Yes I do envision a few other changes to magic in general. Perhaps they aren’t actual changes so much as play considerations. Very little of this is set in stone and I’m open to any ideas:
- I want to mitigate or eliminate any spells that are essentially plot breakers, or spells that trivialize many natural challenges that would fit well in this type of campaign. Alex made a list in a thread awhile back, though I can’t remember where. Here’s my list:
Spells I would consider eliminating: Detect Evil, Read Languages, Create Water, Create Food, Tongues.
Spells I would consider reducing the power of: Knock, Find Traps, Locate Object, Speak with Dead.
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With regard to the Sleep spell in particular, I know what you’re driving at, but I don’t have an answer, other than I’d like to change spells as little as possible, simply because it’s a lot of work.
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I’ve also been considering having cantrip-styled spells for arcane casters.
I envision it as building on the concept of Spell Signatures. Coming up with them would be mostly up to the player and approved by the GM. Rather than try to explain it, here are a couple examples:
Light:
Cantrip - the caster may illuminate any translucent object (essentially a light bulb) roughly the size of an apple to shed light as a torch, as long as the caster is conscious and holding it. It may be affixed to another implement such as a wand or staff. Yes… I sort of ripped this whole idea from the scene of Gandalf in LOTR, leading the Fellowship through the Mines of Moria.
Ventriloquism or maybe Magic Mouth:
Cantrip - the caster can speak without moving his lips and counts as taking the Mimicry proficiency twice.
There is a lot of fertile ground here IMO. I’d probably want to limit the number of them… perhaps equal to the number of 1st level spells known? I’d also seriously consider them off limits for the most popular spells (such as sleep and magic missile… though making people drowsy could be really fun!).
- Magic Items: I would prefer to limit the amount of magic items quite a bit… Conan, nor Turin have any magic items for the most part. Actually doing that though kinda rains on the fun for players… they always get excited at the prospect of a new magic item.