D&D 5E Low Level Wizards Really Do Suck in 5E

[Stalker0]

I do think witch bolt is a lackluster spell. It seems so cool in the description...but normally falls short.

At base I would add in a half speed clause, and would have the ongoing damage scale with level as well.

 

[5ekyu]

No. MOST wizards do not have WC by 4th level. Per Jeremy Crawford, the WotC research indicates that the majority of games do not even use feats.

Relatively few wizards have WC by 4th level. MOST (non-human) wizards have it by the time they reach 20th if te game uses feats, but it battles with the following options that are widely taken:

Raising Intelligence (usually twice)
Alert (less common than WC for wizards, but still widely taken)
Luck
Racial Feats (Deep Gnomes getting so many spells is very enticing)
Keen Mind / Observant (for the +1 Int primarily)
Resilient (Con)

There are also Dragonmark Feats and other campaign specific feats competing with these, as well as a lot of less 'efficient' feats that are favored by some PCs, such as Spell Sniper, Elemental Adept, Durable, Tough, Inspiring Leader, Magic Initiate (Warlock), Ritual Caster (Cleric - there are some goodies in there for clerics that a wizard can enjoy) that might be taken before WC. Also, if it is a melee wizard, there are a lot of other feats competing for the starring roles.

I've run several wizards. None of them had WC at 4th. The earliest I've taken it is 12th. My most recent wizard, a Svirfneblin Enchanter, has made exactly 9 concentration checks between levels 1 and 13, and his OA opportunities that matter have been very, very rare - despite his desire to use Hypnotic Gaze a lot putting him into melee range - a lot.

I've seen about 20 5E wizards run for a prolonged time. I do not recall many, if any, of them having it before 12th... I'd be shocked if any of them had it before 8th.

"No. MOST wizards do not have WC by 4th level. Per Jeremy Crawford, the WotC research indicates that the majority of games do not even use feats. "

Would you,please give a link or cite for that?

I recall *and just re-googled* the statements where he was very clear about the claim which was that a majority of D&D *characters* dont use feats.

That was a whole different claim than a statement about how games use them. If one character out of every party use feats, every "g add me" would be using feats yet the number of characters would be 3 to 1 dont.

 

[Maxperson]

Commonly? Not at my table. War caster is nice, but then so is a lot of other options. I have to wonder how often the players at your table have the wizard get attacked that they have to have war caster in order to make Concentration saves. Gish build? Sure.

Wizards have tremendous ability to control and sway combats. Just about every intelligent encounter is going to have the wizard in their sights in order to keep that from happening. Wizards get attacked a lot.

No doubt. As a DM, I go out of my way to have encounters where the group is surrounded and/or back rank PCs get attacked on occasion. But the only class PC that has taken War caster at my table have been druids. For a wizard, it almost seems like paranoia to take it.

Considering how crappy concentration saves are for a wizard, and how quickly damage goes up, without War Caster concentration spells are kinda crappy.

 

[Maxperson]

Per Jeremy Crawford, the WotC research indicates that the majority of games do not even use feats.

You believe everything corporate people say to you? I suppose it might be true, and I've just gotten REALLY lucky that every 5e game I've seen or played in used feats, but color me skeptical.

Relatively few wizards have WC by 4th level. MOST (non-human) wizards have it by the time they reach 20th if te game uses feats, but it battles with the following options that are widely taken:

Raising Intelligence (usually twice)
Alert (less common than WC for wizards, but still widely taken)
Luck
Racial Feats (Deep Gnomes getting so many spells is very enticing)
Keen Mind / Observant (for the +1 Int primarily)
Resilient (Con)

There are also Dragonmark Feats and other campaign specific feats competing with these, as well as a lot of less 'efficient' feats that are favored by some PCs, such as Spell Sniper, Elemental Adept, Durable, Tough, Inspiring Leader, Magic Initiate (Warlock), Ritual Caster (Cleric - there are some goodies in there for clerics that a wizard can enjoy) that might be taken before WC. Also, if it is a melee wizard, there are a lot of other feats competing for the starring roles.

Sure. There are a lot of feats. Most of them aren't as good as advantage on all concentration saves, unless of course you are avoiding concentration spells.

