What's in a Wand?
November 21st, 2011
Wands. My initial reaction to wands is to say that they are the most boring kind of magic item in the entire game. Upon closer examination, however, this is clearly not true. They’re more like the third most boring kind of magic items in the entire game, after armor and staves.
No doubt this statement has inflamed a number of you who feel that I am incorrect, and that wands, armor, or staves are more or less boring than I say they are, so let me take a moment to quantify why I’ve put them where I have.
Armor, to my mind, is the most boring kind of magic item for two reasons. First, it is purely defensive, which, in general, is less exciting than things that are offensive (this is not a hard and fast rule, but in general, the inability to be affected by something in the game world is a lot less exciting than the ability to affect something in the game world). Secondly, armor rarely contains activated abilities. For that matter, armor abilities rarely tend to be anything more than an AC bonus, possibly resistance to precision damage, and possibly energy resistance. Few armor special abilities from the core book are any good, and the ones that are tend to fall into the above categories. All in all, unless your armor is bringing your AC to the point where enemies literally cannot hit or cannot harm you (in which case you probably have it at a lower level than you should), it’s rarely cause for excitement.
Staves are a bit more difficult, and in fact I think there are a number of solid arguments for why staves could be more exciting than wands. For one thing, they are (as of Pathfinder, anyway) inherently rechargeable, so they don’t share a wand’s problem of being disposable. Second, staves occasionally have cool and unique abilities in addition to just being a reservoir of extra spells, which definitely adds to the “cool” factor. Unfortunately, nearly all staves don’t have any cool or unique abilities, so that doesn’t really matter. And they recharge by eating up one of your daily spell slots, which, mid-adventure, eats up most of what makes staves and wands cool in the first place (getting extra spells in a day). Finally, staves are far more expensive, making them a much greater investment, and typically what you get is something that may last longer than a wand, and double as a quarterstaff, but it can’t actually cast as many extra spells in a given day as a wand can.
And that’s really what makes a wand cool (or, rather, cooler than the average staff): if you wanted to, you could blow all 50 charges on an extra 50 spells, right then and there. Plus, if you drop all your gold on it, or buy partially-used wands, you can get access to spells you shouldn’t have access to, yet. Or, to put it another way…
Wands are cool when they let you break the game.
Now, this is obviously hyperbolic, but the point is, there are only two reasons to be excited about a wand: either you’re casting spells you’re not supposed to have, or you’re casting a lot more spells than you’re supposed to have. You don’t get excited about a wand because it does some cool, unique thing. Wands don’t do that. They don’t exist, it seems, to be sexy, fun items that appeal to players who enjoy the experience of the game (“Timmys,” to borrow a phrase from Magic: the Gathering design philosophy). Rather, they exist as a utility that can be used by min/maxers who are trying to break the game, and players who value efficiency and economy of game resources (“Johnnys” and “Spikes,” to continue with Magic parlance).
Now, that choice of wording probably portrays the former in a good light and the latter in a poor light, and that’s because, frankly, I tend to infinitely prefer the former to the latter, especially in D&D or Pathfinder, where there’s really no upside to “breaking the game.” But, really, that’s not fair. There are a lot of people who derive great enjoyment from creating the strongest build possible, usually as an intellectual exercise rather than to ruin everyone else’s fun, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Wands serve an important role in the game, and it’s important to have these sorts of “spell in a can” items that allow players to cast spells, well, just like they were opening up a can of Merlin Brand Magic Missile: For when you can’t afford to miss.
Those of you who keep apprised of Necromancers of the Northwest’s .pdf products are probably aware that we’ve put out products designed to “fix” both of the two magic item types that I listed as the most boring, The Ebon Vault: Secrets of the Staff, and The Ebon Vault: Adamant Armors, respectively. You might be wondering whether or not a wand-themed Ebon Vault is on its way down the pipeline.
I’ve certainly considered it, and taken a close look at it, because, believe me, I want to do something to make wands a lot more varied and, well, interesting. The listing I gave above about what magic items were the most boring? That was from a player perspective. There’s no question about the most boring magic items from a game design perspective: wands, potions, and scrolls. Hands down. Why? Because you can’t actually do anything with them. They cast a spell when used. Period. End of discussion.
We have experimented a little bit with wands and potions, in the past. Into the Armory contained both the randomized wand and the randomized potion, which are essentially normal versions of those two items, except that they have four different spells stored in them, and the spell that actually gets used is determined randomly (once with the potion, with each casting with the wand). In retrospect, they’re a bit of a rules nightmare, but the intent gets across pretty clear, and I doubt anyone would have difficulty using either of them. I think that they’re cute items, and would make for fun treasure (if clearly labeled), but I doubt if any players will actually have their characters buy or craft the things.
The problem with creating interesting wands (or potions, or scrolls) is that if you deviate too far from the norm, they really stop working as potions or wands. For example, if I decided to make a wand, that, I don’t know, granted a +1 bonus to caster level for all spells you cast while wielding it, well, it wouldn’t be a wand except that the item’s description says it is. The definition of a wand is pretty straightforward, and wands kind of already do exactly what they want to do, without needing any changes.
Still, I’d like to find a way to make wands more fun and exciting (preferably without making them less utilitarian), and, if I succeed, you may very well see The Ebon Vault: Wands of Wonder advertised on a banner at the top of the site here. In the meantime, though, if you’re looking for exciting magic items, you’ll probably have to look elsewhere.
I’m interested to hear your thoughts on the matter. Feel like wands are great how they are, and don’t want to see new wands of any kind? Think you’ve found a more boring kind of magic item? Have an idea for how to make wands cooler without making them not really wands anymore? Send me an e-mail at ariggs@necromancers-online.com.
Thanks for reading. Enjoy Wand Week.