D&D 5E Fixing Eldritch Blast

[Greenstone.Walker]

An archer going up against a deadly threat can (and IME often does) poison his weapons:

That's not something I've ever seen in 2 years of 5E. Perhaps because none of the players in any of my games have taken the tool proficiency.

As for this thread, cantrips are there to remove the need for spellcasters to use crossbows. In 1E, it didn't feel very wizardly for you to cast your one magic missile and then spend the rest of the combat plinking away with a crossbow.

Unlike bows, cantrips do not run out of ammo and cannot be disarmed. They also do damage that is less resisted than nonmagical weapons.

As far as eldritch blast is concerned, it does the second best damage in the game, out to a range longer than the short range of every ranged weapon except one. With invocations, it adds ability score damage (admittedly, every ranged weapon already does this), it pushes the target back, and its range can be extended to well beyond the short range of every ranged weapon. Higher level Warlocks get extra attacks with it, so they can hammer one target or spread the damage out among many. It is by far the best damaging cantrip in the game.

On the other hand, an archer can fire inside a silence spell, which a warlock cannot.

 

[cbwjm]

A compelling argument, except they call out cantrips specifically.

I'm going of a copy of the chart in a word document that I copied from my DMG for ease of access, in the chart I have a d10 for single target and d6 for multitarget for cantrips. This seems to fit for cantrips in the PHB, 1d10 for firebolt, 1d6 for acid splash (which I honestly think should be 1d6 to everyone in a 5 foot radius, so a 2x2 square). Did I copy this out wrong, does the cantrip line have d12 for single target?

 

[Azzy]

I'm going of a copy of the chart in a word document that I copied from my DMG for ease of access, in the chart I have a d10 for single target and d6 for multitarget for cantrips. This seems to fit for cantrips in the PHB, 1d10 for firebolt, 1d6 for acid splash (which I honestly think should be 1d6 to everyone in a 5 foot radius, so a 2x2 square). Did I copy this out wrong, does the cantrip line have d12 for single target?

It's 1d10 in my DMG.

 

[Mistwell]

Using darkness + devil's sight means your not using other spells, like fireball.

Also, archery is dex based, with all those advantages.

Also, magic weapons.

The darkness + devil's sight tactic seems to be best on paper only. In practice, it's highly impractical unless you're running a solo campaign or, at best, two players. And that's because the darkness messes with all the other players as much as it messes with the foes.

That said, I think it would be great in a solo campaign. Or a campaign full of warlocks who all have it, which could also be fun.

 

[Yunru]

I'm going of a copy of the chart in a word document that I copied from my DMG for ease of access, in the chart I have a d10 for single target and d6 for multitarget for cantrips. This seems to fit for cantrips in the PHB, 1d10 for firebolt, 1d6 for acid splash (which I honestly think should be 1d6 to everyone in a 5 foot radius, so a 2x2 square). Did I copy this out wrong, does the cantrip line have d12 for single target?

It's a d10. It's the paragraph above that changes the damage if it doesn't have DoaM/S.

 

[Yunru]

The darkness + devil's sight tactic seems to be best on paper only. In practice, it's highly impractical unless you're running a solo campaign or, at best, two players. And that's because the darkness messes with all the other players as much as it messes with the foes.

That said, I think it would be great in a solo campaign. Or a campaign full of warlocks who all have it, which could also be fun.

Or a party where everyone has at least two levels of GOO Warlock, muhahahah!

 

[cbwjm]

It's a d10. It's the paragraph above that changes the damage if it doesn't have DoaM/S.

Ah okay, I will have to reread the spell design rules. Perhaps they treat cantrips differently due to their at-will nature but didn't think to clarify that in the text.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

That is strange, especially given it only shafts melee builds.

I know. Previously I had thought that they were deliberately allowing poisons to last for a full minute on melee weapons as deliberate compensation for the weakness of melee, whereas archers only got three poisoned shots. But it turns out that the 1-minute duration thing is only supposed to be for PHB "Basic Poison," not for DMG poisons; whereas the 3-pieces-of-ammunition rule applies to everything.

Of course as DM I'm perfectly comfortable overriding their rules. Letting a weapon stay poisoned for a full minute not only gives some badly-needed help to melee builds, it's also consistent with the way poison works for creatures like Drow Elite Warriors with their poisoned blades.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Thanks for the maths. I will always leave the maths for someone else, but I think it seems OK at the lower levels especially as Bards get no other combat cantrip bar thunderclap which is kind of too dangerous to use up close.

Sure, but everything is decent at the lower levels, including a plain old crossbow, which unlike vanilla Eldritch Blast automatically gets your +Dex to damage.

so.......Close burst 2 it actually is then?

Making it an AoE seems a bit weird to me, since there's no particular reason why an insult out to insert all creatures sufficiently close to you. (Maybe if it were an odor instead of an insult that would make sense.) IMO it's more appropriate to have it impose disadvantage on a full round of attacks. Alter as follows:

You unleash a string of insults laced with subtle enchantments at a creature you can see within range. If the target can hear you (though it need not understand you), it must succeed on a wisdom saving throw or take 1d4 psychic damage and have disadvantage on [the next attack roll it makes before] attack rolls until the end of its next turn.

That makes it like a small, bad*, but cheap version of Fear with some psychic damage as a bonus.

* Short-duration and single-target, reduced effects compared to Fear. No action denial, no movement restrictions, no penalty to ability checks. Fear blows it out of the water, but Fear isn't free.

 

[rgoodbb]

Apologies. I was trying (unsuccessfully) to make a funny.