Level Up (A5E) Improving spells

[Morrus]

I like the idea of having 'tags' that let the fire mage cast fire spells or a fire cleric cast fire spells, but some of this already exists with the light cleric casting fireball. I would think that there also needs to be some trade off with a wizard getting all the spells and a fire mage, who is also a wizard but, what? Does he not get cold spells? That is worse that just being a generalist. Does he get a boost in fire? That is good.

What would stop people from cherry-picking all the good 'tags' and making a class or cleric that has them. If I want to be able to heal and fire and lightning and charm and ... I could just make a god that has them, or are you picking gods, or are you assigning these 'tags' to the gods in the books. It starts to become a challenge. I like the idea and process, but some stuff needs to be worked through.

The tags are literally just a classification system to aid people in filtering spell lists and opens up design space for future archetypes and stuff. You’re reading far more into it than I intended. I kinda wish I hadn’t mentioned it now! It’s only a vague concept.

 

[RangerWickett]

This is probably too much of a change for the core wizard, but I'm getting a bit nostalgic for an old book.

In "Elements of Magic - Lyceian Arcana" we had magical traditions. Different cultures around the world would have their own unique traditions that gave them a block of spells they knew, and some special benefits if they cast spells a particular way.

Like a society of calligraphers might be really good at setting spells as traps by writing runes.

A culture of seafarers who communicate vast distances by singing over the winds would be able to easily cast gust of wind and then do fun tricks along the length of the wind, like deflect ranged attacks or cast spells with touch range anywhere along the stream.

A group of elemental guardians who maintain the balance of the fundamental forces of nature might be restricted from learning magic of other elements, but get 'Avatar: The Last Airbender" style special abilities they can use at will for their element.

 

[Minigiant]

D&D Beyond already has a sort of tagging system in its spell search. So it could be done. I like the idea,

The issue is that the spells were given them retroactively.
So scorching ray has the -Fire, Evocation,and Damage tags. However it is wizard, sorcerer, fiend lock, light cleric and artillerist artificer. Now the light cleric isn't the cleric cleric? So do you just give it access Fire spells carte blanche now?

 

[Giauz]

@Morrus , instead of simply alphabetizing the spells, organize them under their schools (Evocation, etc), mention in the description what Classes they are available to, have the long lists of available spells organized by level and alphabetized in the individual class sections for which the spell Classes are named (Wizard spells in the Wizard Class section, etc) with the school in (Evocation/...) next to each spell. Maybe tighten up the spell descriptions so that damage and healing spells, for example, have exactly what they do in the stat block. Instead of having to make/buy spell cards or use an app or website, I think this would greatly reduce the search time in the book for spells.

 

[ThatGuySteve]

The idea is more:

• the wizard can cast all [arcane] spells
• the fire cleric can cast all [fire] spells
• the generalist cleric can cast all [divine] spells
• Thor can cast all [nature] [lightning] spells (or something)

(Well not that exactly, but you get the idea -- with the tags you can create any dynamic list).

But it's literally just an idea so far, so don't ask too many questions, as the answers aren't there yet. We haven't worked on this. The tags might not even happen!

I like it for tighter, specific classification, like fire or lightning. Not so much for generic lists like arcane or divine, it would make spell lists pretty homogenous.

 

[CapnZapp]

Forgetting changing individual spells, how would you improve spells in general? In terms of things like formatting, classification, and content.

(Not asking about individual spell changes or fixes at this time).

Bear in mind, we’re not changing the underlying system. This isn’t about alternate spell systems. Assume you’ve been tasked to take the existing spell lists and rewrite them. What do you do?

About the only huge omission is what everybody else has already stated: each spell needs to tell the reader which lists it is on - the "Bard 3, Sorcerer 4" stuff.

Other than that, the big ease of life improvement is maybe the topic of another thread:

Making monster spellcaster stat blocks more self-contained.

A DM should not have to cross-reference a monster's spell loadout with the spells in the PHB when used as a straight-forward combat encounter. It's that simple. Having a couple of spells that help define the monster (but are of no use in a direct confrontation) is fine (and one of the things where 5E went a bit too far in its drive to simplify the silly-long spell lists of 3E). And pointing the DM to the PHB for those spells is fine. But any spell the monster can reasonably be expected to cast in a straight-up fight should have summary information right there in the monster stat block: a monster doesn't have three Fireball slots so much as it is capable of making a special Fireball attack three times, and the basic info for this attack should be right at the DMs fingertips.

Back to your question - other than the "Bard 3, Sorcerer 4" stuff I can't come up with any other change that must happen.

Well, avoiding the "clever" stuff 5E pulled, with things spell targeting (also mentioned upthread). Such Sage Advice that relies on "since you target yourself, you can Misty Step across a Wall of Force" is not clever, it is too clever by far.

 

[CapnZapp]

@Morrus , instead of simply alphabetizing the spells, organize them under their schools (Evocation, etc), mention in the description what Classes they are available to, have the long lists of available spells organized by level and alphabetized in the individual class sections for which the spell Classes are named (Wizard spells in the Wizard Class section, etc) with the school in (Evocation/...) next to each spell. Maybe tighten up the spell descriptions so that damage and healing spells, for example, have exactly what they do in the stat block. Instead of having to make/buy spell cards or use an app or website, I think this would greatly reduce the search time in the book for spells.

Spell descriptions should definitely remain alphabetized.

 

[Horwath]

Spell descriptions should definitely remain alphabetized.

yes, but 1st they should be divided by level.

 

[CapnZapp]

no I disagree, they should be divided by level

FTFY

Hopefully Level Up will stick to the alphabetized listing used by 5E (simply adding which classes get each spell at what level)

 

[DND_Reborn]

I will only say this because I am more hoping WotC will change things for 6E, not that I imagine this will have any impact on A5E:

There should be an alphabetical reference list of all the spells showing what page number they are on in the PHB.
Spell descriptions should be by class and level and then alphabetically, repeating descriptions for spells that overlap (overlapping spells should be reduced a LOT IMO to make each spell list less "samey").

1. If you reduce the amount of overlap, spell lists become more unique and you will not have half-a-dozen printings of the same spell, thus you can reduce the page count.
2. For the additional page count, I would rather pay a few dollars more and have everything more accessible.
3. The PHB is for the players, and when a character gets a new spell level they can cast, it makes more sense to be able to read through the spells of that level in one section instead of having to flip back-and-forth through alphabetical descriptions (which is annoying for people learning the game!).
4. Given 3, you have to reprint duplicate spells which overlap between classes, otherwise the frustration is that you have to reference another class's spell list to find a spell your class also knows (also annoying!).
5. If you reduce some of the artwork, you can easily make up the pages of print needed to reprint the spells that overlap, so there would be no additional cost that way. Yes, the artwork looks nice (mostly...) but I would rather have the information I need as accessible as possible.
6. Yes, the digital age makes accessing spells easy for people who want to do it on their computers or phones, but a LOT of players like the feel of books, so I don't see the answer of "digital reference" as a solution, personally.

Ok, rant over, thanks for reading.