I have been talking to a few people regarding the level of magic on amia, and it's influences on the roleplay, plots and atmosphere. It has become something I would like to discuss.

I am not a big fan of high magic settings, and in addition I have always been irked by the fact that the amia setting resembles the forgotten realms on mega-steriods. With that I mean while the characters are level 30, they are more on the line of level 10 to 15 in regards to the vanilla FR comparison, while the level of powerful npcs hence is heightened to be more on line of level 40s and 50s.

In the Forgottem Realms epic characters are rare. It is also different for a pen and paper campaign having a group of legendary adventurers fighting the greatest threats to toril, and having an island filled with a caste of three hundred of them. Vangerdahast is level 17, Elminster is level 27, Gromph Baerne is level 22 and Drizzt is level 16. All of these characters in the standard setting pale in comparison to the power of the standard adventurers of the amia setting, and those are one in a million characters of incredible power and prestige.

With none-spellcaster classes it is no problem, as it is simply reflected by more damage and ab. In turn the ac and hp can simply be heightened by the spawns, just making numbers bigger. However, when involving clerics, druids and mages we suddenly find ourselves in the situation that almost all of those characters (except those still leveling) have access to 9tier and epic spells. Still, those nwn spells are primarily all combat focused in one way or another, and hence not that problematic when one disregards the flamboyent spelleffects of a hellball.

Summons have been toned down quite a bit from the past. Instead of being able to summon balors and pitfiends, we summon less lore-wise powerful creatures.

What becomes a problem is when we add pen and paper spells to the equation. There is well written and badly written source material. There is an abudance of spells, and way too many that are custom tailored for difficult situations making this far too easy. When we are faced with a problem, we resort to finding a powerful mage, having him browse the books for a spell and then deal with the problem easily, instead of having our characters needing to really use their brains.

My suggestion would be to customize the magic on amia. We are to a great portion our own setting, and why not make use of it? Spells and prayers need to be learned. All pen and paper spells are unlearned and need to be requested. This means the dm team can weed out spells simply counter-productive by being overpowered.

The spell level, required sacrafice (spell components and xp) are scaled in appropriation of the power of the spell. Certain spells simply remain out of the grasp of the characters, for instance wish and mindrape and so forth. We create a custom topic where all of those spells are listed, with spell level, required componenents, xp and gold cost, and the description of what they do. If you cast a powerful incantation to divine someone who was kidnapped, it will cost the wizard a great deal of xp and gold, making the use of such not something to just yawn about.

In addition it adds the very cool aspect caster characters actually need to put an effort to learn a great deal of their spells. You can no longer simply kill 200 orcs to learn analyze dweaomer or wall of force. In other words we customize the forgotten realms further to make a multiplayer world of level 30 characters cool, fun, immersive and believable.

I have a lot of thoughts on this topic but I'm on my phone so let me summarise:

-This is a problem with the setting, though yeah with the asymmetry of NWN/D&D it's a bit worse
-In fairness, sorcs don't have it great as is
-Effectively you want P&P use to be standardised and policed. This has been discussed before and I'll sidestep the bulk of it but, I'm concerned that it will lead to people being bullied into accepting P&P use (it has happened).
-Certain spells are already policed like True Res and I think Wish. DMs have insisted on certain spells being researched before they can be used, in events.
-Mindrape is a roundly terrible spell which no one should ever use including DMs. There is the perfectly serviceable Programmed Amnesia if you want that sort of effect.

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@Thanatopsis#6293

From a personal experience, as a player who playes a wizard and relays heavily on PnP spells I can tell you that when a certain spell was deemed overpowered, DMs agreed upon that the spell would simply be outside Amia spellcaster's grasp. So in a way it is already being done (at least by Nivo and Glim). Also, whenever the spell is important enough to drain the XP, the XP was drained (at least in Tarkuul). Requesting every single tiny spell a normal mage should know would become a huge chore for the DMs I believe.

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I'll second Dead. I've lost XP for both wizardly and clerical spells. I've also had a wish blow up in my character's face, which (in my opinion) is how it should be. I think if you're going to police PnP spells, limit it at least. Limit it to maybe spells that affect others.

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Aly'dra Zau'ana: Priestessish Of Eilistraee
Danika Nefzen: Druid of the Earthmother
Delia Am'Anodel: Paladin of Torm

Maybe this is something that should be looked at more by the playerbase, rather than DM regulation. Rather than creating a whole new structure of cleared and non-okay Amian spells, what if we suggested methods in which magic can be performed in a way that is 'modest'? So rather than regulate, list out some suggestions and help players find creative solutions.

I've said it before and I'll say it again-- Good RP is contagious. If people want a less powerful magical world, those people will play it responsibly and in that manner, encouraged by others who perform the same.
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Here's a few things I do. I'm absolutely not saying that what I do is 'the kewl', and anything else isn't. Like Phearnun, I appreciate low magic settings, and I often go a bit out of my way to keep my spells and abilities tamed in a way that encourages future Rp, rather than instant solutions. These are just suggestions. They're not required by any-- just food for thought! I'm sure the rest of the player-base can come up with thoughts on how to 'lessen' the magical experience on Amia with their own characters in ways I wouldn't have thought of before.

