Ignimortis
2018-05-23, 01:37 AM
As always, my ideas are not exactly 100% proof to criticism and tend to encapsulate my own view of what D&D should be like, but I'll jump on the bandwagon anyway.
Most issues with spellcasters arise not from there being effective spells - BFC is fine and all, and can certainly be absolutely deadly, but it's not what breaks the game - a T3 or T4 martial can keep up with a simple BFC caster and perhaps their brand of crowd control, which is "death from suddenly reaching negative hitpoints" is often even more effective. (Most) buffs or HP damage spells are fine, as most of the latter are notoriously underpowered in comparison to other spells.
The thing that damages the game most is the ability of spellcasters to often and reliably shift the game from their own capabilities to someone else's abilities being borrowed for a while and to negate their own weaknesses too well. This creates the most problems before really high levels, but those have some problems of their own.
So, point by point the things that need fixing (usually by nerfs or outright rewrites) with spellcasting are:
A) A summoned creature is often about as good as a non-optimized T5 or T4 class, doesn't take a share of XP or loot, and you can always make another one if the first one bites the dust. The only issue is the casting time, but...see C.
A.1) Summoned creatures have a very wide range of abilities, and even those you probably wouldn't summon as a beatstick can severely impact the game by using those (i.e. efreeti). While summoning should be a viable and enjoyable archetype, it shouldn't go as far as it does, and I would argue that it needs to serve mostly a combat purpose.
B) Polymorphing into something, which can be done as soon as level 3 (Alter Self, limited usability, sees some abuse with Outsiders) or 5 (Wild Shape is pretty good) and starts being awesome at level 7 (Polymorph and everything else upwards), invalidates your physical stats, as most melee monsters have great physical stats and ways to use them effectively.
A+B) Those points are exacerbated by multiple sources for monsters, which means a new adversary is actually a possible tool for a caster to use.
The combined solution to those points would be restricting summoning/polymorphing to MM1/SRD, perhaps banning Planar Binding and similar effects that allow abuse altogether, but I'm sure there is a more elegant solution that I'm not seeing. Oh, and Divine Power is supposed to come into it somewhere, too, as one of the worst ideas for buffs, since it explicitly gives worse results the closer you are to full BAB.
C) Casters possess the most efficient means of scouting with a slew of Divination spells and specific shapeshifting forms suited for information gathering. Therefore, a caster might arguably be prepared for most situations, if the DM doesn't take specific steps to counter them ("Yes, all doors in this dungeon are lead-lined, so you can't Detect Magic past them"). This makes some casting times moot, since you're often aware of what lies ahead and can pre-cast related spells.
This is not exactly a problem by itself. Diviners are an interesting archetype, but most of the Divination spells are magical eyeglasses and/or lower-scale GPS, which are okay by themselves, and the remainder is something that's not exactly suited for spellcasting, which leads us to...
D) (Here's where my maybe unpopular personal opinion starts) Arguably, some spells don't really make sense as a "magical button" you can press and have the effect created. For instance, Dominate Monster is a good example of what a 9th level spell might look like, and a good case can be made for Meteor Swarm or Absorption or Time Stop or Wail of the Banshee and the like. What should not be on the list are Wish and Genesis and similar effects. Those things don't make sense as defined spell effects. It's literally god-like power, and while I'm all for higher power levels, I don't think those things are on the same level as the aforementioned spells, and neither do I think those effects are suitable for casting as long as you've got the requisite XP and gold. Other things like Augury/Scrying and Magic Circle against X seem more like rituals, and I don't mean that in 5e sense, but as something everyone should be able to do without spellcasting with proper knowledge/skill.
Therefore, I argue that some spells should probably either removed from spellbooks entirely or remade into rituals, accessible to all characters if they make some non-level investment into it.
The minor changes include removing Druid's Animal Companion (and buffing Ranger's companion to Druid's AC level), making Clerics into Cloistered Clerics (Cleric shouldn't be a better Paladin than a Paladin is) and fixing spontaneous casters' spell progression.
