D&D 5E UA Spell Versatility: A deeper dive

[5ekyu]

The comprehend languages>tongues part of the example us more apt than the abstracted scepter puzzle. I don't think the scepter type puzzle is common & the comprehend languages>tongues part lights up a couple different problems. The first part related to what spells are ritual & what is not, but more on that later because it's a larger more subtle problem in the long run. The second part is that there are only about 17-18 ritual spells for wizards once you trip & the vast majority of the common use ones are first/second level (8 1st level, 3 2nd level, 4 3rd level, 3 5th level, 1 6th level). On top of being fewer & fewer from level 3+ they get more & more niche or redundant.. When was the last time you saw someone effectively use illusory script, feign death, magic mouth, or contact other plane given that the lat one can require a long rest or greater restoration unless the pc's next words are expected to be "I'm going to work, merlin is going to take a long rest here in the hotel". On top of being so few, they aren't exactly common to find those spells in spellbooks so pretty much every wizard is forced to make some of those their free spells & that leads back into the first point. A wizard who spends lets say 3-4 of their five starting spells & 1-2 of their free level up spells on ritual spells (pretty common to see IME) is going to have lots of ritual spells sure... but when it comes to combat & getting stuff done.. the sorcerer & warlock are going to have just as many of not more spells to pick from as ritual spellcasting is rarely plausible mid fight. Yes the wizard can make up for this over time by adding spells from looted spellbooks... but a lot of those will be duplicates or entirely random, "I really wish I knew acid arrow vampyric touch & faithful hound" or "I wish I had two dozen spellbooks with fireball in them" are words you probably never hear. Because spellcasters can often float between getting killed instantly & easily TPK lower level parties without even really trying with little in between a wizard is not likely to even see spellbooks early on. The warlock/sorcerer isn't going to be picking up those early utility spells for the first several levels because everyone expects the wizard to so the spells being chosen there are going to be "bread & butter things hit the fan so bad, fixitfixitfixitfixit!" solutions.. on the odd chance that you do find a spellbook, it's rarely on anything less than a cr6 mage, cr12 archmage, or some unique NPC & even if a wizard has the coin to scribe the spells, odds are good that they already have a significant chunk if not most/all of the spells in the book if the gm is pulling from published adventures (seriously how many spellbooks with the spells from the cr6 mage does one wizard need? Not to mention, how many wizards killing the cr6 mage for the first time don't already have a lot of those spells in their book for a long time now?)

Magic mouth sees a lot of use in our games.
Feign and Script hardly ever they are rarely chosen except for specialized concepts.
Contact plane is one of a slew of " help from beyond" that cut across many classes in tier-2. It's hot a lot of competition.
But nobody is afaik arguing there arent less useful low vslue selective opportunity only spells - they are on every list.
I do note they seem to have added divination to wizards, iirc in this UA.

But as for sorc and warlock having as many avsilsble or ehstever, nope. At 10th level its gonna be 11 known for sorc vs likely 15 prepared and maybe at least a half dozen to a dozen rituals spellbookery. With the rest-swap for wizards not bring level locked and having a minimum of 2 dozen in his spell books that he chose free - in our games that has been seen as big.

Obviously, the scribe gains will vary by campaign. I tend to assume none in my estimates or "one additional found spell of B-list caliber each character level" when I want to be generous.

Again, based on the assumptions and arguments presented, the foundations for the concern, it's pushing me more to not worry about the impact sprll versatility will have in my games or games played in our style.

For that, they were very helpful.

 

[tetrasodium]

Could work, that feels too long to me though, I don't know why 2 days is better than 3 for 3rd, but I definitely don't like it taking a full week for a 7th level swap. Since this locks all swapping, that feels like a bit much.

Could also be that I like it capping at 5 days with 9th (a nice stopping point) instead of it taking 9 days (a weird off-kilter number of days)

It shouldn't make a difference, the more I think about it, I just don't like the numbers as much.

It might help with the problem, but probably only so much for various reasons. It's not controversial & kinda moves from anecdote to statistics given how many people have pointed out between the various threads that most prepared casters they see have a regular set of spells & only occasionally swap out one or two spells.