My most recent wizard, a Svirfneblin Enchanter, has made exactly 9 concentration checks between levels 1 and 13, and his OA opportunities that matter have been very, very rare - despite his desire to use Hypnotic Gaze a lot putting him into melee range - a lot.

If you've only taken damage 9 times while using concentration spells over 13 levels, you are either avoiding concentration spells or the DM is being very, very friendly to you. A wizard should be taking damage in most combats, so if you were using a lot of concentration spells, you would be way over 9 checks.

 

[jgsugden]

"No. MOST wizards do not have WC by 4th level. Per Jeremy Crawford, the WotC research indicates that the majority of games do not even use feats. "

Would you,please give a link or cite for that?

I recall *and just re-googled* the statements where he was very clear about the claim which was that a majority of D&D *characters* dont use feats.

Minor distinction. Regardless, the assertion that MOST wizards have this feat by level 4 is extremely unlikely when most CHARACTERS do not use feats at all.

 

[KarinsDad]

Wizards have tremendous ability to control and sway combats. Just about every intelligent encounter is going to have the wizard in their sights in order to keep that from happening. Wizards get attacked a lot.

The Wizard? Not the Druid? Not the Cleric? These other PCs don't have the ability to control and sway combat?

In our current campaign, we have 1 melee PC, 2 semicasters, and 3 full casters. The team almost always deploys in such a manner as to protect the back line PCs. Sure, they get attacked on occasion, but the players go out of their way to try to avoid it. Sometime it works, sometimes it doesn't. But if we had a wizard (which we don't in our current makeup), s/he would only be 1 PC out of 5 who can cast concentration spells. The NPCs cannot typically attack everyone, especially if one or more of them is using a concentration control spell.

In our last encounter, the Ranger cast Spike Growth on 4 crossbowmen and did the control. All of the enemies who could tried to target the Ranger. He merely stepped behind a large statue and then came out a little to take pot shots. One or two enemies readied bow shots, but he only came out enough to fire, so he had a cover bonus and never got hit before the rest of the team took everyone out. That's how concentration is handled in my game.

The +2 Int at level 4 instead of a feat works on nearly every single round for either "to hits" or "saves". War Caster for a wizard at level 4? Maybe it might help once a day because the wizard is probably only going to cast maybe 4 Concentration spells a day out of his 8 spells. There might also be a Mage Armor spell, maybe a Shield spell, a few mostly damage spells.

At low level, the math doesn't work with your assumptions. Wizards just don't, at least in my experience, get attacked so many times while concentrating in an adventuring day that the player is worried about a concentration spell here or there. A 6 encounter day, 4 rounds per encounter is upwards of 7 spells and 17 cantrips and often Mage Armor outside of combat. Most of those rounds, the caster is probably not concentrating, or he is concentrating behind partial or full cover (or concealment if the player uses some tricks like Minor Illusion to become an unseen attacker while concentrating).

The players who have played wizards in my group just don't worry about a once in a blue moon break of concentration. If it happens, it happens. Two players of druids have taken the feat.


And as levels go up, it tends to be even less important because PCs have more spells per day. If one fizzles, cast another.

War Caster really is mostly important for PCs that get into melee like gish builds, or druids who want to concentrate on a spell in melee. The name of the feat tells you most of what you know about it. It's pretty much is a waste on a traditional wizard build.

 

[Dessert Nomad]

Most people? Sorry. Someone who decides to buck trends is the opposite of most people.

Most people who describe themselves as bucking trends also spend a lot of time insisting that they're not like the other people who buck trends.

 

[5ekyu]

Minor distinction. Regardless, the assertion that MOST wizards have this feat by level 4 is extremely unlikely when most CHARACTERS do not use feats at all.

Not at all... in the traditional party of four cleric, wizard, fighter, rogue- the wizard is only 1 in 4. If every traditional party wizard chose war caster, the majority font use fests could still be very true.

I mean, you could likely say truthfully most characters dont wear heavy armor too, even "the vast majority" but tp then take that and extrapolate *anything* about how many paladins do would be faulty reasoning and a botched extrapolation.

That's where the distinction you dismiss as "minor" between "character" count and "campaigns" count shows an incredible lack of understanding of the nature of statistics, data, analysis and extrapolation from incomplete data specifically.

But hey, if that's how your reasoning and analysis turns, that's plenty informative enough.

