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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Gadget" data-source="post: 8258069" data-attributes="member: 23716">No, Witch Bolt is a terrible spell any way you slice it.  I like the option to cause it to grapple a target, but I'm conflicted that it might be too powerful a debuff for some targets, as it bypasses legendary resistance and can really ruin a BBEG's day if applied correctly.I see a lot of arguments on line about this and other spells being justified as "DM spells" for use by NPCs/Monsters for show or flavor, but I have a hard time swallowing that as DMs can just make up stuff, or have things be part of a Monster's stat block for effect.  It smacks of trying to justify bad design after the fact.But, on the other hand, it is impossible to finely tune balance to such a degree that spells are always equally viable in every situation.One major issue with spell balance in 5e is that they have added balancing factors in addition to level and (potentially costly) material components:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Concentration, which can effect how likely a caster is to employ a spell. Is concentration worth X levels? Or, in other words, would adding X levels to the spell be "balanced" with removing concentration? Some spells (Bestow Curse & Major Image come to mind) do this through upscaling, but could this be applied more broadly?</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Actions to maintain.  This is an opportunity cost that is often overlooked, but requiring the caster to spend their action every round to maintain the spell is a very large burden, and I'm pleased to see that WOTC seems to be moving away from this recently (the last spell to use this method was Enervation in Xanthanar's)</li> </ul>Unfortunately, Witch bolt runs afoul of all of these restrictions, along with poor range and mediocre damage.</blockquote>

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