Quote from: Blankman;1135340Yes, if you're still holding on to that 3.X rule, who the hell knows what other faulty rules assumptions you are making.

Cloudkill automatically killed anything with 4 HD or fewer, gave a saving throw vs Poison at -4 to creatures with 4+1 to 5+1 HD to not instantly keel over and die and creatures with up to 6 HD getting an unmodified save vs poison or dying instantly. The cloud also rolled away from you. It was an amazingly effective killer of armies, effectively mustard gas, the spell. Yet you don't mention it at all. The reason I didn't mention Melf's acid arrow is that it is a 2nd level spell, so didn't fit in the imaginary gap of damage spells you constructed between 3rd and 6th level spells. Melf's Acid arrow is not useless though, it is basically a trollkiller spell as it will continually cause acid damage to the troll over many rounds, screwing up the troll's regeneration.

The only Ice Storm I know has a casting time of 4 and does 3D10 damage in a 40 foot by 40 foot area, no saving throw. It had a more predictable area of effect than a fireball and at 7th level, when first available, did damage somewhere between what a creature would take from a fireball on a successful saving throw vs an unsuccessful one. Doesn't sound useless to me, although probably slightly underpowered compared to a fireball, but again more predictable. So again you are way off base about rules details here.

Cantrips don't scale up in 5e so that Wizards and Druids and Clerics can keep up damage-wise with the warrior classes, they scale up so that they're not hilariously left behind. The spellcasters get more damaging cantrips, but highly limited actual spell slots. If all you do as a Wizard is throw Cantrips around, any Fighters, Barbarians, Paladins, Rangers and Rogues in the party are going to massively outshine you in combat, and you're not going to be much good outside of combat with your cantrips either. Sometimes useful, sure. I've also never been in a 5e game where running out of arrows was a major concern (a bit unfortunately in my opinion, but I'm usually the only person in my groups who cares about counting torches and the like). Bags of Holding are some of the most common magic items available now, so transporting massive loads of arrows isn't going to be much of an issue most games.

If you know how to use a bow, the bow is better than fire bolt as a weapon, even if you are a wizard. That is, until the Cantrip bonus damage starts coming online, but a bow in the hands of a Fighter or Ranger is still going to be better than a Fire bolt.

As for the cantrip slots, you'll note I counted them separately precisely because I didn't want to count them in with the main number of spell slots a Wizard got in 3.5. I decided to mention them (they weren't in my first draft of the post) for completeness sake. And no, high level spell slots have not been "slightly toned down" in 5e. In 3.5 a 20th level Wizard had 4 level 6 spell slots, 4 level 7 spell slots, 4 level 8 spell slots and 4 level 9 spell slots. That is without any bonus slots due to high Intelligence, and that is already 16 high level spell slots. A 20th level AD&D 2e Mage with 18 Intelligence on the other hand gets 4 level 6 slots, 3 level 7 slots, 3 level 8 slots and 2 level 9 slots. That's only 12 slots for high level spells. A 20th level 5e Wizard meanwhile gets 2 level 6 slots, 2 level 7 slots, 1 level 8 slot and 1 level 9 slot. That's a total of 6 high level spell slots, and those plus a third 5th level spell slot are all the spell slots a 5e Wizard (or Sorcerer, Cleric, Druid or Bard) gets between levels 11 and 20.

The design intent here, and with a lot of other Wizard abilities, is pretty clear. The Wizard never runs out of magic completely. They can keep using cantrips forever if they need to. But they don't have nearly as much high level spellpower as earlier edition magic users. One Meteor Swarm is the limit. In 3.5 your Wizard would have been able to throw around four of those before needing a recharge, and they'd still have 12 high level slots left. The 5e Wizard, after using four high level spell slots only has two left. So the 5e Wizard never has to resort to throwing darts at the enemy, but also has nowhere near the top level magic capacity available in previous editions. Many of the spells themselves have changed too. Teleport is now a 7th level spell and unless you are teleporting to a permanent teleportation circle, someplace you have an important piece of or a place you know intimately like your own home, then you have a bigger chance of fucking up than getting it right. Knock makes a booming sound when you use it, completely negating stealth. Charm Person makes the charmed person view you as a friendly acquaintance rather than a trusted ally, only lasts an hour and the person always knows they've been charmed.

