Exclusive Spells

[jaappleton]

This has been bothering me for quite some time now.

As 5E has continued, with books like Tasha's, and with various subclasses adding spells to the class list for you, the list of class exclusive spells has gotten incredibly slim.

And don't get me wrong, a lot of that is correction. Yes, I believe Sorcs should have had a lot of those spells BEFORE Tasha's. It wasn't until Xanathar's that Sorcs got Absorb Elements, they were left out in the cold when the spell was introduced in the Elemental Evil Players Companion.

And I feel that spells give the spellcaster classes a lot of identity.

Yet this has really mitigated this.

I want the spellcasters to have more exclusive spells, and not just at high levels, either. A few exclusive spells every few levels I think would go a long way to helping shape the identity a bit more.

And these spells should be good spells. Their 'killer app' spells. Like 'fireball good for a third level spell' kind of good.

Rangers and Paladins shouldn't have to wait until Tier 4 play to utilize the spells the class is best known for, for example. They should each get a few new, exclusive spells at second and third level.

Sorcerers, Warlocks and Clerics should have more spells that don't also get added to the Wizard list.

Anyone else feel the same way?

[Dork_Forge]

I prefer there to be some identity in spellcasting too, I allowed a Druid to use Aura of Vitality (I actually allow the optional spells across the board in my current games) but in future campaigns, I'm going to be pickier with what I allow. They're explicitly optional additions, so I don't think player pushback will be too much.

I prefer Aura being a Paladin/Battle Smith spell, the full casters didn't need that bump of healing at 5th.

[strangebloke]

this kind of cross-list pollution is inevitable, it was in the PHB after all and its only grown from there. But IMO poaching spells from another list should require some amount of build cost. Arcana clerics grabbing booming blade is fine, but life clerics doing the same thing is lame.

The sorcerer is a special case because gosh, it has had basically no unique spells since launch and is almost completely unique in that respect and there's zero justification for it. They've got exclusive spells in legacy editions and it isn't like this would make them overpowered in any way.

[Guy Lombard-O]

I feel that spells give the spellcaster classes a lot of identity.

Sorcerers, Warlocks and Clerics should have more spells that don't also get added to the Wizard list.

Anyone else feel the same way?

Hard agree. I'd go farther and say that every casting class should have more exclusive spells.

[Amechra]

The cool exclusive spells for the Paladin and Ranger really should've been 1st and 2nd level. Otherwise, Bards can snipe them 3 levels earlier than the original classes can grab them.

Also, Warlocks should get more spells that scale well, and Druids/Rangers need ways to get around the fact that most of their good spells require Concentration.

/ObviousIdeaTheater

[Amnestic]

In my ideal world maybe 50-70% of a class' spell list would be class-exclusive spells, with certain subclasses (eg. Nature Cleric) letting you pinch an exclusive or two from another class.

Doing so would drastically increase the number of spells I expect, unless you pared down the existing lists, so I doubt it's something viable for a widespread 5e "Optional rule", but I definitely think that spell lists should be more differentiated in the future, either in 5.5e or 6e.

[jaappleton]

Hard agree. I'd go farther and say that every casting class should have more exclusive spells.

Its very odd.

I consider myself fairly well versed in 5E. I have made characters and played every class, darn near every subclass. Truly, I'm not right 100% of the time on the rules and all that. But I think I know what I'm doing, overall. Whenever I even hear the name of a 5E spell, I have a pretty good idea of what it does, what saving throw it requires, etc without having to actually look at it.

And if you handed me a class spell list without telling me what class it was for, I can only think of one spell list where just by looking at the spells available, I know exactly which spell list it is.

(Take Cantrips out of this because that gives it away a lot, especially for Cleric and Warlock)

Druid.

The Druid list, through and through, gives it a very cohesive and precise identity.

I'm sure if I studied the other lists a bit more, I could do it for absolutely every class.

But Druid is the only one where I can look at it and immediately say its the Druid list.

Shouldn't I be able to do that for every class?

[PhoenixPhyre]

In my ideal world maybe 50-70% of a class' spell list would be class-exclusive spells, with certain subclasses (eg. Nature Cleric) letting you pinch an exclusive or two from another class.

Doing so would drastically increase the number of spells I expect, unless you pared down the existing lists, so I doubt it's something viable for a widespread 5e "Optional rule", but I definitely think that spell lists should be more differentiated in the future, either in 5.5e or 6e.

