spells for the after school class

Explanation: Tavis and I are running an after school Dungeons & Dragons program for some elementary school kids.  Most of our prep consists of wishing we’d done more prep while on the subway to class.  But I made up this list of spells for the Magic-User.

Every morning, Magic-Users can cast different spells! Roll the d12 a number of times equal to your level, and look on the chart for the spell matching that number. If you roll a spell once, you can only cast it one time a day. If you rolled a spell more than once, you can cast it that number of times per day. So, if you rolled Fire Ball twice, you could cast it twice in one day, but not three times.

 

Roll	Spell	What Does the Spell Do?
1	Animate Dead	You create a number of zombies equal to your level, who obey your orders.
2	Anti-Magic Shell	For 1 hour a shimmering aura around you blocks all magic, including yours.
3	Charm Person	Unless the target resists with Will, he or she becomes your friend for 1 day.
4	Contact Weirdo	Ask an angel, demon, or space alien several yes-or-no questions ( # = level ).
5	Disintegrate	Point at a target. Unless it resists with Fortitude, it is destroyed completely.
6	Fire Ball	Everyone within 20 feet of the target must roll Reflex or take 5d6 damage.
7	Haste	For 1 fight, you and your friends move double-fast and attack twice a turn.
8	Hold Portal	Magically seals a doorway, trapdoor, etc. For 10 minutes, no one can open it.
9	Locate Object	Name an object: this spell will point you in the right direction to find it.
10	Phantasmal Force	You create an illusion that lasts for 10 minutes. Enemies resist with Will.
11	Polymorph Self	You can take the shape of any animal for up to 1 hour, but you cannot talk.
12	Wall of Ice	Your breath becomes a huge icy surface – a wall, a bridge, a dome . . .

 

Magic-User Research

Each time you gain a level, you can spend one thousand gold coins to research a new spell! The spell can be anything you want. This new spell takes the place of another one on the list. You can choose what spell it replaces. (Example: I don’t like Hold Portal, so my new spell replaces it.) If you don’t have one thousand gold coins, you’ll have to find more treasure or persuade people to fund your work.

Here are ideas for research. Ancient books mention these spells, but I don’t know what they do!

• Turn to Slime
• Perfume of Trickery
• Zolobachai’s All-Powerful Laxative
• Contagious Dancing
• Maldoor’s Lesser Apocalypse
• Hazart’s Infinite Sandwich
• Speak with Ghost Sharks
• Levitate Head
• Turn Light to Amber
• Summon Monkey Butler
• Xindi’s Cupcake of Insanity



Commentary: random selection isn’t just done for its own sake, but rather to force the children (especially little boys fixated on killing things) to think laterally.  The best part of playing a Magic-User in a “real” game is the Eureka! moment when you figure a great use for a seemingly lame spell.  The kids, in particular, are in love with Wall of Ice.  At one point in Tavis’s game, they proposed using Wall of Ice to create an airtight bubble to survive an ICBM flight outside of the Earth’s atmosphere.

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