Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Any class cast any spell on any scroll?

I am not familiar with modern D and D. But can a fighter pick up a scroll of magic missile and caste it? I thought the whole concept for magic was that Armor interferes with spells? that's why mages can't wear armor? Also, is not magic learned? don't you have to study it and learn it to use it?

Seems to me that is like just anyone picking up an electrical plan house blue print and wiring your house up with it, without any prior training or knowledge? Does D&D 5e allow this?

or is this an attempt to make some classes not needed? we don't need a mage we can just get a scroll sort of thing? We don't need a cleric we can just eat the food, giving players more flexibility on party make up?

5e doesn't allow that, it's a Larian house rule.

To use a spell scroll you have to have that spell on your class spell list. If the spell is of higher level than is available for you to cast, even Wizards have to roll an Intelligence check to successfully cast it or the spell simply disappears from the scroll.

Yeah, it's a bit of a cheap feeling when any class can be a Wizard or a Cleric with just consumable items. I hope they change that soon.

From what i understand/ have read Larian is focusing on difficult thing first, leaving easy fixes like spell learning towards the end.

Actually, I don't see a problem that other classes can use that scrolls.
There is always more to do for the non-magic classes, especially in the lower levels.
There are quite a few useful scrolls in the game, and since rest will eventually be available much more often than in a typical PnP game, it means that they are not obsolete.
I would treat this as a harmless homebrew like using potions as a bonus action.

Any 8 Int Fighter being able to cast Fireballs from scrolls is "harmless homebrew"? How about Blur and Mirror Image? Eldritch Knights will feel so special when any other Fighter can be a spellcaster too and steal their unique perks, while also using their own Battlemaster or Champion stuff the EK doesn't get.

Then there's simply making magic feel cheap and illogical in the setting when it's widely available to anyone regardless of class or stats. Those scrolls aren't written in english or common yet somehow everyone can read and speak the arcane language.

It's just a flavor and balance fail. You can multiclass a character into Wizard if you want that ability. It should at least require the Magic Initiate feat, as long as you have to roll those ability checks.

This, really.

If I'm not wrong barbarian and monks are the only classes in the PHB that doesn't have any sublass that can use magic. That's 2 classes out of 12. All other can access to magic and their own "class/subclass spell list".
Once again, allowing everyone to cast spells (and wizards to write divine spells in their book) just tone down what makes classes/subclasses unique and trivialize our choices... Like many other things.

If you block the scrolls, you may as well remove them from the game.
The scrolls themselves are very limited in the game, I doubt if I found more than 2-3 of each scroll (I'm talking about the ones that actually make sense to use).
Due to the fact that the scrolls are disposable, they will run out quickly and unlike the Eldritch Knight, you will not refill them quickly.

Doesn't the fact that resting is more frequent in BG3 actually devalue scrolls? Like, if I can restore spell slots after every fight, then why would my wizard ever use a scroll?

I'd be fine if everyone could use scrolls, but it required a successful (DC 12 or 15 + spell level) Arcana check to use a spell you don't have on your list. This would provide some combat reasons for a Barbarian/Monk to take Arcana as a proficiency. The spell is already cast into the scroll, after all. You don't need magic to cast it, just the ability to read it.

I doubt whether a double roll is a good idea.
I did a quick test using a scroll of fire bolt and a helmet giving 18 int.
I ordered Lae'zel to use the scroll. When she was wearing a helmet, her chance of hitting was 50%, but when she took it off, the chance decreased to 30%.
Seems the scrolls are still using the stats so most will be competently non-profitable on characters with low intelligence (I think the rest of the scrolls work the same, but I haven't tested it)

@Rhobar121 what you you mean by a double roll? You mean to use the scroll and then any roll associated with the spell?

I'm fine with that. There are a lot of good spells that don't have an important roll: mirror image, blur, healing word, darkness, bless, jump, magic missile, protection from Evil and Good, Shield, Shield of Faith, Sleep, Heat Metal, misty step, invisibility, spider climb, counterspell, haste, dimension door, greater invisibility. These are just the ones I judged most important from levels 1-4. Also, all the leveled surface spells might have surface effects that do guaranteed damage to enemies, making any attack roll/ST less important.

