Building a Spellcaster    

Spells and spellcasting take up an enormous portion of the rules of any D&D product.  It certainly isn't the only way to create a comprehensive magic system (see Ars Magica, for example), but D&D and Pathfinder insist on having each and every potential magical action described, in detail, each with its own rules.  This is not necessarily a bad thing!  D&D has at its core a tactical combat game.  Designing a magic system with the breadth of the entire fantasy genre, that can be applied to the very narrow focus of tactical combat, is a fairly astounding feat.  For those of us who love the D&D magic system, even the parts that we sometimes hate, it is an integral part of the game.

That said, it has become so incredibly huge that it is barely workable for experienced players, much less for new players.  Consider, for example, the number of charts in just the core Pathfinder rules that deal with the number of spells that a character either casts or learns per caster level:  there are ten of them.

In addition, spellcasting hasn't really caught up with the evolution of the rest of the system.  No where is that more clear than in the multiclass rules.  Once you decide to be a spellcaster, anything that you do that takes you away from that specific spellcasting class is going to make your character substantially less powerful.  A fighter/barbarian, or fighter/ranger is a perfectly acceptable path, but a sorcerer/wizard is simply not.  (As an aside, I had a player play a sorcerer/wizard in one of my campaigns, and he was an excellent character.  This is not to besmirch the concept at all, just the way that the rules support that concept.)

In case it wasn't clear by now, it is my intention for these house rules to eliminate the need for multiclassing.  And I believe that Pathfinder has made moves in that direction as well.  For example, the hybrid classes essentially do what I am doing, but in a much more limited way: they combine the components of two classes together, so that you can level up in both at the same time.  The Arcanist, for example, is Pathfinder's solution to the sorcerer/wizard problem.

Why is this important for story? The short answer is, it isn't directly important, but the ways that it indirectly impacts the story add up to a big difference.  First, simpler rules allow new players to feel more welcome.  Having new players feel welcome leads to a table with more diverse viewpoints and experiences, which leads to better story.  Second, having spellcasting be an addable (and removable) component allows the gamemaster to easily turn the dial on how much magic they want in their campaign.  Eventually, this blog will turn to the subject of gamemastering, and how class components can be set up for particular genres of fantasy.  It may be that you want spellcasting to be a rare, but powerful thing.  An easy way to accomplish this is to eliminate Secondary and Tertiary Spellcasting, and only allow it to be a Primary component.  Or, alternatively, you may want magic to be pervasive, but not as powerful.  Doing the opposite, and allowing Tertiary Spellcasting only will accomplish this.  Rules that support genre will, in turn, support good story.  Third, streamlined spellcasting rules make the game go faster.  It means that a larger amount of the time that you have to sit down and play the game can go toward advancing the story, rather than fiddling with rules and looking things up.

Spellcaster

Requirements:  none (but see restrictions below)

Hit Dice:  no change

Skills:  Spellcasters gain the following class skills:  Knowledge (arcana), Spellcraft, Use Magic Device

Base Attack Bonus:  no change

Saving Throws: Spellcasters advance quickly in Will saving throws.

Additional Spells:  see below

Special Abilities:  Spellcasters are able to prepare and cast magic spells.  Preparing spells requires the spellcaster to be well-rested (eight hours of rest), and to spend one hour of preparation time in a relatively peaceful environment.  Note that other class components may provide additional restrictions or advantages in preparing and casting spells.

Spells Per Day:  Spellcasters can generally cast at least two spells per day of the highest spell level that they can cast, at least three spells per day of the second highest spell level that they can cast, and four spells per day for all other spell levels.  They begin able to cast only first level spells or lower.  They gain access to a new level of spell every two character levels.  When they do not gain access to a new spell level (on even numbered levels), they instead gain an additional spell for every level that then can cast at, to a maximum of four.  Their progression thus looks like this (apologies, as Blogger doesn't seem to be able to do tables):

Character     Spell Level
Level           0             1st           2nd         3rd         4th

1                  3             2
2                  4             3
3                  4             3             2
4                  4             4             3
5                  4             4             3             2
6                  4             4             4             3
7                  4             4             4             3             2
8                  4             4             4             3             3

Spells Known:  Spellcasters know a number of spells equal to twice the number of spells that they can cast.  They can choose from this list when preparing their spells to cast.  For example, if a spellcaster can cast two second-level spells, three first-level spells, and four zero-level spells per day, they will have four second-level spells, six first-level spells, and eight zero-level spells in their repertoire to choose from.