I've never even bothered with Cloudkill cuz it was a 5th level spell that instantly killed creatures that are no longer a threat to a caster who's high enough level to cast that spell to begin with. You know what else is almost guaranteed to instantly kill a whole pack of 3 HD creatures (specially if you're high enough level to cast Cloudkill)? Fireball, and that's two levels lower than Cloudkill. Granted, Cloudkill has a duration and can sorta move across the battlefield at a slow crawl. I suppose the reason you're bringing it up is because it got "nerfed" in 5e, when they changed its insta-kill properties against pathetically weak creatures to just 5d8 poison damage against ANY creature (half on a failed save), which is still enough to kill any 3 HD creature regardless, except its actually useful against any creature now. EDIT: Also, Cloudkill only insta-killed 3 HD creatures. HDs 4-6 got a save, higher only got CON damage.

And Acid Arrow used to make less damage than a composite bow with STR bonuses (2d4), and only lasted 1 round per 3 levels, which is not "many rounds". Hardly a "trollkiller", though, I suppose it helps somewhat, since they can't regenerate that damage. But that's just one subset of creatures with regen that it kinda helps against, unless you have fireball and do some real damage they can't regen either. Now it does 4d4 damage, or half on a missed attack (in 3e if you missed, you just wasted a spell), plus an extra 2d4 the next round, which is higher initially, but has no duration. Overall I like it better now, though, I'll admit it's not much of a buff compared to what you could potentially do before if you were REALLY high level. And waited a while.

I'm also not sure how useful a bow can be in the hands of anyone but a pure, non-multi-classed fighter (or when comparing low level characters), since every other warrior class only gets a single extra attack per round by level 5, and cantrips can go up to 4 dice of damage. After further consideration I will grant you that casters lost a significant number of higher level spell slots, though. But that still balances out with most damage spells being more useful now, and cantrips preventing wizards from becoming totally useless once they run out of spells. I also don't like the changes to Charm Person, so not all is good.

Quote from: oggsmash;1135323I did not notice fighters sucking.  At what point would you experienced folks say they start to suck?

They really don't. I'm not a huge fan of the class in 5e but lots of my players play Fighters and they do ok.

Quote from: VisionStorm;1135351I've never even bothered with Cloudkill cuz it was a 5th level spell that instantly killed creatures that are no longer a threat to a caster who's high enough level to cast that spell to begin with. You know what else is almost guaranteed to instantly kill a whole pack of 3 HD creatures (specially if you're high enough level to cast Cloudkill)? Fireball, and that's two levels lower than Cloudkill. Granted, Cloudkill has a duration and can sorta move across the battlefield at a slow crawl. I suppose the reason you're bringing it up is because it got "nerfed" in 5e, when they changed its insta-kill properties against pathetically weak creatures to just 5d8 poison damage against ANY creature (half on a failed save), which is still enough to kill any 3 HD creature regardless, except its actually useful against any creature now. EDIT: Also, Cloudkill only insta-killed 3 HD creatures. HDs 4-6 got a save, higher only got CON damage.

And Acid Arrow used to make less damage than a composite bow with STR bonuses (2d4), and only lasted 1 round per 3 levels, which is not "many rounds". Hardly a "trollkiller", though, I suppose it helps somewhat, since they can't regenerate that damage. But that's just one subset of creatures with regen that it kinda helps against, unless you have fireball and do some real damage they can't regen either. Now it does 4d4 damage, or half on a missed attack (in 3e if you missed, you just wasted a spell), plus an extra 2d4 the next round, which is higher initially, but has no duration. Overall I like it better now, though, I'll admit it's not much of a buff compared to what you could potentially do before if you were REALLY high level. And waited a while.

I'm also not sure how useful a bow can be in the hands of anyone but a pure, non-multi-classed fighter (or when comparing low level characters), since every other warrior class only gets a single extra attack per round by level 5, and cantrips can go up to 4 dice of damage. After further consideration I will grant you that casters lost a significant number of higher level spell slots, though. But that still balances out with most damage spells being more useful now, and cantrips preventing wizards from becoming totally useless once they run out of spells. I also don't like the changes to Charm Person, so not all is good.

Cloudkill can instakill any monsters up to 6 HD, and still do 1D10 damage per turn to other creatures who remain in the cloud. And no, it autokills creatures up to and including 4HD, or fewer than 4+1. The 2e PHB and OSRIC are both very clear on the +1 there being different than just 4HD. And yes, the entire point of it being an acid arrow is that it sticks arounds and keeps hurting the troll. And again, it gets better with more levels. Just like Magic Missile, which is a crap spell at 1st level (Sleep is a far superior combat spell in most situations) but really quite good at higher levels.

