Spells Cost HP?

[sayaijin]

I'm sure this idea has been voiced before, but what if the way to balance casters is to remove spell slots and make spells cost HP? Obviously we'd have to do something about healing magic. Maybe increased casting time so healing spells are a ten minute ritual i.e. usually only done during a rest.

So theoretically, a spell would cost 1d6-Con per spell level as a starting point (let me know if my math is way off). A first level caster could theoretically cast 2-3 first level spells without making saving throws (~2.5 HP per spell). If they use magic out of combat or take other damage, then they are very limited in the amount they can do in combat.

This would be a world more like what we see in The Witcher and other fantasy worlds where magic takes a toll on the wielder.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

I tried making a (3.5) Vitality and Wounds (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/adventuring/vitalityAndWoundPoints.htm) version of this, where spells and special abilities cost vitality points, but it wasn't really possible to balance it. You're stuck deciding whether to give spellcasters hp like a barbarian, or making spells absurdly cheap to cast, or letting spellcasters go down like they're made of paper if they get hit after the 2nd or 3rd round.

[Naanomi]

Would make Warlocks especially weird to balance our I’d guess

[PhoenixPhyre]

I'm sure this idea has been voiced before, but what if the way to balance casters is to remove spell slots and make spells cost HP? Obviously we'd have to do something about healing magic. Maybe increased casting time so healing spells are a ten minute ritual i.e. usually only done during a rest.

So theoretically, a spell would cost 1d6-Con per spell level as a starting point (let me know if my math is way off). A first level caster could theoretically cast 2-3 first level spells without making saving throws (~2.5 HP per spell). If they use magic out of combat or take other damage, then they are very limited in the amount they can do in combat.

This would be a world more like what we see in The Witcher and other fantasy worlds where magic takes a toll on the wielder.

This is doable, but IMO would make being a spell-caster a trap option. And an active liability most of the time. Which would work for a very different world than most of the D&D ones.

Although the Blood Hunter (Mercer's class) does have mechanics that involve doing damage to self to buff the character. Which makes them kinda awkward to use a lot of the time.

I've toyed with the idea of classes that could use Hit Dice for other things (like to recharge slots or amp up effects), but have never implemented it because it throws off the basic balance curve so tremendously.

[sayaijin]

So I think giving each caster access to some sort of ritual/ability to regain health outside of combat would allow them to start fights consistently near full health. Then I think my math of 1d6-Con x spell level scales pretty well.

This is erring on the side of making casters fall after 1-2 hits, but this really limits what they can do with magic. Also, a common complaint I've seen in these threads is that magic "just works".

[micahaphone]

In a similar vein I like the option to exert yourself beyond normal limits in exchange for exhaustion and/or hit dice. I think exhaustion is underused in the rules. Or maybe I just almost never play RAW exploration/travel and as such never take con saves against exhaustion from traveling extra hours.

[animewatcha]

Gotta be careful when playing with exhaustion since certain effects only 'cure' certain amounts of levels of exhaustion. 6 levels of exhaustion and pc dies.

[TrueAlphaGamer]

Perhaps consider making a small pool of a mana-esque resource that spellcasters can draw on, which they can refill either through rests or through sacrificing a portion of their hit points. Forcing the use of hit points to cast spells significantly disadvantages spellcasters at very low levels, due to their low(er) hit dice (unless that's by design or you only player games in tier 2 onward, in which case go crazy I guess).

I hope you're excluding rituals from this hp tax, so that an unlucky mage can still have out of combat utility after he gets hit by an orc javelin or two during a fight. On this vein, consider making spells like false-life have the ritual tag, so that spellcasters have some way of slightly bolstering their effective hp.

[jjordan]

I like the idea, but only for a subset of casters.

[Sigreid]

A while back there was a D20 rules set Grim Tales. It had a really cool magic system where when you cast a spell you had to roll a skill check based on the skill level. If you succeeded at one level you cast the spell and had to pay with strength to get the magic to go off, leaving you weak until you had time to recover (long rest str recovery like any other stat drain). Succeed at another level and you avoid the str drain. If you didn't have enough strength left for the spell, you could pay with con.

I liked it.

[NaughtyTiger]

magic has a cost, or magic has risk
it should be much harder to bend the weave to your will than to swing a sword.

[Snails]

A while back there was a D20 rules set Grim Tales. It had a really cool magic system where when you cast a spell you had to roll a skill check based on the skill level. If you succeeded at one level you cast the spell and had to pay with strength to get the magic to go off, leaving you weak until you had time to recover (long rest str recovery like any other stat drain). Succeed at another level and you avoid the str drain. If you didn't have enough strength left for the spell, you could pay with con.

The idea is a good one.
Usually these things are scaled such that it is easier to succeed on the check for low level spells, and harder for the high level spells. That way the cost/penalty can be flat or close to flat.

[Anonymouswizard]

I'm sure this idea has been voiced before, but what if the way to balance casters is to remove spell slots and make spells cost HP? Obviously we'd have to do something about healing magic. Maybe increased casting time so healing spells are a ten minute ritual i.e. usually only done during a rest.

So theoretically, a spell would cost 1d6-Con per spell level as a starting point (let me know if my math is way off). A first level caster could theoretically cast 2-3 first level spells without making saving throws (~2.5 HP per spell). If they use magic out of combat or take other damage, then they are very limited in the amount they can do in combat.

This would be a world more like what we see in The Witcher and other fantasy worlds where magic takes a toll on the wielder.

It could work, but you'd pretty much have to rewrite not just how magic works, but also hp (as casters now need hp just as much as frontline warriors you might just go for giving everybody d8 or d10 hit dice).

One of my favourite games is designed around this assumption. In The Fantasy Trip you can take damage, which reduces your effective Strength (ST) score, and you can suffer Fatigue, which also reduces your effective ST score (neither of them will, IIRC, require you to use smaller weapons, but it's reduced for almost everything else). In the second edition wizards can learn the Staff series of spells where the second allows them to store 'phantom' ST points to cast more, but recharging your staff costs five points of fatigue for a single point (but, despite what the rules claim, half a day's rest should allow you to restore eightish points instead of one).

The trick is that spells have fixed costs, and that Fatigue recovers much more quickly than wounds (a point per 15 minutes of rest, rather than a point every two days). A wizard can actually cast spells fairly regularly without risk of death if they get an occasional sit down, but taking an arrow will cut into your ability to cast.

It works because the entire system is based around it (Stats are likely no higher than the mid teens, a spell is equivalent to a hit from a light weapon, there's very little in terms of ways to cheat the system). Several other systems do the same thing, applying either hp damage, stats damage, or levels of fatigue for spellcasting, and many have it as an option for when you run out of spell points (some of these actually will make it a Feat/Edge/Talent you have to take to unlock the ability to cast yourself to death).

But just slotting it into D&D5s isn't going to be easy, because the game isn't based around that assumption.

[lukethecat2003]

So I think giving each caster access to some sort of ritual/ability to regain health outside of combat would allow them to start fights consistently near full health. Then I think my math of 1d6-Con x spell level scales pretty well.

This is erring on the side of making casters fall after 1-2 hits, but this really limits what they can do with magic. Also, a common complaint I've seen in these threads is that magic "just works".

EK = OP with this idea, from what i know anyway

[NaughtyTiger]

EK = OP with this idea, from what i know anyway

why do you say that?
every class values con

[sayaijin]

I greatly appreciate the feedback. I recognize that a lot of things would need to be rewritten in D&D for this to work, but it's one way to bring casters and martials closer to parity. I think the cost needs more tuning than I originally stated, but I've always been bothered by the fluff of spell slots. Cantrips help, but running out of slots means that the wizard is too tired to cast more spells?

With costing HP, the mage knows that the cost can be lethal if they don't perform the spell perfectly.

I think I'm going to just create a new homebrew class that uses HP instead of spell slots and see how it goes.

d8 hit dice? Cost of HP equal to 1d4 x spell level? Regular full caster progression as far as what level of spells they have access to?

[Kyutaru]

magic has a cost, or magic has risk
it should be much harder to bend the weave to your will than to swing a sword.

This would work if magic had a stress system. As it stands, things have gotten easier for mages and concentration is their only real limiter now.

[NaughtyTiger]

magic has a cost, or magic has risk
it should be much harder to bend the weave to your will than to swing a sword.
This would work if magic had a stress system. As it stands, things have gotten easier for mages and concentration is their only real limiter now.

Yes, the OP proposed a stress system for magic.

[Pex]

No. Characters should not be punished for doing what they're supposed to be doing. They should not be committing suicide. If you absolutely cannot stand a PC doing something that you feel the need to punish the character by making him worse off than he was if he hadn't bothered doing the thing, then get rid of it and do something else.

It is not balance to say you can do something then make you wish you hadn't used it.

I speak from experience. An old Star Wars game had Force users lose HP to use the Force. As I was playing it I was killing myself doing Jedi Mind Tricks and Moving Objects even when not in combat. I was always dropping when combat did happen because I had so few HP to defend myself with. Eventually the DM had to house rule I always get max hit points upon leveling just to give me a chance to not die and get to play a Jedi. I didn't drop as often, but it still cost extra resources of healing because I was always near death after every combat.

