Magic users should be required to use a wand to cast spells. If their wand breaks or is stolen...

So basically Harry Potter?

I have a very autistic interpretation about magic and would like someone to rate it.

Basically, your wand is your focus to enact "change" on the world. Point your wand at something, concentrate, and like in a dream you can force change. The changes will be small and temporary for novices, but for masters of the craft they can be quite powerful and permanent. There is a bit of a mixture of symbolism and energy here- changing a wheel to heal someone when they touch it is much more difficult then making water heal someone when they drink it, since water is already closely associated with health and the body. If you throw in some herbal remedies into the mix, it makes the magic even stronger and easier then just regular water. So symbolic and sympathetic magic is still very common.

I really like this interpretation of magic, but it would probably fit in better with a novel then a roleplaying game. What do you think?

If you had said "a focus" and not necessarily a wand, then I'd be 100% with you. But if I can't have my Pinhead expy cast sinister spells using a puzzle cube, then no deal.

Nah wands are pretty trash-tier dude.

Staves are always better.

I do this. A wand, staff, gauntlet, sword, whatever. you want. But you need a specialized item prepared to channel mana in order to perform magic.

How about, wands aren't needed to cast they just focus spells making them stronger and easier to cast, so without a wand spellcasters are practically crippled put not useless.

>Basically, your wand is your focus to enact "change" on the world
That's a pretty common interpretation, actually.

> it would probably fit in better with a novel
Unless the game is ABOUT that. You could have a wizard's school setting, or Ars Magica, or Mage: the Ascension.

>wands
>breaks in half easy
>look dumb carrying a plain looking stick
>cant do anything other than spells, useless in close combat

>staff
>is sturdy piece of wood that can split heads
>can put charms and items on it to personalize, put noches in it for each wench layed
>simple tool with many uses (even help support your boney ass if you dumped str for some reason)

wandlets never learn, magic staffs are for chadlocks

Spell books basically already do this?

The problem with it is that the symbolism needs to clearly established and agreed upon with the players. I, for one hate water-based healing magic from the bottom of my heart, so I would probably say go fuck yourself, if you tried to sell that to me.

>not holding an orb

Name fucking one.

It was less about water = healing and more about water being something you drink and it enters the body and medicines are made to be drank.

You can lift water with a bucket, but you can't lift a bucket with itself. The bucket is magic, the water is reality.

Harry Potter, Magi, pic related.

That is not how Harry Potter works even close.

I'm not sure about Magi, but I heard it uses an elemental system. I could be wrong on that one though.

>you can't lift a bucket with itself
but you can with another bucket

>Fantasy settings do not have "physics"
You're completely in the wrong here.

The only important difference between magic and science is that magic isn't real, so you can make up whatever justifications you want. Narratively it needs to be internally consistent, but otherwise there are no ironclad rules or laws on magic. Magic is whatever the writer says it is, and if they want it to be circumventions of the physical world then goddamnit that's what magic is.

I thought we were just talking about how wands work, not about how magic works as a whole.

So you still lifted water using a bucket, no matter how many intermediary buckets you used.

you idiot he's not talking about picking up water, he's talking about picking up a bucket. With another bucket.

It's buckets all the way down

The original metaphor was about buckets (magic) and water. The point was that while you can pick the first buket with another bucket (or whatever) you still are using a tool. The bucket is not selfsufficient to pick itself up, and you still need another tool to pick it up. Dumbass

Magic users should be required to make armpit noises to cast spells. If they actually fart, the spell is cast twice, once from either end of their body.

I like wands/staves/catalysts for casting, but I dislike them being binary requirements. Being binary requirements, it means that casters either are on or off, and due to losing all powers being super sucky, most will have theirs at most times. It's sort of like how D&D wizards really need their spellbook, and GMs can specifically remove it from play for a while, but doing so is generally considered a dick move as it is a huge hit to the wizard while it's missing. However, the spellbook serves an actual function, and it's immediately clear WHY removing it would be troublesome- It's where the wizard actually stores their spells. And because it serves a function and only that function is lost when the book is lost, technically the wizard still has options, and can plan for the possibility of losing the book (IE when book is lost, you can still use previously prepared spells, you can take options to let you prepare a couple spells without spellbook, etc.).

I'd much rather have catalysts be used to improve spellcasting in specific ways. Things like being able to channel mana faster or improving attunement to a given element, or whatever makes sense for the setting. That way it might still be considered a necessity that most casters carry, and it might still suck to lose it, but it actually does something meaningful in the meantime, and even losing it highlights other aspects of the character (IE what are you capable of doing without the augmentation of the catalyst).

