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View Full Version : D&D 5e/Next DR's 5E Fixes (Today: the Sorcerer)



Dark.Revenant
2020-09-07, 04:07 PM
I'm posting a new thread because I can't change the original thread title.

Here, I explore D&D 5th edition content that missed the mark, explain why it ought to be better, and offer a solution for it.

The goal is simple: to offer insight into design issues with this edition of D&D, and to attempt to correct these issues as simply as possible.

The Ranger
Fixes: https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/LhO8kd6Q8
Commentary: https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24476695&postcount=2

The Barbarian
Fixes: https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/Dxl3foIAj
Commentary: https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24537986&postcount=23

The Sorcerer
Fixes: https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/iyYwqqWxy
Commentary: https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24698306&postcount=30

Dark.Revenant
2020-09-07, 04:08 PM
The Sorcerer
After long delay, my Sorcerer fixes are HERE (https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/iyYwqqWxy), reproduced here:


Sorcerer Fixes
If one of the following class features replaces an existing class feature, then you can choose whether to use the new class feature or the original one. If one of the following class features is a new feature, then you can freely use it.

Magical Knack
New feature

When a sorcerer discovers his or her powers, the sorcerous magic manifests in unpredictable ways that oftentimes affect the sorcerer's background, casting style, or other talents. Choose one of the following options.

Combat Training
You gain proficiency with light armor and simple weapons, and you can use a weapon as a spellcasting focus for your sorcerer spells.

Eschew Materials
You do not need to provide material components for any sorcerer spell you cast, unless the material component is consumed by the spell.

Hedge Magic
You gain proficiency with herbalism kits and one of the following skills of your choice: Animal Handling, Medicine, or Survival. Whenever you make an ability check using your herbalism kit proficiency or the chosen skill proficiency, you gain a bonus to the check equal to your Charisma modifier.

Additionally, you can use a healer's kit or a herbalism kit as a spellcasting focus for your sorcerer spells.

Tacit Casting
When you cast a sorcerer spell, you can cast it without any verbal components. If you do so, the spell gains somatic components if it did not already have them.


Metamagic (v2)
Replaces Metamagic

At 3rd level, you gain the ability to twist your spells to suit your needs. You gain two of the following Metamagic options of your choice. You gain another one at 7th, 10th, 13th, and 17th level.

You can use only one Metamagic option on a spell when you cast it, unless otherwise noted.

Careful Spell
When you cast a spell that affects other creatures, you can protect some of those creatures from the spell's full force. To do so, you spend 1 sorcery point and choose a number of those creatures up to your Charisma modifier (minimum of one creature). The chosen creatures automatically succeed on their saving throws against the spell.

Distant Spell
When you cast a spell that has a range of 5 feet or greater, you can spend any number of sorcery points to multiply the range of the spell by 1 + the number of sorcery points you spent. For example, if you spend 1 sorcery point, the range of the spell is doubled, and if you spend 3 sorcery points, its range is quadrupled.

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

To be eligible, a spell's effects must not involve an unlimited number of targets within range—in other words, Distant Spell cannot widen a true area of effect. For example, thunderclap and earth tremor aren't eligible, but fireball and dimension door are.

Elemental Spell
When you cast a spell that deals a type of damage from the following list, you can spend 1 sorcery point to change that damage type to one of the other listed types: acid, cold, fire, lightning, poison.

Empowered Spell
When you roll damage for a spell, you can spend 1 sorcery point to reroll a number of the damage dice up to your Charisma modifier (minimum of one). You must use the new rolls.

You can use Empowered Spell even if you have already used a different Metamagic option during the casting of the spell.

Extended Spell
When a spell you have cast that has a duration of 1 minute or longer reaches the end of its duration, you can spend 1 sorcery point to extend the duration by an amount equal to its original duration, up to a maximum duration of 24 hours.

You can use Extended Spell even if you have already used a different Metamagic option during the casting of the spell. You can't use Extended Spell on the same spell twice.

