The Wizard: Knowledge and Magic

Wizards are my original favorite fictional archetype. Before I discovered the wonder of witches, wizards were my main Class to play and, to this day, I still love them. Some of my most beloved characters in fantasy fiction—Gandalf, Raistlin, Sparrowhawk, Eskarina Smith, Jayna Proudmoore—are wizards, so working on Dungeon World 2 (DW2)’s version of the Class was a pleasure, a privilege, and quite a challenge, all on its own.

Of course the main defining feature of The Wizard is their spells, the magical formulae they use to change the world through sheer power of will. Every fantasy game that’s ever had a wizard-type has had to deal with this question, and we sure did take inspiration from some of them for our version.

In my case, two of my favorite TTRPGs of all time are Ars Magica (4th Edition) and the Mage line from the original World of Darkness (Mage: The Sorcerer’s Crusade, Mage: The Ascension, and Dark Ages: Mage). These games have, in my humble opinion, the best magic systems, and were a great inspiration to design something similar for our Wizard.

As I already mentioned in my post introducing The Cleric, we wanted for the Alpha Playtest to give it a try to have all Classes fit in a double-sided sheet of paper with no extras. That meant that our first design choice for this stage was getting rid of the classic list of spells the Dungeon World 1 (DW1) had.

Another aspect that we knew from the get go we wanted to bring in was including the 8 Schools of Magic that were standardized in D&D from 3rd Edition onwards.

These have some issues of their own, mostly about where each spell fits; in one edition healing was in Necromancy, in the next in Conjuration. It can reasonably be argued to fit better in Abjuration or even Transmutation, and so on and so forth. But, in spite of the potential issues, the basis of the 8 schools is solid. It’s a good way to organize the study of arcana, it’s relatively intuitive (we think), and it has become an obvious way of expressing the wizard fantasy in different forms under the same overall Class umbrella, which was one of our priorities in our Class design.

With all of that in mind, let’s start with the Wizard preview.

Origins and Backstory

You weave the very fabric of reality, binding chaos into order and manifesting your will upon the world. While some hope for rain, you conjure storm clouds. While others travel for weeks between cities, you step between worlds in the blink of an eye. Some may fear and revile you for your gifts, but they do not know what magic is truly out there.

Ancestry: What do you look like? How does your ancestry affect your biology, behavior, and communication? How does it affect how you cast or study spells?

Culture: How does your culture view the study of magic? Was it openly supported, hid away in secret, or considered taboo? What belief or common practice of your people relates to the arcane, directly or indirectly?

Background: How was your life before adventuring? What led you to study magic out in the world, rather than in a tower or academy?

Backstory
At character creation, mark one Facet of your backstory and answer its associated questions:

☐ A bitter rival recently bested you in your latest conflict. Who are they? Did you always butt heads? Resolve this by proving your superiority or putting aside your differences for good.

☐ You were once involved with an obscure arcane cabal who wants you either back or gone. Who were you to them? What do you know of their plans? Resolve this by destroying or subjugating them.

☐ You've been researching a dangerous mystery, and are close to a breakthrough. What are you researching? What makes it dangerous? What do you need to take the next step? Resolve this by finishing or destroying your research.

Feature: Schools of Magic

The academic study of arcane magic is divided into eight main categories or “Schools”. Each School deals with a specific substance (in parenthesis after their name) and a few related verbs, either Adept or Master. Mark two Schools during character creation. You can only Weave Spells from Schools you’ve marked.

Abjuration (magic itself) ☐ Adept: banish, protect from ☐ Master: undo
Conjuration (objects or outsiders) ☐ Adept: create, summon ☐ Master: teleport
Divination (past, present, or future) ☐ Adept: discern, divine ☐ Master: scry
Enchantment (sapient beings) ☐ Adept: charm, modify emotions ☐ Master: bind
Evocation (elemental energies) ☐ Adept: channel, give shape ☐ Master: detonate
Illusion (perceptions) ☐ Adept: alter, trick ☐ Master: substantiate
Necromancy (life force) ☐ Adept: drain, limitedly imbue ☐ Master: create unholy
Transmutation (matter) ☐ Adept: repair, temporarily change ☐ Master: transmogrify

So, this is the big thing! The idea is that you now create spells by combining verbs + substances and then you Weave Spells. So, for example, if you mark Abjuration and Conjuration as Adept you can create spells that banish magic, protect from magic, create objects, create outsiders (creatures not native to the fantasy world you play in, like angels or demons), summon objects, or summon outsiders. But you aren’t limited to those! You can combine any verb with any substance you have access to, following the example above, you could banish objects or create magic, among many other combinations.

We hope that this flexibility allows for creativity and to truly express the fantasy of always having the right spell if you can think of a right combination.

Starting Moves

Prestidigitation
You can produce minor magical effects without much effort. Examples include but are not limited to: slowly moving small objects, creating minor obvious illusions, generating mild heat and sources of light, etc.

These may seem like minor effects, but they’re highly reliable and should provide our Wizards with something they can be creative without having to risk Weaving a Spell. This is so because we chose to make the casting of spells a risky, significant thing for the Alpha Playtest.

Speaking of, here’s the main Wizard Starting Move.

