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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Sage Genesis" data-source="post: 6911178" data-attributes="member: 6706099">It's not entirely unprecedented. Monte Cook's Arcana Unearthed/Evolved used this as a cornerstone for its spellcasting system. 13th Age also allows a very freeform "ritual" system where you use up a spell for a different but related effect. In my experience, this kind of flexibility can enhance the enjoyment of the game (and what higher priority is there than that?).A couple of things though.First, keep in mind the potential for abuse, malign and accidental. Exercise caution and if something seems too difficult to balance on the fly then just err on the side of lower power or just disallow this particular effect. Second, make sure this doesn't overshadow the non-casters. Spellcasters already have some advantages over non-casters in 5e, so giving them more tools at their disposal is risky. This really depends on the players and their characters per individual game.Third, I would mostly allow this in cases of "filling in the blanks". There were vermin-warding spells in previous editions, for example, but none in 5e as far as I'm able to tell. So if a caster wants to spend a first level slot on a "Bug Bomb" version of Cloudkill, that is fine. If the player just wants to have Cloudkills that are exactly strong enough to kill whatever he happens to face at the moment, thereby saving up higher level slots, I would be less inclined to grant it.</blockquote>