Fireball and Lightning bolt

[Karnack]

Something I remeber seeing on the Sage Advice site about these two spells was Crawford saying that these spells where made much more formidible for a reason and looking at the suggested spell damage in the DMG there doing damage suggested for a 5th level spell. I'm just trying to figure out why though.

Don't suppose anyone knows what the reasons might be?

[Ninja_Prawn]

Tradition? Both of those spells were absolutely iconic in previous editions.

[coredump]

They are iconic, they have always been the workhorse of damage spells so they wanted to make sure they were still 'special'.

[Fizban]

A word of advice: never pay attention to the suggested damage dice for spells in any DMG, as you've seen it never matches the actual spells. In 5e it's clear they want fireball and lightning bolt to be the go-to blasting spells all the time, so they start with way more damage and even when other spells can scale up better they're still the most efficient options. Other spells must find their usefulness in alternate damage types or targeting methods. Of course you can always ignore this and fill out the spell list with the full array of 3.5's "whatever energy in whatever shape you want", but this will most likely increase the power of casters by at least a bit (depending on the prevalence of energy resistances of course, I don't know what the spreads are right now).

The buzzword is "iconic," but I'd say it's more intentional than just hype. 5e is a very tightly controlled system (when it's not DM fiat), where the obvious options are supposed to be the most powerful. It was outright stated that in 3.x there were intentionally bad options left in so people could learn to make better choices, by this point they've realized that doesn't work. So if they want blasting to be relevant (and indeed even death spells are just hp now) then the two most obvious spells will need to be the strongest and most efficient.

[Ninja_Prawn]

and even when other spells can scale up better they're still the most efficient options.

What do you mean by that? Comparing multi-target damage spells...

Fireball V and Lightning Bolt V are 10d6 (35), whereas Cone of Cold is 8d8 (36).

Fireball VI and Lightning Bolt VI are 11d6 (38.5), whereas Chain Lightning is 10d8 (45).

Fireball VII and Lightning Bolt VII are 12d6 (42), whereas Symbol of Death is 10d10 (55).

I'm not saying Fireball and Lightning Bolt are bad spells, but they're not so overwhelming that similar spells are pointless.

[Fizban]

When I say efficient, I mean where you can be efficient, that is with Sorcerer Spell Points or Wizard Arcane Recovery, your pools of potential spell slots.* Fireball/Lightning bolt deal ~28 for 5 spell points or 3 spell levels. You can only gain extra spell slots for spells of 5th level or lower, and at 4th level Ice Storm only deals ~23 (or Blight deals ~36, but we're talking AoEs here), so that leaves Cone of Cold at 5th, which deals ~36 for 7 spell points or 5 levels.

At 9th level and thus 10 spell points you can get two Fireballs or Lightning bolts, 56 damage>36 from a single extra Cone of Cold. At 13th you can get a second Cone of Cold, but next level at 14th it's now 3 BBs/2 CCs, 84 damage vs 72.

I don't have the statistical skill to evaluate Empower metamagic in exact terms and there are other low level spells to fill the gaps, but in pure lowest common denominator "fireball or nothing because low level spells suck" mentality it's true for Sorcerers. In actuality I'm sure most players will notice leftover spell points and fill the gaps so it's not too off, but note also that however much damage Empower is worth it will always be best multiplied over area from a lower level spell, not Cone of Cold (unless cone is the shape you need)

For a wizard, you don't have metamagic so it's just the slots. You get can one CC at 10th, but then it's two BBs at 12th, three at 18th, and it's not until 20th that you can get a second CC at which point it would still be behind in efficiency. There's no contest here.

Note again that you can't get extra slots higher than 5th level: thus, your high level slots are either your strongest spike attacks or your emergency defenses, while you occupy other rounds with spells at 5th level and down. At an assumed 6 encounters per day those high level slots really need to be stretched, which means you want your other spells to be efficient sources of damage, and that means lots of Fireballs (unless you're fighting single targets, obviously).

*I misspoke a bit before, implying that there are other spells that scale better in the same tier. I think Witch Bolt is pretty nuts if you let it run and the Erupting Earth spell from the Elemental Evil Player's Companion does scale past them at 6th or 7th, but it would have been more accurate to just say that high level spells deal more damage. It sounded like I was saying that's not the case so your response is perfectly valid.

[coredump]

By that logic, every cantrip is game-breakingly OP>

[SharkForce]

witch bolt doesn't scale that well. it's a single-target damage spell that only goes up 1d12 per level and starts off at only 2d12, and you have to hit.

now, if you can actualy guarantee the entire thing sticks around, well... at that point, just use cantrips if you're shooting fish in a barrell.

[Fizban]

By that logic, every cantrip is game-breakingly OP>
You know perfectly well that's not true or what I meant, but I'll point you again to where we were discussing large area of effect spells for hitting multiple targets.

witch bolt doesn't scale that well. it's a single-target damage spell that only goes up 1d12 per level and starts off at only 2d12, and you have to hit.

now, if you can actualy guarantee the entire thing sticks around, well... at that point, just use cantrips if you're shooting fish in a barrell.
Edit: Okay Witch Bolt actually sucks because it only scales initial damage. It's not like there are any 2nd level spells that scale continuous damage and only cost bonus actions oh wait. . .
That's actually high scaling since most spells only add 1d6 or 1d8, I mentioned Eruption of Earth which also uses d12's and that's why it can scale past other options in high level slots. I figured you'd use True Strike to increase the odds and then have the rest of your party dogpile the target (possibly literally with grappling) so they can't escape. Compare to Blight: ~36 save for half, or ~26 per round up to 10 rounds if you land the attack and they can't escape from Witch Bolt. Unless they immediately break the Witch Bolt you get the second round and shoot up to ~52 damage. Even if the fort save is easier to fail than it is to hit with WB, you can use True Strike to even those odds, and it's a lot easier for the rest of the party to aid attack rolls and grappling than trying to debuff a save.

