Not allowing the PCs to be spellcasters

[Erebus]

Magic is widely available to PCs in fantasy RPGs. In D&D, for instance, the classes who do not give magical ability are much less numerous than those who do : even paladins, rangers and bards - the concepts of which have nothing to do with magic - can cast spells.

I think that making magic so easily available ends up cheapening it, making it less impressive, mysterious and threatening than it would otherwise be.

In traditional stories (such as the arthurian legends or the 1001 nights), heroes were never spellcasters ; magic was limited to "NPCs", who could be benevolent or malevolent, but were always powerful and enigmatic. The early fantasy novels, such as Conan or the Lankhmar series, did not have spellcasting heroes. Even in LOTR, Gandalf is clearly apart from the rest of the Fellowship and he's not directly involved in the main quest for very long.

So, what would you think of a fantasy CRPG which would not allow the player to cast spells ? The closest example I can think of would be "The Witcher". While Gerard can use magical Signs, they're clearly limited and a far cry from real magic.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

I remember when I first started Dragon Age, I thought grimdark "Dark fantasy" meant magic was going to be rare, especially since I assume I had heard mages were mistrusted/strictly controlled before I had played.

Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan was that a letdown.

 

[Oriental European]

Imagine a game, were you can't use magic but instead have to find wizards and sorcerers and ask them for help, but they will only help you after you will help them, by finishing a quest or completing a trial.
Yeah, just like in folk fairy tales. All my money, take them...

 

[Destroid]

I've often thought this is a great idea, but for PnP RPGs, not computer games.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

Great idea. I will love it to only be allowed to play fighter-types and watch my characters full-attack each round like those other idiots who are doing that deliberately.

 

[Black Cat]

@ Erebus

The problem isn't making magic available but making it cheap and abstract, I believe.

Say, create complex ritual mechanics based on symbolic systems you need to research through the game. Use a correspondence system requiring both rare components you have to look around and a scheme of symbolical relationships you need to deduce before finding which use each actually has in the ritual system. Add bargaining with entities, subtle manipulation of events and probabilistic systems and perception and metaphysical constructs and natural forces and wide patterns instead of fireballs, a long and complex system of rules and laws that, again, you have to deduce by yourself, and make all magical thingies (spellcasting, ritual magic, alchemy, etc) to be highly influenced by contextual interactions (Which direction is the witch facing? In which direction is the target facing? Which are the dominant color in both the caster and the targets clothes? Which phase of the moon is it? What geographical feature dominates each of the four directions from the point where the spell is being cast, and which others dominate the four directions of where the target is if the location is different? What time of which day is it? Etc) and tie all of this to a pretty deep set of variables that keep track of the general bias in choices and actions the witch demostrates and then use those to influence how different magical styles, actions, techniques, and more actually behave.

There isn't any problem with magic users being selectable. The problem is with magic being usually retarded and banal instead of being, say, magical and coherent. Or about it, like, being nothing but arbitrary gameplay design choices instead.

 

[Demnogonis Saastuttaja]

Yeah, that sounds cool. Another thing would be to make the magic risky - let's say the player mages are hedge wizards, rogue sorcerers or some such without much training. The kind of mages that could blow themselves up.

Say, in WHFRP, if you're a metal mage, that is an alchemist of sorts, you can for example turn your various body parts into improved gold parts. Now if you fail, the part becomes useless, so there's results like turn your heart to gold - success is that you don't feel emotional pain. Failure is death. In addition to that there's always a chance that you get sucked in to hell or something like that.

This wouldn't be a super good idea in a standard game, but in a game that's designed to be ironman only, it'd be fun. In an ordinary game you could always have something like shifting winds of magic, where your magical power is highly unreliable, so that sometimes you're only able to cast pitiful cantrips, sometimes mighty fireballs and such. And when you'd go against a mightier wizard, it'd be a contest of who can use the most magic in the area, but the expected advantage goes to the trained, experienced wizard.

