Prestidigitation. Take it early or never.

[Foolwise]

Claiming longswords aren't foodstuffs is straight up speciesism. Oozes gotta eat too.

[Greywander]

i mean, yes you could lol. but thats hardly a mechanical benefit

Prestidigitation is the sort of ability that you have to look beyond raw mechanical benefits. D&D isn't a video game, part of the roleplay is behaving as a person living in another world, and part of the DM's job is to do the same with NPCs. Harmless sensory effects, non-magical trinkets, or the ability to warm, chill, or flavor something can all be used in ways that don't grant a mechanical advantage, but would cause other people to behave differently, or even cause the environment itself to react.

For example, a harmless sensory effect can be used to distract someone, diverting their attention and possibly even drawing them into a trap or away from something they're guarding. You can warm someone's beer to make them think the barkeep is stiffing them, or use flavoring to cover up poison. You could briefly show someone a rare item, offering to sell or give it to them if they fulfill some request or conditions for you (when in reality it was just a fake that disappeared after a few seconds). There are tons of possibilities for a spell like this, you just have to get creative and think less like a character in a game and more like an actual person living within that world.

YMMV, as this does require some DM buy-in, much the same as illusion spells. It's understandable if a DM doesn't want to play that kind of game, but they should be up-front with their players about that. But I think it would be a shame not to allow this sort of creative play, which can lead to a lot more interesting adventures and stories than something more focused on mechanical combat.

[kazaryu]

Prestidigitation is the sort of ability that you have to look beyond raw mechanical benefits. D&D isn't a video game, part of the roleplay is behaving as a person living in another world, and part of the DM's job is to do the same with NPCs. Harmless sensory effects, non-magical trinkets, or the ability to warm, chill, or flavor something can all be used in ways that don't grant a mechanical advantage, but would cause other people to behave differently, or even cause the environment itself to react.

For example, a harmless sensory effect can be used to distract someone, diverting their attention and possibly even drawing them into a trap or away from something they're guarding. You can warm someone's beer to make them think the barkeep is stiffing them, or use flavoring to cover up poison. You could briefly show someone a rare item, offering to sell or give it to them if they fulfill some request or conditions for you (when in reality it was just a fake that disappeared after a few seconds). There are tons of possibilities for a spell like this, you just have to get creative and think less like a character in a game and more like an actual person living within that world.

YMMV, as this does require some DM buy-in, much the same as illusion spells. It's understandable if a DM doesn't want to play that kind of game, but they should be up-front with their players about that. But I think it would be a shame not to allow this sort of creative play, which can lead to a lot more interesting adventures and stories than something more focused on mechanical combat.

thats not an effect thats created by the spell, thats using the spell to flavor something you could do anyway. thats my point. there is no 'getting creative' with prestidigitation from a mechanical standpoint. it has several things it can do, but all of them are just...flavorings of things that can be done in a variety of different ways, both magical or non-magical. its just not an optimizers spell. please, try to understand where a person is coming from before saying things like 'you have to stop thinking like a video game'. im speaking in the context the OP started, from an optimizers perspective. i've also stated that, in spite of the spell not actually providing anything mechanically, its still a spell i always take.

[Thunderous Mojo]

its just not an optimizers spell.

Wouldn't that depend on what you are "Optimizing" for?

There are not a lot of spells in 5e that create scents. Spells such as Major Image that do create illusionary scents, often tie those scents to a visual phenomenon the spell creates.

Prestidigitation, magically speaking, covers some niches that other magics either do not cover, or those magics come with a significantly higher cost; be it in the form of the spell slot required for the spell, or a Concentration cost.

For a class that starts with 3 Cantrips, Prestidigitation is a solid third Cantrip selection. For other classes, Prestidigitation, is a fine selection as one advances in level.

Teleportation mishaps, Magical Gates, large birds of prey grabbing a character and dropping the PC into frigid waters, all of these perils and more can land someone into a hazard that they were not explicitly prepared for. Prestidigitation has quite a few bullets points under it's description, and serves as a good multi-tool.

[Unoriginal]

There's is a difference between "Doesn't break the setting" and "Is inconsequential"

Maybe I just want to cook soup for my party without lighting a fire to give away our position.

I never said it was "inconsequential." I said it wasn't setting-shaking/breaking.

Is nothing that doesn't break the game or revolutionize the setting away from the pseudo-medieval fantasy it's set up to be worth wanting?

It's true there is a big gap between "doesn't break the setting" and "is inconsequential", but then the question is: are the positive consequences of doing the whole "alternate between using physical laws and game logic depending which is convenient at the time" thing only for the PCs?

If it is only for the PCs, the question is "why do the PC get to do that and not the rest of the world?".

If it's not only for the PCs, the question is: "why is it not setting-shaking?"

Being able to produce boiling water, or boiling-temperature-anything, would have massive implications in, for example, the module Rime of the Frostmaiden. And that's just one of the things.

