Unearthed Arcana Unearthed Arcana: Wild Magic and Draconic Bloodline

[Marsellus1]

Hello everyone,

With the new Unearthed Arcana design direction of providing bonus spell lists to sorcerers based on their Sorcerous Origin, I decided to create a list of such spells for the two base class options found in the Player’s Handbook. Please provide me any suggestions or feedback that you may have.

Wild Magic Sorcerer:
First level : Chaos Orb, Chaotic Command
Third level: Phantasmal force, Rope trick
Fifth level: Dispel Magic, Hypnotic Pattern
Seventh level: Confusion, Whimsical Polymorph
Ninth level: Animate Objects

New spells:
Chaos Orb – As per Chromatic Orb except you roll 1D6 to determine damage type rather than choosing. This spell always triggers a wild magic surge when cast.
Chaotic Command – As per Command except you roll 1D4 to determine which command is issued rather than choosing. This spell always triggers a wild magic surge when cast.
Whimsical Polymorph – as per Polymorph except that when you first cast this spell, but before choosing the target, the DM randomly chooses a single creature of CR 10 or lower. The target you choose transforms into this randomly chosen creature. This spell always triggers a wild magic surge when cast.

Draconic Bloodline Sorcerer:
First Level: Charm Person, Dragonblood Orb
Third Level: Suggestion, Elemental Ray
Fifth level: Fear, Fly
Seventh level: Compulsion, Dragonform
Ninth level: Dominate Person

New Spells:
Dragonblood Orb: as per Chromatic orb but the damage type is always whatever matches your dragon ancestor’s breath weapon. This damage ignores all resistances and immunities.
Elemental Ray: As per Scorching Ray, but the damage type is always whatever matches your dragon ancestor’s breath weapon.
Dragonform: as per Polymorph but with a target of Self instead of any, and rather than choosing a beast equal to or less than your CR you transform into a Young Dragon of your ancestor’s dragon type with the following limitations:
AC: Reduced to 16 if higher than 16
HP: Reduced to 110 if higher than 110
Bite and claw attack bonus: reduced to +7 if higher than +7
Bite damage: reduced to 2D10+4 if higher than 2D10+4
Claw damage: reduced to 2D6+4 if higher than 2D6+4
Breath weapon recharge: breath weapon only recharges on a 6
Breath weapon damage: reduced to 8D6 if higher than 8D6
Breath weapon save DC: reduced to DC 13 if higher than DC 13

 

[CapnZapp]

The Draconic Sorcerer is stronger than all these new subclasses and should not get more spells.

The wild mage, well... What it needs is a solid attack spell on each spell level (that lets the sorcerer make attack rolls rather than force saving throws).

Spell level 2 has Scorching Ray. Then there's nothing until the hands at level 6(?)

Sure the wild mage would like more spells, but what he really would like is for the PHB to offer more spells with attack rolls...

 

[Minigiant]

It would break them.
The draconic sorcerer is the strongest subclass from level 6 on.
And the wild mage sorcerer is almost overpowered with a surge happy DM.

These subclasses were built for power. Giving them too much flexibility is danager.

 

[pukunui]

The wild mage, well... What it needs is a solid attack spell on each spell level (that lets the sorcerer make attack rolls rather than force saving throws).

Spell level 2 has Scorching Ray. Then there's nothing until the hands at level 6(?)

Sure the wild mage would like more spells, but what he really would like is for the PHB to offer more spells with attack rolls...

This. The guy playing a wild mage in my campaign has just come across this problem. I told him I'd have to just make sure he makes more ability checks and saving throws to make up for the lack of spells requiring attack rolls. Not even the new elemental evil spells helped much in that regard (there are only three that require attack rolls and one is a druid-only cantrip).

 

[Mephista]

Dragonblood Orb.... power creep much? Its just chromatic orb with more power, instantly overcoming immunity and resistance? Chromatic Orb fits this slot perfectly.

Personally, I would just go with something simple for the dragon. Every level, get a free spell from any list that corresponds to your element (and only your element, no mixed damage like flame strike); alternatively, choose a spell like Chromatic Orb or Conjure Elementals, and you can cast that only applying to your element. Quick and painless.


