A wizard's most important contributions should be knowledge,

But my knowledge IS arcane fuckery!

Knowledge is the most important contribution the wizard makes to himself.
For everyone else, there is arcane fuckery because they are uneducated peasants who couldn't appreciate a well crafted formula if it made their bed for them in the morning.
The simpletons.

If you want someone to contribute with their knowledge, get an alchemist, or a seasoned hunter with knowledge of many beasts of all kinds, or a dwarven engineer, or a multilingual diplomat bard.

The wizard is there specifically for his arcane fuckery. He contributes with knowledge only at times when magical items or obstacles are encountered, which could range from once in a while to very often depending on how much magic the setting involves.

>>44403269
>Discuss
Depends on setting.

Played with a GM that understood wizards are to be sages and scholars, gave them some extra skill points to be spent solely into Knowledge skills. The wizard I played was particularly skilled in the medicinal fields and had a great understanding in Astrology and Astronomy. Spent most of the time working as the healer for the group. Healing magic was super uber rare in this setting and we were using some optional rules that made the Heal skill actually useful, could get up to like 2d10 hp back on a awesome role.

>>44403696
Fantasy setting

>>44403849
>Fantasy setting
What kind of fantasy setting?

Yeah, but why would a wizard ever want to contribute?

>>44403269
What you're looking for is not a D&D wizard, but a Gandalf 'wizard'. I don't mean that in an insulting manner, merely to say that Gandalf is anything but a D&D wizard. He seems a lot more modeled after Odin, right down to his description.

That could fit in the right game. You just have to acknowledge that the 'right game' for that sort of thing isn't D&D. I'm really not sure what system works best for that, but it'd have to be one with a really low level of magic.

File: Mordenkainen02.jpg (118KB, 400x298px) Image search: [Google]

118KB, 400x298px

>>44403269
Sounds like someone never created a new spell and put his name in it.

>>44403855
One with magic.

>>44405104
>One with magic.
High magic? Low magic? Heroic fantasy? Sword and sorcery?

>>44403308
This. It's fun to have a mages guild or an arcane university in which wizards actually act like scholars, share theories in different fields and conduct experiments, yet to fund this research they preform various feats of fuckery for the simple folk.

A wizard who is just about "Nya, skellington army to give me all the power" is a bad wizard in my opinion

>>44405145
Seriously dude, does it make a difference?
Put your money where your mouth is and give the various answers for these settings. I dare ya.
'depends'-faggorty can be suitable for many threads, but not this one.

>>44405171
>Seriously dude, does it make a difference?
Yes, it does. It's either that or everyone spams editionfaggotry.

>>44405232
How about you interpret 'discuss' as 'what's your opinion? Do you have a preference? Also have a pleasant dialogue about other peoples opinions'?

>>44405232
Agreed. The question is about flavour. Different settings have different flavour. A low magic setting would be a good place to have a sage-like wizard character, who is privy to a lot of arcane and archaic knowledge.

Contrastively, it would be less fitting to play such a character in a high magic setting, where magic is both common place and powerful. This does not mean it is impossible for such characters to exist or be good in the either setting. It just means some settings cater better to the archetype.

>>44405264
Meh. /tg/ assumes too many things and it gets tiring to get served with the same one-line threads every day in-between generals and I HATE WOMEN/I THINK WOMEN DON'T PLAY GAMES BECAUSE CONSPIRACY threads.
>>44405282
Pretty much, yes. Not to mention that certain magic systems don't really seem all that scholarly. Vancian magic is just learning the same formulae by rote and firing them. Magic in say Legend of the Five Rings or Werewolf: The Forsaken is about learning how to interact with the spirits and how to not make them angry.

The Force is about wisdom, the One Power is about being creative and having balls of brass, Near-Ascension powers in SG MAKE you into an archetypical wise person, just twattier.

>>44404354
>LaughingEvard.livingpainting

what if the wizard spent his life studying arcane fuckery and is completely ignorant in any other field of study

A true wizard shouldn't be out adventuring on the road with a bunch of nobody adventurers anyways. A wizard should be a figure of myth almost in himself. The ones out in the feld are apprentices, students and acolytes.

>>44403269
>should be

But when you're actually a wizard, do you even care about other people's perceptions of you? Perception is just another toy that you can play with when you're a wizard.

>>44403269
But my arcane fuckery fills the local populace with the Knowledge that to fear me is Wise. I've given them the cornerstones of a well endowed mind its not my fault they waste it.

Agreed, wizards should be like the scientists of the setting, couched in alchemy and hermeticism.

If all people who go to college could only be professors, we would have nothing else.

A wizards contributions to knowledge should be backed up by actions. I'd rather ask the man who stopped the volcano a question then the man who wrote about it.

Hes a wizard, not just a philosopher. He can make things happen himself, he should use it, and then teach it.

If by this you mean "Wizards should be supremely loathesome to use magic when there's much simpler ways of doing things that doesn't involve parading like a fool in front of the martials" then yes.