Circular Argument

Magic resistance in AD&D is not very precisely defined, although it’s not too bad compared to some rules. It is initially covered in the Monster Manual thusly:

Magic resistance indicates the chance of any spell absolutely failing in the monster’s presence. [Discussion of chance based on caster level and saving throws]. Note also that the magic resistance of a creature has an effect on certain existing spells such as hold portal, where it indicates the probability of the magic resistance shattering the existing spell.

By Monster Manual II the text had altered slightly:

MAGIC RESISTANCE is the chance a spell might fail when cast on the monster; this chance is expressed in a percentage.[Discussion of chance based on caster level and saving throws].
A creature’s magic resistance extends only to its immediate possessions, i.e., anything carried or worn. Area-effect spells will still function if targeted on a magic-resistant creature within their area. The creature itself might not be affected, although all others in the spell area will be subject to spell effects. A fireball, for example, may wipe out a cluster of orcs, while an agathion standing in their midst might be totally unaffected. The percent of magic resistance of a creature has an effect on certain existing spells such as hold portal, where it indicates the probability of shattering the existing spell.

This leaves the question of spell-like powers to the DM but I have never met or heard of a DM who actually ran a game where magic resistance did not affect these in the same way as it did spells. The question of what level the spell-like powers were cast at was generally settled either by the monster description or by the various hints here and there that HD should be used as a surrogate for level.
So, what about paladins’ protection from evil power?

Well, what about it? Surely it’s just another spell-like power and presumably it’s regarded as being of a level equal to the paladin?

Yeah. Just like those protective circles any character can draw with a bit of chalk…er, what?

The sixth level clerical spell ’aerial servant’ introduces the idea of the magical protection circle and the DMG presents these three as options for protection from the servant:

These are presented as an alternative to casting protection from evil and no spell is apparently required. Which fits with real-world folklore. Certain symbols simply keep certain monsters out.
Similarly, we are informed by the Monster Manual that demons can be kept out by a thaumatergic circle if lesser than a type VI, and ’special pentagram’ if they are that degree or higher.

Devils are a little less clear, but magic circles are effective, but have to be ’ensymboled’ in the case of greater or arch devils.

MMII tells us that a pentagram will keep out dæmons.

Up to this point, the power of these circles has been presented as a simple “if you are facing these, then use this” proposition. There is no hint that their use involves spell casting and basically, there’s no reason to think that they don’t work as advertised.

This introduces some balance questions as regards the power of demons and devils. Any street artist could render him/herself safe from the powers of Asmodeus using a bit of chalk and an umbrella, assuming they had a flat bit of space to draw and stand on.

My interpretation of how they work has always been that they are not “magic” in the normal sense, they are somehow expressions of the fantasy equivalent of physics. Gravity causes demons and devils to fall; magic symbols can cause them to be repelled. Maybe it’s a sort of phobia or a twisting of the planer effects that allows them to manifest in a different world.

Unearth Arcana then brings in the sixth-level magic-user spell ensnarement. This details the use of magical inscriptions of this type as prisons rather than guards. The spell itself is unusual in that the saving throw is actually an Int test between the monster and the magic-user who is trying to trick the subject into stepping through a gate-like portal.

For example, if the monster being summoned is a Type IV demon with an Int of 12, and the summoner has Int 14, the monster rolls 3d6, adds 2 for the difference in intelligence and if the result is greater than 12, the demon steps through the special gateway and finds itself in the diagram prepared for it, probably a pentacle.

There is some doubt but it seems that magic resistance is not applicable as the question is whether the demon falls for the trick and thereby steps through voluntarily.

But what about the portal - what about the gate spell in general? Magic resistance “indicates the chance of any spell absolutely failing in the monster’s presence”. In this case there would be at least a 60% chance of failure if we assume that the gate-like opening appears “in the monster’s presence”.
This is where I think the slight change to the description of magic resistance in MMII comes it. Now the effect “is the chance a spell might fail when cast on the monster”. Gate and ensnarement are not cast directly at the monster and both spells become much more workable when used on the sort of beings they are intended for, which generally have high magic resistance scores.

