Magic in the Realms

[Steve]

Sometimes it seems, magic—or the Art—in our setting of the Sword Coast of the Forgotten Realms, is used quite offhanded...which I can understand on a practical level, considering from the Player's point of view, it is unlimited, has little consequence OTHER THAN achieving the objective in its use, and its everywhere, without much if not any NON-MECHANICAL prerequisite, i.e., RP requirement.

Additionally, when storylines and RP also uphold the ubiquitous and "all powerful" solution in Magic Use, it can greatly devalue the practical, if not completely defy the plausible.

Magic can be considered, respected, seen and understood in a richer, particular, challenging and special manner, if the time is given to Lore regarding its existence—and its use—in the Forgotten Realms.

Realmshelps has a excellent page on Magic in the Realms...you can read it here.

I will share here two quotes that gives me pause in my RP:

The great river of history is directed and redirected by magically powerful people acting out of both malice and benevolence. Even so, magic still rarely touches the life of the common Faerûnian.

If it's possible to accomplish a task without magic, then in most places and in most circumstances the mundane methods are employed. Even powerful wizards easily capable of flying or teleporting are inclined to walk on their own two legs from one town to the next. The reason for this is simple: It's prudent to reserve one's magic for when it's really needed.

Enjoy!

EDIT: and if anyone else has good source material for Magic in the Realms, please do post it here!

[Deathgrowl]

The book Magic of Faerûn is in my opinion the second most important book for the setting, right after the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting itself.

[Rhifox]

Decided to reread Magic of Faerun since you mentioned it.

Saw a feat that might be something for the devs to consider adding now that we're getting the Dispel fix:

Hidden: show

Spell Girding
Your spells are particularly hardy, resisting dispel checks more readily than normal.
Benefit: Any dispel checks made against your spells are made with a -2 penalty.

[Boddynock]

How, realistically speaking, do you effectively apply this to our server? We aren't playing D&D, we are playing NWN2, a game based on D&D. And we aren't playing in Forgotten Realms, we are playing a NWN2 version with our own unique twists.

How do you relate the description of that setting to ours, where every other person plays a favored soul (even the paladins usually take 4 pally and then FS) and of the remaining 50% 4 out of 5 are arcane casters. Every temple is populated by clerics and paladins, despite every lore source stating that the majority of any Faerunian churches clergy are NOT clerics or divine casters (similar to my Doombringer of Hoar, who is not a cleric). Al of the NPCs have PC levels. NPC barbarian lizardmen chieftains with no knowledge of magic can inexplicably cast morderkainen's disjunction for no particular reason. HIll Giant Chieftans have magic eye balls with permanent truesight. Xvart shamans have permanent immunity to death magic.

TL;DR- D&D's Forgotten Realms is a low magic setting (not really, but that isn't the point of this debate), BGTSCC Forgotten Realms is, unarguably and indisputably, not low magic.

Just a recent example I can give you. I had a guard in the FAI come up to my familiar and threaten to step on it (spider familiar) and did not relent even after I mentioned is was in fact a familiar. In FR, a no name nobody NPC guard who came to the sudden realization that he just threatened to kill a wizard's familiar would literally hurt himself trying to prostrate on the ground in apology. The FAI guard we have simply warned me, after it scuttled off, that should they find the familiar on the premises that it would be slain. In a setting where magic is (supposedly) both greatly feared and respected, do you really think that situation would have played out that way? (I understand that there had been a recent report of a spider attack nearby, in which case the guard would have at least gotten a large amount of backup...but I understand what the DM was trying to accomplish, no hard feelings here.)

Regardless of whether we like it or agree with it, we have to play in the setting the staff and DMs have made for us, and that setting shares a name, a pantheon, geography, and most of it's history with Forgotten Realms...but realistically this server became it's own unique setting the day it went live.