But hey, all that sounds too complicated, why not just press X for a DPS spell, can't deviate too much from WoW and Final Fantasy, the best classic RPG's.

 

[Erebus]

The problem isn't making magic available but making it cheap and abstract, I believe.

Your suggestions would certainly make magic more interesting, but I suspect they would be too complex to implement in a CRPG, even if the developers were willing to spend a lot of time on it.

And, even if using magic could be made as interesting as it should be, I still think that a CRPG in which it were restricted to a few NPCs would have merits. It would make magic actually magical : something fantastic and mysterious, beyond your understanding. Fighting an evil wizard when you yourself couldn't possibly have powers like his would be much more impressive and require much more cunning.

 

[Baron]

I wouldn't mind if they were like Akira in Conan the Destroyer. Short and Asian.

And also pretty limited in power. You choose one if you're a storyfag because of the mage'ss awesome Lore skill. He can read runes, speak to demons*, activate the occasional portal, let you avoid an instant death sigil, help out in small ways. But you're effectively down one fighter (Wilt Chamberlain or Grace Jones depending upon whatever floats your boat...)

Would include more puzzles, the thinking man's play through. Fighter types just kick down doors and stab to death boss monsters.




* trade his soul with them instead of having to fight them

 

[Multiple Sarcasm]

Say, create complex ritual mechanics based on symbolic systems you need to research through the game. Use a correspondence system requiring both rare components you have to look around and a scheme of symbolical relationships you need to deduce before finding which use each actually has in the ritual system. Add bargaining with entities, subtle manipulation of events and probabilistic systems and perception and metaphysical constructs and natural forces and wide patterns instead of fireballs, a long and complex system of rules and laws that, again, you have to deduce by yourself, and make all magical thingies (spellcasting, ritual magic, alchemy, etc) to be highly influenced by contextual interactions (Which direction is the witch facing? In which direction is the target facing? Which are the dominant color in both the caster and the targets clothes? Which phase of the moon is it? What geographical feature dominates each of the four directions from the point where the spell is being cast, and which others dominate the four directions of where the target is if the location is different? What time of which day is it? Etc) and tie all of this to a pretty deep set of variables that keep track of the general bias in choices and actions the witch demostrates and then use those to influence how different magical styles, actions, techniques, and more actually behave.

During which, a warrior comes up and stabs the witch in the butt.

Magic can be made interesting in better ways, without resorting to symbolic onanism: like making it scarce, difficult to learn and its application/effects malleable and situational; making the effects subtle and extended - something that tips the balance rather than hits the target square in the face; or a combination of either.



@Erebus:
Poking stuff with sharp sticks is fun and all, but gets repetitive and boring rather quickly. Note, that your very examples focus on storytelling (combat in both Witchers was tolerable, at best - even with signs) - that's why they don't need magic to keep the readers awake. In contrast, how much time is spent on combat in games? A way to deal with that would be to diversify the available moves (+poisons are a natural addition), proficiency in them and progression branches. But the reasons I can see why that is unpopular with most devs/publishers are that:
1) Magic sells.
2) Magic is easier to animate than to perfect the timing and the moves of dolls.
I guess that means that PnP will forever remain the best platform for what you're after.

 

[Relay]

A game solely dedicated to mages as the only class would be the way to go to make magic actually fun like in old tales. Magic should never come out of your finger tips in three small incantations coming out of some stupid mana concept, it should require study (by the way of quests), finding components, brewing potions through alchemy and tracing magic circles. Hell I would love a game where you play an evil wizard, slowly corrupting people around you with mind controlling magic and gaining power behind the scenes, manipulating pawns instead of being a frontman. I am sick of games where you play a hero, I want a game solely dedicated to a selfish character, someone who does not think highly of lives and would use everyone around him to become stronger. Most of the games with an "evil path" still leaves me dissatisfied because you're almost always ending up (accidentally since you didn't want to) doing good. You can be evil in games like Fallout but you're still destroying the mutant army or the enclave in the end, which completely offsets all the evil you may have done throughout the game. You should be selfish. Why help others ? If there is a power stronger than yours wreaking havoc, flee the scenes and go to some place where you can grow your own competing power. That would be awesome.
I'm not a fan of magic as implemented in RPGs but I would loooove a game where you play some evil doer in a dark medieval fantasy setting, being more of a witch and less of a bearded benevolent man. With a satanic theme.