The reason I'm bringing up Cloudkill is because you said there were no damage spells in between third and sixth level in older editions, it has nothing to do with changes to the spell in 5e.

You seem really obsessed with that 4 dice of damage thing. You seem to be forgetting that it does not include any damage modifiers for high stats. A fire bolt fired off at 20th level will do on average 22 damage if it hits. A Ranger with a Longbow at that level, with a maxed out DEX, will do 1D8+5, or on average 9,5, damage with each attack (assuming the 20th level Ranger has no magic bow or magic arrows). If the Ranger has Hunter's Mark up, and he really should, he'll deal 1D8+1D6+5 damage per hit, or on average 13 damage on average. If the Ranger is a Hunter he'll also either do 1D8 extra damage against a creature below maximum HP, once per turn, or get a third attack against a target adjacent to the one he's shooting at. He swill also be able to with one action attack any number of creatures within 10 feet of a point with his, excellent against tightly packed enemies. If the Ranger is a Horizon Walker (from Xanathar's Guide to Everything) one of his attacks that hit will turn all damage into Force damage (which pretty much nothing resists or is immune to) and also deal an extra 2D8, or 9 on average, force damage to the target. He will also be able to teleport 10 feet when attacking, and if he attacks two different creatures with his attack he gets a third attack.

Basically, stop being obsessed with 4 dice of damage on cantrips. That's really not that great, and easily outshone by any martial classes. A typical raging Barbarian at level 20, with a maul or greatsword, will deal 2D6+11 damage per attack, or an average of 18 damage per hit. He can also get advantage on all those attacks, which increases the chances of a crit. This means that if the Barbarian is out of position, the Wizard will do much better by helping the Barbarian into close combat so he can unleash the fury than by shooting a Firebolt at the enemy. And the Barbarian will, just like all the other martial classes, have some extra stuff from his subclass. Maybe he's an Eagle totem warrior who can fly, or he's a berserker who can go into an unstoppable frenzy and get to attack a third time each round, or if he's a Storm Herald he may be able to do 4D6 lightning damage, save for half, to any creature within 10 feet once per turn.

As for most damage spells being more useful now, no. The other way around. You may look at the raw numbers and say "holy moley, this does a lot more damage than it used to!" Okay, but the average orc now has 15 HP instead of 5 in AD&D, the average ogre now has 59 HP instead of the 19 of AD&D, the average Hill Giant now has 105 HP instead of the 55 of AD&D 2e. Hit points have increased with damage and spell save DCs aren't as crazy as they were in 3.5.

Quote from: oggsmash;1135323I did not notice fighters sucking.  At what point would you experienced folks say they start to suck?

I wouldnt say they suck they're just kinda boring imo. I prefer DCC's fighter

Quote from: Blankman;1135372Cloudkill can instakill any monsters up to 6 HD, and still do 1D10 damage per turn to other creatures who remain in the cloud. And no, it autokills creatures up to and including 4HD, or fewer than 4+1. The 2e PHB and OSRIC are both very clear on the +1 there being different than just 4HD. And yes, the entire point of it being an acid arrow is that it sticks arounds and keeps hurting the troll. And again, it gets better with more levels. Just like Magic Missile, which is a crap spell at 1st level (Sleep is a far superior combat spell in most situations) but really quite good at higher levels.

The reason I'm bringing up Cloudkill is because you said there were no damage spells in between third and sixth level in older editions, it has nothing to do with changes to the spell in 5e.

You seem really obsesses with that 4 dice of damage thing. You seem to be forgetting that it does not include any damage modifiers for high stats. A fire bolt fired off at 20th level will do on average 22 damage if it hits. A Ranger with a Longbow at that level, with a maxed out DEX, will do 1D8+5, or on average 9,5, damage with each attack (assuming the 20th level Ranger has no magic bow or magic arrows). If the Ranger has Hunter's Mark up, and he really should, he'll deal 1D8+1D6+5 damage per hit, or on average 13 damage on average. If the Ranger is a Hunter he'll also either do 1D8 extra damage against a creature below maximum HP, once per turn, or get a third attack against a target adjacent to the one he's shooting at. He swill also be able to with one action attack any number of creatures within 10 feet of a point with his, excellent against tightly packed enemies. If the Ranger is a Horizon Walker (from Xanathar's Guide to Everything) one of his attacks that hit will turn all damage into Force damage (which pretty much nothing resists or is immune to) and also deal an extra 2D8, or 9 on average, force damage to the target. He will also be able to teleport 10 feet when attacking, and if he attacks two different creatures with his attack he gets a third attack.