Special Restrictions:  All Spellcasters must choose one of the following restrictions below.  Secondary Spellcasters must choose two restrictions, and Tertiary Spellcasters must choose three.

• Delayed Spellcasting:  Instead of being able to cast spells at first level, spellcasters with this restriction do not begin to learn to cast spells until they are fourth level.  At that point, they continue to learn at the normal rate, reducing their character level by three for the purposes of spells and spellcasting).
• Limited Spell List:  Initially, all spellcasters gain access to the same list of spells.  They will also gain access to additional spells through other class components.  However, spellcasters who take this restriction cannot learn some of the more powerful spells available.  A breakdown of individual spells and how to create spell lists for your campaign is the subject of a later post.
• Required Item:  In order to prepare and cast spells, the caster must have a particular unique item available.  Note that this restriction cannot be taken if the spellcaster does not have to prepare spells (due to an ability from another class component).  The eschew materials feat does not remove the requirement to have this item.
• Slow Learning:  Spellcasters with this restriction know half the number of spells that they can cast per day (rounded up), instead of twice that number.  Note that this restriction cannot be taken if the spellcaster has a way to learn more than the usual number of spells (due to an ability from another class component).
• Slow Progress:  Spellcasters with this restriction gain access to a new level of spell every three character levels, instead of every two character levels.  If desired, this restriction can be taken twice.  Spellcasters who do so gain access to a new level of spell every four character levels.

Existing Spellcasting Classes

How does this look for our existing spellcasting classes?  Currently, we have three Primary Spellcaster classes:  druid, wizard, and sorcerer.  While all have Primary Spellcaster, they are distinguished by their other components and also by the special restrictions that they have chosen.  Druids have the special restriction of Limited Spell List, which removes some of the traditional "wizard only" spells such as magic missile, but druids can still gain additional spells to add to their list from their other components.  Wizards will have Secondary Scholar component, which will give them access to many more potentially known spells, but at the cost of having to scribe them into their spellbook.  Their restriction is Required Item: Spellbook.  Sorcerers have a Secondary Bloodline component which will give them an increased number of spells per day, as well as giving them access to a more spells for their list based on their birthright.  They will also have a component that removes the requirement for preparing spells in advance, making them more versatile casters.  Their restriction could either by Slow Learning or Slow Progress, but I strongly prefer giving them Slow Learning.   In comparison to current Pathfinder rules, this will mean they have a few less spells to cast, but will gain new levels of spells at the same time as wizards do.

Our cleric and bard have Secondary Spellcaster components.  Clerics take the restrictions of Limited Spell List and Required Item, which is their holy symbol.  They can then gain additional spells from their Primary Healer component, as well as from their Domain component.  Bards currently have the restrictions Limited Spell List and Slow Progress.  They share a component with sorcerer that will enable them to not need to prepare spells in advance.

Finally paladins and rangers have Tertiary Spellcaster components.  Assuming they are not traded out for something else, they will have the limitations of Delayed Spellcasting, Limited Spell List, and Slow Progress.

Next up is the Jack-of-all-Trades, but Master-of-None, the Bard!

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Tackling Spellcasting     

Whenever I sit down to muck with whatever D&D rules have come out most recently (which is fairly often), I always say to myself:  "just leave the spells and magic section for later."  And, inevitably, I will immediately be drawn down into the rabbit hole of analyzing and rewriting the spells and magic section, and banging my head against the wall as to why mage armor is still a Conjuration spell (thank you Fifth Edition for fixing this!) and what exactly the point of the Transmutation school is (spells that change people or stuff, to make them better or worse, except not magic weapons, because that's Enchantment, and not cursing, because that's Necromancy, and who the heck knows why message is in here...)