One thing I do as a Cleric is put limitations on my healing, or come up with ways that magical healing could be harmful. It's really easy to just cast Heal or Greater Restoration on someone and be like, "There! You're all better!" But I've often found when playing my own character's wounds, that I don't -want- them immediately healed with magic, because I enjoy the Rp of playing an injured figure. When someone casts a spell on me like this, its hard to then justify why my character would still be ill. So generally, I try to be considerate of the other player's investment into the injury, and keep to mundane or light magical healing as best I can.

Here's a few excuses I've found to lessen the general effect of my own healing spells (Again, these are just my own tools, and are not DM approved):
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- While a heal spell does tend to all wounds, the mind may still lag behind, believing the body to be in ill-repair. This may produce a feeling of exhaustion or weakness, even though the body is in mint condition. Exposed practice could mitigate this, but usually the subject of the healing spell will remain generally fatigued. While possible to fight through the fatigue, my clerics highly encourage the subjects not to-- though in desperate times, there come desperate measures, of course.
- Healing completely with magic while the body isn't arranged properly could lead to scarring, lack of future muscle development, etc. By using mundane healing to "Set" the bones first or stitch the wounds will allow for little complication.
- Immediate Mental healing through magic may result in emotional injury in the future. In some cases, the subject has to discover healing through their own emotions to validate it. Magical mental healing may lead to general feelings of emptiness or prolonged regret.
- I also make my healing magic hurt. At least for the first few moments. The body stitching back together is likely an uncomfortable and frightening experience, and the mind may issue a series of pain nerves/fear emotions in response.
- Immediate magical healing, easily available, may inhibit learning from mistakes. Sometimes, a bit of rest and recovery is just as good, if not better, than healing. You'll be sure to be more careful next time, after you've had to moan and groan in a bed for a few days.
- For Epic PnP magic, I try to arrange a number of other Clerics to directly assist. I draw pentagrams, create protections, and encourage long procedures. I look for negative consequences to slap into the mixture as often as I'm allowed to.

What this all does for my character is instill an odd sense of uncertainty in him. While he has the -power- to instantly heal folks from a bloody pulp, he believes there are secondary and tertiary consequences to magical healing. So he often only resorts to it when it is in dire need. This gives me, as a player, more of a feel of a less-magical Cleric.
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I also believe that a lot of DM's have this kind of problem in mind. Anything that's considerably epic or large, they take careful consideration in approving. I'm not too sure on how to make wizards and sorcerers feel less dominating in the PnP sphere, but hopefully my own 'excuses' for clerics can plant a few seeds of thought.

Mr. Hackums approach to healing is how I've often thought of healthyng magics in general. This is largely due to the fact that I'm unfamiliar with D&D PnP mechanics and lore but have read several fantasy books with their own takes on healing magic and I've more or less averaged them out in my mind to very similar effect. In my mind healing magic, be it potion or direct spell, feeds off of an individual's own healing ability, so depending on the severity of the injury this could leave the healed person somewhat tired to exhausted and needing to consume a few thousand calories or more to replenish their body. Similiarly the healing process is likely very uncomfortable or painful unless the one doing the healing has enough experience or knowledge of medicine/anatomy to be able to anesthetize the area while healing. And to heal one's self would be nearly impossible without tremendous focus required to block out the pain since the magical anesthetic can't be applied to one's self.

Granted this only solves healing magic in this scenario and not arcane magics, but I do feel that it helps lower the feeling of overpowered healing magic, and brings it down towards a more mundane level without the need of actual intervention. I agree that a lot of what would feel like an oppresively powerful magical world is maintained or brought down by how the characters prefer to view/play it. My personal illusions about healing magics get broken when I see someone raised from the dead and they carry on like they simply stopped to tie their shoe, but I've also seen how someone reacted to how I played being healed and later incorporated it similarly themselves.

Mmhm. And that's what makes me believe that if we really emphasize this style of roleplay in a way that makes it enjoyable for all parties involved, that people will start to practice it.

It's simply extremely difficult to mandate. Nor am I sure that we should. While some players here enjoy the idea of a low magic server, there are others who have come to Amia because of its High magic level. And they're neither right or wrong, its simply a matter of taste. If an attempt was made to regulate these sort of affairs much more thoroughly than the case-by-case method that's used currently by our DM team, then we're going to encounter a lot of opposition from players who enjoy the high magic feel.

That's why I encourage trying to make these changes from the ground up. Firstly, by practicing modesty in magic yourselves (Should you wish to see the change in others, change yourself first!). People will gradually begin to learn who enjoys lower levels of magic, and who doesn't mind the high magic levels, and they'll cater their RP accordingly. Or group themselves with like-minded individuals.

