D&D (2024) What's your opinion on the standardization of Spellcasters?

[UngeheuerLich]

I don't disagree, but also the bard's niche is not "I'm totally a full on wizard when it's useful". Back in the past being half caster kept the bard from shoving the wizard aside from the wizard's own niche but bounded accuracy skill changes & making them a full caster allows them to do that. Why is it a problem for bard to find their own niche in generating these effects if they need them instead of using the wizard's niche for them?

Back in the past (2e) my bard was behind the full wizard in casting for exactly half a level... then the bard was level 3 as the wizard was just level 2. They had a bit harder time finding spells and having high int on top of charisma etc, but they were level 7 when the wizard just hit 5.
Then the bard had much more hp and all spells were cast at higher level. 7d6 fireball was better than 5d6 fireball. Chromatic Orb was way more usefull for the bard as was magic missile...

So no. The bard was not a 2/3 caster in 2e. Rather 90% caster. And they could keep up quite well with non specialist magic users. And their chance of survival up to level 7 was also way higher.

 

[tetrasodium]

Back in the past (2e) my bard was behind the full wizard in casting for exactly half a level... then the bard was level 3 as the wizard was just level 2. They had a bit harder time finding spells and having high int on top of charisma etc, but they were level 7 when the wizard just hit 5.
Then the bard had much more hp and all spells were cast at higher level. 7d6 fireball was better than 5d6 fireball. Chromatic Orb was way more usefull for the bard as was magic missile...

So no. The bard was not a 2/3 caster in 2e. Rather 90% caster. And they could keep up quite well with non specialist magic users. And their chance of survival up to level 7 was also way higher.

You are oversimplifying things & skipping over how different 2e was in ways that really matter in this case.

Spoiler: 2e bardstuff

Spoiler: 2e wizard stuff

2e bard had the thief/rogue exp progression as opposed to the wizard's wizard progression & both of them gained experience for different things.Bard also had a requirement of dex 12 int 13 cha 15 at the time when pointbuy was not the norm (or even in the phb from looking at pg 18/19).

I believe that the only spell mentioned by name as a thing bards must have without cost is heroes feast. As now heroes feast was a level 6 spell but bards got their first level 6 slot at level 16 not level 9 as now. Wizards by comparison got their first level 6 slot at level 12. Even comparing the available spell slots each class had at 16 & 12 was different with wizard having 4/4/4/4/4/1 to the bard's 4/3/3/3/2/1. The wizard reached level 12 to get that 6th level slot at 750,000xp while the bard was midway between 13(660,000xp) & 14 (880,000xp). The bard gets level 16 at 1,320,000 which would put the wizard somewhere between 13(1,125,000xp) & 14(1,500,000xp).

I'm not sure why levels 7 & 5 are of note & might have missed something that makes them relevant but a level 7 bard has minimum 40,000xp & the following spell slots 3/2/1 while a level 5 wizard minimum 20,000xp & has 4/2/1 spell slots. at the same 40,000xp a wizard would be level 6 & has 4/2/2 spell slots. Why is the bard7 wizard5 lineup here?



Comparisons to 2e are difficult to make because there were so many variables, but the wizard had been casting 6th level spells for a good 4 of the bard's levels before the bard even gets their first first level slot despite their accelerated progression. Saying 2/3 caster is close enough even then

 

[UngeheuerLich]

You are oversimplifying things & skipping over how different 2e was in ways that really matter in this case.

Spoiler: 2e bardstuff

View attachment 263618
View attachment 263622

Spoiler: 2e wizard stuff

View attachment 263617
View attachment 263621

2e bard had the thief/rogue exp progression as opposed to the wizard's wizard progression & both of them gained experience for different things.Bard also had a requirement of dex 12 int 13 cha 15 at the time when pointbuy was not the norm (or even in the phb from looking at pg 18/19).

I believe that the only spell mentioned by name as a thing bards must have without cost is heroes feast. As now heroes feast was a level 6 spell but bards got their first level 6 slot at level 16 not level 9 as now. Wizards by comparison got their first level 6 slot at level 12. Even comparing the available spell slots each class had at 16 & 12 was different with wizard having 4/4/4/4/4/1 to the bard's 4/3/3/3/2/1. The wizard reached level 12 to get that 6th level slot at 750,000xp while the bard was midway between 13(660,000xp) & 14 (880,000xp). The bard gets level 16 at 1,320,000 which would put the wizard somewhere between 13(1,125,000xp) & 14(1,500,000xp).