Once the monster is in the trap, a check is made to see if the diagram is correct. This is significant as the question appears to be independent of the spell and applicable to those trying to use the diagrams as protective mechanisms.

On usage, there is a chance that the diagram fails. Firstly, there is a base chance which can be brought to zero (and no further) by expenditure.

Always be careful
where you bleed

In classic AD&D style, the logic for this is somewhat dubious. A hand-drawn diagram has a base 20% chance of failure when used. This can be reduced by 1% for each 1000gp spent in combination with an extra turn’s work on the drawing. So it takes 20,000gp to reduce this to a base zero chance of failure.

Alternatively, the magic-user may have a permanent diagram inlaid or carved somewhere. This has a base chance of failure of only 10% but taking that down to zero is extraordinarily expensive: 50,000gp and an entire month of additional work (no guide is given about the base time needed).
When some creature is snared, there is a roll to see if the diagram works (assuming it’s the right type of diagram, of course). The failure chance is equal to the monster’s Intelligence score plus its HD (or level), minus the same score for the caster, plus the final base chance.

So, the Type IV demon has an escape chance of 23% (12 Int plus 11 HD). The caster is, let us assume, 12th level and adding this to their Int score of 14 gives 26, for a score of -3. The cheapest of inlaid floors would give the demon just a 7% chance of escape, a quick chalk diagram 17%. Higher quality materials and time could easily reduce this to no chance at all.

There is an issue here with the description of how circles work. The text says that inlaid circles need only be tested on first use. But there’s no guarantee that the second occupant of the circle is not more powerful and/or intelligent than the first. It seems unreasonable that a magic-user could summon an imp to “test” a circle before using it on Asmodeus. Not having any flaw that an imp can find is not the same as being able to hide shoddy workmanship from the gaze of the Master of Hell.

So I would suggest that each test establishes that the circle is proof against the intelligence plus HD of whatever has been captured. Ensnaring a second imp will work automatically; further rolling is needed for a more powerful target which, if successfully caught, then establishes a new “high score” of what can be held within the inlaid pattern.

Be that as it may, the question of magic resistance remains well and truly out of the picture.

So, where does this fit with the spell protection from evil?

The drawing of a circle as part of the spell seems only to be indicative of the range of the protection - 3’ diameter in the case of the basic spell, and 20’ in the case of the area effect spell.

Nothing more is needed than to draw a circle on the ground, or even in the air using the material component. As such, this is mainly a somatic component not directly connected with any of these diagrams, not even the lesser magic (protection) circle. So there is no real reason to view the repulsion field, once established, like other spell and subject to magic resistance.

As an aside, it’s worth remembering that magic-users are significantly more adept at this spell than clerics, not only do they cast the spells much more quickly (1 and 3 segments casting time versus 4 and 7), but magic-users get the 10’ radius spell as a 3rd level spell rather than the cleric’s 4th level - 32,500xp earlier.

To finally bring this back to our paladin, I can’t see any reason to treat their protection from evil effect any differently from the spell as regards the magic resistance roll.

This has an unpleasant effect for the paladin since all demons and devils have magic resistance.

The Paladin’s Problems

The objection has been raised by Skalding on Dragonsfoot.org that

Paladins are meant to be exceptional figures, holy exemplars of LG conduct. So holy that they are immune to disease, can cure by touch, and can sense the presence of concealed evil. One of their special powers is a constant circle of protection.
It makes very little sense to suggest that the circle hedges out summoned beings except for demons and devils because [insert one reading among many of a particular mechanic.] Even though demons and devils can be kept away by properly chalked circles, and devils repelled by holy objects

I sympathise with the reasoning but I feel that it misses out on some advantages of the paladin’s power. Firstly it is mobile, which a chalked circle is not, secondly it is 1" radius, not 10’. But more importantly it is constantly renewed.

It is hard to read the description of magic resistance’s effect on hold portal and not feel that it should have the same effect on a normal protection from evil spell, i.e., that it should dispel it if the resistance succeeds. At the very least it should allow the monster to encroach on its target for duration of the round.

Against the paladin that doesn’t work as the effect is a continual one without any need for concentration or casting. Breaching it once means nothing more than it has been breached once.