We'll see how long that lasts when things get competitive and self-imposed restrictions are nothing more than a nuisances. Am I cynical for thinking nobody's going to stick with it when it's no longer convenient unless they're forced to?

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Aernoud Van Brabant: Heir of the House. Proprietor of the Beer Wagon.
"Go to the Mayfields, have a pint, and wait for this to blow over."
Aurelius: Sunmaster of Amaunator. Contemplative. Aspirant to Transcendance.
"Sol Invictus"

For my own wizard (and when I’m DMing) I generally try to make sure that any PnP spells used are in the purview of the favored schools of that character. For instance, my wizard is primarily a Transmuter, with some inclination towards Evocative and Abjurative magics. He has good theoretical knowledge of Necromancy, but no practical experience, so he doesn’t generally cast any spells from that school. Likewise he has never had much use for Divinations, so I try to keep any spells from that school to lower-tier schools (I don’t think he’s cast a Legend Lore or Vision in his life).

One way I’ve also found that helps “combat the high magic feel” ICly, is to keep spell effects subtle. My wizard has one custom spell, with one more in the works, and both have very little visual effects to them. Personally I find that if a spell is cast with only a small bit of VFX to mechanically show that it’s worked (or failed) it goes a long way to keeping things feeling a little less high-magic, whereas the big flashy effects and full array of buffs always make me feel like my character is a glorified Christmas tree. Granted, for large epic rituals that involve more than one arcanist, ya you’re going to want some flashy visuals. But for the “mundane” castings, low-key isn’t a bad thing.

I will also add a comment about the “run to a wizard to solve the problem” thing. That’s not only a symptom of a high-magic feel to things. I’m probably going to be a bit unpopular for saying this, but it’s also a symptom of a lapse in creativity. Sure you can Legend Lore some information about an enemy leader… but why not have someone who’s stealthy sneak into the leader’s camp and observe the guy himself? You might even overhear a snippet of his plans, rather than just getting legends about his past. Sure you can have a mage cast Vision to try to learn who’s behind the creation of a deadly poison and what the antidote might be… but why not have someone experienced in herbalism and mundane healing methods identify the poison and it’s components, maybe even down to one particular region that is the only known place this certain plant extract grows? Those are only a few random examples of how there are more creative (and potentially more rewarding!) ways of solving issues.

Is the magic readily available? Yes. Is it the best course? Sometimes yes, but just as many times no.

To use an example, there is currently a problem in Tarkuul that has someone entirely stumped, that has had magic thrown at it and gotten them no closer to the solution. Sometimes the only answer –is- the mundane way.

Yes I have to agree that I feel like the level of magic on Amia is playing a much larger roll in roleplay, plots and atmosphere then it did back when I started years ago.

Not that it is a bad thing but I know I offen find myself feeling more like some USELESS pet rock because all I can contribute is what I can physically do more or less.
I can't use fancy PVP spells to place a Consecrate,Hallow or one of the many diffrent defence warding spells to a location.
I can't do Scrying or any other large number of Divination spells to learn the weakness or goals of the foe threatening impending doom on my people.
I can't craft a army of golems,elemental,undead or other summons to even the battle against the uncountable hordes.
Neither can I use the arts to dispell portals,gates, magical barriers or a number of other things or craft to rare magical objects or Potions.

I try my best to not let this stop me from trying and some DMs are open to using other methods to achieve the same goal, but over the years I find thats not allways the case, I know when I researched/invented/crafted my negative energy potions the team seemed ok with me using diffrent methods and afew liked my use of ingenuity to do so,even with my lack of magic and such.
But in the last few months I noticed a request for potions and a reply from one of the team was "Why don't you have brew potion" like brew potion is the key to potion crafting even if that only applys to people using magic to craft potions, not people who use what would be passed as chemistry. Sort of put of a fear of the focus on magic being the be all end all.

Monsters have been getting stronger some to ungodly amounts but we still have a linear scale on "balance" of 30 fighter against say a 30 wizard that does not factor in what I listed above that casters can bring to the table where the fighter brings "hey guys, if I left click I attack! *swoosh swoosh*" to the table.
Now factor in how DMs added in Books of Transmutation that lets them change the effects of the spells to turn what might have been a useless spell into a very powerful one, Fighters and other Melee classes cant do anything like what BoT does, and that was given to them for free as its just random loot table drops

So I find the fighters/melee heavy PCs who are less flexable then Casters are fighting monsters with even more HP,AC and AB then befor in some cases are geting left in the dust because they bring less to the table RP wise in events and cant stand up to the monsters like they used to (dev crit and heal potion nerf)


Thats just my opinion, and I'll stick with my guy and push the limits of "balance" as best I can to combat the increasing power of monsters and usefulness of non-casters.

