Worlds With Typical Amounts of Magic

"Typical" in this sense means the amount of magic present within the limits of an average AD&D® campaign world. In such worlds, magic is known to exist, but real wizards are regarded with awe and perhaps a little suspicion. Average people may be baffled by magic and others may be afraid of it, but all are impressed by its power.

Wizards are uncommon, especially those of higher levels. Novices wishing to master a particular school of magic may have to work hard to find a suitable mentor or academy. In some areas of the world, certain specialists may not even exist. Spell books, magical items, and magical monsters are relatively rare; finding one will probably be a major event in the life of any character.

To avoid violating the unique nature of magic in this type of world, the DM must be careful to set limits on the availability of magical items, spell books, and magical effects in general. He also may wish to limit the number of magic-users by deciding whether PCs can be multi-class or dual class characters with wizard or priest spells. In a campaign where such restrictions are in force, evil wizards will not need to be quite as powerful to be effective against a typical party. Without such restrictions, there are likely to be more magic-users in a party, meaning that evil wizards will need to be of higher levels to be effective opponents.

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