D&D General When to know a rule?

[James Gasik]

This is what we use for spell research currently (@DND_Reborn came up with it). Since our games rarely get much past level 12 it seems to be working ok. We use it for researching spells already in 5E, but also for designing custom spells.

We also expanded it to the other classes, using things like pilgrimages, prayer, and donations for divine, money and time spent on natural conservation for primal, and so forth; using Religion and Nature instead of Arcana in such cases.

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Hm. How has that worked out for you? It seems fairly trivial to make cantrips and low level spells.

 

[AnotherGuy]

I will say that having a DM such as @bloodtide who enjoys the world-building aspect and has done the work for 5,000 additional spells makes it worthwhile to play a caster within their campaign.
Researching, collecting/testing various components, obtaining scrolls/spellbooks as rewards, collaborating with other NPC casters, adventuring to quest for esoteric arcane sigils, negotiating for rituals...can be quite fun. A DM dreams of having such world-engaging players.

I have an Artificer who collaborated during some serious downtime with a fellow NPC dracologist (Leosin) in ToD and through a skill challenge and successfully created a lengthy ritual on the Blue Dragon Mask, which they managed to obtain, to diminish Tiamat's lightning breath weapon should she enter the prime material plane.

It is fun for a DM to surprise players. It is no fun if the player is aware of everything upfront. As a DM you create stuff to share with the players. And vice versa.

But this all goes back to @GrimCo's quote upthread

But personally, i think being charitable and giving DM benefit of the doubt that he isn't a-hole goes long way in building good relationship.

 

[Lanefan]

This is what we use for spell research currently (@DND_Reborn came up with it). Since our games rarely get much past level 12 it seems to be working ok. We use it for researching spells already in 5E, but also for designing custom spells.

We also expanded it to the other classes, using things like pilgrimages, prayer, and donations for divine, money and time spent on natural conservation for primal, and so forth; using Religion and Nature instead of Arcana in such cases.

View attachment 361760

That's not an awful table as a starting point, but I'd like to see some variability to it; also a means of reducing the check's DC by spending extra time and-or money over and above what's listed. For example, by the table a 2nd level spell takes two weeks and 500 g.p.; a researcher who throws 2000 g.p. at it and spends 3 months researching it should be able to knock that DC of 12 down to about 6.

The monetary costs for 0th-3rd level spells are also far too low, but then again low-level types in 5e tend to be dirt poor compared to what I'm used to: the table as written probably works if the researchers are only working on spells of the highest level they can cast.

Where it breaks a bit, however, is that a caster who can afford to design one new 9th level spell can, in the same time and for much less cost, flood the setting with 100 new 1st-level spells.

 

[Lanefan]

I will say that having a DM such as @bloodtide who enjoys the world-building aspect and has done the work for 5,000 additional spells makes it worthwhile to play a caster within their campaign.

To add to this: if those 5000 spells are indeed all different, and if there's any significant randomness in which of those spells a given wizard has in his-her book, the end result will be that each wizard's spell list might be truly unique. You could have three wizards in a party with three completely non-overlapping spell lists (until-unless they start swapping spells among themselves), which would be a pleasant change from all wizards trying to get the same 20-ish staple spells in their books as soon as they can.

The challenge for bloodtide would be to make it such that of those 5000 spells there's not too many that only work in corner-case or unusual situations.

An example of a corner-case spell might be a hypothetical spell Full Moon Fever that is extremely effective at taming/confining/killing were-creatures but only on the day-night of a full moon: great spell in the one situation it's designed for, but useless the other x-number of days of the month and-or if there's no were-creatures around.

 

[AnotherGuy]

That's not an awful table as a starting point, but I'd like to see some variability to it; also a means of reducing the check's DC by spending extra time and-or money over and above what's listed. For example, by the table a 2nd level spell takes two weeks and 500 g.p.; a researcher who throws 2000 g.p. at it and spends 3 months researching it should be able to knock that DC of 12 down to about 6.

The monetary costs for 0th-3rd level spells are also far too low, but then again low-level types in 5e tend to be dirt poor compared to what I'm used to: the table as written probably works if the researchers are only working on spells of the highest level they can cast.

Where it breaks a bit, however, is that a caster who can afford to design one new 9th level spell can, in the same time and for much less cost, flood the setting with 100 new 1st-level spells.

I'd also add that a high-level caster would likely have such mastery over spellcraft that not only would they be able to almost always successfully create a low level spell, with their modifiers being so high, but that it would take them less time to create low-level spells.

 

[TiQuinn]

Not sure how it applies to a 5th Edition DnD discussion. But sure?

(Looks at D&D General tag on the post)

 

[EzekielRaiden]

(Looks at D&D General tag on the post)

It may be tagged General, but Bloodtide runs 5e. He has said so numerous times in numerous threads.

 

[TiQuinn]

It may be tagged General, but Bloodtide runs 5e. He has said so numerous times in numerous threads.

With regards to homebrew, and I know this is going to be deeply controversial for you, it’s not relevant. Bloodtide also indicated he’s run multiple editions.

 

[AnotherGuy]

I'm not sure what the relevance of edition has to do with anything.
The OP query is not about about x or y mechanic of any specific edition.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Well, while there may not be a default time or cost to work with for spell creation, there are two other considerations. One, the spell creation guidelines (we know WotC breaks their own rules here, buffing damage and nerfing healing, but that's a whole other conversation) and of course, what the DM will allow. Just like any other option, what you have access to is decided before play begins, with the DM having a pretty strong say. Asking for a spell all your own is right up there (IMO) with asking "Hey can I play a Bloodhunter or a Gunslinger?".

So most likely, the only way you'd get a WeWinEverything spell is if your DM is asleep at the wheel, lol.

Besides, we already have ways to win D&D with stuff WotC published, like Wish/Simulacrum "Snow Cone Wish Factories", 18th level Wizards using Spell Mastery on Silvery Barbs and using Shapechange to become a Marilith to gain a free reaction on each turn (!), using Wall of Stone and Fabricate to build massive fortifications in days, or using Teleport Circle to upend world trade, among other things.

Magic is pretty cool that way. The trick to my mind is regulating how one accesses these kinds of effects, not removing them altogether.