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================-<Cory ShadowFlame>-================
Risenlord-Shifter(OMG a Non-Dragon Shifter that can hold his own in PvE)

I think this sounds like a lot of work for not much benefit. Amia isn't an overpowered setting because of the widespread casual use of PnP spells; I'd say that's only a tiny portion of the issue. Amia is overpowered because it's crawling with lvl 30 characters, and unless someday there's a server vault wipe and everyone has to start over from lvl 2 , in conjunction with a massive rules change that makes leveling way, way harder (unlikely), things are pretty much always going to be as they are. Maybe I'm being cynical, but I'm pretty sure I'm not wrong.

Also, what good would it do to impose a systemwide power correction on the three spellcasting classes with broad access to PnP spells, but leave the other equally overpowered classes untouched? A melee character loaded up with epic gear is just as out of tune with canon FR as is a wizard throwing around Wish spells like candy. I have a sneak character that can reach bonuses in Hide and Move Silently that PnP never heard of. Does a solution for them come with this suggestion too?

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Winner of Amia's "Most Ethical Time Traveler" award 2026

Character Portraits!

Well, you could always create a cap at level 20. Level 21 would need to be requested, and requires an appropriately epic effort on behalf of the character. This would mean people at level 30 would really have worked for it, and are genuinely.. well, epic.

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Aernoud Van Brabant: Heir of the House. Proprietor of the Beer Wagon.
"Go to the Mayfields, have a pint, and wait for this to blow over."
Aurelius: Sunmaster of Amaunator. Contemplative. Aspirant to Transcendance.
"Sol Invictus"

Sure, that might work. You think it's likely to happen?

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Winner of Amia's "Most Ethical Time Traveler" award 2026

Character Portraits!

This would likely put an extreme overhead on the DM's who should be allowed to focus their time on fun and engaging plots and not a constant instream of level approval requests. Plus, what will constitute an epic advancement for each and every person which would have to be considered independently for everyone.

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Nhalis Sauvan - Flamboyantly Amusing Brasskin-Bard
Zal Marrak - Druid with a case of Shifter [inactive]

There'll be snowball fights in Hades when it does.

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Named Most Influential Character, Amia Awards 2011

I really want to chime in and give my support for what Hackums is saying here. I knew another cleric a while back that had a similar mindset, maybe even taken a bit further, and the amount of difference it made was huge. A trip to the Doc to get patched up after a raid became a separate event in and of itself.
The main thing I noticed about how he operated was that even though he was a cleric of Salandra (initially at least) he viewed heal spells and the like as merely one part of a larger doctor's bag. Sort of how we might view scientific medical progress today. Magic could regrow bone and ligament, but an operation was still required to go in and fix each part individually. It attached a sort of dread to having to go under the knife, and there were consequences if he botched his rolls on the job.
As far as I'm aware the lore is there to support this. Heal spells working to repair a body to match a metaphysical "template" that the body and mind are used to. A poorly healed wound that had complications attached would become a part of said template that a heal spell alone couldn't fix.

Though this is just my view, I think subtle things like this can add a lot to character development. The lack of an instant "everything is better" button at your disposal can give a lot of new challenges to overcome and more reason to reflect on past action.

Oh, how I can keep wishing...

I disagree with you there. As an example we will take a vanilla paladin (level 10) and an amia paladin (level 30). As long as we scale the monster in the same relation of power, the difference is only that we roll with bigger numbers. 10 ab against 25ac, or 45ab against 55ac makes no difference, as long as the monster stays the same. That is how you can easily have the server reflect how powerful a character is. For instance, if you make ogres the level 30 hunting areas, your character will be the roughly the equivilant of what ever CR an ogre has in standard FR.

That is why I always suggested using the less lorewise powerful monsters for summons. If a gate summon gets you an erinyes in place of a pit fiend for example, we do not make everything overly-epic. The same way I do not like us being able to hack through 200 giants and 200 balors at level 30, and I in the past suggested using those ic powerful monsters more as mini-bosses. Instead of meeting 6 frost giants in Brogendenstein, you replace those with the chance of at times meeting 1 frost giant that takes just as much an effort to bring down as the former spawn of 6 required. But that is another topic I do not want to derail the thread with, even if it is related.

Now, with druids, clerics and especially wizards that is a whole different ball game once you introduce the pen and paper spells. Unlike the combat spells that damage wise stand also in relation to the spawn you fight (just like the other classes like paladins and fighters) the pen and paper spells do not, because they are not just numbers of damage and difficulty of saves.

I do get what you're saying, however it's sort of been my view that those gifted with magic ares supposed to understand and comprehend things far beyond the grasp of us simple sword swingers.

I agree with you completely, and they should continue to do so. I am not suggesting to nuter those classes and characters. There are great spellcaster characters who use pnp spells, and have very often enriched the plots and storylines through them. I am talking about adjusting them to go into line with the rest, just how we decided that having devils, celestials, full dragons and vampires hanging out together outside the temple of torm in cordor was a bit too much. I think some of the spells are just a bit too much. Or how we decided bigbying lolth in plots was a bit too much.

This is turning out to be a 'what is programmed into the game' or not discussion.