I definitely agree...and also agree that you should chop spell lists. A lot of spells need to go away entirely; others should be made into not-spells that anyone can access, and the rest need to get pruned down. The prime offenders are the ones that let you mimic other spells. In my mind, each spell should be a unitasker. It does one thing and one thing only. And there should be some way of encouraging thematic spell choice, not simply "pick the best spells and ignore the rest".

And there should be a moratorium on printing new spells for a while. In my mind, that's one of the reasons that the martial/caster divide grows as editions age--it's way easier to print (and to have access to once printed) spells than it is abilities martials can access. Add 3 spells to the cleric list, and an existing cleric can pick those up after a long rest, despite nothing changing in universe. At worst, they can be picked up at the next level change; feats only come every 4 levels, and most other things require a full rebuild of the character to access.

And since spells are independent choices without prerequisites other than level, printing new spells either means they're power creep (ie better than the best existing spell in that niche) or they're ignored. Because there's no cost to picking the best spell. Imagine if spells had limits of the "must know XYZ spell to learn this one" or "must know N <school/theme> spells".

[jaappleton]

Perhaps this is flying in the face of the whole 5E design philosophy

But I just had a thought.

I know 5E tries to remove the distinction as much as possible, but what if the Divine and Arcane casters had separate vanilla pools of spells

And each class and subclass got more specific spells added to it?

So Bards would have the vanilla Arcane pool, and exclusive spells, plus some healing spells because they're Bards.

Just spitballing here.

[Amnestic]

If I were to approach it from an arcane/divine aspect then I'd want Nature to be separate to Divine. Druids, as you've noted, have a very "druid" spell list, and rangers as "druid-fighters" aren't that far off. I'd like to keep that distinction. It'd help establish druids as a notable separate source of magic to clerics too.

So for shared pools:
Arcane: Wiz/Sorc/Bard/Art(?)
Divine: Cler/Pal
Nature: Dru/Rang

Warlock: Depends on Patron perhaps (eg. Fiend - Arcane, Celestial - Divine, Archfey - Nature, or something like that)

With regards to the PhoenixPhyre's note about spell requirements (Eg. "Must know X spells of Y school") it's not something I dislike out of hand, though I do worry if it strays close to the idea of 'feat chains' that they wanted to keep away from in 5e. It's the sort of thing where I don't think I'd like it with the current spell lists, but if they'd started with that sort of assumption in mind it would probably work quite well, if that makes sense.

[Dork_Forge]

Its very odd.

I consider myself fairly well versed in 5E. I have made characters and played every class, darn near every subclass. Truly, I'm not right 100% of the time on the rules and all that. But I think I know what I'm doing, overall. Whenever I even hear the name of a 5E spell, I have a pretty good idea of what it does, what saving throw it requires, etc without having to actually look at it.

And if you handed me a class spell list without telling me what class it was for, I can only think of one spell list where just by looking at the spells available, I know exactly which spell list it is.

(Take Cantrips out of this because that gives it away a lot, especially for Cleric and Warlock)

Druid.

The Druid list, through and through, gives it a very cohesive and precise identity.

I'm sure if I studied the other lists a bit more, I could do it for absolutely every class.

But Druid is the only one where I can look at it and immediately say its the Druid list.

Shouldn't I be able to do that for every class?

Are you sure the Ranger and Paladin lists wouldn't stand out to you?

I think I could do a pretty good job of this task:

Artificer- Pretty unique Arcane with dash of divine

Bard- the have Healing Word and arcane stuff

Cleric- heals and support including bane and bless etc.

Paladin- Smite spells, Find Steed

Ranger- Hunter's mark, Hail of Thorns, lightning arrow etc.

Sorcerer- To be blunt Wizard spells but a shorter list

Warlock- Arcane missing Shield

Wizard- massive list

Identifying them is pretty easy IMO, the better question isn't if you can associate them, but rather those lists actually achieve building a theme for that caster.

[Unoriginal]

Perhaps this is flying in the face of the whole 5E design philosophy

But I just had a thought.

I know 5E tries to remove the distinction as much as possible, but what if the Divine and Arcane casters had separate vanilla pools of spells

And each class and subclass got more specific spells added to it?

So Bards would have the vanilla Arcane pool, and exclusive spells, plus some healing spells because they're Bards.

Just spitballing here.

Nah, it would be much better if every class had its own spell list with exclusive spells, plus some subclass-based variations like the Divine Soul Sorcerer.

[jaappleton]

Are you sure the Ranger and Paladin lists wouldn't stand out to you?

