Tuesday, February 8, 2011

Fat Cotton Knocks Another One Out Of The Park & AD&D Spell Analysis Request

Another great piece by Fat Cotton, this time for Fight On! magazine...between FO and Petty Gods I'm thrilled to see folks availing themselves of his surreal, whimsical talents!

Also, does anyone know of any online analysis of AD&D spells and their casting times? With all the hobbyist Gygaxian research floating around on the net, someone must have done the number crunching regarding AD&D spells and how many segments it takes to cast them? The discussion regarding The Black Lasher made me realize that I need to include AD&D/OSRIC information with the Gramaree spells in order for full-universal-oldschool D&D utility.

7 comments:

  1. What kind of info on the spells are you looking for? A rough rule of thumb is 1 segment per spell level, but some spells, like power words, are meant to be cast quickly and only take a segment. Most non-combat spells take considerably longer, sometimes several rounds.

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  2. And magic that's intended to be more ritual should probably take even longer, possibly several turns.

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  3. @ C'nor - Yes. There are also instances where I'm not sure what GG was thinking. Probably stuff he worked through during actual play.

    Taking the 5th level MU spells from the PH, all take five segments, except:

    Animate Dead - 5 Rounds.
    Conjure Elemental - 1 Turn.
    Contact Other Plane - 1 Turn.
    Distance Distortion - 6 Segments.
    Extension II - 4 Segments.
    Leomund's Secret Chest - 1 Turn.
    Magic Jar - 1 Round.
    Stone Shape - 1 Round.
    Teleport - 2 Segments.

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  4. Thanks for the feedback guys...this is exactly the kind of information I was looking for! :)

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  5. That's a great piece. The art put out by the OSR is getting better and better.

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  6. No, but please post anything you find here. I've started an spell by spell look at the effects. I'm shocked to find that I like some of the 2nd edition AD&D changes.

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  7. @ kelvingreen: You're certainly no slouch either!

    @ widderslainte: Will do!

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