Reliving the Magic: A Nostalgic Trip to Plymouth Meeting

Yesterday, I attended the Magic Memories Plymouth meeting, and it was truly a memorable experience. The meeting started with a warm welcome from the host, followed by an introduction to the theme of the event - magic memories. The room was beautifully decorated with colorful lights, and the atmosphere was filled with excitement. The first speaker of the evening shared their magical memories from their childhood, taking us back to a time of wonder and imagination. It was heartwarming to hear stories of how magic had played a significant role in shaping their lives and bringing joy to their families. The speaker also emphasized the importance of holding on to these memories and passing them on to future generations.

Next up, you determine movement with 2d10, with 10 entries provided - these can include phasing, jumping, levitating and the like, and the entries are presented in a concise manner. For attack method, we roll 1d10, with 7 entries, one of which is "multiple" - bash, spikes, etc. Some of these decrease damage die size, some enhance it, and projectiles are possible. After this, we come to the first half of what can be considered to be the "heart" of this book: The massive 1d100-tabke of distinctive features, quite a few of which do have game effects and sub-entries. Unless I have miscounted, a total of 54 entries are included in the table, though e.g. distinctive markings has its own 8-entry subcategory, while the 100th entry has 6 sub-entries, one of which could e.g. result in damage dealt to the creature exchanging souls with it. You roll on this table until the creature feels complete according to your own aesthetics.

Artworks are stunning, full-color, and littered throughout - from the cover to the interior artworks, they tend to be evolutions of the artwork of previous editions, which is a nice touch. In the end, I could have lived without the introductions and artwork, and would have preferred more content, but then again, I m a weirdo who is more impressed by content than awesome artwork.

The speaker also emphasized the importance of holding on to these memories and passing them on to future generations. Next, we were treated to a stunning magic show by a talented magician. His tricks were mind-boggling and left everyone in awe.

Random Spellbook Generator

Generating spellbooks is always a hassle. Each book is its own unique collection of spells, requiring considerably more care and effort to assemble than other classes of magical items. At the same time they tend to be throw-away items, something for the party wizard to study in his downtime before pawning it off. So I really don't want to put a lot of effort into making these things, especially if I'm just stocking the local magick shoppe with merchandise my wizard player might not even purchase.

I still plan on improving this further, but I feel it's far enough along to share it and get some feedback. I do plan on including more sources as well (in the immediate future, Ultimate Combat and Advanced Class Guide are priorities). Any feedback, questions, feature requests, or bug reports are welcome.

So can inappropriate spells be replaced with homebrew spells when they occur? If there is a GMs choice that comes up, that is just as well.

Fun. The only error I noticed in generating a handful of spellbooks was that Ear-Piercing Scream was misspelt.

It's quite interesting looking at such a spellbook and imagining what it says about the wizard who compiled it.

Do all spells have an equal chance of showing up, or are some spells more likely to occur?

Thanks for this! Lots of wizard NPCs in my games and my random spellbook generation has heretofore been very time-consuming.

So can inappropriate spells be replaced with homebrew spells when they occur? If there is a GMs choice that comes up, that is just as well.

Sure, the GM absolutely has final say over what they bring into their game. If you want to tweak these random spellbooks after generating them, power to you.

Fun. The only error I noticed in generating a handful of spellbooks was that Ear-Piercing Scream was misspelt.

It's quite interesting looking at such a spellbook and imagining what it says about the wizard who compiled it.

One of the first spellbooks I generated was a 5th level Evoker whose only two 3rd level spells were Daylight and Tiny Hut.

The occasional surreal result is one of the charms of using random generators.

Do all spells have an equal chance of showing up, or are some spells more likely to occur?

Spells from your specialty school are significantly more likely to appear, and spells from opposition schools won't appear. Otherwise yes, all spells have an equal chance of appearing. (Edit: also you're guaranteed at least one specialty school spell at every included spell level)

Adding some more weighting options is definitely something I'd consider doing. Weighting by source seems to be the easiest approach, and I could replace the checkboxes with weighting sliders for each source to give the user control over that. Weighting by individual spell may be more problematic since there's no way I could fit that on the user interface, so I'd need to apply my own subjective discretion to determine what the weighting should be. Still, this would allow iconic spells like fireball, dispel magic, or invisibility to be prioritized. I'm definitely open to any suggestions people may have on the matter.

