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Aug 19, 2012 -- 6:57PM, Chakravant wrote:

Valdark and cobaltbluenight, while I find myself more or less in line line with your concepts, the discussions on these forums, the nature of Playtest Packet 2, and the constraints placed upon WotC by already having planned out and partially written The Sundering (and therefore aspects of DDN well in advance) give me little hope.

I assure you they are listening. 

Great thing about the realms is it has always had its own quirks outside of the core books so what is written there does not have to be a core assumption.  

Aug 19, 2012 -- 6:26PM, DM_Nel wrote:

And you do know that the wizard, witch, sha'ir, bladesinger and mage in 4e all use the same list too. So both have a tradition and precedent of casting classes sharing lists even when they have different fluff and casting methods.

Those are all different builds of the Wizard class.  They are not unique classes unto themselves. 

The 4E Sorcerer and Warlock were unique classes and had unique magic lists.

The 3E Binder, Shadow Mage and Truenamer were all unique magic-using classes that each had unique powers.  

All of these are vastly more interesting than the Wizard/Sorcerer of the playtest, IMO.  

I was refuting the precedent statement of Chakravant, and I think I did. On the individual points.

Wizards in 4e. Yes they are all 'wizards' but the have vastly different flavor and casting methods. It shows that there is a precedent of not needing a whole new list of powers to have a class play differently.

On 3e casters, yes some casters used the same list and some used different lists. However, you'll note that you'll find spells on multiple lists and usable on different classes. That's all I was saying. I'm for expanding those common spells and leaving the standout to the unique class lists. Again, it's nothing new, I'd just rather see it's on a different scale. A LOT caster classes in 3. used another classes list or just made up a list of spells from another class. Look at wujen, warmage, spirit shaman, spellthief, shujenga, shaman, healer, favored soul, hexblade, dread necromancer, beguiler and archivist and see that they aren't using their own unique lists but using spells from someone elses class. If you want to go by numbers 3.5 had MORE classes sharing lists than not.

On playtest, we have the first 5 levels of a prototype class vs. a whole complete class. Yeah, it whole classes are more interesting... It's not like they are doing anything new with the lists being the same for sorcerer and wizard. You know, precedent.

Aug 19, 2012 -- 9:33PM, jaelis wrote:

The thing is that I want that story to be consistent. You can do some things with magic for a given level of effort, and others you can't. I can make up stories all I like, but I can't make things consistent if the mechanics aren't consistent. If a sorcerer can use arcane magic to hit two enemies with a firebolt, why can't a wizard? And if a wizard can shoot an unerring force missile, why can't a sorcerer? Of course, I don't think they need to have perfectly identical spells... they do access magic differently, so they will have their own tricks and interests. But if they are entirely separate, that's not just tricks and interests. I don't know how to make sense of sorcerers and wizards having entirely distinct spell lists, without saying there are basically two different kinds of arcane magic. And that breaks the kind of story I want to tell.

I'm rather new to D&D so I really don't know what "arcane magic" is supposed to be, but if it is some nebulous force that can be harnassed in an essentially infinite number of ways, then it makes perfect sense to think that different people would unleash it in very different ways. So you could have one person who was just born with magical abilities and doesn't really know how to control it consistently, and another person who has no innate abilities and instead has spent countless hours learning and practicing how to use magic and thus utilizes it in a very predictable (but maybe limited) manner. The game could easily reflect such variety with different spell lists.

Can you explain what you think arcane magic is? That would go along way towards determining how it is utilized.

Aug 19, 2012 -- 9:33PM, jaelis wrote:

Because a lot of what I like about the game involves having a consistent and cohesive world to play in. Things shouldn't just be random, there should be a certain logic to them. Specifically here, there is some reason that magic works the way it does. Maybe arcane casters get their power by tapping an energy flow from the postitive to negative material plane, maybe they get it by opening a link to the elemental chaos, I don't know. I'm happy to come up with my own story for it, though I'd love to see one in the rules.

Ok, cool.

So you want to be able to set the systems in your game.

Making all Wizards Vancian and all Sorcerers Spell Point and all Warlocks... (whatever, I get the feeling you wouldn't want them being AEDU) ?

Would you WANT Sorcerers to have some abilities which Wizards do not? 

Vice versa?       
  

Aug 19, 2012 -- 9:33PM, jaelis wrote:

The thing is that I want that story to be consistent. You can do some things with magic for a given level of effort, and others you can't. I can make up stories all I like, but I can't make things consistent if the mechanics aren't consistent. If a sorcerer can use arcane magic to hit two enemies with a firebolt, why can't a wizard? And if a wizard can shoot an unerring force missile, why can't a sorcerer? Of course, I don't think they need to have perfectly identical spells... they do access magic differently, so they will have their own tricks and interests. But if they are entirely separate, that's not just tricks and interests. I don't know how to make sense of sorcerers and wizards having entirely distinct spell lists, without saying there are basically two different kinds of arcane magic. And that breaks the kind of story I want to tell.

Interesting.

If they are different in some ways, where do you draw the line?

Without some differences what is the point in the two separate classes at all?      
  

Aug 19, 2012 -- 9:33PM, jaelis wrote:

I literally feel like it would be the same as rogues getting an entirely different weapon list than fighters.

Really?

Hunh, it feels more to me like Fighters getting access to all the class abilities and skill training options as rogues.

After all... spells are for more than blasting, right?    
 
  

Aug 19, 2012 -- 9:33PM, jaelis wrote:

So that's my preference, not to denigrate anyone else's. But I would further argue that it is easier for someone else to reflavor the same spell into two different ones with the same mechanics, than it is for me to combine two different mechanics into the same spell. If you hate that wizards and sorcerers both cast fireball, you can say that a sorcerer casts red dragon storm, which fills a 20 ft radius with dragon-shape flames that happen to do 5e6 fire damage. I know that's not great, but it's easier than me taking a wizard's 5e6 fireball and a sorcerer's 4e8 fireblast and uniting them into the same effect.

And thankyou for taking the time to explain it.

But I don't think that you are really answering the "saminess" complaint.

Nor offering any real reason why there is more than one class.   
  

Aug 19, 2012 -- 9:33PM, jaelis wrote:

This is particularly about spell lists. I could make another rant about why I think wizards and sorcerers should have distinct casting mechanics with integrated flavors, but I won't get into that here.

I'd like to know, either here on one of the (seemingly dozens) of other threads discussing similar issues.