To be eligible, you must be concentrating on the spell or be able to perceive its effects.

Heightened Spell
When you cast a spell that forces a creature to make a saving throw to resist its effects, you can spend 3 sorcery points to give one target of the spell disadvantage on its first saving throw made against the spell. If the chosen target still succeeds that saving throw, you recover 2 sorcery points.

Quickened Spell
When you cast a spell that has a casting time of 1 action, you can spend 2 sorcery points to change the casting time to 1 bonus action for this casting.

Seeking Spell
When you cast a spell that requires you to make a spell attack roll or that forces a target to make a Dexterity saving throw, you can spend 1 sorcery point to ignore the effects of half- and three-quarters cover against targets of the spell. If the spell has an area of effect, it spreads around corners.

Subtle Spell
When you cast a spell, you can spend 1 sorcery point to cast it without any somatic or verbal components.

Twinned Spell
When you cast a spell that targets one or more creatures and doesn't have a range of self, you can spend a number of sorcery points equal to the spell's level to target additional creatures in range with the same spell, up to the number of creatures that were originally targeted (1 sorcery point if the spell is a cantrip). The full effect of the spell is duplicated; for instance, a twinned scorching ray spell typically produces six rays of fire, although no more than three could be aimed at a particular creature.

To be eligible, a spell must target individual creatures; it cannot have a true area of effect. For example, burning hands and dragon's breath aren't eligible, but ray of frost and charm person are.

Unerring Spell
If you make an attack roll for a spell and miss, you can spend 2 sorcery points to reroll the attack roll. You must use the result of the second roll. If the attack still misses the target, you recover 1 sorcery point.

You can use Unerring Spell even if you have already used a different Metamagic option during the casting of the spell.

Widened Spell
When you cast a spell that has an area of effect such as a cone, cube, cylinder, line, or sphere, you can spend a number of sorcery points equal to 1 plus the spell's level to double the size of the area of effect (1 sorcery point if the spell is a cantrip). For example, a widened thunderwave spell targets a 30-foot cube.


Draconic Bloodline Fixes
If one of the following class features is a new feature, then you can freely use it.

Draconic Magic
New feature

Starting at 1st level, you learn an additional spell when you reach certain levels in this class, as shown in the Draconic Bloodline Spells table. The spell counts as a sorcerer spell for you, but it doesn't count against the number of sorcerer spells you know.

Draconic Bloodline Spells

Sorcerer LevelSpell
1stburning hands*
3rdalter self
5thlightning bolt*
7thpolymorph (self only)
9thcone of cold*
17thshapechange (dragons only)

*Deals the damage type associated with your draconic ancestry.


Wild Magic Fixes
If one of the following class features is a new feature, then you can freely use it.

Wild Magic
New feature

Starting at 1st level, you learn an additional spell when you reach certain levels in this class, as shown in the Wild Spells table. The spell counts as a sorcerer spell for you, but it doesn't count against the number of sorcerer spells you know.

Wild Spells

Sorcerer LevelSpell
1stguiding bolt
3rdray of enfeeblement
5thcounterspell
7thconfusion
9thBigby's hand



Storm Sorcery Fixes
If one of the following class features is a new feature, then you can freely use it.

Storm Magic
New feature

Starting at 1st level, you learn an additional spell when you reach certain levels in this class, as shown in the Storm Spells table. The spell counts as a sorcerer spell for you, but it doesn't count against the number of sorcerer spells you know.

Storm Spells

Sorcerer LevelSpell
1stthunderwave
3rdgust of wind
5thcall lightning
7thstorm sphere
9thmaelstrom



Divine Soul Fixes
If one of the following class features replaces an existing class feature, then you can choose whether to use the new class feature or the original one.

Divine Magic (v2)
Replaces Divine Magic

Your link to the divine allows you to learn spells from the cleric class. When your Spellcasting feature lets you learn or replace a sorcerer cantrip or a sorcerer spell of 1st level or higher, you can choose the new spell from the cleric spell list or the sorcerer spell list. You must otherwise obey all the restrictions for selecting the spell, and it becomes a sorcerer spell for you.