See, even in that paragraph, I got drawn down the rabbit hole!  I cannot keep out of it.  But, in this post, I swear, I am not going to get into individual spells.  Instead, I'd just like to talk about spellcasting, generally, as a class ability.

Out of the eleven core classes in Pathfinder and Third Edition D&D, only four are non-spellcasters.  And one of those, the rogue, can actually cast a few spells through Rogue Talents.  Each class has its own spell list, gains spells at a different rate, prepares spells in different ways, casts a different number of spells each day, and requires different components to do so.

Compare this, for example, to the combat rules regarding fighting with weapons.  All but two of the eleven core classes can use crossbows, and they all use the same rules for doing so.  What makes a fighter better at firing a crossbow than a wizard is separate from the rules about how crossbows work.  This is what I would like to do with Spellcasting.  There would be only one class component for Spellcasting, because it would all work in the same basic way.  It would then be modified by other components of your character class.

Which Ability Score Should Spellcasting Use?

One way in which the different classes approach spellcasting is that they use different ability scores to do it.  Clerics, druids, and rangers use Wisdom; bards, paladins, and sorcerers use Charisma; and wizards use Intelligence.  There isn't, as far as I can tell, a reason why these particular ability scores are used.  Paladins cast divine magic, but sorcerers cast arcane magic.  Bards do not need to prepare their spells, but paladins do.  All three classes use Charisma as their ability score for casting spells.  Let's look at the sort of things that having a high ability score will give you, with respect to spellcasting:

• Determines whether or not you are able to cast spells of a particular level at all.
• Grants a number of bonus spells per day.
• Grants a bonus on the DC for opponents to save vs. your spells.

The first two rules are odd, to say the least.  Most other class abilities that are based on an ability score have a set number of uses per day, and then either add or subtract their ability modifier to that number of uses.  It would make more sense if low scores for spellcasters resulted in the opposite of bonus spells, i.e., you can cast fewer spells per day, instead of not being able to cast at all.  Moreover, ability scores do not grant a flat bonus of "plus however many spells per day."  Instead, there is a table that limits these bonus uses of spells by level, meaning that a first level character will have a maximum of "gain one bonus spell per day" and a minimum of "can't cast spells at all."

The third rule affects some, but not all of your spellcasting actions.  Specifically, it only affects spells that require a saving throw from your opponent.  These spells are offensive in nature, since spells that boost your abilities or the abilities of your allies do not require a saving throw.  Nor do spells that are cast on non-creature targets, generally speaking.  And many offensive spells do not having a saving throw, but are instead resolved with melee touch attacks or ranged touch attacks (making the relevant ability scores Strength or Dexterity, respectively).  Indeed, only about 26% of the Pathfinder Core Rules, first level cleric spells require a saving throw.  That number rises only slightly, to 27%, when considering first level wizard spells.

It is with this context in mind that I would like to propose the following:  eliminate ability requirements for accessing high level spells, and standardize what ability score determines save DCs with respect to all spell casting.  Other facets of spell casting, including number of spells per day, can be determined by whether your Spellcasting component is primary, secondary, or tertiary, and what other class components your character has.  The challenge will be keeping the distinct flavor of each major spell casting class, and keeping the ability scores balanced within the game.

Wisdom, Intelligence, and Charisma: a Brief History of the Dump Stats

In original versions of D&D, you did not always have control over where your ability scores were placed.  It was also fairly likely that you would have one or more ability scores that were below average.  So the concept of the "dump stat" started very early in D&D's history.  Charisma was the primary target, since the system didn't provide very much incentive to take a high Charisma, unless you were a paladin.  But Wisdom and Intelligence were not far behind, especially before the advent of a skill system and the all-important Perception skill.  Wisdom was important for clerics, and Intelligence for magic users, but neither was particularly important for any of the fighting types.

