On Fri, 12 Dec 1997, J. D. Lail wrote:
> Something that has been bothering me for sometime is the existance
> of the Magian. This mage becomes a Lich using only the spells of
> that class. Assuming Blood Enemies is correct he came to Cerilia
> Unblooded. To reiterate, in order to cast the spells needed to become
> a Lich he should be blooded, he wasn't, big contradiction, how did he
> do it ?

Is this going to prompt an evil grin from Carrie or Ed?

I'd imagine there's all sorts of nasty stuff in the Magian's history.
AFAIK he comes from Djapar, and the Basarji were also fleeing from the
Shadow, it's a safe bet that Djapar isn't a very nice place anymore.
There's probably all sorts of gribbly stuff going on over there.

> The only way I can think of is by an application of spell level
> alteration rules. (See Jan 98 Dragon Magazine *)
>
> * I am very supportive of these "rules" since they duplicate almost exactly
> my rules on the same subject done 16 years ago.

I don't think they reflect the damage progression in mage spells very
well - after third level the damage that I/E spells do plateaus for a
good three to four levels. Instead of increasing the damage, mid-level
invocation spells do damage in different ways (cold, damage over time,
less effective saves.

They're nice guildlines, but no substitute for thorough DM
consideration. I wouldn't let a PC use them to justify a spell that I
didn't approve of, but as working guidelines they're handy.

neil