Blade-wrought Spell Metamagic: how can it be broken? (Homebrew)

[Kadesh]

A player has come to me with a concept for their character which basically involves their Hermit background the ability to come up with their own 'secret': they have developed the ability to shape ranged spell attacks into a blade influenced by the old Dusk blade's Hold Spell feature. They have so far used only Inflict and other Touch melee weapon spells.

This is not the final rules, and I'm happy to amend.

Blade-wrought Spell
- When you cast a spell that has a duration of instantaneous and makes a ranged spell attack, you can instead make a melee spell attacks with the spell against a creature within your reach. You can expend a number of Sorcery Points to concentrate on this spell, the duration of which is a number of rounds equal to the number of expended sp. While concentrating on the spell, you may use your action to make a single melee spell attack each turn - you may not make ranged weapon attacks with the spell. The spell's effect takes the form appropriate to the wielder and nature of the spell used as determined by the DM - inflict wounds appears a smoke wreathed scythe for example.

First thought seems okay: it doesn't mesh with Paladin (no weapon), so my biggest concern is how it interacts with Quicken and how it gives 1:1 return on higher level spell usage (3 sp on Finger of Death = 3 effective 6th level spell slots), and those like Scorching Ray which make multiple ranged spell attacks.

So, what is the cost of the SP that would be appropriate for this, and how would it need to be reworded to avoid this?

I'd like this to be more interesting and useful than simply 'take Pal 2 and refluff' despite the opportunity cost.

Ta.

[Damon_Tor]

A player has come to me with a concept for their character which basically involves their Hermit background the ability to come up with their own 'secret': they have developed the ability to shape ranged spell attacks into a blade influenced by the old Dusk blade's Hold Spell feature. They have so far used only Inflict and other Touch melee weapon spells.

This is not the final rules, and I'm happy to amend.

Blade-wrought Spell
- When you cast a spell that has a duration of instantaneous and makes a ranged spell attack, you can instead make a melee spell attacks with the spell against a creature within your reach. You can expend a number of Sorcery Points to concentrate on this spell, the duration of which is a number of rounds equal to the number of expended sp. While concentrating on the spell, you may use your action to make a single melee spell attack each turn - you may not make ranged weapon attacks with the spell. The spell's effect takes the form appropriate to the wielder and nature of the spell used as determined by the DM - inflict wounds appears a smoke wreathed scythe for example.

First thought seems okay: it doesn't mesh with Paladin (no weapon), so my biggest concern is how it interacts with Quicken and how it gives 1:1 return on higher level spell usage (3 sp on Finger of Death = 3 effective 6th level spell slots), and those like Scorching Ray which make multiple ranged spell attacks.

So, what is the cost of the SP that would be appropriate for this, and how would it need to be reworded to avoid this?

I'd like this to be more interesting and useful than simply 'take Pal 2 and refluff' despite the opportunity cost.

Ta.

So the way I see it, this ability gives you:

+Extra castings of a spell from one slot
-Costs SP
-Reduces the range to Touch

My major concern would be the efficiency of the ability as it pertains to higher level spells. 1 SP for an extra 7-9th level slot is bonkers. 3 SP for 3 extra 7-9th level slots is crazy. The SP cost needs to rise with the spell slot being used like Twinned Spell does. Of course there aren't currently very many spells that actually use ranged spell attacks, and many of those that do have a duration, so that's not much of a concern right now, but any features you introduce should be future-proofed.

IMO, it shouldn't interact with Quicken at all: it should explicitly be a metamagic effect and as such couldn't interact with quicken, twin or anything else problematic.

I'd word it thus:

Blade-Wrought Spell (Metamagic Option)
When you cast a spell that has a duration of instantaneous and makes a ranged spell attack, you can instead make the range touch. Any ranged spell attacks are melee spell attacks instead. For up to one minute, you can concentrate on that spell, and while concentrating on that spell, as an action you can spend a number of sorcery points equal to the slot used to cast the spell in order to cast it again without expending a spell slot.

The scaling cost and the use of concentration begins to offset the potentially enormous benefit of being able to repeat high level spells again and again. It begins to offset it, but this would still be a terribly powerful ability. At the same it's a bit more user friendly, since it doesn't require you to spend SP to lock in a duration right away, you aren't penalized if the situation changes and you feel the need to do something else next turn.