[JellyPooga]

No. Characters should not be punished for doing what they're supposed to be doing. They should not be committing suicide. If you absolutely cannot stand a PC doing something that you feel the need to punish the character by making him worse off than he was if he hadn't bothered doing the thing, then get rid of it and do something else.

It is not balance to say you can do something then make you wish you hadn't used it.

I speak from experience. An old Star Wars game had Force users lose HP to use the Force. As I was playing it I was killing myself doing Jedi Mind Tricks and Moving Objects even when not in combat. I was always dropping when combat did happen because I had so few HP to defend myself with. Eventually the DM had to house rule I always get max hit points upon leveling just to give me a chance to not die and get to play a Jedi. I didn't drop as often, but it still cost extra resources of healing because I was always near death after every combat.

Counterpoint: Advanced Fighting Fantasy uses Stamina (essentially HP) as magic-fuel and has been commercially successful and enjoyed by many for decades. Your opinion/experience does not make the idea objectively a bad one.

The idea that magic might actually have a cost associated with it is *not* a punishment to the player if they're aware of how magic functions in that game/setting. If you want to see it that way, that's your prerogative, but it's also only your opinion. Many fantasies are built on/around the notion that magic is/can be dangerous or costly to ones own health; notably Dragonlance is included in the list of those fantasies, but also the Shannara series among others.

[Kane0]

Draining regular HP probably wouldn't work because they're so easy to replenish, you would have to dig a little deeper into say Hit Dice or Maximum Hit Points. This would also help address Cure spells.

[Fnissalot]

I tried making a (3.5) Vitality and Wounds (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/adventuring/vitalityAndWoundPoints.htm) version of this, where spells and special abilities cost vitality points, but it wasn't really possible to balance it. You're stuck deciding whether to give spellcasters hp like a barbarian, or making spells absurdly cheap to cast, or letting spellcasters go down like they're made of paper if they get hit after the 2nd or 3rd round.

I agree, it is almost impossible to balance it. And even if you would be able to balance it there are too many ways to start cheating the system to gain more slots out of it, becoming an even better coffee-lock in essence.

edit: (to make it work, you would either need to make a spell slot cost more HP than a spell slot at that level could possibly heal, or it needs to prevent any healing for a while after casting it. The first is pretty impossible to balance as it either costs too much based on how little HP you have as a full caster or it is too cheap which makes healing spells give you endless casting, and these two statements overlap in the middle which gives no room for designing it ( A level 1 wizard has 2 spell slots and probably around 6-9 HP while a cure wounds should heal 1d8+3 at level 1). The second will be frustrating to play as you will often be on the brink of death and not able to do anything.)

I tried to do it for the homebrew challenge a few months back and the closest thing to HP spell casting I got to was a system using your hit dice to generate spell points. I got it to be comparable to the spell point variant.

[DeTess]

You could definitely balance a system around this concept, but I don't think you can slot it in 5e without rewriting all magic classes and the entire magic system paradigm. The problem is that, as it stands, combat magic is reasonably balanced for most of the game, so you can't make those spells too costly hp-wise. On the other hand though, a reasonable cost for a combat spell would make most non-combat spells close to being free (assuming you tie it to spell-slot, rather than costing each spell individually), which also just so happens to be the part where spellcasters really start to out-shine non-spellcasters in my opinion.

[Unoriginal]

Matt Mercer's Blood Hunter class did possess many powers with "PC hurts themselves and lose XdY ammount of HPs" as requirement for activation.

This resulted in the Critical Role Blood Hunter PC killing himself on live television while trying to cast Blindness on the boss of the encounter.

[Delph]

This idea made +CON races best casters. Can't work.

It could be 1d6+2*spell level - Int/Wis/Char as classes have spellcasting ability.

with d6 for start - 1st level spell will be in averege 2,5 dmg (5,5 - 3) , that coud be 2 safe spells. 3 if you have luck (roll some ones and it's a free spell :smallsmile:). 1 if you havn't.
When you have +5 casting stat you have almost 1/2 chance to cast 1st level spell as free spell.

[EggKookoo]

Matt Mercer's Blood Hunter class did possess many powers with "PC hurts themselves and lose XdY ammount of HPs" as requirement for activation.

This resulted in the Critical Role Blood Hunter PC killing himself on live television while trying to cast Blindness on the boss of the encounter.

To be fair, IIRC, it was the boss' glaive in his chest that did the actual killing. And they admitted to themselves later that they went up against someone distinctly outside of their power level. When they went after him later, they strategized the wazoo out of it, employed extra healers, and only won according to Mercer because he made a single positioning mistake. That set of encounters was bound to kill someone.

[sayaijin]

This idea made +CON races best casters. Can't work.

It could be 1d6+2*spell level - Int/Wis/Char as classes have spellcasting ability.

with d6 for start - 1st level spell will be in averege 2,5 dmg (5,5 - 3) , that coud be 2 safe spells. 3 if you have luck (roll some ones and it's a free spell :smallsmile:). 1 if you havn't.
When you have +5 casting stat you have almost 1/2 chance to cast 1st level spell as free spell.

Yeah, I realized it couldn't be 1d6-Con because high level casters would get free spells. Like others have said, it's a pain to balance, but the concept makes more sense narratively than spell slots.

[Unoriginal]

To be fair, IIRC, it was the boss' glaive in his chest that did the actual killing.

Depends how you see it. The power use put the character to 0 HPs while in attack range of the boss, the boss just attacked twice to skip the "death saves" part.


And they admitted to themselves later that they went up against someone distinctly outside of their power level.

The boss alone wasn't, but the other bad guys + one of the PCs being out of the fight due to backstory-reasons-induced fear + the incorrect intel they were given + one of the PCs spending the fight trying to free the people the bad guys had caged as they had planned rather than fighting made it so they were spread too thin. Could still have fled without casualty after they killed the bad guys' druid, though.



When they went after him later, they strategized the wazoo out of it,

Untrue. They just sneaked in the bad guy's base so they could kill most of the goons and one of the mid-boss before the alarm got rung.



only won according to Mercer because he made a single positioning mistake.

Not quite. Mercer said the boss was supposed to escape after losing his whole organization and being badly wounded, but he made the mistake of finishing his turn on the ground and in range of the monk's Stunning Strike instead of flying back up.

So they'd have won either way, the boss would just have escaped.



That set of encounters was bound to kill someone.

It wasn't. They could have run pretty easily in the first case, and in the second the only question was if the boss escaped or tried to toy with them too much


Regardless, my point was that having abilities that damage the user during a fight will result in them getting rekt much more.

[EggKookoo]

Untrue. They just sneaked in the bad guy's base so they could kill most of the goons and one of the mid-boss before the alarm got rung.

For the Nein, though, that's pretty complex strategy. I mean, usually they employ the opposite of a plan. :smallsmile:

(I'm up to somewhere around episode 37. Maybe they get more strategic later...)

[Kyutaru]

This was how Demonologists functioned in Age of Conan. Set isn't the nicest of guys and they would regularly sacrifice their own blood to the cause. They even had a super move that took half their life to make their spells temporarily free and powerful. The lore of evil diety rituals require blood sacrifice too, Bloodmages bounce between full and low by siphoning it, and even Vampires in the White Wolf games use their own blood to cast spells.

To say that adding this cost would punish casters unjustly is disingenuous as casters have gotten away with murder over the game's changes and are possessed of almost no usage difference between magic and martial abilities. Concentration remains the one thing holding them back when in the past they'd have a slew of disadvantages restricting their dominance. The penalties have gone away yet the magic wasn't toned down and spell slots are still as bountiful as ever, now even spontaneous casters. It's insane.

[Unoriginal]

yet the magic wasn't toned down

This is incorrect.

[Kyutaru]

This is incorrect.
It is not, the shift from 2E to 3E where the elimination of much of these features happened also came with no change to most spells. Some even got better. What you mean is an attempt to deny universal application of the statement which was never its intent to begin with when dealing with literally hundreds of spell options. 5E nerfed everyone, not just wizards, and the toned down magic reflects the toned down combat and toned down fighters too.

[Composer99]

I would concur with either using Hit Dice or some sort of "strain"/"corruption" mechanism, over hit point damage.

[Unoriginal]

It is not, the shift from 2E to 3E where the elimination of much of these features happened also came with no change to most spells. Some even got better. What you mean is an attempt to deny universal application of the statement which was never its intent to begin with when dealing with literally hundreds of spell options. 5E nerfed everyone, not just wizards, and the toned down magic reflects the toned down combat and toned down fighters too.

You cannot use the sentence "magic was not toned down" or "no change to most spells. Some even got better" and "5e nerfed everyone"and avoid contradicting yourself.

If you want to say "everyone got toned down, but magic wasn't toned down enough", that'd be your opinion, but don't pretend that "magic was not toned down" isn't a massive hyperbole made to give the impression the 5e casters' toys were unchanged from the 3.X casters' ones.

[Kyutaru]

You cannot use the sentence "magic was not toned down" or "no change to most spells. Some even got better" and "5e nerfed everyone"and avoid contradicting yourself.

If you want to say "everyone got toned down, but magic wasn't toned down enough", that'd be your opinion, but don't pretend that "magic was not toned down" isn't a massive hyperbole made to give the impression the 5e casters' toys were unchanged from the 3.X casters' ones.
Actually I can because the context of the statement matters. I specifically cited "over the game's changes" and past penalties, where do you think those penalties drew from since you quoted but an out of context partial phrase from the comment and must understand it fully? The time magic users lost penalties was in my cited edition change and your pedantics don't change that fact. No change to most spells is consistent with the original statement. When discussing the state of a whole one does not point to outliers to disprove the prognosis. The body may possess immune cells but is still very much infected. What you have demonstrated is a fixation with being literal which failed to acknowledge the context of statements made.

