There is no need to ban spells of any sort.
The only class not controllable is the sorceror.
You can alternatively also bind (via geas) spellcasters not to attack the island kingdom.

[Tura]

Control of magic comes through numbers: the island kingdom simply has more spellcasters than all the other countries combined and the other countries can't increase their numbers of spellcasters.

That's a nice idea, too. Doesn't fit with the flavour of the particular setting I have in mind, but it's still a nice idea.

(Opa! Den eixa petyxei edo ki allous apo ellada. Omorfa.)

[Craig1f]

I'm surprised no one has mentioned the ultimate artillery weapon, the Fireball.

I'd ban that quick, along with lightning, cloudkill, tentacles, invisibility, call lightning, and a few others that people have already mentioned in the post.

I'd be more likely to give out things like plant growth, fabricate, and create food and water. Countries that are not lacking in natural resources have a harder time convincing the populace to go to wear. Yes, soldiers march on their stomachs, but so do blacksmiths, innkeepers, and everyone else. A content populace doesn't like to go to war, even if war is justified and necessary.

You want to get rid of things that make going to war easy or necessary. Scarcity of natural resources is one. Another is removing the consequence of war. If you can conduct a stealth war, or attack with relative safety, you're more likely to go to war. Fireballs have tremendous range, and invisibility helps you to get in and out unseen. Getting rid of those just seems like a good idea.

Any spells that increases a countries defense would have its spell components provided cheaply. Firewalls, continual flame (to make stealth more difficult), that sort of thing are mostly defensive. If defensive spells are abundant, but offensive spells are not, picking fights becomes less attractive.

Last, I'd definitely ban spells that allow people to engage in subterfuge. Charm, dominate, disguise self, glibness, etc. One trick to conquering a country is to get that country to get in a fight with another country. Countries B and C go to war, then country A comes in and conquers the winner.

[Swordguy]

All of them.

As long as you're the only country with magic, regardless of what that magic actually does, people will want to take it from you. Therefore, to avoid having people come and try to take it, you have to get rid of all of it.

Moreover, assuming nobody else knows very much about magic (since they don't have any), they'll automatically fear and misunderstand your capabilities. Even if you've only got low-level casters, and everyone in a meta-sense understands that they can't throw world-shattering magic around, the other people on the planets in-character won't know that. They'll see impossible things and think that you can do anything. Therefore, they're more than likely to overestimate your capabilities, and will be afraid of you (and thus more likely to invade) as long as you have any magic.

[Severus]

All these are very valid points. But my objective isn't the neutrality of an isolated island, neither its invincibility. It is precisely the ability of a (neutral, or in any case not imperialistic) island to control the world's access to arcane magic. So, from there, I hope to find a compromise between believable and playable. Storing fireball scrolls is as good a tactic as any, but minimizing the possibilities for an army of casters to get there in the first place, seems better. As a compromise, always.

I don't think this is achievable.

You would want to get rid of destructive spells, so most evocation would go. You wouldn't want people storing up fireballs or chain lightenings or whatever. Much of Necromancy would have to go too.

You would want to get rid of most enchantment spells, so that someone couldn't conquer the island by skillful use of dominates and the like.

You could probably keep most transmutation, but no baleful polymorph or other one shot kill things.

Divination, and abjuration would be mostly all good.

You'd want to clip all the damage dealing spells out of Illusion, so no shadow conjuration, nightmare, etc.

Death dealing Conjuration would be out too.

This makes the mage class into a utility class. Haste/slow, teleport, rope trick, invisibility, etc.

Why would you take this, when you could play a cleric or a druid, have more hit points, better saves, more AC, more abilities, and lastly a better spell list?

That's why I don't think for PCs it would work.

And that still doesn't address the issue of how a divine nation couldn't conquer the place.

[Tura]

All of them.

That's the obvious answer to a question that hasn't been asked. "What would a country with exclusive access to arcane magic do". However, I said from the beginning that the Island wants to give away components and trade peacefully. I know it doesn't make sense at first glance, but 3 millennia of setting history justify it. I don't want to bother you with all that.