The second problem dates to my experience running AL tables at a local flgs. People don't play sorcerer or warlock because they are interested in tracking things. Frankly I got so tired of telling scorlock players* "no 1-2 levels in warlock does not refresh all of your sorcerer slots too, only the pact magic slots & I don't care how misleading the wording is on page 107 spell slots", "no pact magic does not multiclass with slot magic classes like slot magic classes do, the rules are on page 164 please review them again and follow them this time" or occasionally "oh my holy .... this is straight up gestalt, you are not a level 6 character with five levels in warlock and six levels in sorcerer, you aren't even attempting to follow the rules on phb164". If your version were in, I'd expect that any time "what spell it was/how many rests it's been" came up then the answer would be a immediate "I don't know/pretty sure it's been enough"

edit: the * was the biggest contributing reason behind why I quit running AL tables at the time.

 

[abirdcall]

And if that Sorcerer were a Cleric, would we still be having this argument? Unfettered access to their entire spell list, oh no!

You can say this about anything.

Oh, you think it's unfair to grant fighters access to 9th level spells? Well what about Wizards then, oh no!

Just because one class has an ability doesn't mean it's okay to give other classes that ability.

 

[cbwjm]

That's not a meaning supported by the game.

A bard spell is simply defined as a spell on the bard spell list. Or rather, the bard spell list is simply a list of all bard spells. They're entirely synonymous terms and the game never draws any meaningful distinction between the two. There's nothing to suggest that it stops being true even if it's only a bard spell for your character. Therefore, saying "X is a bard spell for you" (i.e., Magical Secrets, some Ranger subclasses) and "X is added to the bard spell list for you" (i.e., Warlock subclass spells, Sorcerer subclass spells, Paladin subclass spells) are synonymous rules. The only reason the game states them differently is because some mechanics also add the spell to your spells known list.



But that doesn't mean the spell stops being a bard spell for you. Read what it says:



Nothing there says it stops being a bard spell. It just stops being a bard spell you know.

Further, read the next question. It makes it explicitly clear that spells gained through Magical Secrets are added to your character's bard spell list, and not some odd "only when you cast it" rule:



I agree, RAW there's no mechanic to change which spells Magical Secrets selects. However, exchanging a spell doesn't remove it from your list of bard spells. A spell learned through Magical Secrets would not be removed, either. A lore bard could exchange a fireball he learned at 6th level for dimension door at 7th level, and then later at 8th level exchange sleep for fireball again.

That fireball spell isn't added to the bard spell list when picked up by magical secrets. Compare it with the warlock patron spells which explicitly say they are added to the warlock spell list. Magical secrets just let's you pick up non bard spells but when you swap them out you are required to pick the new spell from the bard spell list. If you can show me where in magical secrets it says that the spells chosen are added to the bard spell list then I will happily say you can swap that fireball back in.

 

[Undrave]

That fireball spell isn't added to the bard spell list when picked up by magical secrets. Compare it with the warlock patron spells which explicitly say they are added to the warlock spell list. Magical secrets just let's you pick up non bard spells but when you swap them out you are required to pick the new spell from the bard spell list. If you can show me where in magical secrets it says that the spells chosen are added to the bard spell list then I will happily say you can swap that fireball back in.

I'll make this easy for you and just quote Magical Secret from DnD Beyond here:

Magical Secrets
By 10th level, you have plundered magical knowledge from a wide spectrum of disciplines. Choose two spells from any classes, including this one. A spell you choose must be of a level you can cast, as shown on the Bard table, or a cantrip.

The chosen spells count as bard spells for you and are included in the number in the Spells Known column of the Bard table.

You learn two additional spells from any classes at 14th level and again at 18th level.

 

[Chaosmancer]

You can say this about anything.

Oh, you think it's unfair to grant fighters access to 9th level spells? Well what about Wizards then, oh no!

Just because one class has an ability doesn't mean it's okay to give other classes that ability.

Yeah, but your fighter's gaining 9th level spells is a very Apples to racecars example.

In this case we are giving a weaker version of an ability that is shared by multiple classes to a few different classes. And the question I see being presented is "Are the concerns of overshadowing the Wizard moot because many of the same things have already been happening with Clerics, Paladins, and Druids."

I do not have an exhaustive understanding of the various spell lists, but if you had a Wizard, Cleric, Druid, and Sorcerer who is using this Spell Versatility ability, is the Sorcerer really gaining that large of an advantage by swapping a single spell a day. For example, I think Water Breathing is on all four lists, so the Druid and Cleric can already swap into it on a long rest if they need it, and the Sorcerer isn't overshadowing anyone.

