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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 6774908" data-attributes="member: 996">Maybe I'm seeing too pedantic  distinction, here, but cantrips are class abilities, while weapons are gear.  Proficiency with a weapon, making it a practical choice to make an attack with might be a class ability, but making attacks with weapons is something anyone can do.  /Extra Attack/, for instance, is a class ability that can be used with weapons.... ...cantrips are like Extra Attack in that they scale up your at-will damage as you level.   They are also like Battlemaster maneuvers in that they can do a bit more than just damage.  In theory, sure, but it's not like there's a lot of theoretical balance designed into the classes as it is.  In practice, the DM holds the reigns when it comes to balancing encounters, adventuring days, and managing spotlight balance among the PCs.  Shifting theoretical balance a little (or even a lot) won't change that.That further limits the impact of reducing cantrip availability.  For a low-level caster, using a cantrip is a lot cooler than making an attack, but it's not vastly more effective.  When the best fighters get an Extra Attack at 5th, casters will notice that their attack options once they're out of cantrips are starting to look pretty inferior, but if you never reach 11th, that's the worst it'll ever get.  Balance is something you can manage in play.  Shortening the day slightly - consistently having closer to 6 rather than 8 of the standard-issue 6-8 medium-hard encounters/day, for instance - would probably be more than enough.  You'd want to be sure that the number of rounds of combat in the day still exceed the available cantrip slots + spell slots, of course, so you don't have spells going off absolutely every round, if you're trying to get a remotely low-magic feel.The other significant consideration is that if your campaign is at all low-magic, in general - if NPCs are rarely casters and most enemies aren't casters and don't specifically prepare to counter caster threats as a matter of course - then PC casters are going to have an advantage, anyway, as their magic will be unexpected, less likely to be countered, and generally higher-impact than in a more typical high magic D&D campaign. You could provide alternative Actions that the wizard could take instead of casting a spell or using a cantrip.  Wizards are supposed to be very knowledgeable, including about monsters, for instance.  Over and above whatever else you allow for knowledge checks, you could allow a Wizard to make a Knowledge check against a particular enemy to give an ally advantage on his next check against that enemy.  It'd be something to do on a round when casting a spell or cantrip isn't worth the resource, but plinking with a crossbow feels too undignified to the player.A power-up to those specific spells, out of all proportion even to the complete loss of cantrips.  At the same time, no help to a caster who doesn't happen to know such spells.I'd also warn against messing with Concentration.It might make more sense to boost the damage of cantrips a little, since they're more limited.  Maybe a caster could use an action to 'gather power' so that his next cantrip does an extra die of damage, for instance.It's perfectly OK for them to trail in combat.  Bounded accuracy means a wizard's DEX or a Cleric's STR and proficiency with a simple weapon is adequate to contribute in combat, once spells and cantrips are expended.  Your casters at level 3-10 will have from 6 - 15 cantrips/day, on top of their spellcasting.  Even assuming a 'normal day' of 6-8 fast 5e combats, and thus maybe 20 or 25 rounds, that's still casting something every combat - sometimes every single round of every combat in the day at higher levels and/or on shorter days.The Druid's shape-changing should help out more than enough.  The Cleric will trail a bit for want of an Extra Attack at 5th level, but that shouldn't matter greatly.  Maybe you could let a Cleric 'smite' certain enemies based on his Domain, dealing an extra die of damage against them with weapons, starting at 5th level.</blockquote>

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