Cantrip House Rule

[FrogReaver]

OP, do you think this would be a good alternative way to go at the problem?

Cantrip Scalling for levelled spells:
When you reach 5th level your single target damage spells (same limitation as Twinned spell maybe?) can be cast with the lowest level spell slot possible as if they were cast with a 1 level higher spell slot. At level 11th level they can be cast as if using a spell slot 2 levels higher spell slot. At 17th level they can be cast as if using a spell slot 3 levels higher spell slot. This only aplies to spells of 5th level or lower.

What makes you think there is a problem?

 

[André Soares]

What makes you think there is a problem?

sorry, that's not what I meant. I meant problem like in a math problem, the challenge, the puzzle, the thing we're trying to work out. I personally prefer to create house rules that give players stuff instead of taking things away from them. So I thought that maybe instead of bringing cantrip power down we could power up damage spells (wich I really think are kind of meh in 5e).

I don't really think your option would break the game, it would change it of course, but not break it. I think it's worth trying with your players if they are ok with the house rule, just went at it by another angle, and could be an option if your players don't feel good about having their classes nerfed.

 

[FrogReaver]

sorry, that's not what I meant. I meant problem like in a math problem, the challenge, the puzzle, the thing we're trying to work out. I personally prefer to create house rules that give players stuff instead of taking things away from them. So I thought that maybe instead of bringing cantrip power down we could power up damage spells (wich I really think are kind of meh in 5e).

I don't really think your option would break the game, it would change it of course, but not break it. I think it's worth trying with your players if they are ok with the house rule, just went at it by another angle, and could be an option if your players don't feel good about having their classes nerfed.

In that context your solution would be a solution for a different “problem”.

I much prefer house rules to give stuff than take atuff away but I don’t find that a practical approach since I also want fairness and giving something extra for nothing isn’t my idea of fair.

First level damage spells may well be underpowered compared to cantrips in the later tiers and I’ve made that case on other threads but this proposed change should be viewed independently of that belief even if it does end up coincidentially changing that as well.

Like I said earlier I’m leaning more toward this to be an additional option alongside normal 5e cantip rules. A player could choose to play a caster either my way or the normal way. So it needs to be balanced with it.

by the way thanks for offering actual analysis of my idea as well. That’s what this thread was started for.

 

[FrogReaver]

There's the problem of utility casters not being able to take as many utility spells because now they have to take combat-applicable spells rather than using their combat cantrips. So yes, they have more slots, but they either take all the utility spells they want and not contribute much to combat, or become less versatile outside combat in order to contribute more in combat.

This change has a lot of implications and I would not play in a game where it was implemented.

I get that you don't want people asking why, but I think that's sort of the point here. If we knew why you were implementing this change, which a lot of posters don't seem to think will work the way you want, we could offer alternatives or tweaks. But without knowing the intent of the rule change, it's hard to frame responses in the proper context.

If all you want is for people to not use cantrips, this rule will absolutely do that. But if you're looking for more of a tonal shift or emulating the feel of another edition or something along those lines, there may be a better way to do it. Good feedback depends on context. It's not an attempt to say you're wrong or that your intent is wrong. It's an honest attempt to try to find the best way to get 5E to do what you want it to do. That's the beauty of 5E: it's fairly easy to hack to get it to do what you want it to do. But to get there, knowing the intent and the end goal is key.

The concept still works it just doesn’t work out mechanically exactly the same. Of course there will be slight changes. Do those slight changes kill the whole concept? I don’t think so and I don’t think you reallly think so either.

Taking 1-2 damage spells and mostly utility spells while rarely using the damage spells is essentially the same concept as taking all utility spells and never using a damage spell except a cantrip.

You are still playing a utility wizard concept in either case. The mechanical representation that you previously used to play such a concept is no exactly longer there, but that just means the mechanical way to play that concept has changed.

 

[André Soares]

In that context your solution would be a solution for a different “problem”.

I much prefer house rules to give stuff than take atuff away but I don’t find that a practical approach since I also want fairness and giving something extra for nothing isn’t my idea of fair.

First level damage spells may well be underpowered compared to cantrips in the later tiers and I’ve made that case on other threads but this proposed change should be viewed independently of that belief even if it does end up coincidentially changing that as well.

