3. Wizard Class Guide

Wizard Class Guide


  • **[Wizard Class Guide

    Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary,
    Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
    While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
    As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
    'Tis some visitor,' I muttered,tapping at my chamber door -
    Only this, and nothing more.'
    Edgar Allan Poe, "The Raven"

    Overview of the Class
    Wizards in Narfell are one of two “mage” classes, the other class being the sorcerer class. Wizards have a more limited number of spells per day compared to the sorcerer class and unlike the sorcerer class they need to prepare their spells ahead of time, but wizards can learn absolutely any spell they like. Wizards learn spells in two ways, they can pick two spells of any level they can cast when they level up, or they can acquire a scroll of a spell they would like to use and then right-click on it and select “add to spellbook”. From an in-charcter perspective, a wizard’s power comes from their spellbooks which can take many forms.

    Wizards can, if they so choose, pick a specialty, this gives them an additional spellcasting slot for each spell level per day and grants the specialized spells +2 to the difficulty to resist them (also known as DC); however the wizard also has to pick a prohibited school when they pick a specialty, the wizard cannot cast any spells from that prohibited school of any level, they also get a -2 penalty to any save attempts against spells from that school. Wizards receive special bonus feats at level 5, 10, 15 and 20; these bonus feats can be used to pick a spellcasting feat, including metamagic feats which can make spells more powerful at the cost of making them take up a higher level spellcasting slot. Wizards and sorcerers are the frailest of all of the dungeons and dragons classes; at most they get 4 hit points plus their constitution and toughness bonuses per level, the average (on a class count basis) is 8. Lastly, wizards get to pick a familiar, a creature that can assist the wizard in combat and may also have spells of their own and their own unique abilities.

    Wizards use the Intelligence statistic to increase the difficulty of resisting spells and to increase the number of spells they know; additionally wizards need to have ten plus the casting level of the spell in intelligence in order to learn or cast spells of that level. Because of their spellcasting requirements, intelligence is absolutely vital and required to advance and do well as a wizard. People that want to play wizards like to play as a character with a quick mind and a penchant for study.

    Character Concepts
    Wizards are an extremely broad class, given their ability to specialize and to learn any wizard spell in the game, here are a handful of common concepts in Narfell.

    The Professor
    The Professor is, in many ways, the classic Dungeons and Dragons Wizard; a studious mage more interested in books and knowledge than the particulars of the world around him or her. Professor-type mages are usually generalists and only have levels in the Wizard class. Professor types often use their extra skill points to learn additional languages (see Hints and Tips below) to better study the secrets of magic. Professor mages will often have a mix of spells from various schools and for various purposes, additionally a professor mage will invest in learning Pen and Paper spells that do not have combat abilities (see Narfell Specific Rules).

    The Warrior Mage
    The Warrior Mage is a wizard that also takes some levels in a combat class such as fighter, ranger, barbarian or paladin. Fighter mages cast spells to strengthen themselves before they charge into battle. The idea is to combine the best of both worlds, giving a fighter the ability to “buff” themselves and giving the wizard some toughness they sorely lack. The biggest challenge to the Warrior Mage is armor, any armor carriers a percentage chance that an arcane spellcaster (such as a wizard) will fail to cast the spell; this can be overcome with the metamagic still spell, but this requires the spell to take up a higher level slot in casting. Many Warrior Mages will cast spells longer lasting spells with the extended spell metamagic feat before they put on their armor, which again takes a higher level spell slot. A major risk for the Warrior Mage are the dispel and spell breach spells, which can remove the spells they have cast to make themselves more powerful. The Cerulean Knights, an arm of the Peltarch Defenders, require their members to be capable of casting spells and wearing armor and are a common organization for Warrior Mages to join.

    The Battle Mage
    This often appears as the “pyro” mage in Narfell; the Battle Mage is almost completely focused on offensive and combat-based magics. Most commonly the offensive mage is specialized in the evocation school of magic, which contains most of the damage dealing spells in Dungeons and Dragons. Fireball, Magic Missile and Firebrands are amongst the most common spells used by this character concept; often times the Battle Mage will utilize the Empower metamagic spell, which for any spell that has a randomized damage or bonus multiplies the resulting amount by 1.5; making their damage spells even more effective and impressive. Sometimes, Battle Mages will take cross-class skills which may make them more effective in battle or harder to stop such as discipline or tumble. Battle Mages are often played as having short tempers and rapidly changing opinions, a low charisma or wisdom score is fairly common as this also opens up the possibility of making the battle mage tougher by investing those points in their constitution statistic.

    The Necromancer
    The concept is a very old one, but fairly straight-forward; most evil mages that have existed in Narfell use necromancy as a way of gaining the advantage. While the school of Necromancy itself is not evil, the various spells within the school to raise the dead are evil (even if you use your undead for a good purpose, the act of creating undead is evil in and of itself); that said necromancy can give you long term summoned creatures in Narfell, or with DM assistance can give you permanent servants and guards. Of course, most people in Narfell do not appreciate necromancers, Norwick and Peltarch both have laws making the use of necromancy (in the sense of creating undead) illegal. Being evil in general in Narfell can be very difficult because of the PvP rules and the fact that most player characters are either good or neutral with goodly leanings. For new players, I highly suggest they avoid playing the Necromancer concept until they better understand how Narfell works.

