Since they have added alchemy, and are getting ready to update the tech, let's give magic fans a little love. It can be added easily using resources already present in vanilla, and has many advantages.
advantages
spell's would be on the same level as potions or enchanting, so they won't OP the start of the game.
having spell's ready when you respawn will allow the player to get to the spot they died faster, and prepared to recover their stuff.
spell's can free up hotbar space for more tool's
spell's can make establishing new base's much easier
how it work's
basically there are 5 spells slot's added to the inv ui, near where armor is placed. crafting spell would require an enchanted book case and enchanted book's (which seems to have been added already in the snap shot). then you can keep book's in those slot's. those 5 stay with you even when you die. to switch to a spell, use "Ctrl" + 1-5. spell's are all based on stuff already in game, so little needs to be added.
spell idea's and uses
egg - spawn a chicken egg which you can throw (good for knocking mob's off of ledges, moving a villager without harming it, spawn and raise chickens for food while on the move)
snowball - Spawn's a snowball to throw (good for knock off's, and fighting blaze)
heal - same effect as eating a golden apple ( can also heal others)
fire bolt - fire's the same fireball as blaze (attack)
fire ball - same as ghast fireball (attack, and tunneling through the nether.)
bat - spawn's a bat that flies to and around other mob's ( good for scouting ahead)
fire bat - spawns a bat with the "burning in lava" animation, otherwise act's as above (good for night scouting, marking mob's, advanced lighting into cave's)
create food - spawns bread to eat
create water - spawns a water source block on the ground
create lava - spawns a lava source block on the ground
create fire - same effect as flint and steal
find path - follow the path you have walked for the last 128 or so blocks.
lure mob - same effect as using a fishing rod to draw them in
arrow - fire arrow's without a bow
fire arrow - your next arrow fired will have same effect as shooting an arrow through fire ( work's with bow, or arrow spell)
lightning - cause's lightning to strike at player's cross hair's ( good for attack, charging creepers, creating zombie pigmen - only can be used outside)
flare - spawn's a firework ( good for signaling others to your location, and everything else fireworks are good for)
fly - fly like in creative mode for a couple of minutes (good for traveling, escaping mob's, building high altitude structures.
teleport - spawn's an ender pearl that can only be thrown for teleportation purposes
rain - cause it to rain (good for making the outdoors enderman safe)
armor - increase armor level by 1-3 (can be stacked by carrying multiple copies of the book)
fire resist - same as drinking a fire potion
lightning resist - same as fire resist, but with lightning
I'm sure there is much much more that can be added to this list, but as you can see It's an Idea that can be added with little effort in the way of modeling, or coding - maybe a new enchanted book case skin at minimum, most everything else is already in the game, just change the ui, and code spell book items to trigger game effects.
Hmm...I like this actually. However it seems like the cost (1 bookcase plus 1 book plus some levels) is too small for the rewards (death persistent abilities that really lower the difficulty of the game). Also, it seems there's no cost to use these. If not, I'm going to make infinite food, grief with infinite lava, dominate pvp with infinite fire arrows and still be playing legitimately. That is a concern I have. Other than that..I'm pretty good about it all tbh. Address these things and I'll fully support.
Minecraft is not an RPG, there are already plenty of "magic" mods out there which change the UI to accommodate "spell slots".
Enchanted tools and potions should be the limit of magic's practical uses in minecraft.
Why do you say that that should be the limit? We've been able to cast spells on tools and armor, why shouldn't we be able to cast spells upon air itself?
well I was using a minimalistic approach while coming up with this, and I haven't experienced what playing on public servers is like so I hadn't considered PvP, or griefing situations - now's a good time to start a discussion on that
I agree that it would lower the difficulty of the game, but at a point in the game play where difficulty has already been lowered by normal play. in order to be enchanting at any meaningful pace you've already build a xp mob farm or two - which mean's you've already cleared out most of your surrounding area and rarely are running into trouble anyway. - redstone, potions, enchanting all lower the difficulty, but are introduced at a point in time where your game isnt all that difficult anymore - so will spell's.
a more realistic approach to crafting would be to have a new type of enchanting table used to craft spell book's, which opens a crafting ui to build the recipes... I'ld also think to require that all bookcase's surrounding it have to be enchanted book case's. Finally I would add blaze rod's, nether wort, and other nether resource's as ingredients - even resource's from the end for some of the nastier one's.
