With the 3E rules, does anyone play magicians in their campaigns? Any house rules?
I have a player who runs a magician. He’s a land holding noble in central Roesone who is an active agent/patron of the Ruornil temples.
The player isn’t overly knowledgable about the Birthright game world, so there isn’t really much difference (as far as he’s concerned anyway) between the magician and the wizard.
I hd him use the rules from Doom’s manual, and so far it has worked well I suppose. (The character was designed as a crusty, disinterested, frail old man, so it makes adventuring a bit difficult.)
I use them as NPCs mostly since few (sane) players of mine would actually want to play a magician over a true wizard! I use one house rules though; blooded magicians(very rare I admit, blooded tend to go for true mages, but there are a few of them) get the ability to cast divination and illusion battle and realm magic spells as if they were true mages provided they learn the spell.
Tell me why anyone would want to play a magician or a non-blooded character for that matter. My as well play in a regular D & D realm.
The Magician is rather weak honestly, but it IS an interesting character concept… Basically a specialist in two schools; illusion and divination. Normally you can only be a specialist in one school(except one exception from the FR campaign; the bloody Red Wizards, but anyhow), and I think that makes magician interesting. Really, I have thought a few times to play a magician source regent. Why? I think it would prove an interesting alternative since the character would focus on realm magic like Scry(very useful spell btw, if used well) as well as illusory effects to defeat his opponents rather than the classic Mass Destruction, Summoning, Legions of the Dead and Warding spells.
You could be surprised how effective a magician would be if he had access to realm and battle magic, and actually worked to develop 2-3 spells of his own…
However magicians are incapable of true magic and thus would not be able to tap into the powers of a source. You would have to ignore the rules to make a Magician Source Regent. That may make magicians way too powerful if they could tap into the powers of sources.
Not everyone can be a regent Eldred. It was mostly likely an attempt by the designers to prevent every two-bit wanna be wizard from attacking and trying to seize power of sources. It would have been kind of annoying to allow every wizard in the realm use sources. The mage wars would have been devestating.
Since magic is so limited in my campaign the only real use for magicians in my world is street magic and parlor tricks. Mostly cantrip type stuff, with little chance of higher than lvl 2 spells.
Remember I’m talking about BLOODED magicians, not people who can’t learn true magic, but people who have actually chosen to put aside the standard way of studying magic to focus on the so-called ‘lesser arcanas’. Their bloodlines however may allow them to achieve such level of mastery in them that they should be able to use battle spells and realm spells, but only from their two specialty schools. They would likely still be much weaker than any true mage; but… they might be able to surprise those who underestimate the powers of the ‘lesser arcana’.
Ok but why?
Noone would play one I guess. However, the Magician is a very interesting class on its own, and as presented in Travis Doom manuals quite balanced.
I had a PC playing a Brecht Rogue/Magician (very interesting combination!) and we really enjoyed it.
I’ve never been adverse to the existence of magicians, they actually would work very well as one of those commoner classes, such as the ones presented in the DMG. A playable one at that. They definately work better as NPCs to amaze and annoy.
Yes Gargamel but would you play one as a PC in Birthright?
I played a magician (2E AD &D) long ago. The DM made birthright a low magic campaign. The campaign was more typical D&D until we played King of the Giant Downs and the group’s Paladin became ruler. My magician character was kind of a wily counselor advising the group’s “leader” a paladin on magic and statecraft. In a wilderness setting any magic was a big deal. Also with the experience bonuses nonblooded charaters received, my character got to 8th level while the blooded characters were around 6th.
I think that the magican (and non-blooded characters) are worth playing, but it depends on the type of campaign.
However, the suggestion was for a blooded magician and I am not sure why anyone would want one of these!
How about just for the challenge of playing one, good roleplaying can make any type of character fun to play.
Like you would know anything about that Lord Shaene 
All I gotta say about this one is that “can you imagine what a highly skilled magician would be capable of in a diplomatic setting?” His abilities at scrying and illusory magic would grant amazing advantages if used properly.
As to whether or not I’d play a magician (blooded or not) in Birthright the answer is yes. As a matter of fact, if my present character decides to die on me a magician is what I was planning on bringing in.
Well let us know how it goes and if it is any fun to play!
I think that depends on the makeup of the magician class -there are currently a lot of different versions out there.
If your DM uses a magician class that is on par with the other PC classes, I’d say yes. For those who use the magican as another type of adept, I’d say no.
Arlen makes the best argument however for the use of a blooded magician!