If you missed it, I posted this look at a 1970s OD&D spell point system yesterday. Includes discussion of potential OSR usage at the end.
Originally shared by Zenopus Archives
In 1975 a group of Caltech students published Warlock, one of the first supplements for OD&D. Holmes used this system for his personal OD&D games prior to editing the Basic Set. He was a fan of the Warlock spell point system and mentioned in Dragon #52 that he tried to get Gary to include a spell point system in the Basic Set. I've written up a summary of these rules if you are interested in trying them out, either in your OD&D game (particularly now the pdfs are publicly available) or in your OSR game.
Yeah, the problem with Vancian magic is that low level MUs suck and high level ones dominate the games. We played for a long time with Chainmail type magic (casting roll required but if you succeed you keep the spell in memory) but that breaks down beyond mid-levels as spells a couple of levels down from you essentially become 4e style "at will" abilities.
ReplyDeleteNo problem, Shannon Ferguson. So much of OD&D only makes sense when viewed in the context of Chainmail. I just wish WotC would release an official PDF.
ReplyDeleteYes, thank you, Shannon Ferguson, I have it. I've also run games of Spellcraft & Swordplay which utilises many aspects of Chainmail, albeit in a not very well thought through way.
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