So one of the quirks of D&D is that since almost the very start, we've had the generalist MU/mage/wizard who can perform (mostly) any magical effect imaginable, and we've also had various specialist casters with specific themes and more limited spell lists. Clerics are Christian-crusades-themed healers who are also decent warriors, illusionists are tricksters with extra-tricksy spells, and so on as more material is added to the game.

From a player/DM/design/whatever standpoint, which style do you like best, and why -- the generalist caster class, or the many specialist classes?

The Cleric is also a generalist. The Druid is the specialist subset. The Cleric has its own and mostly different spell loadout than the Magic User does.

I prefer 5es overall approach in that specialists come about more by player choice and outlook than class. what path you decide to walk.

I'd prefer the player choose whether to specialize or generalize based on how he plays his character and what spells he chooses to learn or what deity he chooses to proselytize for. I don't really need that in the rules as a bunch of different classes as long as there are the options available that allow such differentiation. But I don't really care for classes as a concept anyway.

I like having both (generalist and specialist) in a game. Some tradeoffs are fine of course for flavour and for mechanics.

In literature with Wizards, very few of them are as generalist as the ones listed in most editions of D&D.  You read about 'Necromancers', or Enchantresses or Oracles/Wisemen or Witches and Warlocks, most of which can be linked to a specific school of D&D magic.

But in literature they can do a bunch of other stuff too.  Gandelf was great with a sword, Vald Taltos was great with a sword, and and assain and a good cook too.

Even Dresden hits baddies with his staff.

I'm always leery of using fairy tales and literature as a yardstick for game concepts, as those characters have whatever abilities and quirks make for a good morality tale or classic novel -- not necessarily the abilities and quirks that make for a good game.

Quote from: Dumarest;958650I'd prefer the player choose whether to specialize or generalize based on how he plays his character and what spells he chooses to learn or what deity he chooses to proselytize for. I don't really need that in the rules as a bunch of different classes as long as there are the options available that allow such differentiation. But I don't really care for classes as a concept anyway.

Ha, I like classes as a concept, but D&D's execution tends to be...inconsistent.

Quote from: Tequila Sunrise;958627So one of the quirks of D&D is that since almost the very start, we've had the generalist MU/mage/wizard who can perform (mostly) any magical effect imaginable, and we've also had various specialist casters with specific themes and more limited spell lists. Clerics are Christian-crusades-themed healers who are also decent warriors, illusionists are tricksters with extra-tricksy spells, and so on as more material is added to the game.

From a player/DM/design/whatever standpoint, which style do you like best, and why -- the generalist caster class, or the many specialist classes?

I think either approach can work well.

However I find long spell lists a bit overwhelming as a GM, and even as a player if I have to think about situations where people could have many different spells. As both player and (especially) GM, I like to play not just reactively but in terms of a situation with many players who may be working at odds to each other. The larger and more powerful the range of spells available, the more complex that game can get, to the point where I can't handle it. Also, with varied high-powered magic, or even a few spells with nasty potential like invisibility, control person, long-distance teleportation, divination, there can arise a "magical arms race" to the point where if you have a potential magic-using opponent, you may need to strike first in a terrible nasty way before they strike you first in a terrible nasty way, because you both can. Or if there are enough countermeasures to have there be deterrents, then that can get really complicated for each wizard involved. That can be really fun and interesting, if you're into it (and if you're not a non-magic-using character who's getting massively overshadowed and overpowered by all this), but it can also be quite overwhelming if there are many spells available. It seems more interesting when there are limited spells available to people and so some amount of prediction can reasonably be made about what your opponents' powers are or are not like.

I could mostly handle the number and power types of spells in Advanced Wizard, minus the crystal ball divination (and I could do without a few of the other nasty spells, such as demons and wishes and curse/bless). But GURPS Magic or D&D magic for example have so many spells and they can get pretty powerful and complex to think about and keep track of in the ways I prefer to be able to... unless the number of them available are limited and organized.

Which is why I came to prefer to break up spell knowledge in my campaigns. As I've described on some other threads, I like to design campaign worlds where certain schools / traditions / organizations have a limited list of magical spells that they know and teach, and usually limits on which spells are available to be taught to whom, and in exchange for what (often, trust and service to the organization). Especially for the more powerful spells, which reduces the complexity to something I can manage, and also creates an interesting situation that makes sense in the world (e.g. it gives meaningful answers tied to the rest of the world for who/where/what you'd have to go/do to get access to certain magic).

I don't mind if there are generalist characters or even generalist wizard guilds or whatever, but I want to track at a practical level who in general knows what (especially for the more powerful spells that can mess with and attract the attention/interest of powerful people), and not just have a supposition that they know and make available most everything.

With regard to long spell lists in rulebooks, there is no reason all those spells should be readily available (or ever available) to a character if you want to tailor magic to suit your campaign. I generally play very magic-light ganes, where powerful magic is usually evil and the result of corruption, artifacts, demons, and blood sacrifices...but I'm greatly influenced by Robert E. Howard Conan stories like The Hour of the Dragon and The Tower of the Elephant in my fantasy games.

You know, limited and random spell selection and discovery tends to create ersatz specialists. A good player will run with this and develop favoured tactics and procedures and become his own unique thing. Throw in random magic items found over the course of play and ya, every generalist mage should be able develop his own signature.

The only really generic casters I see in play tend to be NPCs. Which is somewhat OK because most exist only for a single encounter.

Quote from: Tequila Sunrise;958764I'm always leery of using fairy tales and literature as a yardstick for game concepts, as those characters have whatever abilities and quirks make for a good morality tale or classic novel -- not necessarily the abilities and quirks that make for a good game.

There's reason that some people claim to like multi-classing.  And given that Gandalf is an angel first, I don't think using him as an example of a Wizard is kinda incongruous, despite him being the original wizard template for AD&D and onward.

But there are analogs in which you can say 'close enough', like Conan of Cimmeria being a Fighter (Yes, yes, I hear people claiming 'Bu, bu he wassa tief an' a pirate an' a...', what they don't seem to want to realize that every thing he did was still in line with a fighting man first.  So he could climb towers, so can most anyone, he never picked a lock, being a pirate just means he learned how to sail, his fighting style never actually changed.  And that's what makes an interesting character, consistency.  He had adventures and changed, grew you could say, but his core being, a Cimmerian barbarian warrior didn't change to the point of being unrecognizable.  A class is supposed to be an archetype, a loose basis to hang a character on, something that helps define but isn't the be all and end all of the character.  Except when how people play D&D, apparently.)  And that's another issue I'm probably going to have with this thread, again, people whining about X won't fit EXACTLY into Y.  This isn't an exact science, people.

Eh, whatever, it's the internet.

I much prefer specialist casters. Makes it feel more "magical" to me.

I like the combo of weak here / strong there in powers. I especially like Clerics whose powers are dictated by their god.

I don't mind the generalist wizard but was always fond of the specialist options for mages in 2e. The priest class options were even better in this regard.

I think both have their place. However, both in D&D and in other systems, I find that magicians tend to have broader abilities than non-magical characters. Not that they can do abolutely everything, but they can often effectively participate in a number of spheres - combat, skulking, traps, social, etc.  Thus, I like specialist casters as a change of pace.