I'm not sure why levels 7 & 5 are of note & might have missed something that makes them relevant but a level 7 bard has minimum 40,000xp & the following spell slots 3/2/1 while a level 5 wizard minimum 20,000xp & has 4/2/1 spell slots. at the same 40,000xp a wizard would be level 6 & has 4/2/2 spell slots. Why is the bard7 wizard5 lineup here?



Comparisons to 2e are difficult to make because there were so many variables, but the wizard had been casting 6th level spells for a good 4 of the bard's levels before the bard even gets their first first level slot despite their accelerated progression. Saying 2/3 caster is close enough even then

Level 7 and level 5 were important, because this were fireball levels. And I mentioned the harder stat requirements.
And yes, I was simplifying things, but since the bard got extra XP for gold, usually the bard was ahead xp wise.
But as you see in your table, the bard was usually at least a bit ahead in levels and so it usually amounted to more than 2/3 caster. 90% was proabably a bit exaggerated, but the bard kept up quite well. Maybe I had the level 7, level 5 i my head, because most wizards we had were multiclass fighter/wizards, because wizards without multiclass rarely made it to level 5...

Edit: having studied the xp tables, the bard usually is only 1 spell level behind, not accounting for the more easily gained xp. So when the wizards learns 6th level spells, the bard can cast level 5 spells. So I think 80% caster is close enough...
and the bard gets to 3rd level spells before the wizard reaches 4th level spells. And the bard casts them with greater potency (because many stats depend on the caster level!), so maybe we are back up to 90%.

Edit 2: and then there was the sage bard kit, who could cast spells as a bard one level higher... fun times for being a bard...

 

[tetrasodium]

Level 7 and level 5 were important, because this were fireball levels. And I mentioned the harder stat requirements.
And yes, I was simplifying things, but since the bard got extra XP for gold, usually the bard was ahead xp wise.
But as you see in your table, the bard was usually at least a bit ahead in levels and so it usually amounted to more than 2/3 caster. 90% was proabably a bit exaggerated, but the bard kept up quite well. Maybe I had the level 7, level 5 i my head, because most wizards we had were multiclass fighter/wizards, because wizards without multiclass rarely made it to level 5...

Sure but 7 bard was 40,000xp & 5 wizard was 20,000xp. The bard did indeed get exp for gold under an optional rule, but the wizard was not omitted from that rule

Spoiler: 2e dmg pg70

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Sure but 7 bard was 40,000xp & 5 wizard was 20,000xp. The bard did indeed get exp for gold under an optional rule, but the wizard was not omitted from that rule

Spoiler: 2e dmg pg70

View attachment 263629

But level 6 wizard at 40k XP still cast level 3 spells top.
And at least in our campaigns, xp from gold outpaced xp from spells by a lot.
And we actually used the optional optional rule for bards that gave about half XP from rogue, wizard and fighter tables.

edit: and I really have to tip you with XP for research!

 

[MoonSong]

You are inserting "good thing" in place of "a thing that fits within the power budget of a class". I don't believe that the base bard class has room for all of the spells being thrown around as "iconic" and all of the stuff it already gets from base+archetype and be a full caster. A particular archetype is something I could see substituting some of the factotumish lore master stuff & heavy bardic inspiration options for those spells or similar effects.

"But it's iconic" is avoiding the fact that it's "iconic" & "bards should be able to" from when bards were not full casters like they are now. Why are we calling to history only for power& ignoring the thorny parts of that history?

I asked if you thought something was a good thing or the desirable outcome.

I partly buy your argument: There is not enough power budget to have both prepared fullcasting and have the bard do iconic bard things. Why do you want the bard to remain unable to do the iconic bardic thing instead of, say turn it back into a known caster so it can do iconic bardic things again? (Or whatever dialing back you think they have to do in order to allow for it). Why would you rather double down on the path that guts the essence of the class? (And I would think that you would appreciate keeping the wizard special in mechanics?)

 

[tetrasodium]

I asked if you thought something was a good thing or the desirable outcome.

Without seeing an example of such a subclass where it might be thematically appropriate & within the power budget it's difficult to say if it's good or desirable in that case. Bards in playtest packet2 are not unable to cast those spells though. At both 11 & 15 bards can choose a spell list they can prepare any two spells from & change the spells they prepare from it whenever they prepare spells. Let's not pretend not to notice the elephant that goes wit not using that class resource for these spells. Freeing those two spells up is more about being able to cast tiny hut & fireball (or whatever).

It doesn't look like magical secrets was a thing until 5e so if we are talking about "iconic" bard stuff it's hard to see why the bard shouldn't be using that for old missing spells instead of picking up tiny hut & fireball or whatever on top of the new spells they can now cast.