Spell's can have a durability meter on them, much like other gear and tool's. so every so often you have to craft new books and nothing would be infinite. arrow for example would have as many use's as a couple of stacks of arrows, while fire arrow's give's only 25-50 use's. create water would have 4 uses, enough to make an infinite water source. - stuff like lava or lightning can be a single use spell. each one would need to have it's own balance value.
my first point on overall PvP balance goes like this - everyone would have the same access to these spell's, as well as potions and so on - therefore everyone is still on the same playing field. if anyone is dominating PvP, where abilities are equal, then they are doing it by skill and deserve it.
a potion of fire resist work's just as well against a players fire arrow or fireball, as it does from mob's. wouldn't hurt to add a new lightning resist as well....speaking of which fire resist is another good spell to add to the list.
as for griefing goes - sorry but it's just a part of life.
Basically, you rob desert temples of glyphs (engraved sandstone tablets), put them in a special book, and start casting spells. There are no predefined spells (e.g. X glyph + Y glyph + Z glyph won't always result in the same spell) since limits and restrictions are something that shouldn't be in Minecraft in most cases.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Did something happen to you in your childhood to give you this unreasonable fear of rutabaga?
Basically, you rob desert temples of glyphs (engraved sandstone tablets), put them in a special book, and start casting spells. There are no predefined spells (e.g. X glyph + Y glyph + Z glyph won't always result in the same spell) since limits and restrictions are something that shouldn't be in Minecraft in most cases.
The only problem I'ld have with that would be for people, like myself, who don't have access to desert's.. My current world I spawned on an island with just 1 tree, one reed, some grass and a ravine. I've traveled thousands of block's in all directions (both by boat, and through the nether) and have found no other land. getting book case's is hard enough without any leather. here is a link to a thread on how I accomplished that - http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/1599444-how-to-outsmart-your-situation-and-thrive-a-brief-tutorial/ .
I would however be in favor of spell book's showing up in temple chest's, and spell's using those tablet's as ingredients for boosting durability, - or even expand it to use them as rune traps (much like tripwire traps, but placing a rune with an attached spell. on the ground)
I would not object to glyphs showing up in jungles, strongholds, dungeons, or netherforts (nor would I dislike empty magic books showing up in abandoned mineshafts), but this isn't the thread for that.
I think with some tweaking this idea could work really well, the thing i'm most worried about is the 'Minecraft is an RPG' war sparking up again but I like this idea.
This would make an excellent mod (and I'm sure I've seen a few magic mods out there), but the time needed to program and balance all of that wouldn't be worth it for vanilla. We already have enchantments as our magic, and a lot of what you presented sound like copies of other existing things:
Why bother having a "create fire" spell when Flint & Steel does the exact same thing?
Why have "fire resist" if we already have the Potion of Fire Resistance?
Why have "heal" the same as a Golden Apple, when we can have just the Golden Apple?
I like this Idea but it sounds overpowered. Mabe you can get the spells as a rare enchant from enchanting books?
If you made it so the different spells would cost evels of xp to use that might be good. Over all cool idea I support.
Just so you know, an apostrophe does not mean 'look out, here comes an s!'. Apart from that though it's not a bad idea.
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"Strong Pokémon. Weak Pokémon. That is only the selfish perception of people. Truly skilled Trainers should try to win with the Pokémon they love best."
Why do you say that that should be the limit? We've been able to cast spells on tools and armor, why shouldn't we be able to cast spells upon air itself?
It's not that enchantments and potions should be the limit of magic, but magic should always be present as an item or block, not as a skill which your character can utilize. Many of these spells could be achieved with enchantments and potions, if it was presented as those things I would be in support of such an idea.
Maybe if your mana source was your XP, it would make sense, and give it a reasonable cost.
That would be cool.
That is something that can be considered, however we are already charged alot of XP for alot of other thing's, if we use it as a source for mana as well, then in effect we create a situation where player's have to spend a-lot more time in front of their XP grinders then already required. - Using XP to create the spell book's, then giving the spells a durability meter allows us the same limit of the power achieved, without requiring a butt ton of additional xp grinding.
This would make an excellent mod (and I'm sure I've seen a few magic mods out there), but the time needed to program and balance all of that wouldn't be worth it for vanilla. We already have enchantments as our magic, and a lot of what you presented sound like copies of other existing things:
Why bother having a "create fire" spell when Flint & Steel does the exact same thing?
Why have "fire resist" if we already have the Potion of Fire Resistance?
