D&D 5E Arcane Grimoire Too Much?

[LordEntrails]

Overpowered?
Power is relative to the other characters. It doesn't matter what a character's power is relative to anything but the other characters in the party.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Mayfair Games had a 3rd party supplement for 2e called Archmages and they had powerful artifact level grimoires, what you are suggesting is nothing compared to those.

Would the Grimoire be overpowered for a seventh-level wizard? I mean, let's leave the money question aside for the moment: given wizards' extreme dependence on DC and magical attack stats, would an artifact that permanently boosts one's DC by one (or even two) points be too much? I'm at the point where on Tuesday Mr. Conjectural Me says, "That's way too big a buff," and on Wednesday (same guy) says, "No, it's appropriate." I think the truth, though, is that I just don't know because I've never fiddled with these sorts of items before and therefore lack experience.

Anyone got experience with these things?

what I would do is 'borrow' some ideas though. Have the book take time to 'read' and 'learn' something like "You need to take a week to study it and make a DC XX Arcana check to understand it. When you do you get a +1 to the DC of all your spells. After that you can spend 2 more weeks studying it and make a DCXX+2 check to gain a +1 to all attack rolls with your spells. After that you can spend 4 more weeks studying and make a DCXX+4 check to gain +1 to damage with all cantrips. After that you can spend 8 more weeks studying and make a DCXX+6 check to up that +1 to DC to +2. After that you can spend 16 more weeks studying and make a DCXX+8 check to up the attack bonus to +2."

that is 31 weeks of study of an artifact that goes with "you need to be smart and study the book" as the fluff but it also gives you the ability for that item to 'grow' over time with you (unless they take more then half a year off all at once).

I can even say adding a spell not on the wizard spell list to the wizard spell book, letting a 3rd level or lower spell become a 1/day and/or always preped for you. letting a 1st level non damaging (non shield) spell become a cantrip for you. grant you a feat like elemental adept. upgrade a damage die of a spell (like your magic missiles are now 1d6+1 instead of 1d4+1) are all OTHER example things such a book could grant.


and no, level 7 is a perfect time to allow a artifact, but you should have some RP down sides...

 

[cbwjm]

The +1 grimiore would be an appropriate item for a level 7 wizard, I might not go up to +2 at that level, though I might allow the grimiore to be upgraded at a later date.

One I thing I don't allow in my games is for bonuses from an arcane focus to stack. So if they gain a wand, or staff of the archmage that also boosts their spell attack/DC, they'd have to use the bonus of only one of them.

 

[Blue]

Yes, I let the wizard in my Mad Mage game have one, and now I kind of regret it. It doesn’t help that he now also has a +1 wand of the war mage.

One of these days I’m going to run a game where none of the magic items grant a +X to anything.

I've been running that for the last 2 years - no +X items. Told the players in Session 0. The only exception was that they had cursed Demon Armor, and it's claws count as a +1 weapon.

 

[Blue]

I often see some people with a +1 difference in their primary ability score modifier, this is around the same.

I don't think it's overpowered as long as it's ot buttressed by other items. Looking at the items by tier chart in Xanathar's (pg 135), a party of 5-10 would have a total of 5 uncommon and 1 rare item. So if he's rather have this instead of anything else until level 11+, I'd go for it. It doubles down on being a glass cannon - increases his offense a touch at the opportunity cost of not improving defenses, or mobility, or other-pillar-advantages that might save spell slots.

I would not give out the +2 version until 11+.

 

[Benjamin Olson]

I think small bonuses to spell save DCs make a bigger difference than they initially seem like they would. Frankly I think WotC erred in just copy-pasting the rarity scheme from Rod of the Pact Keeper, an item that has the major restriction of belonging to Warlocks, for whom Spell Save DC was the less exciting part than the to-hit bonus (and the extra spell slot a day). Having the handful of spells a Warlock casts in an adventuring day be more potent is a lot more manageable than doing the same for any of the conventional full-casters.

Which is not to say don't do it, but simply to say treat the Arcane Grimoires as at least a rarity level higher than they are listed, and honestly probably just avoid the versions above +1, unless the character has a low Int and you're confident it will continue to be low.

 

[James Gasik]

Mayfair Games had a 3rd party supplement for 2e called Archmages and they had powerful artifact level grimoires, what you are suggesting is nothing compared to those.

what I would do is 'borrow' some ideas though. Have the book take time to 'read' and 'learn' something like "You need to take a week to study it and make a DC XX Arcana check to understand it. When you do you get a +1 to the DC of all your spells. After that you can spend 2 more weeks studying it and make a DCXX+2 check to gain a +1 to all attack rolls with your spells. After that you can spend 4 more weeks studying and make a DCXX+4 check to gain +1 to damage with all cantrips. After that you can spend 8 more weeks studying and make a DCXX+6 check to up that +1 to DC to +2. After that you can spend 16 more weeks studying and make a DCXX+8 check to up the attack bonus to +2."

that is 31 weeks of study of an artifact that goes with "you need to be smart and study the book" as the fluff but it also gives you the ability for that item to 'grow' over time with you (unless they take more then half a year off all at once).

I can even say adding a spell not on the wizard spell list to the wizard spell book, letting a 3rd level or lower spell become a 1/day and/or always preped for you. letting a 1st level non damaging (non shield) spell become a cantrip for you. grant you a feat like elemental adept. upgrade a damage die of a spell (like your magic missiles are now 1d6+1 instead of 1d4+1) are all OTHER example things such a book could grant.


and no, level 7 is a perfect time to allow a artifact, but you should have some RP down sides...

I really liked Arch Magic, it oozed with flavor.

 

[Guest 7034872]

Overpowered?
Power is relative to the other characters. It doesn't matter what a character's power is relative to anything but the other characters in the party.

I was actually more worried about him becoming overpowered relative to the encounters, puzzles, and other challenges I had planned. But you're right: I will need to make sure other players receive comparable boons.

I can even say adding a spell not on the wizard spell list to the wizard spell book, letting a 3rd level or lower spell become a 1/day and/or always preped for you. letting a 1st level non damaging (non shield) spell become a cantrip for you. grant you a feat like elemental adept. upgrade a damage die of a spell (like your magic missiles are now 1d6+1 instead of 1d4+1) are all OTHER example things such a book could grant.


and no, level 7 is a perfect time to allow a artifact, but you should have some RP down sides...

Mistah, I like the way you think.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

My suggestion would be, if you think a full-on artifact is too much at this level, let him have an incomplete Arcane Grimoire, and make a quest of repairing or completing it. E.g., perhaps he finds an Incomplete Arcane Grimoire that adds +1 to spell attacks...and nothing else, no save DC bonus, no bonus spells from Arcane Recovery, with a plot hook to take it to some expert on magical writings who could guide him on repairing the book.

First repair step, let the book give the extra spell slot from Arcane Recovery--perhaps it only needs to be re-bound or needs certain pages replaced. Second step, it becomes fully restored as a normal +1 Arcane Grimoire. Third step, which is only revealed once the book is fully restored, he can begin trying to add wholly unique features--but this is a much more experimental, difficult process, one that could take a very long time.

You can easily get 3-5 levels' worth of personal quest through this, giving the player a tool he will almost certainly care about...and in so doing, get (hopefully) a ton of really good RP out of the player's natural desire to pursue powerful, high-efficiency character options.