D&D 5E Why Has D&D, and 5e in Particular, Gone Down the Road of Ubiquitous Magic?

[AaronOfBarbaria]

While this post is phrased pejoratively, I think it's generally right. The better way to say it, I think, is that it's bad design to make a game whose core premise is that half of the players feel useless at any given time. As D&D has matured and the designers have gotten better at their craft, the later editions are designed so that everyone can feel powerful throughout the life of the game.

Now, I think that's all well and good, but the problem with the Potterization of D&D is the option missed by this post:



The third option being:

3) Let characters that focus on magic use (i.e. wizards) use magical means as often as they want, but magic is fickle and dangerous to use.

The problem I see with a lot of the magic in D&D is it's 100% good at what it does. There's no risk​ in dropping a fireball. A +3 weapon is just better than a non-magical version. There's no risk or opportunity cost. There's no chance of loss or damage. As a result, magic becomes humdrum because there's no reason not to use it.

The amount of risk present when casting a spell is entirely separate from how frequently a character is able to do something magical - so that's not an "option 3" so much as it is "option 1b" and "option 2b".

Of course, my experience of D&D players is that, when it comes to D&D, most don't actually want to have risk added to their spell casting (check the lack of popularity for the Wild Mage for evidence).

And while you say there is no opportunity cost, I don't find that to be correct - to gain anything magical, something else is not being gained. Whether that is gaining spellcasting as a class feature rather than any other class feature because you chose to be a wizard and not some other class, or it is a DM giving you a +3 weapon rather than some other form of treasure, or even just using that specific +3 weapon (let's call it a longsword) rather than some other weapon (like a polearm, for example).

 

[TheCosmicKid]

Because when you do get to use that power, you own the scene.

This would be true if more spells were written with it in mind. But a 1st-level wizard casting magic missile in 1E-3E definitely didn't own the scene -- you just rolled for a bit of damage and then you were done. A great example of a spell that did let you own the scene was flaming sphere: once you cast it, you got to play with your awesome sphere for the rest of the fight. Countless rounds of fun for only one spell slot*! If more spells were written based on this "management" model rather than instantaneous or "fire-and-forget" effects, I think we'd see less of an impulse towards spell spam. But the trade-off would be in spell complexity: resolving magic missile is also a heck of a lot easier than resolving flaming sphere.

*Do not taunt flaming sphere.

 

[krakistophales]

Ok, I'm trying not to make this a rant, but, as the title says, why have we continuously seen this very upward spiral in the amount of magic that is used at the table? While 5e reduces the need for magic items, it has ramped up significantly the amount of magic that is used on a round by round basis. I'm going to provide a bit of historical context to my argument then I'm going to try to show how 5e has continued this trend. My basic question though, is why? Why has DnD gone from a system where magic was used in maybe an encounter by encounter basis to a round by round and often several times per round by round basis?

[sblock=Historical Background]
D&D has always had magic. That's true. But, in AD&D 1e, you were more or less limited to clerics and wizards (and subclasses thereof) for most of your spells. A 5th level party with a 5th level cleric and 5th level wizard didn't actually have that many spells per day to cast. The cleric spells were very limited in scope and rarely applied broadly. Wizard spells had a much broader application, but since wizards had so few spells (our 5th level wizard only has 6 spells/day TOTAL), you could easily go entire encounters without seeing a single spell. Many encounters might see healing afterwards, and maybe a single spell from the wizard, and that was about it.

Something to remember here is that the adventuring day in 1e and 2e was assumed to be considerably longer. You could have multiple encounters and not spend any significant resources (no major HP loss, that sort of thing). For example, if you look at the old Keep on the Borderlands module, each of those lairs were pretty obviously meant to be resolved in a single game day - 7 or 8 encounters wasn't unusual. So, if you have 7 or 8 encounters per day and you only have 6 spells, there's a pretty signicant limit on the number of spells that can be cast.

2e changed things slightly here in that they allowed for specialist casters, so, they had some more spells, but, again, by and large, the difference isn't that significant.

3e, OTOH, makes two very, very big changes. First, casters get a LOT more spells per day. Between straight up ability bonuses and class spell bonuses (domain spells, specialist caster bonuses), you also had easily craftable magic items like scrolls (available to any 1st level party) and wands. Casters could, with a minimal expense, craft enough scrolls and wands to hold most of their utility spells and save their slots for in-combat or in-encounter effects. The second big change was the idea of the 4 encounter day. While there is obvious variation from table to table, saying that 3e generally plays out with 2-6 encounters per day isn't much of a stretch. So, you have casters with significantly more spells per day, the ability to easily increase that number AND the fact that you typically only have half as many encounters.

This, of course, ignores later additions like at-will spells from things like Complete Arcane and the like.

4e simply continues this trend. Now all casters have at-will spells and encounter spells. It would be unusual for a caster to not cast a spell every single round of every single encounter.

5e takes this trend and then adds to this the fact that almost all classes have access to spells. There are very few classes that don't have at-will spells and, what, 5 classes total that have no spells at all. It's not unusual, IMO, to have groups where all or almost all the PC's have spells from one source or another.

