Learning new spells

Alrik:Handicraft describes articles, which explain old school roleplay as was common in the 70s or 80s. Overall these are things missing from OSRIC™.

Learning new spells is an important issue for scholastic spellcasters such as magic-users or illusionists. When playing such a class, the following two questions arise: when are you allowed to learn new spells, and which spells can you learn.

When do you learn new spells?

Magic-users start with four 1st-level spells in their spellbook. One of these spells is read magic, two more are chosen at random, and the last is freely selected by the player.

Illusionists begin with four 1st-level spells in their spellbook. Two of these spells are chosen at random, and the other two are freely selected by the player.

The randomly selected known spells are determined by rolling on the list of 1st level magic-user spells or illusionist spells. Illusionists roll a d12, magic users roll to determine a random number from 1-30 (see simulated dice).

When magic-users or illusionists gain a level, they gain another spell of their choice. It is advisable to choose a spell of the highest permitted level.

If a magic-user or illusionist comes across a spell scroll or the spellbook of a spellcaster of the same class, all spells can be copied, provided the spellcaster copying them can learn them. To do this, magic-users must use the read magic spell. Spell scrolls are destroyed during the copying process, but spellbooks are not. Copying consumes time, materials, money, and other resources, depending on the campaign. One probable cost is that each spell would require a special ink made of rare, symbolically and magically resonant ingredients. The more powerful a spell, the more exotic the ingredients would tend to be. In the course of their campaign, the GM can of course also abstract the acquisition of the ingredients and production of the ink and assign a price in gold to the ink depending on the level of the spell. At the same time, acquiring the ink ingredients for a particularly powerful spell or spellcaster can be an adventure in itself.

Example: Ink recipe for read magic

2 mL of ink from a giant squid
1 eagle feather
dust of crushed crystals
100 mL tears of fatigue

When the sun is at its highest point, the eagle feather must be slowly boiled in the tears of fatigue in a bronze vessel for five hours. This brew is strained with the utmost care and finally mixed with the ink and the crystal dust at the new moon.

Example: Procedure to determine the availability and price of ink for write

In small towns there is a 10% chance that the required ink will be available in an apothecary or alchemical laboratory. In cities this probability is doubled, i.e. 20%. The available ink is enough for 2-4 entries in the spellbook. It costs between 400 ep (200 gp) and 1 000 ep (500 gp).

When creating a character, magic-users and illusionists receive their first spellbook for free. Each spell requires as many pages as its level and each spellbook has a hundred pages. When the spellbook is full, a new, empty book must be purchased. To do this, purchase a "Spellbook (empty)" as indicated under equipment.

What spells can you learn?

Arkane spells (Classes: Ranger, Magic-user)
Phantasmic spells (Classes: Illusionist, Jester)
Heathen spells (Classes: Witch)

There are several methods for determining which spells you can learn. Method A describes a procedure that is used when leveling up; Method B describes a procedure that is used whenever a specific spell is available in a transferable form. For both methods, the following three numbers must be determined first based on intelligence and using the following table:

Probability of learning new spells (d%)
Known spells per level (minimum)
Known spells per level (maximum)

Method A: When leveling up

Which spells can be learned is determined during character creation and when leveling up, provided a new spellcasting level has been unlocked:

Class	Level to reach spell rank
Class	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9
Magic-user	01	03	05	07	09	12	14	16	18
Witch	01	03	05	07	09	12	14	16
Illusionist	01	03	05	07	10	12	14
Jester	04	06	08
Ranger	09	13

Then you go through the list of arcane or illusionist spells of the appropriate level in any order and roll d% to see if the spell could be learned if the opportunity arises.

As soon as you reach the maximum number of spells you can know per level, you stop. All remaining spells cannot be learned. Therefore, it is best to roll the dice first in an attempt to learn the specific spells you would like to learn.

Rerolling is only permitted if your intelligence score increases, or if you have rolled through the entire list and the minimum number of spells known per level has not been reached. In this case, you repeat the process until the minimum number of spells known per level has been reached.

Thus you have now determined which spells you could learn if given the opportunity. When such opportunity arises is explained in the previous section.

Method B: By transfer

Whenever the character has the spell at hand, you can determine whether they understand it, be it in the form of a scroll or a (certainly legally acquired) spellbook of another person. To determine that, a d% is rolled and compared with the probability of understanding new spells in the intelligence table. It is assumed that the spell is transferred if it can be understood. If it is not understood, such failure is recorded. A further attempt is only permitted if the character has already tried to understand all spells of the respective level once and the minimum number of known spells per level has not yet been reached. If the maximum number of known spells per level has been reached, the character cannot transfer any more spells of this level into their spellbook.

Example: Alrik the Preppy (MAU3, INT17)

Alrik has accidentally found a spell scroll in the depths of his robes containing the spell charm person and wants to transfer it to his spellbook. Because Alrik is practically a genius, he can learn up to 14 1st level spells and store them in his spellbooks. At the moment he only knows 8, so knowing a ninth spell would be no problem. He casts the spell read magic to read the spell. Alrik has a 75% chance of understanding a new spell. Alrik's player rolls a 65 with the d% and Alrik can now transfer the spell to his spellbook. The spell scroll is destroyed in the process.

Example: Rosella from the Fraundorfer Institute (MAU1, INT15)

Rosella has come into possession of a former colleague's spellbook and wants to copy friends into her own spellbook. She already knows 6 first-level spells and tries to understand the new spell, using read magic to do so. Rosella's player rolls an 89% and Rosella fails to understand the spell. Rosella's player makes a note of this, and further attempts to learn friends are not permitted until Rosella, after unsuccessfully attempting to learn all other first-level spells, still only knows 6 spells or fewer, which is the minimum number of known spells per level for a spellcaster with Intelligence of 15.