[Swordguy]

That's the obvious answer to a question that hasn't been asked. "What would a country with exclusive access to arcane magic do". However, I said from the beginning that the Island wants to give away components and trade peacefully. I know it doesn't make sense at first glance, but 3 millennia of setting history justify it. I don't want to bother you with all that.

Regardless of what they may want to do, other countries will simply look at them and see magic that they can take for themselves, even if the island nation is willing to trade for some of it.

Witness oil-exporting countries being invaded by larger neighbors even when the smaller country exports their oil TO that invading country (Iraq/Kuwait). This happens all the time throughout history. Why trade for it if you can take it?

In such a scenario, therefore, giving any magic away to any nation would compromise their security in the long run by making it easier for the aggressor nation to invade. Even innocuous spells can be used to increase labor efficiency, which means an easier process of war preparation. Magic is in this case a vital defensive strategic asset - not likely to be traded away. It would be analogous to the US trading nukes away in the late 1940s.

[Tura]

You would want to get rid of destructive spells[...]That's why I don't think for PCs it would work.

I agree arcane casters become unplayable if we go down that road. That's why I don't want to go there. I think that if the islanders focus on impeding hostiles from reaching, unnoticed, the island, it's enough.

And that still doesn't address the issue of how a divine nation couldn't conquer the place.

If there was one powerful enough, it probably could. I'm afraid I didn't make that clear, so I'll say it again. The island is not designed to be completely invincible, that's not the objective.

Magic is in this case a vital defensive strategic asset - not likely to be traded away. It would be analogous to the US trading nukes away in the late 1940s.

Except this isn't the cold war era. It's a particular fantasy setting, whose history and current situation make all this possible. I already said that, didn't I?

[Craig1f]

You might want to ban components for anything greater than cure light. People won't want to get into combat if they can't get healed.

[Voyager_I]

True enough, but Oil doesn't blow the snot out of you in a storm of Arcane fury.

Personally, I'd expect these people to err strongly on the side of caution. If they can think of a way that a given spell could possibly be used against them, or just decide that they can't imagine any, but someone else probably could, they'll ban it.

This takes care of Divination, most of Evocation and Enchantment, lots of Conjuration and Transmutation, lots of Necromancy, probably just about all of Illusion, and maybe not that much of Abjuration.

[Reinboom]

Antimagic Field, M's Disjunction
This is an island who has one major power - arcane might - their most significant weakness would be the ability to strip them of it temporarily.
Dispel Magic line might also apply here, albeit, that's a bit nerfing to PCs.

Control Water, Rock to Mud
Depending on how the island is structured.

Reverse Gravity
This can decimate a fleet of boats or ships, or even a small squadron of troops or similar. Possibly with no or few saving throws.

The broken line of 9th level spells:
Time Stop, Gate, Shapechange, Programmed Amnesia...

Alter Self/Polymorph line
These can be as effective as Invisibility, and in most cases, worse.

Anything with the [Teleport] descriptor.

Invisibility
Simply due to some of the very... very... tricky attacks it can allow.
(Greater Invisibility is fine, however. The duration difference is very significant)

Fly, Overland Flight
Mobility.

Control Weather
Another possible mass punishing spell.

[Kioras]

I would personally ban no magic. The components of the spells will be rare enough for them to control who they sell items for.

A simple solution would be an 'export' ban to any nations at war, they get no magic at all. Of coarse this can make things messy as the winner would be quite upset with the island nation.

Another idea for the particular spells themselves if you go along with banning them, it would be more likely affected by the national outlook then anything else. If they dislike poisons, any posion spell might not leave the island. If they are a strong free will nation, anything with charm or domination might not make it past the island. This would tie it in with some of the cultural aspects of the island.

The only reason i would prefer magic be available is that without it, people will look to another way to improve their lives, or to emulate magic. I can imagine a kingdom that gets very little actual magical supplies in trying to manually recreate those substances, coming across things such as gunpowder. Technological innovation is the biggest threat to magic, especially in a low magic setting.

[Swordguy]

Except this isn't the cold war era. It's a particular fantasy setting, whose history and current situation make all this possible. I already said that, didn't I?

