Honestly. I love 5e Arcane Trickster. I really truly do. It's a fun class with a lot of flavorful, useful abilities. It also has access to spellcasting to supplement it's abilities. However, it is truly criminal how small a selection of spells and the like they get.

  • There is truly no reason that we couldn't have gotten at least Paladin/Ranger spell slots. Getting access to 2nd level wizard spells at 7th and 3rd at 13! is a huge slap in the face.
  • If they're going to limit us to only Enchantment/Illusion, but grant us out of school spells later, why can I not get a 1st level out of school spell at some point? Find Familiar is absolutely thematic for the class, but if I want it I have to use an ASI or my 8th level spell known which I could be getting a 2nd level spell with.
  • Why does the magical rogue archetype not get to Sneak Attack with spells and cantrips?
  • Why does the magical rogue archetype get so few spells known, no way to learn extra spells, so few cantrips, and get saddled with the "only Enchantment/Illusion" restriction?
  • Why does the magical rogue archetype not get to add Arcana to their skills?


Basically, if I want to play a rogue with some arcane power, I honestly feel like you're supposed to just play Rogue 2/Wizard X, or even some variant of Bard. This archetype is supposed to fill a specific class fantasy, and while it brings all the flavor and abilities you would want, the spellcasting has such mediocre progression that it feels like the spells are there largely for flavor purposes only.

This could've been fixed by giving Arcane Trickster it's own spell list where it got access to some spells at a lower level than normal, or they could've just gotten a decent spell progression based on other half casters.