D&D General In defense of Shocking Grasp

[Silam]

Its not a bad cantrip.

The problem is that cantrip slots are limited and it is competing with True Strike, which has:
more damage,
is resisted less,
works at extended range and in melee,
applies the benefits of a magic weapon,
is compatible with weapon masteries if you have access to them.

If you want to have utility cantrips, and so can only spare one cantrip slot on offense, it is hard to justify picking Shocking Grasp.

The True Strike redesign is unfortunate…

It deviates significantly from the original flavor, which was to give a significant boost to the chance to hit of another attack, at a significant cost in terms of actions. So that niche the original spell design filled is now empty. I guess the Rogue’s Steady Aim is maybe what comes closest to the original TS flavor at this point, but anyhow.

And the fact that the new TS is broadly considered to be so good that no other cantrips can compete, is a balance smell.

Oh well… I do still think Shocking Grasp is fantastic, and the ability to disengage (from a single adjacent foe, at any rate) while also doing damage is fantastic both mechanically and flavor-wise. I wish they retained the advantage against metallically-clad opponents (actually, it may be a decent house rule to simply give that to all lightning damage in the game… that element might need a bit of love).

 

[W'rkncacnter]

Oh well… I do still think Shocking Grasp is fantastic, and the ability to disengage (from a single adjacent foe, at any rate) while also doing damage is fantastic both mechanically and flavor-wise. I wish they retained the advantage against metallically-clad opponents (actually, it may be a decent house rule to simply give that to all lightning damage in the game… that element might need a bit of love).

the only thing that makes me hesitant about that is it disproportionately screws over pcs who already have terrible dex saves (because all the saves vs lightning in 5e are dex for some insane reason)

 

[Silam]

the only thing that makes me hesitant about that is it disproportionately screws over pcs who already have terrible dex saves (because all the saves vs lightning in 5e are dex for some insane reason)

What can I say? The Druids of yore were wise to protect themselves with leather and beast hide armors! Maybe they should be reminded of the old ways!

That said, at equal slots, in terms of Dex save, Fireball’s sphere AoE tends to outperform Lightning Bolt’s straight line AoE in most circumstances… and if you also make flammable stuff light up for FB but not for LB, the balance could be tipped even further… not bad to let LB catch up, IMHO.

 

[W'rkncacnter]

What can I say? The Druids of yore were wise to protect themselves with leather and beast hide armors! Maybe they should be reminded of the old ways!

ah yes, leather and hide, those armors that pair...so well with low dex characters. right.

but for real, 5e's terrible saving throws are kind of the entire problem here. they're implemented so terribly it's kind of sad.

That said, at equal slots, in terms of Dex save, Fireball’s sphere AoE tends to outperform Lightning Bolt’s straight line AoE in most circumstances… and if you also make flammable stuff light up for FB but not for LB, the balance could be tipped even further… not bad to let LB catch up, IMHO.

the problem is that'll only really help it catch up for npcs. monsters/npcs with metal armor aren't super common, so for players lightning bolt will still suck, it'll just be really annoying for the frontliners.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Don't even get me started on these white-room analyses.

My biggest pet peeve with white rooms are how they always use average dice results. I understand the reasoning, but it gives a false confidence...dice rolls are never that reliable! On your turn, you don't get to roll the d20 a bunch of times and average the result--you get to roll once, and that one roll is just as likely to be a 2 or 3 instead of a 10 or 11. Your white-room analysis needs to account for that.

Why should it give false confidence?

The thing you're asking to be accounted for already is accounted for. That's...literally why you multiply by the percentage chance to hit you have--and why hit bonuses are almost always better than equal-sized damage bonuses.

This gets even more applicable once you start making multiple attacks a turn, or when using AoE spells.

What more are we supposed to do? Pretend that the worst-case scenario always happens? Now martials never do any damage at all, outside of the Graze mastery, and spells do at most half damage. Surely that's dramatically worse than working with averages and multiplying by expected hit rate?

This is just statistics. The thing that backs up the entirety of modern science. Do you believe vaccines are still worth taking, even though there's always the chance that you end up being one of the bottom 10% in terms of beneficial response? If so, then why is that thinking invalid for game design analysis, but valid for something orders of magnitude more serious and important?

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I have had fun using shocking grasp. I have a guy who uses it and booming blade all the time.

