All Wizard Game?

[Pharaoh's Fist]

Now the wizards are in a world of trouble. And a special squad consisting of level 10 elite anti-wizard units would still put wizards in a world of trouble, even without magic weapons and divine magic. Seeing as some non core classes specialize in killing an arcane mage. The DM can make the world respond to wizard superiority even without divine magic. Like applying elite units of high level and number against them.

Poorly, I might add.

[Set]

Doing this now, basically, but taken a step further.

Party basically consists of three focused specialist necromancers, focused in an even smaller sub genre of necromancy. I'm playing a curse/fear caster, another raises undead, another focuses on save or dies. We've yet to find an encounter that actually challenges all three of us, up to and including CR 16s when we're level 9.

I want to play in this game! It sounds awesome.

[Yuki Akuma]

The only way to kill a well-prepared Wizard is with magic. Mainly copious dispels. A world with no magic (or hardly any magic) will be a Wizard party's playground.

[Flickerdart]

The only way to kill a well-prepared Wizard is with magic. Mainly copious dispels. A world with no magic (or hardly any magic) will be a Wizard party's playground.

Until you start to really explore the implications of a non-magical world. No scrolls for sale (though the Wizard bunch can crib off each other), no Rods or Ioun Stones or other items that some shenanigans rely on, no stores stocking tongues of newt and black onyx...Eschew Materials might alleviate that a little bit, but when you have to mine the stone yourself if you want to get any Animating Dead done today, it makes the Wizard slightly less powerful (and more engaging to play: every spell's a quest!).

[Yuki Akuma]

Sure, but if his enemies don't have any magic items either...

How do you kill an ethereal wizard without magic, exactly?

And if everyone takes Collegiate Wizard and no one picks the same spells... who needs scrolls?

[Ozymandias9]

The way to make this kind of game interesting is easy -

Make the campaign based on cleansing any kind of magic in the world

That way the party of wizards are hunted anywhere they go and if entire world is against them, their not that unstoppable anymore.

Honestly if they're the only ones with magic, the ones hunting them become less dangerous, not more.

The way I would spin it is a war on arcane magic. That leaves divine magic in the hands of their hunters. Some relatively minor home-brewing would also be in order.

Perhaps...

Olympian Witch Hunt
Setting Breif:
Five years ago the Archmage Krieuessa began her war on the heavens in retaliation for Zeus's rape of her daughter. Having defeated her, Olympus has turned its anger upon all mortal arcane casters, becoming intent that no mortal should again become powerful enough to challenge the gods. Schools of Wizardry are shut down. Arcane casters, when found, must either take powerful oaths of fealty to Zeus that prevent the use of their powers or be hunted by the church. Many have faked their deaths and gone into hiding.

Cosmology:

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Based primarily on the mythological Greek Pantheon, as it seems to fit rather well. Many Olympians should be flavored a bit more gritty than Deities and Demigods presents: i.e. the initial conflict has Zeus as both the god of Power and Rulership and the god of Rape (obviously, he also gets Sky, Air, and Thunder).

Structurally, this should be closed polytheism with a tendency towards Pantheon Polytheism. We don't want to limit entirely to the Olympians, but it is a closed system and the Olympians are clearly in charge with Zeus at the top.

There should be a monolithic Olympian church. The clerics thereof might generally have a single primary deity, but a cleric of Athena heals by praying to Hermes (or perhaps by praying to Athena to intercede with Hermes). Shrines to individual gods should exist, but the church structure should be monolithic to create a backing for this organized war against arcane magic.

Particularly relevant Deities: (Note especially Hecate)

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Zeus, spun LN:

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God of Sky, Air, Lightning, Kings/Rulers, Honor, Truth , Fealty, Power, Patricide, and Rape. If we draw from myth, Zeus has dominion of all things under the open sky. Thus a house, building, cave, etc is outside his direct domain. Primary force behind the war: his anger and wrath should be unforgiving.

Athena: Normal LG spin.

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But as the goddess of strategic warfare, her clerics may very well be in charge of the crusade against arcane users. A reasonable position to the conflict is that she viewed Krieuessa's anger and injury as valid and just, but her war on Olympus as dangerous and reckless. She views the dangers of mortals with godlike powers as far more dangerous than the lusts of Zeus and other less noble gods. You could probably spin the turncoat wizards already mentioned, who took powerful oaths to prevent spellcasting, as her attempts at forcing a compromise. If you flavor Ares closer to the Greek Ares than the Roman Mars (see Ares below), she may be the primary patron of any Paladins hunting the wizards.

