CapnZapp
Legend
How?Couldn't additional subclasses address that issue?
I mean, "without overshadowing the existing subclasses?"
The UA Storm subclass was such a solution. It was nerfed back into blandness precisely because it meant nobody would play the PHB subclasses any more.
I'm more and more convinced WotC needs to bite bullet and accept that not all elements are equally good.
It's not enough to create a Storm (or Winter) sorcerer, and just give it more spells in the hope people will use the extra spells to create thematic thunder, or cold, spell selections. Not even restricting the extra spells is enough, since it only means players will use their core spells for Fireball etc and supplement that with the bonus spells.
There needs to be a rule saying something like "if you want to focus on cold or electricity you gain N extra spells but then you can't take any fire spells" and "if you want to focus on acid or poison you gain N+M extra spells, but then you can't take any fire, cold or electricity spells".
(Just to make up some example) Fire is simply better than poison. If you want to be a "poison witch", you need to get compensation for that, sure, but you also need to be unable to circumvent your theme to get both extra spells AND fireball.
It's a level of control they have NEVER dipped into. Without it, choosing Fireball will always be the better choice, and you will always have to sacrifice utility for theme, which I hate.