When you attacked me unduly over your limited reading, I clarified. That's not contradiction, that's illumination.

[Unoriginal]

When you attacked me unduly over your limited reading

Simply pointing out an incorrect statement is not an attack.


That's not contradiction, that's illumination.

Thank you for your illumination, in that case.

In the optic of illuminating further, could you precise if you think that magic was not toned down in 5e, or that it was toned down like everything else but not enough to make a difference, please?

[Kyutaru]

Simply pointing out an incorrect statement is not an attack.
It is when your version changes the context of the statement to be misrepresented.


could you precise if you think that magic was not toned down in 5e
Asked and answered. Moving on.

[Anonymouswizard]

Counterpoint: Advanced Fighting Fantasy uses Stamina (essentially HP) as magic-fuel and has been commercially successful and enjoyed by many for decades. Your opinion/experience does not make the idea objectively a bad one.

The idea that magic might actually have a cost associated with it is *not* a punishment to the player if they're aware of how magic functions in that game/setting. If you want to see it that way, that's your prerogative, but it's also only your opinion. Many fantasies are built on/around the notion that magic is/can be dangerous or costly to ones own health; notably Dragonlance is included in the list of those fantasies, but also the Shannara series among others.

It's also in The Fantasy Trip, in fact several games are designed around the idea (including, I believe, at least one OSR game). And it works when the game is designed around that (generally spellcasting losses are tracked separately, there's no healing magic, or both).

My game has a Health/Fatigue split, and I've bounced back and forth on what normal attacks should hit and what spells should draw from, with the healing spell changing from close wounds to energise when casting causes damage instead of exertion. The game is also designed to make your available resource pool about half it's true size via death spiral, and I'm not 100% sold on including spellcasting in the core rules anyway. Currently spellcasting and any rerolls your Talents provide both come from Fatigue, so spellcasting might knock you out but unless otherwise stated it won't kill you.


It is not, the shift from 2E to 3E where the elimination of much of these features happened also came with no change to most spells. Some even got better. What you mean is an attempt to deny universal application of the statement which was never its intent to begin with when dealing with literally hundreds of spell options. 5E nerfed everyone, not just wizards, and the toned down magic reflects the toned down combat and toned down fighters too.

5e did noticeably throw more nerfs at spellcasters than martials, particularly through trimming the spell lists (I'm not convinced that the fewer slots per day matter much when 'free Long Rest at the beginning of the session' is a common houserule). Although Casters also got free Cantrips which let them do damage near Martials without expending spell slots, and that's it's own can of worms.

But getting nerfed 20% more when you're twice as powerful isn't a major difference, spellcasting is still IME better than not spellcasting. It also removed the few actual limitations 3e kept beyond the rare 'exoensive material component'.

[PhoenixPhyre]

5e did noticeably throw more nerfs at spellcasters than martials, particularly through trimming the spell lists (I'm not convinced that the fewer slots per day matter much when 'free Long Rest at the beginning of the session' is a common houserule). Although Casters also got free Cantrips which let them do damage near Martials without expending spell slots, and that's it's own can of worms.

But getting nerfed 20% more when you're twice as powerful isn't a major difference, spellcasting is still IME better than not spellcasting. It also removed the few actual limitations 3e kept beyond the rare 'exoensive material component'.

Note: a caster spamming cantrips isn't "nearly on par", they're doing 50% of the at-will damage of a fighter. Roughly. With much poorer aggregate accuracy (one attack vs many).

Fewer slots makes a huge difference, as does restricted preparation abilities. But the big one is concentration. Only being able to concentrate on a single spell, with most buffs, debuffs, and control effects requiring concentration, means that spellcasters are way limited in comparison to 3e. Plus, adding in the "spells only do what they say"/"no hidden rules" thing and the trimming of the spells themselves (cf scrying and teleport, both of which are nerfed into the ground along with polymorph), the imbalance isn't nearly as bad. Not a 20% (relative) nerf, but a much more major one. And well deserved IMO.

[Kyutaru]

Note: a caster spamming cantrips isn't "nearly on par", they're doing 50% of the at-will damage of a fighter. Roughly. With much poorer aggregate accuracy (one attack vs many).
I'll grant you that at low level but why do casters get 4d8 on a cantrip at lvl 17? Gosh, I wish my swords evolved like that.

[Anonymouswizard]

Note: a caster spamming cantrips isn't "nearly on par", they're doing 50% of the at-will damage of a fighter. Roughly. With much poorer aggregate accuracy (one attack vs many).

I don't have time to do the maths, and can't be bothered to change my post, so I'll state the intent behind the words, 'significantly close at-will damage as compared to fighters than 3.5 and earlier'.


Fewer slots makes a huge difference, as does restricted preparation abilities. But the big one is concentration. Only being able to concentrate on a single spell, with most buffs, debuffs, and control effects requiring concentration, means that spellcasters are way limited in comparison to 3e. Plus, adding in the "spells only do what they say"/"no hidden rules" thing and the trimming of the spells themselves (cf scrying and teleport, both of which are nerfed into the ground along with polymorph), the imbalance isn't nearly as bad. Not a 20% (relative) nerf, but a much more major one. And well deserved IMO.

Again, IME experience I don't think less spell slots make much of a difference, as I see long rests happening every session instead of every 2-3 sessions as intended. I mean, they do at low levels, but not once a character has enough slots to see them through two fights and a few spare. Now you could argue that this is not playing the game as intended, and you'd be right, but Rules As Intended matter less than the rules that are played.

It's why I prefer AiME to core 5e, most of the class have a mixture of SR and LR resources so that rest frequency doesn't have as major an impact on balance.

[kazaryu]

Counterpoint: Advanced Fighting Fantasy uses Stamina (essentially HP) as magic-fuel and has been commercially successful and enjoyed by many for decades. Your opinion/experience does not make the idea objectively a bad one.

The idea that magic might actually have a cost associated with it is *not* a punishment to the player if they're aware of how magic functions in that game/setting. If you want to see it that way, that's your prerogative, but it's also only your opinion. Many fantasies are built on/around the notion that magic is/can be dangerous or costly to ones own health; notably Dragonlance is included in the list of those fantasies, but also the Shannara series among others.

additional counterpoint: while i agree with you generally (i.e. its possible to have a fun time/well designed system that drains HP for extreme effects), drilling down into the specific scenario of dnd 5e, this proposed system still wouldn't work. not as he wants it to. sure you could have *some* groups that have fun with such rules. thats the inherent subjective nature of 'fun'. However from a game design standpoint, there are several spells that are designed to reduce HP damage taken...having to pay HP in order to save HP is an inherently broken concept. In fact, all combat is really a series of 'i pay x cost to hopefully gain x profit'. with the cost typically being some resource that you only get back on a rest. and the profit being 'the party loses fewer HP'. you don't cast a fireball into a crowd of minions to deal damage. you cast fireball into a crowd of minions to prevent those minions from dealing damage to your party. Having spells cost HP *can* be fun, for extremely tactical minded people that enjoy balancing things like that (although due to the nature of DnD this would also increase the element of RNG, so even tactical players could easily find it frustrating) but now you're forcing your players into that particular niche of combat. which they may not enjoy.

Furthermore, DnD isn't *designed* around a gritty 'realistic' aesthetic. This is why the rulesets such as 'gritty realism' are alternate rules in the DMG, not the primary rules. thats also why barbarians can have such ridiculous hitpoints, even to the point of being able to face tank ancient dragons breath weapon. because its not designed around 'realism'. Casting isn't meant to be difficult. or taxing on the caster.

lastly, just looking at the practical implications, such an addition to the rules would mean that casters are discouraged from casting. But caster classes have already been designed around the assumption that they can cast their spells. so what is the caster going to do...toss out next to useless cantrips until the situation turns dire enough that using their actual spells becomes justified? there's a good chance you wind up in 1 of 2 situations:
1. caster player spends 45 minutes doing effectively nothing (yeah, yeah i know 'but muh cantrips'. no. outside of warlocks cantrips are rarely an efficient use of an action in combat. not on their own. what they are is 'good enough' options when you don't want to/can't cast full spells. so the caster spends their time doing effectively nothing. for however long the combat lasts. or
2. combat starts going sour, therefore justifying the caster spending HP on salvaging the battle...but wait...the battle is turning sour, casters taken damage. they *cant* try to salvage it without risking sacrificing their life.

now a character sacrificing their life to save the party is a cool end for a character. and in a group where PC deaths are common thats not really a problem. but those assumptions aren't true for all...or even most DnD parties. If going into any combat i know that im either going to spend the combat doing nothing, or risking my characters life to do something useful, then im not going to have fun. The problem is that casters don't actually *get* at-will non spell things to do, becasue the system assumes they have spell slots available.

