Why I Stopped Using Spell Slots in my 5e Campaign
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- čas přidán 27. 11. 2022
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It's always felt strange to me how spells function in Dungeons and Dragons 5e. You're telling me you can mess with the weave and have magic function consistently all the time? Casting Dimension Door or Fireball has no risk to the caster or those around them? Seems fishy to me.
Drawing inspiration from Shadowdark RPG @TheArcaneLibrary , Frostgrave, and other games like Dungeon Crawl Classics, I designed my own homebrew roll to cast magic system you can use with your 5e D&D Campaign. In this video, I share that homebrew with you and offer the rules text for free in the link down below. Please note that this document is a "live" document and I will be updating this with FAQ's and other adjustments as I fine tune this homebrew. Enjoy!
If you enjoy this content, please throw me a like and subscribe to the channel so you can stay informed when I upload new videos. Thank you kindly!
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I really like the idea of blood magic. Question with this system though, how do you account for up casting spells?
Hi Ayden! Great question. Check the google doc in the video notes for a bunch of additional details on making this system work. Its all free. But to sum it up, the caster can choose to increase the DC for casting the spell before they roll. So if you want to cast Burning Hands at 2nd level instead of first, just adjust the DC up by 1 from 11 to 12.
Just note that the caster needs to declare this intent before they roll, not after. Hope that helps!
My first thought is perhaps to make blood magic cost the spell level in hp for each +1 to the roll.
@@chrisnagy377 I actually play tested using d4 dice and it became really lethal for low level characters. Hence the 1 for 1. To be fair, it sounds like what you’re saying would allow 1st level spells to remain 1:1 which is line with the current system. But think about how the additional math slows down higher level spells.
Fail to cast a 6th level spell by 4 points so you have to lose 4x6 (24) hit points in blood magic to force it to be cast? That’s a pretty steep price for a 6th level spell. I think this would disincentivize all spellcasting and that’s not my intent.
@@HouseDM Well, honestly, forcing a caster to lose 24 hit points to cast a level 6 spell would only be bad for a level 6 character (As you have it). Allow the level 6 spell to be cast when it's supposed to be cast (11th level character) and 24 hit points wouldn't be as big of a deal. Not saying it's a good idea, just pointing it out.
@@genostellar you make a really great point here. So in an effort to keep max hit points lower, I don’t run campaigns past level 10. Hence the whole 9th level casters can cast 9th level spells. Didn’t want them to miss out on those high power spells.
I’ve tried running campaigns that go past 10th level (highest was 14) and the game just becomes a slog with all of the abilities and it wasn’t that fun for me, at least with 5e.
OSR games on the other hand don’t have this issue and can go up to level 80 if you have a dedicated enough player group. But that’s a different story.
I ran a short campaign where the DC started at 5 to cast and went up by 1- each time the spell was cast. The wizard had a blast - literally - with fireball until we reached the end and the severity of the next check sank in…
I’ve seen systems like this. I’ve found adding things to keep track of like variable dc’s can be an added burden though. Really like how simple Deathbringer keeps spellcasting checks. DC=10. Always.
@@ork44 ok, that is a cool idea!
Why not have the DC go up with each casting during combat for all damage dealing spells, by the spell level of the previous spells, all cumulative until you take a long rest.
@@SophiaAphrodite we’re going to try this
I like this idea, spell slots force you to take too many rests and makes you stop too much…well everyone is out of spell slots and in game time has only been like an hour. We made it like two rooms in the dungeon at a low level and you have to leave and take a long rest…so frustrating.
I both: do not like your idea and don’t want to use it at my table;
and Also: love that you made this video, as it’s thought provoking and interesting new take on how magic “could” be handled!
Hi Codie! Thanks for sharing this. I think all my house rule idea videos are me just tinkering and changing things until I find something I like. Your feedback is appreciated 🤘🏼
Finding what you like is #1 (having players that also enjoy what you like is validating, and while this one is not for me, I am certain many players WILL like this). Keep up the tinkering! :)
Agreed wholeheartedly, it'd be especially brutal at my table considering we do roughly eight hour sessions with little breaks or mercy (in game, of course ... Mostly. 🫣)
I would love to say that this reply exemplifies how we should think. Even in the things we don't like can act as fuel for thought.
I know it's rather pedantic, but I feel it's worth mentioning that 5e casting mechanics are extremely loose compared to the original "Vancian" magic D&D used. Up through 2e, if you wanted to cast a spell three times, you had to have it memorized three times. If you had three 1st level spell slots and we're fighting a troll, you might memories memorize Burning Hands three times and hope like hell you don't need Chill Touch later that day, because you only have Burning Hands available. A spell slot was for a specific spell, not just a unit of magical energy like it is today.
I can definitely appreciate this thought process. Personally, I'm not sure if I'd enjoy using it. A lot of 5e spells are already pretty feast-or-famine (i.e. save or suck spells), and adding another necessary dice roll exacerbates that. It already sucks when you botch an Inflict Wounds attack roll, or the enemy rolls really well to save against Polymorph or Disintegrate. And getting a critical Fireball or Hold Person would probably end a lot of fights instantly. Which is super cool for the caster and would admittedly be hype as hell, but feels like it would widen the gap between casters and martials even more. That being said, I can appreciate the idea that even if I botch my Raise Dead, it doesn't waste my opportunity to cast Bigby's Hand instead, since they no longer share a resource. It would also encourage the use of utility spells like Silent Image and such, since you don't need to "save" the spell slots for combat.
Sounds like something we could fix with an adjustment to the meaning of a 1 or 20.
Either say the die doesn't matter (1 and 20 aren't special) or make the penalty/bonus modest.
The save DC goes up by, I dunno, 2 / DC goes down by 2. Reroll one die for that fireball / lose one die of damage.
What if, spells that already require a save or an attack roll, don't require making this extra roll if the spell failed?
In that way you won't be punished twice.
If the spell does work, you have to make the check.
A fireball spell "works" even if it doesn't hit every target.
Fourth Edition solved the problem of combat spells competing with utility spells (and spell slots in general).
This was one thing that came to mind for me right away too: Adding another roll that can cause a spell to fail. I have some players who are unhappy with these kinds of rules and have been so since 3rd ed. I'm not sure if there is a graceful way to mitigate this for spells with a save DC, but one thing I would do is have the spellcasting check pull double-duty for ranged spell attacks. Use the result of the the spellcasting check for the ranged spell attack roll. Both rolls use Prof and Ability for the bonus to the roll so that might work.
I concur, it sucks when a player wants to accomplish something and then it just fails because of bad luck. It's one reason I don't utilize Roll 20 systems for my campaigns. I prefer to utilize mechanics that focus on failing forward. This could work with elements of the proposed system, such as sacrificing HP to be able to cast the spell if you "fail" the check, but it'd be nice to have other methods to interact with it beyond that, such as becoming tired, temporarily blind/deaf/mute, getting a headache, having a mood swing, etc.
In my preference I like to reward players for their tactics, problem solving skills and ingenuity. Also, I don't like wasting time. Nobody wants to waste a bunch of time of whiffed attacks and failed spells. Sure, it's realistic... but it's not engaging. It's better if "failures" cause things to still move forward and to have players feel like narrative progress is being achieved (but at a cost). And players are willing to pay rather interesting costs and make some rather heroic sacrifices to achieve their goals (trust me).