 

[5ekyu]

The Wizard? Not the Druid? Not the Cleric? These other PCs don't have the ability to control and sway combat?

In our current campaign, we have 1 melee PC, 2 semicasters, and 3 full casters. The team almost always deploys in such a manner as to protect the back line PCs. Sure, they get attacked on occasion, but the players go out of their way to try to avoid it. Sometime it works, sometimes it doesn't. But if we had a wizard (which we don't in our current makeup), s/he would only be 1 PC out of 5 who can cast concentration spells. The NPCs cannot typically attack everyone, especially if one or more of them is using a concentration control spell.

In our last encounter, the Ranger cast Spike Growth on 4 crossbowmen and did the control. All of the enemies who could tried to target the Ranger. He merely stepped behind a large statue and then came out a little to take pot shots. One or two enemies readied bow shots, but he only came out enough to fire, so he had a cover bonus and never got hit before the rest of the team took everyone out. That's how concentration is handled in my game.

The +2 Int at level 4 instead of a feat works on nearly every single round for either "to hits" or "saves". War Caster for a wizard at level 4? Maybe it might help once a day because the wizard is probably only going to cast maybe 4 Concentration spells a day out of his 8 spells. There might also be a Mage Armor spell, maybe a Shield spell, a few mostly damage spells.

At low level, the math doesn't work with your assumptions. Wizards just don't, at least in my experience, get attacked so many times while concentrating in an adventuring day that the player is worried about a concentration spell here or there. A 6 encounter day, 4 rounds per encounter is upwards of 7 spells and 17 cantrips and often Mage Armor outside of combat. Most of those rounds, the caster is probably not concentrating, or he is concentrating behind partial or full cover (or concealment if the player uses some tricks like Minor Illusion to become an unseen attacker while concentrating).

The players who have played wizards in my group just don't worry about a once in a blue moon break of concentration. If it happens, it happens. Two players of druids have taken the feat.


And as levels go up, it tends to be even less important because PCs have more spells per day. If one fizzles, cast another.

War Caster really is mostly important for PCs that get into melee like gish builds, or druids who want to concentrate on a spell in melee. The name of the feat tells you most of what you know about it. It's pretty much is a waste on a traditional wizard build.

"War Caster really is mostly important for PCs that get into melee like gish builds, or druids who want to concentrate on a spell in melee. The name of the feat tells you most of what you know about it. It's pretty much is a waste on a traditional wizard build."

I would say this is - speaking generously- highly campaign specific.

If the campaign festure a lot of dungeon delves type situations (very controlled scenery) with a higher preponderance of sluggervtypes adversaries thrn yeah - the wizard can expect far fewer cases of damage getting to them since these elements lend it to more mundane blockades holding damage at bay.

But if the challenges are more open, outdoors perhaps, or fluid snd moving - like towns and villages - or there are significant numbers of enemy spellers and ranged attackers then the ability to count 9n not having to make saves for hits is much higher.

Moreover, it also varies by the frequency of the Mage Hunter fest among a few or certain types of enemies. If that Con save for concentration from a single dart of the MM or a single ray from scorching ray is at disad then your chance of making that save goes way below 50% - even only 44%-ish if you are DC 10 with 14 con.

Admittedly, the other benefits of warcastrr serve other needs but even those vary in their frequency along the same campaign lines.

On Monday, in a village raid combat every caster wound up at melee range more than once, just doe to the scene and the threats and needs.

As always, the challenges and needs are what determines the value and appeal of this trait over that trait and those vary by campaign.

 

[Hussar]

Meh, even without warcaster, it's not like it's guaranteed that you fail concentration checks. Particularly at low levels where the DC is typically going to be 10. Anything damaging enough to make it higher than 10 is likely going to KO the low level wizard anyway.

So, the baddies have to attack the wizard, hit the wizard and the wizard has to fail a fairly easy concentration check in order to lose the spell. Again, that's not bad battlefield control for a 1st level spell. Particularly for an Abjurer who is likely going to have a pretty strong AC - between Shield and Arcane Ward, you're not too far from being a pretty darn effective tank. Again, how is this not pretty much doing what it's supposed to do?

Look, is Witch Bolt the greatest spell? Meh, no, of course not. But, it's hardly terrible either. It's just kind of meh.