I should have specified full casters.

I bet I'd have a hard time differentiating between Cleric and Bard at first glance. Surely Sorc and Wizard.

I mean, I know Clerics don't have Faerie Fire and Bards do. I know Wizards have Steelwind Strike and Sorcs don't.

But at just a cursory glance, really only Druid is the one that I'd be able to nail 100% of the time.

[Dork_Forge]

I should have specified full casters.

I bet I'd have a hard time differentiating between Cleric and Bard at first glance. Surely Sorc and Wizard.

I mean, I know Clerics don't have Faerie Fire and Bards do. I know Wizards have Steelwind Strike and Sorcs don't.

But at just a cursory glance, really only Druid is the one that I'd be able to nail 100% of the time.

I'd encourage you try it, their lists are actually very different, Cleric hallmarks like Bless, Guiding Bolt, Inflict Wounds are missing from the Bard list, which contains notable spells like Dissonant Whispers, Tasha's Hideous Laughter and other arcane spells like Feather Fall.

Wizard and Sorcerer are harder because the Sorc list is just a trimmed Wizard list, it's easiest to just go off of the number of spells tbh.

I do still agree with your point about more exclusive spells, I just don't think telling the lists apart is very difficult.

Now, if you looked at what actual PCs were preparing, then I think that would make it harder as the cross-pollinated spells are some of the most popular, like Healing Word and Detect Magic.

[strangebloke]

I'd encourage you try it, their lists are actually very different, Cleric hallmarks like Bless, Guiding Bolt, Inflict Wounds are missing from the Bard list, which contains notable spells like Dissonant Whispers, Tasha's Hideous Laughter and other arcane spells like Feather Fall.

Wizard and Sorcerer are harder because the Sorc list is just a trimmed Wizard list, it's easiest to just go off of the number of spells tbh.

I do still agree with your point about more exclusive spells, I just don't think telling the lists apart is very difficult.

Now, if you looked at what actual PCs were preparing, then I think that would make it harder as the cross-pollinated spells are some of the most popular, like Healing Word and Detect Magic.

I think you are correct. I also think that Jaapleton is correct that most spell lists are not all that memorable. Looking at something for a while I could figure it out but the spells that would be giveaways are a very small fraction of the total.

[Amechra]

Honestly, casters suffer from having crufty spell lists. Like, I think you could consolidate most spell lists down to 30-ish spells without losing anything meaningful.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Honestly, casters suffer from having crufty spell lists. Like, I think you could consolidate most spell lists down to 30-ish spells without losing anything meaningful.

(fiddler on the roof) Tradition! Tradition! (/Fiddler)

[IsaacsAlterEgo]

I think having more options is good. I don't think it's important for classes to have that much of an identity, because I tend to see them as just a bag of mechanics that suit the identity of my character and what they do rather than my character having to suit the identity of a class. More choices is good because it means that my thunder and lightning themed Sorcerer can grab more thunder and lightning spells, instead of having to find ways to work around it like multiclassing or feats just so that Wizard can feel more special. If it's not overpowered and it lets people be more creative, I think it's always a good idea to allow more options. So I don't really think this is an issue and kind of hope that they allow more spells to hop over from other spell lists, rather than less.

I will say though, since exclusive spells do still exist, it is kind of lame that Sorcerer gets left out in the cold. Their spell list is currently just "Wizard, but not as much", right? That should probably change in one way or another.

[False God]

I typically agree, with the caveat that I think spell lists in general should be more defined. Rather than "one or two" unique spells, it should be the reverse, with one or two "general" spells. The majority of any class's list should be unique to that class. And they should all be spells that feel like that class. If the class has multiple play styles, it should be careful not to overstep into other classes and absorb their spells, or worse just duplicate them but call them "divine" instead of "arcane".

A much narrower spell list, with a much stronger class-specific theme is IMO, my preferred direction.

[Amechra]

(fiddler on the roof) Tradition! Tradition! (/Fiddler)

Dang it, Tevye!

In all seriousness, I think Warhammer Fantasy 2e got it right, scale-wise — every Priest or Mage (outside of a few weird careers) had a list of 10 unique spells, and later supplements basically offered entirely new spell lists instead of expanding the preexisting ones.

...

Honestly, the one class where kinda-generic spell list really annoys me is the Cleric (and, to a lesser extent, the Warlock). Domains really should customize your spell list more than they currently do.

[Chronos]

The bard list is characterized by a lot of illusions and charms, but almost no blasts.