Again this is efficiency of damage for slots, not maximum DPS, and under what I'd expect as the fairly obvious assumption that no one wants to be prioritizing cantrips and the only class that should consider it is the Warlock (having Agonizing Blast). Since in 5e almost everything is hit points, striking the balance between DPS and efficiency is the caster's new game.

[Flashy]

Compare to Blight: ~36 save for half, or ~26 per round up to 10 rounds if you land the attack and they can't escape from Witch Bolt. Unless they immediately break the Witch Bolt you get the second round and shoot up to ~52 damage.

The slot scaling only applies to the first hit on Witch Bolt. So that's 26 average on the first round and then 6.5 on each subsequent round, because the repeated damage is still an unscaled 1d12.

[Fizban]

You're right, it does say initial there. Sigh. That reduces interesting level 1 damage spells from 2 to 1, unless I missed something in Hellish Rebuke that makes it useless (action economy damage spike that requires risk and luck to set up rather than efficiency of course).

[Ninja_Prawn]

Well, I'd argue that Magic Missile's auto-hit feature makes it interesting.

Hellish Rebuke suffers from an undesirable damage type, but it seems like a good spell to me. Especially when you're a tiefling and you get a level 2 version for no reason.

[PoeticDwarf]

What do you mean by that? Comparing multi-target damage spells...

Fireball V and Lightning Bolt V are 10d6 (35), whereas Cone of Cold is 8d8 (36).

Fireball VI and Lightning Bolt VI are 11d6 (38.5), whereas Chain Lightning is 10d8 (45).

Fireball VII and Lightning Bolt VII are 12d6 (42), whereas Symbol of Death is 10d10 (55).

I'm not saying Fireball and Lightning Bolt are bad spells, but they're not so overwhelming that similar spells are pointless.

If you cast spells at higher levels they lose power. There isn't a level 3 area spell as strong as those.

[Flashy]

Well, I'd argue that Magic Missile's auto-hit feature makes it interesting.

Hellish Rebuke suffers from an undesirable damage type, but it seems like a good spell to me. Especially when you're a tiefling and you get a level 2 version for no reason.

Catapult (from the Elemental Evil supplement) is also reasonable simply because at high spell levels you can use it as a source of no save damage for small or tiny creatures. Fairly niche, but at least it upcasts to some new function.

[Ninja_Prawn]

If you cast spells at higher levels they lose power. There isn't a level 3 area spell as strong as those.

Yeah, Fizban has explained what he means. When he first said they're more "efficient", my head started calculating damage per round, but he was thinking about damage per spell point. So that's where our misunderstanding was.

As an aside, I like how the PHB doesn't have many spells that duplicate each other's functions. For example, there are only one or two area damage spells at each level. It makes it easy to pick the spells you want.

[TheOOB]

It's much more likely in this edition that you're going to only have one or two different damage spells prepared with how spells work, so they seemed to have wanted there to be a couple fairweather spells that scaled well and were not too high of a level for those characters.

[Fizban]

As an aside, I like how the PHB doesn't have many spells that duplicate each other's functions. For example, there are only one or two area damage spells at each level. It makes it easy to pick the spells you want.
I could go either way (simplicity is nice but you can already guess I'd get bored fast), but I'd point out that the 3.5 PHB didn't have many duplicates either. It's mostly the same list actually. The overlaps came with splatbook options and I'm interested so see where 5e goes from now. I don't know what sort of books they're planning, but if the adventure supplements and Unearthed Arcana articles are any indicator I expect the exact same trend. Tons of new spells and little other support. In another year or two we could be rolling in duplicate spells if someone doesn't keep a tight leash, and Fireball will be off my radar.

Hmm. I wonder if there's been a properly observed trend of content creators preferring casters. Seems easily disprovable, but still all the best homebrew I've read has come from people who know the full scope of magic that only comes from experience or deep study.

[MinaBee]

Something I remember seeing on the Sage Advice site about these two spells was Crawford saying that these spells where made much more formidable for a reason and looking at the suggested spell damage in the DMG there doing damage suggested for a 5th level spell. I'm just trying to figure out why though.

Don't suppose anyone knows what the reasons might be?

The suggested damage table in the DMG is intentionally low-balled. Whether they assumed homebrewers would be creating additional effects to go along with the damage, or just to encourage us to make our first drafts something that isn't superior to the core spells in every aspect.

You are supposed to start there, and titrate the damage up after playtesting. It is far, far better to give your players a new spell that you might need to boost mid-game, than to give them one that you might need to nerf mid-game.

[TheOOB]

The suggested damage table in the DMG is intentionally low-balled. Whether they assumed homebrewers would be creating additional effects to go along with the damage, or just to encourage us to make our first drafts something that isn't superior to the core spells in every aspect.

You are supposed to start there, and titrate the damage up after playtesting. It is far, far better to give your players a new spell that you might need to boost mid-game, than to give them one that you might need to nerf mid-game.

I remember in Tome and Blood for 3e they said that if you're home brewing a spell and it's around the same power level of the best spells of a certain level it's too powerful for that level. Fireball and Lightning Bolt are the best spells for 3rd level damage, and any new spells shouldn't be as powerful to keep things from getting broken.