Most issues with spellcasters arise not from there being effective spells - BFC is fine and all, and can certainly be absolutely deadly, but it's not what breaks the game - a T3 or T4 martial can keep up with a simple BFC caster and perhaps their brand of crowd control, which is "death from suddenly reaching negative hitpoints" is often even more effective. (Most) buffs or HP damage spells are fine, as most of the latter are notoriously underpowered in comparison to other spells.
The thing that damages the game most is the ability of spellcasters to often and reliably shift the game from their own capabilities to someone else's abilities being borrowed for a while and to negate their own weaknesses too well. This creates the most problems before really high levels, but those have some problems of their own.
So, point by point the things that need fixing (usually by nerfs or outright rewrites) with spellcasting are:
A) A summoned creature is often about as good as a non-optimized T5 or T4 class, doesn't take a share of XP or loot, and you can always make another one if the first one bites the dust. The only issue is the casting time, but...see C.
A.1) Summoned creatures have a very wide range of abilities, and even those you probably wouldn't summon as a beatstick can severely impact the game by using those (i.e. efreeti). While summoning should be a viable and enjoyable archetype, it shouldn't go as far as it does, and I would argue that it needs to serve mostly a combat purpose.
B) Polymorphing into something, which can be done as soon as level 3 (Alter Self, limited usability, sees some abuse with Outsiders) or 5 (Wild Shape is pretty good) and starts being awesome at level 7 (Polymorph and everything else upwards), invalidates your physical stats, as most melee monsters have great physical stats and ways to use them effectively.
A+B) Those points are exacerbated by multiple sources for monsters, which means a new adversary is actually a possible tool for a caster to use.
The combined solution to those points would be restricting summoning/polymorphing to MM1/SRD, perhaps banning Planar Binding and similar effects that allow abuse altogether, but I'm sure there is a more elegant solution that I'm not seeing. Oh, and Divine Power is supposed to come into it somewhere, too, as one of the worst ideas for buffs, since it explicitly gives worse results the closer you are to full BAB.
C) Casters possess the most efficient means of scouting with a slew of Divination spells and specific shapeshifting forms suited for information gathering. Therefore, a caster might arguably be prepared for most situations, if the DM doesn't take specific steps to counter them ("Yes, all doors in this dungeon are lead-lined, so you can't Detect Magic past them"). This makes some casting times moot, since you're often aware of what lies ahead and can pre-cast related spells.
This is not exactly a problem by itself. Diviners are an interesting archetype, but most of the Divination spells are magical eyeglasses and/or lower-scale GPS, which are okay by themselves, and the remainder is something that's not exactly suited for spellcasting, which leads us to...
D) (Here's where my maybe unpopular personal opinion starts) Arguably, some spells don't really make sense as a "magical button" you can press and have the effect created. For instance, Dominate Monster is a good example of what a 9th level spell might look like, and a good case can be made for Meteor Swarm or Absorption or Time Stop or Wail of the Banshee and the like. What should not be on the list are Wish and Genesis and similar effects. Those things don't make sense as defined spell effects. It's literally god-like power, and while I'm all for higher power levels, I don't think those things are on the same level as the aforementioned spells, and neither do I think those effects are suitable for casting as long as you've got the requisite XP and gold. Other things like Augury/Scrying and Magic Circle against X seem more like rituals, and I don't mean that in 5e sense, but as something everyone should be able to do without spellcasting with proper knowledge/skill.
Therefore, I argue that some spells should probably either removed from spellbooks entirely or remade into rituals, accessible to all characters if they make some non-level investment into it.
The minor changes include removing Druid's Animal Companion (and buffing Ranger's companion to Druid's AC level), making Clerics into Cloistered Clerics (Cleric shouldn't be a better Paladin than a Paladin is) and fixing spontaneous casters' spell progression.