Of course, if OP thinks their particular players would enjoy this style, more power to them. However, the tone of the OP was more offering a generalized solution, not (seeming to) ask about their table by itself.

oh, and one last disclaimer: yeah, i know there are some of you that are capable of enjoying playing a cleric, casting spirit guardians, and then just taking the dodge action for teh next 2-4 rounds of combat. nothing wrong with that. just understand, not everyone is.

as for OP: personally i think the answer to the caster/martial imbalance is to fix martials, not nerf casters. however, if you're hellbent on nerfing casters than your instinct is correct, you need to reduce their casting potential. but you also need to give them at-will potential to compensate. so that they can actually do things in combat.

edit: oh, and just so we're clear...average damage for a d6 is 3.5, not 2.5. which is a big difference if you going with d6/spell level.

[Kyutaru]

as for OP: personally i think the answer to the caster/martial imbalance is to fix martials, not nerf casters. however, if you're hellbent on nerfing casters than your instinct is correct, you need to reduce their casting potential. but you also need to give them at-will potential to compensate. so that they can actually do things in combat.
Merely bringing back casting times would do wonders for closing the gaps. Heck, bringing back a lot of older mechanics would fix the discrepancies. Casters have gone unchecked in terms of power for a long time and having less hitpoints isn't enough of a counterbalance. They even have their own "weapon" attacks now and some can summon CHA-based ones out of thin air.

[kazaryu]

Merely bringing back casting times would do wonders for closing the gaps. Heck, bringing back a lot of older mechanics would fix the discrepancies. Casters have gone unchecked in terms of power for a long time and having less hitpoints isn't enough of a counterbalance. They even have their own "weapon" attacks now and some can summon CHA-based ones out of thin air.

bringing back casting times could help, but that'd be more of a combat overhaul. they'd basically need to rework action economy as a whole.

as for 'being unchecked'...from what i've seen the marital/caster balance in 5e is pretty widely considered to be the closest its been to being perfectly balanced..definitely compared to 3e/3.x.

you've claimed that spell slots are as abundant as ever..to which i reply. no. that is objectively a false statement. the only spell slots that are sort of as abundant as ever are 1st level. and even those ren't actually.

for comparison the basic wizard (in 3.5) ended up with 4 of each spell slot (including lvl 6+) by the time they reached 20. the sorcerer had 6. and both of them got bonuses spell slots per day based on their casting modifier, in an edition where ability score bonuses were even more common.
by contrast the 5e casters get 4 first level spell slots and it falls off rapidly from there. and they don't get extra spell slots for higher ability scores. spell slots are objectively less abundant, and concentration rules means a caster can't combo alot of buff spells. Caster's are far more limited in 5e than you give them credit for.

casters get at-will 'attack' options, sure. but damage wise those options are incredibly lack luster compared to weapon attacks. at lvl 5 most cantrips are finally doing as much damage per hit as a single martial weapon attack. but its also at lvl 5 that martials start getting 2 weapon attacks. so even though they have 'at-will' things, lets not pretend that they're actually efficient uses of the casters time. they aren't. they're just something that helps the caster contribute, even if its just a little bit.

as fro hexblades: yes, the fact that a 1 lvl dip allows the hexblade to use cha for weapon attacks is a problem from an overall game design perspective...specifically in that it doesn't follow previous game design. its observable power creep. On the other hand, its also something given to a class that is objectively better off not making melee weapon attacks. at least in terms of DPR. Furthermore, the problem with it, is by no means the same, nor is it in any way related to the more general problem of caster/martial balance.

Now, there are some older mechanics that i'd have liked to see come back. for example: allowing martials to hold their attacks in order to interrupt a caster. that was cool. it made sense. it should probably come back.

edit:

I'll grant you that at low level but why do casters get 4d8 on a cantrip at lvl 17? Gosh, I wish my swords evolved like that.

they do. just not in the same way. fighters have potential damage of 6d6+15 (rerolling 1s and 2s) at that level. barbarians are 4d6+18. paladins are 4d6+2d8+10. and thats before we get into their increased ability to further buff their damge. for example: battlemaster dice gets bigger, paladins get larger spells to smite with. things like that. in fact, thats *why* cantrip damage scales. because its hard to feel useful *in any way* using at-will abilities when you're doing 4 damage per action, and the fighter is doing 30-40. so instead it gets bumped up to a more respectable...22? for firebolt. still not as good as martial at-wills. but good enough that the caster can at least think 'well, its not much, but it is something'.

[TrueAlphaGamer]

I'll grant you that at low level but why do casters get 4d8 on a cantrip at lvl 17? Gosh, I wish my swords evolved like that.

You play to 17th level?!?!

In all seriousness, at that point, spending an action to deal an average of around 18 damage after landing a single spell attack isn't that outrageous of damage when compared to the stuff most martials can do. A rogue's sneak attack does 9d6. A non-fighter martial can bust out two greatsword attacks with GWM for 2d6+15 damage, twice. Fighters can get three attacks with that same greatsword.

Of course, this kind of breaks down when you consider warlock's Eldritch Blast, but that's a whole other issue.

The balance issue at high(er) levels isn't with cantrips, but more with the breadth and depth of a caster's spell list, where they can reliably cast powerful spells both in and out of combat.

[Willie the Duck]

I'll grant you that at low level but why do casters get 4d8 on a cantrip at lvl 17? Gosh, I wish my swords evolved like that.
At 17, no caster is bothering with cantrips. They have too many spells.
Regardless, in a featless, low magic item game, the fighter might very well be only doing 3d8+21 (longsword with dueling and 20 str, or similar). And that is the low point. Feats (PAM+GWM, or SS+XBE) and magic weapons (especially those that do +2d6 per hit, or the like) change this dynamic significantly (plus level 17 is a spot specifically chosen to where a caster gets their attack upgrade but the comparable fighter still has to wait for theirs).

Anyways, to the primary subject:

So I think giving each caster access to some sort of ritual/ability to regain health outside of combat would allow them to start fights consistently near full health. Then I think my math of 1d6-Con x spell level scales pretty well.

This is erring on the side of making casters fall after 1-2 hits, but this really limits what they can do with magic. Also, a common complaint I've seen in these threads is that magic "just works".

Okay, so the caster starts each combat at or near full health, but then takes 1/X of their total per casting, giving themselves a per-combat reasonable maximum of spell-levels to cast, presuming they don't get hit. I will give you this, it is an interesting bit of resource management, along with even more incentive to make your wizard never actually targeted (so we're favoring a wizard who starts every combat with a few defensive spells first, or finding ways to wear armor). It does seem like it increases the chance that each major combat, the wizard may fall, and one of those times might lead to death in a way that is unrecoverable. Reminds me of high-level 3e rocket tag, which is a way to balance things, but I don't really think it ended up being a good way. Maybe this will work better, but I'm not seeing how just by looking at it.

[Kyutaru]

for comparison the basic wizard (in 3.5) ended up with 4 of each spell slot (including lvl 6+) by the time they reached 20. the sorcerer had 6. and both of them got bonuses spell slots per day based on their casting modifier, in an edition where ability score bonuses were even more common.
by contrast the 5e casters get 4 first level spell slots and it falls off rapidly from there. and they don't get extra spell slots for higher ability scores. spell slots are objectively less abundant, and concentration rules means a caster can't combo alot of buff spells. Caster's are far more limited in 5e than you give them credit for.Less abundant doesn't mean not abundant to me. While many assume a 3e baseline, I'm preferential to the 2e baseline as it was better balanced than the experiment that was 3e. There spell slots were hardly abundant given how long they took to replenish, how frequently they were lost, and how circumstantial magic was against foes. Future editions departed from these limiters and others to allow for casters that could spit off spell after spell like Harry Potter without requiring a martial to defend them during the casting.

Casters getting attacks isn't to say they're on par with martials who literally specialize in the same but to say that they lack that weakness that once served to hamper their round-to-round utility. The existence of cantrips, most notably the attack-based ones, has filled up space that previously was spent throwing darts with an awful chance to hit and even worse damage. In that sense, casters have gone from being major gameshifters during specific rounds only (and spectators the rest of the time) to participants throughout the battle without impacting the rule breakers they're known for. In fact, some spells like Haste had their 1 year aging on cast drawbacks removed entirely entering 3e, enhancing these effects even further and wholly moving them from situational to frequent usage.

So when you say casters are far more limited in 5e than I give them credit for I conclude you don't know or understand my frame of reference.

As an example, the identify spell has undergone a significant change since older times. Where once a caster had to spend rounds determining a single property of the item, with a chance for failure that was unknowable and perceived as the truth, and had to operate on only the vague information the spell provided (did not give exact numbers or charges), now they are able to simply know everything about an item. Such a thing used to be 6th level magic. Additionally, casting the spell came with an 8 Constitution loss that could even render the caster unconscious and it took 1 hour of rest per point to fully recover from the spell's strain. While we can see why it was changed for the sake of fun, casters have had similar limiters expunged without compensation. The game has changed and magic has become mundane and the topic is aimed at restoring the balance by reimposing real drawbacks to the power of sorcery. It's okay to have great temporary power but it needs to be sufficiently counterbalanced with disincentives.

On the subject of action economy, that too is something that broke. Casters were once limited to a single spell per round and were still considered powerful. The introduction of ways to put in multiple spells, twin spells, and react to things with spells severely impacted the action economy already. Which is why the changes that impacted casters the most were not caster nerfs but edition changes. Advantage, no buff stacking, concentration requirement, these impacted the game more than the actual spell changes (some of which actually went up in power - look at Bless). Having magic scale to level was already a thing but now it can scale to spell slot too. A lot of things that previously kept being a caster something that required a defensive playstyle have shifted to promoting jumping into the fray with the warriors and hurling death with the flick of a wrist.