To clarify, I am not arguing against the attempt to keep our setting as close to FR as possible, simply warning against something I occasionally see that never works (and have been guilty of in the past myself), and that is players that put on blinders and insist this is Forgotten Realms and that lore needs to match this lore 100%... No, this is not Forgotten Realms, this is BGTSCC, and they are two different things.

[Steve]

Boddynock, many of your concerns is precisely why I posted the link.

Though I disagree with some of your opinions about The Forgotten Realms and BGTSCC, we are entitled to our opinions. And it is my opinion that perceptions and actions can be changed through dissemination of information.

[Boddynock]

Boddynock, many of your concerns is precisely why I posted the link.

Though I disagree with some of your opinions about The Forgotten Realms and BGTSCC, we are entitled to our opinions. And it is my opinion that perceptions and actions can be changed through dissemination of information.

What I got from you post, and correct me if I am wrong, is that we should attempt to move things back towards the FR setting and increase respect for magic as a whole, which I agree with. That's why (and I agree it is easy to miss considering the rest of the post that follows, lol) the first thing I did was ask you how do we do this (which you answered with "disseminate information" which is a perfectly viable strategy).

The intent of the rest of my post was to warn people from making the mistake of sticking to close to what they want, as opposed to what they have, it will only lead to frustration.

And I hate to say it, and I am not trying to inflammatory here (rather I am trying to put this whole discussion into sharp perspective), you can disagree with anything you want, but the fact that you felt the need to post this at all lends credence to my statements. What we have IS different than FR, the only real opinion is on whether or not we should attempt to bring it back to 100% true to lore, or we should not.

[Moltrazahn]

A way to achieve a greater respect for magic and increase the rarely of it... would be to treat spells as they are supposed to... x-timers PER day (!). Allowing one rest per day ( or every 8 hours )would make all casters careful when to use their spells.

However... this won't happen. Because it lowers the overall quality and freedom that people enjoy. As things are now you will often see those 24/buffed sparkling individuels. However aside from removing spell vfx I doubt there is much else one can do to reduce magic "presence" in our server setting.

[Steve]

Currently, more "problems" are solved and more storylines are forwarded by Magic Use (spells, items, innate, etc) than by skills or abilities, in my humble opinion. Conversely, rare or custom magic is also denied the Player Character because there is no correlating spell in actual, available spells.

By striking a balance, through lowering expectations of what magic can and is able to do—reliably—by players and DMs, could make the gaming experience more varied and enjoyable.

I cannot say if many share this opinion—I am pretty sure Invoker doesn't —and I realize that magic is kinda the reason people play fantasy games, so if anything, I'm advocating a World where magic is MORE IMPORTANT than now, through its rarity and its particular use, then it's pervasiveness and commonness. To whatever extent we choose or consider best for rewarding experience for all (and ourselves, natch).

[Karond]

I 100% agree with Steve.

I struggle with this myself. I don't see FR as a low magic setting boddyknock, if anything, with what I've learned and experienced it seems to be very high magic. Out of the 6-7 or so fantasy realms I've delved into, FR is the highest magic of them all.

The thing is that magic in FR seems to be able to solve everything. Even on this server, we're approaching spellbooks where there is a spell for everything, and d&d is worse in this regard. I can understand Thay and other magic-heavy societies to a certain degree. Magic is everything, and really every ruler and society in FR should be magic-focused. I can't understand why there even is Thayan knights though. Another red wizard would be a thousand times more useful. I can't even figure why someone would ever raise a sword in a world where magic users can do everything. It's like using a wooden spear against a military aircraft.

That link claims that spellcasters are rare but one in 100 is far from rare. Even if it's just 1 in 1000, given populations of millions, the entire military, ruling class and pretty much everything would be made up by those who can shape their very surroundings with a word. Even if they were rare for our server, which they obviously can't be given they're easily accessible classes and the entire environment is promoting spellcasters, it brings out several issues (so, one has to think of spellcasters as rather normal rather than rare since they're everywhere).

