D&D General Should Schools of Magic Be Proficiencies?

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

This approach has a lot in common with the Spheres of Power or Domain Casters from older editions – less breadth, more depth. It also, effectively, shares common ground with Equip-to-Cast systems like we see in Final Fantasy or certain OSR variants (Cairn maybe? can't recall atm).

Knave.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Making it harder to use wizard spells makes wizards feel more wizardly?

This feels very much like extreme surgery when additive measures could accomplish your stated goal just as well.

All magic would work this way for casting. not just wizards.

I love it, but Roll-to-cast tends to divide D&D players. Some people love it, some people hate it. If it's just for your table, do what makes you guys happy of course, but if it's for wider dissemination, consider avoiding "if you fail the roll, the spell fizzles."

I have a homebrew option for wizards that I borrowed/adapted from Jason Lutes' awesome Freebooters on the Frontier playtest that uses a roll-to-cast BUT the penalty for failure is never "you don't cast the spell", rather it's more "undesirable things also happen when you do." I think that's an important thing to bear in mind to make any roll-to-cast house rule more palatable (if disseminating the house rule beyond your table matters to you).

I’m more of a “the attack roll also determines how powerfully you cast the spell” guy, but even if you roll very low, some magic still occurs you just don’t do anything useful with it.

I recall a wizard player in AD&D getting really frustrated with failing % chance to learn new spell checks. I never found the rule worth the headache or frustration. IF you wanted to implement something like this, it would be more interesting not to make consequence of failure "you fail to learn the spell" but maybe some change to the spell or some weird quirk when you cast it (that's leaning more into weird magic tables that you can find all over the OSR).

Like casting, it’d be more “how well does it work” than “does it work”. In the game this project is a dndification of, you can get a total failure, but even then you Push to a Partial Failure, either by spending a resource or taking a complication.

the complication would normally just be “you can’t learn it yet, and you have strained the pet of your mind that does this, so trying again would be incredibly dangerous” and you have to wait to try again.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

So, one thing that I’d implement if I were to do this is, 4 Cardinal Magic Skills, and the 13 Houses of Magic.

The Cardinal skills would be Arcana, Nature, Religion, and maybe Spellcraft (Arcana is very broad, so splitting it seems logical). Each one allows you to do magic stuff but aren’t used to actually cast spells. They’re more about ritual magic and stuff like examining a magic effect to see its purpose.

I’m still not sure if I’d want to write magic skill effects out like SWSE force powers, or more loosely defined with general rules about how strong an effect is at a given check result.

 

[SkidAce]

Schools of magic should be eliminated entirely.

Nah,

Many of the academies in my campaign are based off the schools, treating magic as a semi science.

I.e. "Well I majored in Enchantment" or "Bob skipped necromancy 101 today."

 

[SkidAce]

Give them different spell lists.

Have a very small 'General List' that everyone can take that gives general utility up to 9th level (like, 1 or two spells/level) edit: maybe wizards have these spells automatically in their spellbook
Have a Primary List and they get extra slots for those spell and can learn up to 9th level
Have a Secondary Specialty that gives you spell options to 5th
The rest of the lists only give options to 3rd.

This way, from 1st to 5th level, most wizards are generalists with a small bit of specialization (since they get a few bonus slots/level in their specialty. After 5th level, the differences between wizards really begins to stand out and their specialties take centre stage.

I think you just re-invented major and minor domains from clerics in 2nd edition?

Which I kinda liked.

 

[Dausuul]

The school system is a wizard's approach to magic. It's analytical, mechanistic, scholarly; no other class should care about it at all. They would have their own ways of organizing spells, which might or might not be reflected in the rules, but certainly should not be subordinated to the wizard system.

A wizard considers fireball and ice storm and concludes they belong in the same group because both are calling up raw energy.

The sorcerer looks at the wizard and says, "Are you nuts? They're total opposites. One is fire and the other is cold. The spells that belong with fireball are Ashardalon's stride and flaming sphere."

