Nangband > Magic
This page contains thoughts on all things magical.
Magic-using classes
Divide into three sets of magic-using ability: first, second and third level.
The first level consists soley of the "Magic-user". They can use everything without trouble, but have a fairly low cap on strength and constitution.
Second level classes are Rangers and <something else>. These have a slightly more restricted choice of spells, and have a higher cap on constitution and strength, respectively.
Third level classes are Rogues and Paladins. They have a very restricted set of spells, but suffer no penalties related to their magic-using abilities. (They have their own advantages/disadvantages.)
Only first and second level classes can do things like authoring scrolls, or spellbooks (if allowed). The various levels also start off with different amounts of magical knowledge; each level, for example, starts off with knowledge of some randomly-selected herbs - Magic-users will know more at the beginning of the game than others.
Spell systems
Possiblity: a "preference" system
This is quite an old thought.
All magic-users get to use the first two books ("compendiums") of basic spells useful to everyone - universal utility spells need identifying for these. Each compendium would need to be pretty chunky (10 spells each?). There are also high-level, randomly created spellbooks, which contain spells not found in the compendiums (reasoning: dead magic-users will have had their own selections of spells).
At character birth, the player makes a preference as to when various types of magic will become available to them. This means they put however many divisions there are in order, top to bottom. The first choice will also grant the spellcaster certain benefits.
Old thinking on divisions:
escaping (+5 stealth)
- blink
- armour
- dimension door
- shift levels
divining (see invis)
- detection
- know item
- magic mapping
summoning
- bring food
- summon item
- summon elementals
- summon destruction
- "summoning" fire/frozt bolts...
Thoughts on new spells
Priestly spells
- Holy light
- Only works if room is black. Lights the room, and for each square lit, deals 1d8 damage to undead/light sensitive creatures
- Eyes of the Gods
- Each visible undead creature (i.e. LOS) takes xd10 damage, where X is the number of visible undead creatures
- Rot
- Target creature stops regenerating hitpoints.
General spells
- Detect Monsters
- Detects all monsters; at clev 7/8, also invisible monsters
- Displacement
- Teleport self; prompt for radius in multiples of ten. blink (10 squares) costs 2; teleport (100) costs 6. sqrt(radius), rounded up, would be a good cost
- Steelskin
- temp. resist lots of things, but slow -10
- Explode traps
- Set off all traps in the surrounding area, each one creating a 2d5 ball of force
- Impact Lock
- When standing next to a door, destroys the door and casts a GF_IMPACT bolt in that direction afterwards.
- Force Bolt
- Force now throws monsters/players back a few squares.
- Manablade
- Creates a piercing weapon that is totally useable by mages, with bonuses determined by mana used to create. TTL 500 turns.
- Blades
- piercing damage to a creature, 2% chance of beaming, max 95%
- Charm
- monster just sits there on failed save, until the player hits them or their HP is under 40% max
- Imprison
- Surround a monster with granite. ("The floor raises up around the monster!") High level.
- Home ground
- Marks the grid the player is currently on as "home ground". The player gets an AC bonus on this grid and has an increased chance of saving on saving throws. lasts until the player moves from the grid, or 500 turns.