Like I said earlier I’m leaning more toward this to be an additional option alongside normal 5e cantip rules. A player could choose to play a caster either my way or the normal way. So it needs to be balanced with it.

by the way thanks for offering actual analysis of my idea as well. That’s what this thread was started for.

Giving the player the choice is a good option indeed. As for the argument of fairness, well, that's kind of subjective. If all players agree with a house rule, who it would be unfair to? I don't think your house rule is leally balanced, I'm not certain the summ of the limitations on cantrips and the power up to spell slots equals zero, but again, it does not braek the game. If it ends up making the characters weaker, just give them the opportunity to back out of the house rule and come back to RAW. If it makes casters way stronger and makes the martial players feel less usefull, talk to the group and revise/strip the rule. In both cases the important thing is how the group feel about it. Encounter and monster CRs are ajustable and with time you would find the right balance.

 

[FrogReaver]

Giving the player the choice is a good option indeed. As for the argument of fairness, well, that's kind of subjective. If all players agree with a house rule, who it would be unfair to? I don't think your house rule is leally balanced, I'm not certain the summ of the limitations on cantrips and the power up to spell slots equals zero, but again, it does not braek the game. If it ends up making the characters weaker, just give them the opportunity to back out of the house rule and come back to RAW. If it makes casters way stronger and makes the martial players feel less usefull, talk to the group and revise/strip the rule. In both cases the important thing is how the group feel about it. Encounter and monster CRs are ajustable and with time you would find the right balance.

What do you think is unbalanced about it?

Keep in mind balance doesn’t actually mean exactly the same in overall power, it just means close enough in overall power level.

 

[André Soares]

What do you think is unbalanced about it?

Keep in mind balance doesn’t actually mean exactly the same in overall power, it just means close enough in overall power level.

The thing that might change the power level in this is that you are removing straight damage, wich is not a big focus of the affected classes to give them versatility wich is a big deal for casters. Not telling what the caster can do with the slot means they will use for anything they want, and more acces to spells that interfere with the action economy and/or remove enemies from combat can tip the scale very heavilly, in any tier of play.

What I mean about balance is not sctrictly power level, but being able to use the Raw notions of power to create encounters. If the option isn't balanced, it will affect the way you have to create encounters for your party, if you want to know if the enconter is easy or deadly...

That said, I'm not stating that IT IS unbalanced, nor that caster will be too weak or too powerfull, I'm not that good of a designer to state that without playtests, my only argument is, it has a good chance to happen, so be ready to ajust your game around that.

 

[squibbles]

I commented on [MENTION=6795602]FrogReaver[/MENTION]'s proposed changes in an earlier post (summary; the balance is probably fine but I suspect the changes would not be much fun), but have had some further thoughts while continuing to read the thread.

To compensate for the lack of scaling cantrips I would reward casters with extra spell slots. I'm leaning toward 1 extra spell slot of each level up to level 6 spells. You would gaub the extra spell slot immediately upon reaching the level where you first gain that spell slot. For example a level 5 Wizard would have spell slots of 5 level 1, 4 level 2, 3 level 3 but his cantrips would not scale.

Casters would scale with more spell slots, more powerful spell slots and more powerful spells. So my take is that removing cantrip scaling doesn't go against any of that.

The design principle underlying cantrip scaling is that 5e aims for a balanced rate of power acquisition across classes. All the classes get a power spike at 5th, 11th, and 17th levels, usually from multiple features at once, i.e. rogues at 5th get uncanny dodge but also +1d6 sneak attack. I would argue that this design principle is positive for inter-class balance, the feel of character progression, and the codification of 5e's heroic fantasy sweet spot.

Cantrip scaling is a junior partner in the power spike of full caster classes--the main spikes are 3rd, 6th, and 9th level spells--but cantrip scaling is part of that power spike. Consequently, if you want to get rid of cantrips and replace them with additional spell slots, you would do the best job at maintaining balance by granting those spell slots at levels 5, 11, and 17, rather than 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, and 11.