 

[Zardnaar]

Why should it give false confidence?

The thing you're asking to be accounted for already is accounted for. That's...literally why you multiply by the percentage chance to hit you have--and why hit bonuses are almost always better than equal-sized damage bonuses.

This gets even more applicable once you start making multiple attacks a turn, or when using AoE spells.

What more are we supposed to do? Pretend that the worst-case scenario always happens? Now martials never do any damage at all, outside of the Graze mastery, and spells do at most half damage. Surely that's dramatically worse than working with averages and multiplying by expected hit rate?

This is just statistics. The thing that backs up the entirety of modern science. Do you believe vaccines are still worth taking, even though there's always the chance that you end up being one of the bottom 10% in terms of beneficial response? If so, then why is that thinking invalid for game design analysis, but valid for something orders of magnitude more serious and important?

Depends on how much damage youre trading off. Accuracy isnt as important in 5E vs 4E for example.

Old dragon article broke it down what's better + 1 to hit or damage. Generally its the damage.

More base damage is eg 1W vs 3W or +3d6 accuracy matters more. Eg Rogue. Spamming attacks its damage. Eg Monk.

-5 to hit +10 damage accuracy matters more eg 5.0.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Depends on how much damage youre trading off. Accuracy isnt as important in 5E vs 4E for example.

Old dragon article broke it down what's better + 1 to hit or damage. Generally its the damage.

More base damage is eg 1W vs 3W or +3d6 accuracy matters more. Eg Rogue. Spamming attacks its damage. Eg Monk.

-5 to hit +10 damage accuracy matters more eg 5.0.

As I said...an accuracy bonus of +N is generally worth the equivalent of about +2N raw damage, loosely speaking, at most hit rates players are likely to see (generally not lower than 40% hit chance, generally not much higher than 65% hit chance). +1 to hit is worth more than +1 damage but often not quite as good as +2 damage, when in that range. Lower, and hit is far far more valuable than damage. Higher, and damage clearly begins to outpace hit.

None of which really addresses the core of my argument. Statistical reasoning is valid in science. It is very literally how we can draw meaningful conclusions from incomplete data. That's why it was created. If it's appropriate to use it for civil engineering, aviation, medicine, and many more extremely serious things, then I don't understand how anyone can argue that it's completely unacceptable in something with near-zero stakes relative to these other things.

I effectively bet my life on statistics being the valid way to reason, on the regular. I have chronic medical conditions. Statistics, average performance for medicine, is how I know that my prescriptions should work for me. If that reasoning holds for something I'm getting my life on, I don't see how it becomes invalid when it's something I'm merely spending my free time doing.

 

[Zardnaar]

As I said...an accuracy bonus of +N is generally worth the equivalent of about +2N raw damage, loosely speaking, at most hit rates players are likely to see (generally not lower than 40% hit chance, generally not much higher than 65% hit chance). +1 to hit is worth more than +1 damage but often not quite as good as +2 damage, when in that range. Lower, and hit is far far more valuable than damage. Higher, and damage clearly begins to outpace hit.

None of which really addresses the core of my argument. Statistical reasoning is valid in science. It is very literally how we can draw meaningful conclusions from incomplete data. That's why it was created. If it's appropriate to use it for civil engineering, aviation, medicine, and many more extremely serious things, then I don't understand how anyone can argue that it's completely unacceptable in something with near-zero stakes relative to these other things.

I effectively bet my life on statistics being the valid way to reason, on the regular. I have chronic medical conditions. Statistics, average performance for medicine, is how I know that my prescriptions should work for me. If that reasoning holds for something I'm getting my life on, I don't see how it becomes invalid when it's something I'm merely spending my free time doing.

Think its build depending.

Chromatic orb abuse is the new obvious accuracy build.

Another might be celestial warlock+ devotion paladin. Some rogue builds or using their aim feature.

Martials and gish builds is adding more dice of damage (divine favor, hex, hunters mark, vicious/flametongue weapons) .

Adding advantage is aways nice and often easy.

A few interesting gish builds built around one big attack that you can add damage to after you hit or crit.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

i just like it because i think it's funny. "Man, shut the--" electropunch

same reason i like inflict wounds, actually, but i always see that as a pimp slap.

This is why i like giving spells to monks now, (since casting them doesnt interfere with fob). I just wish there was a gish subclass that could replace an attack with a cantrip.