And the sorcerer does have a handful of spells the wizard lacks: Chaos Bolt (a true exclusive, aside from the Izzet background), Enhance Ability (shared with bard, cleric, and druid), Darkvision (shared with druid and ranger), Daylight (shared with cleric, druid, paladin, and ranger), Water Walk (shared with cleric, druid, and ranger), Dominate Beast (shared with druid), Insect Plague (shared with cleric and druid), Firestorm (shared with cleric and druid), and Earthquake (shared with cleric and druid).

A bit ironic that the sorcerer, with the least-distinctive spell list, shares so much with the druid, the most-distinctive.

[Kane0]

Perhaps this is flying in the face of the whole 5E design philosophy

But I just had a thought.

I know 5E tries to remove the distinction as much as possible, but what if the Divine and Arcane casters had separate vanilla pools of spells

And each class and subclass got more specific spells added to it?

So Bards would have the vanilla Arcane pool, and exclusive spells, plus some healing spells because they're Bards.

Just spitballing here.

Id make a third category actually: Arcane, Divine and Primal. Some classes might even be able to pick which one they want to use, and subclasses expand on individual spells added to the base lists.

[Narsham01]

I've been doing an experimental rework of the 5E classes, and this was a big part of it: Spellcasting classes now define the basics of how you acquire and use magic (Arcanists through study and spellbooks; Sorcerers through inner ability and insight; Theurgists by imploring a powerful entity like a deity to perform magic), archetypes specify what makes you unique within your category ("Sorcerer" includes Naturalists, who attune themselves to nature, and Psionicists, who tap their inner mind-power), and at 5th level, you choose a specialization. All full casters pick one from the list available to everybody, so you can specialize in Life and Death as a Death cleric or as a Mechanist who wants to reanimate the dead.

Spell lists are fairly expansive from Cantrip to L2 spells. L3 and up are increasingly restrictive, with only 2 spells on the list at levels 8 and 9, and that means that some spells are only available to a few--or one--specialist caster type. Specializations also provide some extra abilities that complement the specialty.

Hybrid casters get to pick a specialization at L10 and the resulting list goes through L5 spells for them.

You could probably guess all the specializations looking at the spell lists, though a few will be tricky because 5E has less spell variety than it appears and populating an Acid specialization, for example, is difficult.

[ATHATH]

I'd encourage you try it, their lists are actually very different, Cleric hallmarks like Bless, Guiding Bolt, Inflict Wounds are missing from the Bard list, which contains notable spells like Dissonant Whispers, Tasha's Hideous Laughter and other arcane spells like Feather Fall.
Fun fact: While Bless isn't on the Bard spell list, Bane, its inverse, is (for some reason).

You're still right, but I discovered that recently and I've been looking for an opportunity to mention it somewhere.

[Hytheter]

The lack of bless on the Bard list bothers me. It's not a good flavour match, but the effect seems right up their alley.

[Foolwise]

Bless is too steeped in divine magic and bards have Bardic Inspiration to fill the same role. Bane meanwhile lets a bard be that charming wisecrack that can be thorn in the side for the target. I think it was very savvy of the designers to give bards Bane and not Bless.

[Chronos]

Honestly, I'm not fond of how much they've moved the bard away from the buffer role, in the change to 5th edition. Sure, the bard can give their allies bonuses... to one ally per turn, that can be used once each. That's not even close to the Inspire Courage that they used to have. And they also don't have much in the way of buff spells, either.

[fbelanger]

Extra spell list is the new norm, it will be hard to have exclusive spell when so many subclass pick other class spells for thematic purpose.

[jaappleton]

Extra spell list is the new norm, it will be hard to have exclusive spell when so many subclass pick other class spells for thematic purpose.

You have a solid point here.

As more subclass are released to cover more thematic concepts, more bonus spell lists tied to those subclasses exist.

And that's fine. In fact, I encourage that. Destructive Wave SHOULD be on the Tempest Domain list, not exclusive to the Paladin.

I'm fine with specific subclasses getting all sorts of bonus spells, it helps form the identity of the subclass.

My issue is "Why is there so much overlap between Wizard and Sorc?", and "Why don't Bards get more exclusive spells?"

[No brains]

Not truly an 'exclusive' spells issue, but I just wish wizards got more enchantment spells so school of enchantment wizards could actually benefit from being able to copy those spells easier.

All of the good enchantment spells are either class identity spells (bless, vicious mockery, animal friendship, hex) or spells that were puzzlingly mislabeled (hex again, phantasmal force(an illusion in 1 creature's mind? Really!?), dream).