Second Edition added school specialization rules for wizards that required very high ability scores in something else other than Intelligence, presumably in an attempt to balance and differentiate them.  However, this approach was not particularly successful, and was dropped in Third Edition.  Third Edition's approach was to add a robust skill system based around Intelligence.  The Will saving throw and the Perception skill made Wisdom useful.  Charisma was used for several key skills and special abilities, as well as being the core of the new Sorcerer class.

Intelligence, however, suffered major setbacks when it came to Pathfinder.  Originally, the number of skills you received at first level was multiplied times four.  An 18 Intelligence score could translate, therefore, into twenty-four (!) additional skill points for a first level character (and an additional four per level).  Pathfinder changed this rule (for good reasons) so that instead you would only receive four extra skill points at first level (and an additional four per level).

These extra skill points from Intelligence were not bonuses, but rather ranks.  This is important, because in Third Edition you could spend up to your character's level +3 in ranks into a skill.  However, in Pathfinder, you can only spend up to your character's level.  This means that additional skill ranks will give a character more skills, but not higher skills.

In Third Edition, Intelligence added to the following skills:  Appraise, Craft, Decipher Script, Disable Device, Forgery, Knowledge, Search, and Spellcraft.  In Pathfinder, however, the Decipher Script and Forgery skills were eliminated.  Search was incorporated into Perception, which remained based on Wisdom.  And the important skill of Disable Device was made into a Dexterity skill.  This left only five skills (with the newly added Linguistics) for Intelligence in Pathfinder.

Intelligence as the Primary Spellcasting Ability Score

My house rules would make Intelligence the ability score used for calculating all spell saving throw DCs, regardless of class.  How would this impact the other spellcasting classes?

Bards are often already high Intelligence characters, since they have access to all Knowledge skills (as well as the other four Intelligence based skills).  Their Charisma will be less useful for spell casting, but will remain critical for their Perform-based abilities and bardic performances.

Clerics will be at somewhat of a disadvantage, since they are not generally high Intelligence characters.  However, their Domain abilities are often Wisdom based.  By standardizing that rule, that Domain components work off of Wisdom, it will remain an important score for clerics.  To further keep Wisdom as the primary ability score of clerics, it could be substituted with Charisma as the score which determines how many channel energy uses the cleric receives.  This will also serve to further distinguish clerics from druids, as clerics will be higher Wisdom whereas druids will be higher charisma.

Druids are also not generally high Intelligence characters.  However, the trade off from Wisdom to Intelligence is unlikely to affect druids very much.  Their abilities are generally Charisma based.  The advantages that a higher Wisdom brings are mostly in the area of skill bonuses, will be offset by additional skills in the form of higher Intelligence.

Paladin and ranger are tertiary spell casting classes.  Their spells are focused primary on buffing, and they will not be unduly hindered by having somewhat lower save DCs.

Similar to the cleric's domain being important for Wisdom, sorcerers will keep Charisma as a primary ability score by making it critical for their Bloodline abilities.  But Sorcerers will have to have a decent Intelligence score as well.  Currently, Sorcerers have less need for Intelligence than Fighters do (after all, fighters might want to take combat expertise).  This is a change that I think will enhance game balance, and to the extent that sorcerers are less accurate in their targeting of spell effects, I think that makes for good story as well.  Wizards are the spell experts, and sorcerers are the rogue talents who don't know nearly enough about the massive powers that they can wield.

It's a big change, but a change that I think makes for a better game system.  Next post, a breakdown of Spellcasting and how primary, secondary, and tertiary components differ!

