Another magic initiate feat query.

[Stygofthedump]

If I as a pure (PHB only) sorcerer want more spell choices and slots; can I take this as sorcerer and get maybe shield. I would swap out a first level spell to use spell known somewhere else.
Will this give me at lvl 4?
spells known=6! (One more is great for such a restricted class)
Effective slots= 5&3
(Cantrips a bonus)
Can I chew up extra first level spell for metamagic if need be?
Worth it?

[Man_Over_Game]

If I as a pure (PHB only) sorcerer want more spell choices and slots; can I take this as sorcerer and get maybe shield. I would swap out a first level spell to use spell known somewhere else.
Will this give me at lvl 4?
spells known=6! (One more is great for such a restricted class)
Effective slots= 5&3
(Cantrips a bonus)
Can I chew up extra first level spell for metamagic if need be?
Worth it?

I would actually invest in Ritual Caster instead. I say this because Ritual Casting is something sorcerers can't do, which really hurts their sustainability. Ritual spells don't usually scale with your spellcasting modifier, so you could even grab Wizard rituals without too much investment into Intelligence (you need a 13 INT or WIS for the feat). This gives you access to about 19 spells that don't cost spell slots, where your Magic Initiate gives you 1 non-cantrip spell.

If you want something for combat, get Spell Sniper, as it works with all of your spells that attack against AC. Or grab Elemental Adept, especially if you're going Dragon Blooded sorcerer.

Magic Initiate is the one thing I would not recommend to main casters unless it was for a very very good reason.

You can get Shield later when you unlock more level 1 spells, or you can swap spells out when you level up. Magic Initiate is better used for rogues/fighters.

[Stygofthedump]

Thanks.

problem here is Spell sniper doesn't give any more slots or spells known. Magic initiate allows swapping out a lv one spell for any other spell at any level.
Doesn't sound like much but a lvl 4 sorc only has 5 spells, try it - its tough.
I am not sure if this feat effectively allows an extra lvl one slot and therefore more Spell points.

Ritual casting can be taken by others and has no special benefit for sorcerers per say, also int is 10.
Realistically I'll go +2 CHA to max it first but the spells knows is squeezing me.

[ErrantNonsense]

To answer your question, yes: because Shield is on the sorcerer spell list you will be able to cast it with your regular spell slots as well as the magic initiate “slot”. That slot will only be usable for Shield, and can’t be turned into sorcery points, but so long as you’re casting Shield at least once a day it is functionally +1 first level slot.

[Stygofthedump]

Probably a safe bet. Thanks

[Quoxis]

Thanks.

problem here is Spell sniper doesn't give any more slots or spells known. Magic initiate allows swapping out a lv one spell for any other spell at any level.
Doesn't sound like much but a lvl 4 sorc only has 5 spells, try it - its tough.
I am not sure if this feat effectively allows an extra lvl one slot and therefore more Spell points.

Ritual casting can be taken by others and has no special benefit for sorcerers per say, also int is 10.
Realistically I'll go +2 CHA to max it first but the spells knows is squeezing me.

Just to clarify: no, it does not.
You get to choose a spell and you’re stuck with it - shield is great, but you don’t get to exchange that (unless you meant „now that my sorc knows shield by feat, i can exchange the previously known shield spell from my sorc‘s known list for spell X“).
You also don’t get an extra slot, just one free casting per long rest, so no spell points and no extra casting of another spell instead of shield.

As for ritual caster: you mean to tell me that A) your party doesn’t need detect magic, identify, detect poison and disease, leomund‘s tiny hut etc. and B) both your int and wis stats are below 13?

[Aaron Underhand]

If you want to free up some known spell slots then MI gives you one, Ritual caster is good, but one level dip is also fantastic. You could dip Bard or Warlock easily, get low level spells and free up your spells known choices. Bard is great for healing word as well as dissonant wisphers.

If you have Int or Wis 13 + you could consider druid, cleric or wizard. My bard dropped a level of wizard, getting great extra flexibility, including those 1st level rituals

[Greywander]

Just to clarify: no, it does not.
This. The spell you learn from Magic Initiate can't be swapped out for something else when you level up. However, you can cast it normally using spell slots (https://www.sageadvice.eu/2016/01/09/eldritch-knight-with-magic-initiate-feat/).

Therefore, what you can do is learn a spell via Magic Initiate that you would have wanted as a spell known. Since you have it via MI, you don't need to have it as a spell known anymore, freeing you up to learn a different spell. This can extend the number of spells you know, plus giving you a free casting of that 1st level spell(s) you got from MI, but MI doesn't just give you more spells known. So as long as there is at least one 1st level spell you want to know, you can get that spell via MI and learn something else instead.

[Stygofthedump]

Thanks, bad news for me is as follows. No INT and WIZ at 13, also no multiclass allowed. To clarify yes I did mean keep shield spell and swap all other LV one spells out eventually.
Still worth it as a feat?
Worth mentioning we have bard and Druid available as well (and barbarian and rogue)

[Arkhios]

A player in my group did this, more or less.

