Variant Spell Lists

[Jacob_Orlove]

I'm going to be running a small campaign soon, and I worked up a few small spell lists for spontaneous casters to use. They're like the Beguiler list, but more limited (I'm trying to stick to no more than 7 spells in a level, because that's what people can remember). Spell slots will be as a Sorcerer of their character level+1.

The campaign will either end at 6th level, or we'll stop gaining levels then and switch to feats, E6 style, so the lists only include 1st-3rd level spells. The party will consist of no more than 3 PCs at a time, and it's quite possible that 2 could be casters, so keep that in mind when you evaluate the spells.

I'll leave out the rest of the house rules. For now, I just want to see if these lists are reasonably balanced against each other as character choices:

Now the various Mages. A few spells are universal: every arcane caster gets these. Otherwise, they are limited to the spells on their list.

Universal spells!
Cantrips: all 0 level spells, plus Magic Missile (you get unlimited cantrips per day)
1st: Mage Armor
2nd: Resist Energy
3rd: Dispel Magic


The Fire Mage!
1st: Fireball, Flame Blade, Grease, Endure Elements, Expeditious Retreat
2nd: Blur, Scorching Ray, Flaming Sphere, Flame Arrows
3rd: Fire Shield, Daylight, Haste


The Weather Mage!
1st: Lightning Bolt, Shocking Grasp, Fog Cloud, Endure Elements, Feather Fall
2nd: Gust of Wind, Hold Person, Sleet Storm, Wind Wall
3rd: Ice Storm, Gaseous Form, Stinking Cloud


The Illusionist!
1st: Silent Image, Disguise Self, Color Spray, Obscuring Mist, Unseen Servant
2nd: Minor Image, Invisibility, Mirror Image, See Invisibility
3rd: Major Image, Displacement, Slow


The Witch!
1st: Vampiric Touch, Cause Fear, Charm Person, Ray of Enfeeblement, Sleep
2nd: Blindness/Deafness, Ghoul Touch, Hideous Laughter, Darkness
3rd: Confusion, Deep Slumber, Suggestion


The Spider Mage!
1st: Entangle, Enlarge Person, Reduce Person, Jump, Summon Swarm
2nd: Freedom of Movement, Spider Climb, Summon Spider*, Web
3rd: Black Tentacles, Ray of Exhaustion, Poison

*summons 1d3 fiendish monstrous spiders, Medium (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/monstrousSpider.htm)

[Username17]

Black Tentacles is a lot nastier than the other spells you have of that level. Confusion is also a 4th level spell in basic, but it's a shitty 4th level spell, so no one cares. Evard's Black Tentacles is an awesome 4th level spell, and people would cast it if it was 5th or 6th level.

Considering that it lives right next to Ray of Exhaustion - a spell that wouldn't get cast that often if it was first level, the discrepancy is pretty stark.

-Username17

[Jacob_Orlove]

Black Tentacles was the one I was worried about, and that's a good point about Ray of Exhaustion.

Any suggestions for a couple of spells I could put in there instead?

edit: strongly tempted to give them Foresight. That's a fair 9th level spell for 5th level characters, right?

[RobbyPants]

Black Tentacles was the one I was worried about, and that's a good point about Ray of Exhaustion.

Any suggestions for a couple of spells I could put in there instead?

For core only?

Just some suggestions that might be thematic:

Dominate Animal (spiders only, ignores typical vermin/0 Int immunity to [MIND AFFECTING] spells)
Magic Fang, Greater
Neutralize Poison
Poison
Hold Person (spiders paralyze their prey)
Slow (spiders paralyze their prey)

[Jacob_Orlove]

Yeah, I'm sticking to the SRD because it's all some of the people have access to.

Dominate Animal would require sending a whole bunch of spiders at them. I could do that, but it would feel weird. I think I'll just bump up the Summon Spider to 3rd level/large spiders, and put in something else on 2nd level. That gives a similar effect, and makes the summon spell more useful once the character hits the level cap.

The other suggestions would be good, but I'm trying to avoid too much duplication on the spell lists, and Magic Fang actually does nothing with the changes I'm making to magic items.

So, Foresight, Summon Spider, and Poison for the level 3 spells.

For the second level spell, I guess I'll go with Darkvision.

[RobbyPants]

That sounds fine. I figured Dominate Animal would be a stretch.

You know, feel free to make your own spells as needed. There's no reason to make a weird or crappy spell list because the SRD doesn't have what you need.

[Jacob_Orlove]

You know, feel free to make your own spells as needed. There's no reason to make a weird or crappy spell list because the SRD doesn't have what you need.

Actually, I kinda like the weird spell lists. I only tried to make a spider mage in the first place because most of the spells I hadn't used yet, fit.

Anyway, the first combat was interesting. The Illusionist knocked out 3 wolves and the Fire Mage with a Color Spray in the first round, but the other four wolves took down the cleric before also getting Color Sprayed (no one rolled a successful save vs anything the entire encounter, wolves included). By the time he managed a successful heal check on the cleric (no ranks and a Wis penalty), there wasn't enough time to CdG all of the first 3 wolves. That meant the Fire Mage got to stand up after 5+3+1 rounds of being stunned+, and actually kill a wolf.

Next time they're going to face some ogres in rather difficult terrain (canyons, rope bridges, etc), which should be interesting. I still haven't decided what to put in the ancient ruins, though, but I'm leaning towards some good old fashioned skeletons and zombies.

Mostly, though, people are getting into character and having a good time, and I'm starting to hint at some bigger problems that they can go get involved with.