Are There any Spells you Would Remove from D&D?

[Dr. Cliché]

As the title, I'm curious as to whether there are any spells (or abilities) that you would like to see removed from D&D?

The intention of this thread is not so much about nerfing casters for balance reasons, but rather about limiting what magic can do for the purposes of encounters and worldbuilding.

For example:
- Would you like to see spells like Create Food and Water removed (so that a Druid or Cleric can't instantly solve any wilderness or survival challenge)?
- Would you like to see some/all teleportation spells removed (either to prevent fast-travelling or to stop parties from bypassing whole sections of buildings and such)?
- Would you like to see Resurrection spells removed, so that death is less trivial?

[KorvinStarmast]

As the title, I'm curious as to whether there are any spells (or abilities) that you would like to see removed from D&D?

Man, this answer is going to take a while, I may have to come back and edit.

The intention of this thread is not so much about nerfing casters for balance reasons, but rather about limiting what magic can do for the purposes of encounters and worldbuilding.

Go back to true Vancian casting, which makes each spell choice significant. (Yeah, I know, not happening)

- Would you like to see spells like Create Food and Water removed (so that a Druid or Cleric can't instantly solve any wilderness or survival challenge)?

No. It costs a resource, so make the wilderness/survival scenario mixed challenges! Make the spell slot choice mean something. Also, not every group will have a cleric or a druid. (I'm in a group now that has a paladin, bard, bladelock, sorclock) We, for example, can't turn undead.

- Would you like to see some/all teleportation spells removed (either to prevent fast-travelling or to stop parties from bypassing whole sections of buildings and such)?

Not really. If you don't like them since they become a 'win' button, add more risk of 'it didn't quite go as planned' so that an "aw crap" moment has more opportunity to occur.

- Would you like to see Resurrection spells removed, so that death is less trivial?

I'd get rid of True Resurrection.

I'd combine Charm Person and Suggestion into one spell.

Get rid of Find Greater Steed; convert Find Steed to where you get better steeds as you use a higher level spell slot.

There are so many spells that overlap, I'll get back to you on more of the ones I'd like to simply remove or fuse two spells into one.

Chaos Bolt: it's too fiddly, get rid of it.

[Yakmala]

I like to think that as a DM, I’m fairly adaptable, but if I was basing my answer on the spells that most frequently screwed up my encounters, here are my top picks.

Force Wall / Force Cage. The number of creatures that can deal with these spells is small. These two spells can quickly bring the toughest encounters to an end.

Arcane Eye. You either design your dungeons around this or risk everything being revealed the moment the party sets foot inside.

Simulacrum: Sure, they’re somewhat fragile, but while active, they are a super powerful force multiplier, especially in the hands of a Sorlock or similar build.

[Zuras]

The most problematic spells that could easily be removed or reworked (as opposed to Healing Word, which would require a complete re-working of the death and dying system) are Counterspell and Banishment. Simply switching Counterspell to be an application of Dispel Magic (as a readied action) would prevent caster vs caster interactions from devolving into Counterspell duels. Switching Banishment back to only working on extraplanar creatures would also rein in that spell.

Those are the two that have come up as overly disruptive at my tables. Restricting spells for food creation or fast travel are more a session 0 issue to me. If the DM and the players want to make travel difficulties a major element of the campaign, then access to those spells gets restricted/eliminated.

[KorvinStarmast]

The most problematic spells that could easily be removed or reworked (as opposed to Healing Word, which would require a complete re-working of the death and dying system) are Counterspell and Banishment. Simply switching Counterspell to be an application of Dispel Magic (as a readied action) Switching Banishment back to only working on extraplanar creatures would also rein in that spell.

Hard disagree, I guess our table experiences are quite different. We have those alive and well in our games, and they are not disruptive. They are magic doing magic. We had a battle a few weeks ago where we were faced with a number of enemy casters. They were counterspelling (or trying to) some of our spells, and we countered (or tried to) some of their spells, but none of us tried to counterspell a counterspell.

would prevent caster vs caster interactions from devolving into Counterspell duels.

Never seen that at table, ever. I smell a 'white room argument' but it is possible if the DM or the players want to burn a slot on this to do this. If that's how a table has fun, roll with it. Does your table actually do this?

Those are the two that have come up as overly disruptive at my tables.

