Wizard

NWN Requirements

• None

Arelith Changes

• Spell changes, or Organized Spell Changes.
• Requires spell components to cast spells greater than level 6. Level 7 spells cost 1. Level 8 spells cost 2. Level 9 spells cost 3.
• Bonus Language: Draconic
• Familiars
• Can save and load Spellbooks through the Crafting Skills menu

The Greater Spell Foci of every school that they take, additionally to the normal effects that they grant, will unlock a spell which the sorcerer, spellsword or wizard may cast freely and without limit as a special ability, that works identically as a spell casted from their spellbooks. Cannot be targeted at fixtures.

• GSF Abjuration grants Endure Elements.
• GSF Conjuration grants Melf's Acid Arrow.
• GSF Divination grants See Invisibility.
• GSF Enchantment grants Blindness/Deafness.
• GSF Evocation grants Magic Missile.
• GSF Illusion grants Color Spray.
• GSF Necromancy grants Ray of Enfeeblement.
• GSF Transmutation grants Burning Hands.

To cast the spells, look for them in your radial menu of abilities. The subclasses and paths also benefit from this effect.

These spells are lost if they are interrupted, but they can be refreshed by casting another infispell.

Paths

For the Wild Mage path, see Wild mage.

For the Shadow Mage path, see Shadow Mage.

For the Spellsword path, see Spellsword.

Roleplay Tips

(Please, note that these are all "Roleplay Tips". Nothing of this is mechanically enforced on Arelith in any way and will not give you any mechanical advantages. Only additional nice roleplay if you choose to try it.)

Origins of Wizards

Wizards are magical spellcasters that do their work through the language of magic. A wizard requires access to that language, and records of that language to do her work. The practice of wizardry is sometimes deeply ingrained in the culture of a race, such as the elves or gnomes, and sometimes taken from other races, as in the human adoption of Elven, Draconic and Infernal spells. Wizards are the people whom wish to tap this power, and are willing to dedicate time and a great amount of work to the practice. Anyone interested in the grand, sweeping history of wizardly magic in Faerun can contact me individually. If I get enough requests, I’ll write up a history.

Spells

The concept of a “spell” needs to be clarified. Spells are not raw magic. The term for that phenomena is “spellfire”, and that’s a whole ‘nother can of worms. Spells are a collection of words and gestures that are stored as a sort of ‘paragraph’ in the wizard’s memory. Some of them require their words to be spoken aloud, some require a non-verbal language of symbols to be used. Very often, it’s all three.

When not in the wizard’s memory, spells are recorded in the wizard’s spellbook. The spellbook is a vital component of the wizard’s casting, as knowledge of spells, the medium by which they harness arcane energy, is obliterated from their memory as they use the spell. They’ll certainly be able to remember which spell they cast, as they have seen its effects for themselves, but the actual –method- of that spell becomes unknown without consulting their spellbook. A wizard deprived of their spellbook will only know the magic in their memory, and if they do not use that magic to re-scribe those spells, they will lose knowledge of those spells altogether until they find another scroll or spellbook to copy them from. When playing your wizard, always remember that a wizard is always slightly emotional about their spellbook. It’s a representation of often decades of study, and an entire life’s work. Threatening the wizard’s spellbook, or, gods-forbid, destroying it altogether, would be counted as a threat of the highest caliber.

It should be noted that spells, when cast, are not the entire spell being cast in a one-round period. It’s actually the completion of a far more arcane and elaborate process, the majority of the spell was cast often the night before, after meditative preparation and preliminary casting. This is to bring the magic to readiness for when the wizard is prepared to use it. This is not true for sorcerers. Make that distinction. Wizards are dedicated, focused individuals.

Becoming a Wizard

(Please, note that these are all "Roleplay Tips". Nothing of this is mechanically enforced on Arelith in any way and will not give you any mechanical advantages. Only additional nice roleplay if you choose to try it.)

Wizards are almost always apprenticed. The logistics of this are clear-cut. Nobody ‘stumbles’ onto wizardry, figures it out on their own by waving their hands around and chanting. No spellbook? No spells. To write a spellbook, the wizard needs access to prior training in how to write in the often bewildering series of languages that composes wizard spells, along with a steady hand to properly transcribe glyphs and the like, and the steel-clad memory in order to keep the exact shape of those glyphs in one’s head. Therein: if someone wants to learn how to do this, they go to someone who knows what they’re doing.

