Spell Schools and Wizards

[PhoenixPhyre]

To me, it seems like the schools of magic (abjuration, evocation, etc) only have meaning for wizards, and even then. Sorcerers? Don't care. Bards? Yeah? So? Clerics? Really but no.

And even for wizards, they're anything but balanced.



School
Spells on Wizard List


Abjuration
29


Conjuration
54


Divination
18


Enchantment
27


Evocation
62


Illusion
30


Necromancy
28


Transmutation
62


Total
310



This tells me that really, wizards have 3 major roles, with the rest playing supporting parts.

Conjury: Bringing matter from one part of the universe (including other planes) to another.
Evocation: Creating energy, often of elemental forms.
Transmutation: Changing matter into other matter.

With this in mind, how might we rebalance things to give wizards actual class features instead of being 50% "you get a new level of spells"?


One idea I had was to cut the subclasses into major/minor pairs (plus some oddballs like bladedancer).

Subclasses would be of the format Major + minor. So like "Conjuration + divination". And much of your spell list would come from the subclass--such a hypothetical Conjuring Diviner would be able to learn any conjuration or divination spell, plus a few low-level ones marked as universal, but would be restricted in their access to anything else (requiring finding scrolls or spellbooks of them and not being able to scribe ones of their highest level).

This would give room to do things like theurges--someone whose subclass is, say "Evocation + Life", gaining limited access to the cleric list in exchange for not really having much from the wizard list except evocations. Or "Conjury + Druid".

Most of the "same spell but with some things better" spells (Invisibility -> Greater Invisibility, Charm Person -> Dominate Person -> Dominate Monster, fireball -> delayed blast fireball, lightning bolt -> chain lightning, alter self -> polymorph -> mass polymorph/shapechange/true polymorph, animate dead -> create undead, etc) would become alternate upcast options, but only available to wizards with the right class features. They'd not cost another spell known or prepared (which is a versatility boost), but would be exclusive. So only transmuters can cast polymorph, but then they can't cast dominate person or greater invisibility).



Drop spell schools. Instead, give each spell a set of tags. Things like "summon", "fire", "transportation". Subclasses would specialize in tags, potentially gaining access to spells from other classes that have those tags. And would be better at casting tag spells than any other wizard.


In the end, I think that wizards are the worst-designed class. Their entire identity is "gimme all the spells." Maybe mixed with a bit of "I'm smarter than you." Basically no hooks, no identity, nothing to go on. And impossible to balance, since they automatically get new features anytime a new book is released with new spells[1]. Whereas others only get those new features if you build something of that new subclass.

Whatever the case, the wizard would be better off (as would the game, IMO) by cutting their list and actually giving them a new, strong identity. Or group of them.

[1] an issue shared with druids in past editions; this edition's basically mostly putting out new beasts which somewhat calms that problem.

[Man_Over_Game]

I think a big part of it has to do with balance between the schools and their respective wizard subclasses.

Divination has a terrible spell list for combat, so it gets a game-changer at level 2, as well as being able to recycle their spell slots spent on Divination spells (so they can still fuel their combat spells).

On the other hand, Transmutation has the biggest spell list, is incredibly versatile, and has a ton of support for combat. As a result, its subclass features are boring, hard to use, and are a bit specific.

The worse the subclass, the better the spells. And vice-versa. It's not a perfect theory *cough* EVOCATION *cough*, but it seems to fill in for some of the nonsense.

[GeneralVryth]

I think the number of spells in each school, is not the best metric of how many "useful" options in the given school. Evocation is basically 4 spells, single target damage, area damage, wall damage, and healing. All of the variation comes in damage type, area shape, and higher leveled versions with different names to maintain efficiency (burning hands versus fireball). Occasionally you have a rider that can matter but that is more the exception than the rule.

In conjuration you have something similar with the various summoning spells.

I am not sure why Transmutation has so many spells.

I would be curious what the numbers looked like if you collapsed the options like you were already talking about. My guess is with the exceptions of Transmutation and Divination once you start collapsing some obviously overlapping spells most schools are going to end up in the 20 to 30 range.