Basically, stop being obsessed with 4 dice of damage on cantrips. That's really not that great, and easily outshone by any martial classes. A typical raging Barbarian at level 20, with a maul or greatsword, will deal 2D6+11 damage per attack, or an average of 18 damage per hit. He can also get advantage on all those attacks, which increases the chances of a crit. This means that if the Barbarian is out of position, the Wizard will do much better by helping the Barbarian into close combat so he can unleash the fury than by shooting an Firebolt at the enemy. And the Barbarian will, just like all the other martial classes, have some extra stuff from his subclass. Maybe he's an Eagle totem warrior who can fly, or he's a berserker who can go into an unstoppable frenzy and get to attack a third time each round, or if he's a Storm Herald he may be able to do 4D6 lightning damage, save for half, to any creature within 10 feet once per turn.

As for most damage spells being more useful now, no. The other way around. You may look at the raw numbers and say "holy moley, this does a lot more damage than it used to!" Okay, but the average orc now has 15 HP instead of 5 in AD&D, the average ogre now has 59 HP instead of the 19 of AD&D, the average Hill Giant now has 105 HP instead of the 55 of AD&D 2e. Hit points have increased with damage and spell save DCs aren't as crazy as they were in 3.5.

I was going with 3e's description for Cloudkill, since that was the original point of comparison, on terms of what they took away from 3e casters in 5e (ignoring 4e, cuz that was basically a different game). I also cleared up what I meant by "all you had was Fireball" in the post you were replying to (one before last) and I never explicitly said "there were no damage spells other than Fireball". I was talking about "real" damage dealers, as opposed to toss away 5ft level spells that do a whopping 1d10 damage when a 3rd level spell can already do 1d6 per caster level (10d6 max).

Also, ran into Cone of Cold while checking out my old 2e PHB to look up Cloudkill, and holy crap! That spell was garbage till 3e turned it into a real spell. 1d4+1 per caster level...for a 5th level spell. No wonder I rarely used it, it never got good till 3e (1d6 per level; 15d6 max).

Regarding acid arrow and magic missile, those spells only marginally got better after many caster levels and were absolute garbage at lower levels (and even at higher levels they were weak), where a high Strength warrior could basically out do a low level mage just swinging a sword. And they could do that all day long, meanwhile a low level mage had a handful of crappy low damage spells that did less damage than a sword, and once they used up those spells, all they could do was flail a dagger or a staff around hoping to hit something and not get killed. It wasn't till level 5 that they got their first real damage dealer: Fireball (or Lightning Bolt, in case you managed to funnel a bunch of enemies down a long corridor). Then most spells from that point onwards were crap again, at least compared to Fireball, unless we're talking defensive or utility spells, like Stoneskin or Teleport, which were good.

And Sleep was only good against a handful of low HD enemies (on which case it was practically a death spell). But higher HD enemies were immune.

I can't really comment on 5e classes outside of the core books, but until you started mentioning them none of those examples you were giving for Rangers or Barbarians really seemed to do more than a 17+ level Wizard's Fire Bolt. And that's partly relying on maxed out ability modifiers that are not intrinsic to the class. Granted, those classes also get a bonus attack, so if both attacks hit they might surpass a Fire Bolt (by a few points). But that's martial classes giving out their best (sometimes relying on Rage abilities and such) vs a backup attack that's not even the Wizard's greatest weapon.

Quote from: VisionStorm;1135383I was going with 3e's description for Cloudkill, since that was the original point of comparison, on terms of what they took away from 3e casters in 5e (ignoring 4e, cuz that was basically a different game). I also cleared up what I meant by "all you had was Fireball" in the post you were replying to (one before last) and I never explicitly said "there were no damage spells other than Fireball". I was talking about "real" damage dealers, as opposed to toss away 5ft level spells that do a whopping 1d10 damage when a 3rd level spell can already do 1d6 per caster level (10d6 max).

Also, ran into Cone of Cold while checking out my old 2e PHB to look up Cloudkill, and holy crap! That spell was garbage till 3e turned it into a real spell. 1d4+1 per caster level...for a 5th level spell. No wonder I rarely used it, it never got good till 3e (1d6 per level; 15d6 max).

