User:Cedric/Wizard

Wizard

Ordinant stat: INT

Tier path: Apprentice -> Scholar -> Wizard -> Magus -> Aethernaumus

Skills:

• Magic-user: gets spell-casting ability to direct energy from the ethers into the material plane.
• Arcanae: sees subtle cues within the mundane.
• Mastery of Character: gets a saving throw on political charms or witch hexes
• Energy Conversion: can convert their HP into Mana when needed or vice versa -- allows spells to be cast that would require more mana than they have per round.

XP gained by: Effective Mana Utilization (EMU) + Creativity Bonus. For battles, this amounts to XP=HPfromopponent^(numberofclasses+1).
Mana directed to: Wards of protection (like AC or protection over their possession) or magical output.
Dice Use: Roll dice based on the complexity and power of the spell up to 10 dice for complex spells (Must have INT 10+dice needed to cast it). Low rolls can be replaced by (up to) your ASM score through some formula that starts at the average (d4 roll of 1 becomes a 4 if your ASM is >= 4) when you’re in perfect health. You can use up to LVL rounds of MANA (actually up to your HP score), so that your impact is greater, but you must specify before you roll, if your ASM is below average.
Real-life interactions: Exchange of insults/complements. Somatic War? War of words because when mages battle out against each other, the heavens cry (for they have seen the results many times).
Lore: Wizards began when magic was first discovered (or uncovered by the gods?). It stabilized after the Mage Wars whose "ending" heralded the Second Age of the realms. Thier modus operandi is to use the power of their intelligence which they've applied in making spells (INT flood), to solve problems that come their way. A good wizard learns to hone their spells to a perfect minimum (INT focus) that can be applied to many different ways. The ultimate aim of the wizard is to create a world where magic is commonplace and the mundane (cooking food, cleaning clothes, laborous chores) is relegated to oblivion.
Alignment characteristics: Evil wizards are called warlocks and use magic against people for personal power. Chaotic wizards use magic to tear down other wizard's lessor magic. A wizened wizard sees the use of such lesser magic in many things...
Moral code: The People shouldn't settle for the mundane (life of drudgery or whatever).
Group Dynamics: Mana pools from different schools of magic allow getting extra energy for spells when called for it.
Sloppiness penalty: If wizards don't stay in the zone with the rounds choices for MANA use in the spirit of the spell for the duration, then they get disadvantage on any event during the duration.

Skip to next section if you don't want to read this unintegrated mechanical stuff... Under normal circumstances, specialization of the INT stat would make you a scholar, but since that's not very fun, we make it a wizard... For (good) wizards, XP comes not from kills (which would be macabre!!), but from Effective Mana Utilization. For offensive moves, this amounts to the # of reduced hitpoints*50 = XP. If you use a new spell, you also get temporary up-to-2 +CON for the remainder of the day (depends on how novel the spell was; i.e. adding another offensive spell when you have 2 already gains nothing). Spells have to be written into your grimoire (this is to encourage the perfection of spells and discourage a plethora of useless ones) if you want them prepared and to keep and reuse them. ASM must be greater than 10.

Different spells have different dice, depending on the complexity of the spell. A fireball spell for example, might have 1d4+1d8, with the smaller being the fire damage and the larger the blast itself. A complicated spell might have upto 8 dice associated with it in order to perform well, but if you are disabled in some way, one or more of them might be taken out. If you really wanted to add some flair, your fire ball die would be flaiming orange.

Wizards can have names that get longer as they advance in levels. For example, the wizard on the TSR logo, has a name beginning with X and holding 10 letters Xenocanthh. When a wizard start however, their master gives them a name (up to 5 letters, generally) which shows their inverstment and hopes. In no case can (or should) they give names more than the level of their own experience.f If they are less than LVL50, then they can only give 4 letters.

For each spell cast, there is a die for each spell component. The number of sides is dependent on how difficult the spell component is. So a spell with 3 components, one with a difficulty of 20, and the othe 8, rolls 1d20+2d8. The DM then, has to imagine how the move worked given the dice. The higher level you are, the more XP gets converted into mana, when, if effective, gets re-converted back into new XP. These dice should be “normalized” towards the range of spells generally, so that a spell with 6 components, all difficult doesn’t get huge dice like 6d20s, but is scaled down to 6d4, or something along those lines.

Dice components connected to the wizard who created the spell have a special composition/color or other distinguishing characteristic. In the case of being in possession (through affinity with the said wizard), these dice can automatically be placed at their highest value, giving slight or significant advantage for success. In the case of font design and such, they give advantage and you can roll two dice for that component and take the highest roll.