In addition, choose an affinity for the source of your divine power: good, evil, law, chaos, or neutrality. You learn an additional spell based on that affinity, as shown below. It is a sorcerer spell for you, but it doesn't count against your number of sorcerer spells known. If you later replace this spell, you must replace it with a spell from the cleric spell list.


AffinitySpell
Goodcure wounds
Evilinflict wounds
Lawbless
Chaosbane
Neutralityprotection from evil and good


Starting at 3rd level, you learn an additional spell when you reach certain levels in this class, as shown in the Divine Spells table. The spell counts as a sorcerer spell for you, but it doesn't count against the number of sorcerer spells you know.

Divine Spells

Sorcerer LevelSpell
3rdaid
5threvivify
7thdeath ward
9thflame strike



Shadow Magic Fixes
If one of the following class features is a new feature, then you can freely use it.

Shadow Magic
New feature

Starting at 1st level, you learn an additional spell when you reach certain levels in this class, as shown in the Shadow Spells table. The spell counts as a sorcerer spell for you, but it doesn't count against the number of sorcerer spells you know.

Shadow Spells

Sorcerer LevelSpell
1stinflict wounds
5thlife transference
7thshadow of Moil
9thenervation



Overview
The Sorcerer is conceptually a mostly self-taught caster with innate power, typically from good/bad genes, but sometimes from a fantastic event that happens during the Sorcerer's lifetime. That's essentially the only common point between all sorcerers. Some players want to live and breathe magic with their Sorcerer, essentially someone who has superpowers. Other players want someone whose magic is an undesirable burden, their unruly abilities sometimes getting the upper hand over the caster's attempt to control them. Yet more players prefer the idea of being a confident magical artisan, fully in control and utterly specialized. I could go on; the class's premise offers a versatile breadth of fantasies, so it's up to the class's mechanics to help fulfill those fantasies.

The Problem: But does it? The Sorcerer is definitely no beginner-friendly class; spell choice is everything, and making the "wrong" choices can make for an ineffective or dead character, or worse: leave the player frustrated and bored at the table. The problem is that the answer most definitely isn't widening the free-choice spell choices even further; this won't really help newbies that much, and it's thematically inappropriate for a character who is supposed to be very familiar with a relatively small set of magical powers. Perhaps a particular subclass could offer a bunch of extra spell picks (we need more Sorcerer subclasses to begin with), but that's not really the focus of this exercise.

Furthermore, the first couple levels of Sorcerer are quite underwhelming. A Wizard is almost strictly superior until third level; the only objective benefits a Sorcerer has until then is an additional cantrip and the possibility of casting five 1st-level spells in a single encounter, rather than four (plus a fifth in a different encounter). With low AC, low HP, a lack of weapons, and significant opportunity costs for investing in even moderate defenses like Shield and Mage Armor, a beginning Sorcerer is quite possibly the squishiest class in the game, barring the Draconic subclass. This is in stark contrast to the broad usefulness of the Sorcerer for multi-classing.

Finally, Metamagic choices are broken down into choices that are clearly optimal and choices that aren't very useful. Many Metamagic choices are also very narrowly applicable, either affecting (to a sufficient degree) a very small list of spells, or so hard to find a compelling use for that it's not worth the choice. A sorcerer picks their first two Metamagic Options at tier 1, but must wait until damn near the start of tier 3 to pick their third! It's really far too painful to "waste" Metamagic choices on flavor; you'll be stuck without the mechanically effective options for most of the campaign.

The Fix: First off: each subclass needs some bonus spells that you just get, no questions asked. Technically, as with the Ranger subclasses that offer bonus spells, these spells can be retrained into any old Sorcerer spell, but it's generally not something most players will do. The bonus spells are chosen to benefit the subclass, and this mechanic can be used to patch dated subclasses. For example, playing as a black/copper/green Draconic Sorcerer could be extremely frustrating, given the lack of bread-and-butter spells that use those damage types. But with the bonus spells, I can guarantee that the Sorcerer will have a good variety of blasts that match the color. These bonus spells are meant to make sure that beginners always have some effective spells to start with, but they also serve to make it a bit easier for veteran players to branch out and be creative with spell choices.