For the record I don't like either idea replacing the Wizard class, and probably wouldn't play either idea if given the option over the existing class options (I would probably try and graft the bladesinger onto the Sorcerer which I would kind of like to do anyways with an unarmed flavor mixed in but that is a different homebrew discussion).

[anthon]

I think the number of spells in each school, is not the best metric of how many "useful" options in the given school. Evocation is basically 4 spells, single target damage, area damage, wall damage, and healing. All of the variation comes in damage type, area shape, and higher leveled versions with different names to maintain efficiency (burning hands versus fireball). Occasionally you have a rider that can matter but that is more the exception than the rule.

In conjuration you have something similar with the various summoning spells.

I am not sure why Transmutation has so many spells.

I would be curious what the numbers looked like if you collapsed the options like you were already talking about. My guess is with the exceptions of Transmutation and Divination once you start collapsing some obviously overlapping spells most schools are going to end up in the 20 to 30 range.


For the record I don't like either idea replacing the Wizard class, and probably wouldn't play either idea if given the option over the existing class options (I would probably try and graft the bladesinger onto the Sorcerer which I would kind of like to do anyways with an unarmed flavor mixed in but that is a different homebrew discussion).



alteration school of magic used to be huge.
that i understand.

as for divination having so few spells? i think i over paid for my players handbook.

[Intregus182]

Just curious. Are those spell totals based off all published wotc 5e material or just the phb?

[KorvinStarmast]

I am not sure why Transmutation has so many spells. Because it's magic that crosses a whole lot of different story styles and forms.
Changing someone or something (prince into frog, lead into gold being but two examples) is a core magical story form.

Divination is a problematic spell form for TTRPGs and specifically D&D because it is a narratively great kind of magic, foreseeing and prophecy, that in mechanical implementation for a game where the players choices are all over the map and are not pre determined, always falls flat IME.

Augury being one example of many - but if the DM has their players on a railroad, diviniation spells can be more practical to implement.

[Sorinth]

I generally agree that wizard specializations don't do a lot to make wizards of different schools unique and a lot of that is because they have access to the full spell list. So I don't mind limiting spell selection in principle, but two schools of magic (Major/Minor) + a universal school seems a bit on the harsh side.

A middle ground might be something where you limit the spell level based on schools. So for example a 9th level Evoker would be able to prepare evocation spells up to 5th level(His major), but be limited to 4th level spells from whichever school they selected as their Minor, and 3rd level spells from all other schools. Though I'd probably make all 1st level spells available, so this would only apply as you level up. That way the specialist is getting their spells first, so an Evoker getting access to Fireball when reaching 5th level is a feature of Evokers rather then something every 5th level wizard can do. There would have to be a reworking/adding a lot spells so that each school has decent spells at each level (Which should be done anyways).

[Sorinth]

Because it's magic that crosses a whole lot of different story styles and forms.
Changing someone or something (prince into frog, lead into gold being but two examples) is a core magical story form.

Divination is a problematic spell form for TTRPGs and specifically D&D because it is a narratively great kind of magic, foreseeing and prophecy, that in mechanical implementation for a game where the players choices are all over the map and are not pre determined, always falls flat IME.

Augury being one example of many - but if the DM has their players on a railroad, diviniation spells can be more practical to implement.

Divination spells should be focused on the immediate future. So seeing far into the future is impossible but seeing that a trap is about to go off makes sense. The Alex Verus novels are a good inspiration for this. A spell like Foresight is a great example of it, there should be lesser/weaker versions of it at earlier levels. So from a mechanical POV spells should basically be buffs providing Advantage, Rerolls, Initiative Boosts that sort of stuff, with a few Locate/Scry type spells thrown in.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Just curious. Are those spell totals based off all published wotc 5e material or just the phb?

The setting neutral books. Vague memory is that it's even worse if you limit it to the PHB, but I could be wrong.

[TyGuy]

Add to the mess the fact that there's many spells that step on the toes of other schools, or are straight up placed in the wrong school.

I find the thematics of scribe pretty niche, and I would only play it with specific races/settings/refluff. But beyond that, it's exactly the type of wizard subclass I would have liked to see more of.