Neither was that, really. And besides, on a macro scale human nature doesn't change. Nations behave generally the same way now as they did in the 1600s, or the Dark Ages, or when they were warring city-states along the Mediterranean. Being in a fantasy setting doesn't change that.

Now, if your nation isn't human-controlled, then you've got a point. But nothing's been said on that one way or another.

[Tura]

*Sigh*
I don't mean to be rude, but this was a simple "If A, then X?" question.
And you keep saying "but it's not A, it's B!".

[Mike_G]

In such a scenario, therefore, giving any magic away to any nation would compromise their security in the long run by making it easier for the aggressor nation to invade. Even innocuous spells can be used to increase labor efficiency, which means an easier process of war preparation. Magic is in this case a vital defensive strategic asset - not likely to be traded away. It would be analogous to the US trading nukes away in the late 1940s.

I disagree.

You could look at it like the European powers trading firearms to African tribes back in the colonial period. They could get plenty of goods for obsolete muskets, but generally didn't sell the latest model rifles or repeating/breechloading arms, and certainly not modern artillery.

So, if the buyers decide to try to take your advanced stuff by force, they can bring all the smoothbore muzzle loaders and primitive cannon they want to face magazine rifles and rapid firing artillery, loaded with timed fuses.

Heck through the cold war, the US and USSR were happy to sell assault rifles, older model tanks, fighter jets and all manner of last years military hardware to lots of nations. So long as they held back the nukes and the best conventional stuff, it's not that bad an idea. Sell Chad all the Sherman tanks they can afford, they still can't scare a platoon of M1A2's.

If the island keeps all the Teleport and Control Weather stuff to themselves, just being an island becomes pretty defensible, and if they're the only nation with access to Wish, Polymorph, etc, then they can retain the upper hand.

[Draz74]

Without the broken stuff and without teleportation and flying, they need to take a boat to the island, and they can't try something tricky because they'd be scryed and countered. If all your enemies need a boat to get to you...can you say "hurricane on demand"?

Most adventurers don't have the patience for it, but Endure Elements and Water Breathing will get you to & from the island without a boat just fine too.

[Artanis]

Most adventurers don't have the patience for it, but Endure Elements and Water Breathing will get you to & from the island without a boat just fine too.

Hence the ban on anti-scrying stuff

[Severus]

I agree arcane casters become unplayable if we go down that road. That's why I don't want to go there. I think that if the islanders focus on impeding hostiles from reaching, unnoticed, the island, it's enough.

But if there is no similar limitation on Divine magic, then there is really no point in limiting arcane magic this way. The islanders certainly could, but they'd get no benefit from it that I can see.

A hostile would just turn to Divine magic to fill in the gaps they create.

The islanders would be better off letting arcane magic flow freely, and then if they're attacked, other countries might come to their defense for fear of losing their own access. (provided there is not a dominate other power in the world and no one nation could win against the others combined.)

I'm afraid I didn't make that clear, so I'll say it again. The island is not designed to be completely invincible, that's not the objective.

You're asking us to step into the shoes of the islanders and tell you what we'd ban to protect ourselves, but you don't like the answers you're getting. I hear that you don't want it to be invincible (which I think it isn't even if they were the only ones in the world with arcane at all.), but what I don't think you're thinking through is the flexible nature of magic in a battlefield context.

If you ban only a few things, then the other things are just as much of a threat, and someone would just pick the other things to attack you with.

By way of example, if you ban evocation, but not others, then its cloudkills and baleful polymorphs that people can use to attack.

The problem is that many battle spells are close enough to interchangeable in a battle situation that to close the loophole you have to cut them all off, or you might as well not cut any off.

So my answer is that you either need to ban A LOT, or just give up on the idea entirely and ban nothing.

If you want to create limitations to create a different feel for magic, you can come up with other reasons, like say evocation and conjuration magics damage the fabric of the world and therefore those magics are outlawed and the trade in their components is black market. Maybe necromancy is evil. Whatever.

But if the set up is as you describe, a peaceful people who have sole access to all arcane spell components who could limit magic for their own safety, then I don't see how you get to a middle ground in banning things. You have to either go for a lot to avoid people working around the limitations, or go for nothing.

(And since you can't control the divine magic anyway, why bother to limit the arcane?)