A campaign without magic-users

[Michael Hopcroft]

Has anyone ever run a fantasy campaign in which none of the PCs can use magic? Maybe magic is a closely-guarded secret that none of the PCs got in on. Maybe magic is forbidden or inherently corrupting, and only villains use it.

IN any event, how does that change the game?

[Markdoc]

I ran exactly such a game once a week for the last 2 and a half years - although I allowed talents. I also ran a similar no-magic game once a week for a year, a few years.

Both went fine. PCs in fact COULD use magic, but I had hedged it about with limitations so that magic use was difficult and dangerous in combat or combat-related situations. Very few NPCs had magical powers either (4, I think, out of hundreds).

There are several points: without easy access to magic, the players have to think more. It makes the GM's job much easier as there are fewer strange contingencies you have to plan for.

Finally, you need to plan scenarios so that rest time is possible to make allowances for the fact that when the players get badly hurt, they need a while to recover.

I have also played in games where none of the players had magical power, and all of those games were also great (among the best, I have played in, truthfully). The key seems to be to balance it off. If the players have no magic, it's not fun to face them off against foes with lots of magic unless "get the magic-user" is the point - in which case there needs to be a compensating weakness.

cheers, Mark