Regarding acid arrow and magic missile, those spells only marginally got better after many caster levels and were absolute garbage at lower levels (and even at higher levels they were weak), where a high Strength warrior could basically out do a low level mage just swinging a sword. And they could do that all day long, meanwhile a low level mage had a handful of crappy low damage spells that did less damage than a sword, and once they used up those spells, all they could do was flail a dagger or a staff around hoping to hit something and not get killed. It wasn't till level 5 that they got their first real damage dealer: Fireball (or Lightning Bolt, in case you managed to funnel a bunch of enemies down a long corridor). Then most spells from that point onwards were crap again, at least compared to Fireball, unless we're talking defensive or utility spells, like Stoneskin or Teleport, which were good.

And Sleep was only good against a handful of low HD enemies (on which case it was practically a death spell). But higher HD enemies were immune.

I can't really comment on 5e classes outside of the core books, but until you started mentioning them none of those examples you were giving for Rangers or Barbarians really seemed to do more than a 17+ level Wizard's Fire Bolt. And that's partly relying on maxed out ability modifiers that are not intrinsic to the class. Granted, those classes also get a bonus attack, so if both attacks hit they might surpass a Fire Bolt (by a few points). But that's martial classes giving out their best (sometimes relying on Rage abilities and such) vs a backup attack that's not even the Wizard's greatest weapon.

It's all martial classes doing stuff they can do all day. A 20th level barbarian has unlimited rages, and none of the other mentioned powers except Frenzy has any sort of cost. And yes, maxed out main stats can be assumed, otherwise we might also assume the Wizard has no combat cantrips. Even without raging a 20th level barbarian gets 2D6+7 damage per hit, or 14 on average, and they have two attacks, so a much better shot at hitting with at least one attack than the Wizard does. Have you actually played 5e? Because from your misunderstandings of the rules, obsession with 4 die cantrips (which no one who has played 5e, not even people decrying Fighters as terrible in comparison to spellcasters, has ever thought made spellcasters overpowered),  insistence that some spells doing more hit point damage is great news for Wizards and general lack of knowledge of the game has me thinking not. If you haven't actually played the game, you don't really have a leg to stand on. White room theorycrafting is bad enough, but here you are theorycrafting when you don't even know the rules of the game and clearly have no actual experience with it.

Also, you're kidding with Cone of Cold right? You know that 1D4+1 and 1D6 have the exact same average outcome yeah? A 10th level Mage throwing a Cone of Cold in AD&D does an average of 35 damage, while a 10th level Wizard throwing a Cone of Cold in D&D 3.5 does an average of ... 35 damage. In 5e it does 8D8 damage, with more requiring a higher level spell slot and that averages out to ... 36 points of damage. The ranges are a bit different, with the Cone in AD&D being 20-50, in 3.5 being 10-60 and in 5e 8-64, but the average is exactly the same (or one point more in 5e). And since monsters and enemies in AD&D generally have fewer hit points than in 3.5 and 5e, Cone of Cold does more relative damage in AD&D than in 3.5 (and 5e), and is therefore actually a better spell in AD&D than in 3.5 (or 5e). Is this why you aren't getting why 4D10 of damage sans modifiers isn't as good as fewer dice but more modifiers? Or that rolling twice to hit is an advantage, and not a disadvantage?

edit: To explain the above clearer, a typical Minotaur has the following HP in all three systems: AD&D 2e: 30. D&D 3.5: 39. D&D 5e: 76. So a 10th level Mage/Wizard casts a Cone of Cold at a group of targets including an average Minotaur. In 2e, the bull man is dead unless he saves vs spell, he doesn't have enough hit points to withstand the full blast. If he does save, he'll be down to 13 HP. In 3.5, the bull man will survive whether or not he saves, but he will be heavily damaged if he doesn't save, down to 4 HP, and if he does save he'll be at 22 HP, more than half his hit points left. In 5e, the Minotaur cannot be killed by the Cone of Cold even if the Wizard rolls absolute max damage and the Minotaur fails his save. With average damage, even with a failed save the Minotaur still has 40 HP and can take another equally damaging blast without dying. With a successful save, the Minotaur loses 18 out of 76 HP and is down to 58. So, comparing the average damage of the spell to the average HP of monsters shows that the AD&D 2e version of the spell is clearly the most powerful, being able to totally freeze the Minotaur on average damage on a failed save, and still damage him heavily even with a successful save on average damage, a damage potential the other versions of the spell fail to achieve.

