D&D 5E Is the major thing that's disappointing about Sorcerers is the lack of sorcery point options?

[Tony Vargas]

...but you'll always be outclassed by the kid with System Mastery who can do all that better by choosing better options.

That's a matter of how well your choices are balanced. And, you're starting to posit a very newbie-hostile group, there, too.

I'm not sure that most warlord fans are satisfied with the BM's archetype emulation

I'm sure they're not. But the BM and, even more so, the EK, illustrate that you can have more and less complex vs newbie-friendly sub-classes within a single class.

I'm also not sure that many 4e fighter fans are satisfied with the BM's Defender-role emulation, so I think we've got a pretty clear example of more options not necessarily solving the issue

It's just another issue of not enough options, really. Not just the BM not having the options to emulate a 3e or 4e fighter, but the fighter chassis being impossible to hang a Warlord on. The needed additional option in that instance is a complete class.

I do think you could hypothetically weave a more complex, option-based pool of abilities on top of the sorcerer

You wouldn't need to, you'd probably need to simplify it a little, if you were looking to re-capture the 3e era build-to-concept flexibility.

"A lot of people might enjoy a more focused class more" doesn't mean that a broad, flexible class is wrong. It ain't really about right and wrong, it's about what you gain and what you lose

If you have both a concept-focused sub-class or few, and a concept-flexible sub-class, you have gained both and lost nothing.

(and I would suggest that your gains in using a broad, flexible class are probably not worth what you'd lose, but that's certainly a debatable opinion).

And thus an assertion that it's 'wrong' in the sense that it shouldn't be done. If it's not wrong, there's nothing wrong with wanting to see such a sub-class added in the future, now is there?

 

[abirdcall]

I think part of why people are seeing sorcerers as being pushed toward being "blaster" types is alongside the reason why others complain that dragon sorcerers "have to be fire" types - they think they need to have at least 1 in-theme damage-dealing spell at every spell level, instead of embracing the up-casting rules to do damage well enough with a smaller selection of attack spells.

I think it is a similar trap that people fall into with Warlocks. They see that Eldritch Blast is good so they take 2 of the invocations for it and cast Hex taking up one of their few spell slots and their concentration. Then they say that is all a Warlock can do. When Eldritch Blast is just fine on its own, the Warlock has great invocations, and great concentration spells available that scale well with level.

At 5th level the Sorcerer has 5 cantrips and 6 spells. If they take 2 damage cantrips and 1 or 2 high level spells for combat/damage that leaves 3 utility cantrips and 4-5 other spells. At that point I would rather be twinning cantrips than casting 1st level damage spells. There is little need for low-mid level combat spells, so cycle them as you gain levels.

 

[MoonSong]

...but you'll always be outclassed by the kid with System Mastery who can do all that better by choosing better options.

As opposed to being outclassed by literally any kid that just plain chooses the class that is so loved by the designers they can't just stop giving it toys, toys and more toys to play with?

Just what is wrong with a subclass that A) literally just lets you be very good at an utility niche and b) isn't so strongly flavored so you can choose the kind of flavor you are looking for, specially one that doesn't turn you into a freak or a deformed person?

The point I was responding to was that the warlock is "more flexible" than the sorcerer. My counterpoint is that they're about equally as flexible - a DM can ignore whatever. And if your DM is open to ignoring whatever and is fine with not enforcing the fluff of warlock pacts, that opens up playing a Wizard who uses CHA instead of INT or a Sorcerer who has spears if you want.

Fluff is not meaningless, just because a DM can rule 0 it out doesn't mean it isn't important or problematic.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Not "enforcing" the pact flavor (which I think is a bad idea. The player should feel free to use the mechanics to represent what they want to represent) is an entirely different thing from changing the mechanics, such as what stat is used to cast spells, or the proficiency or spell list.

MANY DMs will allow one, but not the other. Most DMs I know won't even consider changing fluff a thing the player needs the DM to allow, but definately consider any mechanical change to require direct DM permission.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Just what is wrong with a subclass that A) literally just lets you be very good at an utility niche and b) isn't so strongly flavored so you can choose the kind of flavor you are looking for

It's not what we were already given, so there must be something wrong with it!

Fluff is not meaningless, just because a DM can rule 0 it out doesn't mean it isn't important or problematic.

Fluff is not meaningless. But it can have a relatively low impact on things we tend to obsess over, like what's optimal and what's balanced and what isn't - it can be limited to the more or less cosmetic. It can be. It is coupled or entangled with various mechanics to varying degrees throughout the game, though. The DM can change fluff just like he can change rules, and I'm sure with less worry that it'll screw something up - sometimes, though, they're the same thing, the fluff and the rule can't be teased out.