I do like the idea, but I would rather focus on spells that work from a generic stand point than something that goes "and this triggers wild surge." And more color-spray style stuff. Prismatic spheres, and similar, are what I think of.

 

[Marsellus1]

Thank you all for the feedback!

I too like the idea of allowing one extra known spell per level for dragon sorcerors so long as the draconic ancestor for that player is of a type that has choices for that damage type each level.

I am a bit surprised that the "dragonblood orb" variant spell is seen as more powerful than the base chromatic orb. The design intention and my own perception is that it is somewhat weaker than chromatic orb due to being unable to choose the element at will. Because of this the base chromatic orb spell ignores resistance, immunities, absorbtion effects, and can exploit elemental weaknesses for bonkers damage. Dragonblood orb loses out on the best two of those four use cases. The only two upsides that it gains in return are that a) you don't have to have knowledge of the monster's resistances to ignore them and b) if a monster is specifically resistant to your primary elemental damage type you still can get +cha damage to a single target.

While thematically I like having this flavor to encourage less scholarly sorceror options, as well as helping enable mono damage type spell selections, I do not weigh the upsides of dragonblood orb as heavily as I do the downsides mechanically. So my personal perception is that they are close but chromatic orb is more effective strictly speaking.

 

[Mephista]

I am a bit surprised that the "dragonblood orb" variant spell is seen as more powerful than the base chromatic orb. The design intention and my own perception is that it is somewhat weaker than chromatic orb due to being unable to choose the element at will.

Generally speaking, when you cast Chromatic Orb, you're going to be casting as your element, since that's what you're getting the subclass bonus for. Sure, you can swap out the damage type if you're against fiends, tieflings, or some dragons, but if you're getting more spells, chances are you'll end up with stronger off-element spells than Chromatic Orb to cast.

As well, overcoming resistance is pretty potent - the only other spell I know of that that does that is in the Elemental Evil Companion, and its 4th level. There's also the feat, which, while lame in damage boosts, gives ignoring resistance as well. There's nothing that can break immunity, and I suspect that's intentional at the moment - I don't know if I'd want that broken. If it was, I certainly think that a level 1 spell is not the place for it.

While thematically I like having this flavor to encourage less scholarly sorceror options, as well as helping enable mono damage type spell selections, I do not weigh the upsides of dragonblood orb as heavily as I do the downsides mechanically. So my personal perception is that they are close but chromatic orb is more effective strictly speaking.

Sorcerers are scholarly?

Putting aside my doubts about that, I'd also like to point out that there's no way to know what monsters are resistant/immune to some elemental magics. There's nothing in the Arcane, Religion, Nature, etc skills that suggest it, so its up to the DM how much they would know at any time as it is.

I also would imagine most of this would be fairly common knowledge or pretty obvious. Fiends (and thus tieflings), various fire-aligned elementals, and certain dragon/dragonborn bloodlines. Contstructs made of metal, maybe? I don't remember, and currently too lazy to check. I don't think there are there others that are fire resistant/immune, but rule of thumb - if it breathes, known to live in, or is made of fire, then chances are its resistant or immune.

 

[Mephista]

Another thing to think about. There is a huge, huge abundance of fire spells at the moment. Red/Gold dragon sorcerers are easy to run. Ice? There's technically enough spells to play one reasonably since Elemental Evil Companion came out, but not really enough empty spell slots that we can fill in to have a wide variety of effects; fire's just more effective. Electricity? Same as ice, but with a caveat - we now have Stormsoul, which not only expands the list of thematic spells to include thunder, but it plays in a vastly different (and arguably more thematic) way from the fire dragon bloodline. Acid and Poison I think have four non-cantrip spells between them, five if you count Chromatic Orb; individually, they're non-choices, even with your extra spells.

Perhaps it might be best to focus on fire magic for the Dragon, and ignore the others? Ice can get a water/ice elemental Origin for itself, and focus on additional effects that slow, freeze, or hold targets.