I'll do another example for you, just so you can see the problem. Take the comparison between our 20th level Wizard with Fire bolt and our 20th level Barbarian with a Greatsword. Let's say they're fighting a Dao. The Dao has AC 18. The 20th level Wizard has Int 20, so a +5 bonus. The Barbarian has Str 24, so a +7 bonus. They both have a proficiency bonus of +6. So, the Wizard needs to roll a 7 to hit. The Barbarian needs to roll a 5. That means the Wizard has a 30% chance to miss and 5% chance to crit, while the Barbarian has a 20% chance to miss and 5% chance to crit. The average damage on a hit for the Wizard is 22. Times 0.65 equals 14.3, but the possibility of a crit adds another 2.2, so a total average damage of 16.5. So the Wizard is doing an average of 16.5 damage per turn by fire bolting the Dao. The Barbarian is raging, and therefore does 2D6+11 damage on a hit, average damage 18. Times 0.75 means the Barbarian does an average of 13.5 points of damage per attack, except the possibility of a crit adds in 1.25, so a total of 14.75. The Barbarian has two attacks, so does an average of 29.5 points of damage to the Dao every turn.

So, the Wizard does an average of 16.5 points of damage with a cantrip while the Barbarian does an average of 29.5 with basic attacks while raging. The Wizard gets entirely smoked when using cantrips. Now this is extremely white room, and obviously a bunch of other factors are going to matter in an actual fight, but just on pure damage dealing with a target you can hit, the Barbarian does far more damage with a weapon than the Wizard does with a cantrip.

@OP Adventures in Middle Earth is 5e based but has all clases non casting.

The 20th level pcs in my high magic Runelords game seem well balanced. With the 12th level pcs in my low magic item Princes of the Apocalypse game the casters may be a bit ahead on average as there are a lot of mook hordes to kill with AoE. But everyone has fun and everyone contributes.
My 14th-16th level Primeval Thule group is dominated by non casters, last session's group was Fighter Barbarian Monk and Rogue. They all seem roughly equal. Maybe barbarian slightly ahead.

Quote from: Blankman;1135384It's all martial classes doing stuff they can do all day. A 20th level barbarian has unlimited rages, and none of the other mentioned powers except Frenzy has any sort of cost. And yes, maxed out main stats can be assumed, otherwise we might also assume the Wizard has no combat cantrips. Even without raging a 20th level barbarian gets 2D6+7 damage per hit, or 14 on average, and they have two attacks, so a much better shot at hitting with at least one attack than the Wizard does. Have you actually played 5e? Because from your misunderstandings of the rules, obsession with 4 die cantrips (which no one who has played 5e, not even people decrying Fighters as terrible in comparison to spellcasters, has ever thought made spellcasters overpowered),  insistence that some spells doing more hit point damage is great news for Wizards and general lack of knowledge of the game has me thinking not. If you haven't actually played the game, you don't really have a leg to stand on. White room theorycrafting is bad enough, but here you are theorycrafting when you don't even know the rules of the game and clearly have no actual experience with it.

Yes, I've played 5e. I played primarily 3e and 2e the most, never got to play 4e or 1e, and also played Basic when I was introduced into the game, but quickly moved to 2e (the current edition at the time) once I started buying my own books and running my own campaigns, since I preferred the range of options over Basic.

And I'm not crying about cantrips. In fact I actually like them. I like the idea that casters are no longer useless if they run out of spells. That was one of my biggest problems with casters in older D&D--specially mages, and specially at lower levels. Clerics at least had decent weapons and armor, plus more hit points, and granted powers, so they weren't entirely useless without spells, but low level mages were dead weight. They were a liability everyone else had to protect, and even when they had spells, they were of questionable usefulness. It wasn't till higher levels that mages got real power, and even then if they ran out of spells they couldn't do much, except perhaps against weak enemies, unless they had a magic wand or something with  charges remaining.

The way that 5e handles cantrips solves that in many ways, and provides characters with a lot of options other than twiddling their thumbs once they're out of spells. I prefer that over having to rely entirely on spell slots to do anything in the game (at least adventuring related). Now I can just reserve spells for when I really need them, but still do something magic-related in between. This is much better than before. If I was gonna build upon any published edition of D&D to handle spell casting (despite my misgivings about how D&D handles certain aspects of magic), I would build on top of 5e.

I'm just saying that compared to a basic weapon attack, cantrips can eventually do significantly more damage, which pretty much undermines basic weapon damage. Mages went from doing nothing if they ran out of spells, to doing more base damage than a weapon, without actually having a weapon, or even casting a spell that costs them anything. It's only through special abilities and ability modifiers that you can really equal or surpass them. And characters that don't specialize in weapons can't.