Like psionics being or not being magic. It's fluff, but there are definite mechanical consequences to going one way or the other. It'd be nice if the player could just fluff-to-concept, but it's not practical this time around.

 

[I'm A Banana]

As opposed to being outclassed by literally any kid that just plain chooses the class that is so loved by the designers they can't just stop giving it toys, toys and more toys to play with?

I dunno which Class That Shall Not Be Named kicked your puppy here, but, no. As opposed to having a narrower suite of abilities that are a mix of flavorful and effective so that you can't just rate the top five light-blue or gold options and insist that that's what everyone should be playing. That's how System Mastery invalidates choice. The less broad and expansive and option-rich the environment, the less this bugbear rears its head.

Just what is wrong with a subclass that A) literally just lets you be very good at an utility niche and b) isn't so strongly flavored so you can choose the kind of flavor you are looking for, specially one that doesn't turn you into a freak or a deformed person?

A isn't a problem. B is kind of a problem because, as you say:

Fluff is not meaningless

This includes the idea that by definition, sorcerers are "freaks" with unusual magical origins that don't just happen to anyone.

just because a DM can rule 0 it out doesn't mean it isn't important or problematic.

Again, my only reason for pointing this out is to show that assertion that the Warlock is "more flexible" than the sorcerer by dint of being able to "ignore its fluff" is not an argument I buy. If you're willing to ignore warlock fluff, you can ignore a lot of "fluffy" things like spellcasting ability scores and simple weapon proficiencies and the idea that you have a fairly unique magical origin. If you're not willing to ignore sorcerer fluff, you probably shouldn't be willing to ignore warlock fluff. Or, you're willing to ignore them both. Either way, that makes the comparison between the two as far as flexibility goes a moot point.

 

[Xetheral]

Here's the crux: preferring a toolbox/generic style that lets you make every special snowflake you can imagine is all well and good, but there are tradeoffs to be made for doing that.

One big tradeoff from a design perspective is that this is newbie poison. If you want to give your game a broad, open appeal, you do not want to have to educate new players on the relative benefits of a pool of dozens upon dozens of options. People will just not bother - there are better things to do with their time than learning how to build an imaginary dragon elf or whatever and getting it to do what they want it to do.

Two points:

First, while I agree that too many options can turn off newbies, too few is also a problem because it makes it harder for newbies to take the image in their head and find the right mechanics to express it. Skilled players familiar with the system can find good mechanical approximations for most concepts, particularly by being aware of refluffing possibilities, but an inexperienced player only has the options in front of them at the moment. For example, a new, inexperienced player displeased with their spell options as a sorcerer may not even know that wizards get access to all the same spells, plus more. Even if they did know, they might reject switching to Wizard on fluff (or primary stat) grounds, not thinking to ask the DM to refluff the wizard as a sorcerer.

The sorcerer/wizard divide is particularly hard for new players because you're almost always picking your class by comparing a rough-hewn concept to the class descriptions, long before you've read through the spell lists. But those descriptions don't tell you which concepts the sorcerer class has the spells to mechanically support and which concepts are much better represented as wizards. (Unlike say, Cleric vs Druid where the thematic difference between their spell lists is readily apparent.) So in this case the relative lack of options on the sorcerer spell list is more of a problem for newbies, simply because they don't that the limitations they're facing when expressing their sorcerer concept may be surmountable.

Second, increasing the size of the Sorcerer spell list to make more concepts realizable can't qualify as too many options until it surpasses the wizard list, unless you're arguing that 5e wizards themselves are newbie poison.

From my perspective as a big ol' nerd, a big tradeoff is that generic classes with lots of options have an emphasis on building a character. Wading through a sea of options to curate the perfect mix just reeks of Paradox of Choice - none of these options are increasing my enjoyment of playing the character, where I won't be picking character options at all. In fact, given that some options will be better than others (because any group of two or more things can be ranked), there's a real risk of this turning into "not really a choice" or "a choice between being flavorful and being effective," and leaving me less satisfied than I would be if I had no choice!

Personally I feel the character-building minigame is an important part of what drives experienced players to keep playing D&D, because it can be done solo. When in-between campaigns and/or gaming groups, the ability to build characters as a creative exercise keeps interest in the game high. Once of the prices of having deliberately limited options is reducing the appeal/longevity of the minigame to your veteran fanbase.

None of that means your preference is wrong, but it does mean that not being super-duper flexible isn't some flaw with the class's design, but is an intentional decision that, in getting rid of the ultimate in generic flexibility, stands to significantly improve the class in the estimation of a broad swath of the gaming audience. To put that away just so someone can imagine a "light bender" and a "dimensional witch" and an "arcane thief" and a dozen other preciously unique options all with one class that must also be named "Sorcerer" and who is barred from offering these as archetype options....that's a pretty big ask a pretty marginal gain. That same result can be pretty easily realized in practice by throwing more subclasses at the existing sorcerer 'till yer face turns blue.