Weave a Spell
When you combine a marked verb and a substance into a magical effect, say what you want to happen and roll+Astute. *On a 7+, the effect is created successfully, but choose two from the list below. *On a 10+, only one:
- Lose access to the spell's verb or substance until you next finish Relaxing Together
- The spell is not exactly what you wanted; the GM will add an “and” or “but” to its effect
- Your magic draws unwanted attention

As you can see, this version of Weaving a Spell is powerful but always comes with a cost, even on a 10+. We wanted to make the costs interesting but not too punishing, as we want Wizards to cast spells constantly, and keep the drama and tension of doing so alive.

Equipment

Gear
Choose one from each line (or write your own with the GM’s permission):
☐ enormous spellbook ☐ glowing staff ☐ enchanted dagger
☐ astral robes ☐ inconspicuous cloak ☐ scorched leathers
☐ fireworks ☐ list of magical contacts ☐ unseen servant

Supplies
You start with adventuring supplies and magical supplies.
You also start with either ☐ academic supplies or ☐ alchemical supplies.

Advancements

When you Level Up, choose one of the following:
☐ ☐ Gain an Advanced Move from your Class
☐ ☐ Multiclass — Gain an Advanced Move from another Class
☐ ☐ +1 to any Stat (max. +2)
☐ +1 to two different Resistances
☐ Change to a new Class, then choose another Advancement
☐ Acquire a magic robe, staff, or tome
☐ Unlock another type of Supplies
☐ Mark a new School as Adept or Master an Adept one
☐ Mark another Facet of your backstory

After you've marked 5 above, you can also choose from the following list:
☐ ☐ ☐ Gain an Advanced Move from your Class
☐ Multiclass — Gain an Advanced Move from another Class
☐ +1 to any Stat (max. +2)
☐ +1 to any Stat (max. +3)
☐ Acquire an artifact robe, staff, or tome
☐ ☐ Mark a new School as Adept or Master an Adept one
☐ Unlimited Power. When you Push Yourself, instead of the normal options you may choose: "Treat an unmarked School as Adept, or an Adept School as Master, until the end of the scene."

With Unlimited Power, our “capstone” Move for The Wizard, we hope to provide veteran PCs with the last bit of oomph and flexibility necessary to pull off the most dramatic spells when they need them—usually just once per session.

Advanced Moves

Arcane Familiar
You have a magical companion in the form of a small animal innately connected to you. Who are they? What do they look like? How do they act? This companion is a mostly-harmless creature that usually acts as an extension of you, but as a Move the GM might have them act on their own. You can communicate telepathically with your familiar and, if you concentrate and they consent, you can perceive through their senses. If your familiar ever gets hurt, mark a condition.

Councel of the Wise
When you Rejuvenate Allies with advice and direction, tell them what you honestly think they should do. While they act to follow that advice, they have ᴀᴅᴠ the first time they roll.

We've updated most of the core moves since they were previewed weeks ago, including renaming many of them. Rejuvenate Allies used to be called Comfort or Support, and a few other moves below have similarly new names.

Deep Knowledge
When you Recall Knowledge, you may also ask Is this subject related to my established skills or Class? Like the other questions, gain +1 to the roll if the answer is “Yes”. Additionally, while you act on the GM's answer, you have ᴀᴅᴠ the first time you roll.

Perform a Magical Ritual
When you draw on a font of arcane power—object, person, or place—to create a magical effect, tell the GM what you’re trying to achieve. The GM will tell you, “Sure, no problem, but…” and then present you with 1 to 4 of the following requirements:
First you must ___________.
It’s going to take days/weeks/months.
It will require ___________.
The effect will be unreliable or limited.
You and your allies will risk ___________.
You’ll need help from ___________.
You’ll have to destroy ___________ to do it.

Once all requirements are fulfilled, the ritual is complete.
When you Push Yourself while Performing the Magical Ritual, you can "Ignore one Ritual requirement" instead of the normal choices.

We wanted to open up the possibility to perform magic in ritual form to all PCs. As with everything else during Alpha Playtest, this is highly subject to change depending on your feedback.

In the Name Is the Magic
You can Sense Motives of non-living things as if they were people, and you roll +Astute (instead of +Intuitive) when doing so, and you may ask about their functions and history as if they were thoughts and feelings.

Sense Motives is the new name we have for Read Someone.

A Very Good Tale
When you impress someone with your knowledge (magical or otherwise) to Exert Influence over them, you can roll+Astute no matter what approach you use.

We’ve rewritten Sway into Exert Influence and we’ve incorporated early feedback to make it so each approach uses a different Stat. This move allows Wizards (and other Astute characters) to get its benefits without needing to be Compelling, Sly, or Forceful (the basic options of Exert Influence right now).

And that’s it! With The Wizard we’ve previewed all of the Classes we’ll include in the Alpha Playtest. This also brings this batch of blog entries to a standby. The next entry will hopefully be the one that starts the playtest in earnest. After that we hope to add more entries as we update the Alpha doc, but that won’t be until later in the year.

Thank you all for your comments and feedback so far. We hope you’ll take the time to read and play with the Alpha rules, and give us as much feedback as possible. With your help we’re sure that we’ll come out on the other side with a great set of rules.

Until then, happy gaming!

Helena