I'm not saying that cantrips should to be nerfed, but they represent a significant addition to a caster's arsenal, and they're probably part of the reason why casters no longer have access to so many higher level spell slots. And for the most part I'm fine with that. But 4d10, or even 4d6, for an unlimited ranged attack is still a lot of damage when the strongest weapons in the game have a base damage of 2d6 and melee range. Its just out of whack with weapon damage ranges.

Quote from: Blankman;1135384Also, you're kidding with Cone of Cold right? You know that 1D4+1 and 1D6 have the exact same average outcome yeah? A 10th level Mage throwing a Cone of Cold in AD&D does an average of 35 damage, while a 10th level Wizard throwing a Cone of Cold in D&D 3.5 does an average of ... 35 damage. In 5e it does 8D8 damage, with more requiring a higher level spell slot and that averages out to ... 36 points of damage. The ranges are a bit different, with the Cone in AD&D being 20-50, in 3.5 being 10-60 and in 5e 8-64, but the average is exactly the same (or one point more in 5e). And since monsters and enemies in AD&D generally have fewer hit points than in 3.5 and 5e, Cone of Cold does more relative damage in AD&D than in 3.5 (and 5e), and is therefore actually a better spell in AD&D than in 3.5 (or 5e). Is this why you aren't getting why 4D10 of damage sans modifiers isn't as good as fewer dice but more modifiers? Or that rolling twice to hit is an advantage, and not a disadvantage?

edit: To explain the above clearer, a typical Minotaur has the following HP in all three systems: AD&D 2e: 30. D&D 3.5: 39. D&D 5e: 76. So a 10th level Mage/Wizard casts a Cone of Cold at a group of targets including an average Minotaur. In 2e, the bull man is dead unless he saves vs spell, he doesn't have enough hit points to withstand the full blast. If he does save, he'll be down to 13 HP. In 3.5, the bull man will survive whether or not he saves, but he will be heavily damaged if he doesn't save, down to 4 HP, and if he does save he'll be at 22 HP, more than half his hit points left. In 5e, the Minotaur cannot be killed by the Cone of Cold even if the Wizard rolls absolute max damage and the Minotaur fails his save. With average damage, even with a failed save the Minotaur still has 40 HP and can take another equally damaging blast without dying. With a successful save, the Minotaur loses 18 out of 76 HP and is down to 58. So, comparing the average damage of the spell to the average HP of monsters shows that the AD&D 2e version of the spell is clearly the most powerful, being able to totally freeze the Minotaur on average damage on a failed save, and still damage him heavily even with a successful save on average damage, a damage potential the other versions of the spell fail to achieve.

Crap! Sorry, I messed up and misread the description. I must have glanced over it while reading with my phone's flashlight and didn't read carefully what it said. I thought it said 1d4 roll, plus + 1 point of damage per level (as in, a level 10 wizard would do 1d4+10 damage), since they added a space between the 1d4 and the +1 in the spell's description. But once I went back and reread it--reading the example carefully--apparently it's supposed to be 1d4+1 per level (as in, a level 10 wizard would do 10d4+10 damage). Which is not so bad, but still a bit underwhelming considering a spell two levels lower already does that without taking up a 5th level spell.

Re cantrip damage, the boosts at level 5 certainly, and pretty much at the 11th level tier breaks are fine, but the extra boost at 17th is a bit much since martials don't really get a huge boost then. Would have made more sense to increase cantrip damage at 20th to matcg martial's capstone powers.

Quote from: S'mon;1135403Re cantrip damage, the boosts at level 5 certainly, and pretty much at the 11th level tier breaks are fine, but the extra boost at 17th is a bit much since martials don't really get a huge boost then. Would have made more sense to increase cantrip damage at 20th to matcg martial's capstone powers.

With the extra damage die at level 17, Cantrips are about drawing even with the damage output of a 9th level Champion fighter who hasn't focused entirely on damage.

Quote from: VisionStorm;1135401Yes, I've played 5e. I played primarily 3e and 2e the most, never got to play 4e or 1e, and also played Basic when I was introduced into the game, but quickly moved to 2e (the current edition at the time) once I started buying my own books and running my own campaigns, since I preferred the range of options over Basic.

And I'm not crying about cantrips. In fact I actually like them. I like the idea that casters are no longer useless if they run out of spells. That was one of my biggest problems with casters in older D&D--specially mages, and specially at lower levels. Clerics at least had decent weapons and armor, plus more hit points, and granted powers, so they weren't entirely useless without spells, but low level mages were dead weight. They were a liability everyone else had to protect, and even when they had spells, they were of questionable usefulness. It wasn't till higher levels that mages got real power, and even then if they ran out of spells they couldn't do much, except perhaps against weak enemies, unless they had a magic wand or something with  charges remaining.

