High Magic and 0-level spells.

[Wiseman]

So I've been watching Fairy Tail recently, and it's encouraged me to expand upon my a formerly generic setting and turning it into a very high magic setting. The issue I'm having is that I want magic to be so commonplace that everyone can use zero level arcane spells at will as spell like abilities regardless of ability scores.

What would be the ramifications and potential pitfalls of this?

[vagrant]

No one ever has to wash their clothes again!

[Prak]

It means people have little tricks that make life a bit more convenient--see prestidigitation--and general survivability would go up a bit. A person caught out in the wild attacked by an animal has flare, touch of fatigue, acid orb and ray of frost which would be decent deterrents for most animals. Resistance means everyone's just a touch luckier. Poisoned food becomes a thing of the past as everyone can use detect poison on suspicious food, most light sources are magical because it's safer, and there may be a slight uptick in wizards just because it's that much easier to get access to spell instruction with detect and read magic. City watches get a nice present in the form of at will message, but thieves get it too. Knobs on doors and other handles could well also be a thing of the past as everyone has Open/Close, but it's a standard action, so it probably wouldn't see a ton of use.

[Koumei]

People would be lazy about cooking, because everything would always taste awesome. People would possibly be lazy in general, because of Open/Close and Mage Hand doing all that crap like "opening the door that's all the way over there" and "picking that pen up".

People would be able to read/write at any time of the day without needing to give a shit about lanterns and candles (which can vary in use between "so what?" and "brilliant, now my house won't burn down!" and "we didn't have the resources for candles, this is amazing").

So basically, people's lives are better in some small, nice ways, and potentially there is a greater push towards literary pursuits (the same way "glass windows" and "lights" really helped us out).

[infected slut princess]

The world would be a much better place for everyone. They would certainly be more prosperous.

Hot and cold environments would represent no danger to people anymore. You could hunt polar bears wearing nothing but a thong. Resources that would otherwise go into means to endure harsh elements would be allocated elsewhere. That would be very benefiticial.

A lot of labor would be saved cleaning. Particularly stubborn stains would no longer be a major pain in the ass.

Mage hand, prestidigation, and open/close, have many labor saving applications.

Mending would make repairing things much easier. More labor saved.

It would be easier for tribes with different languages to communicate.

Anyone could conjure up unlimited acid bursts to melt stuff.

Ray of frost could be used to make popsicles.

Torches and candles and lanterns would be less needed because you could just use the light spell.

An interesting musical culture would arise out of composing music for ghost sound ensembles.

Parents could maybe use touch of fatigue to put their bratty kids to sleep.

Rapists would probably use daze when attacking their victim.

People would almost never be poisoned by accident.

[Prak]

Endure Elements and Comprehend Languages are first level, not cantrips. Parents could use Lullaby (Bard 0) instead of, or in addition to Touch of Fatigue. Potential victims of rapists can use Ray of Frost and Acid Splash on offensive genitals, or even Daze their attackers. Rape might actually take a down tick just because it means risking 1d3 acid or cold to the dick.

[erik]

It'd be a fair bit like modern tech. Things smell nice, foods taste good and are sanitized. Improved lighting and walkie-talkies.

Fixing minor breaks in objects is trivial with mending. You can also melt things down with acid orb. Turn water to ice at will.

Bandages are outmoded as you can just heal with a touch. Bards bring the Ambien with Lullaby.

Solving sanitation via Prestidigitation-cleaning and Purify Food/Water is basically easy mode for solving many serious health hazards. It's hard to imagine many people bleeding to death accidentally thanks to cure minor wounds. Life expectancy ought be going way up from medieval tech.

Being able to instantaneous create temporary small simple objects at a whim is kind of like having an fast 3-d printer on hand. Sweet. Imagine all the times you needed a little thingamabob. Floss, nail file, deck of cards, dice, dishes/utensils, tools, curved glass to create fire, toilet paper (actually, nm- prestidigitate that shit), whatever. Conjure that thang.

[edit:]
Re: violent crime.

I'd worry about acid to the eyes. Civilization will have to account for everyone being armed with ranged deadly/crippling weapons at all times.

What do you do about a psycho who can conjure acid projectiles at a whim? I think you gotta end em.

[Koumei]

Simple: if someone starts casting in a tense or threatening situation, people take that attack of opportunity. Similar to how if you suddenly pull a gun out while police are already aiming at you, they'll probably shoot you.

[TarkisFlux]

A world where everyone has all of the 0 level spells looks a lot different than a world where everyone can learn any or all of them, which looks a lot different from a world where only some people can learn certain ones, which looks a lot different from...

You get the point. Wiseman needs to specify whether everyone can use all 0 level spells at will, or only some of them. And whether different people get to pick different things. And what (if anything) that's based on. There's a few toggles here, and they all produce things that are different in meaningful ways. Or perhaps he implied it somewhere and I missed it because I should be asleep right now instead of replying to threads.

[OgreBattle]

The world would be a much better place for everyone. They would certainly be more prosperous.
.
.
.

Rapists would probably use daze when attacking their victim.

Everyone, rapists included.

[rasmuswagner]

The world would be a much better place for everyone. They would certainly be more prosperous.
.
.
.

Rapists would probably use daze when attacking their victim.

Everyone, rapists included.

Fact: Infected Slut Princess thinks about rape all the time.

[Vebyast]

Arcane Mark means that most theft goes away; anything you want to fence needs a casting of Erase, which for non-adventurer gear costs a hundred times more than the item itself.