>No human can actually cast magic and humans are inherently non-magical, wands are sacred objects that contain magical spirits that will occasionally allow humans to use them

That's how wizards work in pathfinder.

It's like some magic users aren't even trying...

I use magic to turn the bucket into a sheep the shape of a bucket that grows water-wool filled splinter-wands.

Also I imbue it with an insatiable blood-lust to kill adventurers who seek it's water squirting wand loot.

I say make it a focus instead. What makes limitations fun is the imaginary arms race that happens when people adapt and counter adapt to exploit this limitation.
>Wizards start adapting mundane ways to prevent themselves from being disarmed
>Start hiding their focus under their skin
>People start using special wizard skinning knives to remove focuses
>Develop armoured glove which locks their focus in place
>People just simply opt to destroy the entire hand, glove, focus and all
>Attach a chain to their focus
>Find a way to smash the chain

I feel like the counter to hiding the focus in the skin would be "remove wizard's arm from body" rather than "use teeny skinning knife to try and carefully remove focus from wizard's hand".

That also works.

>wizard's wand breaks
>he just takes a spare from his big bag of wands

If the store the spells in their spellbooks what is the point of spell slots?

I mean that the pool of spells they can prepare in their spell slots is defined by their spellbook.

Is the restriction based on the idea that they can't remember what is wirten on a page with enough clarity? Are their exceptions for spells you know by heart, or perhaps have tatooed on your body?

Wands are pretty lame, but that may be because only very popular very poor executions of the concept immediately come to mind. There are probably badass examples of wand users if I look harder. I like magic consistent with a set of rules, but still incredibly diverse. Tying everything to just wands would kill it for me.

It's based off of Jack Vance's book series, hence "Vancian magic". The idea is preparing a spell involves memorizing it, and the act of casting it causes it to vanish from your mind. D&D does include options for mastery of certain spells so they can be prepared without spellbook, such as the Spell Mastery feat in D&D 3.PF.

Think of it more as creating the spell in the wizards mind rather than memorizing it. As if the spell were a separate thing in the wizards mind. Casting the spell causes the spell to leave the casters mind.

I can see that. I can also see fire being associated with healing. Fire cauterizes wounds, sterilizes needles for stitches, purifies food and drink, and provides life giving warmth. Living things are like fire, consuming fuel until there is nothing left or they are smothered out. Intelligence and divinity is also associated with fire, in some mythologies being a tool divinely conferred upon sapient beings by the gods.

More likely they'd carry a ton of them and disguise at least a couple as something ordinary, like a pipe.

I don't mind that. I just don't like wands. I mean I just don't like having ONLY wands. Sometimes, even, I don't want any wands at all. But that's just me.

Except how do you actually administer it? If you used a wand to make a fire heal, you'd have to change it so that it no longer was uncomfortably hot or burned you to touch it, and gave it its healing properties.

Or you could just point the wand at some water in a cup and make it heal. Like I said, it's also about portability. Food would probably work too, but water could have some random herbs thrown in first to make it easier.

This is already a requirement in 5e
anyone who has actually read the rules would know you can't cast a spell that has a Material component without using either a spell focus or component pouch that would have the components for your prepared spells in it.

My original inspiration was Dark Souls' Warmth spell. While you could carry literal fire everywhere with you and jab it into the wound to burn and heal it, I was also thinking of collecting kindling after the party stops, then having the sickly gather around an enchanted campfire to benefit from a gradual rejuvenation.

You are like little babby. I fist vampire for bat guano, then cast fireball inside vampire.

I didn't say there wasn't a way to do it without them, but it would probably be unlikely.
if you're on the beach then you can cast sand as much as you want.

nevermind I guess I did say that. it wasn't what I meant, though.

That’s actually a thing in 5e.
You can either use spell components (which fucking EVERYONE forgets even though all the most powerful spells require them) or a Casting Focus, one of which is wands.

I know, I just wanted to say that.

I find wands idiotic desu, as mentioned above a focus in general is a much better idea which (also already noted) spellbooks already are.

But what I'd really like to see is a game were magic is based around regents and fetishes. Want to cast fireball? Better have a bronze rod forged during a full moon.

Wands look goofy as fuck. Switch it to staves and I'm in.

you speak the truth

Wands are for fairy godmothers.

And they're the best wizards.

We call that divinity you un educated pavement ape

This is true but ONLY they know how to make it work.

Everyone else should use some other kind of sensible focus.

Especially if you think you might ever run into a situation where something has protection from magic or might take your magic away.

That's the best thing about a staff, at least you can defend yourself.

...hmm... can you use a gun as a focus? Shoot magic as long as the magic is working then switch to bullets if you need.

