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Multi-Classing a Wild Mage

simAlitysimAlity Member Posts: 64
My understanding is that this can't be done. If I'm wrong, then this post will be a huge waste of time. What am I saying? It will probably be a huge waste of time no matter what. But at least I will get this off my chest.

I really think it ought to be possible to multi-class a wild mage. Wild mages are born, not made. They don't choose to be wild mages and from what Neera says they don't do really have to train all that hard either. It comes naturally.

But what if a wild mage didn't want to be a mage? What if they are like Valgar and despise magic? They'd still be a wild mage, because it's not something that can be shrugged off, but couldn't they also study to be something else? Something that they *wanted* to be? Like a cleric? Or a ranger?

From a gameplay perspective I can see problems with trying to dual class a wild mage. Dual classing turns off the old class and wild magic *can't* be turned off. But why not give Wild Mages the opportunity to multi-class? To balance things out, you (BeamDog) could say that a multi-classed wild mage is *more* prone to wild surges and that sometimes their magic will cause their weapons to break.

What does everyone else here think?

Comments

  • FrancoisFrancois Member Posts: 452
    A wild mage who didn't want to be a mage anymore would probably die very quickly. It takes constant vigilence to avoid blowing yourself up by accident. For regular races, I assume wild magic requires complete focus to control and leaves no time to seriously learn other trades. Like sorcerers, they can't put it aside, so they have to constantly work on it. It would be interesting to include a special race that could multiclass as a wild mage, a race that is more attuned to chaos, like the githzerai.


  • AstroBryGuyAstroBryGuy Member Posts: 3,437
    Actually, there's nothing the wild mage kit description that suggests wild magic is an innate trait.
    WILD MAGE: Wild magic is a new type of magic that is characterized by powerful and dangerous surges of unpredictable magic. Generally considered to be an unfortunate byproduct of the Time of Troubles, wild magic has recently begun to attract the attention of many a curious or scholarly wizard.

    Wild Mages are wizards who specialize in the study of wild magic. They have access to spells to protect themselves from wild magic and bend it to their wills. Wild magic is extremely unpredictable and should be used with caution.
    The Spells & Magic sourcebook also refers to wild magic as a "theory of magic" and "field of study", not something innate. That would support the view that wild mages are specialist wizards, just ones in a rather esoteric field. And a specialist wizard can't be multiclassed (except for gnomes).

    I always thought the way Neera describes her abilities with magic, that she fit a sorcerer better than wizard.
  • VallmyrVallmyr Member, Mobile Tester Posts: 2,459
    I think it's in D&D 5e that Wild Mage is a Sorcerer sub-class archetype thing.
  • simAlitysimAlity Member Posts: 64



    I always thought the way Neera describes her abilities with magic, that she fit a sorcerer better than wizard.

    Fair point....I was going off of Neera's description rather than the kit description. Didn't realize how big a discrepancy there was between them. OTOH, the kit's description is the stand-out anomaly. Not Neera.

    The Wild Mages at the Hidden Refuge seem to consider their abilities to be inborn/involuntary as well. I mean can you really see "King" Graham studying magic? Or what about Zaviak? I can't see him studying anything except possibly alchemy. Then there was the little boy, Kirk (sp?). His mother heavily implied that he was born with the gift. Then there was Mereth, the little girl, who seemed too young to be studying anything other than her ABCs.
  • AstroBryGuyAstroBryGuy Member Posts: 3,437
    edited July 2015
    simAlity said:



    I always thought the way Neera describes her abilities with magic, that she fit a sorcerer better than wizard.

    Fair point....I was going off of Neera's description rather than the kit description. Didn't realize how big a discrepancy there was between them. OTOH, the kit's description is the stand-out anomaly. Not Neera.

    The Wild Mages at the Hidden Refuge seem to consider their abilities to be inborn/involuntary as well. I mean can you really see "King" Graham studying magic? Or what about Zaviak? I can't see him studying anything except possibly alchemy. Then there was the little boy, Kirk (sp?). His mother heavily implied that he was born with the gift. Then there was Mereth, the little girl, who seemed too young to be studying anything other than her ABCs.
    The description is from the original BG2-TOB, so it pre-dates the introduction of Neera and her quest by over a decade. It is also consistent with (and largely drawn from) the description of wild magic in the Tome of Magic AD&D sourcebook.