I don't understand how, for example, not giving the sorcerer access to the entire wizard list significantly improves the class for you personally. You'd have no more options than a wizard would, so there shouldn't be too many, and it leaves the fluff divide between the classes entirely intact, so they remain distinct. (If both classes had unique spells, I could see an argument that merging the spell lists would reduce the distinction between the classes, at least so long as the assignment of particular spells had a thematic divide. But when one class's spell list is a strict subset of the other's and lacks any rhyme or reason, I don't find that convincing.)

I'm also unconvinced that the "marginal gain" of improving the game for whatever-size swath of the gaming audience feels as I do is necessarily any less valuable than improving it for whatever-size swath shares your opinions. Without some sort of concrete data on the prevalence of certain preferences, what basis can there be for claiming your opinion is more important than mine? It does indeed sound like you're saying that my preference is wrong on the (unknowable) basis that it is less popular than yours.

You can ignore any fluff as long as the DM lets you.

...

Also, if you want to ignore fluff, you could be approaching this from the other direction. You can ignore fluff and make a wizard who doesn't use a spellbook and who is tough and strong, or an Arcane Trickster with a mysteriously magical origin, or whatever floats your boat. That's as easy as ignoring warlock pacts.

There is a difference between tossing out the "sworn & beholden" fluff for the warlock and changing the mechanics of the wizard class to no longer have a spellbook or be based on charisma. I've never yet encountered a DM who wasn't fine with rewriting fluff, but I've met several who were very hesitant to make even small mechanical changes. And for those who do organized play, the former is legal, but the latter is not.

I'm in a game with two sorcerers, and we've got more than enough options between us to avoid doubling up on mechanics with room to spare. My actual play experience says there's enough variety there. White-room speculation on all the hypothetical character types you miss out on doesn't affect the actual enjoyment of the class one little bit.

I'm glad! Your experience shows that the class has enough options for you to be content. But I don't see how your experience is sufficient to reduce my perspective to "white-room speculation". I am indeed frustrated with the sorcerer builds that the truncated spell list precludes--there's nothing hypothetical about it.

 

[aramis erak]

Metamagic was a lousy fit for Sorcerers. Everything about metamagics scream "analytical mind", which is exactly what sorcerers aren't. If there was one class to give metamagics to, it is Wizards. (Or, perhaps even better, Psions)

But generally I wish metamagic was kept as a standalone subsystem, not tied to any one class.

It's a holdover from 3.X.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I dunno which Class That Shall Not Be Named kicked your puppy here

I'm guess'n Wizard. IDK if it was the Tier 1 status in 2007, or glut of wizard goodies in every book starting with Heroes of... or the 8 sub-classes in the most recent PH, but "so loved by the designers they can't just stop giving it toys, toys and more toys" certainly sounds like the wizard.

just rate the top five light-blue or gold options and insist that that's what everyone should be playing. That's how System Mastery invalidates choice.

System Mastery doesn't create imbalances (a lack of meaningful, viable choices, whether for want of any choices or for an excess of non-viable ones), it just exploits them. OK, sometimes imbalances are built into a system as 'rewards for system mastery' - still not the same thing as system mastery creating the imbalance in the first place.

But when one class's spell list is a strict subset of the other's and lacks any rhyme or reason, I don't find that convincing.)

Mostly good stuff, but a quibble: the Sorcerer's spell list is not a strict sub-set this time around. It has no unique spells of it's own, unlike every other caster, but the Sorcerer does get a few spells the Wizard, specifically, does not:

Daylight
Dominate Beast
Earthquake
Enhance Ability
Fire Storm
Insect Plague
Water Walk

 

[MoonSong]

A isn't a problem. B is kind of a problem because, as you say:
This includes the idea that by definition, sorcerers are "freaks" with unusual magical origins that don't just happen to anyone.

Sorry I missed the memo where it said this was a monster class

Again, my only reason for pointing this out is to show that assertion that the Warlock is "more flexible" than the sorcerer by dint of being able to "ignore its fluff" is not an argument I buy. If you're willing to ignore warlock fluff, you can ignore a lot of "fluffy" things like spellcasting ability scores and simple weapon proficiencies and the idea that you have a fairly unique magical origin. If you're not willing to ignore sorcerer fluff, you probably shouldn't be willing to ignore warlock fluff. Or, you're willing to ignore them both. Either way, that makes the comparison between the two as far as flexibility goes a moot point.

Well there's a reason I have never played that crazy sorlock combo, and I will never even entertain touching a wizard.