    Hints and Tips
    1. You’re Squishy: Wizards and sorcerers have the smallest hit die of any class in Dungeons and Dragons, Narfell maximizes the roll automatically so you receive 4 hit points + your constitution bonus but that is half the hit points of most Dungeons and Dragons classes. Often times, the best policy is to run if engaged in close combat, unless you have some spells to absorb the enemy’s damage.

    2. Variety is the Spice of Life: Unlike the sorcerer class, Wizards can learn as many spells as they like without sacrificing a spell you already know. So feel free to learn new spells and experiment with them, try different combinations and see what works and what doesn’t for your play style.

    3. Don’t Forget your Friends: Often the most effective spells you can use are on other people, in particular spells that increase other people’s stats like “Bull’s Strength” are helpful; other spells that work extremely well in groups are Magic Circle Against Alignment and Mass Haste. Sometimes the best thing you can do is toss your friends/allies/patsies against your foes with a Haste spell and a Flaming Sword.

    4. Pace Yourself: Don’t use all of your spells at once, try to use your magics gradually so that you don’t run out at key points; keep in mind that in Narfell you can only rest every 8 game hours (or 32 minutes in real time) and that in DM-run events you can only rest when the DM says it is okay.

    5. Think, Don’t Just Blast: As a wizard you’re supposed to be the smartest guy or girl in the room, act like it; try to study magical effects, writings and strange markings. You can study things by emoting that you are studying whatever you want your character to examine further, a message to the DM channel (put /dm in front of the message) can also help DMs to catch what you were trying to do. One extremely helpful (and much used) tip is to use your level 0 spell slots to use to cast “Detect Magic”, a spell that exists in the pen and paper version of Dungeons and Dragons; it can give you further information on magic that you encounter. If you are not entirely familiar with how magic works in Dungeons and Dragons or what you should look for as a wizard, you can ask a DM or a more knowledgeable player to point out an opportunity to study something that you should study when you are in an event (though the DM or player is not required to do so).

    6. You Will Have Extra Skill Points: While Wizards only get two skill points per level by default, when you add what should be a very high intelligence bonus you will have more skill points than you can use. First, it is worth noting that all of the craft skills are not used in Narfell, so do not invest any points into increasing them; that leaves you with four class skills, even if you only have +2 bonus to intelligence (a 14 or 15 ability score) you will be able to maximize all four. A great idea is to use extra skill points to learn additional languages, you can spend two skill points to learn an additional language. Since you already get additional languages (1 per +1 bonus you get for intelligence) it is fairly straight-forward to become a master of many languages, though you do want to roleplay trying to learn the new language before your next level up. Any skills points used to learn a language need to be “dumped” into a skill that is useless or not used; crafting skills work well. Aside from languages, you can use the additional points to improve combat-focused skills as cross-class skills (which cost 2 skill points to bring up 1 rank).
    www.narfell.us/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=51504

    7. PC Cleverer than Player. Role playing a genius level PC is hard. When you're stuck for ideas in an event or plot, feel free to message a DM for hints of what the PC might think of that you haven't.

    Narfell Specific Rules

    1. Spell Modifications: Narfell modifies a lot of spells, far too many for me to list here; a full list can be found at http://www.narfell.us/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=54073. The most major modification for wizards is the Summon Monster spells have a much lower duration and summon different monsters.

    2. Familiars: Familiars do not have level requirements like animal companions, but there are some modifications from standard NWN.

    • Familiar death causes a lose of 200 XP per level (with DC 15 Fort save for half).
    • Familiar death causes your PC to take damage (with DC 15 Fort save to avoid this).
    • If your familiar dies you must either level up or spend 100 gold to be able summon it again.
    • You may hear mention of familiar's having half their master's hit points. This policy was changed and your familiar's hit points are now exactly as displayed on their character portrait.

    3. Pen and Paper Spells: I mentioned it above multiple times, but wizards (or any other class in Narfell for that matter) can learn and use Pen and Paper spells Details can be found at http://www.narfell.us/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=40565&highlight=pen+paper+spells, I will note that contrary to the post there is no dedicated Pen and Paper spell DM right now, but you can make the request to any DM. A full list of Dungeons and Dragons pen and paper spells can be found at http://www.d20srd.org/indexes/spells.htm. It is worth noting that wizards know all of the level 0 spells automatically, including the Pen and Paper spells.

    Handy Links

    Narfell Spell Modifications:](be3c74dcd1) http://www.narfell.us/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=54073

    Narfell Pen and Paper Spell Rules: http://www.narfell.us/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=40565&highlight=pen+paper+spells

    Dungeons and Dragons Pen and Paper Spell List: http://www.d20srd.org/indexes/spells.htm

    Dungeons and Dragons D20 SRD: http://www.d20srd.org/

    Enchantment Rules: http://www.narfell.us/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=45909

    The NWN Wizard: http://nwn.wikia.com/wiki/Wizard**