D&D 5E Does the "Friends" cantrip need a fix?

[famousringo]

With the exception of guidance (which in my opinion is a little too good) and damage causing cantrips, all other cantrips are very limited or subject to a lot of situational adjudication by the dm. Minor Illusion, Thaumaturgy, Dancing lights, and prestidigitation only have mechanically equitable effects if the DM basically invents them. Light can be replaced by a torch. True strike costs an action, thus rarely more equitable then just 2 attacks. Message in most situations can be accomplished with hand signals. Mending, situationally useful since there are no basic rules for items breaking through regular use.

What cantrips aside from damage causing and guidance are measurably better then friends?

When I look at cantrips, I think two general roles are being fielded in the design; basic at will weapons for casters, and minor magical abilities that are designed to advance the gestalt feel of 'magic' to the player. Where the light cantrip allows me to have light without a torch, friends allows me advantage to a cha checks without a friend. Had friends granted adv without a possible consequence (hostility) it would be (like guidance) too good as compared to other cantrips, and possibly grant charachters without a charisma focus a commensurate capability as those who do specialize in charisma (and that would be bad design).

I'll grant you that a lot of cantrips are mostly fluff, but as just one example, Light is way more useful than a torch.

First off, cast Light on your equipment and you free up a precious hand for larger weapons, shields, or spellcasting. When you want stealth instead of illumination, the 'lit' object can be hidden and revealed with a simple object interaction, while lighting and dousing a fire takes considerably more effort. The fact it illuminates without being a fire hazard can be quite valuable while exploring dusty, cobwebbed ruins. You can cast Light on an arrow and illuminate something much farther than you can throw a torch, or launch the arrow into a creature and use the light to help track it. Toss a 'lit' coin underwater to illuminate areas where fire doesn't work at all.

I'd make similar arguments for Message and Minor Illusion, and even fluffier cantrips like Prestidigitation can open up some clever tricks without automatically counterproductive consequences.

Light is way cool. It lights all sorts of things in ways they can't be lit without magic. Unlike the Friends spell, which is vastly better at making enemies than making friends and rarely better than simply taking your chances on a CHA check without advantage.

Guidance does Friends' job better than Friends does, which I don't think can be said of any other cantrip, despite Guidance being super powerful.

 

[Coredump]

All I can say is that when I look at the lists of cantrips I see 32 spells that I would use regularly without having to build a character around them. I see 3 spells that are way too situational to get regularly use: blade ward, truestrike, and friends. I guess friends is better than the other two, in that you can get regular use out of it if part of your character concept is "I want to constantly offend people and make new enemies."

Needless to say, I think all three of those cantrips fail.

Lets ignore the damage cantrips for now...

Blade Ward
Dancing lights
Druidcraft
Friends
Guidance
Light
Mage Hand
Mending
Message
Minor Illusion
Prestidigitation
Resistance
Spare the Dying
Thaumaturgy
True Strike

Gust
Mold Earth
Shape Water


As for the Good ones... Guidance, Mage Hand, Minor illusion..... After that you get a big drop off. They are all pretty niche, and the ones you will use more often tend to be the 'less powerful'.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

True Strike is essentially worthless save for circumstances where another attack isn't possibly or takes longer than one action to initiate (shooting a siege weapon or an arrow of slaying). Friends is closer to True Strike in terms of worthlessness.

Unfortunately the 30 foot range limitation on True Strike makes it effectively useless for siege weaponry and archery.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

Unfortunately the 30 foot range limitation on True Strike makes it effectively useless for siege weaponry and archery.

OK, rescinded. Dangit True Strike, stop sucking!

 

[PnPgamer]

to the op:
Yes the cantrip should be fixed.
it should be named Enemies

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

to the op:
Yes the cantrip should be fixed.
it should be named Enemies

"Frienemies"!

 

[Leatherhead]

I feel the need to point something out here:

The only part of Guidance that is powerful is it stacking with advantage.
Otherwise you are spending an action to gain an average of 2.5 bonus to a roll, which is less useful in normal play than just granting advantage with the Help action. And you can't even use it to give bonuses on attack rolls.

If you are using it to abuse stacking, it's good. Otherwise it's just banking an action with a service fee.

 

[zago]

[MENTION=6792445]famousringo[/MENTION]

I agree, but it's situational. Is light better for a high elf Arcane trickster? Probably not, darkvision diminishes much of the need for any light, and a rogue might be already engaging in 'hostile' actions against neutral individuals.

Also comparing divination cantrips and arcane cantrips isn't quite a great comparison. That being said I like all of the arcane cantrips, for what they are.
[MENTION=31506]ehren37[/MENTION]
True strike IS useful, it's only drawback is action economy in comparison to other classes, but not necessarily against enemies. Imagine a situation where a scouting arcane trickster, gets caught separated from the party. He can use his superior mobility (cunning action) to move far enough away to cast true strike between each alternating round of attack, sustaining his sneak attack. It's only when in a party of attacking individuals that spells like bladeward or true strike seem bad, i.e. I waste every other action when fighter doesn't waste any waste any action.

My main point is that a cantrip either needs to be weak, situationally useful, or require some creativity to be effective. Otherwise its too much of an advantage over other class abilities. Or conversely, the benefit they provide overshadows the primary mechanics, like actual spells. The limitations of minor illusion, prestidigitation and thaumaturgy are imposed by the system, but with the caveat that the DM can allow for unique uses and circumstantial effect. In the Mearls ran game for the people at the Nerdist, he allowed one individual to use Thaumaturgy to have such an effect as to grant advantage to that individuals next attack. This of course would make true strike seem weak if it was codified, but is an acceptable situational effect to many DM's.

 

[zago]

[MENTION=53176]Leatherhead[/MENTION]

I don't think the issue to guidance is that at all. I think the friction is felt most in non-combat scenarios, where a Cleric or druid can at low levels, perform unskilled skill rolls with a somewhat commensurate bonus as characters who are skilled.

Depends on group and players, but admittedly its annoying when you make your guy good at persuasion and fail checks, only to see the unskilled druid guidance his way into passing it. They spend one resource (cantrip) to get your proficiency bonus (lvls 1-8) to all skills.

I wouldn't call it broken, just a bit irritating. In our group we house ruled in a number of 'interpretations' that limit it. NPC's know what it is, and if you cast guidance around them, they hear it and know its effect which can make them apprehensive to exchanges. Some could passively refuse to negotiate with someone who uses a spell to influence the outcome of a barter or agreement. We also inhibit the ability to use it in situations like stealth, where the 'prayer' would alert others of your presence before the check. This doesn't really limit it all together that much, just means the player needs to 'plan' to use it. In our group it is much more difficult to use it spontaneously.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

[MENTION=6792445]famousringo[/MENTION]

I agree, but it's situational. Is light better for a high elf Arcane trickster? Probably not, darkvision diminishes much of the need for any light, and a rogue might be already engaging in 'hostile' actions against neutral individuals.

You might think darkvision obsoletes the Light cantrip, until you have a ranged combat under conditions of partial lighting, and then you realize that lighting control (including Dancing Lights) has the potentially to be simply incredible. Darkvision is extremely short-ranged, but if someone lights an enemy up with a torch you can fill him full of arrows from 600' away (or more if you use a ballista, and at advantage if you're a Sharpshooter), and he can't even reply effectively. Nor does he get a saving throw against being lit up. Lighting and cover are the two most powerful environmental advantages in 5E, followed by caltrop deployments and high cliffs to push people off of.

Note to self: when PCs land on the moon next week, try to make sure a fight happens in sheer mountainous terrain under a gigantic lunar shadow.