I would be remiss if I didn't say there was NO place for complete failure without any other objective result. This is in relevance to checks that have NOTHING to do with the primary crux of the player's goal/path. Say your goal is to navigate an abandoned dwarven mine because one of your party member thought it would be a fantastic shortcut. Any check or choice made to advance that goal should fail forward to keep up the momentum. But if, say, one of your compatriots wants to wander off in search of leftover bounty, well that check can fail if they're unlucky. Killing the momentum helps keep a focus on the primary goal, but affords the player a risk/reward opportunity to pursue a more personal affair without leaving the group feeling like time was massively wasted.
Sorry for the word vomit.
tl;dr: I prefer fail forward mechanics, so spells that "fail" should incur a setback either in temporary conditions or in a new challenge presenting itself (you tried to Mold Earth, you did what you wanted... but you also unearthed a sleeping *insert dangerous monster here* and she hangry)
@@asthmeresivolisk3129 I prefer a perhaps more realistic approach to gaming. Im not here to coddle players so not going to give them an 'out' because they are whining. I'll just get other players. I like most of the removal of spell slots ideas and have a version I am play testing now. I might adapt to more this way as its more interesting. A caster whining cause there spell didnt work is no more or less important to a fighter who missed their attacks really...
@@CaptnJack It's not so much to coddle and more in the interests of time and fun. I totally understand not hosting players that bitch and moan about every little inconvenience. But that's not why I play the way I do. To fully explain takes... much more text than I had already written, and it was already turning into a wall so I decided to stop.
To elaborate: I find there are checks related to 2 things. Category 1 are Party/Story related checks. These are things the players do to progress the plot and move the party as a whole forward into the adventure. When these checks fail, it only serves to bring the momentum of the story to a screeching halt as now the players have to find some other way to solve the issue. Even more annoying if the solution is obvious, but the check is difficult. For Category 1 checks I utilize failing forward or introduce new twists that keep action flowing. Then there's Category 2 checks which are personal interest checks. These are personal things players want their characters to do like tame a wild animal to be a companion or take a detour in a cave to look for treasure. These checks I have no problem rendering a failure and blocking from progressing further. They serve no purpose to furthering the narrative and if focused on too long will draw too much focus on a single character at the expense of the rest of the players. Personal side quests should be short and sweet so failure means failure in those cases.
Hopefully that makes a bit more sense on the grand scale. There's obviously more to it than that, but that's the skinny of it.
tl;dr: I separate checks into 2 categories. Checks that further the story and help the party as a whole get the falling forward treatment and are Category 1. Checks made for personal interests are allowed to fail outright and are Category 2. This is all done in the interest of time and fun. It is not done to coddle the players.
I think a soft version of this could be a way to extend past expended slots. So your spell slots now represent your ability to cast spells safely but you can extend this by doing the check. Id probably increase the DC in this case (maybe 13 + twice the spells level) and similarly double the amount of health needed to make up the difference
I just ran a test session of almost this exactly, but instead of spell slots being 'safe use' I made the roll determine if the spell slot was expended. This system I think will work really well for my solo campaign for various reasons, however I agree about the DC, in two back-to-back medium-hard encounters she cast many spells, but didn't expend any slots (only 1st lvl spells, but with her bonuses she only needs to roll a 6 to succeed, I feel like it should be more difficult). I also decided the health make-up would reduce her max hp by double the difference, but she never had to do that so I'm not sure how it would've played out.
That's basically how "drain" works in Shadowrun. Like you can cast what you can handle then it gets sketchy when you cast too much.
I did this in pathfinder but something more similar to exhaustion - Failed checks compounded themselves as the mage gets more desperate.
This just gives more spellslots. Stop.
@@orionar2461 So reduce the spell slots on top of it.
I love the idea of blood magic. I'd like to see some kind of 'using your hit dice' to regain lost spells as well. So you could make further sacrifice to pull a clutch spell off.
Also, the 'not knowing if you've can cast that spell 4 times today' really adds a bit of tension to spamming certain spells.
Breaking concentration of concentration spells might also have the effect of losing the spell for the day (though maybe this is too hardcore).
Interesting idea for breaking concentration but I don’t think I would do that. If anything, this makes concentration spells better because once cast, the spell stands.
Like your idea of using hit dice for regaining spells. Seems like a cool idea but then also takes away a valuable healing resource for blood magic casters. I really like how hit dice function in 5e as is but thanks for sharing your thoughts here. More for me to ponder in my tower 🧙🏼♂️
God yes, hit dice are underutilized in 5e. I've always thought that they are a great resource, with a good system for replenishment, and they just sit there much of time doing nothing.
I did a wizard subclass that revolves around that. They can also use their hit die to increase damage and ac and such
@@HouseDM If you do blood, you kinda need either max hp or hit die expenditure, or you end up with endless spells and hp courtesy of Goodberry or something similar. I'm not sure of the numbers but I think by averages Goodberry will give more hp that it takes
@@notoriousgoblin83 great point! Except for if you use blood magic to force the spell, the spell is still lost upon casting so at that point, no more goodberry until you rest.
just a heads up, hp also correlates to your general energy level. This is shown in 5e with the fighter's second wind ability where they gain hp by dipping into a well of stamina. Just in case you would like to flavor text the blood aspect differently.
awesome video man! just started dming my first campaign about 5ish months ago (been playing 5e since the pandemic started) and these videos are great at expanding my horizons/making me think about my world. Thanks!
Thanks for saying this Plop! I’m always looking to try new things in the pursuit of enhanced game mechanics. Cheers!
I haven't gotten into 5e yet, but for my 3.5 casters I prefer using the alternate spell points rule in which removes spell slots from sorcerers and other spontaneous spellcasters, and wizards, clerics, etc. Had to prepare a spell only once (using up a single spell slot) to cast it as many times as you want using your spell points.
I also really like the spell points system. Seems more flexible than slots and a lot easier to explain imo. 5e has a lot of incredible things going for it, but it also has a lot of "fluff" and "poor game design elements".
@@HouseDM that's why I have been mixing 3.5 with Pathfinder as of late. Both have elements to bring that really enhances gameay for my style. I just feel bad for the warlock who gets no love in 3.5.
YES!!!! My SPELL POINT BROTHERS AND SISTER UNITE!!!!!
I prefer 3.5 over 5e, but everyone transitioned over. Soo 5e it is.
@@jonathanfenton8695 Warlock was something the DM was more expected to handle back in 3.5, at least in my experience.
In "The Dark Eye" you can manipulate spells, some sponateous (when casting) some by investing XP into it. For most you have to roll, to see if the effect happpens and you can even botch, creating uninteded negative effects. The system also uses something akin to mana points.
Beautiful! Bravo. I really enjoyed this. I think you just changed my concept of magic in D&D. That's a first in 27 years. I'm excited to run some magic players now. Thank you.
Awesome! Glad you enjoyed it David!
Funny to find a video on this. In my homebrew, I'm making spells to function closer to AD&D psionics, which function somewhat similar to this. Interesting channel, instant subscribe
I kinda like the Shadowrun spellcasting system. You cast the spell, define its limits, see how effective it is, and then try to resist the "drain", or the mental and physical repercussions of channeling the mana.
Problem with that (speaking as a long term Shadowrun GM and player) is that it *strongly* incentivises casters to min-max their Drain resistance stats to the point where they can practically ignore Drain as a mechanic and spellcast very high force at will with no penalty. This is such a problem that I've been at Shadowrun tables (not ones I've GM'd I stress) where Mage or Shaman players have been shamed by fellow players or even other GM's for failing to optimise enough (honestly a common cultural problem with SR as a system) since any caster who ever has to worry about Drain is 'weak'.