[/sblock]

Why is this? Why has the game become Potterverse? Not in the sense of Casters and Caddies. This most certainly isn't a balance issue. The non-casters in 5e can and do stand on a pretty level plane with the casters. But, Potterverse in the sense that everybody and their brother is dropping spells all the time. We've gone from a game where you might see one or two spells in a single encounter to a game where you will likely see one or two spells (or more) every single round of every single encounter, all day long. Is it just a shift in the genre as a whole? I don't think so, because you have things like A Song of Fire and Ice where the level of magic in the setting would be far closer to AD&D than 5e. So, what is it?

I feel the reason is quite simple: What would you have players that choose to play a caster class do in combat other than casting magic? Make a feeble attempt at stabbing something in the kidney with a d4 dagger that they're barely proficient with, only to most certainly be hit like a truck due to their abysmal AC and pathetic hit points?

 

[Fanaelialae]

Because when you do get to use that power, you own the scene. The wizard, casting its one spell for the day, is the most powerful person in the room, and commands the respect and admiration of everyone there.

And the trade-off for that is that you're not as good at swinging your staff as the fighter is at swinging her sword. You're still doing cool heroic stuff - smashing demons and saving villagers - but the fighter is the star of any show where the wizard doesn't cast a spell.

I disagree with your conclusion. I've played a wizard in 5e and there were definitely scenes that I owned (full disclosure - I dipped one level of cleric for Heavy Armor).

In one encounter we were facing an entire hive of Giant Wasps that could turn people into zombie slaves with their poison. About 50 wasps came at us in waves over the course of several rounds. I simply waited for them to group up and threw a few fireballs at them. The rest of the party cleaned up the handful of critically injured wasps that survived, and just like that an encounter that had a high chance of TPK (IMO) was a cakewalk.

In another encounter, we were ambushed by several stone giants while traveling through a chasm. The giants were up at the top of the cliff walls, and most of the party was better at melee than range. I first Shattered the cliff under one of the giant's feet to give our melee something to beat on. Then I occupied another giant with Tasha's Hideous Laughter. After this, the giants decided to focus on me so I lead them on a merry chase using teleporation spells and Shield to make them waste their time trying to attack at me. Finally, one of our melee was dangerously low on health, so I polymorphed him into a Giant Ape which allowed him to finish the fight very effectively.

In both those fights, if I'd been playing another fighter (or some such) we would have most probably TPK'd.

It's fair to say that there's more scene sharing in 5e than AD&D, but that isn't to say that you can't still have your moments in the spotlight.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

This would be true if more spells were written with it in mind. But a 1st-level wizard casting magic missile in 1E-3E definitely didn't own the scene -- you just rolled for a bit of damage and then you were done.

In early editions, the awe-inspiring instant-win spell was Sleep. In 3E, it was Color Spray.

Magic Missile was a weird design option. It basically existed as something for high-level wizards to spend their low-level slots on. It's not an example of the topic at hand.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

It's fair to say that there's more scene sharing in 5e than AD&D, but that isn't to say that you can't still have your moments in the spotlight.

In 5E, the spotlight is tied to resource management within each class, rather than certain classes being burst-centric and others being steady. Every class has at least one Awesome button.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

I feel the reason is quite simple: What would you have players that choose to play a caster class do in combat other than casting magic? Make a feeble attempt at stabbing something in the kidney with a d4 dagger that they're barely proficient with, only to most certainly be hit like a truck due to their abysmal AC and pathetic hit points?

As a point of reference, Wizards haven't had bad Hit Points since the universal stat modifier was introduced in 3E, and they haven't had a meaningfully-inferior AC since at least the days of AD&D. It's entirely possible to design a game where the Wizard could actually contribute by swinging its staff for a decent amount of damage.

It's just that the designers flubbed it in 5E, by letting everyone use Dex to hit and damage, so Wizards are incompetent with a staff and can only reasonably hit with a dagger (which does way less base damage).

 

[Fanaelialae]

In 5E, the spotlight is tied to resource management within each class, rather than certain classes being burst-centric and others being steady. Every class has at least one Awesome button.

I think it's a matter of degrees. The wizard is still a much more burst-centric class than the steady fighter, but now the fighter also has a burst button while the wizard has a steady-mode. I don't deny that the difference has lessened, but it's certainly still there. The wizard still has amazing burst abilities that can turn a fight from a near-guaranteed-TPK into a cakewalk, it's simply that the fighter outdoes him in single target DPS. Which is fine, because the wizard still has an amazing niche of AoEs and control abilities that the fighter can't ever hope to even come near.

Which isn't alien to an AD&D experience if you consider a specialized fighter with high exceptional strength and a magic weapon. (Admittedly, this wasn't a given, but due to the many and varied strength-boosting magic items, it wasn't as rare as 3d6/4d6 + 1d100 might suggest.)

EDIT:

As a point of reference, Wizards haven't had bad Hit Points since the universal stat modifier was introduced in 3E, and they haven't had a meaningfully-inferior AC since at least the days of AD&D. It's entirely possible to design a game where the Wizard could actually contribute by swinging its staff for a decent amount of damage.