[MoiMagnus]

It's true there is a big gap between "doesn't break the setting" and "is inconsequential", but then the question is: are the positive consequences of doing the whole "alternate between using physical laws and game logic depending which is convenient at the time" thing only for the PCs?

If it is only for the PCs, the question is "why do the PC get to do that and not the rest of the world?".

If it's not only for the PCs, the question is: "why is it not setting-shaking?"

Being able to produce boiling water, or boiling-temperature-anything, would have massive implications in, for example, the module Rime of the Frostmaiden. And that's just one of the things.

And prestidigitation is far from the only spell that does it. Between "Create Bonefire", "Fire Bolt", "Shape Water" (which allows to freeze) and many others, I think that's fair to say that peoples can break conservation of energy.
An that's not counting all the various monsters that are literally made of flames or cold.

There are two ways of dealing with "small stuff that are potentially setting-shaking":

(1) Restrict their availability. Just because it's a cantrip doesn't means it's easy to learn. Just because a PC can take it with a feat doesn't mean it doesn't require 10+ years of training for a regular human being to learn. Just because a PC is always allowed by the rules to take it doesn't mean you need to be in the "special 1%" of peoples genetically able to use magic to be able to learn magic. Etc.

(2) Restrict its practicality. Just because you have a screwdriver and the problem is a screw doesn't mean you have enough room around the screw to put your screwdriver. The description of cantrips doesn't go much into the details of all the little quirks and "actually, it doesn't work well in this particular situation" because no designers wants to write a 2-pages long text for each cantrip detailing their inner working about what the cantrip actually does, and most players don't want to read through such lengthy text.
[For example, for prestidigitation, maybe you're taking the heat/cold out of yourself, so spamming it can be problematic to your health]

The general ruling of my GM is "When doing something complex with a cantrip, the cantrip adds your proficiency bonus to the check (potentially on top of existing proficiency bonuses), but very rarely offers an automatic success. If it is really perfectly adequate, an advantage might also be granted.". E.G:
=> You want to give some heat to peoples so that they don't die out of cold. That's a Survival check to find the good positions to avoid the wind, preserve the heat, etc. And if you have a cantrip that produces heat, that's an additional proficiency bonus to this test.
=> You want to repair some machinery. That's a tool proficiency check, but if you have Mending, that's an additional proficiency bonus to this test.

[Segev]

It's true there is a big gap between "doesn't break the setting" and "is inconsequential", but then the question is: are the positive consequences of doing the whole "alternate between using physical laws and game logic depending which is convenient at the time" thing only for the PCs?

If it is only for the PCs, the question is "why do the PC get to do that and not the rest of the world?".

If it's not only for the PCs, the question is: "why is it not setting-shaking?"

Being able to produce boiling water, or boiling-temperature-anything, would have massive implications in, for example, the module Rime of the Frostmaiden. And that's just one of the things.

Once again, this argument is attributing a position to me that I do not believe I've espoused. Where did I say to switch - conveniently or otherwise - between game mechanics and "real-world physics?" My statement was that having prestidigitation magically alter the temperature of an item as an instantaneous effect, so long as it can only "warm" or "cool," (and not, for example, bring to temperatures that could cause harm nor bring from temperatures that cause harm to non-harmful temperatures, neither of which the game rules support it being able to do), it does not cause setting-shaking rammifications.

Nowhere in that have I brought up shifting between game rules and real physics. I have said that even if we adhere to real physics as we understand them, the game rules don't cause setting-shaking breaks to appear. Not at the level of tech that D&D deals with. I went on to say that it might have some dramatic impacts at industrial revolution level tech or later, but anything the thermodynamics-breaking of prestidigitation in pseudo-medieval tech levels can do will not result in immediate destabilization of the setting expectations.

[Chronos]

Quoth MoiMagnus:

=> You want to repair some machinery. That's a tool proficiency check, but if you have Mending, that's an additional proficiency bonus to this test.

Or how about "but if you have Mending, then that's what Mending does"? I mean, that's what it's for.

Quoth Greywander:

Prestidigitation is the sort of ability that you have to look beyond raw mechanical benefits. D&D isn't a video game, part of the roleplay is behaving as a person living in another world, and part of the DM's job is to do the same with NPCs. Harmless sensory effects, non-magical trinkets, or the ability to warm, chill, or flavor something can all be used in ways that don't grant a mechanical advantage, but would cause other people to behave differently, or even cause the environment itself to react.

You don't even need to be interacting with others for it to be relevant. Even a solo adventurer who's just gotten through slogging through a swamp, still in the middle of the wilderness where they won't meet anyone civilized for days, might still want to clean up just because they, personally, like to be clean. Remember, D&D isn't actually about solving the problems that the DM places before you: It's about doing what you want. And sometimes, what you want is exactly what a cantrip can give you.