My xp calculations place the Type I demon at level 7. With a 50% MR, against a 7th level paladin the Vrok’s effective MR is a whopping 70%.

Pausing only to note that against any other class the Type~I has a 100% chance to be able to affect the character with its powers, let’s look at what this means in practise.

Against AC -1 the demon normally needs to roll 14, so it has a 35% of striking. Add in the effect of the protection and this drops to 24½%. So the paladin effectively has +2 to their armour against each attack.

And at the start of each round of combat there is a 30% chance that the demon will be forced out of melee range (offering a free attack at it’s back, I think) and have to close to combat again, which takes a round of combat where the paladin can be doing something else (I’m assuming that the demon already used its charge option for the turn, which of course had a 30% chance of failing).

If the demon chooses to attack from range then there is no question of magic resistance affecting the protection and the normal protection from evil modifiers of +2 to AC and -2 to saving throw targets apply. Which is weaker than what has been put forward for the drawn diagrams but of course it retains the advantage of mobility.

So I think the paladin is doing all right against an equally levelled monster and, again, it’s worth remembering that none of these partial protections are available to any other class, not even clerics.
So that’s sorted, then: static diagrams are powerful but limited, mobile spells and powers are more flexible but more vulnerable to MR. Job done.

Except…

The considerate summoner
always has a host body
ready
(Art: Carlyn Hill)

We Need to Talk About Demogorgon

The Big D has a magic resistance of 95%, the highest in the Monster Manual and ignoring the odd MR mechanic of the daemons, exceeded only by the Crimson Death in MMII.

A protection from evil spell by an 11th level caster (or 11th level paladin) thus has only a 5% chance to have any effect on Demogorgon, and a 15% chance to keep Orcus at bay.

That seems fine to me. These are ultra-high level god-like monsters.

The problem comes with the magic item, scroll of protection from demons. What is its effect on Demogorgon?

If it is treated as a normal spell effect then Demogorgon’s magic resistance should penetrate it. We’re not given any guidance as to what level protections scrolls are but even if we assume an arch-mage has created the scroll, there is a 60% chance of the protection failing. And in fact there’s a substantial chance of it failing against any but the very weakest of demons - 15% against a Type I demon, for example.

This seems wrong for an item specifically stated as protecting against demon princes; it should do what it says on the tin.

One thought was that the scroll might actually create one of the diagrams perfectly. That fails on two points: firstly, a simple pentacle protects against all demons so there’s no reason for the progressive levels of protection for different powers of demons, and secondly the fact that the effect of the scroll moves with the user.

At this point I think we have to simply give up on trying to fit the protection scrolls into the magic resistance framework - they just don’t fit.

For my personal rationalisation of this I’m falling back on my old idea that there are things that can be done to the “space-time” of the PMP which can create spaces or barriers that the nature of certain foreign beings can not tolerate. In the case of the scrolls of protection from demons, protection from devils, and so forth the barrier prevents voluntary entry, but the monster can be forced in by the actions of the scroll user.

This twist in space may be created by magic but the result is not magical, in the same way that a dig spell creates a real hole (probably). As such magic resistance does not protect against the barrier.

What happens to a demon which is forced into the circle by an outside agent? That’s a DM call but I’d send them back to the abyss or wherever. But it would be like trying to get a cat into a bath, not something the creature would do willingly (presumably it’s extremely painful).

At the Table

The six types of protective circle below can be drawn by any character using various materials which may be available either at home or on an adventure. They can be used in various ways to attempt to protect a character or characters from some enemy, or to block portals. They are perhaps most useful for hiding from any detection powers or ESP employed by the relevant monsters.

