D&D 5E Cantrip nerf (house rule brainstorm)

[doctorbadwolf]

To put it another, very simple way, 5e brought the caster power ceiling down a lot, but also raised the floor. By getting rid of damage cantrips, you're dropping the floor basically back to what it used to be, but the ceiling is still lower.

But the ceiling is still at least as high as it is for martials, so....so what?

 

[Mistwell]

At lower levels, crossbows are on par with cantrips, if not a touch better, as long as your DEX is at least 14. As you level up, though, problems start to appear:

1. You just nerfed Quicken Spell into the ground.
2. Realistically, your only option when casting a bonus action spell is Dodge.
3. Druids and Bards rely heavily on Concentration spells and have very, very few fire-and-forget spells. Taking away Vicious Mockery, Thorn Whip, Produce Flame, etc is a pretty serious nerf to these classes, because it's a long time before they'll be able to do much else with their action.
4. Cantrips are a key feature for EKs.
5. Boosting cantrip damage is a pretty important feature of Dragon Soul sorcerers and several cleric subclasses. Are they going to get a replacement for having this feature nerfed?

I'm sure there's more.

1. He's still giving limited uses of cantrips, and those limits track fine with your uses of Quicken Spell, so I disagree it's "nerfed into the ground."
2. Why? You shoot your crossbow and cast Healing Word. Works fine.
3. It's not "taken away" he just limited it to X uses per short rest. Plus your claim is just plain incorrect on Druids and Bards. Both get LOTS and LOTS of non-concentration spells. Is your Druid simply not casting Thunderwave or Ice Knife? No Erupting Earth? Does your Bard not have dissonant whispers, earth tremor, sleep, blindness, or shatter? Obviously this house rule will influence spell choices, but both should do fine with this.
4. TWO. You learn TWO cantrips with an EK until level 10. But sure, if you feel this impacts them too much, I'd make an exception for the two cantrips an EK chooses.
5. I don't even know what a Dragon Soul sorcerer is? But sure, if I were to houserule this I would go through subclasses and perhaps tweak the subclass to adjust to this rule if it's particularly impacted.

 

[TwoSix]

At lower levels, crossbows are on par with cantrips, if not a touch better, as long as your DEX is at least 14. As you level up, though, problems start to appear:

1. You just nerfed Quicken Spell into the ground.
2. Realistically, your only option when casting a bonus action spell is Dodge.
3. Druids and Bards rely heavily on Concentration spells and have very, very few fire-and-forget spells. Taking away Vicious Mockery, Thorn Whip, Produce Flame, etc is a pretty serious nerf to these classes, because it's a long time before they'll be able to do much else with their action.
4. Cantrips are a key feature for EKs.
5. Boosting cantrip damage is a pretty important feature of Dragon Soul sorcerers and several cleric subclasses. Are they going to get a replacement for having this feature nerfed?

I'm sure there's more.

To be fair, this is only really needful if you thought 5e was somewhat balanced before.

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

Situationally, if Mold Earth and Mending etc are infinitely spammable, they put whole occupations out of work. Moving a 5ft cube of earth 5 feet every 6 seconds (or whatever time a round represents these days) basically makes shovels obsolete, Prestidigitation does the same for pretty much any cleaning task, and Mending means that stuff absolutely never need wear out or remain broken, and the implications of THAT on the economics of people trying to make a living from (for instance) tailoring or shoemaking or damn near any form of craftsmanship are pretty obvious.

Of course, this need never bother you in a game if you choose not to think about it, unless a PC decides to set up a 'we repair anything in 6 seconds!' shop. But it does have big implications on the implied setting.

I'm not aware of any settings where that kind of magic is explicitly stated as being learnable by anyone. Even inj Eberron where magewright training is a thing that allows more people access to it than any other setting, it is much more limited than the PC-level magic.

The thing that would concern me with this, is cantrips already lag martial attacks by martial claseses (Agonizing blast excepted) and if you nerf them the martial classes will just be flat better than the casting classes.

I'll worry about cantrip damage lagging behind martial at-will damage when martial's resource-spend options are as powerful and versatile as spells.