 

[Bacon Bits]

That fireball spell isn't added to the bard spell list when picked up by magical secrets. Compare it with the warlock patron spells which explicitly say they are added to the warlock spell list. Magical secrets just let's you pick up non bard spells but when you swap them out you are required to pick the new spell from the bard spell list. If you can show me where in magical secrets it says that the spells chosen are added to the bard spell list then I will happily say you can swap that fireball back in.

Had you read the entire post I made, you would have seen that every point you're making here has already been addressed.

In short, you need to show where the rules tell you that "a bard spell" and "a spell on the bard list" are distinct rules concepts. I claim they're as synonymous as saying "a martial weapon" and "a weapon on the martial weapon list."

 

[tetrasodium]

Yeah, but your fighter's gaining 9th level spells is a very Apples to racecars example.

In this case we are giving a weaker version of an ability that is shared by multiple classes to a few different classes. And the question I see being presented is "Are the concerns of overshadowing the Wizard moot because many of the same things have already been happening with Clerics, Paladins, and Druids."

I do not have an exhaustive understanding of the various spell lists, but if you had a Wizard, Cleric, Druid, and Sorcerer who is using this Spell Versatility ability, is the Sorcerer really gaining that large of an advantage by swapping a single spell a day. For example, I think Water Breathing is on all four lists, so the Druid and Cleric can already swap into it on a long rest if they need it, and the Sorcerer isn't overshadowing anyone.

Given the number of people in the other thread saying that wizard is too good... is it weaker in any relevant way, or is it just stronger? Sword of spirit gave an excellent abstracted example earlier that showed just how gigantic a boon it is being granted the ability to choose spells from your entire class list during a long rest... Multiple people have pointed out that prepared casters tend to have a fairly stable set of spells they keep prepared with only the occasional spell or two that gets swapped out for odd situations. Weigh that against the fact that wizards need to find scrolls & spellbooks then spend gold to scribe whatever nonduplicate spells they don't already have scribed out of their spellbook after finding it. If you think that's not a big deal, look around at some of WotC's published adventures on what actually says there is a spellbook to be found. Here's a head start ;D

Yea there are some great spellbooks to be found just before you retire & some mediocre spellbooks after you kill cr6 mages, but pretty much none of WotC's adventures have well stockedspellbooks to find at tier 1 & the spellbooks you might find at tier2 are pretty much going to "contain the spells in the mage statblock, see monster manual" & a lot of those spells are frequently going to be ones that were also found on scrolls or chosen previously at some point in the past long before they show in a spellbook.

Even though two wizard players sitting at the table tends to go like this "you have spells I don't have" > "Yea & you have spells I don't have"> speak in unison:"Lets start copying each other's spellbooks! excitedhighfive" giving copying from a similarly leveled peer's spellbook a cost of around the cost of an two empty spellbooks or spellshards to scribe to while they two peers scribe from each other's spellbook, woc still treats spellbooks like they were in 1e/2e/3e when fully loaded spellbooks were stupidly huge boons to a wizard & you needed extradimensional storage to carry your WBL gold. Sure you could say "well low level characters are too poor to really make use of a spellbook without taking all the gold the party finds", but wouln't saying that also imply that a first level ability with this phrase included "For each level of the spell, the process takes 2 hours and costs 50 gp. The cost represents material components you expend as you experiment with the spell to master it, as well as the fine inks you need to record it."
is improperly or poorly designed?

 

[NotAYakk]

Had you read the entire post I made, you would have seen that every point you're making here has already been addressed.

In short, you need to show where the rules tell you that "a bard spell" and "a spell on the bard list" are distinct rules concepts. I claim they're as synonymous as saying "a martial weapon" and "a weapon on the martial weapon list."

And on top of this, this is play test material.

Do you really think it would be a good idea to put in a system where Bards could literally lose an important class feature forever by making the wrong decision overnight?

And what, exactly, is lost if you could swap away and swap back to that exact same spell?

 

[Stalker0]

The OP version was similar to mine. I think one spell swap allows for flexibility without changing the character fundamentally.

also when discussing wizards you have to keep ritual casting in mind, that’s a very flexible benefit right there