Mechanically you can adjust any number of creatures to be resistant to spells, damage, etc if they wanted to up the difficulty on that end. Just as much as they could have them spawn with any number of effects to counter half of what a wizard/druid/sorc/etc is tossing. Problem is that the Non-caster classes can swing, swing, swing, swing, swing all day long and they're still effective in combat. A wizard is Pew, pew, pew, click, click, click...damn out of spells. Now where did I put that dagger?

PnP spells if they're allowed don't come into factor for mechanical fights. They're RP based and can be handled by the DM involved with said plot. That gives a lot of leeway to how it'll work or not, and the DM's get the final say. They could require more stringent physical materials to cast spells, up the XP costs more in-line with the mechanical numbers, call for a longer cast time of hours/days rather than minutes, etc..

To comment about FR being high magic? Yep. Absolutely. You have a world where the gods quite often show up and have a hand in dealings with things. Elminster in 3.0 is actually level 35-ish. With 5 levels of Archmage and a retarded number of spells and such. This world has always been about lots and lots and LOTS of magic. Otherwise you'd want Kyrinn or some of the other settings. Things may have taken a turn with settings like Game of Thrones where the magic is toned way back, but I've always appreciated this setting for letting you raise the magic flag high and throwing that fireball like you mean it.

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Nhalis Sauvan - Flamboyantly Amusing Brasskin-Bard
Zal Marrak - Druid with a case of Shifter [inactive]

I'm not going to post here, but I have to say that ...



... I approve of this. It bothers me as well, because I am also not a fan of high magic settings.

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Mercadier - *sleeps six feet under the warm sands of Khem*
Alex - Life is adventure or nothing!
Eddie - Sex, drugs and rock'n... more sex.
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Obsidian (inactive)

To add some crunch to Glim's sentiments, I generally think spellcasters should be limited to their areas of focus in regards to splatbook spells. I'd propose a rule that 4-5th level spells require spell focus, 6-7th greater, and 8-9th epic. It certainly doesn't -solve- the problem, but it drastically cuts down on overpowered PnP spells unless the mage is specialized in them. It might even encourage mages to make less powerful builds mechanically to have a wider range of RP utility, or focus on less mechanically preferable schools.

Fair enough, but from what I see it has less to do with a structural balance issue and more simply to do with the plots themselves. Many of them lately have been heavily magical in nature and it stand to reason that you'd want a mage of some sort to be figuring that out. Perhaps a solution would be simply to have some more mundane (in the magic sense) plots thrown in?

This I wouldn't mind seeing at all. It is just a little ridiculous that creatures that're supposed to be the biggest badasses next to demon princes themselves can get rolled like a drunk in an alley by your average adventurer.

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Named Most Influential Character, Amia Awards 2011

And perhaps some DMs have been doing just this.

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Playing:
Marcus Valis

I certainly hope not. If Amia goes down either path it will be a sad day.

Was there not a huge discussion months back about how we were loosing players? We've been recovering, however doing something like that will probably drive off half of our population. And I don't think that's a pessimistic estimate, I think it'd be far higher. What that would do is completely change the server we play on. Not only that, but everything would have to be changed in order to make the server even fair on a PvE standpoint.

I mean, and I'm not trying to be rude to anyone in particular, but does anyone that ever suggests something like the above quotes think about the implications what what they are suggesting? It's not as simple as making a cap at 20. You have to rebalance creatures, for one. Semi-simple, but then you have to also take into account every build is going to change. The server could not be planned on what people can aspire to it would have to be reconfigured around what most people will aspire to. There's a lot of Dev time that has gone into Amia over the years, a lot of that would likely have to change.

Despite what Honeydew said, there would still be a huge amount of time invested into changing things. And also, how would you explain everything suddenly changing? We would have to essentially reboot the server.

As for wiping the vaults and making leveling harder ... why take the fun out of the game? Some people -hate- leveling, so are they to be penalized even more by a harsher leveling system? I can't stand leveling sometimes, but if you want to be mechanically more powerful (which contrary to what some think, it is necessary at times) you have to level.



Now, on target again with the magic thoughts: I'm not swayed, really. Magic is overpowered to some extent, you can't escape that. It's magic, after all. Making every since caster character request every single PnP spell would be tedious and time consuming for the players and the DM Team. The DMs already make players research some spells (not just custom ones) and XP is taken away where appropriate (I've seen it happen and had it happen). But to make every since PnP spell require vast amounts of research, well... that's just counter-intuitive to a game.



Nail + head right there.
That's what I did when I assembled the PnP spellbook on Lucious. Most of his are Abj/Div (since he's ESF in both), with some Universal and other nifty ones tossed in. Did I go with every Abj/Div spell, though? Nope. Some he has to learn, even though I knew some projects in Kohl would need some (I think I purposefully left one or two out, even, just to be difficult). Plus, I knew he could likely learn them from someone, providing even more tasty are-peas for use all.