Mage Hand doesn't have much practical use, but has some cultural effects. Specifically, everybody is now fantastically lazy; why get up to open the fridge when you can just float over a cold one? Houses might even be designed to keep lines of effect open between important areas. Similarly, secure areas, particularly jails and offices, don't have windows. Depending on how you interpret the spell, everything might be secured with extraordinarily stiff latches.

[ishy]

Disagree with arcane mark. Selling any item through a shop or other legal way would also cost way more than the actual item.

You could use mage hand to handle dangerous chemicals?

If you shoot a flare up into the sky instead of into someone's eyes, it can probably alert people as well.

[Prak]

A world where everyone has all of the 0 level spells looks a lot different than a world where everyone can learn any or all of them, which looks a lot different from a world where only some people can learn certain ones, which looks a lot different from...

You get the point. Wiseman needs to specify whether everyone can use all 0 level spells at will, or only some of them. And whether different people get to pick different things. And what (if anything) that's based on. There's a few toggles here, and they all produce things that are different in meaningful ways. Or perhaps he implied it somewhere and I missed it because I should be asleep right now instead of replying to threads.

I want magic to be so commonplace that everyone can use zero level arcane spells at will as spell like abilities regardless of ability scores.

So everyone gets Wizard and Bard cantrips at will, but no at will cure minor wounds.

[fectin]

Light drives disease way down and increases the usable hours in a day. In the real world, that consistently leads to industrial revolution and vastly increased quality of life.

If you want to leave ubiquitous cantrips in, but avoid the crazier edge cases, try making them easily learnable rituals, which take 1 minute to cast.

[infected slut princess]

]

The world would be a much better place for everyone. They would certainly be more prosperous.
.
.
.

Rapists would probably use daze when attacking their victim.

Everyone, rapists included.

It is quite uncharitable to think that is what I meant. I just happened to raise that issue in a list of implications that were otherwise positive. I am the most anti-rape person on this forum. You are rude and should apologize.

What you should have done instead is be useful, like that Prak Animer guy who suggested why rape (and other crime statistics for that matter) would likely fall. He said:

Rape might actually take a down tick just because it means risking 1d3 acid or cold to the dick.

That is extremely important. I'm glad someone mentioned it.

Since everyone would at all times be wielding acid splashes and frost rays, violent crime would be dramatically lower than otherwise. No one would ever be "unarmed" and therefore the danger attempting using violence against any given target would necessarily rise. This is quite possibly the biggest social benefit entailed by at-will 0-level arcane spells for everyone.

After all, these are not just pussy-ass loser weapons we are discussing. At 1d3 damage, ray of frost and acid splash they can gruesomely kill commoners who will have only a few hit points.

You might have also been useful by pointing out daze isn't a big advantage for violent criminals like rapists in a lot of situations, despite what I thought at first. For some reason, I thought the daze lasted 1d4 rounds instead of just one round. I haven't used 0-level spells in a long time so whatever, I forgot.

EDIT: I also thought it was very interesting what Koumei said about food, because prestidigitation can be used to flavor stuff so the entire art of cooking would be really different.

[virgil]

Since everyone would at all times be wielding acid splashes and frost rays, violent crime would be dramatically lower than otherwise. No one would ever be "unarmed" and therefore the danger attempting using violence against any given target would necessarily rise. This is quite possibly the biggest social benefit entailed by at-will 0-level arcane spells for everyone.

So how about that gun culture and its effects on violent crime and rape?

[infected slut princess]

So how about that gun culture and its effects on violent crime and rape?

I don't know, what about it? Criminals are more deterred if their potential victim is armed.

[fectin]

Regardless of whether you're correct, ISP, that argument will not make you happier.

[Saxony]

Since everyone would at all times be wielding acid splashes and frost rays, violent crime would be dramatically lower than otherwise. No one would ever be "unarmed" and therefore the danger attempting using violence against any given target would necessarily rise. This is quite possibly the biggest social benefit entailed by at-will 0-level arcane spells for everyone.

So how about that gun culture and its effects on violent crime and rape?

Not everyone in the US owns a firearm, and those that do are not armed at all times. A large portion of the US population goes about without having a gun on their person for 90% or more of the time.

In this hypothetical campaign setting, everyone is armed at all times. Therefore the comparison is invalid

[...You Lost Me]

I love some good old politics in my D&D.

If it helps ISP's side at all, crazy people wouldn't use at-will arcane spells to kill people, because that has the very slow incidence of death of (at max) 1 person per six seconds. Also in D&Dland, targeting is easy, so if a guy busts into a common area waving a weapon he can get smacked by 40 different rays of frost even after he gets the surprise round.

It's very different from real life.

[Vebyast]

What do playgrounds look like when every kid is running around casting Prestidigitation, Stick, and Mage Hand on everything they see? Are schools blanketed in AMFs so temper tantrums aren't an emergency situation?

[Prak]

Maybe schools are like Hogwarts, teaching kids how to use the magic and they don't necessarily know how to use all the spells from birth.

[Wiseman]

Okay...

Looking at that, it's clear that I should err on the side of everyone being under the effect prestidigitation. It's not innate, just learned as they're growing up.

Perhaps other zero level spells can be learned at will by taking ranks in knowledge arcana or spellcraft or something.

[Prak]

I wouldn't even necessarily go that far. Maybe just saying that they have to actively go and learn the spell for a modest price.