Spellcasting

[hcobb]

ITL implies that it takes an ordinary person nine months to learn a spell that then takes 5 seconds to cast.

And knowing any other spell gives no help on learning another.

Spellcasting must be a really out there mental exercise.

[Shostak]

Unless you are casting the spell from a book, in which case it’’s not so much a mental exercise and more a question of playing with physical ingredients.

[hcobb]

Originally Posted by Shostak

Unless you are casting the spell from a book, in which case it’’s not so much a mental exercise and more a question of playing with physical ingredients.

The extra price is for the good stuff to put the wizard into an altered mental state as he plays with the toys.

[TippetsTX]

I look at that learning time as the time it takes the mystical imprint to establish itself in a mortal mind. Magic is naturally ephemeral so it will some time to build up the required meta-muscle memory.

[phiwum]

Originally Posted by hcobb

ITL implies that it takes an ordinary person nine months to learn a spell that then takes 5 seconds to cast.

I am not sure where ITL implies this. Which passage do you have in mind? (And what do you mean by "ordinary" person?)

Thanks.

[hcobb]

Originally Posted by phiwum

I am not sure where ITL implies this. Which passage do you have in mind? (And what do you mean by "ordinary" person?)

Thanks.

Three months per memory point from Thieves' Guild text, non-wizard.

[phiwum]

Originally Posted by hcobb

Three months per memory point from Thieves' Guild text, non-wizard.

The two point Detect Traps takes a minimum of six months to learn and the one point Remove Traps takes a minimum of three months to learn. If these two talents are representative and if spells work exactly the same way, then a non-wizard would take nine months to learn a spell, and a wizard would take three months to learn.

Personally, I won't take a line about training in these two talents to be a hard and fast rule about anything. Certainly, PCs in my games do not announce what spells or talents they're working on three months ahead of spending the XP. (My game is unrealistically full of happenings and three months is a lifetime. See Chogzol's short but eventful life.)

[TippetsTX]

Yeah, I wouldn't use the Thieves' Guild reference as template for learning spells either, but some of us still use the old 'study' rules (or a variation of them) from Advanced Wizard which measured learning time in weeks, not months.

[hcobb]

The one week course in the old Adv Wiz costs at least $2400 and takes the time of some high level wizards. The usual route takes a wizard at least 4 (not 3) months to learn a spell.

[TippetsTX]

I agree that the classic AW rules were way more punitive than they needed to be. An IQ 15 wizard learning an IQ 15 spell needed 30 weeks of dedicated study (assuming they forgo costly instruction) to learn the spell. And even after all that, the wizard was casting the spell at -2 DX for another month.

That said, I think there's still a place for such rules or, preferably, a more reasonable version of them. Wielding power over reality should require an investment of time as well as XP.