In each case the base chance of failure, due to inaccurate measurements and other issues, is 20% (I assume that inscribing is not likely to be available as an option other than at home base). When the diagram is tested this chance is increased as usual by the INT and HD/level of whatever is attempting to breach the protection. Whichever character drew the diagram may subtract their own ability score from this. Furthermore, the various classes allow the artist to subtract their level or some proportion of their level from the failure chance, depending on the diagram and class:

Class	Devices	Mod
Magic-user	All	Level
Cleric	All	Level
Illusionist	Magic Circle, Thuamaturgic Triangle	Level
Druid	Pentagram, Thuamaturgic Circle	Level
Thief	Pentgram	Level-9
Paladin	Pentagram, Basic Circle	Level-8
Bard	All	Bard Level÷2
Monk	Pentagram	Level÷2

Thieves and paladins below 9th or 8th level respectively do not receive any modifier when their diagrams are tested for failure. Bards and monks round all fractions down.

In each case, “pentagram” includes the ability to produce a pentangle.

Finally, the DM may feel that an additional penalty is needed to reflect less than ideal circumstances, from 1% up to maybe 25%.

The Diagrams

Brief discussions of the devices follow, in each case the normal time to draw it is included in parenthesis.

None of this is quite by-the-book as there are inconsistencies and gaps in the book text. I’ve italicised particularly non-conformist parts of my own devising.

When referring to beings “from” a plane I generally mean native to that plane, so devils are from Hell, even though they may pass through to various other lower planes at will. The exceptions to this are the astral and ethereal planes. In those cases the diagrams block activity for any being currently on the named plane.

Pentangle

The Pentangle (5 rounds)

A pentangle may be placed on a location or object while a being not of the plane is magically held by other means within. If all exits from the prison are adorned with a pentangle, the magic effectively becomes permanent. The trapped being may not use any power or physical action in order to leave; at least one pentangle must be broken by some outside agency.

A pentangle can also be used to seal a reversed divination spell. For example, if  obscure object is cast on a magical sword and the sword placed into a case, if the case is sealed with a pentangle upon the lock(s) or bindings, then the spell effectively becomes permanent until the seal is broken. The object itself is contained by the seal and no special power or effect may be activated or utilised while it is so cloistered. Only one such item (or being) may be protected by any one case, room, or other container.

Pentacle

The Pentagram (6 rounds)

A pentagram will block the passage or attack of any creature native to planes 17 to 21 inclusive (see PHB p121). It will not block devils or arcanodaemons.

If a location, such as a room, has pentacles placed such that the outer circle touches each door-frame post, they will prevent entry by the above beings, even using teleport-no-error or such like. Similarly, sendings, detection, and all other powers will be unable to penetrate the location. Pentagrams so placed will not prevent the exit of such creatures or the effects of their powers from the room.

Protection Circle

The Basic Protection Circle (1 round)

This will block any lesser devil, and any hostile detection, sending, or similar divination power etc which is used by them or any caster of less than 6th level.

They may be used as described for pentacles for securing areas.


 

Thaumatergic Triangle

The Thaumatergic Triangle (5 rounds)

Tricky and thus slow to draw due to the uneven angles, this device prevents passage, sendings, powers etc. from beings originating in planes which are neutral - Concordant Opposition (if in use), and the Inner Planes, including the Ether, and also including alternate Prime Material Planes to the one occupied by the diagram, as well as creatures from planes 11 to 13, 15 to 17, 19 to 21, and 23 to 25.

May be used to prevent ingress as above except for beings on the astral plane of existence.

Magic Circle

The Magic Circle (2 Turns)

Blocks beings from planes 10 to 15, as well as 22 to 25, and the Astral plane.

May be used to prevent ingress as above except for beings on the ethereal plane.

Thuamaturgic Circle (2 Turns)

Blocks actions in the same way as the Thuamaturgic Triangle but is also effective against demons with less than 80% magic resistance (used here as a measure of power, not in the normal way).

Notes

Ingress blocking

The above assumes that the doors being protected are the only way into the location. If there’s a window, then that must be protected in some way too. The DM might want to allow pentagrams to be used in some way, or s/he may decide that more stringent requirements be met such as inlaying the gaps between bricks/stones/planks with lead or similar.

The object is to give a party in trouble some way to gain some breathing space. Since non-planer aid can usually be obtained by such beings which will be unaffected by diagrams, the rules above shouldn’t be too unbalancing.

What is “Extra-Planar”?

Travellers on other planes will find that a diagram meant to protect them from beings from that plane will have no more effect than a chalk circle will have on a mugger in the players’ home town.