The cleric replies, "No, the wizard is right, but the reason is that both are spells of wrath to punish the wicked. Disintegrate is another one in that group. Wall of fire, however, is a spell of guardianship -- I know you both want to put it with fireball, but it doesn't belong there at all."

The druid says, "The sorcerer's on the right track, but needs to look a little deeper. Fireball calls upon the elemental forces of fire; ice storm draws on the forces of water. But Ashardalon's stride mixes the swiftness and suddenness of air with the destructive power of fire. Nothing is purely one or the other. The living world doesn't conform to your neat boxes."

The bard says, "Fireball comes down to us from the Dragon-Mage of Eldamos, she who tamed the seven wyrms. Legend says that she also created cause fear and summon draconic spirit. Now, ice storm is the work of Gorthym, the King of Winter. It's said he was a half-giant, and he made thunderwave when he stomped the earth before battle."

The warlock shrugs. "How many people can I kill with it?"

 

[Undrave]

A friend and I were talking about how…disappointing the Wizard is to us in 5e, and we went over a ton of ideas to make them feel like thier lore, but one stands out.

Each of the 8 schools of magic are a proficiency, and the wizard gets the most of them at level 1.

That's pretty cool. Would certainly make Wizards feel like actual specialists!

 

[doctorbadwolf]

The school system is a wizard's approach to magic. It's analytical, mechanistic, scholarly; no other class should care about it at all. They would have their own ways of organizing spells, which might or might not be reflected in the rules, but certainly should not be subordinated to the wizard system.

A wizard considers fireball and ice storm and concludes they belong in the same group because both are calling up raw energy.

The sorcerer looks at the wizard and says, "Are you nuts? They're total opposites. One is fire and the other is cold. The spells that belong with fireball are Ashardalon's stride and flaming sphere."

The cleric replies, "No, the wizard is right, but the reason is that both are spells of wrath to punish the wicked. Disintegrate is another one in that group. Wall of fire, however, is a spell of guardianship -- I know you both want to put it with fireball, but it doesn't belong there at all."

The druid says, "The sorcerer's on the right track, but needs to look a little deeper. Fireball calls upon the elemental forces of fire; ice storm draws on the forces of water. But Ashardalon's stride mixes the swiftness and suddenness of air with the destructive power of fire. Nothing is purely one or the other. The living world doesn't conform to your neat boxes."

The bard says, "Fireball comes down to us from the Dragon-Mage of Eldamos, she who tamed the seven wyrms. Legend says that she also created cause fear and summon draconic spirit. Now, ice storm is the work of Gorthym, the King of Winter. It's said he was a half-giant, and he made thunderwave when he stomped the earth before battle."

The warlock shrugs. "How many people can I kill with it?"

My warlock take would be more a cynical rant about how all the mysticism is just foolish quackery, it’s all just math, power source, sympathetic links between components and effect that act as a focus, and a ritual perfected over centuries to tthe point where you can just speak the trigger word and let a little power slip out and off it goes.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

The bard says, "Fireball comes down to us from the Dragon-Mage of Eldamos, she who tamed the seven wyrms. Legend says that she also created cause fear and summon draconic spirit. Now, ice storm is the work of Gorthym, the King of Winter. It's said he was a half-giant, and he made thunderwave when he stomped the earth before battle."

Oh also, Bards should have Legend Lore as a class feature.

 

[Baron Opal II]

I developed spell lists based on guild / tradition rather than "schools". I paired them Necromancy / Conjuration, Evocation / Divination, and Illusion / Enchantment at first. The added and subtracted spells until I had twelve spells each for the first three levels, and nine spells each for the fourth through sixth levels of spell. Higher level spells must be researched. If it is on your list they are easier to learn. Many lower level spells are present in multiple guilds. Most higher level spells are unique to the guild. If the spells aren't on the list, they take twice as much time or resources to research, if at all.