D&D 5E (2024) Can A Spell Caster Out Damage a Martial Consistently?

[FrogReaver]

Thunk I prefer new one. It's a lot cheaper sorcery point wise.

Same. The only things the old one was particularly good for was twin haste and twin polymorph.

 

[Zardnaar]

Same. The only things the old one was particularly good for was twin haste and twin polymorph.

That and various level 1&2 spells worth twining and upcasting.

You can twin all your highest level slots from level 3 or so.

 

[FrogReaver]

That's why I rate new sorcerer so highly. 1 sorcery point to twin spell. Command. Tashas tashas mind whip, hol person.

Odds are you won't get 4 failed saves over two rounds vs 10%25% chance of what you got.

Also why I think wizards are comparatively weak in 5.5 vs other options like bonus action command on Glamour bards.

I think it still depends on a few things.

Wizards are better at exploration due to their rituals. When combat actually starts though, Sorcerers tend to be better at least levels 1-5.

If one just uses the 2024 lists only then the Wizards early game spell list isn't that much stronger IMO. (Access to all the splat book spells changes that IMO). For 2024, Sorcerers mostly missing out on the Summon Spells hurts. Later Wizards still have better spells though.

The big caveat in the early game is find familiar. How do you rate it? Wizards early game mostly depends on how you rate that and their ability to replenish slots with arcane recovery. Level 5ish it mostly comes down to how you rate Tiny Hut and Summon Spells.

Like I said, for combat in the 1-10 range I'd probably rate sorcerer a bit higher than wizard, but it's not perfectly clear cut.

 

[FrogReaver]

Right now I'm thinking the party would look something like -

Human Entertainer Vengeance Paladin - Great Weapon Master
High Elf Wayfarer Gloom Stalker Ranger - Dual Wielder
High Elf Sage Stars Druid - Warcaster
Gnome Criminal Dragon Sorcerer - Warcaster

Though @Zardnaar has got me thinking about possibly replacing the Dragon Sorcerer with a Wizard. Summon spells are fairly appealing.

 

[Zardnaar]

Right now I'm thinking the party would look something like -

Human Entertainer Vengeance Paladin - Great Weapon Master
High Elf Wayfarer Gloom Stalker Ranger - Dual Wielder
High Elf Sage Stars Druid - Warcaster
Gnome Criminal Dragon Sorcerer - Warcaster

Though @Zardnaar has got me thinking about possibly replacing the Dragon Sorcerer with a Wizard. Summon spells are fairly appealing.

Think I would do warlock if I cared about summoning tbh. Undead and aberration chain lock plus poison condition.

Might be my first 5.5 PC as no one else will build that. They're busy picking other warlocks, Dragon sorcerers and bards. Eldritch mind for concentration.

 

[FrogReaver]

Think I would do warlock if I cared about summoning tbh. Undead and aberration chain lock plus poison condition.

Might be my first 5.5 PC as no one else will build that. They're busy picking other warlocks, Dragon sorcerers and bards. Eldritch mind for concentration.

Warlock summoner works well. I’ve used the summon fey version. It coupled with EB gives solid damage output for most of the game.

Personally I hate being limited to a max of 2 slots for most of the game. Thus I prefer wizard summoners a bit more, although they tend to be a bit worse at summoning levels 1-10. Sometimes you really want to do something other than summon and Wizard is much better situated for that.

In any event I think I’ve decided to stick with dragon sorcerer for this encounter test.

 

[ECMO3]

Think you guys have more loot and gold than I hand out.

It depends on the game. 50 potions is about the same cost as plate and the vast majority of games the warrior has enough for that by level 5.

If you buy 30, that will usually last a long time, sometimes an entire adventure (as you augment with stuff you buyfind, rests

Even if you only have enough for 5 at every town (250 gold), that is still going to usually be enough until you get more money to restock and it is relatively rare you can't afford 250 gold at that level. If they can't afford that kind of laydown for potions then they can't afford it for spell components either, and that takes som of the best spells off the table. You are not using things like Greater Restoration, Revivify, Protection from Evil and Good, Find Familiar ....

Games vary as far aswhat we can buy, but games where we can't buy PHB adventuring gear in whatever quantities we can afford and carry are rare..

 

[ECMO3]

Er...no, you can't guarantee that.

No you can't. But I have been in many games where we run out of arrows or bolts or players that have those weapons and don't use them have to start handing them off to the archers.

Running out of potions of healing in tier 2 has happened, but it is rare.