@@josephpotter5766 Ah, that makes sense. I haven't had the chance to play yet, so my knowledge is purely based on the descriptions. In one of my more recent DnD campaigns, I gave my characters the option to use a modified drain system instead of a nerfed version of the standard "Spell slot" system. Nobody took it, so I didn't get to see how it would work ;-;.
@@josephpotter5766 True that happens yet at the same time that "nova hot" mage getting their arm blown off having to get some cyber basically put them in the same spot that nonperfect mage or shaman. You still need a silenced pistol since corps and cops can tell if some wild spells been slung.
But yeah most tables want ALL players to be Sam Fisher with a twist even though SR is so open skill wise you can pretty much make ANY campaign happen. Since I had a game where we simply played as street doctors
@@ExeErdna Of the campaigns in SR I've run, from 1st edition to 5th (skipping 4th and 6th) I think only about 30% of them were what you might call "classic shadowrun". I love street level games, games playing gangers, games playing BuMoNA doctors in Berlin, reporters in Laos or rockers on the East Coast of the UCAS.
@@josephpotter5766 Shadowrun is such a great system to run any type of game in it's world. Shadowrun is also the biggest bitch of a system to run because there is way too much to learn and balancing it all is rough. I love Shadowrun. I also hate it lol.
There are two major mechanical issues I can see with this:
1. Buffing the check. The most commonly available option is enhance ability. Advantage on the check drops the mishap chance to 1/400 and the failure chance below 10% for most of your spells. And also there is the circle of stars druid who cannot fail to cast a spell when their dragon constellation is active (min 10+mod rolled on Int and Wis checks). This is not even an endgame thing, it is a 2nd level feature.
Suggestion: Magic has no effect on casting checks.
2. Spells that use saves. Is the save replaced by this roll? If yes, then Int, Wis and Cha save proficiencies are basically useless. If no, then these spells are extra unreliable. If single target, it might not even be worth learning them.
Suggestion: Keep saves, but add +2 to spell save DC-s.
There is also non-mechanical issue: bad rolls. If a primary caster rolls badly at the start of the day, they can just go and sit in a corner for the rest of the day. Not managing a resource well is your fault, thus living with its cosequences is ok. But rolling bady is not a choice. Going with the standard adventuring day, you will have about 4-6 encounters, and a wizard could run out of spells, without actually casting any successfully or getting seriously injured, on the first one. I don't think many would consider this to be fun.
Suggestion: Using blood magic makes you actually succeed on the check. (Maybe only for an additional sacrifice: 2x the cost, or lose a HD.)
All in all I get what you are going for, but this is such a core feature of the game, that I have to ask: why not just play, say, Savage Worlds, which already has a roll-to-cast option?
Enhance ability requires concentration, so it would limit your options for other spells. And it would also require a check of it's own to succeed. But, that said, I think if you had tools to boost a couple of checks to cast Enhance Ability (Favoured the gods, Dark one's own luck...), and were content just casting non-conc spells, this would be potentially wild.
I actually don't think that the first one is an issue, since it is defined as a "spellcasting check" and not an "ability check," so technically those features wouldn't apply.
As for saving throws, I think it would be interesting if the number you rolled on the spellcasting check was both the spell save dc and the attack roll for spells that call for it. That way you don't have to slow down gameplay with a million dice rolls on a turn, while keeping some of that variety the system is meant to introduce.
I definitely agree with your last point, though.
@@ataruDev We also use eg. "strength check" and "stealth check" as expressions, and both are actually ability checks. The base assumption is that there are only 3 types of d20 rolls. Exceptions would have to be explicitly noted.
Making them separate would resolve the issue, though. But I would prefer to minimise the number of core game mechanics we break :)
@@joshuawinestock9998 Well, yeah, there are still limitations with EA. I just felt like they were not properly addressed / thought through. Spamming leveled spells is definitely an issue, even if you are limited to non-concentration ones.
@@joshuawinestock9998 Infinite Fireball has entered the chat
Man, you are so free and wild with 5e...I love it! I'm enjoying your channel
New to the channel, but I’m a forever follower now. My dm sort of worked a mana system. Really love these ideas!
I started doing similar with a roll to cast from an alternative rule in 2.5 in the mid 90’s and have tweaked it over the years
Its much better to roll to cast then a spell slot and the unpredictable nature of magic becomes a great story telling tool
Good to find others doing similar
Cheers
Back in AD&D, we used spell points! at 3rd level you had one 2nd level spell and two 1st level spells you could cast, which gave you 4 spell points, and you could have memorized Magic Missile, Grease and Web! and each day you could cast 4 Magic Missiles or 2 Webs, or Web and 2 Magic Missiles!
This still exists as a varient rule in the DM Guide if I remember correctly.
This is just fantastic. Liked & subscribed!!!
That hit the nail on the head of a quandary for me: magic just doesn't seem magical enough.
It might break down at higher levels - putting more spells in your head is good, and having a chance to cast 2+ 5th-level spells and beyond is cool, but scary. The option of removing the proficiency bonus helps... But I wouldn't know till playtesting.
It opens up a great option for unique treasure: rare spell components that give an advantage on the spellcasting check!
Awesome suggestion, I love it.
This is really cool. I love the "blood magic" idea, and have had thoughts of similar mechanics myself. I figured you were going to have some kind of MP system, but this is so much cooler of an idea than that, especially for D&D specifically since it allows use of the mechanics of Proficiency and the d20 rolls in that system.
You saying "You might roll hot and cast infinite spells... for a time" made me think, what if in this system somebody does roll really well very consistently? Would it cause some sort of buildup of arcane energy within them? Maybe being very lucky and just constantly casting could have some kind of drawback, too.
Hi Zix! Love that your stoked about this system! The way I see it is if you have a player who gets really lucky with their casting, let it be.
Your player will feel so cool and could build a reputation in game for being a legendary magic user. And that’s totally fine in my book. This is how legends are made. And remember, the time will come when their luck runs out and it will come when they least expect it. Thanks for watching!
We are sharing and magnifying our brain waves! 😃🙌 Love your implementation of roll-to-cast!
Watch, the day will come where everyone is like, damn, Shadowdark and other non-D&D rpg's have everything I want. Bye WOTC! Thanks for your support Kelsey.
Love the blood magic idea. I myself use the 3e spell points system with the ability to upcast and downcast by spending extra points. Works for my table.
Since returning to gaming after the second break in my life, I have encountered these discussions on spell mechanics and it is intriging. As a kid I don't recall any of these discussions, but we did not have the interwebs. I really appreciate the range of magic casing systems and house rules.
Keep up hte great content. THank you.
Love Frostgrave. Love your concept here. Thank you for the video.
Thanks J Scott! That means a lot to me. Cheers!
Removing proficiency from the check seems… very strange to me because it means you never get better at it, and seems like a massive flavour fail for the same reason.
Blood magic is a HUGE part of my campaign world. It’s almost like the Force in Star Wars. I like the ideas here.
I... Genuinely... Wow... This improves spell casting, by so much.
With no shame. I am stealing this. You have been notified. 😁👍
This is a brilliant idea! I really like the feel for magic it creates. I think I would add a spell fatigue system though too. It would scale based on level but the more spells you successfully cast fills up the table with advancing negatives that are applied to the Spellcasting check.
So I think the potential consequences from a natural 1 in combination with the caster's soon to be growing dependency on blood magic are significant enough. I don't want to completely dissuade casters from using magic. This seems like a good middle ground.
Interesting ideas. I personally have gotten to play quite a bit of Dungeon World lately and I have to say that I find their system quite refresing. It can be a bit tricky to adjust as a whole, as it varies a good bit to D&D type games but the way combat and checks in general are handled is interesting.
