Spontanious casters

[Rigon]

I was thinking of having clerics and druids be spontanious casters in my campaign. They would still only be able to cast the listed number of spells per day, but would be able to cast any spells from their list that they wish.

Opinions or thoughts welcomed.

R-
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Rigon o' the Lakelands, Baron of The Castles & Crusades Society
The Book of the Mind

[Julian Grimm]

Rigon wrote:
I was thinking of having clerics and druids be spontanious casters in my campaign. They would still only be able to cast the listed number of spells per day, but would be able to cast any spells from their list that they wish.

Opinions or thoughts welcomed.

R-

Been using this for a long time and it is an 'official houserule' of my campaign. Haven't had an issue yet and lower level casters gain great benifits from this.
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[Rigon]

I've been kicking the idea around as a way to seperate the feel of arcane casters and devine casters. And having looked over your material at the Raven's Keep, I thought I'd throw it out there for some scrutiny.

R-
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Rigon o' the Lakelands, Baron of The Castles & Crusades Society
The Book of the Mind

[gideon_thorne]

I've always done it that way. I added the 2e 'channeller' concept later when that came about.

Im ruminating over some new ideas at present. Magic as an applied skill check of sorts and constructed spell powers.
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"We'll go out through the kitchen!" Tanis Half-Elven

Peter Bradley

[Rigon]

gideon_thorne wrote:
I added the 2e 'channeller' concept later when that came about.

What's this?

R-
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Rigon o' the Lakelands, Baron of The Castles & Crusades Society
The Book of the Mind

[gideon_thorne]

Rigon wrote:
What's this?

R-

Twas from a book called Spells and Magic. The Channeller would 'absorb' energy from around them, and or within themselves, and use that to fuel spells. Casting too much, however, began to drain the constitution. Once the character used up his effective con, that's all she wrote.

It's kind of a spell points system, but one I liked.
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"We'll go out through the kitchen!" Tanis Half-Elven

Peter Bradley

[Rigon]

Thanks Peter, I'll have to take a look at it.

R-
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Rigon o' the Lakelands, Baron of The Castles & Crusades Society
The Book of the Mind

[Korgoth]

Rigon wrote:
I was thinking of having clerics and druids be spontanious casters in my campaign. They would still only be able to cast the listed number of spells per day, but would be able to cast any spells from their list that they wish.

Opinions or thoughts welcomed.

R-

I think it is reasonable. The divine casters are praying for the ability to do something... why would they have to pray in advance anyway?
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[gideon_thorne]

Korgoth wrote:
why would they have to pray in advance anyway?

"We're sorry. All our divine messengers are busy at this time. Please leave a message and our Avatar Miracle Service will get back to you as soon as a representative is available."

"For our automated touch tone service, ring the gong once for healing, twice for divine retrebution, thrice to leave a donation."
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"We'll go out through the kitchen!" Tanis Half-Elven

Peter Bradley

[Rigon]

Korgoth wrote:
I think it is reasonable. The divine casters are praying for the ability to do something... why would they have to pray in advance anyway?

That's along the lines of what I was thinking.

R-
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Rigon o' the Lakelands, Baron of The Castles & Crusades Society
The Book of the Mind

[serleran]

I would have no problem with a cleric casting, spontaneously, a spell up to second level. After that, it requires divine emmisaries to grant the spells. In non d20 D&D games, spells (AD&D did not have "orisons" -- 0-level spells -- until late 2E) the spells up to third level were "learned" rituals. Spells up to 5th level required the granting by a "lesser divine being" and anything above that (6th and 7th) needed the god's direct approval. This is why preparing spells beforehand is absolutely required, though the god can channel a needed spell through the cleric... this is an important distinction as the cleric does not know the spell is being changed, and must rely on their faith in their god to grant them the appropriate spell. Without this, the "holy union" between cleric and deity is severed.

[Treebore]

I used to do what Ser does, except up to 3rd level. Until 3E anyways. I should use it again with my C&C game.

The way I have it Solars have the ability to cast and grant 3rd level and lower spells on behalf of the deific power they serve. Beyond that you have to get it from your deity, or some "power" that the deity puts in charge (and give the power to fulfill the post).

Actualy, I used the old rules. If you worship a Demigod you will never cast higher than 5th level spells. Of course to use it now I would have to change things to accomodate 9 spell levels.

So now demi-gods will probably stay at 5th level spells, lesser deities would be 6th and 7th, If I use the "Intemediate" rank (which makes a fair amount of sense to me anyways) they will max out at 8th, and Greater will of course be able to grant 9th. Otherwise Greater gods will award 8th and 9th level spells.

I have always liked that because a religion really should only be as powerful as its god. Which will also motivate gods to accumulate more worshippers, beacuse the number of worshippers really does effect a gods level of power.

Now I'll just have to find or remember, probably just recreate, my god rankings based on number of worshippers. I do remember 30,000 was the magic number for becoming lesser.

Which is why Iuz stayed a demigod in my camapigns of GH. He always killed off too many of his potential and actual worshippers.

Which also explains why, in my games, evil deities were rarely capable of getting above lesser power. They often kill too many of their own.

[rabindranath72]

Yes, I too categorize cleric spells by level according to the guidelines in AD&D first edition, and allow them according the the god's power. It adds flavor without burdening with rules.