The reason is your archers are using 2+ arrows ever turn in combat.

Almost anyone can make generally usable arrows. It's a much bigger deal to find someone who can make healing potions.

You need time, materials and proficiency to make them. I would agree the materials are ubiquitous, the time generally isn't available to make them in the quantity you need.

The rules themselves even contradict this. Under the rules for Treasure, subsection Magic Item Values by Rarity, bolded for emphasis: "Common magic items can often be bought in a town or city. Uncommon and Rare magic items are usually found only in cities, and rarer magic items might be sold only in wondrous locations, such as the City of Brass or Sigil." The critical words "can often" mean "some of the time, but not all of the time".

Potions of healing are in the adventuring gear section of the PHB. Further "often" would be well often as in the antonym of uncommon. So even if you are not going to allow them all the time what that bolded section means is it would be uncommon for potions not to be available in a town .... meaning the players can often buy them, which is the same thing I said and why I used the qualifier "generally" in my statement above. Not always, but often.

It is entirely within the DM's purview to say that a town has no magic items at all, including potions. Or that some kinds of magic items can be bought, but potions aren't one of them. Or that a tiny handful of potions are on hand, but no more.

Sures if for some reason they want to make common adventturing gear unavailable and throw roadblocks in front of their players to make 2nd wind more valuable as a healing option, but I don't think that is common practice as far as potions of healing go. I think they "often" are available at every town.

A DM could do the same with arrows if he wanted: Arrowheads are not commonly available so they can't be made or bought in quanitity. That way foghter-archers would be forced to melee. That way they could not get out of melee by just using tactical shift.

A DM could do either of these things, but why would they?

You are presuming dramatically more availability than the rules actually describe.

Generally adventuring gear is available for purchase in quantity at towns. That is not always true (usually when there is a plot line limiting availability. But it is generally true with every one of the 50+ DMs I have played 5E with.

I have only played 2024 with a handful of DMs and 2024 is where the rules on potions changed dramatically and drove us to buying them in quantity. Prior to this I was not stocking them in quanity, so maybe this is something that will change because DMs don't like players getting so many, but I have not seen it yet.

No, you can't. That's what I'm telling you. This simply isn't true. I have had MANY DMs--including 5e DMs--who explicitly and directly contradicted this.

So what does "often" mean for the DMs you play with? Does that mean you usually can't buy potions of healing?

Further what if you come to a city, or your home base is a city. Are they available then? Do you just not allow players to buy potions of healing specifically because you do not want them doing what I am talking about.

Finally we have bastions which can produce them in large quantity.

Now as I said you can put a stop to all this as a DM, but why would you?

I have never seen a group capable of buying over 100 healing potions at level 5. (Assuming a group of 4-5, you'd need over 100, typically 120-150).

Most published adventures will provide enough funds to do this.

 

[tetrasodium]

It depends on the game. 50 potions is about the same cost as plate and the vast majority of games the warrior has enough for that by level 5.

If you buy 30, that will usually last a long time, sometimes an entire adventure (as you augment with stuff you buyfind, rests

Even if you only have enough for 5 at every town (250 gold), that is still going to usually be enough until you get more money to restock and it is relatively rare you can't afford 250 gold at that level. If they can't afford that kind of laydown for potions then they can't afford it for spell components either, and that takes som of the best spells off the table. You are not using things like Greater Restoration, Revivify, Protection from Evil and Good, Find Familiar ....

Games vary as far aswhat we can buy, but games where we can't buy PHB adventuring gear in whatever quantities we can afford and carry are rare..

That sounds more like ddo than the ttrpg version of d&d where a real flesh & blood human takes the role of gm.your description of what you regularly present as big standard examples of gameplay is so incredibly unique im wondering if you happen to play in a group with 29-39 regular AI users?

 

[Ashrym]

Right, but there also seems to be an assumption in there that casters will need rest more often for spells than martials need to for hp.

That assumption is there because we're comparing spell slots that require a long rest to recover to martial abilities that require a short rest to recover. The martials are actually resting more often but the rest can be done many times while the casters are still taking that one rest.

I like the mercy monk. Unloading focus points on hand of healing and then taking a short rest refills those focus points to do it again. That can be done many times while casters are taking the time to recover their spell slots.

I like the world tree barbarian. Taking a rest recovers a use of rage that powers vitality of the tree for temp hit points that mitigate damage.

Those are two pretty solid options.

We often build are parties with the assumption that we'll rely on spells. We can build our parties with the assumption that we won't rely on spells.