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Whomst've'll'd'mn't I play:
Salema Nefahri :: A penny for your thots
Zrae'a'stra'fryn :: That which nightmares are made of
Khasir :: From the East a storm is coming

Also, keep in mind that with the PnP spells, they are only part of the issue. What you're also contending with is we have a server of some highly educated and right bastards of ingenuity. I'm friends with a few of them. So if you give them enough time to sit around with these spells for a plot you'll go from, "Lets cast X to protect ourselves." to "If we get together and combine spells X, Y, Z, and these materials over here....VIOLA! Orbiting medieval rail gun! Now lets go kick some epic creature ass!" Which makes the whole magic thing rather attractive. Give them less time to plan for these contingencies and you'd probably see less of it, until they have free time in which case they'll work on them then.

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Nhalis Sauvan - Flamboyantly Amusing Brasskin-Bard
Zal Marrak - Druid with a case of Shifter [inactive]

You are absolutely right, in fact.

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Mercadier - *sleeps six feet under the warm sands of Khem*
Alex - Life is adventure or nothing!
Eddie - Sex, drugs and rock'n... more sex.
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Obsidian (inactive)

I find this happens lot in amia. Thus i find my character is just muscle for any combat an event. Granted i can cast detect evil during a dm plot but it never in years has it worked. This year during a plot i did as such, cast it with no evil off the npc. Folks looked at me calling me an idiot. Months later it turns out i was right all along. My point here is what pnp abilities are available to a my character are worth nothing. And yes the spell can be avoided but it comes across with me that a dm didn't want his plot be spoiled so soon. understandable in some circumstances but not very spontaneous rp.

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Sir Azeriel El'johnson - Tormtar and Triadic Knight

You don't like High Magic Settings?

Interesting Question:

Why are you playing on a server which uses a setting that is moderate to high magic as is?

Faerun is a Moderate to high magic Setting folks. Amia skews in favour of higher Magic admittedly but even still there are some things Wizards here just probably are NOT doing for sake of balance purposes. (At least not PCs. NPCs whom we're out to stop cause their plans are just plain bad for EVERYONE... )

To be honest, while yes I have seen a lot of plots where stupidly high magic was involved or needed, I have also seen good plots where such levels of magic was quite the liability.

Also, whiel now I play a Wizard primarily, in the past one of the main plots where more mundane aptitude was valued, I got to put in a decent chunk of work and was rewarded for it even though my character was effing assassinated (ironically, for unrelated reasons).

Incidentally: I do not recall any high arcana being used in his investigation either and yet, I am pretty sure the bulk of the facts got to the right people.

Some plots where the higher magics were needed I think could have been run better, but I don't blame anyone or anything but perhaps slight inexperience or just the issues which happen at a first time running of a major event.

Having read the second portion of your post though:

I agree with forcing a modicum more effort in learning of PnP or custom spells (something which is already in place for the second) but finding a good way to balance that fairly, without having to add a bunch of complication in the Server is going to be an interesting challenge.

When doing Tuomas' PnP spellbook I tried to stick to what made sense for him, his profession, his School Focuses and his race/predilictions.

Because there is none better at this moment. Quite a cheap question, no offense.

Both servers are pretty much filled with people all the time, RP is mostly solid, so you overlook things like that. However, it does not mean they do not bother you.

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Mercadier - *sleeps six feet under the warm sands of Khem*
Alex - Life is adventure or nothing!
Eddie - Sex, drugs and rock'n... more sex.
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Obsidian (inactive)

Fair but it is a weighing point to consider when thinking about this quandry and one of the most obvious, even if it might've been the Elephant in the room.

Faerun is probably the only setting where a cow breaks wind and then glows for the next hour because of the magic in it.

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Nhalis Sauvan - Flamboyantly Amusing Brasskin-Bard
Zal Marrak - Druid with a case of Shifter [inactive]

No, that's when it burps. When it farts whatever is behind it glows.

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Whomst've'll'd'mn't I play:
Salema Nefahri :: A penny for your thots
Zrae'a'stra'fryn :: That which nightmares are made of
Khasir :: From the East a storm is coming

I think it really depends on who you roleplay with, 90% of the time the roleplay I run into has little to do with fancy magic. Admittedly I have been a part of high-magic roleplay and it /is/ a fact of life on Amia, but I really feel it comes down to who you roleplay with. What about the people who enjoy high magic roleplay?

Yeah it's a stretch to call Forgotten Realms anything less than high magic.

Also reducing the level cap to 20 isn't going to do anything about P&P spells so it's a completely separate issue. As Phearnun (never gonna stop calling him that) said, increase levels on a non-caster class and all they get better at is mundane things. Swing sword better. Harder to spot. Their scope is limited. They affect maybe a few lives. A caster with P&P spells (especially proper Epic spells) can influence a plot on a massive scale. Single spells can duplicate the utility of an entire non-caster class (eg: Divination can cut down hours of legit scouting/spying over the module into a few minutes of emotes). Toning this down would be nice but a formally-enforced system may be kind of messy and DMs already have good control over what goes on in their plots.