Conversely, the players may find diagrams deployed against them as the “planer interloper”, as the DM sees fit or appropriate.

Moral Issues

While it is probably not an issue for Evil or neutral characters to use any of these diagrams, it may cause questions to be asked if a Magic Circle is used against creatures from the Upper Planes (Arcadia round to Gladsheim) by a Good-aligned character.

Gods and Wishes

Diagrams need to be limited in their power to some degree. They are vulnerable to damage by agents or other actors from the plane on which they exist as they have no effect on such beings and, for example, the cleaner might wipe away “those funny chalk marks” on the laboratory floor. But, still, it seems unreasonable that a deity would be adversely affected by them.

A wish should probably be able to destroy a diagram which the wisher can see.

Lesser deities should also probably be able to ignore diagrams they are aware of if the diagram was created by a demi-god or mortal. Greater gods should be able to ignore those created by lesser gods, demigods, or mortals.

This area is difficult as there are different conceptions of how gods should work in a gameworld; the DM must ultimately decide for themselves. Personally, however, I think that the ability to hide items using pentangles should be 100% proof against anything except very specific wishes by beings who already have a good idea where the item is hidden.

Spell: Spare Room

Material component
from
Bodices and Bustles
(strangely)

Spare Room (Alteration)
Level: MU 5
Components: V, M
Casting Time: 5seg
Saving Throw: none
Range: touch
Duration: 1 year/lv
Area of effect: 36sq feet+1sq foot/level and see below

Explanation/Description: This spell is cast upon a doorway (ie, a portal with an attached movable door) and creates an extra-dimensional space which is anchored to the door frame.  The surface area of the doorway can not exceed the given area of effect, and must be shaped to allow the caster to pass. If the door is opened then whatever was behind it before is still there and can be entered and used as normal.

However, if the door is opened while uttering a command phrase (chosen by the caster) then it will instead lead to the extra-dimensional space. The room has a floorspace equal to the caster's level in feet squared (ie, a 9th level caster can have a 9'x9' room or a 4½' by 18' room). As with the doorway, the space created must allow the caster to enter fully. The ceiling height is that of the top of the door frame.

It is possible to cast two or more instances of this spell such that they overlap in the extra-dimensional space, in which case a single room is created with multiple doors and perhaps, if carefully placed, an increased floor space.

Note that the spell is anchored to the doorframe and if the doorframe is moved without damaging it, then the rooms will too. If the door is damaged then entry to the spare room is blocked until the door is replaced, although those already inside may leave. If the doorframe is broken then the contents of the room are deposited back in the "real world" as a safety precaution.

If the magic of the spell is cancelled (e.g., by dispel magic) the room is cut off and the contents will be trapped there until the spell runs out, at which point the safety mechanism will kick in.

The spell may be made permanent, but may still be dispelled, in which case the normal duration will re-assert itself in respect of the extra-dimensional space.

The material component is a embroidered cloth representation of a house which is turned inside out at completion of the spell and which re-appears when the spell expires.

Spell: Swan Boat

Not the same thing at all

Swan Boat (Enchantment/Charm)
Level: Druid 2nd, Magic User 4th
Components: V, M, S
Casting time: 4seg
Saving throw: Neg.
Range: 3"
Duration: 1hr/level
Area of Effect: 3", 1 swan/lv

Swan boat enchants a group of swans, cranes, or similar flying animals, and a boat such that the swans can carry the boat through the air at a rate of 36" (Class D).

Each swan can lift 50lbs weight and the total weight of the boat and its occupant must be accounted for or there is no effect and the spell is wasted. Each swan gets a saving throw unless it is willing.

Material components are small golden crowns which go around the swans' necks and from which depend delicate golden chains linked to the boat (the magic bears the weight). These amount to 100gp per swan but are not used up.

The boat may be any normal craft, but it must be sea-worthy (or at least lake-worthy). The swans will sense in advance that the spell is ending and will attempt to make a landing on water. If they can not, the occupants of the boat will take 2d6 damage and the boat will almost certainly (90%) be damaged beyond immediate use.