First of - DCs are done away completely, everything depends on your dice throw.
Second - A D20 is not used in this particular system. You roll everything with 2D6s. If you roll a 1-6 on a check, you fail, if you roll a 7-9 you succeed on what you planned, but something unexpected happens in addition to that. And a 10 and above is a complete success without drawback.
The "you succeed, but..." part is where it shines for me. Our DM usually gives us a few options of bad sideeffects that we can choose from. Mostly something like "you take damage yourself", "you hurt somebody else along with it", "you increase the overall stakes of the encounter", "you sustain a status effect until your next rest", and so on. Whichever are appliccable in the given situation. We also use an optional rule for advantage and disadvantage wherein you use a 3rd D6 and take the two highest or lowest respectively.
As a third change - AC works differently. It no longer raises the DC but the AC gets directly subtracted from the damage taken (granted DW is a lot scarcer with hit points - 20 already being very good).
I feel like this could also be adapted to D&D, but haven't tried it yet. The D6 thing is somewhat a matter of taste I think.
If this sounds interesting, I strongly recommend having a look at the system. Just be warned - it's a very different playstyle to general D&D and related systems.
Before anyone asks, yes DW is a PBTA system.
I've read through Dungeon World and listened to some podcasts. Plus Runehammer used to talk about it awhile back. Big fan of PbtA games but I keep gravitating towards d20 systems. Idk why lol. Thanks for sharing!
@@HouseDM My pleasure. I totally get you on the D20 thing. It's just a different feeling.
But I'm inclined to try the check-stages with it.
Maybe:
1-10: Fail
11-15: Success, but...
16-20: Success
Not sure on the stage intervals yet. Also not sure if I should include a mishap whenever a spell check fails outright. Like: "The effect blows up in your face", "You forget the spell until you next rest" or "A different random magic effect happens". Could get a bit annoying, but definetely checks that hard to contol magic vibe. Plus your give-blood-to-pass-check-mechanic feels like a good tradeoff here.
I think Dungeon World does it in an interesting way.
It's made to be very simple in comparison to D&D and it's balanced with that in mind.
But I don't think you can just take that system and bring it over to D&D because of how different it is.
However things like offering different choices between downsides for failure or partial success is a very good thing that could likely be brought over quite easily.
For a thing like House's system, I see that as being a very good tool for making the players not feel screwed over by the punishments that can happen.
Instead of just flat out losing a spell and have to spend 10 days to trek back to a town to be able to restore it, you can simply pick another choice of what happens.
Different choices can also mean different things in different situations. Losing a spell maybe isn't too bad if you're already in said city, but it's game-ending in a dungeon. Meanwhile the spell having undesired effects can be really bad if you're trying to pass by the guard when stealing something from the town, while it's not that big of a deal when you're fighting the big bad boss in a dungeon.
@@ANoBaka Hmm, you got a point there and the ability to choose between bad concequences is definetelyagood thing. I'll have to thing on that. Thanks for your input.
It's an extremely entertaining idea to change the spell casting system in this way. Especially the part about blood magic as well as arcane mishap table and options on nat 20.
I see a couple of curious things with which the roll to cast system will work strangely. It turns out that the arcane trickster after level 11 is considered the most reliable caster since they will not be able to roll casting check below 14. Also, bards and warlocks, when receiving spells of the 8th circle and having learned glibness, will be able to spam high-level spells every turn. (because they will not be able to roll less than 15 + a spell characteristic modifier, which by that time is most likely at least 4).
Ought to read the google doc.
This is awesome, i think i'm going to use this in my game. Thank you so much.
excellent video and take ive just got back into dnd in about the last year love your take back when i was dm in the late 80s/early 90s had a bit of math in spell use to cast spells correctly it was base of 10 + spell level - the casters level i dont normaly subscribe however seems like you have similar ideas that i have had in the past so love to hear more ideas from you so i will subscribe keep up the awesome ideas
I agree totally with the concept of there is no right or wrong way to play D&D. Making D&D unique and fun is paramount in my campaigns. Great video!
Hell yeah! Rock on!
How many hacks before someone is playing a different game, and maybe should look at different systems sooner rather than later?
@@mustakrakish I don't know the answer to the question about hacks, but I have played several different rules systems. D&D has changed so much over the years, from the 3 book boxed set to now, but we still call it D&D. However, I find 5e the best framework to run my campaigns in, and am always looking for "embellishments" to make player characters more unique, or the game more enjoyable for the group.
There is a BESM d20 system sourcebook for the anime Slayers that was heavily magic focused. Each spell had a spellcasting DC based on the 'level' of the spell. If you succeeded the DC, you cast the spell with no issues. However, if you failed the DC, you still cast the spell, but lost HP based on how badly you failed the check. You had options to decrease the DC of the spell by taking longer to cast it by reciting the full incantation as well as yelling out the spell name, potentially alerting you target to your intentions.
There were also mechanics to amplify a spell effect by having multiple casters cast the same spell at the same time, as well as offer to share their HP with the caster in case they failed and a few other nifty tricks.
Personally, I like the idea of implementing an MP system to D&D and I discovered there already is one in the DM guide.
This looks awesome!! Perfect for the campaign I'm writing
Wonderful! Glad this is useful!
Interesting idea for rolling to succeed instead of expending guaranteed spell slots. I won't be taking this system, but it did define what I've seen in other RPG's which have magic so I can better understand what magic systems are out there. Thank you for sharing.
This reminds me of a homebrew system I use with one of my players. She's an alchemist artificer in a low-magic setting, flavored that her spells are cast through alchemically altered bullets, so rather than using spell slots, she can cast whatever she is able to create at the time--including one use of one spell up to one level above what she can normally cast. Unfamiliar to the stress of combat, she rolls on a d20 table to determine whether she grabs the correct bullet. This includes healing spells, which has (once) caused her to shoot a dying comrade point blank with a normal bullet. Hilarious and chaotic.
I love this.
I prefer casters, but I prefer magic that is magical, rather than scientific.
The blood magic really makes it for me.
It rewards sacrifice without requiring it.
Hell yeah! I like giving players more choices. Definitely one of the fun and strategic aspects of Frostgrave and it works really well in D&D. Thanks for watching!
What about magic in DnD is scientific? 🤔
Magic is scientific in a universe that has magic.
Thanks for this video. Just discovered your site. Some interesting ideas and applications here.
Awesome! Happy to have you and glad you find my ramblings interesting. Cheers!
Another really interesting topic and definitely one of the reasons we removed spell slots and went with a mana system and spells being learned skills.
I would actually love to borrow this idea as the basis for a homebrew class. Call it the "Conduit" or something. Subclasses could be something like Arcane, Nature, and Divine, borrowing the spell lists from sorcerer, druid, and cleric, respectively.
Sick! Love to see what you come up with.
@@HouseDM I think the real challenge is balancing this as its own class in a game where other players are playing regular spellcasters with the regular rules.
Since every spell could be attempted at least once, a character with, say, 4 3rd level spells known, and a 75% chance to cast each of those successfully, that character will usually get to cast three of those spells once, and two of them twice, and probably one of them three times (The statistics get a little difficult). So is that the equivalent of 6 3rd level spell slots? I would say not really, since the player doesn't get to choose which spells they can repeat the most. However, if they choose spells that have a similar effect (ie. fireball, hunger of hadar, erupting earth, and lightning bolt are all AoE damage spells), it could end up having the effect of having 6 spell slots. So it's tricky.