[Kyutaru]

At 17, no caster is bothering with cantrips. They have too many spells.
Regardless, in a featless, low magic item game, the fighter might very well be only doing 3d8+21 (longsword with dueling and 20 str, or similar). And that is the low point. Feats (PAM+GWM, or SS+XBE) and magic weapons (especially those that do +2d6 per hit, or the like) change this dynamic significantly (plus level 17 is a spot specifically chosen to where a caster gets their attack upgrade but the comparable fighter still has to wait for theirs).
The fighter has to invest in both stats and abilities to accomplish anything while not having the spellbook of assorted goodies to dive into. Please don't assume I mean wizard cantrip damage is equal to fighter damage, and if they're using spells that aren't cantrips it's because those spells are BETTER than cantrips. The caster's cantrips upgrade with nothing more than level while retaining all the features of a wizard while the fighter's damage upgrades BECAUSE of all of the features of being a fighter. A caster with the worst ability score possible can still be flinging the same sized spell, something frontline builds benefit from.

Cost is one of the balancing factors in RPGs and the investment difference is noticeable. Since we were discussing edition differences, even 3e had it worse with cantrips having almost no effect. Spells having casting times or Spells cost HP are but one of many ways one can attempt to offset that difference.

[kazaryu]

Less abundant doesn't mean not abundant to me. While many assume a 3e baseline, I'm preferential to the 2e baseline as it was better balanced than the experiment that was 3e.

you didn't say 'abundant' you said 'as abundant'. implying that their abundance hadn't gone down. it had. that was all i pointed out there.



Casters getting attacks isn't to say they're on par with martials who literally specialize in the same but to say that they lack that weakness that once served to hamper their round-to-round utility. The existence of cantrips, most notably the attack-based ones, has filled up space that previously was spent throwing darts with an awful chance to hit and even worse damage. In that sense, casters have gone from being major gameshifters during specific rounds only (and spectators the rest of the time) to participants throughout the battle without impacting the rule breakers they're known for. In fact, some spells like Haste had their 1 year aging on cast drawbacks removed entirely entering 3e, enhancing these effects even further and wholly moving them from situational to frequent usage.

except..they have impacted it...in several ways. its obviously not 100% perfect. But its getting better. I don't want to go back to a time where i got punished for casting a spell. I *would* like to see high level casters balanced better with high level martials however. and actually, thats something that i admire 4e for doing.


so when you say casters are far more limited in 5e than I give them credit for I conclude you don't know or understand my frame of reference.
i think your frame of reference is generally irrelevant to that particular discussion. you speak as though casters have little to no limitations. except they do. again, that is all i was responding to there. you ignore the trend that casters have been going through since 3e. they've been getting more and more limited. WoTC seems to be trying to find a sweet spot where casters are fun to play (i.e. don't spend the entire encounter being spectators) but aren't overwhelming. in other words, you're not giving them the credit for being ALOT more limited than they were in 3e/3.5.



As an example, the identify spell has undergone a significant change since older times. Where once a caster had to spend rounds determining a single property of the item, with a chance for failure that was unknowable and perceived as the truth, and had to operate on only the vague information the spell provided (did not give exact numbers or charges), now they are able to simply know everything about an item. Such a thing used to be 6th level magic. Additionally, casting the spell came with an 8 Constitution loss that could even render the caster unconscious and it took 1 hour of rest per point to fully recover from the spell's strain.

lest i be accused of a strawman, i'm gonna preempt what i say by agreeing that i understand this example. you're saying that spells have lost nearly all of their inherent drawbacks. However, i did want to point out the irony that in 5e identify is actually an incredibly weak spell. because it takes a minute to case (11 minutes if you're ritual casting it) and all it does is the same thing as spending an hour with the magic item. sure *sometimes* it'll be helpful. *sometimes* you need to know the magical properties RIGHT NOW. but not usually. just found it kinda funny.


While we can see why it was changed for the sake of fun, casters have had similar limiters expunged without compensation. The game has changed and magic has become mundane and the topic is aimed at restoring the balance by reimposing real drawbacks to the power of sorcery. It's okay to have great temporary power but it needs to be sufficiently counterbalanced with disincentives.

on the contrary. i don't think disincentivising is the way to go. i can agree that there should be more limitations. But if you add overt punishments to casting spells, then you remove alot of the fun of magic in general. Im ok conceptually with the idea of adding larger costs to spells (although i will reiterate, i think the correct answer is to buff martials, not nerf casters). but having those costs be punishments is not a good idea IMO. having more spells consume a gold cost could work, since gold is typically fairly useless anyway. and it wouldn't as likely be seen as a 'punishment' because its something the caster prepares beforehand.

Having magic scale to level was already a thing but now it can scale to spell slot too. A lot of things that previously kept being a caster something that required a defensive playstyle have shifted to promoting jumping into the fray with the warriors and hurling death with the flick of a wrist.

the only way that spells scale in level now is their save DC. but the only actual effect scaling is spell levels. its not additional, its spell level scaling *instead of* caster level scaling. (with the exception of cantrips obviously). and actually, that makes spells even more limited. (again, to reiterate, more limited compared to when high level caster's were truly the Kings.) it makes them more limited because it means in order to get more out of a lower level spell, you need to expend a more expensive resource. Of course it also means that some spells become obsolete while others don't. which is kind of an intra-casting balance issue.

[Willie the Duck]

Please don't assume I mean wizard cantrip damage is equal to fighter damage,
I took the following post:

I'll grant you that at low level but why do casters get 4d8 on a cantrip at lvl 17? Gosh, I wish my swords evolved like that.
At its word, and made a direct comparison. The end.

[NaughtyTiger]

Please don't assume I mean wizard cantrip damage is equal to fighter damage,
I took the following post:

I'll grant you that at low level but why do casters get 4d8 on a cantrip at lvl 17? Gosh, I wish my swords evolved like that.
At its word, and made a direct comparison. The end.

And then he clarified it in the post you quoted.
The cantrip damage goes up without investing in wizard class abilities.
The sword damage does not go up unless the player invests in class abilities.

I don't agree with his assessment cuz cantrips don't matter, but he did explain himself.

[Pex]

Counterpoint: Advanced Fighting Fantasy uses Stamina (essentially HP) as magic-fuel and has been commercially successful and enjoyed by many for decades. Your opinion/experience does not make the idea objectively a bad one.

The idea that magic might actually have a cost associated with it is *not* a punishment to the player if they're aware of how magic functions in that game/setting. If you want to see it that way, that's your prerogative, but it's also only your opinion. Many fantasies are built on/around the notion that magic is/can be dangerous or costly to ones own health; notably Dragonlance is included in the list of those fantasies, but also the Shannara series among others.

I stand by what I said. The Star Wars game I played had its fans too. That doesn't mean it's a good mechanic.

When opinion is asked for opinion is given.

[Kyutaru]

you didn't say 'abundant' you said 'as abundant'. implying that their abundance hadn't gone down. it had. that was all i pointed out there.Fair enough, I said spell slots are bountiful because they don't run out like they used to. Not in practice anyway. More spells than a day full of encounters requires has that effect. If martials are balanced around being infinite then casters cannot also be infinite effectively. If they are then there must be another form of penalty for their usage lest they be considered the most effective tactic available. 4e balanced this by simply making martials spellcasters and making spells equivalent, not the ideal route in my opinion.


I don't want to go back to a time where i got punished for casting a spell. I *would* like to see high level casters balanced better with high level martials however.Yet simultaneously people will excuse the gross differences between the two as justified and valid. We can't achieve balance when people hold fast to everything that is capable of changing. Punishment is not the goal, restriction is. Sneak attacks are restricted. Firing ranged weapons at point blank is restricted. Using nonmagical weapons against a lycanthrope is restricted. Attempting to burn a demon with fire damage is restricted. Restrictions encourage players to consider alternative options than just using their strongest attack without regard for circumstance. Classes that don't have much in the way of restrictions function through consistent output and it tends to be less than those with restrictions.


i think your frame of reference is generally irrelevant to that particular discussion. you speak as though casters have little to no limitations. except they do. again, that is all i was responding to there. you ignore the trend that casters have been going through since 3e. they've been getting more and more limited. WoTC seems to be trying to find a sweet spot where casters are fun to play (i.e. don't spend the entire encounter being spectators) but aren't overwhelming. in other words, you're not giving them the credit for being ALOT more limited than they were in 3e/3.5.But not as limited as they were before that, was all I was commenting on. My frame of reference matters here because it paints a different picture of casters still having grown with fewer limitations. This is a topic concerning the adding of a cost to casters for balance and my original comments in it reflected on how they once did have such limits and have grown disproportionately to the rest. Where fighter weapon proficiencies have become feats and extra attacks, casters have gained sustainability and lost the drawbacks to using spells.


you're saying that spells have lost nearly all of their inherent drawbacks.Yes, both the innate ones present in the spells themselves and the ones attached to the chassis casting them. Which means they're almost identical to normal attacks. Only stronger.


i don't think disincentivising is the way to go. i can agree that there should be more limitations.That's what's being proposed though. It's a limitation in the form of resource expenditure in the title topic and it's a limitation in the form of turn delays in my example. As it stands, the spell slot limitation is just not working and concentration applies even to paladins. While we've lost true disincentives like the year aging and the constitution hits, I'm not even advocating for their return, only highlighting that the drawbacks are indeed gone.