A wizard can use excess HP and convert it into mana to add power to their spells. The amount is 100 mana * HP_sacrificed. Clearly the wizard must use his INTelligence to avoid death with such manipulations, for to lose both mana and HP for power, you lose both buffers to hold one's own life. Take heed to avoid careless deaths. This weakens the wizard who must decide how much ability to sacrifice until the HP is recovered.

A wizard can use. finesse during spellcasting, adding. tiny, but wholly relevant, details that double the XP(?). gained. For example, if they choose a frost. blast spell instead of a more generic damage spell, then. it has more finesse (roll. a. d8 for the factor after. the event for each NPC encounter). can add a damage. component of cold blast when. the cold has effective mana utilization value.

XXXsee next paragraphXXX Until a complete cataloging of mana - magic correlation is made, you have to make an estimate on how much mana you used and how effective it was, keeping in mind the faster you move something or the heavier it is (bigger and more precise in an illusion), the more mana you'll have to use. To keep an enchantment or curse on something probably reduced the amount of mana you get per round, depending on if you have a god keeping track of the use of the cursed/enchanted item (when not in use, it doesn't have to deplete mana if your gods track that for you).

So, high-level, high-INT characters are storing their mana and HP in their tissue more efficiently. That gives more power when needed for their spells. Given that 1 time-quanta must be used to incant the spell, the amount of damage of magic-missile, for example would be just under #MANA*(spell_precision/20)%*(ASM/20)%/100. Spell precision is how precisely is the spell tuned for the desired effect (on a scale of 1-20)? It takes INT to make a good spell, so that there are no loopholes. This gives your INT some real function in the wizard class besides just knowing arcana. Wizards can keep this INT up with potions, if they choose. ASM gives you the finesse to gather all of the forces together within your round.

Consider that different races will employ different variants of spells, so an offensive spell for a human wizard might be magic missile, while for a dragonborn one, it might be fireball.

Spells must be incanted and different wizards can fight each other without the other knowing what their spells are. Of course, if they come from the same guild, they'll likely recognize each other's spells. Players can write their own spells in their own grimoire and let the DM analyze which spell in the canon is most similar for any offensive spells. The more attention you put on writing these spells, the more power they should have (lasting longer, more damage dice, etc.).

Your LVL affects the power of your spell. Your INT affects the mana available. If you have low LVL you only have the mana you have for the round to give it power. Otherwise the mana available is LVL*(mana per round, typically 600). If you choose to expend this much mana, you will get fatigued and need rest, losing 1/2 your available HP. This mana can be transformed into either power (ability to do damage) or special effects (flashy splendor or illusions). Expending all of your mana * CON in this way will make you faint, but can recover (with weakness or 1/2 HP) within 1 time quanta. It is here that criticals from NPCs can get you though.

Expect projections of illusions to consume 100 mana per projected square foot of illusory (visible, simple) surface area per round. Multiply this by a linear factor if the surface area contains text or is complicated, by an exponential if the user interacts with it. 100mana/ounce of matter per round. 
 Wizard's invoke a spell by incanting the words holding the spell. Player's should simply say the spell as their role playing without having to inform the DM that "Now I'm going to cast levitate to get over the water puddle" (perhaps godroll revealed a puddle of mud in the road). They simply say "levioso" and the DM can figure out (or ask) that the player chose to use some magic to enhance his wizard character and avoid an obstacle that otherwise may have made a problem.

What's new here is that your level affects the power of most spells. Do you really think a level 99 Wizard is going to just give 2d6 damage for a full-power spell? No, you must hone your offensive/defensive spells to perfection. That's the purpose of your guild, not to make endless trivialities and modifications. Perhaps YOUR guild is content with such, though...?

The defining feature of the wizard (or "witch", if female) is spell-casting. Mages typically rely on their greater dexterity and intelligence to avoid getting damage in a weapons fight (and spells typically have effect over distance). They are at their best when they rely on cloaks and other non-metallic armors to stay free from damage as it allow them to be more sensitive to the forces of magic in or from others. But you won't find the best of them sporting studded leathers as an alternative, as that would imply that they lack sufficient ability to avoid damage (oh the shame!).

Mana is a mages bread and butter. Mages gather power from the aether -- the resource used by the gods. Because of this, mages typically do not bow to any gods, though they may fraternize to utilize their special abilities to enchant weapons or armor and such (the god's ability to enchant/curse weapons is perhaps 100x as powerful as a LVL30 mage). Mages may develop a personal sigil which they mark on their spellbook as a concealed identity and type of "brand".