The way that 5e handles cantrips solves that in many ways, and provides characters with a lot of options other than twiddling their thumbs once they're out of spells. I prefer that over having to rely entirely on spell slots to do anything in the game (at least adventuring related). Now I can just reserve spells for when I really need them, but still do something magic-related in between. This is much better than before. If I was gonna build upon any published edition of D&D to handle spell casting (despite my misgivings about how D&D handles certain aspects of magic), I would build on top of 5e.

I'm just saying that compared to a basic weapon attack, cantrips can eventually do significantly more damage, which pretty much undermines basic weapon damage. Mages went from doing nothing if they ran out of spells, to doing more base damage than a weapon, without actually having a weapon, or even casting a spell that costs them anything. It's only through special abilities and ability modifiers that you can really equal or surpass them. And characters that don't specialize in weapons can't.

I'm not saying that cantrips should to be nerfed, but they represent a significant addition to a caster's arsenal, and they're probably part of the reason why casters no longer have access to so many higher level spell slots. And for the most part I'm fine with that. But 4d10, or even 4d6, for an unlimited ranged attack is still a lot of damage when the strongest weapons in the game have a base damage of 2d6 and melee range. Its just out of whack with weapon damage ranges.



Crap! Sorry, I messed up and misread the description. I must have glanced over it while reading with my phone's flashlight and didn't read carefully what it said. I thought it said 1d4 roll, plus + 1 point of damage per level (as in, a level 10 wizard would do 1d4+10 damage), since they added a space between the 1d4 and the +1 in the spell's description. But once I went back and reread it--reading the example carefully--apparently it's supposed to be 1d4+1 per level (as in, a level 10 wizard would do 10d4+10 damage). Which is not so bad, but still a bit underwhelming considering a spell two levels lower already does that without taking up a 5th level spell.

At those levels nobody is doing a basic weapon attack though. It isn't happening. Every character is either a cantrip slinger, or a weapon master, or both. And a Wizard isn't outperforming any Barbarian, Fighter, Monk, Paladin, Ranger, Rogue etc at or even near his own level with cantrips alone. It just isn't happening. Any 11th level martial character is easily going to do more damage than a Wizard if the Wiz only uses cantrips. Do the math. Read the actual rules (which you've shown several times you've not done, even though you say you've played the game). Leave the preconceptions of 3.5 behind and for real, stop obsessing over cantrip damage, it isn't that good.

Quote from: GameThug;1135187Can anyone recommend a 5E hack that rebalances the core classes so Fighters in particular don't suck so bad?

Well I feel no guilt shilling a product I work with:

Spheres of Power

I work and use the PF version but the 5e version is in development after a successful kickstater. It reworks both mages and might into a system that uses 'Talent Tree' esque progression (Except no chain effects)

You're more or less leading the counter-case, so you're getting my reply.

I don't think there's any credible case to be made that Fighters are competitive, in any role, in 5E.

I don't see how you can look at Fighters getting their 4th attack at level 20, and look at Warlocks getting a 4th Eldritch blast target BEFORE that, and tell me Fighters are awesome.

Yes, GWM.  So what?  GWM does not stack with Duellist, leaving Fighters at a massive disadvantage to-hit.

In whatever fantasy world the designers are living in where parties short rest 6-8 times per day, then sure, Battlemasters can recharge their Superiority Dice.

How many groups actually do that?  Hell--how many parties have TWO encounters per day?

Casters can do 1d10 damage one handed, at range.  Many have class features that permit them to add ability bonus to DAM.  Further, many spells are save for half; Fighters hit or miss.

There's no doubt that you can stat out a weak, sub optimal caster that a top-tier Fighter can match--some of the time.

Cantrips never run out of ammo.


And as an aside--stop offering the Barbarian as a response to what is fundamentally a question about Fighters.

I'll add to the above.

It's my view that Martial Classes, and the Fighter Class in particular, should be the top-tier damage dealer in combat, period.  I don't mean in any given round, but that, round after round after round, the fighter should be number one in Damage dealt.  And I also don't mean at any particular level--I mean all the time, consistently.  The way Superiority Dice are managed for Battlemasters is embarrassing.

Every other class has additional utility on top of their base combat abilities, and yet the Fighter lacks those utility options and is not the combat alpha.