Apprenticeships are very often slow, difficult and moderately dangerous for the apprentice. The wizards they’re working with are often absorbed in their own research, very old, and extremely intelligent. The fact that they’ve been working with arcane magic for years and have survived also indicates that they’re fairly cautious. Often people wishing to achieve higher levels of power rapidly get fed up with the tedious pace of arcane education.

The unique master-apprentice relationship between wizards is a fascinating source of role-playing potential. These are two people, likely both highly introverted and intellectually active, whom come together to learn the same thing. One to understand the basics and beg spells off their master, and the other to have a younger, more capable apprentice to aid in their research. Of course, these relationships could be harsher, non-consensual or outright unpleasant, the apprentice biding their time for years, simply because they want the payoff. It’s often a highly passive-aggressive environment, one despising the other for his power, and the other despising their apprentice for their youth, and eventual inheritance of all their magic.

Of course, just because wizards are almost always apprenticed doesn’t mean I won’t speak of the exceptions. I would ask that people think long and hard about their character concept before choosing the following path, however, as it’s an extreme example, and similarly as extremely rare. On occasion, wizards find magic. This person is a genius, they’ve seen mages, and the work they do. They’ve seen how they do things, they’ve read magical scrolls, they’ve noticed the patterns, and they’ve pieced it all together themselves. These highly unusual individuals tend to be extremely focused, academically active and passive. She’ll have insight beyond what is usual for a member of their species into the methods of magic in their world. Maybe they’ll have come across magical scrolls, or spellbooks, or simply been raised in a highly intellectually active environment. Whatever does it, they know magic. And you hear about these people. Gentlemen like Melf and Tenser, you see, are these secondary ‘observation wizards’.

Being a Wizard

The grand majority of wizards spend some portion of their life adventuring. This is either overtly, where they throw in for a cause, or join an adventuring party in order to seek out new magic or some other personal goal, or subversively, where they simply work in the vicinity of danger, and the danger comes to them. After all, who doesn’t want to loot the wizard’s home? Wizards are not used to ‘roughing it’, and thereby prefer to have a steady source of income and a comfortable place to live. Those that travel will often bring accommodations along or memorize spells that will make their journey easier. They will often take consulting positions or advisory positions, given how well-read they tend to be.

Wizards actually have some tendencies in their alignment, similarly to sorcerers and rogues being chaotic, and Fighters being lawful. Wizards actually lean slightly towards lawful and evil. Let me explain this: the law part makes perfect sense. A life spent studying and discovering the strict rules that govern the world and the arcane energy within it, then putting those rules into practice every day of your life can make you a reasonable, focused individual. You’ll gain an appreciation for ‘the rules’, and a keen belief that order is power, as in your life: it is.

Evil, however, is something less frequently understood in the concept of arcane magic. Wizards are rarely saints, or even decent people. These are people that have only been worrying about themselves for the majority of their life, whom spend eight waking hours every two days absorbed with themselves, and whom have an almost fundamentally unfair power over their world. Power does corrupt, and wizards will often find that their power gives them a frequent disregard for the sanctity of other living things. Furthermore, the fact that the majority of them can be grappled and killed in two rounds by any rogue of equal level worth their salt makes them paranoid and isolationist. The presence of rival wizards seeking to know their secrets, and indeed, their own desire for rival wizards’ secrets will often cause them to cloister themselves away behind magical protections and become close to no-one, in defense of their life’s work. These are not the attributes of a ‘good’ individual.

"Guilds"

A bizarre, and extremely modern occurrence in Faerun is the existence of wizarding ‘guilds’. Despite the misleading ‘mages guild’ name, sorcerers will not frequently join these institutions, as they benefit far less from the moderating influence of oversight and peers in their work.

These wizards frequently gather together to ‘check’ each other, and make certain that magic in a local vicinity is not abused or misused, given that no mage wants to be the target of a rogue wizard’s sudden assault on their home. The intimidation factor of such consolidated power is often enough to discourage overtly violent mages from freelancing in the guild’s sphere of influence. These institutions, unlike the individual mage, lean toward neutrality, as they accept the majority of supplicants simply to keep them under their watch.

Two most influential old magical guilds on Arelith being Arcane tower on surface and the Sorcere in the Underdark.

Specialists

Though specialist spellcasters tend to be regarded simply as wizards by the world at large (and treated accordingly), a distinction is frequently placed upon illusionists (prized for their ability to entertain), diviners (sought after for the secret information that is their stock in trade), and necromancers (feared for their sinister powers). Though specialist wizards all have the same general chance of obtaining patrons, a specialist’s focus usually causes her to seek out opportunities geared toward her area of expertise.

External Links

Information about default NWN class are available on NWNWiki.