Restricting spells for food creation or fast travel are more a session 0 issue to me. If the DM and the players want to make travel difficulties a major element of the campaign, then access to those spells gets restricted/eliminated.

Good suggestion.

[PhoenixPhyre]

If I'm being truly honest, about half of them. Basically all the "utility" ones. Not because I'm opposed to the spell effects themselves or even to the concept of utility magic, but because I want to go back to a variation on 4e's Rituals. Instead of being spells that only spellcasters (and wizards only for about half of the set) can do, make them non-spell magic that anyone[1] can learn and perform and gate them in other ways--cast time, costly components, requiring multiple participants, exhaustion, whatever. I don't even care if "traditional" ritual casters have replacement features that make them better/faster/cheaper at performing these incantations, including possibly giving them a supply of them, I just want to break the "magic === spells" identity barrier.

Leave spells for things that have to be cast now and make them always burn slots to do so.

There are many others that need their effects tweaked, but that's not removal, it's just tweaking.

[1] I'd gate learning them by tier and possibly by finding someone willing to teach you (so you'd have to go to a temple of a god of healing/life/etc to learn a Restoration ritual), but basically no further. There are already costs built into using them that prevent spamming.

[samcifer]

I'd get rid of the spell Daylight. It's borderline useless as a spell imo.

[Zuras]

Hard disagree, I guess our table experiences are quite different. We have those alive and well in our games, and they are not disruptive. They are magic doing magic. We had a battle a few weeks ago where we were faced with a number of enemy casters. They were counterspelling (or trying to) some of our spells, and we countered (or tried to) some of their spells, but none of us tried to counterspell a counterspell. Never seen that at table, ever. I smell a 'white room argument' but it is possible if the DM or the players want to burn a slot on this to do this. If that's how a table has fun, roll with it. Does your table actually do this?

If you smell a “white room argument” here, maybe you like including a lot of casters in your encounters normally? It’s been a real annoyance for me the last few weeks, because I either need to include about double the number of casters I normally would in an encounter, or accept that the caster has a significant chance of doing nothing in the encounter. Neither option seems particularly good or fun to me.

Functionally, once your players get counterspell, non-wizard chassis spellcaster NPCs become significantly less dangerous, and good tactics become very static—casting Greater Invisibility and then spamming AoE spells is almost certainly the best move for a lone spellcaster.

So yeah, DM annoyance about Counterspell is a real thing. It made multiple encounters with enemy casters who, by story logic, should obviously be Warlocks, complete curb stomps for the PCs. The existence of the spell completely warps spellcasting tactics, and as a DM it is simultaneously annoying and disheartening to plan out how your spellcasters will behave in combat knowing it’s all probably going to be pointless when the actual battle happens.

(Edited to add)
In the same vein as restricting teleport and food generation in session 0 if everyone agrees travel complications should be played through rather than bypassed, intrigue campaigns really need to work out the limitations on mind reading and scrying spells in session 0 as well. Otherwise you may have some really short murder mysteries.

[PhoenixPhyre]

If you smell a “white room argument” here, maybe you like including a lot of casters in your encounters normally? It’s been a real annoyance for me the last few weeks, because I either need to include about double the number of casters I normally would in an encounter, or accept that the caster has a significant chance of doing nothing in the encounter. Neither option seems particularly good or fun to me.

Functionally, once your players get counterspell, non-wizard chassis spellcaster NPCs become significantly less dangerous, and good tactics become very static—casting Greater Invisibility and then spamming AoE spells is almost certainly the best move for a lone spellcaster.

So yeah, DM annoyance about Counterspell is a real thing. It made multiple encounters with enemy casters who, by story logic, should obviously be Warlocks, complete curb stomps for the PCs. The existence of the spell completely warps spellcasting tactics, and as a DM it is simultaneously annoying and disheartening to plan out how your spellcasters will behave in combat knowing it’s all probably going to be pointless when the actual battle happens.

There's one easy fix--stay out of the 60' range of counterspell. And have screening units. Any single caster will always be a curb-stomp. And most NPC "pure" casters are pure glass cannons, which makes them unsatisfying as part of most encounters--either they blast everyone into oblivion or they die with barely a whimper.

And have more encounters. Burning a 3rd level spell slot is a non-trivial cost.