 

[embee]

Situationally, if Mold Earth and Mending etc are infinitely spammable, they put whole occupations out of work. Moving a 5ft cube of earth 5 feet every 6 seconds (or whatever time a round represents these days) basically makes shovels obsolete, Prestidigitation does the same for pretty much any cleaning task, and Mending means that stuff absolutely never need wear out or remain broken, and the implications of THAT on the economics of people trying to make a living from (for instance) tailoring or shoemaking or damn near any form of craftsmanship are pretty obvious.

Of course, this need never bother you in a game if you choose not to think about it, unless a PC decides to set up a 'we repair anything in 6 seconds!' shop. But it does have big implications on the implied setting.

This is my wizard, Garak. His backstory is that he was a humble tailor in his village of Terok Nor. Why does he have a proficiency in Deception, Persuasion, and Stealth?

No reason.

 

[fearsomepirate]

But the ceiling is still at least as high as it is for martials, so....so what?

In many situations, it isn't.

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

In many situations, it isn't.

OK. So which martial classes do you feel overshadow primary casters in the three pillars of the game, and what are their abilities that allow them to do so?

 

[Jaeger]

A bugbear about 5e (for me at least) was the idea of unlimited spammable cantrips for casters. To us 'get off my lawn' grognards, this seems a touch excessive.

I had an idea for a nerf...

The right way for 'get off my lawn' grognards to deal with cantrips is to bring True Vancian Magic back to D&D!

So in that spirit... Death to cantrips! We're gonna Make Vancian Magic Great Again! MVMGA!

Here's what we do:

Cantrips Known = Universal Spell Slots

Cantrips known are now Universal spell Slots. Which you can use for any spells that you have access to equal to 1/2 your level.

So a level 10 wizard with spell slots for levels 1,2,3,4,5. Can use his 5 universal spell slots for level 1,2, or 3 spells.

So Wizards will start with 5 total spell slots - 2 1st level, 3 universal. Which of course means that at low levels Casters are able to use a lot of 1st and 2nd level spells.

And if their are class abilities that allow boosts to cantrips Casters get to apply that to their spells.

Now here's the MVMGA catch:

In true Vancian Magic fashion; All Spell Slots must have their spells selected each day - for the day. (Or when that Spell slot is again available at the End of a Long Rest.)

At the end of a Long Rest they can switch spells in a slot if it has gone unused.

Thinking ahead will be a thing. If they think wrong... that's just the way the Vancian cookie crumbles!

Now you know why Gandalf carried a sword. So get in there and cut that Filthy Orc down!

In the true spirit of MVMGA, I have no idea what the knock on effects of this would be for Caster PC's or in a campaign, as precisely Zero playtesting has been done.

But that doesn't really matter...

Because True Vancian Magic is Back Baby!

We're gonna make it Great Again, and it's Gonna be Good.

So True.

 

[jmartkdr2]

OK. So which martial classes do you feel overshadow primary casters in the three pillars of the game, and what are their abilities that allow them to do so?

Not the same guy but: paladins.

Exploration: spells (quite a few handy divinations on the paladin list) and a mount, which adds an extra perception roll. The high save mods make them good at dealing with hazards, by pushing through them.

Social: high charisma usually coupled with good social standing. Paladins are champions of good and everyone knows it. Jives well with the more prestigious backgrounds like noble, soldier, and acolyte.

Combat: Divine Smite and Aura of Protection.

Not so hot at ranged encounters or dealing positively with the underworld, but it's fun to let other people shine sometimes.

Incidentally, also immune to cantrip nerfing.

 

[fearsomepirate]

1. He's still giving limited uses of cantrips, and those limits track fine with your uses of Quicken Spell, so I disagree it's "nerfed into the ground."

So it's pointless book-keeping for no functional change? As I said, either you're nerfing the casters hard, or you're making the resource plentiful enough that there is no meaningful difference between what you did and just making cantrips at-will other than needing to do more book-keeping in combat. If the cleric can still use his 2d8+4 cantrip instead of his 1d8+2 crossbow whenever he casts Healing Word, why bother with the book-keeping at all?

4. TWO. You learn TWO cantrips with an EK until level 10. But sure, if you feel this impacts them too much, I'd make an exception for the two cantrips an EK chooses.

Just wanted to point out the absurdity of nerfing caster cantrips for thematic reasons, but still giving them to the Fighter.