You know, if I hadn't played Star Wars Saga edition I'd have been really freaking out about this little development; but even as it stands, SW is one thing, D&D is another.

SW is trying to emulate the movies; and what do you see in the movies? Jedi switching from one neat power to another in the battle, trying a trick and then never repeating it, etc.
So having per-encounter force powers use makes a lot of sense.

In D&D, what you're trying to emulate is a fantasy world, or a book, or what have you. It doesn't make nearly as much sense. Also, how the fuck will this jive with their whole "multiple-room encounter dungeon" idea? If you go from room A to room B, suddenly you have all your spells back, but if you have the bad luck to go from room A to room A1 to room A2 to room A4 to room A8, you have to fight 5 battles all with the same set of spells, just because of the whim of the system? Where going from room a to room b takes about six seconds, and the other set of encounters takes 5 hours? WTF?!

Not to mention, I really don't see how the fuck the existing spell system or anything even vaguely resembling it would work with per-encounter spellcasting.  They'd have to utterly revamp the entire magic system, at least as much and probably far more than they revamped the force powers for SW.

RPGPundit

It looks like the spell system is where we'll see the most change. The old 1-9 model no longer exists, with the implication that spell levels will match the characters, ie.1-30. I imagine that Wizards and Sorcerors will be able to prepare a number of identical spells prior to an encounter, the total number of which will be determined by their current level.

Outside of that it's wide open right now. I'm looking forward to seeing how they manage such a thorough reconstruction, although I've always considered Vancian magic to be more of a hindrance than a boon when playing D&D, whatever the iteration.

I posted this to another thread, but am copying it here:

I'll take a wild guess that most damage dealing spells will now do less, and a fixed amount, of damage. If you have the chance of throwing spells per encounter, then it follows that the ones that deal large amounts of damage will have it reduced. So, maybe Fireball will now do 5d6 damage full stop, but with the correct feats and having it as a per encounter spell, you'll have greater access to it.

Quote from: RPGPunditYou know, if I hadn't played Star Wars Saga edition I'd have been really freaking out about this little development; but even as it stands, SW is one thing, D&D is another.

SW is trying to emulate the movies; and what do you see in the movies? Jedi switching from one neat power to another in the battle, trying a trick and then never repeating it, etc.
So having per-encounter force powers use makes a lot of sense.

In D&D, what you're trying to emulate is a fantasy world, or a book, or what have you. It doesn't make nearly as much sense. Also, how the fuck will this jive with their whole "multiple-room encounter dungeon" idea? If you go from room A to room B, suddenly you have all your spells back, but if you have the bad luck to go from room A to room A1 to room A2 to room A4 to room A8, you have to fight 5 battles all with the same set of spells, just because of the whim of the system? Where going from room a to room b takes about six seconds, and the other set of encounters takes 5 hours? WTF?!

Not to mention, I really don't see how the fuck the existing spell system or anything even vaguely resembling it would work with per-encounter spellcasting.  They'd have to utterly revamp the entire magic system, at least as much and probably far more than they revamped the force powers for SW.

RPGPundit

They've said that both Per-day and per-encounter abilities will be present. I don't think it's too hard to say that a powerful wizard can regain some of his mojo when he has a few moments to breath, while his big guns take more time to recover. I kind of like the dynamic there.

Completely and totally changes spellcasting; its the most fundamental change to playing D&D I have encountered in any edition overhaul.

It will be interesting to see how they approach "spells per encounter" + "encounters can be multiple rooms" design of the game.

This is what I'd do:

Make it based on "resting" outside of combat.  If you have a single room/monster encounter you get all your spells.  If you get into a running battle through the dungeon with waves of reinforcements arriving -- you're at risk of running out of spells!

Look to Book of 9 Swords for some inspiration here.  I can burn through all my kung fu, then spend a round recharging my powers.  Lather, rinse, repeat.  Outside of combat I take 5 minutes and then can switch around what fu options I have at hand.

Quote from: RPGPunditIn D&D, what you're trying to emulate is a fantasy world, or a book, or what have you. It doesn't make nearly as much sense.

With its rez-in-a-can availability of healing and trinket-based empowerment system, D&D has not been trying to emulate anything other than D&D for quite some time. Not that that's a bad thing particularly.

QuoteAlso, how the fuck will this jive with their whole "multiple-room encounter dungeon" idea? If you go from room A to room B, suddenly you have all your spells back, but if you have the bad luck to go from room A to room A1 to room A2 to room A4 to room A8, you have to fight 5 battles all with the same set of spells, just because of the whim of the system? Where going from room a to room b takes about six seconds, and the other set of encounters takes 5 hours? WTF?!

