A question about DM-ing styles

[Slendertroll]

I am of two minds on magic items. And, actually, this ties in with the Edition Calm Discussion (as opposed to War) thread we have going, since it's one of my biggest gripes about 4e.

 

I would love to run a low-magic campaign. Ideally, there's no such thing as a "+1 magic sword." Magic items are rare, important, and special. The PCs get one very rarely. Those who have them are loath to give them up. This is much more in line with traditional High and Heroic Fantasy than standard D&D.

 

However, that doesn't make sense for the standard D&D world. When you have magic-users of all levels running around, that sort of scarcity would be bizarre. It's just too easy to enchant things. There should be plenty of magic items, and plenty of people interested in selling, buying, and trading them. Adventuring is an incredibly lucrative, if dangerous, career. (In my campaign, the Adventurer's Guild is a very powerful organization for this very reason.) Makes sense that there would be a lot of adventurers, and therefore a bunch of magic items of all levels, and that they'd want to trade them with each other. I have actually considered having a super-magic-mart: a magically-distributed catalog with a simple enchantment that magically transfers your bag of gold to the people running it, who magically transport the item you request to you. You can even give out "gift cards" as treasure, which gives PCs the items they want/can use without running into the question of why a goblin tribe would have a set of plate armor made for a dragonborn. This seems like a very logical thing for a cabal of high-level wizards to get up to.

 

One of my complaints about 4e (a system I mostly love) is that a group of five PCs is expected to get four magic items per level and hundreds of gold. And yet a peasant is lucky to make one gp in a year. PCs start out with 100gp each, making them already incredibly rich. By the end of first level (~10 encounters) they're expected to have 3760gp worth of treasure and magic items. The economy is screwed up beyond repair, and it becomes pretty difficult to imagine why, say, a goblin clan would have four magic items worth between 500 and 1000gp each, and oh, by the way, the PCs are able to use all of them. I couldn't run a low magic campaign if I wanted to, since the PCs are expected to get magic items almost every level. In one of the splatbooks they talk about trading magic items for "intrinsic bonuses," but it's a pretty weak workaround.

 

Sorry if that was a little rambly. Tl;dr: I'd like to run a low magic campaign. In a high-magic world, however, selling magic items would be incredibly popular and lucrative. 4e gives the PCs too much loot, even for a high-magic world.

[Doug Sundseth]

Earthdawn does a good job of low-magic-item density in a high-magic world. Runequest does a good job of ubiquitous magic, almost all of very low power with a few artifact-level items around. GURPS does low magic very well. Fantasy Hero does low or high magic with few items. I'm sure there are other systems that fill the niche(s) in a way that would work.

 

But, I wouldn't use any version of D&D to run low magic. It's not balanced for that (to the extent it's balanced at all ) and it would take too much GM work. It's possible, of course, just as its possible to write a game in COBOL, but should be reserved for when you lose a bet.

[dsmiles]

Sorry if that was a little rambly. Tl;dr: I'd like to run a low magic campaign. In a high-magic world, however, selling magic items would be incredibly popular and lucrative. 4e gives the PCs too much loot, even for a high-magic world.

 

 

Earthdawn does a good job of low-magic-item density in a high-magic world. Runequest does a good job of ubiquitous magic, almost all of very low power with a few artifact-level items around. GURPS does low magic very well. Fantasy Hero does low or high magic with few items. I'm sure there are other systems that fill the niche(s) in a way that would work.

 

But, I wouldn't use any version of D&D to run low magic. It's not balanced for that (to the extent it's balanced at all ) and it would take too much GM work. It's possible, of course, just as its possible to write a game in COBOL, but should be reserved for when you lose a bet.

D&D doesn't do low-magic well, unless you're running Ravenloft or Dark Sun. But I've got two words for you:

 

1. Dungeon

2. World

 

Magic is rare and powerful. I mean seriously rare and powerful. Wizards (at high levels) MAY know about 10 or so spells. Magic items are extremely hard to come by, and are powerful. As an example:

 

I was playing a Halfling Thief, and in DW Thieves do d6 damage (maybe d8, I'm AFB right now). I found a magic dagger that did +1d4 damage vs. undead, and it was a HUGE deal. By HUGE I mean: HUGE.

[Dadcubed]

I think when I run my game I am going to have characters start with basic items and make magic scarce and gold hard to come by. By having scarce gold and magic items I feel it gives another motivation to finding those things. Particularly if your characters are trying to gear themselves up to at some point in the distant future take on some terrible tyrant who is corrupting the land or something.