[MoiMagnus]

I'd like D&D to acknowledge that some spells (mostly combat spells) are core to the D&D system, while others (like plane shift) come from the default D&D setting.

And I'd probably put resurrections in the latter category (except for revivify): there are plenty of campaigns where I even find that resurrection spells come too late or are too costly, and other campaigns where I want to ban them because they ruin the worldbuilding I'm trying to do.

Oh, and while that's not directly your question, I'm in favour of merging similar spells. Like "Hold Monster" which should be "Hold Person cast at higher level". (This might mean reducing the number of spell known/prepared, but I'm fine with that).

[Townopolis]

I generally remove Detect Thoughts, Suggestion (including mass), and Zone of Truth.

I'm softening on Zone of Truth because I have a worldbuilding idea for it, but mostly I consider it and Detect Thoughts to be spells for groups that don't like mysteries.

And Suggestion is just "let me break this encounter or argue with me for fifteen minutes about it" the spell.

Food and water spells I have been tempted to remove, but I think using the gritty rest rules keeps them from totally breaking exploration (as much as it exists), especially since I only allow long rests in friendly towns and strongholds.

[Zuras]

There's one easy fix--stay out of the 60' range of counterspell. And have screening units. Any single caster will always be a curb-stomp. And most NPC "pure" casters are pure glass cannons, which makes them unsatisfying as part of most encounters--either they blast everyone into oblivion or they die with barely a whimper.

And have more encounters. Burning a 3rd level spell slot is a non-trivial cost.

Staying 65’ away doesn’t really work for casters like the War Priest or Blackguard. And at any rate, the problem I have with Counterspell is that it completely warps combat tactics involving spellcasters around it and makes that combat less interesting, not that it’s specifically overpowered.

[Snails]

There's one easy fix--stay out of the 60' range of counterspell. And have screening units. Any single caster will always be a curb-stomp. And most NPC "pure" casters are pure glass cannons, which makes them unsatisfying as part of most encounters--either they blast everyone into oblivion or they die with barely a whimper.

And have more encounters. Burning a 3rd level spell slot is a non-trivial cost.

To supplement the above ideas, consider dropping fogs/walls to disrupt line of sight for the PC casters hanging back. The PCs are probably much better at ranged attack than the "monsters". Making it difficult to efficiently place AoEs (or an archer to finish weakened foes at range), even for a round or two, will be less comfortable for the players. Even the disposable mooks can have a shaman or two with 1-3 levels of spellcasting ability, without being a big rewrite of the encounter.

And it makes Counterspell much less reliable, too.

[strangebloke]

I generally remove Detect Thoughts, Suggestion (including mass), and Zone of Truth.

I'm softening on Zone of Truth because I have a worldbuilding idea for it, but mostly I consider it and Detect Thoughts to be spells for groups that don't like mysteries.

And Suggestion is just "let me break this encounter or argue with me for fifteen minutes about it" the spell.

Food and water spells I have been tempted to remove, but I think using the gritty rest rules keeps them from totally breaking exploration (as much as it exists), especially since I only allow long rests in friendly towns and strongholds.

I'd agree with this. In general I'm fine with utility magic but only if its used to skip challenges that are relatively uninteresting. Opening a lock or jumping a chasm are fine rewards for having a spell slot. "Bypassing an entire mystery adventure" really isn't.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Staying 65’ away doesn’t really work for casters like the War Priest or Blackguard. And at any rate, the problem I have with Counterspell is that it completely warps combat tactics involving spellcasters around it and makes that combat less interesting, not that it’s specifically overpowered.

I guess I tend to run enough mixed groups that it makes things more interesting, at least for me--I've had cases where
1) the primary counterspeller (a bard) had already used their reaction earlier, meaning they couldn't counterspell that critical banishment (taking a party member out of the fight temporarily)
2) the counterspeller managed to stop the arc-level BBEG from teleporting out, letting them have a cathartic kill that actually moved the game along
3) the counterspeller managed to stop a minor baddie from doing a tactical reposition that would have (along with his next action) caused a real story-level mess
4) a group of NPCs shut down some heavy control tactics (ie breaking up "business as usual" by the party) by counterspelling[1]

So, on net, I find counterspell to be a net positive. Notes: I run it blind. I don't say what they're casting, and see the footnote as how to I handle NPC counterspells. I also don't counterspell counterspells.