    What Beamdog really should have done was create a "Wild Sorcerer" kit for Neera and the refugees. That would be more consistent with how their abilities are presented. They are not presented in a fashion consistent with the pre-existing Wild Mage.
    Post edited by AstroBryGuy on
  • elminsterelminster Member, Developer Posts: 16,315
    edited June 2015
    I've always viewed wild mages from the perspective that it is a different approach to casting magic. Not in the sense that it is innately acquired, but rather that it is more of a personal preference. After years of study or casting magic Wild Mages would eventually get to the point where they are too used to casting their spells in a way that incorporates some amount of wild magic to go back to more traditional methods.
  • FrancoisFrancois Member Posts: 452
    Wild mages may sound more like sorcerers, but sorcerers and wizards both learn actual arcane spells. Sorcerers just don't have to prepare them in advance. A purely untrained wild-magic person would just have wild surges for unknown reasons. I think the ''wild'' part is innate, but the ''mage'' part is acquired.

    Becoming a Mage is just one way to learn to control that energy. I think an interesting idea would have been to make a ''Wild'' kit for every spellcaster class, even clerics and druids.
  • ZanathKariashiZanathKariashi Member Posts: 2,869
    Wild mages are a kit, not a specialization.

    Specialists can take kits as long as they meet the school requirements for that kit (each mage kit has specific schools that a mage needs access to or they can't become that kit), though the Wild Mage specifically requires all schools.

    Early in their careers during training a prospective Wild Mage becomes interested in the study of Wild Magic zones and begins spending a lot of time there studying it's effects, until they become so proficient at wielding the wild magic that their entire connection to the weave becomes distorted and Wild magic zones become "normal" to them and the rest of the world functions more like Wild Magic (although their better control minimizes the risks substantially to only a small chance of spells going wrong as opposed to garuntee of their spells going wrong like Wild Magic normally does aside for 2% of the time).

    It's possible that Neera and the Enclave were merely gifted children that had the misfortune of learning their art right in the middle of the Time of Troubles (which was roughly ~10 years before the start of BG1) where the entire world became a Wild Magic zone for close to a year, until the Avatar Crisis ended.
  • AstroBryGuyAstroBryGuy Member Posts: 3,437
    edited July 2015

    Wild mages are a kit, not a specialization.

    Specialists can take kits as long as they meet the school requirements for that kit (each mage kit has specific schools that a mage needs access to or they can't become that kit), though the Wild Mage specifically requires all schools.

    In PnP, wild mages are not a kit, they are a non-traditional specialization (of course, the Infinity Engine uses specializations for "mage kits", so the distinction is not important in IE games).

    In Tome of Magic, wild mages are introduced, but there are no "kits" presented in that book at all. Although the Tome does state that Wild Mages are not "traditional specialists", it does say that "[l]ike their traditional specialist brethren, wild mages have thrown themselves into the intense study of a single aspect of magic." They are presented as an alternative to traditional specialists, not as a kit.

    In the Complete Wizard's Handbook, which does present Wizard kits, there is no mention of the Wild Mage as a kit.

    Player's Option: Spells and Magic lists Wild Mages under the "Specialists in Schools of Thaumaturgy" section. The description of wild mages in that book says: "Like other specialists, they gain the bonus memorized spell at each level."
  • xscott71xxscott71x Member Posts: 63
    I don't know why OP couldn't use EEKeeper to make the wild mage a multiclass. Change race to elf (or any other multiclass friendly race) in the Characteristics tab, and the desired appearance in the Appearance tab.

    What I really would like to know is how to multiclass a sorcerer. As said before, sorcerers don't choose to be sorcerers, their abilities are innate, so why can't an (N)PC develop another skill such as melee, thieving, or divine magics as their sorcerer abilities scale proportionately?
  • AstroBryGuyAstroBryGuy Member Posts: 3,437
    xscott71x said:

    I don't know why OP couldn't use EEKeeper to make the wild mage a multiclass. Change race to elf (or any other multiclass friendly race) in the Characteristics tab, and the desired appearance in the Appearance tab.

    What I really would like to know is how to multiclass a sorcerer. As said before, sorcerers don't choose to be sorcerers, their abilities are innate, so why can't an (N)PC develop another skill such as melee, thieving, or divine magics as their sorcerer abilities scale proportionately?

    Possible multi- (and dual-) classes are hardcoded into the IE engine, and there are no sorcerer multi-classes available.

    It is apparently possible with GemRB.

    http://gibberlings3.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=22755
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