The main gist of her character was that she wanted to be able to cast magic missile as many times as possible and that she wouldn't have to choose to learn many other spells than that, so our DM suggested her to make a sorcerer but as a necessary compromise take the Magic Initiate for sorcerer spells and pick Magic Missile as the one 1st level spell.
Effectively she's mostly just spamming Magic Missile when damage is required, or one of her ridiculously numerous cantrips (thanks to magic initiate)


That said, I'd like to clarify a bit more:
The 1st-level spell learned with Magic Initiate doesn't exactly add a spell slot to your existing pool of spell slots. The wording of the feat says that you can cast the chosen spell one time per long rest as if you had cast it as a 1st-level spell (in other words, as if using a 1st-level spell slot, even though you are not). If the spell chosen is from the class you already have levels in, that spell can also be cast normally expending an appropriate spell slot, even higher than 1st-level.)

This in return means that you can't use Font of Magic with an additional slot - because there isn't any.

Contrary to what people have said, you can choose a spell that you already know with the feat, and essentially have same spell known twice, and you can retrain the one you learned from the class while still keeping the one you learned with the feat. Which is what I believe you were trying to say earlier.

[Stygofthedump]

Thank you. Probably worthwhile for shield in my case. I’m thinking 20 CHA can wait till LV 8.

[Greywander]

Contrary to what people have said, you can choose a spell that you already know with the feat, and essentially have same spell known twice, and you can retrain the one you learned from the class while still keeping the one you learned with the feat. Which is what I believe you were trying to say earlier.
I don't know that this is actually contrary to what anyone has been saying, but we might have worded it confusingly. So here's an example:

You're a 4th level sorcerer. You have 5 spells known. One of them is, let's say, Shield.
You take Magic Initiate for your ASI, and also choose Shield as the 1st level spell you get from Magic Initiate.

You now have Shield from two different sources: one as a sorcerer spell known, and one from Magic Initiate.
Since this does not benefit you at all, you replace your spell known with a different sorcerer spell.

You now have 5 spells known, none of which are Shield, since you swapped it out. But since you also have Shield from Magic Initiate, you can still cast it using a spell slot. Because of Magic Initiate, you can also cast Shield once without using a spell slot.

So in the end, you have 5 spells plus Shield. This means you effectively have 6 spells known, however, the spell you got from Magic Initiate can't be swapped out later.

So, when you're choosing your spells for Magic Initiate, you're best off choosing something you know you'll want for your entire sorcerer career. Shield is a great choice, since it remains useful through 20th level, and can't be upscaled. Remember that the one free casting you get always casts it at 1st level, so you'll generally want spells that are still effective at higher level play even when cast at 1st level. Feather Fall, Mage Armor, Detect Magic, Disguise Self, and Silent Image would all be good picks.


If the spell chosen is from the class you already have levels in, that spell can also be cast normally expending an appropriate spell slot, even higher than 1st-level.
Are you sure this only applies if you pick a spell from your class for Magic Initiate? I thought I heard this somewhere, too, that e.g. if a cleric took MI and chose a cleric spell, they could cast it with spell slots, but if they took a wizard spell they could not. However, the Sage Advice I linked to in my post doesn't mention this restriction, it merely says that spells obtained via MI can be cast using spell slots.

[Arkhios]

Are you sure this only applies if you pick a spell from your class for Magic Initiate? I thought I heard this somewhere, too, that e.g. if a cleric took MI and chose a cleric spell, they could cast it with spell slots, but if they took a wizard spell they could not. However, the Sage Advice I linked to in my post doesn't mention this restriction, it merely says that spells obtained via MI can be cast using spell slots.

Yes

See page 8 in Sage Advice Compendium (https://media.wizards.com/2017/dnd/downloads/SA-Compendium.pdf), under Magic Initiate entry:



If you have spell slots, can you use them to cast the 1st-level spell you learn with the Magic Initiate feat?

Yes, but only if the class you pick for the feat is one of your classes.

For example, if you pick sorcerer and you are a sorcerer, the Spellcasting feature for that class tells you that you can use your spell slots to cast the sorcerer spells you know, so you can use your spell slots to cast the 1st-level sorcerer spell you learn from Magic Initiate. Similarly, if you are a wizard and pick that class for the feat, you learn a 1st-level wizard spell, which you could add to your spellbook and subsequently prepare.

In short, you must follow your character’s normal spellcasting rules, which determine whether you can expend spell slots on the 1st-level spell you learn from Magic Initiate.


For the record, that document is from Wizards of the Coast, while the "Sage Advice" website you linked to in your previous post is provided by a 3rd-party source (don't get fooled by the name; if it was official, surely it would be a sub-page for wizards.com, right?), although it does link to relevant Sage Advice tweets. Personally, I don't care what any one of the designers say in a tweet unless it gets into that document as well.