Better Wizard play experience

[FacesOfMu]

Is being limited to four spells per level the issue?

 

Mostly in the sense that four is arbitrary and loreless. Four spells per tier doesn't seem to dovetail with grimoire swapping, number of casts per rest, number of spells available, or anything really. It's possible to make grimoires much more interesting for us.

[KDubya]

 

Is being limited to four spells per level the issue?

 

 

 

 

Maybe the issue is that four is too big of a number. It gives you enough options to cover all possible contingencies and once you figure out what four to take you never change.

 

Maybe it'd be better with only two or three spells per level in your grimoire? You'd probably need to swap them at some point then

Edited September 20, 2015 by KDubya

[KDubya]

double post

Edited September 20, 2015 by KDubya

[Tigranes]

When you write that, I feel like the point you want to make is about flaws in my character, motivations, or execution. Is that what you intended, Tigranes?

 

Nothing to do with your character, which I know little about and in any case isn't my business to comment on. It's all about the substance of your points. Now that I've read the full post:

 

I certainly agree with aims like making the wizard think hard about the spells they cast and the weakness of the enemies, but I think that this happens more in a Vancian system. In per enc, too often you think "yeah whatever it's a waste not to cast every spell I have" - e.g. the rogue has no reason to conserve the blinding and crippling strikes. In contrast, a Vancian mage will only use that level 5 spell when they really decide they need it - and maybe in anxiety that this will get them in trouble later on (although there's so many camping supplies around it's not a huge deal).

 

I'm also not convinced that the current system encourages people to spam their best spell, while per enc would do otherwise. I think that's a feature of spell balance, not Vancian/per enc. If Slicken is overpowered as it was in 1.00, then the only difference is instead of spamming it 4 times per rest people will spam it 4 times per encounter. 

 

Everything geared towards making grimoires more relevant and interesting I think is good, and as I say, maybe one way to do it is actually further limit the wizard's repertoire (e.g. a 'point buy' system where a level 4 spell costs 4 points and the whole grimoire has a limited number of points), and then compensate through varied and powerful grimoires (grimoires with unique spells that can't be 'learned' and pasted onto other grimoires; grimoires with a higher point buy limit; grimoires with a bonus to fire damage...)

[Sabotin]

Honestly I don't see the grimoire handling ever being a big thing for wizards. I suspect that forcing the use (by making spells or enemies much more situational) would fast become tedious and unfun. I'm not sure how others play wizards, but I'm mostly using certain spells as bread and butter. Where I would like to use something else I somehow work around it with other characters etc., not with grimoire switching.

 

One idea would be to make grimoires give different bonuses or modify spells inscribed in them somehow. Something like one book increases buff durations, another increases fire damage, etc. The optimal plays would then probably include multiple books, just to have the efficiency of certain spells be maximised.

 

Speaking about modifying spells, I think a metamagic system simplified into a buff would work well. You cast a buff and then the next spell you cast will have an improved effect. It would be easy to customise the use by just making the buff /encounter or /rest. Another aspect that could make a difference is the casting time of it, basicaly offering the wizard a tradeoff of speed for power. The function the metamagic buff might be a bit trickier, but maybe an increase that depends on the type of spell would work good. Damage for damage spells, duration for buffs/debuffs perhaps?

 

A similar thing could be used for the per encounter spells, too. You cast a buff and, while it's on, your (lower level) spells don't use up a cast. This could also be set as per encounter or rest and the duration modified to achieve the desired amount of spells more finely than just making them per encounter.

 

The power levels of the spells could be capped as well in some way to make wizards prefer higher level ones. For this I'd tweak the level based accuracy bonus abilities get. Perhaps in addition to character level it could look at the spell level and have it capped at let's say x2 spell level. With this the top level spells would be at peak efficiency while the lower ones would fall off a bit as you go along.

[abaris]

I wonder why you don't try to play a non textbook wizard. I have my first go at a wizard as player character and I tried my hand at a fighter/wizard hybrid. I upped con and dexterity and so far it works pretty well and is an interesting experience.

 

This game doesn't follow the D&D rules after all.