 

The more motivations to play and the more curiousities the better.

[Loim]

Low magic isn't as tough as it used to be, but in earlier editions a low magic world seriously limited the types of monsters you could throw at a party with all the higher end magic resistances. I don't have much familiarity with AD&D after 2.0 so I know those in the know will chime in, but I laud the way that PF has added in so many "buffs" that give you ability to punch through damage resistances (magic weapon, etc). I may just break down and buy the Dungeon World PDF, because it really does sound interesting.

 

One way to make magic more interesting is to have "named" weapons. If you have fewer magical +1 swords it's more likely that when your party does find a +1 Long Sword it will instead be Fowlrend: Slayer of Eldritch Chickens. To me it sounds much more interesting to hear, "I lay about me with Fowlrend" than, "I pull out my +1 Long Sword." Plus as a PC I would be much more reluctant to part with a storied weapon. I mean if you know that the last wielder of your magic glaive was the Kobold Blackguard GrowlBark BiteFang, and he used it to cut through the ranks of all the Gnomish King's guards it's more interesting. Plus it could be a good story hook. What boon might the gnomes pay for the weapon of their most hated adversary? I will use Martin for example here, because despite how I may feel about him in other aspects, his use of named weapons was something I like. Needle is a good example, nothing special about it, but it's cooler because it has a name.

[dsmiles]

Was in a campaign once (back in AD&D 2e) where low-magic was the rule rather than the exception. Any magic weapon or armor of +2 or greater enchantment was near-legendary, and wouldn't function unless it was named. Good times.

[Dibbler]

In my campaigns I flat out say that magic items come in two flavors:

Normal magic items. Typically made in this decade (probably in the last few years), which are pretty easy to come by. Identify and everything works. Normal artifacts are in this category as well, since they follow the rules from the books.

Specials. Typically non-human made, old, from the fey-realms or other planes. If identify works it will say something vague. These are typically more powerful, or quirky, or weird or all three ;)

[(SMD)MadCow]

Most games Ive played in, the DM will have us make a wishlist. Anything that doesnt show up in an adventure, we can search for in a large trade city, ie Baldurs Gate, Waterdeep, Calimport. Just because we can look for something in those cities, doesnt mean we will find it, and it generally takes a lot of diplomacy/streetwise/ knowledge local checks to find and then haggle the price down.

 

But, +1 items are pretty common.

[Shogun]

I Havnt played FR but love the drizzt books. What source books do you use?

 

For magic items they start as +1 longsword but by late heroic are named and glow (fluff) I tend not to give out much weaponry or armor more quirky rings or a bottle of smoke etc trying to get my players more creative

[(SMD)MadCow]

Ive got the FR caimpaign setting and players guide for both 3rd and 4th editions, and Baldurs Gate on the PC.

[Suden]

Earlier editions of D&D were more conducive to low magic worlds. 3rd and as I understand 4th edition, magic is required to keep players balanced against monsters. The problem with low magic systems is they really favor casters, who don't really need magic items to deal with problems. In higher magic systems the non-casters tend to excel more. Give a melee a +4 weapon and his power increases dramatically. Give a wizard a magic staff and it duplicates what he can already do, just adds capacity and perhaps some versatility. I always enjoyed the lower magic campaigns, where a fighter might wield a +2 handaxe because it was the mightiest magic item he had.

[Slendertroll]

Well, magic would have to be limited in other ways as well in a low-magic world. No caster PCs, or else magic comes at a great penalty, or takes a very long time to get very powerful.

[Loim]

With divine casters it's more difficult, because the base system is usually that they pray for their spells. I can see maybe implementing a system where they have to find and study certain scrolls and librams from their deity before they know the prayers for a spell. With Wizards you can always just limit the number of spells they find to scribe to their books. In fact a whole quest might revolve around helping the party caster track down and find a spell book so they can get that "one" spell that they obsess over <cough> fireball <cough>.

[dsmiles]

Earlier editions of D&D were more conducive to low magic worlds. 3rd and as I understand 4th edition, magic is required to keep players balanced against monsters. The problem with low magic systems is they really favor casters, who don't really need magic items to deal with problems. In higher magic systems the non-casters tend to excel more. Give a melee a +4 weapon and his power increases dramatically. Give a wizard a magic staff and it duplicates what he can already do, just adds capacity and perhaps some versatility. I always enjoyed the lower magic campaigns, where a fighter might wield a +2 handaxe because it was the mightiest magic item he had.