Why have "heal" the same as a Golden Apple, when we can have just the Golden Apple?
Most of the skills overlap potion's or directly spawn other stuff that happens in game, for two main reason.
Spells, since they are based on knowledge and not on physical items are designed to stay with you when die, and free up hot bar/inv space, as well as other resources. just to address the three you picked out as examples....
"Create Fire" replaces the flint and steal so you don't have to carry it in INV, or your hot bar. so when your portal get's put out by a ghast, you can relight it and get back home with an extra stack of nether wart.
spawning with "Fire Resist" after being killed by another player in PvP , will allow you to go straight to where you died crossing any lava placed in your path, to try to get your stuff back or catch him looting your corpse - without first needing to go to your base and get a bottle of it. - Plus it frees up INV and hotbar space.
"heal" again frees up inv and hot bar space, and again allows you to head into possible combat after a respawn to attempt to recover your drop's without needing to run back to a base to get an apple just in case.... especially useful if you were a long way away from your spawn and every second is needed for travel.
going by the thought's i jotted out on the spell's above, one could carry three armor spell's, arrow, and heal and rush right back into battle (against mob's or Players) with 3 armor, a stack or two's worth of arrow's, and a better then nothing chance to recover their stuff when they don't have the time to run too and use a chest. - Plus a heal for when they succeed, or need to retreat.
of course a set up like that, doesn't leave room for fireball's, or create food, create fire, etc. - and would have to have been set-up before death in order to be available in the first place...A-lot of forethought and planning is required when choosing which spells to keep loaded for your play style, something that many players do enjoy doing.
I like this Idea but it sounds overpowered. Mabe you can get the spells as a rare enchant from enchanting books?
If you made it so the different spells would cost evels of xp to use that might be good. Over all cool idea I support.
The difficulty in obtaining a spell should reflect it's impact on the game play - I would also like to add that they should also have recharge times on par with their physical counterpart's... arrow doesn't seem so over powered when you think of it being the same as carrying a bow and a stack of arrow's, with the same firerate. - in fact the spell might be changed up and reversed from the bow... I.E. with a bow you draw the string back and then release, where as the spell would fire right away and then recharge for as long as a bow drawback takes.
the spell book's would require resource's to craft, as well as XP - the more powerful the spellbook you are crafting, the harder the resources are to get. some quick thought's on that would be.. low level spells would be like arrow requiring arrow's, bones and other skelly drop's + 1-5 xpl. Create fire would require flint and steal , lava, netherrack and 1-5 xpl.......mid level stuff like a fire bolt would need blaze rod's, glow stone dust + 10-25xpl.....top of the line stuff like lightning bolt would need Ghast tear, end stone and 50+ xpl.
and again, this is all in addition to requiring an enchanted book, a spell crafting table, and enchanted book case's - that's gunna drain anyone's XP count a good bit long before any spell's can even be crafted.
Most of the skills overlap potion's or directly spawn other stuff that happens in game, for two main reason.
Spells, since they are based on knowledge and not on physical items are designed to stay with you when die, and free up hot bar/inv space, as well as other resources. just to address the three you picked out as examples....
-snip-
Sure, these spells can be extremely useful and can save inventory space, but that dampens the need to do a lot of things in the game. These spells could make players, for lack of a better term, "lazier". Players won't make as much effort making a brewing table, make potions or explore for more materials because the extremely convenient spells would do all that for us.
I don't doubt that many players would love this, but there's absolutely no reason to go through all the programming effort with all this magic stuff... We can already create fire, we can already make ourselves fireproof with potions, we can already heal ourselves faster, the list goes on. So what's the point of days-to-weeks programming effort to re-add everything that already exists but call it "magic"? It's just not worth it.
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Hey, you there. Yes, you! Are you thinking about posting a suggestion on the forums anytime soon? If so, please read this before doing so.
Sure, these spells can be extremely useful and can save inventory space, but that dampens the need to do a lot of things in the game. These spells could make players, for lack of a better term, "lazier". Players won't make as much effort making a brewing table, make potions or explore for more materials because the extremely convenient spells would do all that for us.
