D&D 5E Teleport /fly /misty step the bane of cool dungeon design is RAW in 5E

[Hussar]

Frankly it's a game thing. What at will effect would you give a paladin or a ranger that has to be good enough to be at least equal to their attacks. The existing attack cantrips aren't going to cut it. No stat bonus to damage.

So what would these canttips actually be?

 

[Alexemplar]

Okay... then why are these 0 level spells rather than just say 1st level spells?

Because that's what they are. D&D arbitrarily assigns every spell a level between 0 and 9 and some spells are at level 0, some at level 9, etc that classes with spell slots can use to cast them.

If you can do as you say you should be able to pick any spell of your choice (of 1st level) that you have learned in such a manner but that is not how it works you pick a spell form a spell list that does not exist within the normal framework (1st to 9th for those who cantrips are not available).

There are a few class abilities that allow some spellcasters to cast certain spells between 1-9 level without expending spells slots. Clerics of Knowledge Domain can use their channel divinity ability to (among other things) cast suggestion without expending a slot so it's tied to channel divinity vs spell slots. Many Warlock invocations allow them to cast various non-cantrip spells effectively at-will. Wizards of the Transmutation school can cast polymorph at-will without expending a spell slot. All higher level Wizards gain the ability to choose a couple of low level spells to cast without expending slots.

I agree that some class should be more of these than others but I abjectly disagree that any spell caster should not have access to these at all. I mean for those classes that do not have it what would be the harm in giving them 1 when they can cast 1st level spells and then an additional one much later on? Does upset the precious game mechanics in some way or is it just an issue of that is not how it has been done kind of thing which seems to propagate through all the versions of DnD every since 2nd Ed

Different classes get different things at different rates and different levels. If you really want to, you could argue that any particular D&D player character should have access to any particular class feature regardless of class/race/level if it makes sense conceptually or storywise. You can likely do it in a balanced way too.

But that's not the game they released.

 

[DeJoker]

Ah okay so it is that age ole issue of "That is not how it was done and no matter how much sense it might make in game terms to fix it properly we are just going to copy/paste it as is as that speeds things up for publication purposes" go it

 

[Alexemplar]

Ah okay so it is that age ole issue of "That is not how it was done and no matter how much sense it might make in game terms to fix it properly we are just going to copy/paste it as is as that speeds things up for publication purposes" go it

If they we're going with the "That's the way D&D has always done it" excuse, then cantrips would be limited to X per day.

Unless you're referring to the vancian/spell slot casting system in general in which case they did it because they've tried other other magic systems, but they've so far all proven less marketable for the D&D brand.

 

[Harzel]

Didn’t like Travel Domain in previous editions get teleporting spells? I don't see why it necessarily can't be on a divine spell list.

I can't read these words without thinking of a website where you can search for cheap hotel rooms, rental cars, and plane tickets.

EDIT: Oh, huh, look at that - the .travel​ domain is a thing.

 

[Harzel]

Personally I do not like it from a GMs point of view as it requires me to keep track of more variables than I see necessary.

What does it require you to keep track of? It is not as if the spells on different class spell lists have different kinds of mechanics.

Way back in 2nd Ed I created a more generic magic system and many of its elements are in the 3.5 Ed/Pathfinder as well as different elements now in the 5 Ed but the two major things it had, which adhere to the K.I.S.S. it principle, is that it only had two magic paradigms Divine and Arcane

In practical terms that is one more than 5e has. AFAIK (I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm missing something) the distinction between arcane and divine in 5e is just fluff.

and it only had 1 Spell List. Granted Mages still generally stayed away from the Necromantic magic (the magic used to Heal - Positive/Negative Energy manipulation) due to its tendency to have nasty side affects but it made for a much easier magic system to run and the two paradigms were different enough to make a Cleric fairly different from a Mage even if they happened to have the same list of spells (which was rare since a deity limited what they supplied to their priests) and wizards were only limited by their abilities and whether they wanted to risk being a wizard or not.

However, 5th Ed at a glance would make this very problematic to implement so not sure if I am even going to try or just leave that one on the shelf for 3.5 Ed or earlier

Yeah, I'm still not sure what game problem you are trying to solve.

 

[Harzel]

Clerics and Druids don't get Misty Step at all.

Not entirely true. A Circle of the Land druid can get it as a Circle Spell (Coast, 3rd level). Although I'll admit, when one of my players took it, I was somewhat surprised to find that out.

 

[DeJoker]

Unless you're referring to the vancian/spell slot casting system in general in which case they did it because they've tried other other magic systems, but they've so far all proven less marketable for the D&D brand.

Really I have never seen them do anything but mildly tweak this casting system -- and the tweaks they used were often horrible mainly because they were extreme partials of what they (imo) should have done. However your point of they did it for marketability reasons is basically what I said "we are just going to copy/paste it as is as that speeds things up for publication purposes" okay maybe not exactly but all I have to add is -- instead of fixing it properly we will just make some really small tweaks the rest we will just copy/paste as is

 

[DeJoker]

What does it require you to keep track of? It is not as if the spells on different class spell lists have different kinds of mechanics.

In practical terms that is one more than 5e has. AFAIK (I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm missing something) the distinction between arcane and divine in 5e is just fluff.

Yeah, I'm still not sure what game problem you are trying to solve.

Okay first with multiple spell lists with the same spell having different levels for different casters -- that means as a GM you have to keep track of that either when creating a magic scroll that gets found or when creating bad guys as they may all have different spell lists. Two more headaches than necessary.

In practical terms, based on my outline, 5th Ed has 8 (Bard, Cleric, Druid, Paladin, Ranger, Sorcerer, Warlock, and Wizard) magic paradigms if you go no further than just the separate magic lists which are then reflected within each of these classes.

Its not a matter of trying to solve, for I have already solved. I was making a comment about not attempting to translate the solution to 5th Ed -- I believe but cannot check because you did not seem to quote the original message you are referring to.

 

[Lanefan]

Okay first with multiple spell lists with the same spell having different levels for different casters -- that means as a GM you have to keep track of that either when creating a magic scroll that gets found or when creating bad guys as they may all have different spell lists. Two more headaches than necessary.

But two headaches you're going to hit anyway, no matter what you do.

For any scroll you place (as opposed to something pregenerated in a canned module) you're still going to somehow determine each spell it holds...this would add one more tiny step, that of determining what class' list to roll or pick those spells from.

For bad guys, again you're going to be rolling or picking their spells from a list anyway...the only minor addition is you need to determine which class. No big deal at all.

In practical terms, based on my outline, 5th Ed has 8 (Bard, Cleric, Druid, Paladin, Ranger, Sorcerer, Warlock, and Wizard) magic paradigms if you go no further than just the separate magic lists which are then reflected within each of these classes.

These can be beaten down a little. Paladin and Cleric would be (close to) the same. Ranger and Druid could be (close to) the same. Sorcerer, Wizard and Warlock can all be (close to) the same overall, though if you separate Wizards out into school-based subclasses (Illusionist, Necromancer, Summoner etc.) you'll have a bunch more lists instead of a few less.

Bard is an outlier, but that's nothing new - I haven't liked how Bards were done in any D&D edition yet, nor am I overly impressed with mine and others' various efforts to homebrew the class over the years. There's a fine class in there somewhere but it's obviously very good at hiding.

Lan-"separating out and redoing all the spell lists is a lot of work, but the good news is that it's work you only have to do once"-efan