[1] NPCs with counterspell (which I don't generally add to custom spell lists, but if they have it stock, I'll use it) will counterspell whatever they can until out of appropriate-level slots. Cantrip or big spell, if they can counterspell, they will.

[Telwar]

Ditch the SCAGtrips. If bladesinger needs them to exist, then ditch bladesinger entirely, or, better, give them a class feature.

[JNAProductions]

Remove entirely? Probably not.

Remove from spell lists and possibly as spell spells, yes. One could do rituals or quests to seek them out, but they wouldn't be something you could just learn on level up.

Clone maybe.
Simulacrum yes.
Wish yes.

And I'd modify Forcecage and ilk to allow saves, at a minimum.

[Pex]

No

There is no spell that stands out as a matter of obviousness I want gone. If I bothered, but I'm not now, to go over the list of spells I wouldn't be surprised if I could name one or two I wouldn't mind gone, but it's more because of redundancy to another spell that exists or the spell isn't working as intending. I could certainly agree to changing how some spells work.

The problem with spells aren't in their power in and of themselves but of people not able or willing to adapt their games to their existence. There is absolutely nothing wrong with Teleport, except for those who can't stand it PCs no longer need to travel hundreds of miles and have random encounters like they used to have. There is fun in the Journey, but there's also fun in the adventure itself at the location they need to be. Even with Dimension Door or Fly, some DMs can't or won't adapt to the idea that a chasm is no longer an obstacle for the party. It's not the spells' fault they exist. High level play has high level obstacles. Low level obstacles made obsolete is the whole point.

[DwarfFighter]

I'd get rid of the spell Daylight. It's borderline useless as a spell imo.

Why remove spells that players themselves eliminate by not using them? It takes away the option of using them when relevant.

[Zuras]

I'd get rid of the spell Daylight. It's borderline useless as a spell imo.

Why remove spells that players themselves eliminate by not using them? It takes away the option of using them when relevant.

Daylight just needs renaming to Dispel Darkness or something similar. It’s a niche spell, but it comes up often enough to justify its existence. In a world where numerous creatures can create magical darkness they can see through at will, tools to combat those tactics should be available.

[Amechra]

Go back to true Vancian casting, which makes each spell choice significant. (Yeah, I know, not happening)

Spell slots equal to your Intelligence/Wisdom/Charisma modifier (with maybe some extra scaling), but all of your spells are big and impactful? I'd be down for that.

It'd actually be kinda interesting to see a version of D&D where magic worked like it did in the Dying Earth books. Casters scale by broadening what they can do, not by getting their hands on more powerful spells — and, eventually, they transition to calling up spirits and making them do stuff for them.

[Warder]

Healing Word, because it makes the game less fun.

Find Steed, because it should be a paladin class feature.

Vicious Mockery because people struggling to come up with puns and failing makes combat a much worse experience. :P

[micahaphone]

In general, 5E spells are a bit simplified/consolidated - for example, "protection from X" spells would've been a good 4-6 different spells in pathfinder/3.5 that are all nearly identical. I quite like that design choice, personally.

However, the one that I have gripes with is "Remove Curse". It's too broadly applicable. Pick up a cursed weapon and want to put it down? You need remove curse. An evil hag or witch or other insidious monster is tormenting the party/the town/etc? remove curse. Werewolf/rat/tiger bit someone and it's only a matter of time until your friend becomes a monster? Remove Curse.

There's so many plot hooks, adventure complications, story beats and other things that can be instantly cleansed with Remove Curse.

If it consumed a costly component like Revivify, then okay sure that's a limited resource and your players might feel a crunch or have to do a quest to find the ingredients. But it's V/S only, so any cleric or wizard can just run roughshod over so many excellent potential stories unless you talk it out ahead of time and agree to nerf the spell.


At least Dispell Magic has a roll to try and get rid of higher level effects. This relies on the nebulously defined "all curses affecting one creature or object".

[PhantomSoul]

(Remove Curse)

I think Remove Curse would also be much less problematic if everyone worked on Spells Known. Then the breadth is great... but often Curses can be solved tomorrow, which then means they lack teeth for something that often should be more significant (to my taste).

[Willie the Duck]

There are some that I would absolutely re-work (so I guess remove the existing version)-- including Wish, Simulacrum, the become-something-else spells, gain-extra-minion spells, Force spells (there's absolutely no reason why things made of force field need to be 'invulnerable except for ___,' give them HP, AC, and damage thresholds like a real huts and cages and such), and such.