As someone who usually plays a caster class, this has me super intrigued. I like the modification to the natural spellcasting, as while it brings in more random chance, I agree that spellcasting shouldn't feel as mundane and carefree as it does in RAW. I have sent this to my group's DMs, and am hopeful to try it out in a one shot sometime very soon. And if they aren't up to it, well, this might just be interesting enough for me to go full Thanos and say "Fine, I'll do it myself" and finally jump into the DM seat for a one shot.
Love this idea!!!! Going be trying it at my next game :-)
Fantastic. Great ideas, Thanks for sharing
This. Is. Amazing. I have been looking for a way to implement this kind of idea for a while, running 3.5 and I am absolutely putting this to use. Might even consider trying it out with the net library 10k wild magic tables.
I like all of this stuff, couple other references and suggestions you may find value in.
Consider mining the FFG WH40k rpg stuff for their Psyker mishap tables, they're awesome.
RE: modifying the check, removing proficiency etc... Consider taking a look at Castles & Crusades for how that would work out math wise, their prime attribute vs non prime is mechanically like, a +6 I believe, which is kinda the difference you're talking about with removing the Prof bonus and lowering the difficulty, there's probably a lot of math that's been done on that.
Another thing I always suggest regarding people using a straight d20 roll for "randomization". Stop. Something I noticed when I was building encounter tables for a sandbox game is the old AD&D encounters are based on a D12+D8 roll, which actually gives you a curve as opposed to a flat d20 roll, so a 2 and a 20 are actually more rare and thus can be weighted as such in regards to their results.
Wrath and Glory's casting system is very neat, but not easily transferable to 5e.
Basically you roll lots of D6s and normally one of those is a special die (a Wrath die) with especially potent effects when you roll a 1 or a 6 on it (so basically something negative in both cases, but also something good when you roll a 6). You can add an additional one of these special Wrath dice by casting 'Unbound' or a potential 4+ additional Wrath dice by casting 'Transcendent'. The wrinkle is, once you cast at that level you have to continue casting at that level for the rest of the scene.
I love this idea! Definitely going to run it by my players and see if we want to use it in our upcoming campaign
Amazing! I'd love to hear what you and your group decide. Cheers!
Thanks for the vid! I’m about to run a wands and wizards home brew (Harry Potter style) and it didn’t make sense that they can only fire off a spell once till they rest in that world.
I was planning on using a scaling value for the spells based on how long they have known the spell and this helps a lot.
In more flexible or homebrew games, this rule could help to improve the engagement. But I definitely know some players who would challenge this as being too novice friendly. Overall great idea and good to share with others.
Yeah, it’s definitely a departure from traditional spell casting though I find it interesting you have players who would find this too novice friendly. Would you mind sharing which part?
It makes more sense as you're supposed to be a trained person in magic or at lease known of magic for a long time. Spell slots to me is more or less something to trick young casters to be a bit more careful to not hurt themselves. When really they can cast the useful more often.
@@Squeekysquid Lots of gatekeeping in the hobby.
I am definitely intrigued and interested by this version of magic casting. There has always been something missing from Vancian casting systems, and your system seems to have a better flavor than RAW. I have a home-brew campaign I've been working on and I think I'm going to integrate this into the campaign.
I love these ideas and the blood magic is a cool concept.
Forwarded to my DM- interesting! Thanks!
This is excellent. Definitely adding this to the "homebrew I want to use in that campaign I want to run... someday" pile. In regards to caster power, I appreciate cantrips not scaling, removing one way in which they compete with martials, though not at low levels, which is fine. I have a few questions, though, and a couple of tweaks I'd suggest.
My questions:
1) What damage type did you envision for the potential damage dealt after rolling a 1? I suppose you could just have it be undefined damage, but I think it would be cool and add an interesting angle if it did the same type of damage as the spell would normally do, if the spell has a damage type. This would give characters resistant to that damage type more incentive to pick those spells, and we always need more reasons for players to vary their spell choices. (I'm again saddened that no character is by nature vulnerable to damage types, as this would have added _another_ angle, both in character concept and in making hard choices during gameplay.) This does leave the question of what damage types to use if the spell has multiple, or none.
2) When you wrote "double the area" as one of the choices after rolling a 20, did you mean "double the number used to determine the area"? Since doubling the radius of a circle ups the area by considerably more than double, but having to calculate the exact shape of an area after it is doubled would be a pain in the arse.
3) How would you handle ritual spells, since with there being no spell slot to lose the advantage of casting a spell as a ritual becomes naught? I have an idea in that regard that I'll put into the tweaks section.
4) What about half and one-third casters? Surely a 5th level ranger shouldn't be able to cast 5th level spells? I'm guessing the way you'd solve this would be to let half casters cast spells equal to half and one-third casters cast spells equal to one-third their levels, rounded up or down. Multiclassing still needs to be solved, though, and the _number_ of spells they can cast per day should also be lower, somehow.
My tweaks:
1) In regards to rituals, how do you feel about using passive skill checks to cast spells? In other editions (I can't remember which) you could "take ten", meaning you took ten times as long in order to automatically get a 10 on the roll, which the rules on passive checks ("Such a check can represent the average result for a task done repeatedly,", p.175 _Player's Handbook)_ seem to allude to. This would in essence give every spell a ritual version and make it the smart course of action for spells that have no time limit and you could achieve on average, as well as add flavour by reintroducing rituals into the game. If you want you could even increase the material cost (say, double, or staying on brand, by ten) if you want to discourage players using rituals to frequently bypass the risks of casting spells. And combining this with Blood Magic (as well as my tweaks to blood magic below) really puts the flavour into overdrive.
2) I'd move the bard from the tribute cost side to the arcane mishap side. I always felt what distinguished bards from other magic users was _how_ they manipulated the Weave - though art -, rather than them being beholden to some muse. That way you have clerics, druids, paladins and warlocks on the side that get their magic from somewhere else, be it gods, nature, oaths, or powerful beings, while on the other side you have artificers, bards, rangers, sorcerers and wizards (and Eldritch knights, Four Elements Monks and Arcane Tricksters), who learned to manipulate the Weave by themselves through various means, be it enchanting objects, art, natural concoctions, raw talent or study.
3) I think the Blood Magic system is mechanically sound, but a bit underwhelming thematically. It doesn't seem to me that blood magic should be something a caster dips their toes into every time they fail to cast a spell and think "Eh, I can spare the hit points." Blood magic seems like it should be a Big Deal. And one important element of Blood Magic seems to be missing: Using or sacrificing other creatures to increase your magical power, both willing and unwilling. I'd suggest not just removing hit points when using blood magic, but also decreasing the maximum hit points by the same amount until the end of their next long rest. That way a spell caster can't just heal back up after using blood magic, making it an even bigger decision to use it. And as for using other creatures, I'd suggest something like:
"Damage to other creatures can also fuel spells. Every point of damage dealt that:
* Is dealt during the casting of the spell;
* Is dealt with the intention of fueling the spell;
* Is dealt within five feet of the caster;
* Is dealt to a creature that is not in combat with the damage dealer
can be added to the roll of the spell, though not exceeding the damage necessary to reduce a creature to zero hit points. [To prevent 500 points of damage being done to a rat.] Damage dealt this way also reduces the creature's maximum hit point by the same amount until they finish a long rest."
The only problem I foresee here is casters using their big beefy friends as volunteers to fuel their spells, at low risk to everybody involved, making me inclined to tie the amount of damage dealt to the hit die a character has and the number of points that can be added to the spell roll to the number of hit dice spent, or something like that, so that it is the amount of damage _proportional_ to the hit point maximum dealt that is relevant, rather than the absolute amount. But this would lead to killing a rat being equal to killing a character, which is not a good idea, so perhaps _both_ should be relevant somehow? I'd have to think about it.