If you wanted to cast scrolls without making a check, you should have taken a level in a casting class.

I like that the scrolls use the caster's ability score.

Virtually every scroll that requires concentration is much less useful because you lose concentration quickly, even without environmental damage. Which limits the number of meaningful turns quite a lot. As for the list of useful scrolls, I'd say it's much shorter in BG3: Blur, Misty Step, Mirror Image, Healing Word. The rest of them are very niche.
Also, the number of scrolls is very small and anyone who knows how to play would never waste a level to be able to use scrolls for some good but extremely rare spells.
Magic classes don't need them, and that is unlikely to change in the full game. At the moment, the only classes that make use of scrolls are those that cannot use these spells.
If you add the rng component to them, you will make them useless and in most cases it will not make sense to waste turns on them due to the high chance of failure.

Yeah this is rubbish and hopefully something they will fix / change. Like others have pointed out, it makes classes less special than they already are due to lots of other homebrewing things going on. This is just another thing added to the list

Concentration spells are indeed riskier for melee characters, although this is offset by having high AC, high Con, and proficiencies in Con STs. Or ranged martial characters will take less risk. Barbarians actually cannot Concentrate while raging, so these scrolls will be useless for them, but we'll see if Larian sticks to that rule.

The final OP'ness of spell scrolls will be heavily determined by what Larian does with splash damage. If they largely reduce the # of enemies with fire flasks and make it so that characters get a ST to take 0 damage from surfaces, then Concentration spell scrolls will be much better.

I agree that magic classes don't really need scrolls (aside from wizards copying to their spellbooks), with the combination of the ability to freely change prepared spells AND the lack of rest restrictions. But I don't agree that the solution to this is to freely allow non-casters to use scrolls. The solution should be to fix casters such that they get more benefit from scrolls. If martial characters can use scrolls without cost, then this muddies the classes too much. Why bother choosing the Eldritch Knight subclass when I can just use scrolls and get the benefits of a Battle Master?

Also, we theoretically will reach the city of Baldur's Gate in Act 2, where there will be plentiful access to buying scrolls. Considering the ease of acquiring money in BG3, I expect that we'll be able to purchase basically any scrolls we want.

There are no recorded public statements from anyone at Larian that give credence to your statement.

Larian probably don't care much about making the magic system coherent and 5e compliant in the setting. They seem to like players being able to do stuff without restrictions and an immersive logical setting is secondary to gameplay and systems. They don't care about cheapening Wizards, Eldritch Knights and Clerics because other classes get more stuff. And more is always better?

It'll be harder to change something like scroll use later down the line when many players would be confused why they suddenly can't use scrolls after using them with their non-spellcaster class for a year. It'll be easy saying "players liked it so we left it in".

Players would probably like to use Action Surge and Full Plate on their Wizards as well. Doesn't mean it's a good idea though.

Well perhaps it would be an idea to ask for this to be changed. What is the point of distinct classes if everyone can do everything?

Even more so, what's the point of multiclassing?

You already don't have to multiclass into Rogue to get Cunning Action for a Bonus Action Disengage or Hide since everyone gets that anyway.

You don't need to multiclass into Wizard to be able to use Scrolls since everyone can.

You don't need to multiclass into Monk to get Step of the Wind because everyone already jumps like a superhero and has the bonus Disengage.

It's possible that they're being slow to limit casting from scrolls precisely because all the classes/companions aren't in the game yet and multiclassing hasn't been implemented. Long term we'll have a lot more ways to cover our bases than we do now. They may view unrestricted casting from scrolls as a stopgap way to compensate for those missing options.

That make sense.
It would be so cool to ask them (and have an answer).

There is, its from a interview that was recently posted. I'm not going to go digging for it, but it's on these forums. Sven mentions the reason they did druid class first was because it was the most difficult.

Edit* I'll throw my hat in the main topic, there used to be a skill for 3.5 where if you sank points into it you could cast scrolls. In 5e I don't know off the top of my head how it works but I can't imagine someone with a lack of knowledge / attribute points will be casting high level scrolls if they have to roll for it, but who knows what they'll do.