(although i will reiterate, i think the correct answer is to buff martials, not nerf casters)Likewise, if only for the sake of ease, yet when I highlight a discrepancy where martials could be buffed, I'm subjected to this entrenchment. This is the real reason people ask to nerf casters, because no one wants to allow martials to reach them.


I took the following post:

At its word, and made a direct comparison. The end.
That post asked why casters had scaling damage cantrips while fighter swords did not scale. It did not presume or even state that their damage should be equal. Those calculating how much the fighter can potentially deal are missing the point. The extra attacks a fighter gets is a class feature that distinguishes it from other martial classes. It's a poor source for the discrepancy, like losing 9th level spell access just for having a Familiar. Ooo, I know, how about a Fighter "cantrip" that punches for improved unarmed damage like monks? Hardly anyone will use it at high levels because Fighter "spells" are better. Therefore it's fine to have.

[Tvtyrant]

I've done something like this in 3.5 using the Psychic Warrior, but the idea there was to make a mundane that acted like a caster.

If I was using 5E I would probably get rid of the casting classes. Instead you could take Mystic disciplines as feats, and instead of psy points you would take that many HD worth of damage. Like if you took Bestial Form and activated Perfect senses you would take 3d6 damage. If you took Brute Force and then activated Brute Strike you would take 1d6 for each 1d6 extra you deal, etc. If you play half-casters you would get Disciplines instead at a commensurate rate.

[Pex]

Yet simultaneously people will excuse the gross differences between the two as justified and valid. We can't achieve balance when people hold fast to everything that is capable of changing. Punishment is not the goal, restriction is. Sneak attacks are restricted. Firing ranged weapons at point blank is restricted. Using nonmagical weapons against a lycanthrope is restricted. Attempting to burn a demon with fire damage is restricted. Restrictions encourage players to consider alternative options than just using their strongest attack without regard for circumstance. Classes that don't have much in the way of restrictions function through consistent output and it tends to be less than those with restrictions.



You can have restrictions that aren't punishing. In 5E concentration is a restriction. In 3E spellcasting provokes an attack of opportunity is a restriction. In 2E being limited in spell knowledge and have to roll to learn a spell is a restriction. Not wanting to be punished for casting a spell is not the same thing as not wanting any restrictions. No one, warrior or spellcaster, should be worse off doing what he's supposed to be doing than not having done the thing at all. No loss of hit points. No loss of turns. No being grossly vulnerable to enemy attacks*. It's why people hate 5E berserker barbarians suffering exhaustion. They may not put it in those terms, but it's essentially why it's not liked.

*This is where it's most subjective. For example, I do think it's punishing using Reckless Attack gives all enemies advantage in attacking you. If it was only anyone you attacked who got Advantage in return I would be ok with it. However, another point of view is this is a good thing because it encourages enemies to attack you instead of party members fulfilling your role as a tank. You have the hit points and resistance to mitigate being easier to hit. In 3E if you charge you suffer -2 to AC. It's technically punishing as I defined it, but it's not devastatingly so and people enthusiastically pay the cost. Therefore to be honest with myself I now add "grossly". Grossly is what is subjective.

[sayaijin]

Alternatively, the best way to buff martials is to make both groups supernatural. Wizards have spell casting, so martials should be able to do super-human feats of strength.

As I like to think of it, if a wizard is MCU Doctor Strange, then a fighter should be MCU Captain America or Spider-Man or something. The wizard is still more powerful, but at least both characters can be relevant.

The alternative to making all characters super-human (which doesn't work for low magic or gritty realism) is to limit spell casters. The method I proposed is to put a resource limit we see in many fantasy tropes.

[kazaryu]

Fair enough, I said spell slots are bountiful because they don't run out like they used to. Not in practice anyway. More spells than a day full of encounters requires has that effect. If martials are balanced around being infinite then casters cannot also be infinite effectively. If they are then there must be another form of penalty for their usage lest they be considered the most effective tactic available. 4e balanced this by simply making martials spellcasters and making spells equivalent, not the ideal route in my opinion. for the spell slots, the only reason casters get 'more spells than encounters need' is due to low encounters. That was obviously a design oversight, casters sppear to be 'balanced' with the idea of a LOT of encounters per day. which seems silly. nevertheless, i've played in games where spell slots became limited before. and it didn't feel like a slog. in fact, there weren't even any houserules in play regarding spell slots. we just..had more encounters per day, or larger encounters per day.

as far as 4e, i don't think there was a problem with having them being treated the same *mechanically*. i think the problem with 4e is that as a result of the mechanics they don't translate well into a distinct narrative identity. But the mechanical balance itself was spot on.


Yet simultaneously people will excuse the gross differences between the two as justified and valid.
here's where we go back to you underestimating the limits caster's do have. I wouldn't define the difference between martials and casters as a 'gross' difference. any more than i'd define the difference between a battlemaster and an assassin as being a 'gross' difference. sure, one is clearly stronger than the other (although in the case of martials vs casters that difference doesn't really come into play until you start getting out of tier 2) but caster's aren't so much better than martials that they make martial unviable. casters are almost always going to be *optimal* but they're not strong enough that they make martials obsolete.


We can't achieve balance when people hold fast to everything that is capable of changing. Punishment is not the goal, restriction is. Sneak attacks are restricted. Firing ranged weapons at point blank is restricted. Using nonmagical weapons against a lycanthrope is restricted. Attempting to burn a demon with fire damage is restricted. Restrictions encourage players to consider alternative options than just using their strongest attack without regard for circumstance. Classes that don't have much in the way of restrictions function through consistent output and it tends to be less than those with restrictions.

when i was talking about punishments i was referring to the original topic of this post. action economy changes wouldn't really do much though, because casters are still limited to 1 spell per round. which almost invariably costs them their action. which means they can't disengage. making them vulnerable to OA's if they wanna move. im ok with bringing back a few of the restrictions from previous editions (for example giving allowing people to ready an attack in order to try to 'interupt' a casting). What we don't need are 'restrictions' that disincentivize players doing the thing that there class is supposed to do on a general scale. so like...a restriction that gives enemies more options vs casters is fine. because thats part of the give and take of combat. but things like 'casting any spell makes you weaker' provide negative incentive to cast as a whole.
But not as limited as they were before that, was all I was commenting on. My frame of reference matters here because it paints a different picture of casters still having grown with fewer limitations. This is a topic concerning the adding of a cost to casters for balance and my original comments in it reflected on how they once did have such limits and have grown disproportionately to the rest. Where fighter weapon proficiencies have become feats and extra attacks, casters have gained sustainability and lost the drawbacks to using spells.


Yes, both the innate ones present in the spells themselves and the ones attached to the chassis casting them. Which means they're almost identical to normal attacks. Only stronger. and more limited.


That's what's being proposed though. It's a limitation in the form of resource expenditure in the title topic and it's a limitation in the form of turn delays in my example. As it stands, the spell slot limitation is just not working and concentration applies even to paladins. While we've lost true disincentives like the year aging and the constitution hits, I'm not even advocating for their return, only highlighting that the drawbacks are indeed gone. spell slot limitation can still work. a very easy way to make it work is to have more encounters per long rest. you don't need many for casters to actually start feeling the pressure. especially at mid-low levels. Adding a secondary resource, or changing that resource to be more limiting is fine. but IMO is should still be a secondary resource. not tied to the caster's primary resources (i.e. HP). something like using the spell point system could be fine, and then reducing the number of spell points. you could even then allow them to cast from HP if they *want* to. but making it obligatory is IMO a bad idea.


Likewise, if only for the sake of ease, yet when I highlight a discrepancy where martials could be buffed, I'm subjected to this entrenchment. This is the real reason people ask to nerf casters, because no one wants to allow martials to reach them.
what entrenchment? i haven't seen anyone say they don't wanna buff martials to put them more on par with casters...in fact from what i've seen thats actually a very common idea, at least on this forum.


That post asked why casters had scaling damage cantrips while fighter swords did not scale. It did not presume or even state that their damage should be equal. Those calculating how much the fighter can potentially deal are missing the point. The extra attacks a fighter gets is a class feature that distinguishes it from other martial classes. It's a poor source for the discrepancy, like losing 9th level spell access just for having a Familiar. Ooo, I know, how about a Fighter "cantrip" that punches for improved unarmed damage like monks? Hardly anyone will use it at high levels because Fighter "spells" are better. Therefore it's fine to have.

all of the martial classes have that same scaling at-will damage though. fighters get it by attacking more, most of the other classes get it by dealing more damage per attack. sure, it costs a character building resource, because the damage itself is better than a cantrip. if they'd made weapon damage scale with character level instead of class level, all that would do is make casters stronger. because now the 1 lvl fighter dip thats fairly common among wizards *also* gives them fighters at-will damage.

of course, thats an obvious exploit and it'd have to get balanced by giving the martial characters even more at-will damage from their class features which...well, is exactly what we already have, except with bigger numbers. just because it *looks* different (1 attack vs multiple attacks) doesn't mean its not the same thing.