Ares: CE (if after the Greek Ares) or LN (if after the Roman Mars).

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Ares in the Greek Tradition is the god of War insofar as he is the god of violence, conflict, bloodlust and slaughter. He is the patron of the gore and blood of battle rather than a god of generals and strategy. Most statues and temples to him in Greece were added during the Roman period and more are more accurately presented as being dedicated to the Roman Mars, who the Romans identified as the same deity (a notable exception is in Sparta, where a statue of Ares in Chains symbolized that war and battle should never be allowed to leave the city. If you Ares with this spin, he should encourage the conflict purely for the sake of conflict and bloodlust.

The Roman Mars, in contrast, was a god of agriculture and war that was held in much higher esteem. He was a god of military duty and the patron of the citizen-soldier who sought only a peaceful life minding his estate but answered the call to war without question out of duty (in the model of, for example, the quasi-historical Cincinnatus). He is the patron of generals in conjunction with Athena, but he is also the patron of the solders at large. If you play him with this flavor, you might have him as the patron of paladins rather than Athena.

Hecate: CN or CG spin. Particularly important.

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Despite the fact that Deities and Demigods place an evil spin on her (partially justified by later myths), early accounts of Hecate are far kinder. She is initially given a measure of the honor and power of all the Olympians. She also dwells in the Underworld with Hades, which is out of Zeus's direct domain. Add this to the fact that she is a patron of magic and you have a way for the PC wizards to get limited divine aid (i.e. some limited magical healing before limited wish).
From a fluff point of view, I would say that she fought with Olympus against Krieuessa, but is opposing the war on arcane magic. She is highly honored among the gods, and her relationship with Hades (a very powerful god) grants her some protection, so she is in no personal danger. But Zeus has forbidden other gods from aiding her Clerics when they interfere with the war on arcane users. Moreover, he prevents her personal exercise of power within his direct domain (i.e. under the open sky) and expects other deities to do the same in theirs.
She still has a portion of the powers of every Olympian, so one of her clerics at one of her personal shrines (or perhaps somewhere else out of Zeus or another Olympian's sight, such as in a cave or home with the hearth extinguished to obscure the sight of Hestia) might be able to provide some succor to the party, though with perhaps a more limited spell list than a cleric might other wise be entitled to.

Hermes, Apollo, Prometheus:

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These gods can provide a different angle for divine healing if you like. Hermes is both the god of healing and the trickster god: you can play with a lot from that angle.
Apollo invented healing before handing the power over to Hermes in trade for purview over cattle and the domestication of livestock. He may still have some capacity with healing that he has hidden from the other Gods.
Prometheus game man their initial capacity for natural healing: you may be able to do something with that if you free him from his torturous prison.

New spell acquisition:

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Communicating with other wizards should be fairly difficult in the setting. Getting a new spell (except perhaps from another party member) should be somewhat difficult, even merely in terms of the new spells wizards are entitled to automatically as they advance. The independent research rules might become necessary for new spells even for spells from the base spell list. And as there are ex-wizard "turncoats," the Olympian Crusade probably knows what kind of purchases to look out for in terms of someone stocking for spell research.
An alternative might be to risk contact with a know npc wizard in hiding, which brings risks of detection for both parties.
Scrolls found with spells of higher level than the players can cast might become significantly more valuable. This is something they might save till they can learn the spell rather than simply using it to deal with a harder encounter.

Arcane Magic items and Spell Components:

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Again, there are ex-wizard turncoats who know what is involved in crafts related to wizardry. The Olympian Crusade (someone give me a better name) knows this as well. Dealing in magical items like scrolls, wands, etc. with wizard spells should be difficult.

If you really want to go for internal consistency, you might toy with the presumption of spell component availability (and presumably ban or limit eschew materials). While I would generally avoid telling the players that they lack the guano to cast a fire ball on a regular basis, telling them when the decide to learn fireball that they will need to find a way to acquire bat guano and sulfur every month or so and that doing so will risk suspicion. I would generally decide make a non-specific endeavor to acquire the more obscure components sufficient rather than requiring separate endeavors to acquire the sulfur for fireballs and the phosphorus for fire shield. If they can't make the general attempt every month or two (or are unwilling because of the attention it would bring), they might need to ration spells with such obscure components and lean more on spells using more common or naturally available components. As I said, however, this is really getting into high internal consistency, and I would limit it to tables that value that aspect of a campaign.

