Let's Fix Wish

Wish is a spell that enables the character to literally alter reality within the boundaries of their mental conception, allowing them to create, destroy, or change anything that they can fully visualise and understand. The power of the Wish spell, however, is limited in critical ways that have been outlined here as precisely as possible, with the caveat that it may be necessary, in game play, to further refine the language necessary to define this very difficult and badly mishandled form of magic.

| range = 360 ft.; see text
| duration = permanent
| area of effect = see text
| casting time = 5 rounds
| save = none
| level = mage (9th)

This said, the magic is not subject to linguistic interpretation by the dungeon master of the player's intentions, regardless of the player's language. When casting the spell, the player makes clear what is being wished for, without presenting a "phrase of wishing" for interpretation, and then the DM permits that result. The DM does not re-interpret, or create invented consequences that are in no way part of the spell or this description here of it, nor does the DM impose any "monkey's paw" thinking in the DM's interpretation. The only effect of the wish spell is what the player wished for on behalf of the player's character, period.

Limitations

When employing the spell, the caster is first and foremost limited by the range of the spell, in terms of what can be affected. Because of this, the wish spell cannot choose to wish away the planet, or a country, or any entity that is larger than the area of effected. The spell cannot be used to cause a country to cease its existence, since some part of that country will continue to exist outside the spell range. With regards to the limitations on "concepts," this point must be clearly understood.

Objects that exist at the time of the spell's casting must be within line-of-sight of the caster at the time they are acted upon. "All the creatures inside a building" that cannot be seen cannot be wished out of existence. All creatures within the character's line-of-sight, however, can be wished away in exactly that fashion. This applies to any other effect that is intended, contained within the vast number of possibilities present in the spell list and the compendium of the game setting's possibilities. Persons seen can be killed, brought alive, their ability stats improved, their wealth improved — they can be demon possessed or the reverse if so wished. But persons who are not in line of sight cannot be summoned to the caster, because they cannot be seen. The caster cannot have the King of England suddenly brought before him or her, because that individual is not in the caster's line-of-sight, unless that king is already in the caster's presence. For similar reasons, the caster cannot teleport to a distant land by wish, because that would be out of the spell's range.

Conception

The caster is limited by what can be conceived. The caster can improve another character's strength to make them "as strong as possible," but the caster cannot conceive of what an "18 strength" is. Further, the caster cannot conceive of "giant strength" — and therefore, while the caster can say the words, "as strong as a frost giant," the caster doesn't really understand what that strength would be like in the body of a character, or themself. Therefore, the wish would be fulfilled, by making the character the strongest possible that they could be, which in my game world is a 19 strength, which can conceivably occur through existing game modifiers. This change would be permanent.

In like manner, while the caster might wish to produce an enormous number of gold pieces, or merely an enormous amount of treasure, again, this defies conception. The player knows the number "one billion" but the human cannot literally conceive of this number; the player cannot, in fact, conceive of the number 351. Were I to pile that many apples in front of the player, their number would have to be physically counted, or my assertion trusted: one could not simply look at the pile and know. Thus, for things that are wished for (which are not brought from elsewhere, but literally appear of their own accord within range and line-of-sight), the idea counts, not the number. For a really large amount of wealth, the character could reasonably say, "As much as the largest horde in the world." But since the player does not know how large that actually is, the amount itself would have to depend on the character's actual experience. More or less, take all the wealth already controlled by the whole party, then double that and have it appear. Job done.

This line of thinking must apply to anything that is asked for, that does not already exist.

Single-use Realism

Once a thing has been wished for, it can never be wished for again. The caster cannot wish for another treasure the next day, or for any treasure, of any kind, ever again. If a character is made to be strong, no other character can ever be likewise affected, even to the tune of one ability point. This is a severe limit on the spell. It says that the caster must consider the use of the spell in any circumstance, since if one frost giant is obliterated out of existence, not only may no other frost giant ever be gotten rid of again with the spell, nor may any other kind of "giant" — because, and this needs to be very clear, "distinctiveness between objects affected only goes so far." Except for colour, one dragon is close enough to every other dragon as to consider the entire species as the same. The same goes for every demon, every snake, every spider and so on. A distinction can be made reasonable for a weretiger vs. a werewolf... those cannot be mistaken for each other. But a weretiger vs. a tiger? It would depend on what shape the lycanthrope took.

And yes, this applies to races also. The caster gets one wish obliterating a human or humans, one wish obliterating an elf or elves, one wish obliterating a troll or trolls. An argument cannot be made that the wish was to heal only humans named "Dave." No, not distinctive enough. The individual DM can choose where to draw the line, but there must be a line. If, therefore, one is going to use the spell to obliterate an enemy, it would be best not to obliterate a large number of mixed raced creatures at a single blow. Best to take out all the frost giants and then use other means to get rid of the rest. And the caster, yes, should consider, is this really as many frost giants as I might have to get rid of someday in one blow?

Uses

Possible uses for the wish spell include, and are by no means limited to, Restore hit points, resurrect a dead creature, cure disease, cure poison, remove curses, repair damaged magic items, create non-magical or magical objects or items, duplicate the effects of any spell except those not possible by the limitations above, make a given spell's effect permanent, grant immunity to a condition, enhance ability scores, grant proficiency in a skill, create buildings, dismiss a spell, push an enemy outside the range of the spell, dispel magic, create a protective barrier, grant the ability flight, take away or restore a memory, alter terrain within range, make a weather-type permanent. And many other things a player can think of.