Next, I added a choice between a few different ribbons at level 1. These serve the dual purpose of fitting various fantasies that players have with regards to Sorcerers, and of adding an extra advantage—right from the start of the campaign—that sorcerers have over other types of casters, shoring up their poor early performance. As an added bonus, these ribbons are generally pretty useless for dips; they mostly benefit Sorcerers who go the distance.

Lastly, I codified several UA Metamagic Options and made a sweeping round of revisions to them, generally beefing up the weaker Metamagic Options, making them more widely applicable to the Sorcerer's spells, and ultimately offering more Metamagic choices throughout a Sorcerer's career. Generating high-level spell slots is usually the most efficient use of Sorcery Points if you're not using the best Metamagic Options, so this should hopefully make Sorcerer players have more freedom and options to take.


Magical Knack: Combat Training
With this, I'm thinking of any kind of sorcerer who grows up as a fighting man, tribal hunter, and so forth. It bothers me that Sorcerers don't have spear proficiency, so this remedies that problem. The main incentive, however, is the light armor proficiency, which can take the place of something like Mage Armor. It can potentially even help a Draconic Sorcerer, thanks to the possibility of taking the Moderately Armored feat for some actually-good AC. This is also a stealth buff for the otherwise fairly underwhelming Storm Sorcerer, who can make better use of their short-ranged powers if they're harder to hit. The weapon-as-a-focus thing is mostly a ribbon, but could come in handy for a weapon-and-shield Sorcerer; if you're already blowing a feat on Moderately Armored, I don't think War Caster should be an additional feat tax for such a trivial thing as preventing the hassle of weapon juggling.

Magical Knack: Eschew Materials
This is for those people who want to play Sorcerers how they used to be. It bothers me that a Sorcerer born with Chromatic Orb and Witch Bolt might never figure out they can cast spells, since those spells require materials someone could conceivably spend their entire life without ever touching.

Magical Knack: Hedge Magic
To be honest, I was mostly thinking of Nynaeve here, but this fits pretty much any self-taught hermit, village magic-user, tribal shaman, and so forth. I took some light inspiration from the Artificer here with the ability to use one of a couple kits as a spellcasting focus, but that's frankly just a pure ribbon. Most of the benefit is the additional tool and off-meta skill proficiency, which I feel is appropriately flavorful, useful enough at level 1, and useless for latter-level dips.

Magical Knack: Tacit Casting
Cast without speaking. If you really want to play as a psychic, or if being able to sneak around is the only reason you wanted Subtle Spell, this could be your jam. This is balanced mostly by the fact that it always leaves the spell with somatic components; anyone who can see you is still going to notice that you're casting spells, but now you can more plausibly ask the DM for a Stealth or Sleight of Hand check to avoid being noticed while you're casting.


Metamagic: Careful Spell
This previously worked only on spells whose saving throw occurs on the turn the spell is cast, by the strictest reading. Web, for instance, wouldn't benefit from Careful Spell. I've essentially just made Careful Spell into a blanket "they pass all their saves, the end." This gives the Metamagic much broader appeal, without making it basically a better version of the Evoker's Sculpt Spell ability.

Metamagic: Distant Spell
Generally, when range is an issue, it's going to make the difference between doing something on a turn and not being able to do the thing you wanted. It's an all-or-nothing prospect. In theory, Distant Spell should be pretty good as a result, but in play what often happens is that it only comes up when there's a "sweet spot": a range where you're too far to cast the spell normally, but not so far that you can't cast the Distant version of it. I wanted to eliminate this because it feels really bad, so the solution was to allow Distant Spell to scale up as much as the caster wants it to. The cost gets pretty exorbitant, but you can indeed stretch a 30-foot spell to hit 150 feet away if the situation calls for it. Plus, I think it makes for a really cool image to lob a powerful spell at artillery ranges; that sort of thing could turn into a memorable scene during, for instance, a pitched siege scenario.

