D&D (2024) What do you think of the new rules for preparing spells?

[rules.mechanic]

I'd like spellcasting ability, or rather, Intelligence to have a role (should not be a dump stat for any caster!). "When you complete a long rest, you can change a number of your prepared spells equal to your Intelligence modifier."

 

[FallenRX]

It just this weird half measure Vancian, it makes more sense if you actually just go back to Vancian tbh.

 

[Krachek]

Spell casting even more easy. that is a good thing!

 

[TheHand]

Yeah, going with the unpopular opinion (?) here and saying that I actually kind of like the change. Bonus points to me if it acts as a soft-nerf to high-level magic, which is one of the reasons a lot of D&D games I've played in tend to end campaigns around level 12. It also reminds me more of the good ol' days of true Vancian magic.

I also think will be less confusing for beginners. Explaining how "spell slots" and "prepared spells" work has always been a challenge with a lot of new players I've gamed with. YMMV.

 

[Charlaquin]

For the benefit of those of us with no access to D&D Beyond, any chance of a summary of the change?

Two of the casting classes we’ve seen were previously “spells known” casters, but are “prepared” casters in the UA, so it seems likely that they are considering switching all casters to be “prepared” casters. Additionally, instead of preparing a number of spells of any level equal to your level (or half your level for half-casters) plus the relevant casting ability modifier, you instead prepare a number of spells of each level equal to the number of spell slots you have of that level. So, for example, a 5th level bard always prepares 4 first level spells, 3 second level spells, and 2 third level spells. Additionally, so far we have not seen individual class spell lists. Clerics prepare spells from the Divine spell list, Bards prepare Divination, Enchantment, Illusion, and Transmutation spells from the Arcane spell list, and Rangers prepare non-Evocation spells from the Primal spell list. Cleric and Bard also each got a short list of spells that are always prepared for them (bards, for example, got lots of always-prepared healing spells, since healing is a bard thing I guess, and the Arcane spell list doesn’t have any of those).

 

[Charlaquin]

I've been following the UAs and I didn't even realize the spell casting prep has changed. When did they change it?

In the expert classes packet. You’d need to have read the text of the spellcasting feature to have noticed the change, of course.

 

[Charlaquin]

Personally, I don’t have much skin in this version of Vancian casting or that version. I just don’t really like Vancian casting in general, regardless of how you fiddle with the details of how a caster learns or prepares their Vancian spells. Let’s just make the change to spell points already.

 

[TheHand]

Personally, I don’t have much skin in this version of Vancian casting or that version. I just don’t really like Vancian casting in general, regardless of how you fiddle with the details of how a caster learns or prepares their Vancian spells. Let’s just make the change to spell points already.

Honestly, Spell Points would save on a lot of headaches, and I've even played in D&D games where we successfully used Spell Points... but Vancian/pseudo-Vancian feels like one of those big sacred cows that they can't seem to sacrifice without much gnashing of the teeth, but for what it's worth, I'd be for it!

 

[the Jester]

It feels like change for the sake of change to me. I don't think it addresses a real problem. Therefore, I think it's a slap in the face to backwards compatibility; therefore I think it's a bad change.

 

[Sir Brennen]

Tying the spells to slots on a per level basis is an absurd constraint that adds nothing of value and boils down to saving them a column for "total spells prepared" on the character level grid.

Just a nitpick: “total spells prepared” isn’t a thing on the class feature grid for casters who memorize, like clerics and wizards. Plus, it’s not a consistent number since it’s modified by caster stat bonus. So, that’s not the reasoning.

I think it might be in part a power balancing thing. It might also open up a bit of design space for “downcasting” spells.

I also think it would be really interesting if this spell prep applied to all the classes that do do prep, except the wizard, who could keep the current 5e version.

Also, this isn’t set in stone. It’s a playtest doc. Tell them you don’t like it, and if it gets less than that 70% (or whatever the number was) positive rating, then it won’t see the light of day.

For the record, I’m not a fan of the change either, but having played around 30 years with Vancian magic as part of the game, it’s not a dealbreaker if they keep it.