Mages require INT to understand/create spells, DEX helps you write it effectively on a scroll or in your grimoire, PER helps them know which spell to cast, ASM helps you gather the forces quickly (like before your round ends). An ASM score of 20 will allow you to create a spell effect in 1 time-quanta where it would take 2 time-quanta for a ASM 10 wizard (the average).

If a wizard's ASM score is below 10, they are not able to harness the forces from the aether to gain additional power from the aether; instead, they must invent greater spells for their grimoire. The amount of power to the spell for a perfect ASM score of 20 is MANA * LVL. One must also have perfect karmic history of spell-use though, otherwise half that probably. The relationship for ASM and power is roughly linear? (or (ASM/10)), otherwise, with an ASM of 1 being 1/10th as powerful.

The witch is the female equivalent of the wizard, with the primary difference being their ability to group together to get these power effects via the power of the womb. They also need good ASM score there. Mages get special ability when reading items of their own language, see arcana.

(Note: Elves relate to magic differently than other races, and don't need to write spells with words, instead they use symbols or pictograms. Further, they don't incant spells, they invoke them somatically.)

In order for a Mage to graduate past the second tier, they should create their spellbook or write scrolls. They can sell these latter to magic shops or gift it to a friend. Druids are often consumers of scrolls to augment their abilities. For their spellbook, a guild member can review and grade it. Third tier mages can craft wands for their guilds and lower-level counterparts.

STUB Mages can unconsciously sacrifice HP to give spells more power. These HP transform into mana. Once they sacrifice 5 HP, they lose 1 -CON. These can be gained back with rest, although a big battle that depletes a mage to low CON levels may have a hard time recovering and can lose connections to the world s/he needs to get what's needed.

Mages find spellbooks or create a grimoire. Spellbooks have a LEVEL associated with them. If you aren't at a high enough level, the handwriting and/or the words may not be understandable to you. Or if you DO understand the words, your lack of understanding of their purpose could backfire on you and cause damage. They can be affiliated with a magical guild, this should be clear to higher-level mages, as there aren't many that make any spellbooks worth having. Different guilds can gather different spells for certain kinds of spell-craft. For example, one guild may specialize in evocation spells, another in divination.

For spells, see AD&D Player's Handbook from 1978, by Gary Gygax (minus the "Rope trick", also "Blink" is not recommended as the caster may wind up in a different, random part of the world with some chance close to 50%). There are other, minor fixes to this set of spells, but otherwise these are trusted.

Spellcasting abilities depend on whether you're ronin or not. Ronin have only their own mana to draw from, while those in guilds have the guild. Ronin have to write in their spellbook, others simply need the blessing of a higher-level mage to give the spell the power of the guild.

Spell availability shall not be advertised, but only sufficient intrigue of basic utility spells published. The rest kept in the grimoirs of the WotC. Some basic spells expected at an apprentice`s respective tier of development:

• Underling: light (lvl 1), levitation (lvl 5), trips (lvl 5).
• Hero: fire or ice hands (lvl 10) (casts from a wand if they fashion one: wood for fire, metal for cold), +/- aligned mage, respectively;
• Paragon: pass door (35), pass wall (45), manifest object (30), create food (30).
• Legendary: fly (lvl 50), others by the guilds that make them

Consider mages leveling not by XP, but by the spells they learn, and then write, then enchant into wands, and then create ex nihilo. Written spells (scrolls) can be sold to other players, out-of-game. Wands can be sold in magic shops, but users must incant the special language for them to work correctly. Created spells must be approved by the guild and higher-level mages.

Skill in spells in proportionate to # of times used. This probably won't effect their power, but defines a mage's fab. Depending on the spells they use make a very different type of mage. Expertise in inter-personal divination can discover this arcane information on fellow magic-users, as it effects thier appearance (large eyebrows, moles/warts, hair type, skin tones, etc.).

Identify: there should be no spell of identify. Mages with sufficient knowledge of arcana (level 50), can write scrolls of identify which connect the reciter temporarily to the mind of the mage and the knowledge therein. Cost is signficant for this reason: about 1pp per level of knowledge accessed (guild leader if you are an apprentice), but the knowledge gained should be significant and nearly irreproducable. Scrolls have the mages (or guilds) sigil -- branding isn't completely unknown to them.

XP is accumulated by effective mana utilization (EMU) -- the amount of mana used that actually provided useful utility. Mana that was effective counts as equivalent eXPerience for the player. So that, for example, levitating something just for showing off your magic skillz confers about 1/2 the XP, while levitating someone so they can reach atop the cupboards counts completely. The DM must be judicious in assessing what %age of mana was actually useful towards it`s purpose. The player can counter-argue for their part if there is disagreement. This is to encourage useful spell creation, interesting spell utilization and to create the "wizarding life", rather than relying on conventional human solutions. Should create some very novel ideas for magic use. Spells must have a NAME. Without a name, they do not count as effective mana utilization in whatever manner they are invoked.