The Spellbook as Laws of Magic

Any sufficiently advanced
maths is indistinguishable
from magic.

There are various spells in the AD&D spell books (PHB, UA) which seem weirdly out of whack with their companions at the various levels of power. Many players and DMs' responses to this is to either change the level of the spell or its effects.

However, the other way of looking at the question "why does it take a 5th level spell to create a moonbeam" is "nobody knows". That is to say that the published spells are a qualitative description of how magic works. It's easy to put people to sleep, but for some inexplicable reason it's hard to make an ordinary arrow burst into flame. It's very hard to teleport without risk; it's quite easy to speak to animals.

It's inconsistent, but that's the nature of magic, or anything which is not actually well understood and has to be treated as a black box. From outside the box, the rules produce surprising results which are often unpredictable. Perhaps somewhere there's a class which finds flame arrow really simple; perhaps not. Perhaps the moon god had some sort of argument with the god of magic. Perhaps the goddess of sleep married the god of magic.

Or perhaps magic is weird and unpredictable and spell casters have to cope with that as best they can.

It's not like sleep being first level is really any odder how an electron works, is it?

Your Local Representative

In case of Law,
break glass

Butterfly Effects
When running a game in AD&D's default "pseudo-mediaeval" setting there is always a tension between drawing on historical information about day-to-day life (such as how drains work, social classes, the value of a good horse) and accounting for those things in the game which are not historical.

A very typical example is the presence of magical street lighting in larger cities. Continual light is not a high level spell and any reasonably successful adventuring party could pay for significant numbers of castings in a year (or cast it themselves) in order to light up some district of their home city or town. This would make a huge difference to the life of people in mediaeval times who were very limited in their outside activities in winter because of the lack of light.

Light Wand

How Many Clerics Does it Take to Change a Lightbulb?

Continual light is, of course, available to magic users and clerics alike and many Good-aligned religions would seem likely to encourage this sort of communal service (for a price, of course. Specifically 9sp per person per month in "trade, taxation and tithes" [PHB p20]). So it's hard to justify the lack of such lighting if a player moots it (which generally happens early on with any given group of players), although naturally there will be people in society who oppose this sort of thing and a dispel magic isn't hard to get either.

This leads to a related question about the availability of magic in the baseline AD&D society. This is a little tricky but there is one interesting thing about the definitions of the classes in PHB: it is easier to qualify for the cleric or magic user classes than it is for the fighter class. The first two require only a single '9' score while the fighter requires both the 9 and a 7 in constitution.

How you extrapolate this to NPCs depends on how much you feel the books' rules for player characters define the workings of non-player characters but certainly there are hints in the DMG that the normal qualifications are needed. It says nothing about ability score generation methods, however.

When I want a town or village I generally run a computer program that rolls up everyone in the place using 3dA (averaging dice) in order with a 1% chance of a particular person being "special" and such characters get 3d6 in order instead and may have a class, with the program then deciding what class, if any, they pick out of the options their scores give them.

For this general pool of NPCs, then, there is a 0.63% chance of qualifying for the Cleric class (and an equal chance of qualifying for the magic user or thief classes). So, in a population of 1000 we would expect to see 6 people capable of casting clerical spells and 6 capable of casting magical spells (there may be overlap between these groups and I'm talkig about adults here, of course).

So, if an NPC qualifies for either magic user or cleric, which isn't too unlikely, which would they go for? Simple answer: cleric. Everyone wants to be a cleric.

Back to Reality
In the real world, "the church" was immensely powerful in most nations and especially so in the West where the Christian, Jewish, and Muslim churches had their centres. The reason for this is simple: people don't want to die and those religions offered a very clear message of "you won't really die".

Quite simply, people could and did give up everything they had in order to ensure that they would qualify for the promise of eternal life even though they had, for the most part, almost no evidence that the claims were true. They didn't need evidence; they needed hope because they had plenty of evidence of the inevitability of death and any chance of escaping that would naturally be leapt on, and was.