[Tyndmyr]

I'd play it. Starting level, allowable races/books?

[Ozymandias9]

I'd play it. Starting level, allowable races/books?

Feel free to take it and expand or alter as you like. Honestly, this is just something I put tohether off the top of my head as I did laundry.

Given that this is essentially a low magic setting (for the PCs at least) I would recommend taking a cherry picking approach to the allowing non-core elements for them (essentially, more supplements taken as a whole means more homebrew work for each book added). But if you want to add a specific book or book in bulk, you just need to sit down and homebrew that book to fit the setting as well.

I would generally avoid a strong emphasis on races with a strong arcane affinity, but any player race can be made to work if the only concern is having the PC use that race.

As an example:
Standard elves would be far less amenable to such a war if you retained their favored class:wizard and the fluff that went with it. If you do include a race with a strong affinity to arcane magic you need to home-brew them to:
~Have a sparse local population. Either the Elven homeland is a great distance removed or you need to make their population sparse and fairly mobile-- closer perhaps to the more fey elves in german myth than Tolkien's highly civilized elves
~Be fairly insular and perhaps even xenophobic. If they are willing to give safe harbor to the party on a regular basis, it negates a great deal of the setting.
~Draw their patron deities from the closed Pantheon polytheism system setup already presented.
Grey elves would require slightly more extreme refluffing.

The easiest thing to do would be to limit it to a strictly human campaign, but that won't sit well with a lot of people.

The other easy option is to present all races as a part of a single highly multicultural society. The elves might be have more people cheesed about Zeus's war, but they live in the same society and are governed by the same church state and thus have no unique seat of power from which to oppose the Church's actions. If someone wants to play a specific race, this is probably the way to go, but it may require some significant re-fluffing of the race in question (and perhaps re-crunching if they are a LA race with an arcane SLA).

[horseboy]

Last time I heard there was someone that did 4 warforged. They pounded through every encounter the DM threw at them. Wouldn't be surprised.

[Ozymandias9]

Last time I heard there was someone that did 4 warforged. They pounded through every encounter the DM threw at them. Wouldn't be surprised.

If you find that, in practice, a CR 8 encounter is not challenging enough (or too challenging) for your level 8 party, try designing encounters with a slightly higher (or lower) CR. Not every group plays with the same efficiency or creativity, and you should be tailoring the campaign to the table.

[Xaklin_Magewrit]

No I got all grey elves generalist wizard all take Collegeiate Wizard feat and copy each other spell book DM = rage quit.

[Tyndmyr]

Well, it's a batch of grey elves that went to wizardry college together.

Strong sure, but they all have the same strengths and weaknesses.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

Well, it's a batch of grey elves that went to wizardry college together.

Strong sure, but they all have the same strengths and weaknesses.

What are these weaknesses of which you speak?

[Tyndmyr]

-con, mainly.

That, and no diversity in strengths. They're a good race, mind, but it could be worse. Could be warforged scout, anthropromorphic bat, grey elf, and lesser tiefling. The first is a bit of an odd wizard choice, but the point is, the above party would unlikely to all be vulnerable to the same thing.

[Yukitsu]

My grey elves seem to always get sexually molested by drow priestesses.

[Kylarra]

My grey elves seem to always get sexually molested by drow priestesses.

Clearly you need either higher or lower CHA.

[Eldariel]

Clearly you need either higher or lower CHA.

...AD&D-style Str as Cha with Percentile would come in handy here. 18/01; use 18 when you want to tell someone not to molest you and 01 when you want someone to miss you and molest your friend instead.

[king.com]

I actually really like the idea of giving all the wizards a new spell and having a trial to use it each time. What would make it more interesting is whoever wins each test gets to keep the spell?

[Yukitsu]

Clearly you need either higher or lower CHA.

I play a lot of planar binding conjurers, or tricky illusionists, so I need my charisma pumped up. It's often my wizard's second highest stat.

[Skorj]

You know, this sounds like a blast to DM as a PbP, and I have small amounts of free time scattered throughout the day, and lots of time on weekends. Is anyone else taking this up?

EDIT:

OK, unless someone is already in motion to start this game, I want to do it - assuming some player interest? I really need a veteran of both 3.5 and PbP to help me with the logistics, however. From what I can tell I should set up an OOC thread for recruiting?