The only issue with high level non-casters is that they fight scarier things with more ease. Well, deal? The authentic Forgotten Realms experience can't be produced by NWN, the system just isn't there. P&P overuse is a bit of a bigger issue because of how much of a game-changer it is.

Good thing is that casters aren't really that common, people have more fun with the mundane classes. Have problem, find wizard. Wizard busy/not available, try to solve problem by self. Always been my policy.

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@Thanatopsis#6293

Really? I have a feeling that lately I have seen nothing but war clerics and mages. Oh, and paladins, naturally.

The moment I see a pure fighter or barbarian (PURE , not the /WM/Rogue bastardised ones) I'll quit smoking... ... (not, but I'd still like to meet them)

And by the way, I know how funny it sounds from someone who is playing a "spellblade", so do not fret and point it out if you want.

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Mercadier - *sleeps six feet under the warm sands of Khem*
Alex - Life is adventure or nothing!
Eddie - Sex, drugs and rock'n... more sex.
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Obsidian (inactive)

My problem is not the magic plots, or wanting more mundane plots. Far from it. For instance the Cordor plot is greatly influenced by magic, but there it has a more mysterious mythical element and a great difficulty and sacrafice in regard to it. When Ulrik needs to conduct his rituals and powerful spells, because Robert can at most make his sword glow, is just how it should be. It is also interresting and enjoyable, and it has added greatly to the story.

The element I have trouble enjoying is when magic replaces the need for characters to think or when it replaces the need for certain cool characters or endeavors. The sheer volume and availability of spells that often have the effect to turn rp lazy and unimaginative is what bugs me. I am also not suggesting we change the FR setting to a magic level like The Dark Eye or Game of Thrones has, even though I would love a server in that magic style with this community a lot more.

I am suggesting that we move back into the direction of the FR setting itself. When these spells are harder to come by, when they are not available to such a brandwith of characters, when they have sacrafice bound to them, then they will be used more rarely. It makes the spells special, and also allows more mundane methods to be employed in less pressing situations.

If we go with the access to all these pnp spells as used currently, we are essentially saying that the baseline of amia is a forgotten realms world, only that the common adventurer is as or more powerful as Elminster in vanilla FR, and our foes are just more epic. Saying that FR is simply high magic also does not convince me, as level 9 spells are not the average.

I'm beginning to think I might be the only one who actively enjoys this disparity, because to be honest the ability to say "screw you, I don't understand this, I don't know what the consequences are, but I'll be damned if I'm not gonna be the one to bludgeon my way to victory anyway!" really is a big part of what makes the experience enjoyable and rewarding to me

I agree with you about the problem, Phearnun, but not the cause. I just haven't ever encountered this widespread casual overreliance on PnP spells. It just doesn't strike me as that big a deal. Far more troublesome to me is the trivialization of epic level gear, which isn't specific to spellcasting classes.

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Winner of Amia's "Most Ethical Time Traveler" award 2026

Character Portraits!

This is just my experience - having problems and constantly having to slog it out the hard way because of all the PCs on hand none of them are utility casters. Paladins don't count anyway. Neither do sorcs, because they can spare like... a handful of their spells known for P&P spells. Unless they're cheesy about it.

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@Thanatopsis#6293

No.



.. .Uhhh.... FR is the classic high magic setting, where wizards and magic abounds, pretty freely... this isn't Dark Siun or Ravenloft....

"PnP overuse" shouldn't be an issue because it is part and parcel to the game we play: The full experience can't be generated within NWN and so we turn outwards.



Detect Evil is peanuts to beat and you shouldn't accuse the DM because your spell like equivalent of a level 1 spell was beaten by was was probably an epic level creature/person.

Drummroll:



Boom, winner. However: This isn't something you actually WANT to fix at this point, or you will kill the server, in all likelihood.

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Davion Telemos - Monk of the Four Winds
Korthan Isharnos - Dragon Shaman of Thunder Spirit Zamasham

I thought you couldn't use a PnP spell without the consent of all the PC’s affected by it? I thought that for the really high level PnP spells we have to get a DM to oversee?

I can't be the only one that has spied on or gotten captured on purpose to find out about the enemy (instead of magicing them to death). I can’t be the only one that checked on the structural integrity of an area/building before slamming it with magicness. I can’t be the only one who’s PC RP’s Finding Familiar or How to play Hellball catch without destroying the surrounding area or To Raise or not to Raise. I can’t be the only one who’s PC isn’t all glowy and noisy with spells while walking through town.

I’m all for wizards/sorcerers using all they can get their hands on arcane wise. They are notoriously squishy.

I’m also for wizards/sorcerers understanding their spells. A friend of mine really did their homework and after being captured and hands tied up knew they could cast a dispel spell on the bad guy, giving their comrades an opportunity to save themselves. No hands needed.