This is a nice tool, but it would be nice to have some spells always in the list. i.e. an Evoker will always have fireball. A weighting system may be a way to do this.

Opposition school spells still should show up, but with a low chance. Some spells are occasionally worth two spell slots to mem.

Support for elementalists would be nice too.

This is a nice tool, but it would be nice to have some spells always in the list. i.e. an Evoker will always have fireball. A weighting system may be a way to do this.

I wouldn't say that Evokers would always have Fireballs, but weighting such an iconic spell higher than others makes a lot of sense to me. The difficult question is which spells and how much higher should they be weighted. That's a very subjective question.

I think I will make an effort this weekend to rework the back-end randomizer to support more nuanced weighting. I'm not sure how I'm going to weight the spells, but I'll get the support in there so that it's not a pain to implement in future. At very least this will let me introduce opposition spells as being unlikely rather than impossible.

Support for elementalists would be nice too.

Yeah, I think that's doable. I'm adding it to the to-do list.

Time wizards are more likely to have expeditious retreat and haste. Less likely to have slow and hold person.

I've updated the spellbook generator. The program now supports elemental specialization and opposition options, and has a toggle to specify the maximum number of pages the spellbook can contain.

Note that unlike the conventional spell schools, the elemental options are Wizard exclusive and will have no effect if you try to use them on other classes. The spellbook generator also has an upper limit on how much content it will generate for a single spellbook, so there's no point to having spellbooks with four digit page counts (the theoretical maximum is 720 pages used, but realistically you probably won't see higher than 500 even with a 20th level Wizard)

I've already done a lot of work towards supporting spell weighting, and the bulk of the work now is in actually deciding which spells to give increased weighting to. Some are obviously iconic, like Magic Missile or Invisibility or Dispel Magic, but there are a lot of spells that straddle that line. Glitterdust, Black Tentacles, or Sending; spells that are very common, but not really iconic in the way the three I mentioned earlier.

@Goth Guru: I won't be weighting by theme. I am definitely open to general suggestions of which spells should be weighted highly for any Wizard. Both Haste and Slow are very iconic Transmutation spells in my view, for instance.

I wouldn't say that Evokers would always have Fireballs, but weighting such an iconic spell higher than others makes a lot of sense to me. The difficult question is which spells and how much higher should they be weighted. That's a very subjective question.

From disappearing objects to predicting cards, his performance had us on the edge of our seats. It was incredible to witness the power of magic and how it can captivate an audience. During the break, there was an opportunity to mingle with fellow attendees and share our own magical memories. It was heartening to hear stories from different people and to realize that magic holds a special place in everyone's lives, regardless of age or background. The conversations were filled with laughter and nostalgia, creating a sense of community among the attendees. After the break, there was a panel discussion with experts in the field of magic. They shared their insights into the history of magic and how it has evolved over the years. The panelists also discussed the impact of magic on society and its power to bring people together. It was fascinating to hear about the role of magic in various cultures and how it has influenced art, literature, and entertainment. The meeting concluded with a closing note from the host, expressing gratitude to everyone for attending and making the event a success. Overall, the Magic Memories Plymouth meeting was a magical evening filled with laughter, wonder, and connection. It reminded us of the power of magic to create lasting memories and bring joy into our lives. I left the meeting feeling inspired and grateful for the experience, eager to create more magical memories of my own..

Reviews for "Creating Lasting Memories: Magic Memories Plymouth Meeting Edition"

- Emily - 2 stars - I was really disappointed with the Magic Memories Plymouth Meeting. The show was not very well put together and the performances felt amateurish. The magic tricks were predictable and the overall atmosphere was lackluster. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone looking for a quality magic show.

- James - 1 star - The Magic Memories Plymouth Meeting was a complete waste of time and money. The performers seemed unprepared and the tricks were poorly executed. The jokes fell flat and the audience interaction was awkward. Save your money and skip this one.

- Sarah - 2 stars - I had high hopes for the Magic Memories Plymouth Meeting, but unfortunately, it didn't live up to expectations. The show lacked originality and the tricks were cliché. The pacing was off and it felt like the performers were just going through the motions. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone looking for a unique and captivating magic experience.

From Laughter to Joy: Creating Magic Memories at Plymouth Meeting