Even games like VTMB avoid the option of letting you play a truly demonic character even though the whole setting is supposedly dark. The concept of "humanity" in vampires sucks a lot.

 

[waywardOne]

Magic became cheap is all. I wouldn't restrict it outright as much as make it more traditional (except fuck "innate" spellcasting altogether).

Make it difficult to learn.

Make it dangerous to use, by both its own volitile nature and the hordes that quite rightly distrust or hate those that use it.

 

[Mrowak]

Say, create complex ritual mechanics based on symbolic systems you need to research through the game. Use a correspondence system requiring both rare components you have to look around and a scheme of symbolical relationships you need to deduce before finding which use each actually has in the ritual system. Add bargaining with entities, subtle manipulation of events and probabilistic systems and perception and metaphysical constructs and natural forces and wide patterns instead of fireballs, a long and complex system of rules and laws that, again, you have to deduce by yourself, and make all magical thingies (spellcasting, ritual magic, alchemy, etc) to be highly influenced by contextual interactions (Which direction is the witch facing? In which direction is the target facing? Which are the dominant color in both the caster and the targets clothes? Which phase of the moon is it? What geographical feature dominates each of the four directions from the point where the spell is being cast, and which others dominate the four directions of where the target is if the location is different? What time of which day is it? Etc) and tie all of this to a pretty deep set of variables that keep track of the general bias in choices and actions the witch demostrates and then use those to influence how different magical styles, actions, techniques, and more actually behave.

During which, a warrior comes up and stabs the witch in the butt.

So what? The same warrior will be penetrated in seconds by Cthulhu demon of multi-hedead-dicks-hitting-arse-and-legs-oh-god-itz-heaven, lest the fighter has a sorcerer for a companion, who can deal with the manace. By deal, I mean hear use some protective enchantement barring it the way, make the party invisible to the demon (only), trap the demon inside a magic circle, use rat demon diplomacy with it etc. - use wits and abilities (as opposed to CHARGE!!) to defeat it. The idea that each party member must be good at the same thing i.e. combat is reterded beyond belief, and it should be finally addressed.

A wizard/sorcerer/warlock/witch/whatever should be party's lore master, not a bloody run-off-the-mill, banal, shit, boring, mobile artillery platform.

Of all the games I think Realms of Arkania series came closest to that.

I would murder for magic implemented in the same vein as in Sapkowski's "Narrenturm" saga. Alas...

Magic can be made interesting in better ways, without resorting to symbolic onanism: like making it scarce, difficult to learn and its application/effects malleable and situational; making the effects subtle and extended - something that tips the balance rather than hits the target square in the face; or a combination of either.

I agree, to an extent. How about implementing D&D 3.5 ruleset correctly - without on-the-go resting, and with proper item crafting feats. Bonus points for various reagents needed for spells, and being limited to three schools at lvl 1 (with the possiblity of learning more, later on). D&D Vencian system is really the way to go, provided you can't abuse it as in the every cRPG with in on board.

 

[Relay]

I agree, to an extent. How about implementing D&D 3.5 ruleset correctly - without on-the-go resting, and with proper item crafting feats. Bonus points for various reagents needed for spells, and being limited to three schools at lvl 1 (with the possiblity of learning more, later on). D&D Vencian system is really the way to go, provided you can't abuse it as in the every cRPG with in on board.

Making magic harder to use would also justify making it as powerful as it was supposed to be, since in most cRPG there is such an abundance of magic-imbued items that full blown wizards aren't actually needed in a party in most cases. I don't remember anything in d&d lore saying that you could find insanely powerful artifacts at every corners and quests, but in every cRPG based on d&d rules, you do. There are too many readily available items giving you huge bonuses to saving throws, energy immunity and the like, which means that any adventuring party like yours could kill a high level wizard without breaking a sweat.