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Considering Clerics     

We are skipping over bards for the moment (we'll come back to them soon!) to talk about clerics, a truly unique character class.  Clerics are one of the "original four" standard classes, along with fighters, wizards (formerly magic users), and rogues (formerly thieves).  The cleric, sometimes known as a priest, was a little bit crusader, a little bit Friar Tuck, and a little bit Van Helsing.  Clerics could fight in melee combat, but with restrictions that made them subpar fighters.  They could cast spells, which were generally less powerful than wizards, and they were extremely effective at dealing with the undead.  They had two very important abilities that set them apart:  they could heal other characters and they could cast spells while wearing heavy armor.

Magical healing is an absolute necessity in most fantasy RPGs.  You can do without the fighter or the rogue, because there are lots of character classes that shares those skills.  You can even do without the wizard, although it will slow you down in higher level adventures.  But you need a healer, and this means someone has to play the cleric.  I'm not certain whether it is because the class is practically mandatory, or because of the religious background, but for whatever reason, I have found that many players hate playing clerics.  If you are lucky, there is that one person in your group who enjoys it (it's almost always a dwarven cleric for some reason), and they end up taking the role in every game.  More often, the cleric is the last character class chosen, by the person who doesn't really care what they play.  The game designers of D&D and Pathfinder, beginning with TSR, realized this.  There were three approaches that they could take to solve this problem:  make clerics more interesting, allow other character classes to heal, or change the way the hit point and damage rules work.  What we have ended up with is a bit of all three.

Second Edition D&D made clerics more powerful and flexible, dividing their spells into "spheres" of influence by their deity, and relaxing the weapon restrictions a bit.  This was greatly aided by one of the classic settings of Second Edition: the Forgotten Realms.  In this campaign world, created by Ed Greenwood, the gods and goddesses were major characters in the story.  Suddenly, playing a cleric or agent of one of these deities gave a character a whole lot of story potential.  Other settings also helped, such as Ravenloft.  The predominance of undead as an enemy meant that clerics would always have a lot to do.  So clerics were still mandatory, but they became more interesting to play.

Third Edition D&D made druids a more viable and interesting character class, and they had access to healing abilities, but druids never really caught on as healers.  Their other abilities, such as wild shape, were not well-suited to support roles.  Bards also gained healing spells, but they were so limited that they were rarely used as full-time healers.  Instead, the main solution of Third Edition and later Pathfinder, was to crank the cleric's healing power up to 11:  spontaneous casting of healing spells and channeling positive energy made healing incredibly easy, leaving the cleric to focus on other aspects of their character.  At the same time, hit points all got a significant boost, so that by Pathfinder, no one had d4 hit die any more.

In my house rules, I've also modified the hit point and damage system considerably, which helps make having a healer no longer a mandatory requirement.  Fourth and Fifth Edition D&D have taken similar approaches, although they use substantially different rules.

Clerics are now about as powerful as they can reasonably get (they are overpowered compared to other character classes), and they still get little respect.  But I suppose that means that folks who like playing clerics (I count myself among them) will always have the option and be welcomed at the table.

How Components Interact

My ulterior motive for skipping to cleric is to discuss how different components of a character's class can interact with each other.  Here's how one could break down the cleric into four components:

Primary Healer

• Heal skill
• spontaneous casting (cure spells)
• channel energy (positive)

Secondary Spellcaster

• fast Will save
• Knowledge (arcana), Knowledge (planes), Spellcraft skills
• divine spellcasting, beginning at first level

Secondary Armored Fighter

• 1d8 hit dice
• medium attack progression
• fast Fortitude save
• proficiency with medium armor and shields
• allows spell casting from Secondary Spellcaster with armor

Tertiary Community Leader

• Diplomacy, Knowledge (history), Knowledge (nobility), Knowledge (religion), Linguistics, Sense Motive skills

There are more things that are granted by these components in my house rules, but these are how the current Pathfinder cleric abilities break down.  Clerics also get a few things that don't fit within any of these four components, such as Appraise and Craft, and some things that are granted based on what deity they follow, such as Aura and Domains (more on that shortly).  Note that I've assumed that this cleric is channeling positive energy.  That is because healing through positive energy channel is such an essential part of the cleric, as it is played in the vast majority of games, as to make evil clerics into practically a different class entirely.  I'll talk about changes we can make to this "standard" cleric in the next post, but for now, assume that the cleric is good aligned and follows a deity of good, community, and/or healing.