For example one of the most annoying things for me when I was a DM was people regularly using etherealness on the entire party to "scout". It just defeats the whole purpose of stealth characters doing anything, or for the DM to bother setting things up.

This is essentially what I struggle with.

The DMs have to circumvent so many things due to player behaviour. The DM can't create a disease for example, because any cleric or paladin can just eradicate it and people are freely giving out their magic anyway without a second thought. To make it interesting, the disease has to have something attached to it that make it less able to be cured, but then players could just ignore the ravages of the disease on themselves or on the local population, and that has to be implemented and so on. It's just an enormous headache to work around how to create interesting storylines and setups, that retain some feeling of being worthy to solve (so bordering epic or at least requiring extensive effort) while at the same time can't be harmful to the environment or indeed in many cases, to the players themselves (as many players hate to be affected by anything, or losing in any situation, according to most of the staff). I've thought a lot about how to circumvent all of the issues that arises out of magical spells doing everything, and I've so far come out empty.

[Invoker]

I cannot say if many share this opinion—I am pretty sure Invoker doesn't —

It's not a matter of what I agree with. It's a matter of what one needs to do.

The way the server is geared, blasting spells don't kill anything, and DC spells are only partially reliable because of the saves on mobs and rigged dice.

I already use as little magic and spells (especially wards) as you will ever see another pure caster using. The absolute minimum to win and ensure safety. Less than that, and I'd either have to run, or die.

So, unless you ask me to let my allies die or directly suicide in the great spirit of mystic wizardry, there is nothing I can do for you.

[Moltrazahn]

I 100% agree with Steve.
...I can't even figure why someone would ever raise a sword in a world where magic users can do everything. It's like using a wooden spear against a military aircraft...

Because those with/in power needs someone to remind them why they are in power.

[Deathgrowl]

The thing is that magic in FR seems to be able to solve everything. Even on this server, we're approaching spellbooks where there is a spell for everything, and d&d is worse in this regard. I can understand Thay and other magic-heavy societies to a certain degree. Magic is everything, and really every ruler and society in FR should be magic-focused. I can't understand why there even is Thayan knights though. Another red wizard would be a thousand times more useful. I can't even figure why someone would ever raise a sword in a world where magic users can do everything. It's like using a wooden spear against a military aircraft.

What a gross misrepresentation of the setting you're making here. Mages know that they are at their most powerful when they haven't cast any spells. Because once they do cast one, they are running out of power. Once their magic is depleted, they are essentially powerless. That is why you would pick up a sword.

Besides, magic requires genius level intellect or inborn gift. Not everyone has either of those.

And you can't do everything with magic. Read Magic of Faerûn.

[Karond]

And you can't do everything with magic. Read Magic of Faerûn.

Sure you can. Just invent the spell. That's pretty much what wizards aim to do.

Because once they do cast one, they are running out of power. Once their magic is depleted, they are essentially powerless.

They just rest and get more spells? Either way, that's how the server works and so that's how everyone treats magic, your feelings on the matter non-withstanding.

[Boddynock]

@Karond:

I personally don't see FR as low magic either, but so many people make that claim. I was just avoid derailing to discuss that.

@Deathgrowl:

Maybe in Magic of Faerun you can't do everything with magic, but lets remember this isn't D&D, and this isn't really Faerun. And, like Karond said, you can invent the spell. I mean, Karsus's Folly, right? In our reality, our server, magic can't do everything and you can't feasibly create spells, but neither is there a real consequence for casting them with the way the rest timers work. Magic is not a finite resource, not really.

This goes back to the whole disconnect between the real FR setting, and our server setting. FR is a setting for D&D, not an MMO. This is not a tabletop game, it is an MMO. It can't all be the same.

[Rasael]

Perhaps increase the rest timer or introduce different types of resting. For spells once per day, for health as it has always been.

if we increase the lenght of a day and hour to the 4::1 ratio it might be neat to combine that with nuanced resting mechanics.