BG2 is the worst offender, letting you get a two handed sword early on that gives you 50% magic resistance, dispel magic both as a spell and on-hit, and +5 enchantment making it one of the few weapons able to hurt a demi lich. Basically once you find this sword you will stick to it from the beginning to the end of the game, eliminating the nice feeling of progress when you throw away old equipment for newer loot.

In a party based cRPG healing potions should be made rarer and harder to acquire too or there would be no point in having a cleric.

 

[laclongquan]

Let's discuss one aspect of magic: Potion brewing.

Potion brewing require: raw ingredients, appropriate potion preparation area, and optional, recipe.

Raw ingredients should be pretty rare since otherwise every moonshine makers and cooks can dabble in the Art. Rare equal expensive, hard to find, and less known characteristics of it. Not bat's wing because a forester can give you that aplenty. It should be, hmm, ghost's tears? ancient killer-whale's pearl?

Appropriate preparation site is a necessary feature. You are preparing rare stuffs, which translate into thief-magnet expensive items. Plus their characteristics are less known so safety should loom large. Nothing like a puff of poisonous air escaped from an whale's stomach being cut open to remind you that a fume box is really really needed. So a large secure room with safety equipments. Then we can start talking about ten kinds of knives just for cutting, different ovens for brewing, etc and etc...

Recipes are optional in a computer games, what with sharing knowledge and all. Of course, if you go MOTB way with specific and rigid recipes allow brewing to happen.... that will make a pretty rigid game.

As it is, every body and his brother can brew potions everywhere, everytime with maybe a fire as a tool...

/rant mode off.

 

[Multiple Sarcasm]

During which, a warrior comes up and stabs the witch in the butt.

So what?

Missing the point there. BC's been describing magic as a lengthy, convoluted affair, clearly relishing the act rather than the result, ending up with a spellcaster unfit for anything other than hiding away in a cave and scrounging for components, let alone a moderately actiony adventure or party support. 'MHDs in the middle of a fight' that you're describing is something else entirely.

Magic can be made interesting in better ways, without resorting to symbolic onanism: like making it scarce, difficult to learn and its application/effects malleable and situational; making the effects subtle and extended - something that tips the balance rather than hits the target square in the face; or a combination of either.

I agree, to an extent. How about implementing D&D 3.5 ruleset correctly - without on-the-go resting, and with proper item crafting feats. Bonus points for various reagents needed for spells, and being limited to three schools at lvl 1 (with the possiblity of learning more, later on). D&D Vencian system is really the way to go, provided you can't abuse it as in the every cRPG with in on board.

Personally, I like pre-4e D&D (and it's probably an easier system to implement in a computer game), but I was thinking more along the lines of Mage: The Ascension's system, with some further alterations. I find preset spells and spells-per-day too arbitrary and restrictive: magic shouldn't be about DPS, but I'd rather use what little ability the PC has (and offset by a chance to backfire painfully) in creative ways than reduce what should be magical and mysterious - to mechanical and routine.

 

[laclongquan]

Let's discuss one aspect of magic: Potion brewing.

Potion brewing require: raw ingredients, appropriate potion preparation area, and optional, recipe.

Raw ingredients should be pretty rare since otherwise every moonshine makers and cooks can dabble in the Art. Rare equal expensive, hard to find, and less known characteristics of it. Not bat's wing because a forester can give you that aplenty. It should be, hmm, ghost's tears? ancient killer-whale's pearl?

Appropriate preparation site is a necessary feature. You are preparing rare stuffs, which translate into thief-magnet expensive items. Plus their characteristics are less known so safety should loom large. Nothing like a puff of poisonous air escaped from an whale's stomach being cut open to remind you that a fume box is really really needed. So a large secure room with safety equipments. Then we can start talking about ten kinds of knives just for cutting, different ovens for brewing, etc and etc...

