D&D 5E Blade Ward - Best Fix?

[Barolo]

Eldritch knights can cast a cantrip and make a weapon attack at 7th.

Meaning they can blade ward + attack.

And Sorcerers can use Blade Ward and then Quicken another spell, limited only by their available Sorcery Points.

I've also used it a lot with a fighter/bladelock build in Heavy Armor with with Heavy Armor Master. Cast Armor of Agathys (duration 1 hour) and then cast Bladeward - either when you are about to enter a room in a dungeon or cast it and deliberately provoke an opp attack. They hit you and take damage from the Armor of Agathys, and your damage is reduced by 3 and then cut in half, which preserves the temp HP from Armor of Agathys and allows you to take multiple hits before it ends.

All this. The cantrip really did not seem designed for the casual wizard, but for a frontline who has some arcane capabilities and means to retaliate. It works wonders with Armor of Agathys even without the feat Heavy Armor Master. It is also quite decent if you know you will get pummeled by all sides, in the cases when dodge won't do much good. Of course, if a simple wizard gets themselves into such a bad situation, I don't really expect a single cantrip will save their arcane arses.

 

[Pickles III]

Interesting, I haven't found it so. It's certainly useful this way, but firebolts are useful too.


I agree, but I feel like the book version is almost provably a trap. Maybe it makes sense for an EK with war magic who fights on the front line by himself, but even then I think you have to look carefully at whether the damage you avoid using BW outweighs the damage you give up.

I don't think I was clear - your improvement is the best if you have to improve it (IMO & you find it works fine so there's that).


Balancing offence vs defence though is part of the game - there is not much to 5e combat so having a choice rather than an I win button to push is good.
Traps are True Strike & spells that do damage that are not Fireball.

 

[Edwin Suijkerbuijk]

Blade ward dosen't see much use in our games, I wonder if it would see more use if it had more use a a utility spell.
I wonder if it would see more use if the "dealt by weapon attacks." part was removed.
so it could help reduce damage if you need to move trough areas like creates by a apike srowth spell.

 

[mellored]

How is it better than dodge? Disadvantage on all incoming attacks is actually very good. Taking no damage is far preferable to taking half damage. And it works against all attacks, not just mundane ones.

And if you still get hit you take full damage.

If you get hit 70% of the time, dodging will reduce incoming damage by 21%

If you get hit 70% of the time and use blade ward, you reduce incoming damage by 35%

Though if you have higher AC, dodging is better. With the balance point being hit 50% of the time, and dodging wins because it's free.

 

[Satyrn]

Edit: The latter is also weaker than a Battlemaster's Parry maneuver in that it only reduces bludgeoning, piercing and/or slashing damage while the parry reduces all kinds of damage from melee attacks.

So far, that's a situation that doesn't come up enough for me to matter, nearly (maybe all, in fact) all the attacks against my gnome battlemaster could be resisted by blade ward. And I could - and would - use it every round without needing to spend a superiority die lke Parry requires.


But look, I provided you feedback based on my play experience. You're response is to counter with what looks like dismissive white room theorycrafting instead of something like "hey, thanks for the feedback," or any interest in probing deeper into that experience.

So I don't know. Maybe I'm feeling touchy today, but I don't want to help with this anymore.

 

[Gadget]

I would like to point out the Blade Ward, unlike similar abilities (I'm looking at you Stoneskin), is not bypassed by magic weapons. That's something at least. If we are going to talk about "fixing" cantrips, I would nominate True Strike and Friends as possible candidates before Blade Ward myself.

 

[Barolo]

And if you still get hit you take full damage.

If you get hit 70% of the time, dodging will reduce incoming damage by 21%

If you get hit 70% of the time and use blade ward, you reduce incoming damage by 35%

Though if you have higher AC, dodging is better. With the balance point being hit 50% of the time, and dodging wins because it's free.

If you mean that the original attack had 70% to hit, with dodge the chance drops to 49%, which is 21% in absolute percentage, the actual reduction is 30% in damage (all this ignoring crits).

But yes, the point was made that, between dodge and blade ward, circumstances will define the better option.

 

[Ganymede81]

Blade Ward; Abjuration cantrip; Casting Time: 1 Action; Range: Self; Components: V, S; Duration: Instantaneous

You extend your hand and trace a sigil of warding in the air. You gain 3 temporary hit points. If you cast this spell again, temporary hit points gained from prior castings of the spell disappear.

At levels 5, 11, and 17, the temporary hit points gained increase to 6, 9, and 12, respectively.

 

[Undrhil]

All this. The cantrip really did not seem designed for the casual wizard, but for a frontline who has some arcane capabilities and means to retaliate. It works wonders with Armor of Agathys even without the feat Heavy Armor Master. It is also quite decent if you know you will get pummeled by all sides, in the cases when dodge won't do much good. Of course, if a simple wizard gets themselves into such a bad situation, I don't really expect a single cantrip will save their arcane arses.

No. In that case, you have Misty Step, Dimension Door, Arcane Gate, Fog Cloud, Darkness, Hypnotic Pattern (and hope you succeed on the saving throw and everyone else fails), etc.

Blade Ward; Abjuration cantrip; Casting Time: 1 Action; Range: Self; Components: V, S; Duration: Instantaneous


You extend your hand and trace a sigil of warding in the air. You gain 3 temporary hit points. If you cast this spell again, temporary hit points gained from prior castings of the spell disappear.


At levels 5, 11, and 17, the temporary hit points gained increase to 6, 9, and 12, respectively.

No, that's terrible! That's next to useless! Think about the current incarnation will cut any weapon damage in half, doesn't matter if it's a magic weapon or non-magic weapon. Sure, spells bypass it, but that's why you have Counterspell and are hopefully hiding in a Rope Trick or something.

 

[mellored]

If you mean that the original attack had 70% to hit, with dodge the chance drops to 49%, which is 21% in absolute percentage, the actual reduction is 30% in damage

???
the second die has a 30% chance to miss, but some of the time it would have missed anyway. having both dice miss does not reduce damage further.

(all this ignoring crits).

Yes, that too.