It's just that the designers flubbed it in 5E, by letting everyone use Dex to hit and damage, so Wizards are incompetent with a staff and can only reasonably hit with a dagger (which does way less base damage).

The point is that many (if not most) people do not play a wizard so that they can swing a staff (even competently). If you want to make your enemy's face intimately familiar with whatever you're swinging, they have other classes that are designed to do that. It's not unreasonable to assume that if you choose to play a Magic-User, you will spend a fair portion of your play time using magic.

 

[Psikerlord#]

Ok, I'm trying not to make this a rant, but, as the title says, why have we continuously seen this very upward spiral in the amount of magic that is used at the table? While 5e reduces the need for magic items, it has ramped up significantly the amount of magic that is used on a round by round basis. I'm going to provide a bit of historical context to my argument then I'm going to try to show how 5e has continued this trend. My basic question though, is why? Why has DnD gone from a system where magic was used in maybe an encounter by encounter basis to a round by round and often several times per round by round basis?

[sblock=Historical Background]
D&D has always had magic. That's true. But, in AD&D 1e, you were more or less limited to clerics and wizards (and subclasses thereof) for most of your spells. A 5th level party with a 5th level cleric and 5th level wizard didn't actually have that many spells per day to cast. The cleric spells were very limited in scope and rarely applied broadly. Wizard spells had a much broader application, but since wizards had so few spells (our 5th level wizard only has 6 spells/day TOTAL), you could easily go entire encounters without seeing a single spell. Many encounters might see healing afterwards, and maybe a single spell from the wizard, and that was about it.

Something to remember here is that the adventuring day in 1e and 2e was assumed to be considerably longer. You could have multiple encounters and not spend any significant resources (no major HP loss, that sort of thing). For example, if you look at the old Keep on the Borderlands module, each of those lairs were pretty obviously meant to be resolved in a single game day - 7 or 8 encounters wasn't unusual. So, if you have 7 or 8 encounters per day and you only have 6 spells, there's a pretty signicant limit on the number of spells that can be cast.

2e changed things slightly here in that they allowed for specialist casters, so, they had some more spells, but, again, by and large, the difference isn't that significant.

3e, OTOH, makes two very, very big changes. First, casters get a LOT more spells per day. Between straight up ability bonuses and class spell bonuses (domain spells, specialist caster bonuses), you also had easily craftable magic items like scrolls (available to any 1st level party) and wands. Casters could, with a minimal expense, craft enough scrolls and wands to hold most of their utility spells and save their slots for in-combat or in-encounter effects. The second big change was the idea of the 4 encounter day. While there is obvious variation from table to table, saying that 3e generally plays out with 2-6 encounters per day isn't much of a stretch. So, you have casters with significantly more spells per day, the ability to easily increase that number AND the fact that you typically only have half as many encounters.

This, of course, ignores later additions like at-will spells from things like Complete Arcane and the like.

4e simply continues this trend. Now all casters have at-will spells and encounter spells. It would be unusual for a caster to not cast a spell every single round of every single encounter.

5e takes this trend and then adds to this the fact that almost all classes have access to spells. There are very few classes that don't have at-will spells and, what, 5 classes total that have no spells at all. It's not unusual, IMO, to have groups where all or almost all the PC's have spells from one source or another.

[/sblock]

Why is this? Why has the game become Potterverse? Not in the sense of Casters and Caddies. This most certainly isn't a balance issue. The non-casters in 5e can and do stand on a pretty level plane with the casters. But, Potterverse in the sense that everybody and their brother is dropping spells all the time. We've gone from a game where you might see one or two spells in a single encounter to a game where you will likely see one or two spells (or more) every single round of every single encounter, all day long. Is it just a shift in the genre as a whole? I don't think so, because you have things like A Song of Fire and Ice where the level of magic in the setting would be far closer to AD&D than 5e. So, what is it?

I suspect because they thought more magic = better. In hindsight, I think they were wrong. The combination of (I) at will magic cantrips and (ii) most classes using magic has resulted in magic being less special/too common/which leads to a kind of gonzo adventuring style.

Personally I prefer OSR or 2nd editions style daily only magic, keeping it rarer and more powerful (but still balanced overall, since there are no at wills). I do think however you need to give such casters basic one handed weapons and light armour to keep them interested, however. Obviously they will be poorer than the fighter types with their weapons, but not as bad as the old days.... They can wear robes if they like, but under there is some leather armour and a long sword!

 

[Mercule]

One of my favourite articles from Dragon magazine was the colour of magic. It was for BECMI rules and talked about allowing magic-users to have minor magical effects such that a wizard that has a tendency to throw fireballs is able to light his pipe at the end of the day by conjuring a small flame or for a dreaded necromancer to be able to kill small animals like mice by touch. It help provide a little bit of flavour for the basic magic-user.

The article also talked about reskinning spells with themes as a means to hide what spells were being thrown about so that a magic missile cast by a witch-doctor might be a cut opening up on the PC when the witch-doctor makes a cutting motion with their dagger.

That sounds very familiar. I know I've used the reskinned magic missle and occasionally throw "resonance" (to borrow a term from Mage) onto the PCs' spells.