The specific game I'm thinking of is not going to be specially focused on the world killing wizards, or low-magic, or populated entriely by golems, or set in a continent-wide AMF, or any such loophole. This needs to be about full frontal cheese, or what's the point. However, I have no books! So I'm limited to the SRD or other stuff legally online, at least at first (I'd be happy to buy needed books if this really gets going, however, so I'm open to PrCs from the non-setting books, plus probably underdark). Does that restrict the cheese too much?

Given the somewhat limited source material, I'd broaden the premise a bit to allow any build that gave 9th level arcane spells at level 20. Game would start fairly low level, but with artifically fast advancement (as much as anything is fast in PbP). Given the obvious party power, the game will be brutal - Gygaxian D&D brutal, given the amount of save-or-die that will eventually be happening - but with a minimal death penalty.

Cheese-wise, I want to allow anything that's merely encounter breaking, blocking only the game-breaking stuff like infinite loops and infinite casting. But everything except arcane magic will be on a very short leash, mostly because we're going for a specific flavor of cheese here.

If there's some interest shown in this thread (and someone's willing to coach me on the play-by-post aspects) I'll flesh this out to a full campaign start description.

BRING THE CHEESE!

[Rainbownaga]

Until you start to really explore the implications of a non-magical world. No scrolls for sale (though the Wizard bunch can crib off each other), no Rods or Ioun Stones or other items that some shenanigans rely on, no stores stocking tongues of newt and black onyx...Eschew Materials might alleviate that a little bit, but when you have to mine the stone yourself if you want to get any Animating Dead done today, it makes the Wizard slightly less powerful (and more engaging to play: every spell's a quest!).

In a non-magic world, how would crafting work? It is assumed you can find the components easily in the market (hence the 1000's of gold worth of components). Low magic may make crafting scrolls much harder which would prevent the wizard's "oh, i just happen to have that spell here" strategies.

[olentu]

You know, this sounds like a blast to DM as a PbP, and I have small amounts of free time scattered throughout the day, and lots of time on weekends. Is anyone else taking this up?

EDIT:

OK, unless someone is already in motion to start this game, I want to do it - assuming some player interest? I really need a veteran of both 3.5 and PbP to help me with the logistics, however. From what I can tell I should set up an OOC thread for recruiting?

The specific game I'm thinking of is not going to be specially focused on the world killing wizards, or low-magic, or populated entriely by golems, or set in a continent-wide AMF, or any such loophole. This needs to be about full frontal cheese, or what's the point. However, I have no books! So I'm limited to the SRD or other stuff legally online, at least at first (I'd be happy to buy needed books if this really gets going, however, so I'm open to PrCs from the non-setting books, plus probably underdark). Does that restrict the cheese too much?

Given the somewhat limited source material, I'd broaden the premise a bit to allow any build that gave 9th level arcane spells at level 20. Game would start fairly low level, but with artifically fast advancement (as much as anything is fast in PbP). Given the obvious party power, the game will be brutal - Gygaxian D&D brutal, given the amount of save-or-die that will eventually be happening - but with a minimal death penalty.

Cheese-wise, I want to allow anything that's merely encounter breaking, blocking only the game-breaking stuff like infinite loops and infinite casting. But everything except arcane magic will be on a very short leash, mostly because we're going for a specific flavor of cheese here.

If there's some interest shown in this thread (and someone's willing to coach me on the play-by-post aspects) I'll flesh this out to a full campaign start description.

BRING THE CHEESE!

I would play in this though my cheese is a bit rusty from lack of use it looks fun. Though I am wondering how I got rusty cheese but probably would not like it if I found out.

[Skorj]

I would play in this though my cheese is a bit rusty from lack of use it looks fun.

That's actually my primary motivation to start at low level - to give players a chance to get into the spirit of things and shake off the rust (and share ideas) before too much in the way of build and items has been committed. There will be plenty of time to research/plot ways to be overpowered once the game begins, even at the fastest rate I can throw XP at a party in PbP.

Also, it gives me time to sharpen my cheesegrater.

[PId6]

You know, this sounds like a blast to DM as a PbP, and I have small amounts of free time scattered throughout the day, and lots of time on weekends. Is anyone else taking this up?

EDIT:

OK, unless someone is already in motion to start this game, I want to do it - assuming some player interest? I really need a veteran of both 3.5 and PbP to help me with the logistics, however. From what I can tell I should set up an OOC thread for recruiting?