It will have to rely on the DM's judgment, probably, and the smarts of the party to avoid fighting the whole dungeon at once. However it works out, it still sounds better for casters than spells-per-day.

QuoteNot to mention, I really don't see how the fuck the existing spell system or anything even vaguely resembling it would work with per-encounter spellcasting.  They'd have to utterly revamp the entire magic system, at least as much and probably far more than they revamped the force powers for SW.

Yes, it sounds drastic. I'm looking forward to it, and I don't think I'm the only one. If they screw it up, that will be disappointing, but no one can see the future.

In some ways per encounter is how GURPS Magic or Hero System already plays. Particularly if the mage has high levels of Recover Energy.

It will  be interesting to see how they make it feel like D&D.

Quote from: jrientsLook to Book of 9 Swords for some inspiration here.  I can burn through all my kung fu, then spend a round recharging my powers.  Lather, rinse, repeat.  Outside of combat I take 5 minutes and then can switch around what fu options I have at hand.

Yep. Greater flexibility and more bang for the Wizard's buck seems to be the goal.

The tackling of the 9-9:05 job problem of spellcasters is for me one of the most promising parts of 4e.
It isn't much fun to either rest between each room to let the spell-caster regenerate after blasting all his mojo away, or to play stupid and to use only a fraction of your spell repertoire in each encounter to manage several encounters between each resting period.

A trick I have thought of before to accomplish this is an absolute need of components for every single spell. Therefore you use up your components for encounter 1, take the loot (or find new components in the loot), buy new components and so on.

BUT:

The fighter is supposed to do stuff repeatedly, even when the wizard is low on spells.

It seems to me, the are turning everyone into a warblade instead of turning everyone into a Wizard.

Quote from: SettembriniThe fighter is supposed to do stuff repeatedly, even when the wizard is low on spells.

It seems to me, the are turning everyone into a warblade instead of turning everyone into a Wizard.

But especially at low levels, a wizard is downright pitiful in a fight, even fully loaded with spells. A low-level wizard doesn't switch to a crossbow after he runs out of spells, he uses the crossbow first because his low level spells do less damage than a crossbow bolt. Or will be saved against. Or whatever.

It sounds like wizards will always have some kind of little magic bolt to throw around, which is a HUGE improvement in my eyes. If I play a wizard, it's because I want to solve my problems with magic, and 80%* of the problems in D&D are fights.

*or whatever percent

Quote from: jrientsLook to Book of 9 Swords for some inspiration here.  I can burn through all my kung fu, then spend a round recharging my powers.  Lather, rinse, repeat.  Outside of combat I take 5 minutes and then can switch around what fu options I have at hand.

And you all laughed at me when I worried about how much Bo9S would influence the design...And, I'll also point out, it seems that the Bo9S approach made fighters too powerful, so they had to up wizards power, right?  Arms race anyone?

OK - done with the snark.  jrients beat me to the punch, though.  If I had to guess, I'd say that's exactly how it will work.  You'll have a list of spells you'll know (maneuvers for Fighters). You will be able to have a (sub)set of those spells "readied." To regain a "readied" spell will be a full round action (or something similar). To replace a spell on your "readied" list with another you know will take 5 minutes or something like that. I'd have to go back and read the specifics in Bo9S - but it's something like that. Which spells are in your list, how many you have "readied" when an encounter starts, etc. will all be determined by class/level.

Which is a bummer.  I'd rather see them go to some tangible measure of power - for both fighter's fu and wizards magic.  Something based on Con and fort saves - like a derived stat; something that doesn't tell you which spells you have to choose, but you have a list of what you know and can use them whenever you have enough power to do so.  And when you're running low, you have to make fort saves to get the spell off.  Or something. Maybe that's how the system will seem in play even if it's this Bo9S-like approach?

While I enjoy the resource-management aspect of D&D spellcasters, I've always found the magic system unsatisfying. The biggest problem is many of the more esoteric or non-violent spells are never used. I'd guess almost half of the 1st and 2nd level spells in the PHB have never been used in our 27 years of D&D. Seriously - who's going to take Audible Glamour when he can take Web? Now, Audible Glamour is a cool spell that could prove very useful - but only in quite specific situations. A magic-user would be foolish to have it memorized when he heads into a dungeon, unless he has reams of spell slots available. It always struck me as odd that a high-level mage would be much more likely to use a Dancing Lights or Unseen Servant spell than a low-level mage.

So anything that makes the subtle, non-combat spells more attractive is an improvement in my books. If that means making them usable per-encounter, then I have no problem with it.