A typical wizard is carrying around just a nightmare of weird powders, animal bones, small gems and other bits and sundry used for fueling their mystic arts. However, despite the prevalence of spell components in AD&D, I have never actually played in a game where anyone took them into account. Typically, they are relegated to casual narrative mentions, and by the time 3.0 came out, wizards had an infinite amount of spell components in their bottomless 5gp component pouches. This is too bad, because they seem like they ought to be important, but they simply aren't. After all, fighters lose their swords because of fumbles and ooze monsters all the times, but magic-users are allowed to have a Batman utility belt of spell components that never run out, and never get lost.
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This doesn't jive with me, because a jar of mummy farts seems likely to break pretty easily, and I doubt a mummified lizard is much use if it gets wet. Here are some rules to make spell components have an actual impact on game play.
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Wizards are all super smart because they are wizards, so they would never forget to bring spell components, obviously.
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Spell components probably weigh a negligible amount. I'd say components probably weigh a pound each. If you are a smart person with good taste and are using
these rules for inventory tracking, I'd say five components fit into one pouch, which takes up one slot.
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Whenever a wizard does something that might damage their spell component, including, but not limited to
- being on fire
- blasted by an area effect spell
- falling more than ten feet
- walking through waist high water
- getting critically hit
then the wizard must make a save vs breath weapon (or reflex save, or whatever) or lose one component. Glass breaks, the component is squished when the wizard sits on it, or the magic crystal falls out of a pouch and is lost in the mud. Randomly select on spell that the magic-user has memorized, and cross it off as though it had been cast.
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I've always used components. To the player who's paying attention, wizards are easy to make super-juicy.
ReplyDeleteI love components for spells, but losing them is only half the fun (and sometimes not even that!). Finding and/or making them is a blast, and can be a terrific prompt for side quests when your wizard learns a new spell but needs something really bizarre (or even taboo) too make it work. Even more fun is having the player explain how the component is used to cast the spell. If it just crumbles in their palm, OK, but no bonuses for you! On the other hand, if they have to rip the mummified cat in two, inhale the dust and then spew it at the enemy in a torrent of magical force... Take an RP bonus!
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