Other ways blood magic could be expanded would be other permanent problems (as well as power, perhaps) coming from overuse - you could tie dangers of using blood magic resurrections to this - and character classes interacting with it in different ways. The "classic" warlock and necromancer wizard especially seem like they should have features that interact with it.
4) There needs to be some way that the old amount of spell slots characters have become relevant. I already mentioned half and one-third casters, but especially relevant here is the warlock, who now feels the same as every other spellcaster in the number of spells they can cast per long rest. _Something_ needs to be added to differentiate them, but I don't know what. Perhaps warlocks always lose the spells they know when they cast them, but regain them on a short rest?
That's all I have to say for now. Once I started new things kept popping into my head, so this comment turned out much longer than I expected. I hope the feedback is helpful, at least.
OK sharing a story. Druid. Had a hard day. Went back to the inn, said: "Right, I am taking a kitten break." Went to our room,' Summon woodland creatures, kittens' and laid down to have kittens playing all over him. Room service raw fish. Room service, bowl of milk. Kittens knocked over the bowl of milk. He looked down at the spilled milk and said; "Well there's no use crying over that." Whole table erupted in laughter. Oh we had a roll d20 system. Just like a physical attack 1 was a fumble, 20 was double damage. 1 was a backfire. Weird shit could happen. Like literally change the entire world as you are plane travelled. Very low chance. Unless the DM was bored or decided to have a little fun.
🎉 well done, Jake!
I really like these ideas, thank you for the video! :)
There was one thing I was thinking of when you talked about spell dc and how good you are at casting. What would you think of a "spell familiarity bonus" or something similar. If you have cast a spell a lot and under different circumstances, I think that should be rewarded, for that spell. If you have looser definitions of the spells the players would really be challenged to be creative with fewer signature spells, or just go all round but without that bonus
I think you have an interesting idea here! The downside of that then would be having casters always trying to cast the same spells just for that bonus right? In my homebrew rules, level ups grant many caster classes some sort of bonus on spellcasting checks or certain types of spells. Wizards for example get a bonus for casting spells of their school and druids can gain a bonus at max level that helps all of their spellcasting checks. That’s the fun of home brewing is you can do whatever you’d like!
Thanks for commenting and I’m glad you enjoyed the video!
I always hated the way magic works RAR in D&D.
{Witness, the door}:
DM: Your way is blocked by a locked door.
Barbarian: I smash it!
DM: Okay, roll a strength check.
Rogue: I pick the lock
DM: Okay, roll a lockpicking check, Dexterity at disadvantage if you don't have any skill points
Wizard: I cast 'Knock'
DM: Okay, the door opens.
{End scene}
There's a discontinuity of rulesets here.
Agreed. With Spellcasting checks, a savvy caster can choose to use blood magic if they roll poorly to get the same effect, and with the associated cost, it adds another clock to keep them in check. Thanks for watching Cy Williams!
No, there isn’t. Non-casters have unlimited use of their abilities but limited effectiveness. Casters always have maximum effectiveness but limited use.
you forgot to mention that every hostile creature in a 300 ft radius is now out to get you
How does this affect the balance between warlocks and the other casters? And what do you replace features like "arcane recovery" with?
Maybe you could recover a number of failed spells instead of spell slots
Uh oh you said the B word. Balance is a farce imo. Features like arcane recovery regain failed spells, just as @RJ1580 said.
This is how I’ve handled those scenarios at my table and I haven’t had any issues.
@@HouseDM Cool man :) Asking since i like the idea and it was things not brought up in the video :) I'm guessing warlocks would also regain failed spells on a short rest, and i'm happy to see my pactbound peeps do more than just spam eldritch blast :D
Great ideas. Hope to try these out at my table.
Nice! I’d love to hear how it goes.
Interesting idea. I think it would work in a campaign where there may be more battles in a given in-game day, so having more resources is useful. But, if things go south it could really ruin a time-crunch campaign (where there is a time limit or the BBEG does the big bad evil thing). I mean, if you roll poorly then you could be losing spells left and right, and need to take the time to go recover them.
One thing that would be issue for me is that it is taking a system that is already rather complicated, and making it more complicated. 5e seems pretty simple, but there are a lot of things that I have to keep double checking the rules because there is so much to remember, or behaviours are inconsistent between similar things.
I personally was considering a complete overhaul of the 5e spells at one point, but eventually that led to me trying to find another system and then start designing my own system. This idea actually moved in a similar direction as my spell system... and has made me consider some further adjustment to mine. I have some 5e artifacts still left in my system that I didn't realize I could actually remove. I will spend time considering this...
It’s definitely an interesting idea, I personally don’t see a world where I would use it. I find the combat system the one place i am not comfortable homebrewing
I like this, but I think I might only use it for Sorcerers.
That might seem weird, but frankly the lore on sorcerers suggests that they shouldn't even know spells, they just do magic. I've never felt like the sorcerer was acting like what I was supposed to be. They can be powerful, don't get me wrong, but they also kind of feel like discount wizards with a neat trick.
What I'd actually like to do is create a system where Sorcerers use their sorcery points to apply metamagics to a "working" and make a roll to see if that succeeds. (metamagics, and how many one could apply to one working, would be gated by levels, and include things like: Range increments, damage types, amount of damage [both amount of dice and degree of dice] condition effects, etc. So in theory you could sacrifice range, but make your touch range fireball do necrotic and do some amount of d10's instead of d6's, with a risk of some kind of magical surge. One would gain different unique metamagics based on one's bloodline, allowing them to create unique workings others could not) I also think all sorcerers should have wildmagic surge tables based on their archetype.
However I don't have the time to create and test this complicated system. But the one you've provided feels unique enough that it might do a good job in it's place.
Thanks!
Metamagic used to be available to all spell casters, and honestly that was a better system. Sorcerers have taken over 5E, because they are so easy and get all the benefits.
@@thanesgames9685 I mean previously they got crap spell selection, but yeah now they just get a list of spells with ever subclass. I do like the old metamagic system, it was neat (my Cleric in Pathfinder doesn't have enough Feat slots to make use of them, but still).
Very clean, thanks for sharing, subbed,
Thanks for watching!
Great vid! I'd love to subscribe but I don't want notifications on youtube shorts. I don't get anything out of shorts. Great vid! Hope to see more full length videos like this with great substance
I’m pretty sure that CZcams doesn’t send notifications for shorts. At least I never get any from channels I subscribe to. Either way, glad you enjoyed this one!
@House DM it does it pops up filling up the feed. So not notifications but it just spams your feed. Nice vid. Would love to see more long form content.
I really like the idea of removing spell slots, as they've always felt unfitting for most fantasy worlds. However, I think keeping track of each spell and if you have it available or not is going to lead to a lot of book keeping, which is something I'd like to stay away from.
Therefore, I've come up with an idea; what if you had a mana die instead? It would start at a d4, and whenever you reached a level in a spellcasting class that raised your proficiency bonus, it would increase by one; so at 5th level it would be a d6, and 9th level a d8, and so on, up to a maximum of d12.
When you cast a spell, you would roll your mana die, and if you roll higher than your mana die, the spell fails unless you invoke blood magic, and in addition your mana die would drop one size.
So for example, a 9th level caster would have a d8; if they wanted to cast a 3rd level spell, they would roll it, and on a 4 or higher they would cast it without spending resources. On a 1-3 they would need to use their blood magic or be unable to cast it, and regardless of their choice, their mana die would drop to a d6. They could still try to cast 3rd or even 4th level spells, but the chance of failure and dropping to a d4 would be much higher, causing a risk vs reward effect.