Recipes are optional in a computer games, what with sharing knowledge and all. Of course, if you go MOTB way with specific and rigid recipes allow brewing to happen.... that will make a pretty rigid game.

As it is, every body and his brother can brew potions everywhere, everytime with maybe a fire as a tool...

/rant mode off.

 

[Archibald]

Missing the point there. BC's been describing magic as a lengthy, convoluted affair, clearly relishing the act rather than the result, ending up with a spellcaster unfit for anything other than hiding away in a cave and scrounging for components, let alone a moderately actiony adventure or party support.

Thats why we get archers without bows.

 

[alkeides]

Everything Black Cat said is more or less how historically ceremonial magic was practised in our world, whether you believe it had any effects or not. However, it obviously was never done in combat situations since the magicians would be killed before finishing a single one of their incantations. For this to fit in an RPG, I'd imagine something like there being no specific "magic" class but your character(s) if educated, could stumble across a rare grimoire in his travels with certain instructions and proceed to follow them to summon spirits to help him with something: obtaining knowledge, wealth, sex, healing, death among others. (Those were among the most common powers of the spirits in Renaissance grimoires). Even enchanting talismans involved the same processes. The grimoires from the Renaissance onwards had a lot of elaborate rituals and ritual tools but even the Greek Magical Papyri, which didn't have as much of that, involved fairly lengthy procedures.

That's ceremonial magic anyway, there were simpler forms of magic which were more attuned to commoners' needs such as healing livestock, preventing food from spoiling, love magic, cursing rivals, etc.

There are examples of both types of magic I mentioned above throughout the world. I think some of the Ultima games came closest to them among CRPGs. King of Dragon Pass isn't really an RPG or I'd say it represents ritual magic better. There might be some little-known PnP RPGs out there with an approach to magic that approximates it as well, I don't know.

 

[Relay]

Everything Black Cat said is more or less how historically ceremonial magic was practised in our world, whether you believe it had any effects or not. However, it obviously was never done in combat situations since the magicians would be killed before finishing a single one of their incantations.

Old tales magic still has a use for combat situation, you just have to prepare it before hand. There are three kind of old tales magic that would be useful in cRPG combat : 1/ Magic that strengthens your senses, abilities, physical power, anything that has to do with your body and mind 2/ Curses. Making someone prone to fall to disease, turn blind, lose their mind. They can be prepared in a potion and thrown at someone, or trap the opponent in a circle, or use a magically poisoned dagger.. 3/ Summoning. We can do it in cRPG but without all the ceremony and sacrifices involved Magic tends to involve sacrifices in many cases which makes it unsuitable for the stereotypical loyal good retard.

Anyway, you wouldn't cast spells while in combat, but you would use magic to make you stronger in combat.

 

[JarlFrank]

I think you might have misinterpreted Black Cat's idea.

It's not about making magic useless in combat. It's about requiring preparation, making it more situational (casting a spell in a dark cave might have different effects than doing it in a forest at midday) and requiring it to be given a lot more thought than just selecting spell X because it does Y amount of damage over Z amount of time.

Sure, you'd need ingredients. Sure, casting might take some time. Sure, spells might be dependent on the environment. But spellcasting would be so much more interesting, and not necessarily useless in combat. Use your warriors to protect the witch for 3 turns while she casts a spell that shatters the enemy morale so much they just drop down motionless in fear. The enemy will, of course, try to stop that witch in her ritual, but if you manage to defend her so she can successfully cast it, the results will be devastating and win the combat for you.

Much more interesting than "I CAST FIREBALL FOR 3d6 DAMAGE!!!"

 

[Mrowak]

I think you might have misinterpreted Black Cat's idea.

It's not about making magic useless in combat. It's about requiring preparation, making it more situational (casting a spell in a dark cave might have different effects than doing it in a forest at midday) and requiring it to be given a lot more thought than just selecting spell X because it does Y amount of damage over Z amount of time.