One effect of the proposed change is that level 1-4 casters would become noticeably stronger relative to martials. A less obvious effect is that the power acquisition rate of casters would become relatively smoother than that of martials. A messier effect is that you'd need to decide how the change affects 1/2 and 1/3 casters; either they would keep their normal progression, which makes spell slots from multiclassing wonky, or they would get more slots, which would be undesirable for 1/2 casters since they don't get cantrips. A serious drawback, which others have pointed out, is that clerics with cantrip damage features would be significantly penalized relative to clerics with melee damage features. None of these consequences would break the game, but I think you could trade cantrip scaling for spell slots in ways that circumvent these problems.

I think I'd go with more low level slots only. Maybe 3 extra 1st level slots at 5th, 3 extra 2nd level slots at 11th, and 3 extra 3rds at whatever the next level is that cantrips scale up at.

This suggestion strikes me as better suited to 5e's normal power progression, but it also seems a little bit awkward. 3rd level spells are one of those big power spikes that caster classes get--so, while trading +1dX to cantrip damage for three 1st level spell slots makes sense on its face, trading +1dX cantrip damage for three 3rd level spell slots seems like a bit much. Considering that the +1dX cantrip damage is MUCH less relevant at 17th level than at 5th, this seems like an undesirable change.

With my change cantrips would essentially be ribbons.

Yeah, makes sense. They'd just be fancy crossbow attacks--you might even give them 1dX+ability modifier damage (with smaller dice) to drive home that they're just fancy crossbow attacks.


My suggestion:

Don't change the base spell progression. Add/change specific features on a class by class basis that mitigate the removal of cantrip scaling; it's easier to avoid skewing the big interlocking game systems by changing/adding narrower game elements.

Full casters:

• At 5th level, each full caster gets a feature that allows it to cast 3 extra 1st level spells, from a preset list of damaging/healing spells on its class's spell list. These spells are cast as 2nd level spells when used. Once cast, they recover after a long rest. Spells known casters learn one spell from the list to make sure that they can use the feature. These spells are not recoverable with arcane recovery or natural recovery.
• At 11th level, they can cast 5 extra 1st or 2nd level spells, also from a preset list, upcast to 3rd level.
• At 17th level, they can cast 6 extra 1st or 2nd level spells, upcast to 4th level.

Clerics with potent spellcasting:
They upcast spells one level higher than normal with the above feature instead of getting cantrip damage, i.e. 3rd level when they get this feature, 5th level at 17.

Warlocks:
They retain cantrip scaling (as mentioned in the OP).

Paladins and rangers:
No change.

Eldritch knights:
The war magic feature is replaced. The new feature allows them to use any or all of the attacks they make with their attack action to cast a damaging cantrip instead.

Arcane tricksters:
They get no compensation for losing cantrip damage, but GFB and BB are suboptimal compared to two weapon fighting anyway.

 

[CrimsonCarcharodon]

The concept still works it just doesn’t work out mechanically exactly the same. Of course there will be slight changes. Do those slight changes kill the whole concept? I don’t think so and I don’t think you reallly think so either.

Taking 1-2 damage spells and mostly utility spells while rarely using the damage spells is essentially the same concept as taking all utility spells and never using a damage spell except a cantrip.

You are still playing a utility wizard concept in either case. The mechanical representation that you previously used to play such a concept is no exactly longer there, but that just means the mechanical way to play that concept has changed.

I never said that it kills the whole concept. I said it makes them less utility-oriented because now some of their spells known are going to combat spells rather than utility. I'm pointing out a consequence of your rules change, which seems like the whole point of the thread.

 

[FrogReaver]

I never said that it kills the whole concept. I said it makes them less utility-oriented because now some of their spells known are going to combat spells rather than utility. I'm pointing out a consequence of your rules change, which seems like the whole point of the thread.

Well what you did say was:

There's the problem of utility casters not being able to take as many utility spells because now they have to take combat-applicable spells rather than using their combat cantrips. So yes, they have more slots, but they either take all the utility spells they want and not contribute much to combat, or become less versatile outside combat in order to contribute more in combat.

This change has a lot of implications and I would not play in a game where it was implemented.

That kind of gave me the vibe that you thought these changes would have significant impact on such a character concept. I'm sorry if I misunderstood and am happy to hear that is not the case.