Recent content by Paul Farquhar

Indeed, and this is the equation you should be using to calculate the additional spells wizards know due to their scribe spells class ability. So 1 additional 2nd level spell and 1-2 additional 1st level spells at level 3 (generally, assume wizards will choose non-specialism spells at level up...

If you kill a wizard, they drop a spell book. If you befriend a wizard, they can teach you spells. Wizards having all the spells they want in their book is included in their class balance equation. That’s why scribing spells more cheaply is a subclass feature. If you block the wizard from...

I don’t think the F4 universe is in the 1960s, it’s a contemporary universe in which the fashions that were popular in the 1960s in our universe are currently fashionable in that universe. So no reason it can’t have alternative versions of a similar age.

The DM can say sorcerers can only recover sorcery points by sacrificing babies. But that’s not in the rules. Per rules scrolls are available to buy. The wizard is designed around being able to have every spell they want in their book. If you nerf that it’s not surprising you find them...

But only wizards can ritual cast it without preparing it. So characters who are not wizards don’t tend to have it. Clerics sulk over having to prep it if there is no wizard in the party. You can get choose them as rewards for completing the quests. But that wasn’t my point. My point was that a...

Have your read Keys from the Golden Vault? You are going to want to focus on out of combat stuff if you are playing that. Very few indicate that there are no scroll vendors. Just like they don't indicate that their are no brothels. There are a great many things that are not included in the...

That depends on what style game is being played. The “best ones” depends on the situation. The DM suddenly announces they will be running a heist from Keys from the Golden Vault. The sorcerer's combat focused loadout isn't going to be much use. The wizard can prep relevant spells (buying...

You can put anything in or out of any setting if you want to. The qualification is meaningless. The point is there is no “setting integrity” justification for not letting players play whatever they want.

If it looks like a book and quacks like a book?

Perhaps more likely: Strahd’s Book of Forbidden Magic. Not specifically Ravenloft (Fizban’s book wasn’t specifically Dragonlance) but including the sort of stuff you might find there, such as necromancers and reanimators, along with misc other things that need updating. Thereby Ravenloft is...

We already know, because it was established in earlier editions, and restated in 5e, that Mordy is a Doctor Strange cosplayer, not a Gandalf cosplayer. Elminster and Fizban are the Gandalf cosplayers. But, if you wanted to reference CoS Mordy, you would put in a stag, since that’s the form he...

Yeah it does. He is busy being a stag. Apart from the ones that aren’t.

Which the wizard definitely does not. Nor any other depiction or Mordy. And there are other things in the picture that do not relate to CoS. If the card is a hint, rather than just an artist’s doodle, then we might deduce that the wizard is a reference to a different upcoming product.

I do think the complaining about this is another example of the entitlement mentality. People seem to think they have a right to know.

What I find interesting is what I didn't learn at primary school. For example, I didn't hear of Beowulf until I was well into being an adult. Rosemary Sutcliff wrote a children's translation in 1956 but I never came across it when I was of school age. And local fairy and folk tales generally, I...