[Amechra]

"Why don't Bards get more exclusive spells?"

Because, for some bizarre reason, they decided that the Bard's "thing" is that they can snipe exclusive spells off of other spell lists (which you'd think would be a Sorcerer thing, what with their whole "I have a unique and powerful magical bloodline" thing... but I digress). To compensate, they nerfed the Bard's core list.

Honestly, the Bard is the biggest problem when it comes to designing exclusive spells. When you're designing 3rd level or higher spells for the Ranger and Paladin, you have to bear in mind that Bards can pick them up early, on a class that's much better at casting spells (more spell slots, better scaling, probably better DCs...)

Take Find Greater Steed, for example. For a Paladin, it's a sweet power-up in the middle of Tier 3 — it's effectively just a tougher, flying version of Find Steed. Bards, on the other hand, grab it at the end of Tier 2 and gain more from having a loyal flying steed that they can share spells with — being able to fly is way stronger when you're trying to avoid melee.

[Xetheral]

Id make a third category actually: Arcane, Divine and Primal. Some classes might even be able to pick which one they want to use, and subclasses expand on individual spells added to the base lists.

I'd support differentiating lists by Arcane/Divine/Primal, to represent distinctions between types of magic that would be observable to the characters in the game world. I'd also support differentiating spell preparation mechanics (e.g. prepared vs known and learning spells vs knowing the whole list) by casting stat, so that all Int casters used the same mechanics, all Wis casters used the same mechanics, etc. I'm also fine with specific subclasses occasionally poaching out-of-type spells, although I'd fluff it as learning to duplicate the effect of the out-of-type spell using one's own power source.

I'm not a big fan of making spells class-exclusive, since I prefer it when class is merely an OOC concept and not something observable in the game world.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I'm not a big fan of making spells class-exclusive, since I prefer it when class is merely an OOC concept and not something observable in the game world.

That's not necessarily tied together. Because NPCs already aren't restricted to any particular published list. You can have NPCs casting off of any list using any ability modifier or spell-casting progression. Or none at all. For instances, most of my priest-type NPCs aren't clerics. They're warlocks, who have specific spells granted. You can have priests who cast a third level spell without having access to any firsts. Or can cast <that spell> off the cleric list and <the other spell> off the wizard list. But nothing else.

Class-based restrictions are thematic and archetypal, not reified.

[Xetheral]

That's not necessarily tied together. Because NPCs already aren't restricted to any particular published list. You can have NPCs casting off of any list using any ability modifier or spell-casting progression. Or none at all. For instances, most of my priest-type NPCs aren't clerics. They're warlocks, who have specific spells granted. You can have priests who cast a third level spell without having access to any firsts. Or can cast <that spell> off the cleric list and <the other spell> off the wizard list. But nothing else.

Class-based restrictions are thematic and archetypal, not reified.

I completely agree that the existence of class-exclusive spells and class-as-an-IC-concept are not necessarily tied together. However, they are tied together for me, since I prefer to treat PCs and NPCs consistently in my game worlds. (I use the optional rule for building NPCs using PC mechanics.)

Yes, this means that my preferences against class-specific spells (but for power-source-specific spells) are informed by my other preferences regarding how I approach the game. At least I'm consistent. :)

[Corey]

Its very odd.

I consider myself fairly well versed in 5E. I have made characters and played every class, darn near every subclass. Truly, I'm not right 100% of the time on the rules and all that. But I think I know what I'm doing, overall. Whenever I even hear the name of a 5E spell, I have a pretty good idea of what it does, what saving throw it requires, etc without having to actually look at it.

And if you handed me a class spell list without telling me what class it was for, I can only think of one spell list where just by looking at the spells available, I know exactly which spell list it is.

(Take Cantrips out of this because that gives it away a lot, especially for Cleric and Warlock)

Druid.

The Druid list, through and through, gives it a very cohesive and precise identity.

I'm sure if I studied the other lists a bit more, I could do it for absolutely every class.

But Druid is the only one where I can look at it and immediately say its the Druid list.

Shouldn't I be able to do that for every class?

Warlock is easily recognizable from Hex. And Armor of .../Arms of ... both happen to be early in the alphabetical listing. :)

You're right of course about Druid.

Paladin has Find Steed.

Bard is arcane caster with some healing spells that goes up to 9th level.

Artificer, similarly, but doesn't go all the way up. :)