Now look at our fantasy world. Here, there is the same message of living on but there is loads of evidence, including people raised from the dead not in some distant Rapture but right here and now and often in front of many witnesses. If you have the cash you can actually speak with the dead (only a 3rd level cleric spell) and get very specific information like "where did you bury the treasure?" instead of vague statements about how much the departed loved Uncle Harry (or was it Uncle Billy? how about Aunt Jane? Some sort of relative, or maybe a friend who was like a member of the family? A favourite car, perhaps? The veil's getting thick; put some more money in the meter).

As if that wasn't enough, look at the cure and heal spells. 6 clerics, even Acolytes, would transform the lifestyle of any mediaeval town, particularly in war time.

The First Dalek Pope
So, if you think the mediaeval churches were powerful, think about what they would be like if they literally could return kings from the dead or cure the myriad of diseases which routinely ran through whole countries.

Imagine, also, the effect of excommunication in such a world? The withdrawl of all healing spells in itself is a major threat to anyone who crosses the church. If the church says "smite this person or we will withdraw our protections from you" then that person had better be fleet of foot because pretty well the whole of society will turn on them rather than face such a loss.

At this point, our pseudo-mediaeval setting isn't looking very mediaeval any more, really, is it? There's little reason to have monarchs and those that do exist will be puppets (not radically different, I know), the populace will have decent health and be safe from the fear of disease and injury while going about their business in the brightly-lit towns with their 24hr lifestyles organized around religious duties. Almost every country will be a de facto theocracy.

Populations will be much more urban, too, as the numbers of clerics suggested are probably still too low to take these benefits out into a scattered rural hinterland, so town life will be more attractive because that's where you're most likely to have clerics on hand. Agricultural output will probably be higher for several reasons (health of farmers and the availability of long-term weather forecasting via divination spells, as well as some perhaps non-adventuring spells for blessing crops which are not listed in PHB) so the lower farming population level will not be a problem.

Good, Innit?

The Duke of Slyonnia

Of course, this all assumes that the dominant religion is basically Good aligned and wants to spread the benefits of clerical magic throughout society. But that's actually a pretty safe bet because those are the sorts of religions that will prosper. If Slyonnia's clergy offer nothing to the peasants and support only the rich elite, while neighbouring Bennifica's clergy support everyone, then Bennifica's population (and therefore its army) will be stronger and healthier and the border regions will see a continual flow of deserters from Slyonnia to Bennifica. With a certain degree of irony, Darwin will ensure that Evil religions will struggle to become dominant in the face of Good.

Evil cults will tend to attract the powerful excommunicated characters from other religions, as they will offer them the healing and so forth that they have lost. The weak can go jump, of course, because Evil despises weakness by definition (AD&D definition). So such cults will be small but with a disproportionate number of high level characters. Zero-level types will still exist because every Evil religion needs its cannon-fodder.

The Evil perspective on all of this is that they are marginalized because the sheep have banded together to thwart the "natural" order where the weak perish and the strong rule and prosper (see previous note about Darwin and irony).

In-Joke for Smalltalkers

The Ivory Tower
I said that everyone who can be either a magic user or a cleric will want to be a cleric. Why? Why are the magic users not ruling the world from their collages of magic instead of the clerics ruling from their churches?

The simplest answer is that first level magic users are rubbish. They certainly offer society at large very little that would work as a seed of a power-base, unless it is a society of insomniacs. Compared to an 18-Wis 1st level cleric with his/her 3 cure spells per day, the 18-Int magic user with one sleep spell is on a hiding to nothing in the popularity stakes.

Cultural values will naturally see the cleric as more useful, and therefor more valuable than magic users and there's an obvious snowballing effect here as the clerics are more respected and therefore have more secular power so more people want to be clerics and the church grows in power and gains respect, gaining more applicants etc.

Meanwhile, people may hear tales of world-shattering arch-mages and army-destroying wizards but the path to that level of power is "back loaded" in terms of reward.

So, while it's certainly possible to imagine isolated cities or maybe nations that are dominated by cadres of magic users, the implication of the rules is, to me, clearly in favour of magic users being loners looking, if at all, for that rare dedicated apprentice who is willing to trudge through the grind of the low levels for the big payoff. A payoff that itself has implications for the numbers of magic users compared to clerics.

