AD&D DMG cover to cover - part IV, pages 37-46 (TIME and SPELLS)

We´ve been reading the original DMG - the ultimate DM book! - but from a B/X and OSR point-of-view.

Check the other parts of this series here.

Today we will discuss:

TIME 37
— TIME IN THE CAMPAIGN 37
— TIME IN THE DUNGEON 38
CHARACTER SPELLS 38
— DAY-TO-DAY ACQUISITION OF CLERIC SPELLS 38
— ACQUISITION OF MAGIC-USER SPELLS 39
— ACQUISITION OF ILLUSIONIST SPELLS 39
— RECOVERY OF SPELLS 39
— SPELL CASTING 40
— TRIBAL SPELL CASTERS 40
SPELL EXPLANATIONS 41
— SPELLS: SPECIAL COMMENTARY FOR REFEREEING 41
— Cleric Spells 41
— Druid Spells 43
— Magic-User Spells 44
— Illusionist Spells 46

TIME

So, I went "digging" into the DMG... and now I think I've found some gold. This single page made me want to completely change the way I run games. It might be the most interesting part so far.

Of course this is not the first time I've read this. This part contains a famous quote in all caps. In addition, many people have been talking about this lately most notably Jeffro Johnson. Here is a relevant bit:

Game time is of utmost importance. Failure to keep careful track of time expenditure by player characters will result in many anomalies in the game. The stricture of time is what makes recovery of hit points meaningful. Likewise, the time spent adventuring in wilderness areas removes concerned characters from their bases of operation — be they rented chambers or battlemented strongholds. Certainly the most important time stricture pertains to the manufacture of magic items, for during the period of such activity no

adventuring can be done. Time is also considered in gaining levels and learning new languages and more. All of these demands upon game time force choices upon player characters, and likewise number their days of game life.

One of the things stressed in the original game of D&D was the importance of recording game time with respect to each and every player character in a campaign. In AD&D it is emphasized even more: YOU CAN NOT HAVE A MEANINGFUL CAMPAIGN IF STRICT TIME RECORDS ARE NOT KEPT.

The gist of this section is emphasizing how important time keeping is for your campaign. This includes not only turns and rounds but also days, weeks and months. The book also stresses the importance of downtime and rotating characters. For example, when a PC is hurt, diseased, or busy with an important project (e.g., researching spells or creating a magic item), you should go adventuring without him or her - or maybe using an entire different party. Even better, you can have multiple groups of players, and different parties, as hinted before. 

The method Gygax used for that is "real time": If one week has passed in the real world, one week has passed in the game world. This means a player could be using a different character for months. Of course you will occasionally need to freeze time between sessions, but now the clock is not working only at the players (in their characters) convenience. Time-railroading is limited. This gives the campaign a much more satisfying, organic feel.

(Of course, this has some issues. Unless we have some "fast forwards", we will never use the rules about aging... without getting older ourselves!).

For smaller units of time, the book recommends careful note keeping. I'm not a big fan of this, but you can easily be replaced by real time too, as I suggested here and apparently has become popular in other games lately. 

Time seems to be the glue that holds many rules together: Healing, researching, building, random encounters, searching, torches, diseases, etc. Once you ignore it, everything seems to come crashing down. Maybe this is one of the fundamental ideas of old school play.

There is much to ponder about this section. For now, I'll just recommend that you read it yourself, in its entirety. This is the first time in this series that I do that. 

CHARACTER SPELLS (plus ACQUISITION)

After finishing this important section on time I thought I could glance over the section on spells. However, there's important stuff here too.

The first parts of this section are about spell acquisition.  I always disliked the idea  that clerics get ALL spells "for free". Here, the book makes clear that this requires continued service in favor of a deity - and, for higher level spells, direct communication with their gods! An "unfaithful" cleric must perform sacrifice and atonement to get spells (which may require time), but changing deities might have irreversible consequences (including instant death, which is less interesting). Similar rules apply to paladins.

Starting magic-users get additional spells and scrolls when compared to B/X,  but here it is clear that these spells are random. The book provides a small table that ensures they'll be varied enough:

Illusionists follow a similar pattern. Some spell choice is permitted on "difficult campaigns".

As magic-users level up, they can get more spells, but they can only choose one per level. Everything else must be acquired trough scrolls, NPCs (or other PCs), and so on. This is seldom an easy process: you might fail to learn from a scroll, and NPCs might require magic items in exchange of spells.

Once again, the book is trying to limit PCs, but this time it does so in a very interesting way for both clerics and magic-users. Now they cannot simply handwave the origin of their spells. On the contrary, they have to engage with the setting to build their PC's repertoire. And there is enough randomness in the game that two magic-users will never be alike.

This sounds fair. Fighters get their "special powers" by finding magic items, intelligent swords, etc., and they usually don't get to choose (unless you're using something like proficiencies or Old School Feats). There should be a balance between choice and chance, and I think AD&D does pretty well in this regard.

RECOVERY OF SPELLS

Spell recovery requires time (again - this is the linchpin), to a maximum 12 hours of sleep plus 15 minutes for each spell level to be recovered. This create meaningful choices - what RPGs are all about. And is also a bit more fair to fighters (they need to rest a lot to recover all their HP).

SPELL CASTING

Next we get a small section explaining how spells work within the fictional world (reportedly taking inspiration from Vance and Bellair). Enticing, short, and clear.

TRIBAL SPELL CASTERS

This sections explain that various humanoids (ogres, orcs, bugbears, trolls, giants, etc.) have their own "shamans" (clerics) and "witch-doctors" (magic-users/clerics). Unfortunately, it does not tell you  if the witch-doctors have grimoires... (I would guess they don't).

While the section was interesting and useful (for suggesting spells and levels for these creatures), I don't find this distinction between shaman and cleric or mage and witch doctor to have much merit, especially as they are restricted to NPCs. It feels a bit like PC "races" can only be "civilized" fighting against "barbaric" foes. Why not have a PC or human/elf shaman? Also, did they forget ogre mages?

We could get something useful out of this (e.g.,  different forms of magic), but as written it feels insufficient and detached from the rest of the game (classes, random encounters, Monster Manual, etc.).

SPELL EXPLANATIONS

This section details particular spell. I'll skip this part entirely; it is basically impossible to understand without the PHB, and it is only separated from it because the books weren't written at the same time.  From a brief glance, most explanations sounds both sensible and flavorful.

What have we learned today?

 

The bit about time, if considered seriously, is definitely a game-changer. I don't remember the exact rules for spell acquisition in B/X, but the ones in the DMG are pretty good. And, okay, I'll admit, I might add a troll shaman or two to my games.

Coming next... THE ADVENTURE!

Additional reading (on time and spells):

https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2022/04/real-time-dungeon-exploration.html

https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2022/05/railroading-in-space-and-time-and.html

https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2018/01/the-best-way-to-get-spells-in-d.html

https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2020/02/living-spells.html

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