[Tesla Dragon]

Some concerns defintely arise with higher level spells, as you're effectively gaining a use of the spell for every sorcery point you dump into it. That seems worryingly powerful with certain spells.

In addition, as it's worded, this metamagic would only work with rolls which require attack rolls. I'm not certain if that's intended, but replacing spell save DCs with an attack roll doesn't feel right either. So if I may, I suggest the following.

As a metamagic option, any spell which requires a ranged attack roll with the duration of instantaneous may have this metamagic applied to it for the cost of 1 Sorcery Point, changing the spell into a touch range, melee spell attack and you may choose to concentrate on the spell for up to 1 minute. While concentrating on a spell affected by this metamagic, you may take an action to make a melee spell attack with the spell again, until 1 minute has passed, you lose concentration or you successfully make a melee spell attack.

This, I hope, balances things out. You don't get multiple spells from your sorcery points this way, but you're more likely to successfully strike with the ones you use this way since you can swing with it multiple times, much like a Paladin's smite spells.

As for spells with saves, the only thing I can think of is to reduce any spell affected to a single target touch spell and on a successful melee spell attack have the target save at Disadvantage, though I worry it may step on Eldritch Knight toes.

[R.Shackleford]

I wouldn't allow concentration and instead just allow the metamagic to be an anti-distant metamagic.

Distant Spell

When you cast a spell that has a range of 5 feet or greater, you can spend 1 sorcery point to double the range of the spell. When you cast a spell that has a range of touch, you can spend 1 sorcery point to make the range of the spell 30 feet.

Sooo.. Something like this would be balanced, I guess.

Close Spell

When you cast a spell that has a range of 5 feet or greater, you can spend 1 sorcery point to reduce the range of the spell to touch or have the spell activate via melee weapon attack.

[Kadesh]

I wouldn't allow concentration and instead just allow the metamagic to be an anti-distant metamagic.

Distant Spell

When you cast a spell that has a range of 5 feet or greater, you can spend 1 sorcery point to double the range of the spell. When you cast a spell that has a range of touch, you can spend 1 sorcery point to make the range of the spell 30 feet.

Sooo.. Something like this would be balanced, I guess.

Close Spell

When you cast a spell that has a range of 5 feet or greater, you can spend 1 sorcery point to reduce the range of the spell to touch or have the spell activate via melee weapon attack.

You mean 'take crossbow expert'? Forgive me if I'm wrong but this doesn't do anything XX doesn't do. Not what I'm looking for, though,, sadly. Also melee weapon attack is begging for Sorcadin Abuse.

Damon_Tor's fix seems more in line with what I want to get out of it :) tha ks!

[Kane0]

I would bundle these two effects into Distant Spell and Extend Spell respectively. Each one would look a bit more attractive as options, one manipulating spell range including ranged/melee spell attack and the other making an instant spell a concentration, duration one with some SP cost attached.

/2cp

[R.Shackleford]

You mean 'take crossbow expert'? Forgive me if I'm wrong but this doesn't do anything XX doesn't do. Not what I'm looking for, though,, sadly. Also melee weapon attack is begging for Sorcadin Abuse.

Damon_Tor's fix seems more in line with what I want to get out of it :) tha ks!

Crossbow Expert doesn't allow for spells to be cast through melee weapon (changing a save to an attack versus AC). Also it only has one benefit to most casters.

ASI slot.

Crossbow expert gives one thing to casters for thr cost of an ASI/Feat.

Changing a saving throw spell into an attack spell... Doesn't change much. Even as a weapon attack roll, you will run out of SP and spell slots very fast if you try to abuse it. You also don't deal weapon damage with the spell activation (think booming blade but without the "takes normal effects of the attack" line out of it).

There are easier things to abuse,

Also, as DM, you should always have a "use it till you abuse it" clause with homebrew.

[mrumsey]

I don't know how this would work in the hands of a coffee-lock, but if you allowed both someone far more clever than I might find a loop hole with massive SP.

Also, what is the cost for cantrips? Multiple attacks leveraging Eldritch Blast could get...time consuming.