I don't doubt that many players would love this, but there's absolutely no reason to go through all the programming effort with all this magic stuff... We can already create fire, we can already make ourselves fireproof with potions, we can already heal ourselves faster, the list goes on. So what's the point of days-to-weeks programming effort to re-add everything that already exists but call it "magic"? It's just not worth it.
so it's lazy to use up 2/5's of your spell slot's on having some spell's that create water and lava for a few use's, but it's not to have to carry a few bucket's that you filled up while just walking around? The only other resource spell suggested besides those two, is food , and by the time you can craft the spell, you've collected so much of it anyway, that "gathering it" mostly refers to going to a double chest and grabbing a few stacks. - I suppose you could argue that the water and lava can be used to make a cobblestone generator, but again if you don't have at least one by the time you make it to casting spell's, you're doing something wrong. - aside from all that, since spell's are limited use and require resource's to craft, they create the need to go gather stuff.
and again you seem to be arguing from the belief that every spell will always be available to you, when in fact there are only 5 slot's - sure you can carry more in your inventory and swap them around, but you drop all those if/when you die. --- And people will still have reason's to make potion's even if they can do it with a spell, choosing to carry a potion frees up a spell slot just as good as carrying the spell frees up a bar slot.... why use up a spell slot with "fire resist", when you can have the potion in your hot bar and use the spell slot for fire ball, or something more fun.
the point of spending a few week's of programming in these different way's for player's to trigger event's in their world, is so that player's have more way's to customize their game experience to their own play style. and I'd wager dollars to doughnuts that there are plenty of people who would think that it's worth it.
advantages
spell's would be on the same level as potions or enchanting, so they won't OP the start of the game.
having spell's ready when you respawn will allow the player to get to the spot they died faster, and prepared to recover their stuff.
spell's can free up hotbar space for more tool's
spell's can make establishing new base's much easier
how it work's
basically there are 5 spells slot's added to the inv ui, near where armor is placed. crafting spell would require an enchanted book case and enchanted book's (which seems to have been added already in the snap shot). then you can keep book's in those slot's. those 5 stay with you even when you die. to switch to a spell, use "Ctrl" + 1-5. spell's are all based on stuff already in game, so little needs to be added.
spell idea's and uses
egg - spawn a chicken egg which you can throw (good for knocking mob's off of ledges, moving a villager without harming it, spawn and raise chickens for food while on the move)
snowball - Spawn's a snowball to throw (good for knock off's, and fighting blaze)
heal - same effect as eating a golden apple ( can also heal others)
fire bolt - fire's the same fireball as blaze (attack)
fire ball - same as ghast fireball (attack, and tunneling through the nether.)
bat - spawn's a bat that flies to and around other mob's ( good for scouting ahead)
fire bat - spawns a bat with the "burning in lava" animation, otherwise act's as above (good for night scouting, marking mob's, advanced lighting into cave's)
create food - spawns bread to eat
create water - spawns a water source block on the ground
create lava - spawns a lava source block on the ground
create fire - same effect as flint and steal
find path - follow the path you have walked for the last 128 or so blocks.
lure mob - same effect as using a fishing rod to draw them in
arrow - fire arrow's without a bow
fire arrow - your next arrow fired will have same effect as shooting an arrow through fire ( work's with bow, or arrow spell)
lightning - cause's lightning to strike at player's cross hair's ( good for attack, charging creepers, creating zombie pigmen - only can be used outside)
flare - spawn's a firework ( good for signaling others to your location, and everything else fireworks are good for)
fly - fly like in creative mode for a couple of minutes (good for traveling, escaping mob's, building high altitude structures.
teleport - spawn's an ender pearl that can only be thrown for teleportation purposes
rain - cause it to rain (good for making the outdoors enderman safe)
armor - increase armor level by 1-3 (can be stacked by carrying multiple copies of the book)
fire resist - same as drinking a fire potion
lightning resist - same as fire resist, but with lightning
I'm sure there is much much more that can be added to this list, but as you can see It's an Idea that can be added with little effort in the way of modeling, or coding - maybe a new enchanted book case skin at minimum, most everything else is already in the game, just change the ui, and code spell book items to trigger game effects.
My Island Adventure - http://www.minecraft...brief-tutorial/
me(red) playing UT2K4 - http://www.youtube.c...h?v=Wz0DnP7wXnU
Enchanted tools and potions should be the limit of magic's practical uses in minecraft.
