Unintended Consequences of "Low-Magic"

     In a previous post, I wrote about a 'low-magic' home-brew campaign I ran a few years ago called Dragon's Eye.  Some of the campaign design decisions led to fun character choices and back stories more-or-less accidentally. The 'low-magic' element and the focus on a dragon deity that was the source for the divine magic as well as the minimal arcane (wizard) magic, effected the spell casting classes the most.


Dragon Priest

    The miniature on the right was partly inspiration for the Dragon Priest.  So was the dragon deity of the campaign.  As was the 'dragoon' from Final Fantasy fame.  The campaign was using 2nd Edition rules, so the combat benefited from a little spicing up, especially for classes like the cleric.  I gave the home-brew cleric a few 'jump' combat abilities that included some movement and an attack.  One was even a delayed attack where the character was in the air, basically off the grid/map, for a turn.  The custom class yielded a couple of fun combat goodies, and it also gave the player playing this class some extra flavor and character background stuff to work with.  Dragon flavored.  Yum.


Gnome Illusionist

 

       This character came about because one of the players wanted very badly to play a magic user.  In this low-magic campaign, we negotiated that he could be an illusionist.  The powerful council that ran the province the characters were from used a circle of illusionists to maintain the appearance of wealth and power.  There were also no demi-humans such as elves, gnomes, or dwarves running around the city. Together, the player and I came up with the idea that he could have a twice per day basic illusion spell.  As a gnome he could use this illusion spell to disguise himself as a human child of perhaps ten years, to blend in with the crowd.   Also, the image is the player's MS paint depiction of his gnome, printed in color, and folded into a little stand-up paper mini.

     I think the lesson here is this:  When you feel comfortable messing with the class abilities, or certain aspects of the rules (of any game), go for it!  My efforts to spice up the campaign yielded even greater fruit than I had anticipated once player input got involved and we thought creatively together.

What have you house-ruled or home-brewed?  Comment below!


Til next time,

-DM Josh