I'd love to hear thoughts about the idea.
It's interesting, but I think one of its biggest issues is that it's too front-loaded.
What I mean by that is casters can typically choose to nova their spells or not. With spell slots that's quite straight forward (use low level slots in lieu of high level slots). With the system from this video, you avoid casting the spells that you want to save for later.
In this system, you can be rocking a d10 mana die and lock yourself out of your 9th level spells by casting a 1st level spell and rolling a 1 (10% chance, which means it's a question of when, rather than if). That means that after a day with multiple encounters, you've either primarily relied on cantrips all day (boring) or your mana die has probably been reduced, locking you out of your better spells (which you arguably would have liked to save for the end).
It also has an issue with healing spells. This is based on the presumption that once your mana die is a d4 that it no longer drops to a smaller die on a failure. Cure Light Wounds is a 1st level spell that heals 1d8+mod HP. Even if you roll a 1 and have to use blood magic to cast it, you take 1 dmg to recover 1d8+mod. Meaning that anyone who can cast CLW or HW would be able to restore effectively infinite HP.
if you just want a more flexible system, have a look at the spell points variant rule on the last pages of the dungeon masters guide. its essentially mana.
@@Fanaelialae One of the late game abilities for one of players in the campaign we just finished was he can cast any spell that was Illusion, Enchantment, or Conjuration, and he has to roll a d10. If the number was equal to or lesser than the spell level, he couldn't use this ability to cast a spell of that school again until he took a long rest.
I genuinely love the idea but it feels unfair for a table. If you arent a magic user, you arent at risk using your abilities, unless you have a particularly cruel DM when it comes to NAT 1s. It seems unfair to have magic users be in the crosshairs of unpredicatable outcomes constantly, while non magic users dont have to.
It feels like ultimately magic users are being punished for doing what they are supposed to.
Is it fun and narratively interesting? Sure but after a time you'll probably get frustrated players.
Just discovered you randomly and I must say I love how professionnal your video looks and sound, and how succinct you are in your approach. You got yourself a new subscriber!
Interesting concepts. I've used a blood magic caster at my table (I'm not a 5e DM) where blood could also be spent for other effects: rerolling the spell effects for either damage or whatever other chart might be being used for teleport safety, monster summoning, etc., but the costs are high in HP and characters have actually chosen to go into negative HP and almost die just to have a chance at casting teleport successfully. My system doesn't use Vancian rules for spellcasting either, though I don't mind that system since I started with it. It's just that for what I was trying to do I wanted something different.
So there is no "right or wrong way of playing D&D"... but why don't you just play completely different system that actually reflects the way you want it to work? Dungeon World is very light system without a spell slots and with consequences of failed spellcasting roll. It's even more streamlined than 5e and is much easier to "balance out" these types of "hacks". Heck, it's even more moldable than D&D will ever be.
This is clearly a case of "just go play a different system".
God forbids someone changes an imaginary game 😂 don't worry, if you can't handle homebrews there's always chutes and ladders
@DargorV God forbid people try out more of the TTRPG space than D&D. This exact spellcasting system is done justice elsewhere.
Even then, this guy could just make his own TTRPG, which is the logical conclusion of Homebrew. Why restrain yourself by a game system that doesn't really help you make big alterations? Changing spellcasting like this completely alters more than half the classes and potentially breaks other interactions with the spellcasting system.
You don't have to feel the need to bastardize and twist 5e to be whatever you want, because what you want is out there in some form in other games. It's like how people turn Skyrim into a Souls-Like through mods. There's a point where you should probably just be playing a Souls-Like.
@@Aazdremzulon the other hand, homebrewing systems together to create the blend that you want should not be stigmatised.
Just found your channel!!!!! This is amazing!!!!!
Awesome! Glad you like it and stoked to have you!
I enjoy the initial concept of this home ruling but I feel there are perhaps a few other RAW points that may have been looked over.
1 - With the spell level being equal to caster level this means that core casters cap out at lvl 9 and give world ending magic to characters that are not even half way through their potential. In addition half casters would also drastically acquire spell power very early.
2 - You covered warlocks in your FAQ but may have glossed over the many conflicts this class would have in this system. Consider that warlocks have a forced spell level, so each spell no matter what has an overtly high casting check (in comparison to their counter parts). Admittedly this _may_ cause a balance by the spell slot limitation being removed but an unlucky warlock essentially becomes powerless by losing spell access to an already rather low spell pool while a lucky warlock becomes game breakingly over powered. (On a counter ruling of simply not have a forced level and casting at initial level, it takes away a large part of the intrigue of playing a warlock mechabically). Furthermore how would you handle evocation spells which give non spell slot use spells? Do these remain RAW?
3 - The clarifications/modifications to Arcane Recovery and Font of Magic seem uneeded and rather strict. Why not just retain their initial costs and allow recovery of lost spells of appropriate levels in place of spell slots?
4 - On the more facetious and not picking side, you covered spell attacks and saving throws against spell casting successes. However, this would only be if a creature's AC is _above_ the casting check? What if a casting check is higher than a targetted AC. Implying that a character rolls a check that would have hit the trarget AC but not meet the casting DC. (Ignoring the counter of why would one would cast a higher level spell on a low level or weaker creature). Further, not as much a balancing issue but on the reverse if a character succeeds a casting check but the roll would not it a creature's AC. While not a loss given the system it does seem to be rather dissapointing given that it is both a success and loss.
6 - Perhaps more lore/logic than mechanic but how would handle/rule/explain advantages? Ie. in the case of Faerie Fire one would have advantage on the attack roll, does this mean the casting check has advantage or that after making the cast check the caster may make a second roll for a hit? Same imlied on the reverse of disadvantage due to a dodge action.
7 - The nerfing of cantrips seems a bit unneeded.
8 - Causing spell loss inadvertently forces casters to pick more damage spells over utility ones seeing as should they lose access to a combat spell they become less and less useful throughout an encounter let alone an adventuring day. Although there are non damage spells that are useful inside a combat many other are solely for outside of combat. Admittedly while certain classes such as cleric, druid or wizard can overcome this in a way through their ability to prepare spells, classes with known spells will inevitably be forced to prioritize pure combat over interesting utility and role play spells.
This video should be called “why I haven’t figured out that I should play a different game so I am making a video about reinventing the wheel “.
Exactly. People will spend 10x more time and effort "fixing" 5e than they would just learning a new system.
On the other hand, I watched this to get ideas for how to swap out spell slots in PF2e because I hate vancian magic with a burning passion.
Do you understand the point of homebrew content or nah? I bet you make ramen exactly per the instructions on the bag.
Does this replace the attack/saving throw rolls or does this take place before/after that?
Btw I love blood magic and your implementation is the most interesting one I've come across!
I really reallly like this idea! I would love a video simulating this combat for tutorial purposes!
Ngl, I love the idea and system and I'm definitely gonna use it in some future campaign but I have a few questions (I hope I didn't miss it in the video but I couldn't find anything in the document).
How do you differentiate between different types of spellcasters? Does everyone get infinite casting with the drawback or do Warlocks keep their restricted casts?
Also how do you rule Paladin smites since they usually cost spellslots?