I’m for non-wizards saying “No” to a PnP spell or calling foul when the wizard PC is using something incorrectly. I’ve stopped scrying attempts before since my PC knew the PC was a wizard using the medium used by a cleric instead the medium used by a wizard. They didn’t have the correct components on their character. My scrying character carries the components, the one that can’t be found as an actual object I have screenies of getting it and carry something to indicate that’s what it is.

Do plots need high magic? Naw, my Bard/AA figured out a magic puzzle before the magic users because she RP’d with a couple of gnome wizards about the scrolls she could read and she wrote down all the schools of magic in her handy-dandy tome. She had to pull it out and look but hey that’s why she has the tome in her inventory.

I will suggest that the DM’s might want to slow down the plot speed. Sometimes it feels like you’d better use that wow magic immediately just so the enemy won’t kill you right then and there.

As fun as it sounds to see Ulrik run around at level 2 then relevel/RP picking up those spells one at a time…
 

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Ari'aerath Dlues'athsha ~ Silver Singer with the Bow of the Sun
Clarette Feohn ~ Magic is Art.
Victoria Marrs ~ "I have an herb for that."

New guy here, so please pardon my ignorance, I don't have a lvl 30 character yet so there's a lot about the server I do not know.

Whats this PnP spell book I'm hearing about? I haven't read the entire forums or website yet but from my perusing of the spell changes and other things this thread is the first I've heard of it. It sounds like its a separate spell book with mostly role play spells form the books that are not in game that characters can use with DM supervision or script interaction to achieve effects outside of the default game engine, I've see the custom spells in the spell list as i am leveling but because they say they are custom and wont work unless you have something in your journal I have not bothered with them, is this the same thing or is this something different?

As some one who is leveling a caster on the server for the first time, I have to say one of the big reasons I like this server is the fact that the spells haven't all been neutered to heck and back as the are on other NWN servers, most still do what the game says they do and the ones that have been changed have been done so for the better or in ways that make them still useful. One of my biggest frustrations as a mage is taking a spell only to find out its useless to me as its been modified into nothingness, I was once on a server that completely disabled polymorph self and they didn't have an easy to use website so i took it expecting t be able to use it for RP purposes but it just took up a place in my book. So if i can chime in at all i ask to please don't go totally revamping the way the spells work here, what you have now in my opinion is a great balance of the game engine and the spirit of D&D

And while I'm sure that at lvl 30 with years of time put into characters it seems like all high magic, to me and my friends leveling up the server has seemed like a mid or low magic at times in terms of gear and buffs available to us, I personally like that feel as it makes my caster more useful to the group with my buffs, mezes and summons.

Of course there's a lot being said here I'm not understanding so it may be completely off base with what your talking about, but if the issue is the custom of PnP spells used in RP plots then those should always have some kind of DM adjudication, and a DM can simply tell the wizard, well that spell doesn't work, or your not able to use it that way, at least in the context of this RP event, if you really want to be a rules lawyer for hours on end explaining why your spell will magically solve everything go to the forums and plead your case for next time and the DM's will make sure to have a plot where your reasoning can be circumvented

As a very long time pen and paper DM, I have some very strong opinions on this subject, but I'm just going to save myself some sanity and say that for every pen and paper spell, there is another one that counters it. And ways that non-magic users can counter it with careful planning. Faerun is high magic. Go play Midnight or something.

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Mathus, Void Apostle of the New Moon

firstly, its been more than long, hi guys >_>

secondly and on topic, i'd guess pvp is to blame for the generic 30 wizard/sorc spam or so it seams, level is directly linked to proficiency vs spell resistances, making combination mages (mystic theurge anyone?) incredibly hard to pull off and still be anywhere near as good, in pvp.

which is unfortunate but like I found out the hard way with the trickier monsters as cory pointed out, sometimes you die, alot. (when trying to avoid the pre-travelled path toward epic spells and int modifiers that outrank deitys.)

for example my highest level character, 24? wizard if i recall, has more int than karsus...something ain't right in the world of balance. but meh. (related note, faerun isn't as high magic anymore since karsus folly, planescape has way more happening imo.)

Nothing is going to happen about this, or any other major flaw in our setting. This is Amia, in case some of you had forgotten that fact.

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Sion of Nimlith
Shadow Disciple

Keep your posts constructive instead of contributing to the 'flaws' you see with negative, poor posting.

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"Let's unwrite these pages and replace them with our own words."

Since I brought that up: It's something the Seven Stars Academy faculty did so that we can know who to go to if we need help with a spell and such. Yes, we are elitists! But seriously, anyone can do that, it's not required. Tis nice to keep track of spells your caster would know, though.

Not the same as the 'custom spells'; those only work after you request them, it's granted, the spell is scripted, and you pay for it with DCs.

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Whomst've'll'd'mn't I play:
Salema Nefahri :: A penny for your thots
Zrae'a'stra'fryn :: That which nightmares are made of
Khasir :: From the East a storm is coming