Mostly, however, I would have the spells broken up into sections that can be included or excluded based on campaign style, and have much more discussion in the book about each campaign being different and having to craft the allowed content to match theme. If you are having a wilderness survival-type game, perhaps the simple Create Food and Water and Goodberry spells are off the table (but here are some alternate spells like Find Water, along with some variant survival rules to make that part of the game more interesting). If Teleport or any planar travel spells would make the campaign specific travel theme meaningless, block those out, but here are some muted spells of a similar vein (because 10 mile teleports aren't disruptive, or similar) along with some interesting travel-based campaign theme ideas.

[KorvinStarmast]

Functionally, once your players get counterspell, non-wizard chassis spellcaster NPCs become significantly less dangerous, and good tactics become very static—casting Greater Invisibility and then spamming AoE spells is almost certainly the best move for a lone spellcaster.

Interestingly, I have only done that once and that was within the past month. It had nothing to do with counterspell being available (only the bard has it) and everything to do with being trapped.

So yeah, DM annoyance about Counterspell is a real thing. It made multiple encounters with enemy casters who, by story logic, should obviously be Warlocks, complete curb stomps for the PCs.

No comment on what's bugging you, I am beginning to get an idea.

The existence of the spell completely warps spellcasting tactics, and as a DM it is simultaneously annoying and disheartening to plan out how your spellcasters will behave in combat knowing it’s all probably going to be pointless when the actual battle happens.

Our Tier 3 DM added more casters to the enemy. My bard has to guess which one to counter. She doesn't always guess right, and she does not always make her roll.
Also, our DM doesn't take it personally if his saves fail or his spells don't go off.

[Amnestic]

Simulacrum. I don't believe it can be 'fixed' in a way that makes it desirable to cast but not abusable.

Also Conjure Animals/Conjure Woodland Beings now that we've got Summon Beast/Summon Fey from Tasha's. And Animate Objects. And anything else that can be used to accrue large numbers of minions easily.

[stoutstien]

If I could have it my way I'd probably remove quite a few spells. The majority of the actual effects would still be in the game they just wouldn't be provided through generic spell casting.

It's a lot easier to add an isolated feature that can't be combined with the totality of spellcasting then trying to have an ever-expanding spell list that maintains any sense of reason or balance.

[KorvinStarmast]

Simulacrum. I don't believe it can be 'fixed' in a way that makes it desirable to cast but not abusable.

Our DM has so fixed it. (Feel free to ask PhoenixPhyre how he runs it).

[PhoenixPhyre]

Our DM has so fixed it. (Feel free to ask PhoenixPhyre how he runs it).

The changes I made were basically:

1) Use AL rules (ie no chaining, no way to create multiple simulacrums[0], any wish-related consequences of the simulacrum apply to the caster as well)
2) Sims cannot ever regain any resource, except HP through the alchemical healing process
3) A strong discouragement of micromanagement of minions (and of minionmancy beyond the very most basic) in general[1]
4) The basic understanding that I'm not playing particularly high-op anyway, so attempts to do so will leave you very very bored and not challenged, and if you seriously de-tune my game, I'll talk with you and we'll figure out a way to bring it back in tune for the sake of all the players. Again, please don't do that.

Side note: everything is abusable. No ruleset can or should close all the holes, because the end of that road is a board game where everything not explicitly permitted is forbidden. And that's no fun. The answer to "that's abusable" is
1) don't leave obvious gaping holes (if you do, that's not really abuse)
2) for things that are stretches or obviously :sideways_owl: scenarios (like wish-sim loops), DM says no.
3) foster a table-culture of reading for meaning and sense, not loophole-hunting and rules lawyering. Worry less about the exact technical wording and ways to subvert it and worry more about the spirit of the rule and the needs of the table. Which needs may differ from table to table; what's an abuse at one table may not be at another.

[0] simulacra cannot cast simulacrum, no matter what. And a strong discouragement[1] of conjured/created creatures casting any summoning/minion-creating spell whatsoever. Yes, that includes (eg) summoned demons by NPCs. They won't have the "summon demon" variant enabled either.

[1] not a rule change, but a "hey guys, let's not do that please?" table-level agreement.