Why do you say that that should be the limit? We've been able to cast spells on tools and armor, why shouldn't we be able to cast spells upon air itself?
well I was using a minimalistic approach while coming up with this, and I haven't experienced what playing on public servers is like so I hadn't considered PvP, or griefing situations - now's a good time to start a discussion on that
I agree that it would lower the difficulty of the game, but at a point in the game play where difficulty has already been lowered by normal play. in order to be enchanting at any meaningful pace you've already build a xp mob farm or two - which mean's you've already cleared out most of your surrounding area and rarely are running into trouble anyway. - redstone, potions, enchanting all lower the difficulty, but are introduced at a point in time where your game isnt all that difficult anymore - so will spell's.
a more realistic approach to crafting would be to have a new type of enchanting table used to craft spell book's, which opens a crafting ui to build the recipes... I'ld also think to require that all bookcase's surrounding it have to be enchanted book case's. Finally I would add blaze rod's, nether wort, and other nether resource's as ingredients - even resource's from the end for some of the nastier one's.
Spell's can have a durability meter on them, much like other gear and tool's. so every so often you have to craft new books and nothing would be infinite. arrow for example would have as many use's as a couple of stacks of arrows, while fire arrow's give's only 25-50 use's. create water would have 4 uses, enough to make an infinite water source. - stuff like lava or lightning can be a single use spell. each one would need to have it's own balance value.
my first point on overall PvP balance goes like this - everyone would have the same access to these spell's, as well as potions and so on - therefore everyone is still on the same playing field. if anyone is dominating PvP, where abilities are equal, then they are doing it by skill and deserve it.
a potion of fire resist work's just as well against a players fire arrow or fireball, as it does from mob's. wouldn't hurt to add a new lightning resist as well....speaking of which fire resist is another good spell to add to the list.
as for griefing goes - sorry but it's just a part of life.
My Island Adventure - http://www.minecraft...brief-tutorial/
me(red) playing UT2K4 - http://www.youtube.c...h?v=Wz0DnP7wXnU
Basically, you rob desert temples of glyphs (engraved sandstone tablets), put them in a special book, and start casting spells. There are no predefined spells (e.g. X glyph + Y glyph + Z glyph won't always result in the same spell) since limits and restrictions are something that shouldn't be in Minecraft in most cases.
The only problem I'ld have with that would be for people, like myself, who don't have access to desert's.. My current world I spawned on an island with just 1 tree, one reed, some grass and a ravine. I've traveled thousands of block's in all directions (both by boat, and through the nether) and have found no other land. getting book case's is hard enough without any leather. here is a link to a thread on how I accomplished that - http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/1599444-how-to-outsmart-your-situation-and-thrive-a-brief-tutorial/ .
I would however be in favor of spell book's showing up in temple chest's, and spell's using those tablet's as ingredients for boosting durability, - or even expand it to use them as rune traps (much like tripwire traps, but placing a rune with an attached spell. on the ground)
My Island Adventure - http://www.minecraft...brief-tutorial/
me(red) playing UT2K4 - http://www.youtube.c...h?v=Wz0DnP7wXnU
Kudos and happy holidays from Javalavadingdong!
since all armor, weapons, magic, and potions are available to the player, they are not pigeon holed into playing just one "role".
My Island Adventure - http://www.minecraft...brief-tutorial/
me(red) playing UT2K4 - http://www.youtube.c...h?v=Wz0DnP7wXnU
That would be cool.
http://www.minecraft...orld-version-3/
Why bother having a "create fire" spell when Flint & Steel does the exact same thing?
Why have "fire resist" if we already have the Potion of Fire Resistance?
Why have "heal" the same as a Golden Apple, when we can have just the Golden Apple?
If you made it so the different spells would cost evels of xp to use that might be good. Over all cool idea I support.
It's not that enchantments and potions should be the limit of magic, but magic should always be present as an item or block, not as a skill which your character can utilize. Many of these spells could be achieved with enchantments and potions, if it was presented as those things I would be in support of such an idea.
That is something that can be considered, however we are already charged alot of XP for alot of other thing's, if we use it as a source for mana as well, then in effect we create a situation where player's have to spend a-lot more time in front of their XP grinders then already required. - Using XP to create the spell book's, then giving the spells a durability meter allows us the same limit of the power achieved, without requiring a butt ton of additional xp grinding.
Most of the skills overlap potion's or directly spawn other stuff that happens in game, for two main reason.
Spells, since they are based on knowledge and not on physical items are designed to stay with you when die, and free up hot bar/inv space, as well as other resources. just to address the three you picked out as examples....
"Create Fire" replaces the flint and steal so you don't have to carry it in INV, or your hot bar. so when your portal get's put out by a ghast, you can relight it and get back home with an extra stack of nether wart.
spawning with "Fire Resist" after being killed by another player in PvP , will allow you to go straight to where you died crossing any lava placed in your path, to try to get your stuff back or catch him looting your corpse - without first needing to go to your base and get a bottle of it. - Plus it frees up INV and hotbar space.