XXX This obiously wont work: Level boundaries are calculated by 2level-1. The amount of XP for the first few levels, then, are: 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512, 1024, 2048, 4096, 8192, 16384, 32768, 65536, etc.

Mage wars (a battle between two magicians) is a special operation during game play. Since the defining feature of the Mage is INTelligence, the two players must square off, dice in hand. Each mistake they make allows double damage from the other player (if they're sending a spell). Mistakes include, getting the spell incantation wrong (not remembering it). Not having your dice -- basically, anything that makes you go back to the gaming table or look away from the battle makes you vulnerable. "Mage: Don't you know what you're doing?" I believe it's essentially a mana strike, so could be setup like such mechanically.

If you want to make a scholar class (specializing in arcana of every subject), then you can still make the utilization of mana an XP generator. Whenever they teach an individual a subject they expend mana. 600mana approximately for an expert to teach one hour of a subject.

Since individuals can teach whole rooms of people, expect this expenditure to multiply approximately by the number of people taught (absorbtion rate%). The approximate value, cognitively, is approximately 1 to 1 of mana expended to value absorbed by the student. If they know it already, this develops into extra thought, otherwise the mana is expended to create new cells. The same is approximately true with receiving light from your surrounding environment — it is absorbed if you know yoru surroundings already, but if it is new or unexpected, you have to process the surroundings and it goes to new cell creation.

Adding people to this takes more mana: 100 per person... approx —— DM notes:

• Creativity bonus for XP and EMU calculations amounts to the question of How perfect was there chosen spell for the task at hand? Did they employ anything new to augment the magic that had some logical sense? If so, then the XP can be up to 2x the normal rate (which means you should reward 1/2 of the XP of simple EMU calculations if the spell wasn't well selected and executed, otheriwse where the mana you use is based on how WELL the spell was selected and executed -- amounting to a creativity bonus). XXXI knkow this is not grammarly! fix it
• Wizards can increase their INT (1-2) score by more precise use of their spell dice. Either tailoring which color or material of dice are used for specific spells, and what specific sides are used. This remains as long as they use their dice properly. If they don’t use their dice in any minimal way tailored to their spell, they can lose 1-2 dice.
• Special equipment: Staff of the Magi
• Special ability: the ability to control magicical elements, obviously
• Basically, ASM gives power to your spells, while INT give you better dice rolls. So LVLxASM * dice or soemthing.
• Evil wizards might sap the MANA re-gen of the population. In an individual it amounts to nothing, but across the population, it could grant huge power.
• Consider calculating EMU not by HP taken (like warriors), but getting past the obstable or dissipating the harm an NPC represents. This way charm and such (which don’t gain you kills or HP) is equally valid XP — when they get you want you intended. But like a billiard shot: even if you got what you want, but did not intend it, it doesn’t count towards E.M.U.
• A kilowatt of light from a crstyal costs about 1000 MANA = spending all your life force plus another 1/2 round. A 100W is about aenough for any dark place at 100W, you’ll get four rounds per cast, except as you rekindle or state the amount your’e committing before casting. 600mana +400 of yoru next round. Consider about 200W/kg of crystal a viable ratio.
• EMU: You have to be a witness for this conversion of MANA to XP to be effective (or take some percentage loss if told to you while blinded, for example OR the DM simply knows…)
• FIXME: Like other (offensive/defensive) spells, you can obligate up to the players HPs future rounds of mana for conjuration. 1HP sacrificed offers 100 mana*#multiclasses. 200 mana allows for 1 sp of conjuration value, scaling linearly up to what their available HP allows. To get a 10gp item, you'll need to obligate 40000 mana or 100 rounds (or 25 rounds for a quad-classed player). To have better performance than this, you'll have to have the help of the gods or your guild.
• If you die, with unpaid mana from a spell you made that utilized the "Future's contract" feature, you cannot be resurrected with the standard cleric spells. A necromancer would have to make a deal with the gods or something.
• Mimics are the protective "wards" of the possessions of wizards.
• Wizards can accumulate Lore cards and ARcana cards, and get XP from such, but they only get an permanent INT gain if they can assimilate and synthesize the knowledge into a coherent whole. Depending on how high the knowledge, the more difficult the task, but the more INT gain.
• Magic Missile dice: 1d20. Fire/Ice ball: 1d4 + 1d8 (plus DC check for elemental damage), Divine Arcana: 4-6 dice depending on how arcane the knowledge sought (this means their INT must be high enough to use 6 dice)