Why not use bullets as your focus?
>Fire bullet
>Make it cast a spell shortly after impact
>Fireball explodes while bullet is inside of target

Yo imma replace my fingernails with tiny wands

Can you cast from something you aren't touching?

(I mean I know in Potter if it was needed for the story JK would just pull something like that power out of her arsehole)

Just enforce existing rules in 5e (because we all know you're talking about that one even though you didn't read it.

Fucking gunmages are my fetish. There's something magical about an old fucker with a beard down to his knees with a pointy hat manhandling a .45 with fucking magical napalm bullets eradicating some god damn ricegoblins.

Everyone except monks needs an external item called "magic focus" to cast a spell.
Any item qualifies as a magic focus as long as it has a magic rune engraved with silver inlays in it.

So dem fine silver decorated bows the elves use? All double as magic foci.

The maces most clerics carry around? Magic foci.

The weird animal bone necklaces on druids and barbarians? Magic foci.

Etc.

No they memorize the spell, then prepare a ritual to cast the spell and leave out the last step of casting the spell till they need it later on. Once they used that spell they can't do so again until they prepared the ritual again but still remember the spell.

>his caster doesn't wield an axe

Fucking mongrels.

>This is true but ONLY they know how to make it work
Canonically untrue.

Wands are dumb. Give me a staff, deck of cards, or a gun any day.

Staffs are better. Rods are the patrician choice.

>doesn't cast from a grimoire
Get on my level.
>still useful if partially destroyed
>sturdy binding is a decent weapon
>thickness directly indicates power
>can stuff literature and lewd etchings between pages

When will you fucks grow up and stop with these goddamn implementwars.
>Component pouch master race reporting in.

Fuck me from the thumbnail I could tell it was Cinderella and all, a sequel, but I thought the stepmother was Captain Hook.

>Water is already closely associated with health and the body.
>Fire is associated with life/growth, safety/warmth, power, light, chaos, destruction, creation, and is oft likened to a heartbeat.
Best maneuver is to coat myself in magic fire and turn into a dragon-ball Z character? I like it.
In all seriousness I like the idea, I'm a fan of more traditional "master of the universe/cheatcodes for the universe" types, but I can see that working conceptually. A little hard to enforce in a tabletop though.

I appreciate it, but that's why I said it was autistic. To me, it just feels the most natural and "realistic" if that makes sense.

Like I can't imagine myself as a person snapping my fingers with memorized information and making a weird magic spell come out. I just can't imagine it. But in my dreams I can stick out my hand and will things to change, and I feel like with a specific tool and a "feeling" of focus down the line with it you could do it in the waking world in a fantasy setting.

It makes things like permanent spells, or abstract spells very difficult or impossible. Like you can't really use that power to teleport objects, levitation is easy just point and move it around, but how could you teleport? Maybe you'd have to be extremely powerful and visualize the destination, but that's part of the fun. Thinking about how something that is a purely tactile method of doing magical change as being restrictive and interesting. It's very wizardly, in my eyes.

5e already makes spellcasters carry a focus or pouch to be able to cast most spells.

>a literal bag of shit
>master race

If casters aren't balanced against martials, why are all-wizard parties absolutely useless?

Ok

>why are all-wizard parties absolutely useless?
Because those parties tend to be made by people who don't know how to actually play as a wizard, and instead try to brute-force their way like a Sorcerer or Martial

Just use your finger as a wand. Duh.

>Sabrina the Teenage Witch game
Sounds kinda fun teebh

just make casting barehanded have potential consequences. channeling mana from your body will cause magic wear and tear just like using any other muscle. so a novice cant really use his bare hand casting untill hes built up his mana pool from learning to cast with a focus i.e. a wand, staff, rod, etc.

like If you cast a simply fireball spell without a wand, you could easily burn your hand if you dont know exactly what youre doing or have some protection. having a focus object keeps stupid magelets from exploding themselves too quickly.

Isn't that what spellbooks are for?

I sort of disagree.

My own suggestion, at least for DnD would be:

>Casters need wands, scepters, or staves to cast certain spells at-will (wands cover cantrips, scepters covers three cantrips and three first levels spells, and staffs cover two cantrips, two first level, and two second level spells)
>without it, they cannot cast certain spells at-will.

Alternatively:
>Wands, staffs, and scepters are sort of a mix of material and somatic components needed for high-level spell about third.
>without it, a caster is restricted to third level spells or lower.
>Different spells will call for either a staff, a wand, or scepter.
>Bards, rangers, paladins, and arcane knights are the only caster completely free from this limit. Druids, Clerics, Warlocks, Wizards, Sorcs, and the like must accept the need for these foci.