I partly buy your argument: There is not enough power budget to have both prepared fullcasting and have the bard do iconic bard things. Why do you want the bard to remain unable to do the iconic bardic thing instead of, say turn it back into a known caster so it can do iconic bardic things again? (Or whatever dialing back you think they have to do in order to allow for it). Why would you rather double down on the path that guts the essence of the class? (And I would think that you would appreciate keeping the wizard special in mechanics?)

Looking back you mentioned heroism(both 3.x & 5e bard/wiz both cast it at character level 5)/bane(not seeing in 2ephb) but I've always seen it as a cleric spell, I'm not sure I'd call either of those "iconic bard spells" just because they were capable of casting them. Heroism was single target so IME any situation where it would be important (ie fear aura type stuff) probably fell to the wizard's stack of scribed scrolls able to cover the party rather than the bard's limited spell slots

The only other spell I remember seeing named by people as important to bards was heroes feast & that was not a spell bards could cast until 16th w/1.32mil exp*(2e) to the wizard's 12(750k exp*) in 2e & 11wiz/bard17 in 3.x. At least in 2014 5e for both wizard & bard . I just don't consider a spell wizards had been casting for so long before bards were capable of casting it to be an "iconic bard spell" that would be part of the class's "essence". Bard hasn't lost any of those spells though, they just compete with fireball & tiny hut or whatever the new big ones are in a new very much not iconic bard feature(magical secrets).

Nobody is complaining about the new spells on the list that bards are able to cast even though they never could before, just lot about couple mostly unnamed ones that are missing if the bard doesn't use their new magical secrets options for them.

I quite like the flex-vancian prep on the bard & wouldn't want to see it go back to spells known. If Heroism & Bane are the only spells we are talking about I'd toss them in as an option for bardic inspiration dice spending.


*2e levels & experience were funny & hard to compare for lots of reasons, there was some discussion & charts on that a few posts back

 

[Mephista]

Nobody is complaining about the new spells on the list that bards are able to cast even though they never could before, just lot about couple mostly unnamed ones that are missing if the bard doesn't use their new magical secrets options for them.

Oh, plenty of people are. They're often unthematic and don't fit the bard's playstyle. Plenty of people would be happy to swap the crappy new spells for the old one. There's even a thread here, and in every place I know, about wanting a forth spell list for bard.

But expecting people to complain about extra spells that you can just ignore? Like... just don't take it? No one is holding a gun to the bard player's head and making them take the spells. Not a lot of point.

 

[Benjamin Olson]

Nobody is complaining about the new spells on the list that bards are able to cast even though they never could before, just lot about couple mostly unnamed ones that are missing if the bard doesn't use their new magical secrets options for them.

What!? Nobody is complaining? I complained about them getting Hex. In your thread. To you.

Alas, for today I've learned I am nobody.

 

[Lycurgon]

I hate the standardisation of spell lists. I really like Warlocks and part of that is their unique spells. Hex and Armor of Agathys and such. Yes there are some subclasses that get some of them, and ways to get some of them with feats, but they remain rare outside of Warlocks. Now Bards can hex.
I don't like Clerics getting all the Paladin Smite spells, I don't like Paladins getting Spirit Guardians.
I don't like bards missing classic Bard spells.
I like that paladins and Rangers having unique spells and think their should be more of them (although most of the Ranger ones are not very good but that is another issue).
Standardising the list makes for less interesting classes rather than more fun and different experiences from each class.

But I do like that Ranger's became a prepared class rather than spells known. I don't understand why rangers were designed this way in the first place when Paladins are prepared casters. Rangers are not as powerful as Paladins and shouldn't be more limited in their spell choices. Many of the spells on the Druid/Ranger list are useful but rather situational, being focused on being in nature. It would help to be able to change them when you are in a city or dungeon or travelling in natural surroundings. Having played a Ranger recently I found it difficult to choose useful spells from their list. There are some obvious choices but after those it is not a great list. Being able to change things up would make it better although it needs more help than just that.

I think it is okay for Bards being changed from known to prepared although I don't think it is required, I don't really care either way for Bards, but they do need their own unique list.

I don't think it is good to make all classes the same in regards to preparing spells. I like there being differences in how you deal with spells. A difference between playing a Cleric vs a Sorcerer vs a Wizard.

Having an optional rule in the DMG for making all classes into Prepared Clasters would be a good idea. But don't homogenise all the class. It doesn't make everything interesting and more fun.