I also use the system I called of "signature spells", i.e. for each level, the CK and the PC choose a spell which can be spontaneously cast and that fits the deity's portfolio. So, no two clerics of the same religion will have the same "domain" spells. This makes the game fun and allows lots of thinking on the part of the player to "explain" why his character can spontaneously cast some spells.

Cheers,

Antonio

[Rigon]

Interesting concepts folks, thanks. I think over the next couple of days, I'm going to rework most of my house rules and tinker heavily with the classes. So, I'll probably be posting other questions or ideas for you all to look at.

R-
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Rigon o' the Lakelands, Baron of The Castles & Crusades Society
The Book of the Mind

[Maliki]

I think it would be a great jump in power to allow a cleric to spontaneously cast any spell from his list. Limiting it to 1st & 2nd level spells sounds like a workable solution, it add a lot of power to lower level clerics, but not so much at higher levels.

One player, for my next campaign, wanted to run a cleric the same way sorcerer, this would not give him access to the whole spell list, he would have a limited number of spells available to cast, but these could be cast spontaneously. (I said no, I was afraid that this might cause a balance issue, but I may rethink it)
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[Fiffergrund]

Regarding the balance issue - Clerics do have lots of advantages, and allowing them to spontaneously cast any spell on the list would put them over the top, in my opinion. YMMV, of course.

To remedy this, I would suggest having divine spells take longer to cast, perhaps doubling their casting times to signify the time required to formulate the prayer to the deity, etc. This gives them flexibility but makes it more difficult for them to get a spell off in combat.
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Sir Fiffergrund, Lord Marshal of the Castle and Crusade Society.

He Who Hides Behind The Elephant's Back

[vogless]

The thing that I thought was the coolest with 3.0 was the ability of a cleric to spontanoeusly cast healing spells. In my experience, clerics before then were nothing but walking first aid kits. This ability allowed them to take other spells for the day, then downshift to heal as needed. Domain spells are a whole other bird. I'm going to allow spontaeous casting of healing spells and I will also allow 1 special ability from a domain. This will definitly be enough candy to get someone in my group to drop a fighter and take the cleric.

[Moorcrys]

I'm recreating domains for my C&C clerics, with a minor ability and spells much like 3.x.

I have about 50 gods in my world... Clerics dedicated to certain deities of healing and purification will be able to convert spells to healing, while other deities will grant other benefits more in line with their area of influence.
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Moorcrys

[Dristram]

I allow the spontaneous casting of healing spells as well, but that's it. I had thought about making the clerics in my 3e games spontaneous casters, but it seemed too powerful. If folks seem to be okay with it in C&C, I may look back into it.

I've been thinking of creating a 3e sorcerer like class though for the elves in my campaign to be. In my 3e games, the elves favored class was Sorcerer.

[phadeout]

As noted earlier, Spells and Magic from 2E AD&D would be a great reference. I'm very tempted to use the Spell Point system, and maybe some of the optional spell casting variations (channelling, witchery, alienists, etc.).

If you want to keep things as simple as possible though, let Clerics (and Druids) use healing spontaneously (a'la 3E).

If the Wizards/Illusionists complain let them cast a single spell, of their choice, of each level spontaneously. (Each time they gain a level, they can change one of their spontaneous spells to another - since they don't have access to all the spells right off the bat they may want to change them down the road).

[Rigon]

Having thought about this, most of the day, I've decided to do away with druids, clerics, wizards, and illusionists. Instead I'm going to go with mentalist (psionicists) and channelers (Wheel of Time style). more to come when I get a chance to really get into it. Mrs. Rigon's drama production is this weekend and I'm busy finishing sets and staging. I love being married to a teacher!

R-
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Rigon o' the Lakelands, Baron of The Castles & Crusades Society
The Book of the Mind

[BASH MAN]

This is a great idea, that I have been using for a long time. It also makes a lot of sense.

Your diety grants you the ability to create miracles to pull your chestnuts out of the fire depending on the situation.

Consider the absurdity of this:

"Diety, please give me the power to breath underwater, resist electricity, and speak with animals today". Diety says okay. Then, you somehow get transported to the elemental plane of earth. All those spells you prayed for in the morning are wasted as your diety says, "oh well, you should have anticipated randomly being taken to the elemental plane of earth. Sorry, nothing I can do for you until tomorrow when you pray for more spells. I am a diety afterall-- I cannot be expected to perform miracles for you at the drop of a hat!"
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[phadeout]

BASH MAN wrote:
This is a great idea, that I have been using for a long time. It also makes a lot of sense.

Your diety grants you the ability to create miracles to pull your chestnuts out of the fire depending on the situation.

Consider the absurdity of this:

"Diety, please give me the power to breath underwater, resist electricity, and speak with animals today". Diety says okay. Then, you somehow get transported to the elemental plane of earth. All those spells you prayed for in the morning are wasted as your diety says, "oh well, you should have anticipated randomly being taken to the elemental plane of earth. Sorry, nothing I can do for you until tomorrow when you pray for more spells. I am a diety afterall-- I cannot be expected to perform miracles for you at the drop of a hat!"

Makes me kind of the Quest spells from 2nd Edition... Basically super powerful priest spells that were very hard to acquire... made up for not having those 8/9th level spells, in a big way.