Sure, you'd need ingredients. Sure, casting might take some time. Sure, spells might be dependent on the environment. But spellcasting would be so much more interesting, and not necessarily useless in combat. Use your warriors to protect the witch for 3 turns while she casts a spell that shatters the enemy morale so much they just drop down motionless in fear. The enemy will, of course, try to stop that witch in her ritual, but if you manage to defend her so she can successfully cast it, the results will be devastating and win the combat for you.

Much more interesting than "I CAST FIREBALL FOR 3d6 DAMAGE!!!"

This.

In 98,5% of RPGs magic is just plain boring, There's no mystery, no flair to it. In most cases it's use is limited to combat situations. Now, I see how that works in the mundblundian school, and indeed, it may be fun. However, this approach has been done to death - the fact that recently it has been dumbed down to hell doesn't help at all.

Generally it would be fun if you could have more diversity in it - like preparing spells from special reagents - adding reagnets to empower it - preparing a spell at a particular time of a day rendering it more powerful etc.

All the better, if magic or knowledge of magic could be used as a tool for solving quests. Say, a certain village is plagued by insomnia - the villagers haven't slept for days - and start to resamble zombies than anything else. Your magician recognises the symptoms of a powerfuil curse cast on the hamlet repeatedly. While spending night there you can not only dispell the effects of the curse but using spells from divination, necromancy or enchantment schools you can 1) pinpoint the culprit 2) cast back even more powerful curse at the culprit (which may allow you to identify him later on) 3) compell the culprit to reveal himself 4) all at once.

Very simplistic quest structure, but you could toy with the idea in verious situations to your heart's content.

 

[deus101]

I agree, to an extent. How about implementing D&D 3.5 ruleset correctly - without on-the-go resting, and with proper item crafting feats. Bonus points for various reagents needed for spells, and being limited to three schools at lvl 1 (with the possiblity of learning more, later on). D&D Vencian system is really the way to go, provided you can't abuse it as in the every cRPG with in on board.

Making magic harder to use would also justify making it as powerful as it was supposed to be, since in most cRPG there is such an abundance of magic-imbued items that full blown wizards aren't actually needed in a party in most cases. I don't remember anything in d&d lore saying that you could find insanely powerful artifacts at every corners and quests, but in every cRPG based on d&d rules, you do. There are too many readily available items giving you huge bonuses to saving throws, energy immunity and the like, which means that any adventuring party like yours could kill a high level wizard without breaking a sweat.

BG2 is the worst offender, letting you get a two handed sword early on that gives you 50% magic resistance, dispel magic both as a spell and on-hit, and +5 enchantment making it one of the few weapons able to hurt a demi lich. Basically once you find this sword you will stick to it from the beginning to the end of the game, eliminating the nice feeling of progress when you throw away old equipment for newer loot.

In a party based cRPG healing potions should be made rarer and harder to acquire too or there would be no point in having a cleric.

ehm...You talking about Carsomyr?

Which you had to loot from a DRAGON?

 

[Hobo Elf]

Considering how combat oriented RPGs tend to be, shifting through berry bushes looking for reagents and then shuffling through inventories each and every time you want to make use of your Wizard is horribly tedious and unfun design. One way of making this work and giving Wizards more fun utility spells, instead of herp derp single target fireballs or AoE fireballs, is to make combat a more uncommon occurance. Re-introduce more adventure game elements to the RPG genre. Puzzle and problem solving with multiple outcomes based on your adventurers. This way you also don't have to limit yourself with the always tried and true holy trinity of adventure parties.
Of course the problem with all of this is that making a game with these ideas in mind requires effort. Why should devs go through the trouble of making a good game, when they can just as easily hire Felicia Day to give her voice for the game, and it'll sell even more copies no matter how shitty and lazy the actual game is.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

ehm...You talking about Carsomyr?

Which you had to loot from a DRAGON?

Yes, that's what he meant. It sucks that this sword doesn't become obsolete throughout the whole game. That deprives you of the joy to regularily switch to a new weapon that does 2 damage more than the last one a la Dragon Age 2.