There are two ways that these components interact, both with spell casting:  Healer grants the ability to spontaneously cast healing spells, which is useless without Spellcaster.  And Armored Fighter grants the ability to cast spells while wearing armor, which can only be used with Spellcaster.

Spellcasting While Wearing Armor

The Armored Fighter class component is designed to work together with Spellcaster in order to reproduce the effects of the wildly inconsistent and incomprehensible "spell casting while wearing armor" rules.  Currently, arcane spells cannot be cast while wearing armor without a) incurring a chance to fail in casting, b) taking a particular feat tree, c) having magical armor made specially for the purpose, d) having a particular racial bonus, or e) being a Magus.  And what qualifies as "arcane" spells is equally unpredictable (bard spells, including healing spells, are arcane, but ranger spells are divine).  Divine spells, on the other hand, are cast in the same way, often with the same somatic components, but can be cast while wearing any sort of armor.

The real reason for restricting wizards from wearing armor is story based.  Wizards wear robes in fantasy stories, and not armor.  That's it.  There is very little game balance justification.  Granted, if wizards could wear armor, they would be likely to wear as much of it as possible.  Wizards would become small tanks, like rooks on a chess board, hiding behind their metal walls and lobbing spells.  And this would be fine!  The system could totally support this sort of change.  Any resulting game imbalance could be easily fixed in other ways.  However, since very few fantasy stories have this sort of character in them, and the genre as a whole is moving away from heavily armored characters, toward more mobile characters, this is not done.

So, instead, here is an alternate solution that generally maintains the status quo, but does so in a more streamlined way:  Armored Fighter allows a character who also has Spellcaster to cast spells wearing armor, if and only if, the Spellcaster component is equal to or less than the Armored Fighter component.  Since a character can have only one primary component, Primary Spellcaster characters cannot cast while wearing armor.

The core classes break down about like this:

• Barbarian - not an Armored Fighter, not a Spellcaster, not applicable.
• Bard - not an Armored Fighter, Secondary Spellcaster, cannot cast spells while wearing armor.
• Cleric - Secondary Armored Fighter, Secondary Spellcaster, can cast spells while wearing armor.
• Druid - not an Armored Fighter, Primary Spellcaster, cannot cast spells while wearing armor.
• Fighter - Secondary Armored Fighter, not a Spellcaster, not applicable.
• Monk - not an Armored Fighter, not a Spellcaster, not applicable.
• Paladin - Secondary Armored Fighter, Tertiary Spellcaster, can cast spells while wearing armor.
• Ranger - not an Armored Fighter, Tertiary Spellcaster, cannot cast spells while wearing armor.
• Rogue - not an Armored Fighter, not a Spellcaster, not applicable.
• Sorcerer - not an Armored Fighter, Primary Spellcaster, cannot cast spells while wearing armor.
• Wizard - not an Armored Fighter, Primary Spellcaster, cannot cast spells while wearing armor.

If we added Magus to the list, they might have Secondary Armored Fighter, Secondary Spellcaster, and thus would be able to cast spells while wearing armor.  The only class that doesn't come out ahead in this equation is the ranger.  Sadly, the ranger loses the ability to cast spells while wearing armor.  However, as the spell casting ability of a ranger is of very low importance to the character class, that it isn't too great a sacrifice.  When I write about rangers, we can see whether we can make it up to them.  Druids also lose the ability to cast in armor, but other abilities and restrictions of druids highly mitigate against wearing much armor anyway.

If one of any of the above classes were to switch out Armored Fighter for a different component, they might lose their ability to cast spells while wearing armor.  And if a spellcasting class switched in the ability to wear armor, they might gain it!  More on switching out components, and how it is a highly useful way to make Domains more interesting, next post!

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