The only class *actually* that violates this principle is the warlock. 2 levels of warlock means you can get almost fighter at-will damage scaling so long as you invest in charisma. and that can be a problem because warlocks also get full caster spell progression. sort of. and thats kind of a 'problem' i've had with warlocks. in a lot of ways they play like a martial...but they still have a lot of the power of a late game full caster. but thats a 'problem' with warlocks specifically, not the casting system as a whole.

[Kyutaru]

That was obviously a design oversight, casters sppear to be 'balanced' with the idea of a LOT of encounters per day.Fully spent they're only as bad as their cantrips, which are sufficiently promising enough to not be a total loss. There is still such a thing as overkill and more encounters drain martial HP more enough than it does spells.


here's where we go back to you underestimating the limits caster's do have. I wouldn't define the difference between martials and casters as a 'gross' difference.Not what I meant by that, as you're referring to power scale. Rather in how they're treated in terms of balance by the rules. While martials specialize to be limited, casters are bequeathed options with seldom a cost. Cantrip scaling was merely an example of it with martials possessing no such secondary attacks that scale freely. In fact even martial prowess through skills and athleticism has no real scaling while casters become significantly more proficient at their craft's options. The battle master appears to have the best resolve for martials but only if spread to be a core implementation (we'll see what class variants does).


casters are almost always going to be *optimal* but they're not strong enough that they make martials obsolete.This wasn't the claim though, and if something is always optimal then it makes other options a foolish selection. Players do want to feel like they're making the best decisions for their character and if that fails right at the Choosing a Class stage then that's problematic.


im ok with bringing back a few of the restrictions from previous editions (for example giving allowing people to ready an attack in order to try to 'interupt' a casting).Costing an action to disrupt an action does not restrict that action, it restricts those who would seek to do the disrupting to only turns where they anticipate the action may happen. It worked well when spells had casting times and could be interrupted at any point during them.


but things like 'casting any spell makes you weaker' provide negative incentive to cast as a whole.This is already how spellcasting once functioned with casting Fireball removing it from the prepared list, eliminating Fireball as an option. Spell slots are a little more flexible now but still deplete, rendering the caster "weaker" over time. Disapproving of negative incentives when rare material and gold costs remain as well is puzzling.


and more limited.On that subject we are not going to agree.


something like using the spell point system could be fine, and then reducing the number of spell points.The Vancian casting system is too much of a sacred cow. They attempted to remove it once before.


what entrenchment? i haven't seen anyone say they don't wanna buff martials to put them more on par with casters.None will ever boldly state their opposition with a brave face. They will instead continually build walls barring the objective.


in fact from what i've seen thats actually a very common idea, at least on this forum.A frequent sentiment yet an oft downplayed reality. A half-hearted measure is none at all.


because now the 1 lvl fighter dip thats fairly common among wizards *also* gives them fighters at-will damage.Similar to a 1 lvl caster dip arming a character with an assortment of max powered cantrips.


The only class *actually* that violates this principle is the warlock.Oh lord, the Hexblade itself still gives me a headache. Help DMs everywhere if the Tasha book has anything even close to that level of cheese.

[kazaryu]

Fully spent they're only as bad as their cantrips, which are sufficiently promising enough to not be a total loss. There is still such a thing as overkill and more encounters drain martial HP more enough than it does spells. no. they're not. a full caster that is reduced to only being able to cast cantrips is essentially just a bag of hitpoints in combat. sure, they *can* be useful, but if all they have is cantrips? please.



Not what I meant by that, as you're referring to power scale. Rather in how they're treated in terms of balance by the rules. While martials specialize to be limited, casters are bequeathed options with seldom a cost. Cantrip scaling was merely an example of it with martials possessing no such secondary attacks that scale freely. In fact even martial prowess through skills and athleticism has no real scaling while casters become significantly more proficient at their craft's options. The battle master appears to have the best resolve for martials but only if spread to be a core implementation (we'll see what class variants does).
again, cantrips look different in terms of mechanics compared to at-will attack options. but the mechanically fill teh same roll. Martials don't *need* a secondary 'free scaling' attack options reminiscent of cantrips *because they already have an at-will attack option that scales better than cantrips*. Martial instead tend to be given limited use abilites that allow them to more effectively nova their at-will damage (action surge, smite) or they're given limited use abilities that increase their tankiness (and in some super limited cases, their out of combat potential.) like Rage, and indomitable.



This wasn't the claim though, and if something is always optimal then it makes other options a foolish selection. Players do want to feel like they're making the best decisions for their character and if that fails right at the Choosing a Class stage then that's problematic.

1. it doesn't matter how good you are at balancing there are always going to be optimal options. the ONLY way for that to not be true, is to remove all options identity and make them all essentially the same but with different flavor. Even in older editions wizards were stronger, the things you cite that make them 'balanced' are *why the caster needs sidekicks*
2. not everyone is an optimizer. Nor do most players care about theoretical optimization. what they care about is how they feel playing the character. thats the difference. a player can have fun playing a martial in a high level party becuase even though technically the caster is stronger than them, its not usually by enough to make the martial entirely unnecessary. in 5e the actual gap between 'optimal' and 'viable' isn't very big. and realistically you can be viable (in combat) just going lvl 1-20 in literally any class/subclass combo. so long as you invest in your ability scores properly. (i.e. at least an 18 in your primary score). there are a few *subclasses* that may not be as fun to play, because they're super niche (assassins') or their subclass features don't d a whole heck of a lot (champion) or the class is poorly constructed (beastmaster/ranger) but they're still viable.
3. of course players enjoy making the best decision possible for tehir characters. but they also enjoy a plethora of other things, that have nothing to do with optimization. and even with that clause, they may define 'the best decision for their character' differently from you. Im getting ready to play a character that will eventually be multiclassed 4 levels into wizard, bard, warlock, cleric and sorcerer. and i wanna play this character for the ludicrous amounts of low level utility it can provide. you know what would be a more optimal choice that would still fit the concept? doing only 4 classes with 5 levels each, so that i can get 3rd level spells. but im not gonna, because 'the best decision for the character' isn't just about raw power. in this case its about more utility. and that decision isn't going to hurt my fun.


Costing an action to disrupt an action does not restrict that action, it restricts those who would seek to do the disrupting to only turns where they anticipate the action may happen. It worked well when spells had casting times and could be interrupted at any point during them. it does when they lose the spell slot. put it this way, I delay my action possibly give up half or more of the action (if i have multi attack) in order to cost a caster a spell slot and some HP on top. thats a good tactical trade. its a small sacrifice on my side, but it can have huge ramifications on the caster. and since spells are typically more important actions anyway, giving half my (weaker) action in order to interupt a spell casters (stronger) action is smart. or it can be, obviously it depends on everything going on.


This is already how spellcasting once functioned with casting Fireball removing it from the prepared list, eliminating Fireball as an option. Spell slots are a little more flexible now but still deplete, rendering the caster "weaker" over time. Disapproving of negative incentives when rare material and gold costs remain as well is puzzling.

i think you are misunderstanding what i mean by weaker. so let me explain what i mean. When i say weaker im referring to either something that generally makes your follow up actions less effective (for example ability score drain) or brings you closer to death. I agree that there is a fine line to be tread there, so what im saying is that casting shouldn't really draw from the same resource that something more generalized does. be that HP, ability scores, anything like that. it should generally have its own resource, or it ends up being un fun. esepcially if the resource that casting is drawn from isn't something you are in control over. Like HP. an enemy just shot my character...so now i can't play the game? no thanks. i'll pass.



The Vancian casting system is too much of a sacred cow. They attempted to remove it once before.

None will ever boldly state their opposition with a brave face. They will instead continually build walls barring the objective.

A frequent sentiment yet an oft downplayed reality. A half-hearted measure is none at all.

so. here's the thing. the reason it *appears* to be a downplayed reality, is that the solutions that work for some people, aren't going to work for others. there's a fairly large and dedicated 4e fanbase. of course they too ahve their complaints, but they still greatly enjoy the system. 5e is the most popular edition of DnD ever. and while a huge (probably even a majority chunk) of that is due to reasons beyond the game design. If the game design was egregiously bad, it would have failed, just as 4e did.

The point that im trying to make is that while you and i can agree that the martial/caster imbalance should be fixed for ourselves. the fixes that we individually come up with, or work for our group, aren't going to be good generalized fixes. and 5e objectively doesn't actually *need* a generalized fix. its already fairly well liked in spite of its problems. This is why you see discussions about 'this is how i do it at my table' rather than 'here's a comprehensive rework of the entire system.

Similar to a 1 lvl caster dip arming a character with an assortment of max powered cantrips.


no. not similar at all. casters primary scaling *isn't* their cantrips. its their spells/spell slots. Martials primary scaling is their at-wills. to try to equate the two is incredibly disingenuous.

also you seem to have missed my point. sure, we could make weapon attacks *also* scale with character level. lets say like, every 6 levels you deal an extra die per hit...but then martials are still doing it better than casters because martials get multiattack. sure, tehy're doing more damage now. great...so what? you still have the same tier progression of
Martial weapon attacks>caster cantrips>caster weapon attacks. except now caster weapon attack are probably on par with caster cantrips. great, you've buffed casters relative to martials. its a niche buff, that wouldn't matter but it is there. But that whole 'wouldn't matter' part. thats the rub. you didn't actually change anything. just made numbers bigger.