When Two Tribes Relax Go To War
The relationship between magic users and clerics also has a bearing on why I weigh NPC generation towards clerics. Basically, I see AD&D as having a built in rivalry between the two classes. There is an inherent challenge to the gods in the way in which the magic user class works.

Clerics get their power from their deities; they may even have to take different spells from the ones they want if the deity disagrees with their choices.

Magic users take what they want, when they want it. Of course, they have to find it first but that's a minor detail. There's a clear statement here that the magic user doesn't need gods.

Clerics, druids, and illusionists get 7 levels of spells; magic users get 9. As I've mentioned before, this is not an accident nor is it some odd design error in AD&D - it's quite intentional. A power word kill is two full levels above a Holy Word in power. This has implications for daemon magic resistance but also various magicks which block spells and effects based on level. In any case it is also an implication that magic users ultimately gain knowledge witch is either denied by the gods or unavailable to them. Neither is something that a cleric would, I think, find a comfortable inference.

So, there is an implied rivalry between the two classes and even mages and clerics of the same alignment must to some degree regard the other as "doing it wrong". And if clerics are in the ascendancy in society then the implication of this is that magic users will find life a bit easier outside the areas where clerics operate. So, it's off to the lonely tower in the middle of nowhere to get on with unpicking the secrets of the universe without some priest constantly saying to leave the universe alone, thank you.

All this stuff flows more or less naturally from material contained in PHB and as such the DM is likely to face questions about it from players in a long-term campaign.

The Big Picture
As I see it, the implied reality of the PHB and DMG is one where magic is both common enough to have an effect across the whole of society (it doesn't take many raise deads to transform people's attitudes) and mostly clerical in nature.

The Friendly Face
of unspeakable
knowledge

Magic users are likely to be viewed with suspicion by normal people who see clerical magic as something that offers them day to day aid and the possibility of long term salvation from personal death while the wizard has no heal spells and no cure spells, but does have animate dead, disintegrate, and fireball. They may well be of great value when danger threatens, but perhaps with something of the air of nuclear weapons about them - "wouldn't it be better if we got rid of all of them?" may well be a sentiment that gets bandied about from time to time.

The dominant church in an area will generally be Good aligned, but in isolated nations where it is harder for people to simply vote with their feet, a Dr Doom or Dracula might be able to keep people under their control with a religion based on doling out favours to those who tow the line. Such nations, of course, make excellent places to set adventures in.

Similarly, magic users will dominate only where the churches are weak, and that probably means out of the way places which have managed to develop more or less independently of the mainstream cultures.

Fighters will be outnumbered by clerics and thieves, but will probably outnumber magic users by a fair margin in most places. The fighter class will tend to be represented more by the lone hero rather than by a ruling warrior caste.

End of Part One
All this is very simulationist, of course. But role playing is by its nature simulationist in that we're trying to simulate a character in a story which emerges from group play (aren't we?)

The DM can certainly fix anything with the above picture that they don't like by fiat but there are alternatives. But this post is long enough and I'll come back to this next week.

Nowt as Queer as Folk Magic

There are two things ye must
know about the wise woman

Stray observation on the issue of why there is no folk magic system in AD&D: since magic does not exist one can invent any magic system for a game or book without worry and then that will simply be how magic works by fiat.

But once you try to add a second way for magic to work in the same setting you need to make them work together. For example, you need to explain why practitioners would not flock to the best one, where by "practitioners" I mean "PCs" and by "best" I mean "the one that kills monsters best".

This is pretty tricky unless you make all the changes purely cosmetic (which can be a let down for players when they realise that there is no "actual" difference) or you proceed with great care.

In AD&D, the standard system covers such a wide range of power from 1st level spells to 9th level ones that it's hard to find anywhere to fit a completely different magic system and if one did it would require a class to go with it, which also has to balance with the existing classes.

In other words: it's a total pain in the neck to have more than one magic system in AD&D and I think this is particularly the case for anything that resembles a folk-tradition with simple amulets, charms, potions, and other typical "wise woman" style magics - why would anyone bother playing such a character when they could play a normal magic user or cleric?