The Magic Scroll I Was Looking For...

I seem to recall making a list of all of the spells in the AD&D Player's Handbook. It was a text file, I am sure. As I look around, I can't find what I did with it. It could have been decades ago, it could be on a floppy.

I'm sure if I searched long enough and hard enough, I would find it.

Google directed me to Pandaria.rpgworlds.info, which has a file sort of like what I want. That website is full of Old School goodness. Check out the top level, here. It looks to a multi-session game log. I can't wait to read it.

Ok, I digress. Back to the task at hand.

I want a list of spells, just the names, from PHB, as close to text only as possible. I needed to recreate the file.

So I got working. Here are the results:

Spreadsheet file for Google Drive.
A Spreadsheet file as HTML page.
A Doc file for Google Drive.
A Doc file as HTML page.

Now, I have better than what I wanted. Feel free to use and share this AD&D Spell List.

At the Table: Those wacky players.

Ah, my wacky players. I pretty much play fast and free with spell casting characters. In the first session, I note which spells they like and then take that into concentration when planning combat.

Theoretically, AD&D magic users should have a limited number of spells. When I plan a combat session, I write down what I want the bad guys to have.

Sometimes, this goes to wanting a specific flavor and other times I fall on the side of "team evil" and use those spells to hose the player characters with significant casting issues. Darkness, light, and silence spells can inflict horrible effects on spell casters, so I am generally pretty careful with them.

What makes my players so wacky is, I can't help but notice that the first couple of sessions, they riff through the spell list and just pick one to cast. After a few levels and encounters, I have flat out caught players casting off a list when they had been picking and choosing among all of the spells a session before.

In every case, the limited choices are comprised of scrolls and spell books found as treasure. What the heck?

Ah, dang. The players go from winging it at low levels to wanting a specific effect or flavor when playing more advanced, knowledgeable characters.

Should I hand out XP for quietly imposing limitations on one's self? I just might. What about you? Let me know in the comments below.

52 Weeks of Magic - 17 of 52 - Missile Mirror

The Missile Mirror is a handy defensive item for spell casters, although any character can benefit a little from it.

The mirror is about 4" in diameter and has a rune of a satyr in a sun on the back. The front is concave and silvered. Used as is, the reflected image is distorted. It is intended that the user "black" the silvered surface over a candle, place it on a tabletop and fill it with water. This produces a crystal clear reflection. The device reveals some of it's magic by repulsing the candle black on command. The black residue forms a small pellet and can be dumped out. It can be used to make paints, inks, dyes or cosmetics. The pellet will have a value of one copper, so it is not a good source of money but will replace a candle or few.

Possession of the Missile Mirror will improve the owner's AC by 1. Anyone can benefit from this. Holding the Mirror out towards missile fire will improve a spell caster's AC by 3 (total). Additionally, spell casters will have a 40% magic resistance to magical missiles AND if successful at foiling such an attack, it has a 20% chance of reflecting the spell back on the caster.

Foiling magical missile attacks uses one charge. Reflecting magical missile attacks uses two charges. The Missile Mirror has 16 charges. The rays of the sun are a visual indicator of these charges and will pit and dent when a charge is used. If all of the charges are used up, the Missile Mirror will still provide a -1 to AC for simply having it and will still be a useful mirror.

The Missile Mirror can be recharged by a silversmith of great ability. By repairing the pits and dents on the rays, they are restoring a charge. While the mirror can be damaged by abuse, an attempt at recharging it will never damage it. Failure to restore a charge causes the smith's patch to bubble and hiss before being absorbed into the mirror's structure. The materials needed to repair each ray is 20 silver pieces or a like-sized slug, bar or ingot. The makeup of such repair materials doesn't matter, only the size or volume counts. Some people use spoons.

Navigation

Week	Item	Week	Item	Week	Item	Week	Item
1	Magic Lamps	2	The Rat Bag	3	Emulous Cursed Sword	4	The Cloak of Peaceful Repose
5	The Cowl of Death	6	Scimitar of Smiting	7	The Symbol of Sol Invictus	8	The Equi Phalera
9	Libertatem	10	Sorrow	11	Aemilla Carna	12	The Obice Cardeam
13	The Gnollish Rattlebone	14	Bands of Roland	15	Shape of Memory	16	Defender's Boss
17	Missile Mirror	18	Stone Horse	19	Staff of Eyes	20	Helm of Aware Airs
21	Potion of the Lionhearted	22	The Unnamed Potion	23	Whispering Wings	24	Monk's Bane
25	Token of Infi	26	Coming Soon	27	Coming Soon	28	Coming Soon

Now, the commercial. I have a little book called Zero to Hero: Uncommon Commoners, over at DrivethruRPG. I am obviously thinking of writing another and Gnolls might be the subject. Please let me know what you think in the comments.