D&D 5E What spells should have had the ritual tag, but don't?

Mistwell · Jul 2, 2019

Wizards are not typically walking around with a 20 Dex. First priority for a Wizard is Int, because spellcasting is their thing. Second priority is their concentration checks, because concentration spells are their best spells. Which means a feat (War Caster, Lucky, whatever) and/or boost to Con (and you cannot dump Con). Which means your THIRD priority is Dex. You're not maxing your third priority at anything aside from very high levels, if you're using standard array or point buy.

If I had to venture a guess, I'd guess a majority of Wizards have a 14 dex for most of their wizarding adventure days. Which means AC 15. Which is NOT PLATE ARMOR. And if you instead increased that Dex, it was at the expense of intelligence and constitution (and a feat to help concentration saves) which means you've just made yourself highly vulnerable in another area (hit points, concentration saves, potency of spell attack bonuses, damage bonuses, and save DCs, etc.) to make yourself less vulnerable to this area of AC. Which seems a really bad strategy for a spell which is easily dispelled and which only lasts 1/3 the day.

Yaarel · Jul 2, 2019

doctorbadwolf said:
If it isn’t about being broken or not, why spend so much time railing against it?

Mage Armor is non-broken.

However, it matters because changing it changes the entire gaming *SYSTEM*.

It makes Dexterity AC strictly equal to Strength AC. Because Dexterity has so many other benefits, this in combination with other options can potentially obsolete Strength builds.

It creates an arms race for higher and higher bonuses, eventuating in bounded accuracy becoming untenable.

It causes design space, like rituals, that was meant for out of combat challenges, to be reused for combat boosts. This makes noncombat options less appealing in comparison. Thus ultimately it reduces freedom of choice.

And so on.

Changing Mage Armor cannot be done thoughtlessly, without considering all of the consequences to the D&D 5e game.

Mistwell · Jul 2, 2019

Yaarel said:
Anyway, keeping combat to 8 hours and less enjoys verisimilitude.

It sooooo does not. If combat only happens conveniently in the 1/3 of the day where you happen to have a spell up to protect from attacks, that's not verisimilitude. I know of no kind of setting where that just happens to work out that way because it's more believable. It's far less believable than the randomness of life causing some encounters when you're not expecting them. If you're somehow never attacked when sleeping, your game is very odd. Again - entire spells are in this game due to the expectation you will be attacked while sleeping, and random encounter tables have been included in the core books in anticipation of having to roll on them for just such a wandering encounter.

If the armor is on for one encounter, then it is an encounter power. If for an other encounter after that, ok. And even a third encounter. But if by the fourth encounter the armor is still probably on, I treat it as if it is virtually a daily power for the purpose of assessing its worth compared to other powers. Close enough anyway.

Leave that 4e stuff at the door, Yaarel. It was a fine system for that version of D&D but has no applicability to this version. 8 hours is 8 hours, not a "daily power". A believable world will not conveniently only challenge you when you are prepared to be challenged and leave you be for the 2/3rds of the day you're not prepared.

Yaarel · Jul 2, 2019

@Mistwell

Normally, fights happen when you go out looking for a fight. When you are doing something else, they normally dont happen.

When I say ‘encounter’ it is roughly per short rest. When I say ‘daily’ it is roughly per long rest.

I almost never have six or more combats per day. Even in reallife warfare that rarely ever happens.

doctorbadwolf · Jul 2, 2019

Also, it isn’t the number of fights in a day.

Last time I had to recast Mage Armor on my Bladesinger, it was a day with only 2 fights. Most of the day was investigation and social interaction, and then some travel.

Another time had a shopping interlude and my character dissected an ettercap.

The day is long. Sometimes you’re gonna get attacked at camp, when you don’t expect to need to reconstitute your magic armor.

Or your going to be very busy all day and spending ten minutes on a ritual just isn’t going to happen.

doctorbadwolf · Jul 2, 2019

Yaarel said:
Mage Armor is non-broken.

However, it matters because changing it changes the entire gaming *SYSTEM*.

No, it doesn’t.

it does nothing more than I enumerated in my list of what it means for individual classes. That’s it.

It is a +1 AC and light armor proficiency. At most.

Yaarel · Jul 2, 2019

[MENTION=6704184]doctorbadwolf[/MENTION]

It is balanced for the Wizard to have Mage Armor always on. Casting and dispelling as an action at-will. As a class feature. Without spending slots on it.

(As is, the Wizard class is underpowered at level 1, compared to Fighter and Cleric at level 1. The boost of Mage Armor can help fill this gap. It balances.)

If other classes want to multiclass to dip into the Wizard to pick up Mage Armor, that is balanced too.

Regarding rituals, I prefer to keep the ritual design space separate for noncombat.

doctorbadwolf · Jul 2, 2019

Yaarel said:
@doctorbadwolf

It is balanced for the Wizard to have Mage Armor always on. Casting and dispelling as an action at-will. As a class feature. Without spending slots on it.

(As is, the Wizard class is underpowered at level 1, compared to Fighter and Cleric at level 1. The boost of Mage Armor can help fill this gap. It balances.)

If other classes want to multiclass to dip into the Wizard to pick up Mage Armor, that is balanced too.

then allowing it as a ritual is also balanced.

Regarding rituals, I prefer to keep the ritual design space separate for noncombat.

This is very much a separate issue, which I have no particular interest in. It’s a matter of preference. As they say, you do you.

Mistwell · Jul 2, 2019

Yaarel said:
@Mistwell

Normally, fights happen when you go out looking for a fight. When you are doing something else, they normally dont happen.=

And your foes are never out looking for a fight when you're doing something else?