"heal" again frees up inv and hot bar space, and again allows you to head into possible combat after a respawn to attempt to recover your drop's without needing to run back to a base to get an apple just in case.... especially useful if you were a long way away from your spawn and every second is needed for travel.
going by the thought's i jotted out on the spell's above, one could carry three armor spell's, arrow, and heal and rush right back into battle (against mob's or Players) with 3 armor, a stack or two's worth of arrow's, and a better then nothing chance to recover their stuff when they don't have the time to run too and use a chest. - Plus a heal for when they succeed, or need to retreat.
of course a set up like that, doesn't leave room for fireball's, or create food, create fire, etc. - and would have to have been set-up before death in order to be available in the first place...A-lot of forethought and planning is required when choosing which spells to keep loaded for your play style, something that many players do enjoy doing.
The difficulty in obtaining a spell should reflect it's impact on the game play - I would also like to add that they should also have recharge times on par with their physical counterpart's... arrow doesn't seem so over powered when you think of it being the same as carrying a bow and a stack of arrow's, with the same firerate. - in fact the spell might be changed up and reversed from the bow... I.E. with a bow you draw the string back and then release, where as the spell would fire right away and then recharge for as long as a bow drawback takes.
the spell book's would require resource's to craft, as well as XP - the more powerful the spellbook you are crafting, the harder the resources are to get. some quick thought's on that would be.. low level spells would be like arrow requiring arrow's, bones and other skelly drop's + 1-5 xpl. Create fire would require flint and steal , lava, netherrack and 1-5 xpl.......mid level stuff like a fire bolt would need blaze rod's, glow stone dust + 10-25xpl.....top of the line stuff like lightning bolt would need Ghast tear, end stone and 50+ xpl.
and again, this is all in addition to requiring an enchanted book, a spell crafting table, and enchanted book case's - that's gunna drain anyone's XP count a good bit long before any spell's can even be crafted.
My Island Adventure - http://www.minecraft...brief-tutorial/
me(red) playing UT2K4 - http://www.youtube.c...h?v=Wz0DnP7wXnU
Sure, these spells can be extremely useful and can save inventory space, but that dampens the need to do a lot of things in the game. These spells could make players, for lack of a better term, "lazier". Players won't make as much effort making a brewing table, make potions or explore for more materials because the extremely convenient spells would do all that for us.
I don't doubt that many players would love this, but there's absolutely no reason to go through all the programming effort with all this magic stuff... We can already create fire, we can already make ourselves fireproof with potions, we can already heal ourselves faster, the list goes on. So what's the point of days-to-weeks programming effort to re-add everything that already exists but call it "magic"? It's just not worth it.
I' d'o' k'n'o'w' h'o'w' t''o' u's'e' t'h'e'm', I' j'u's't' p'u's'h' t'h'e' "'" k'e'y'.
so it's lazy to use up 2/5's of your spell slot's on having some spell's that create water and lava for a few use's, but it's not to have to carry a few bucket's that you filled up while just walking around? The only other resource spell suggested besides those two, is food , and by the time you can craft the spell, you've collected so much of it anyway, that "gathering it" mostly refers to going to a double chest and grabbing a few stacks. - I suppose you could argue that the water and lava can be used to make a cobblestone generator, but again if you don't have at least one by the time you make it to casting spell's, you're doing something wrong. - aside from all that, since spell's are limited use and require resource's to craft, they create the need to go gather stuff.
and again you seem to be arguing from the belief that every spell will always be available to you, when in fact there are only 5 slot's - sure you can carry more in your inventory and swap them around, but you drop all those if/when you die. --- And people will still have reason's to make potion's even if they can do it with a spell, choosing to carry a potion frees up a spell slot just as good as carrying the spell frees up a bar slot.... why use up a spell slot with "fire resist", when you can have the potion in your hot bar and use the spell slot for fire ball, or something more fun.
the point of spending a few week's of programming in these different way's for player's to trigger event's in their world, is so that player's have more way's to customize their game experience to their own play style. and I'd wager dollars to doughnuts that there are plenty of people who would think that it's worth it.
My Island Adventure - http://www.minecraft...brief-tutorial/
me(red) playing UT2K4 - http://www.youtube.c...h?v=Wz0DnP7wXnU