And even then, that solution assumes that the problems with casters are there *damage* relative to martials...which, isnt. thats not at all the problem. The problem is casters broad utility. and the reason casters have it but martials dont is that the skill system is underdeveloped (and imo because players have more realistic expectations for a martial characters capability than a casters).

[Kyutaru]

and 5e objectively doesn't actually *need* a generalized fix. its already fairly well liked in spite of its problems.This is the crux of the problem and what I was referring to. There is no point in attempting these discussions when players are so entrenched into how things already are. Claiming they want improvements is but paying lip service to the principle.


And even then, that solution assumes that the problems with casters are there *damage* relative to martials...which, isnt. thats not at all the problem. The problem is casters broad utility. and the reason casters have it but martials dont is that the skill system is underdeveloped (and imo because players have more realistic expectations for a martial characters capability than a casters).The skill system is universal, it was never class related to begin with. Any caster can stack Strength and take Athletics. Some even do because spellcasting does not require good ability scores to function. We're going to have to disagree about the cause of the discrepancy and utility stems from more than skills. Monks are more favorable as are Battle Masters and not due to that subsystem. Yet the freely scaling high end of damage spells are also leagues beyond what increases to at-will skills manage because 40-foot sized AOEs simply have that effect.

[NaughtyTiger]

Alternatively, the best way to buff martials is to make both groups supernatural. Wizards have spell casting, so martials should be able to do super-human feats of strength.

As I like to think of it, if a wizard is MCU Doctor Strange, then a fighter should be MCU Captain America or Spider-Man or something. The wizard is still more powerful, but at least both characters can be relevant.

The alternative to making all characters super-human (which doesn't work for low magic or gritty realism) is to limit spell casters. The method I proposed is to put a resource limit we see in many fantasy tropes.

What do you do explicitly to buff martial?

[Delph]

Tl:dr
after my post about sam math to use was to much posts, so you maybe noticed here.

If casters use HP to cast spells, those spells should be 2-3 times stronger. As it is now, they are +- in amount of dmg that can physical dmg dealers do. Without loosing HPs.

So better shoud be IMHO change fatigue rules and use fatigue. And now don't know how :smallamused:

[sayaijin]

What do you do explicitly to buff martial?

I had an idea to modify the way double proficiency bonus works for everyone, then give expertise to all non-spell casting subclasses. In essence, make skill rolls for martials consistently way higher than ones for casters. So it's realistic for a martial to roll >20 on an athletics check and jump about as far/high as a caster with the jump spell.


Tl:dr
after my post about sam math to use was to much posts, so you maybe noticed here.

If casters use HP to cast spells, those spells should be 2-3 times stronger. As it is now, they are +- in amount of dmg that can physical dmg dealers do. Without loosing HPs.

So better shoud be IMHO change fatigue rules and use fatigue. And now don't know how :smallamused:

Right, so ideally the caster feels fatigue when they run low on slots/spell points. Whether that fatigue is regular HP, levels of exhaustion, or something new, I want to represent spells taking a toll on the caster. I want this both for balance and for narrative purposes - what narratively happens to a caster when they run out of slots? Does the caster know they're out of slots?

Edit: Formatting

[DeTess]

Right, so ideally the caster feels fatigue when they run low on slots/spell points. Whether that fatigue is regular HP, levels of exhaustion, or something new, I want to represent spells taking a toll on the caster. I want this both for balance and for narrative purposes - what narratively happens to a caster when they run out of slots? Does the caster know they're out of slots?


Narratively is easy. Casters just start feeling drained and tired as they use their spell slots, just as barbarians slowly feel more weary as they go through their rages, battlemasters feel muscle-aches set in as they use their superiority dice and bards start feeling hoarse as they use up their inspiration dice.

Balancing is far harder though, as you'll first need to establish the exact issue you feel need balancing, and unfortunately 'casters are OP' isn't specific enough. You need to determine what the exact issue with casting spells in which specific situations are before you can start doing something to balance that.

If, for example, you think that the main issue with spells is their out-of-combat use, then attaching an HP cost to them will do very little, as out-of-combat it's pretty easy to recover the loss again, and if the loss is so significant that you can't, then in-combat casting becomes impossible and playing spellcasters becomes completely pointless in a combat-heavy campaign.

If, on the other hand, you think that casters are doing too much damage, then adding an hp cost won't fix that. If anything, it encourages casters to nuke even harder to cover up for their greater vulnerability. The same thing goes if you think casters are too good at crowd control or the like.

Really, the only situation in which I can see 'add an hp cost' top be an appropriate balancing lever for DnD 5e as-is is if you believe that the thing that makes casters too powerful are their defenses, as the HP cost would indeed reduce that. I don't think that's the main issue though, but you might disagree.

[sayaijin]

Narratively is easy.

Balancing is far harder though, as you'll first need to establish the exact issue you feel need balancing, and unfortunately 'casters are OP' isn't specific enough. You need to determine what the exact issue with casting spells in which specific situations are before you can start doing something to balance that.

If, for example, you think that the main issue with spells is their out-of-combat use, then attaching an HP cost to them will do very little, as out-of-combat it's pretty easy to recover the loss again, and if the loss is so significant that you can't, then in-combat casting becomes impossible and playing spellcasters becomes completely pointless in a combat-heavy campaign.



I believe it is the out of combat casting that is most problematic. Like I said, I don't know that HP the right lever to pull, but it was a suggestion. I do greatly appreciate all the feedback I've received about how it wouldn't work/would be to complicated to implement. Whatever the resource is, I just want levels of "use too much, and you become less effective" so that the fighter/barb/rogue have a chance to contribute outside of combat.

The other solution is of course buffing martials to compete with casters using their physical prowess, but some DM's don't want Thor, Hulk, Doctor Strange, and Black Panther. They want Legolas, Aragorn, Gandalf, and Gimli.

[DeTess]

I believe it is the out of combat casting that is most problematic. Like I said, I don't know that HP the right lever to pull, but it was a suggestion. I do greatly appreciate all the feedback I've received about how it wouldn't work/would be to complicated to implement. Whatever the resource is, I just want levels of "use too much, and you become less effective" so that the fighter/barb/rogue have a chance to contribute outside of combat.


Hmmmm, here's a crazy suggestion. What if you moved all classes to a spell-point system, but then changed the amount of spellpoints they'd gett. Instead of getting X amount which depletes slowly over the duration of the day, they'd get a far smaller pool, but during stressfull situations (read encounters) they'd generate a certain amount of temporary spellpoints per round. Any of these points not spend would dissappear at the end of the encounter. That way, out-of-combat casting directly taps into a spellcasters 'in case of emergency' reserves, without harshly limiting their in-combat abilities. You could fluff this as their base allotment representing the normal reserves of magic power they got access too, while in combat they can draw on a little bit extra for a variety of reasons. Maybe the warlock's patron or cleric/paladin's god lends extra power to keep their investment/follower alive, maybe the sorcerer's in-born talent only really blossoms under pressure, maybe the wizard becomes willing to cut corners he normally wouldn't while spell-casting, I'm certain you can come up with a reasonable fluff explanation.

Now obviously, this'd need a lot of careful balancing to get the numbers right, but it might be something worth considering, and if you've got a group of players willing to experiment with the rules you could try and run a campaign to hammer out these rules further.

Now, this is really just an on-the-spot idea I got, so it likely needs quite a bit of refinement to make it playable, but still, it might be worth considering.

[Altheus]

I like the idea that you get your usual allotment of spell slots and then you can spend 1d4 hp per spell level to cast additional spells. If this knocks you below 0 then you fall unconscious and have to rest for a couple of days before casting again.

[sayaijin]

Hmmmm, here's a crazy suggestion. What if you moved all classes to a spell-point system, but then changed the amount of spellpoints they'd gett. Instead of getting X amount which depletes slowly over the duration of the day, they'd get a far smaller pool, but during stressfull situations (read encounters) they'd generate a certain amount of temporary spellpoints per round. Any of these points not spend would dissappear at the end of the encounter. That way, out-of-combat casting directly taps into a spellcasters 'in case of emergency' reserves, without harshly limiting their in-combat abilities. You could fluff this as their base allotment representing the normal reserves of magic power they got access too, while in combat they can draw on a little bit extra for a variety of reasons. Maybe the warlock's patron or cleric/paladin's god lends extra power to keep their investment/follower alive, maybe the sorcerer's in-born talent only really blossoms under pressure, maybe the wizard becomes willing to cut corners he normally wouldn't while spell-casting, I'm certain you can come up with a reasonable fluff explanation.

Now obviously, this'd need a lot of careful balancing to get the numbers right, but it might be something worth considering, and if you've got a group of players willing to experiment with the rules you could try and run a campaign to hammer out these rules further.

Now, this is really just an on-the-spot idea I got, so it likely needs quite a bit of refinement to make it playable, but still, it might be worth considering.

I really like this idea. So the math would be x spell points per rest (long or short depending on class), then generate temporary spell points at the beginning of combat which disappear once it's over. What is the current balance for spell points/encounter? We'd want to stick close to that for the temp SP, and then give very little permanent SP top of that. This method might even negate the need for cantrips.

I still think martials need a bump in their abilities to contribute more effectively out of combat, but this way casters don't have to worry about running out of gas in combat, it just makes them be very critical of solving RP/Exploration problems with the snap of their fingers.