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Speaking of dragons and elemental magic, Legendary Red Dragons open portals in their region that allow fire elementals to slither through. Putting Conjure Elemental and Conjure Minor Elemental with restrictions on types might be in theme.

As well, if you do something with ice, there are two level 6 ice spells (Otiluke's Freezing Sphere and Wall of Ice) on the wizard list that the Sorcerer doesn't have access to, and wouldn't be amiss adding it. Other elemental spells not on the Sorcerer list includes Flame Shield (fire or ice), Flame Blade, Flaming Sphere, and Call Lightning. There's also a few cold spells in the warlock list including Armor of Aragyth, Arms of Hadar, and Evard's Black Tentacles, but they're questionable. From the Elemental Evil Companion - Absorb elements (which depends on what you're attacked with), and Elemental Bane (really should be on the sorcerer list).

 

[Marsellus1]

We are in agreement on several items: I too feel that draconic bloodline sorcerers would prefer to cast spells of their preferred damage type when feasible and I agree that in many cases the immunities or vulnerabilities of monsters is self evident. Even if a white dragon sorcerer wanted to cast ice spells as much as possible they would not willingly choose to deal cold damage with chromatic orb cast against an ice elemental. Even choosing to deal cold damage against, say, a mummy when the character knows the mummy is vulnerable to fire is going to be a tough sell and is absolutely not the optimal choice. I am not saying a white dragon sorcerer may not still do this for one reason or another, but I feel spell mechanics are best off being balanced while assuming mechanically optimized play.

I also recognize that character knowledge is a gray area in the rules, so one campaign where knowledge of weaknesses and resistances is deemed self evident as per your “live in fire” example would see chromatic orb’s value as higher since it effectively ignores resistances, immunities, absorption effects, and always deals more damage to any creature that is vulnerable to any of the 6 damage types available. Meanwhile in another campaign where such knowledge was not assumed and difficult or impossible to obtain then the worth of choosing damage types drops significantly. As you say however, most campaigns are going to assume character knowledge of these immunities is self evident and so I look to balance the spells as such.

Here is where I stand: if we already have a level one spell that ignores resistances, immunities, absorption effects, and always deals bonus damage to creatures vulnerable to any damage type, then I see no harm in introducing a level 1 variant spell that only ignores resistances and immunities. Particularly so with Orb, as if it were simply there for the 3d8 damage with no other benefits it becomes next to worthless at level 5 once cantrips deal nearly the same damage as a level 1 orb for no resource cost, and an upcast level 2-9 orb will always be strictly worse damage than a scorching ray cast at the same level.

I like the idea of making more wizard spells available to the sorcerer, particularly with the elemental evil guide making it clear that they have moved away from the design decision in the PHB of keeping named spells away from the Sorcerer. Perhaps a blanket rule of “any spell that deals your element type of damage is on your spell list” wouldn’t be too bad, but I would have to do more research to know the full effects of such a rule before fully endorsing it.

I also see the merit of your argument that spell choice alone greatly favors fire dragon sorcerers at the moment. That being said, even if there were options for the other elements as there is now for Storm Sorcerer I feel there is enough different thematically between, say, a blue dragon sorcerer and a storm sorcerer that discarding the option for one or the other mechanically seems unnecessary. Better to leave the underpowered option in and either give it a boost in the rules or rely on the DM to adjust accordingly.

 

[Jester David]

Most of the stormborn sorcerer's spells are utility spells that a sorcerer is unlikely to take. So it's adding them otherwise the weather sorcerer is very unlikely to have weather spells like fog cloud, gust of wind, or levitate. In contrast, the draconic sorcerer is very blasty, so it doesn't need more spells. The spells the sorcerer is likely to take already match its theme.

Also, many of the good weather based spells are on the druid list and not necessarily sorcerer spells. So it's an excuse to add call lightning and the conjuring spells. But the elemental and chaos based spells are already on the sorcerer's spell list, so they don't need to be added.

If adding new spells to the dragon and wild sorcerer, I'd really focus on utility spells and/or spells not on the sorcerer list.