 

Except that in 3.x/PF where magic is pretty mandatory at higher levels, purely martial characters still suffer from a linear progression, while magic-users progress nearly exponentially. You just don't need meat shields in 3.x/PF.

At least 4e balanced that a little, making many of the batman spells into rituals.

 

Well, magic would have to be limited in other ways as well in a low-magic world. No caster PCs, or else magic comes at a great penalty, or takes a very long time to get very powerful.

 

I played a variant system in 3.x. It's the Advanced d20 Magic book from Guardians of Order, I think. (The same magic system found in The Slayers d20.) Instead of Vancian magic, it uses a 'fatigue'-type system where casting spells caused non-lethal damage to the caster based on a Fortitude save result. I love that system, but I can't convince my latest batch of players to get into it.

[buglips*the*goblin]

I am of two minds on magic items. And, actually, this ties in with the Edition Calm Discussion (as opposed to War) thread we have going, since it's one of my biggest gripes about 4e.

 

I would love to run a low-magic campaign. Ideally, there's no such thing as a "+1 magic sword." Magic items are rare, important, and special. The PCs get one very rarely. Those who have them are loath to give them up. This is much more in line with traditional High and Heroic Fantasy than standard D&D.

 

However, that doesn't make sense for the standard D&D world. When you have magic-users of all levels running around, that sort of scarcity would be bizarre. It's just too easy to enchant things. There should be plenty of magic items, and plenty of people interested in selling, buying, and trading them. Adventuring is an incredibly lucrative, if dangerous, career. (In my campaign, the Adventurer's Guild is a very powerful organization for this very reason.) Makes sense that there would be a lot of adventurers, and therefore a bunch of magic items of all levels, and that they'd want to trade them with each other. I have actually considered having a super-magic-mart: a magically-distributed catalog with a simple enchantment that magically transfers your bag of gold to the people running it, who magically transport the item you request to you. You can even give out "gift cards" as treasure, which gives PCs the items they want/can use without running into the question of why a goblin tribe would have a set of plate armor made for a dragonborn. This seems like a very logical thing for a cabal of high-level wizards to get up to.

 

One of my complaints about 4e (a system I mostly love) is that a group of five PCs is expected to get four magic items per level and hundreds of gold. And yet a peasant is lucky to make one gp in a year. PCs start out with 100gp each, making them already incredibly rich. By the end of first level (~10 encounters) they're expected to have 3760gp worth of treasure and magic items. The economy is screwed up beyond repair, and it becomes pretty difficult to imagine why, say, a goblin clan would have four magic items worth between 500 and 1000gp each, and oh, by the way, the PCs are able to use all of them. I couldn't run a low magic campaign if I wanted to, since the PCs are expected to get magic items almost every level. In one of the splatbooks they talk about trading magic items for "intrinsic bonuses," but it's a pretty weak workaround.

 

Sorry if that was a little rambly. Tl;dr: I'd like to run a low magic campaign. In a high-magic world, however, selling magic items would be incredibly popular and lucrative. 4e gives the PCs too much loot, even for a high-magic world.

 

 

Eliminate the excessive items, and also eliminate the excessive demographics of people who can make them. Never use random treasure tables. Just be sure that the other rewards of your campaign (story arcs, accomplished goals, other advancement) are able to make up for the deficit.

 

It's super easy to do, and the effect is profound. Plus the same logic you applied works in reverse: if magic-users are rare, finding new spells will be a challenge. There wouldn't be wizard cabals. If you didn't adventure, maybe a wizard might apprentice you. But if you adventure, you have to learn as you go. So now a rumor of a wizard is an incentive to go and find him. Finding weird magical creatures and trying to learn from them becomes a hook that keeps on giving. Tie it in with story, and that's a method of advancement infinitely better, and more satisfying, than any chart.

 

Magical research doesn't have to mean holing yourself up in a library. It can be finding a gnome, helping him, and convincing him to show you how illusions work. And if a character knows the basics, they can learn on the road to make new spells. Just make it a learning process - until complete, the spell might do weird things as they figure it out. But once done, they might have something entirely new - and in a low-magic world, that's a very valuable thing to trade. Now maybe that snooty hermit wizard might be inclined to open his door and trade something he has for something you have.

 

The only challenge to any of this is when you have to explain the concept to blank-eyed players who haven't yet gotten to the point where they can think outside the book.