I like the idea of scrubbing spell slots because they've never made sense to me, and really enjoy the options you've created for a Critical Cast. I see where you're coming from on wanting more variability and risk with using magic, though I think the effectiveness of that varies by setting. For example, take Paradox in the Chronicles of Darkness setting for mages; magic, in that setting, can completely flout the assumed rules of reality, so the consequence of paradox makes sense for why you have variability/risk in outcomes. But if magic is natural to a world and follows generally understood principles or consistent paths (like Divine whatever, etc.) then the variability makes less sense imo. So I usually favor something like a mana pool because it conveys the idea that you still have a limited resource for casting that can allow for scale without loss of "knowing" a spell. Great video!
We totally agree, we went to a roll to cast system over a decade ago. It has been very well received. Rolling for spells allows for crit success, crit fail and of course success or failure. This adds great tension and great variety to playing a caster.
I like this, a lot! It feels balanced yet so simple. My only concern is the amount of damage from the mishap table seems a bit high for starting groups 2D6 damage and possible spell damage to everyone within range (i.e. probably most the group) could easily lead to a TPK. For my campaign, I might tone it down a little, but still a great concept. something I might allow is a savings throw to mitigate some of the damage.
Love the concept. I had done something similar by heavily modifying the wild magic table.
Thanks! And yeah, wild magic sorcery is definitely a fun subclass.
This is a solid idea, especially as a PF2e player where the 4 degrees on skill checks comes in and the system gives you a bit more numerical wiggle room to work with. This also gives you a neat way to add flexibility to spellcasting- the age-old "that spell doesn't actually let you do that, but..." conversation.
Genius. This is exactly what I was looking for.
This is how it also works in Dungeon World!
For wizards, when they cast an arcane spell, they always need to make a roll, and there's no spell slots involved.
There's 3 tiers of success: 1) success, 2) success at a cost, 3) failure.
Even in failure, it doesn't mean that the spell isn't cast necessarily, but there's consequences. The Wizard might have to forget the spell for the day, take a minus, or the spell might go awry and cause problems itself.
For success at a cost, there's the chance that the spell is forgoten, or not forgoten but a there's a -1 to future spellcasting rolls, etc.
Very interesting. Thank you
Glad you liked it Thomas!
I like it. Rolling to cast makes me want to play Ars Magica. I love their magic system.
I like that being able to pay the difference with HP. Good appropiation!
Wow, this is really interesting! I might try this in my game actually! 😃
Best of luck to you!
this is such an interesting idea! it reminds me of my favorite part of the monster of the geek system that when you roll to cast magic, you can fail and the GM takes a hard move- it forces you to think about whether or not the risk is worth the potential reward- exactly what i find so intriguing about this d20 test element to casting!
Is that related to the _Monster of the Week_ RPG? The name is similar.
You earned my subscription with this video.
Sorry about the long post, I just really loved the below mentioned RPG growing up so I wanted to share that system.
This very much remind me of the Swedish RPG Drakar och Demoner 6 (Dragons and Demons), except it was a roll under 20-system so everything you said about modifiers but in reverse (you want to roll a 1).
Some of the differences though is that, first of all, you don't forget the spell.
Secondly, you have spiritus points and you could "upcast" your spell with specific effects for each spell for an extra spiritus point cost.
Third, if you reach 0 spiritus, you fall unconscious and if you go below 0, you instantly die but you could still fire off your biggest spell at the price of your life.
Fourth, I don't remember what happened if you roll a Crit success (1) but I think you only spent half the spiritus points, but if you rolled a crit fail (20) you had to roll on the crit fail table that could be anything from "Nothing happens" to "Everything within 100 m takes 10d10 damage and you can be nowhere to be found". How bad the effect was depended on the amount of spirits you used as well as an extra roll depending on what color your magic was (white/grey/black, the color did not represent alignment but availability of spiritus).
Been doing this for years!!! Sooo much better!!!
Totally!
This was an eye opener! I always disliked the kind of lack of randomness of magic, i'll add a tweak of this system in my homebrew ASAP!
Hell yeah! Or test it out and see if your players are down. You can always go back 🤙🏼
Hey Mr House, I've been using your roll to cast system since you uploaded this video (I even have the rules printed out in my dnd file). It's a great system, though obviously I've added my own tweaks to it. One idea I've had is maybe the ability to use someone else's HP for blood magic. Maybe the barbarian offers the squishy wizard some of their HP to get that fireball off. And for martial caster's like bladesingers and paladins, maybe the ability to use a grappled enemy as a mana source, a la blood sacrifice. Also I've homebrewed magic items that the players can destroy to get a free casting, like crushing a dried hag's finger, or very rare items like burning an angel's feather to get an automatic crit on the cast. Not to mention the narrative implications of blood magic! The evil wizard who kidnaps people and uses them as mana sources to keep the magical barrier on their tower. It also meshes the narrative of blood sacrifices with the mechanics. Overall, I have really enjoyed this system, kudos to you
This is awesome to hear! I actually thought about that for awhile and decided to not allow that as a “base mechanic”. It’s cool but then I thought about the implications that would bring into the world and it got grim. So instead I made that a plot device tied to a magic item that, as you sorta arrived at, a mad wizard is creating that let’s them use other people’s blood to power his spellcasting. Pretty awful stuff if you ask me. But by tying it to the magic item, my Pc’s would know it could be destroyed.
Glad you like it. Having run a campaign with this rules hack, I actually don’t think the blood magic is necessary since casters were really good at meeting their spellcasting checks. Might change it back to d4 damage per point as opposed to 1 damage per point. Glad you like it! #Frostgrave
hi ! i really love this idea; i use D&D Beyond for my games & i am trying to figure out a way to implement this in a way that would be easier for my players to use - if you have any experience, do you know of ways to do that? also, been loving your videos recently, & i'm definitely gonna implement your long rest rules in my game :] excited to see what else you have in store for this channel !
also, one more question! how would certain classes work? i.e. sorcerer regaining spell slots ?
I just started running a d20 modern variant called Blood and Vigilance. It's a superhero setting, so they change the casting rules to something very similar to what you describe. It's a spellcasting check using knowledge arcane lore or knowledge philosophy and theology. It's one of the more interesting quirks of this system because it allows a spell caster to keep up with a superhero character.
You could even adjust the DC for each spell, like if your Wizard trains with magic missile a lot, you can lower the DC by 1. Or give out magic items, like wands and staves, that give like “+1 to casting Firebolt”. Sounds cool.
I've never really liked the vancian spell system in dnd so I'm definitely going to try this out!
Question though, how do you implement this system with class features like bardic inspiration? Do they still have to roll against a DC or do you keep it at a x/day kind of situation?
P.S. love the Frostgrave reference.
Hey @5everDM! Thanks for commenting! Bardic inspiration is an ability so it just works. Similar to that of the Fighters action surge/second wind.
But yeah, bardic inspiration will certainly help a caster get those spells off. And hell yeah, Frostgrave is awesome! I’m mid campaign with my Wizard buddy. Cheers!
I really like the spell crit system you have
I actually like some basic form of Vancian magic given how it involves making a lot of difficult decisions, like what spells we should memorize in advance, and whether to use a spell we've memorized knowing we won't be able to use it again until we find a safe place to camp. I always related it somewhat to having very limited ammunition and kit we can carry into battle. Yet I think your general proposal of a very risky and unreliable magic system is one of the most interesting alternatives I've heard, since it makes it constantly very thought-provoking to even risk casting a spell in the first place.
I'm more a video game designer and player than a TTRPG designer and player, but I love role-playing systems that present us with a barrage of difficult and thought-provoking decisions. So a strong element of risk behind a decision would definitely make it a lot more thought-provoking in my eyes, having to factor in the possibility of failure and constantly building contingency plans in case things fail.
I like the ideas for spell csatung.I am going to try it