Metamagic: Elemental Spell
This one is taken from UA, except that I've swapped thunder for poison. Thunder is a bit too strong; it's resisted far less often than even acid is, and the Storm Sorcerer can still do all of their tricks with lightning damage. Meanwhile, poison is absolutely necessary for green Draconic Sorcerers, and one of my goals for this exercise was to make all of the colors into viable draconic ancestries.

Metamagic: Extended Spell
Extended Spell originally sucked because you had to predict beforehand that you'd need to use the spell for a long time, and then the Sunk Cost Fallacy starts to rear its head: you've already dumped a Sorcery Point into making the spell last longer, so it would be a waste to cast a different concentration spell…even if it would save the day right about now! Without making the effect stronger in an absolute sense, I've flipped it around to being a Metamagic you only activate when the duration is about to expire. This way, you'll very rarely "waste" a Sorcery Point on it and are far less likely to feel like that spent point is a "sunk cost".

Metamagic: Heightened Spell
Heightened Spell is a case of "putting all of your eggs into one basket". This Metamagic is most efficient on single-target save-and-nothing-happens spells, which are generally the sort you ought to avoid. Especially with mechanics like Legendary Resistance to ruin your day, I feel like a 3-point cost is too much for something that's uncomfortably likely to fail…but at the same time, 3 Sorcery Points is a fair price if it means flipping a miss into a hit. The solution I came up with is to adjust the cost to 1 Sorcery Point (via refund) if the spell misses, only costing the full 3 Sorcery Points if the target actually fails the save as intended.

Metamagic: Seeking Spell
This one is taken from UA. The only change I made was to add the clause that the area of effect, if it exists, spreads around corners. Seeking Spell is a bit too narrow to be worth it when it only affects cover—something that doesn't come up a whole lot. Meanwhile, corners, doorways, narrow hallways, and other such larger obstacles are more common on battle maps, so I think that allowing spells (at least those that offer Dex saves) to bend around those obstacles would make Seeking Spell more worthwhile at the average table.

Metamagic: Twinned Spell
I made quite an effort here to make Twinned Spell less finicky and limiting, without busting it open for all sorts of abuse. In principle, Twinned Spell now works on any spell that targets individual creatures other than yourself, and doesn't work if the spell involves a proper AOE. This means Twinned Magic Missile, Twinned Eldritch Blast, Twinned Scorching Ray, Twinned Bless, and so forth are all legal uses of the spell. In the case of multi-ray spells or other spells that have a pool of resources, you won't be able to stack more than half of those onto a particular creature. While there is some edge case improvement here for things like Sorlock blasters, I think this change generally improves the Sorcerer in a way that makes the class more fun, rather than more broken.

Metamagic: Unerring Spell
This one is taken from UA. My change here matches what I did with Heightened Spell, except in this case the refund is only 1 Sorcery Point (the original cost is 2 Sorcery Points).

Metamagic: Widened Spell
This one is created anew. I'm not entirely sure why this was never considered by WotC as a canonical Metamagic option; perhaps they're being too conservative? In any case, I made it cost even more than Twinned Spell, so it's probably going to be a once-a-day novelty until tier 3. It's definitely worth the cost, even then; you can do some really neat things when an area of effect exceeds the size your enemies are expecting. Note that some spells will be impossible to avoid hitting yourself with if you use Widened Spell on it, since the area of effect will grow large enough that the range will no longer be sufficient to keep yourself safe. This, along with the fact that you can't combine it with Careful Spell to save your allies, kept me from making it even more expensive; 1 + Spell Level is appropriate because the relative benefit of Widened Spell drops off as the spells get bigger and meaner.


