D&D 1E AD&D Magic Resistance 1e vs. 2e

[airwalkrr]

So the other day I was playing DDO and chatting with some of my fellow players there and the topic of spells in 2nd edition came up. Someone claimed that a spell cast by a 20th-level magic-user was the same as a spell cast by a 1st-level magic-user. Well I knew this was untrue, but it turned out he was oversimplifying based on the fact that saving throws, unlike in 3e onward, were based solely on the individual making the saving throw. Hence, his point was that any spell that allowed a saving throw was just as difficult to avoid whether cast by a 1st-level magic-user or a 20th-level magic-user. Now obviously there is more to it than that, so I started giving examples of ways in which a 20th-level magic-user was superior. One of my examples was magic resistance, that it scaled by magic-user power and that the % chance of spell failure for magic resistance was based on an 11th-level magic-user. Another player piped up that in 2nd edition, this was not the case, and that magic resistance % was static no matter what level magic-user you were. Well I knew that couldn't be right but I didn't have my AD&D books handy. Another player did have his books handy and said he couldn't find anything in the 2nd edition books about magic resistance changing based on the magic-user level.

Well, I found the reference in my 1e AD&D DMG later on. But I couldn't find anything in 2e. Was there any such reference? I seem to recall a lot of things being "accidentally" left out of 2e, and I am wondering if this is one of them.

 

[Thorindale]

Your player is correct - MR was static in 2nd Ed. IMO, it was one of the things they simplified.

DMG p.66

 

[Thorindale]

In a 1st Ed game I was running, I had a player that insisted that MR was adjusted based solely off difference between the creature's HD/level and the caster's level. (if the caster had more levels, MR went down, if the monster had more levels/HD, it went up). He though the "11th-level magic-user" was an example, not a baseline to adjust MR accordingly.

 

[airwalkrr]

During the discussion, one of the players mentioned that the rules for Magic Resistance were expounded upon in Deities and Demigods. Since I do not have the 2e Deities and Demigods, does anyone know if anything on Magic Resistance appears there?

 

[Jhaelen]

During the discussion, one of the players mentioned that the rules for Magic Resistance were expounded upon in Deities and Demigods. Since I do not have the 2e Deities and Demigods, does anyone know if anything on Magic Resistance appears there?

IIRC, it has exactly the same description as the Monster Manual.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

Well, regarding the players assertion that a spell cast by a 20th level caster is essentially the same as that from a 1st level caster, basing that on how saving throws work. He's correct.

The unstated assumption in 1E and 2E is that spells just work. You cast them and their effects occur. Unless you disrupt the casting itself the spell effects will happen. You don't have spells where it successfully cast only if the caster makes a spellcraft roll or somesuch that is modified by his level. Some aspects can be made to work better by a higher level caster but only the combat-oriented spells with damage effects seem to benefit in a particularly noticeable way from this. Normally then everyone would be at the mercy of spellcaster - except these versions of D&D then have saving throws.

Carried forward from their wargaming roots, a saving throw doesn't really affect the spell in and of itself. What it does is give the individual character one last hope of not taking it in the shorts. That chance is based on the skill, luck, divine favor, etc, of the person doing the avoiding, not on the skill, luck, divine favor of the person doing the inflicting. A DEATH spell cast by a 20th level caster can't kill you any deader than a DEATH spell cast by a 1st level caster. But a 20th level victim has a better chance of resisting or avoiding the spell than a 1st level victim does.

The higher level caster then gets more spells, and spells of higher base power (with accompanying effects) to beat down or get around the potential victims ability to endure, mitigate, or avoid the effects of spells.

 

[airwalkrr]

I agree with you, Man in the Funny Hat. That was one of the points I tried to make in the discussion but this individual would hear none of it. Apparently, to him, since your spell was likely to be resisted at high levels, there was no point in casting spells at all. At some point I just decided that he had never actually played AD&D or simply had little experience with the game.

Ah well, I guess my question has been answered. I'm sure if there were some mention of the Magic Resistance scaling in 2nd edition someone would have pointed it out by now, although I might still pose this question at dragonsfoot.

 

[billd91]

I agree with you, Man in the Funny Hat. That was one of the points I tried to make in the discussion but this individual would hear none of it. Apparently, to him, since your spell was likely to be resisted at high levels, there was no point in casting spells at all. At some point I just decided that he had never actually played AD&D or simply had little experience with the game.

I have to give your friend some credit. Some high level characters were extremely hard to affect with spells where saves negated the effect. The old encounter-ending save or die spells tended to be so well resisted (between rings or cloaks of protection, good base saves, wisdom bonuses, luckstones, what-have-you) that they were a real gamble. In many cases it was a better strategy to pound away with damaging evocation spells. Unless the target was a monk, you'd get at least half damage for sure.

 

[airwalkrr]

That's exactly the point, billd91. There are spells for every occasion. When you face an ancient red wyrm, you shouldn't be wasting your time casting finger of death because you know the dragon has a pretty good chance of just making the saving throw. Cone of cold on the other hand, is a pretty good idea. Even if the dragon does make the saving throw (which it probably will) you deal extra damage because of the spell type. But on the other hand, if you run into a group of hill giants, you have a pretty good chance of using charm monster to make one your ally.

Just because high hit die monsters make their saving throws pretty reliably does not mean that the spells are the same for a 1st level caster versus a 20th level caster. There is more to the game than expecting a caster to end a battle with a single spell.

 

[Orius]

No, magic resistance was just a flat percentage in 2e. Didn't matter whether the wizard was 1st level or 20th, 50% MR was still 50%.

As for saves, generally higher level characters and higher HD creatures had better saves and could avoid the effects of spells better. However, the High Level Campaigns book from the Player's Option series did have an optional rule that let level/HD affect the success of a save, so spells cast by high level wizards and priests or high HD monsters became harder to save against. This rule probably affected the newer saving throw system in 3e.