The specific game I'm thinking of is not going to be specially focused on the world killing wizards, or low-magic, or populated entriely by golems, or set in a continent-wide AMF, or any such loophole. This needs to be about full frontal cheese, or what's the point. However, I have no books! So I'm limited to the SRD or other stuff legally online, at least at first (I'd be happy to buy needed books if this really gets going, however, so I'm open to PrCs from the non-setting books, plus probably underdark). Does that restrict the cheese too much?

Given the somewhat limited source material, I'd broaden the premise a bit to allow any build that gave 9th level arcane spells at level 20. Game would start fairly low level, but with artifically fast advancement (as much as anything is fast in PbP). Given the obvious party power, the game will be brutal - Gygaxian D&D brutal, given the amount of save-or-die that will eventually be happening - but with a minimal death penalty.

Cheese-wise, I want to allow anything that's merely encounter breaking, blocking only the game-breaking stuff like infinite loops and infinite casting. But everything except arcane magic will be on a very short leash, mostly because we're going for a specific flavor of cheese here.

If there's some interest shown in this thread (and someone's willing to coach me on the play-by-post aspects) I'll flesh this out to a full campaign start description.

BRING THE CHEESE!

Sounds damn fun, actually. Glad it's not restricted to wizard only; I'd love to apply as a sorcerer (kobold lore-drake if possible ).

Crystal Keep has a lot of things from supplements you can check, though the info can be a bit limited sometimes, especially with PrCs and such. Just core would definitely limit a large amount of cheese, or at least variety thereof. There's plenty of cheese in core, but it's of the type that everybody's going to end up with the same/similar cheese, which might defeat the point of some of this.

I'd suggest having someone else with more access check everything submitted. That, or just have players PM you info with things you don't have access to and open up sheet access to everyone. I would think that with the amount of optimizers you're bound to attract, "peer review" would be more than enough to guarantee fair play.

[Gnorman]

Hell, I'd always be down to contribute a malconvoker.

Or perhaps a shadowcraft mage with a sideline in skillmonkeying.

Or, you know, I've never done Unseen Seer before.

[Skorj]

Sounds damn fun, actually. Glad it's not restricted to wizard only; I'd love to apply as a sorcerer (kobold lore-drake if possible ).

The problem with true wizard-only is you can so easily end up with no party face, and everyone dumping CHA. I hope for "mostly wizard", however.

Crystal Keep has a lot of things from supplements you can check, though the info can be a bit limited sometimes, especially with PrCs and such. Just core would definitely limit a large amount of cheese, or at least variety thereof. There's plenty of cheese in core, but it's of the type that everybody's going to end up with the same/similar cheese, which might defeat the point of some of this.

I'd suggest having someone else with more access check everything submitted. That, or just have players PM you info with things you don't have access to and open up sheet access to everyone. I would think that with the amount of optimizers you're bound to attract, "peer review" would be more than enough to guarantee fair play.

Yeah, I've used the Crystal Keep stuff before, and in general would be open to anything that I can get enough details on to run. I planned to count on peer review, but also on pre-clearing most cheese.

I need to think about "monsterous" races. I think this will be more fun if the focus is on creative use of spells, rather than abuse of the character creation system. Templates and paragons and the like just seem like the wrong direction to take this, but I don't want to reject non-abusive creative character concepts out of hand, and most races wouldn't actually matter much at the power level the party will reach.

[Gnorman]

The problem with true wizard-only is you can so easily end up with no party face, and everyone dumping CHA. I hope for "mostly wizard", however.

Sir, I accept your challenge. I shall now endeavor to add a Social Proficiency Enchanter into the mix.

[olentu]

I suppose if it is not straight wiz 20 just wiz based an unseen seer gets the face skills.

[B9anders]

I played in an all-wizards campaign in Dragonlance once, from 6th to 14 lvl iirc. Variety came in the shape of wziards of all three robes having to work together and of course all of us specialising in different fields.

You'll definitely need your blasters without meatshields plowing the way for you, but it was fun to see just how varied an array of solutions to problems we could deal with.

Securing a stronghold for ourselves under the sea, cloud battles against a squadron of dragons. Good times.

[Eldariel]

You'll definitely need your blasters without meatshields plowing the way for you, but it was fun to see just how varied an array of solutions to problems we could deal with.

A summoner works better and a bit later on, Planar Bindings solve this. Although a game where the Wizards completely ignore killing capability, disable stuff and plop at it with Longbows could be amusing if impractical. Though having access to some damage won't kill the party either.