Draconic Magic
In short, I offer a variety of blast shapes and save types that will allow a Draconic Sorcerer of any color to have some bread-and-butter options that pair with their Elemental Affinity feature. The other spells are mostly to fit the theme of being dragon-like, since the three blasts are so broadly useful. As an added bonus, I threw in Shapechange so that a Draconic Sorcerer can actually turn into a dragon by tier 4. It really bothered me that this was otherwise impossible without DM intervention.

Wild Magic
Most of these spells are chosen to benefit from Tides of Chaos, with particular focus on varied effects.

Storm Magic
This is a standard spread of thunder and lightning damage, windy stuff, and water control. It bothers me that Storm Sorcerers otherwise couldn't cast spells that revolve around actual storms, like Call Lightning…

Divine Magic (v2)
Divine Soul already gets a special spell at 1st level, so there are only four picks here, all taken from the Cleric list for a general mix of effect types.

Shadow Magic
Shadow Sorcerers get Darkness at 3rd level, so there are only four picks here, all of the necromancy school.

Yakk
2020-09-08, 10:23 AM
Unerring Spell: How about "reroll with advantage" and no refund?

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"If the chosen target still succeeds that saving throw, you recover 2 sorcery points."

No, it was already a really strong option.

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Elemental Spell

I get why we need this. I'd rather spend a bit of time writing up a bunch of elemental damage spells that are interesting and different, and not just "poisonball".

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Storm Spells

The UA version of Storm Magic had a good list. Including restricted elemental summoning.

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Magical Knack

Relatively minor benefit.

Right now, there is a reasonable argument that level 1 sorcerers are relatively meh, because the level 1 subclass features don't carry the heft that other classes main class features do with any reliability.

You could probably boost this one a bit.

First, these features are all mechanically focused. Reframe them to be story-focused.

It could be "how do you learn you where a sorcerer".

"Bloodied in Combat", "Apprentice Shaman", "Self Actualization", "Prodigy".

Then hang mechanics off that.

Also, make them just a tad more beefy

Dark.Revenant
2020-09-08, 01:10 PM
Unerring Spell: How about "reroll with advantage" and no refund?

Rerolling with advantage I feel wouldn't be super impactful, since a Sorcerer who is relying on attack spells will definitely have other ways of generating advantage.


"If the chosen target still succeeds that saving throw, you recover 2 sorcery points."

No, it was already a really strong option.

Strong until you fight something with Legendary Resistance. Casting the spell multiple times is more effective than using Heightened Spell once Legendary Resistance is in the picture. Not to mention that the kinds of spells that Heightened helps the most are typically spells you'd want to avoid because they aren't reliable.


Elemental Spell

I get why we need this. I'd rather spend a bit of time writing up a bunch of elemental damage spells that are interesting and different, and not just "poisonball".

The main reason for this is so that a sorcerer can bypass resistance/immunity on demand. Taking all those different elemental blasts separately, even if I wrote new spells for them, would suck up quite a few spells known; this is a way around that.


Storm Spells

The UA version of Storm Magic had a good list. Including restricted elemental summoning.

The UA Storm Magic predates Xanathar's Guide, and I wanted a few of those newer spells in the list.


Magical Knack

Relatively minor benefit.

Right now, there is a reasonable argument that level 1 sorcerers are relatively meh, because the level 1 subclass features don't carry the heft that other classes main class features do with any reliability.

You could probably boost this one a bit.

First, these features are all mechanically focused. Reframe them to be story-focused.

It could be "how do you learn you where a sorcerer".

"Bloodied in Combat", "Apprentice Shaman", "Self Actualization", "Prodigy".

Then hang mechanics off that.

Also, make them just a tad more beefy

I originally considered doing this, but I opted not to for several reasons. First, it clashes with the Background of a character in a way that would be hard to write around. Second, it would necessarily be a narratively-focused feature with the mechanics tacked onto the end, which is generally avoided for first level stuff for various reasons. Third, I’m not sure I could write scenarios for the full breadth of Sorcerer backstories. Lastly, it would create cognitive dissonance when multiclassing into Sorcerer, unless the player somehow manufactures a situation that matches the scenario described by the feature.