D&D (2024) Fireball is a C Tier Spell

[Maxperson]

So...

We're stuck with monsters that barely change, but getting none of the alleged benefits of reusing monsters in large numbers as the design intended?

I don't think the design intends that monsters continue to be used, but in larger number. The design ALLOWS it, which is different.

Edit: I also think that if you are doing that just so fireball can work, that just proves that fireball doesn't work right.

 

[Staffan]

Wasn't that the whole point of 5e's design, though? To make large numbers of weak enemies specifically a usable threat? If it's failed to do that, whether because they aren't a threat or because they're too annoying to actually use, it would seem to be a pretty significant admission either way.

They can pose a threat as a group, particularly if you don't have AOE to deal with them. There is a point where enough opponents with attack +5 and dealing 5 damage per hit equal one with attack +8 and dealing 15 points per hit. Plus, large number of opponents tend to be hit point sinks. I remember a fight in Princes of the Apocalypse where the party were fighting some bulettes, and the druid summoned a throng of giant bats surrounding one of them. This basically locked down that bulette entirely, because while the bulette deals a fairly large amount of damage it's not enough to one-shot a giant bat, which meant that it needed two rounds to deal with each bat.

But just because they mathematically pose enough threat that doesn't mean that using 24 opponents in one fight is a good idea. 24 opponents requires tracking 24 opponents – how many hit points do they have, do they have any conditions inflicted by the PCs, do they have any limited resources, and so on. And if you're using minis, well, that's 24 minis to move around on the battlemap. That's a lot of work for the DM. Again, this is a situation where 4e had the right solution with its 1 hp minions, but that was too gamey for most people.

 

[Guest 7037866]

I believe that was furball, it's feline cousin.

Ah... my mistake.

 

[DEFCON 1]

So...

We're stuck with monsters that barely change, but getting none of the alleged benefits of reusing monsters in large numbers as the design intended?

To me that's not a design problem, that's a DM problem. I suspect we just have a whole crap-ton of not very creative DMs out there. If the DM throws out a horde encounter of low-level foes every dozen or so encounters and the player are bored with that (and yet for some reason aren't bored with singular solo monster encounters or equal-numbers-to-the party encounters)... that's the DM just setting up the scenarios in a very interesting way to make that horde encounter logical and narratively important.

 

[Belen]

Fireball should have the added effect that it sets people who fail their saves on fire and continues to burn unless you take a full action to stop, drop, and roll.

 

[Maxperson]

Ah... my mistake.

No worries! It's an easy one to make.

 

[Maxperson]

Fireball should have the added effect that it sets people who fail their saves on fire and continues to burn unless you take a full action to stop, drop, and roll.

And go back to destroying items.

 

[DEFCON 1]

But just because they mathematically pose enough threat that doesn't mean that using 24 opponents in one fight is a good idea. 24 opponents requires tracking 24 opponents – how many hit points do they have, do they have any conditions inflicted by the PCs, do they have any limited resources, and so on. And if you're using minis, well, that's 24 minis to move around on the battlemap. That's a lot of work for the DM. Again, this is a situation where 4e had the right solution with its 1 hp minions, but that was too gamey for most people.

At some point I think the DM just needs to man up and deal with it.

Sometimes the DM just has to risk the "oh-so-difficult" situation of sliding 24 counters across a grid every half-dozen sessions just so that the Wizard who loves fireball actually gets a chance to decimate enemies with it. I know that can be a hardship for some people [sarcasm intended] but at some point it is not inappropriate to ask the DM to every once in a while to work a little harder if they want to create exciting or different challenges for their players. That's what the job is.

Somehow we have DMs that seem perfectly happy with putting together and running high-level games with monsters that have piles upon piles of different features and abilities plus reacting to the players who have the same... and yet we also have DMs that think sliding two dozen tokens of 4 HP monsters across a grid is like asking them to having their teeth pulled. It's kind of silly in my opinion.

 

[Willie the Duck]

For years I have thought fireball is an over rated spells. But Zard you drunken kiwi how dare you say that. The designers even said it's overpowered!!!.

1. They made that comment years ago.
2. Most of the other damage dealing spells are D tier.

I think this last part is not emphasized enough when people mention that the devs called it overpowered. I don't have the actual quote from them, but the reasonable interpretation is that they thought they had overpowered fireball with regards to AoE spells in general because it was iconic. And it is -- it does higher damage than thunderwave and shatter and similar would suggest was the standard AoE damage progression, and with a serious uptick in area. It does what people expect out of an AoE spell, and is iconic for good reason (once again). Whether that makes it a good spell overall or not is a separate question.

And the answer to that is, generally, only in specific situations. Most notably when DMs use hordes of enemies, but also when players choose evoker or careful-spell sorcerer (or otherwise let them target their own front line in their blast radius). And, most notably, when the other options aren't going to be the optimal choice. This shows up frequently with groups that haven't gotten the so-often-touted crowd-control spells to work as well as the white rooms keep saying they are. That can be because they don't end up using them at the right time or they don't end up preparing the right ones compared to the challenges they will face or the rest of their party is not built to (or simply doesn't) capitalize on the control the spellcasters put down. Fireball is best for beer&pretzel gaming, but hey... a lot of people play beer&pretzel D&D.

The last time it was a good spell was 3.5. I would rate it as B tier there. Remember those broken 3.5 meta builds built around fireball and the warmage? No neither do I. It was B+ in 3.0 and A tier in 2E.

2e is probably the peek for fireball -- hp totals are still low, the area of effect is as big as it will get, it auto-scales*, and people likely have figured out how not to accidentally blow up their own party. Most importantly, without assumed gp=xp, you were less likely than the rest of the TSR era to accidentally vaporize all your precious xp in the winning of the fight.
*up to 10d6-only, but honestly how frequent were you actually getting off 28d6 (or whatever) fireballs in 1st edition?

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Wasn't that the whole point of 5e's design, though?

No, it wasn't.

It was to try and strip back the burdensome and restrictive rules to something looser and more flexible.