D&D General Mearls: Spells and Classes

[Baumi]

There is a new and interesting Video about 5E Spells and Classes from Mike Mearls. 8D


I really wish now for a new Class Book that revises the Standard Classes in a way that they don't need Bonus Actions anymore and either with more distinct arcane - divince spelllists or no spells at all (more like Warlock).

On the other hand I also wish for a 4E Style Classbook for a long time now, where Martials have Maneuvers..

 

[Emerikol]

He will poison the well for such a book if those martials have time limits like spells.

 

[Baumi]

Not for me, I like BIG Moves and this works only if there is a limit to those.

But anyway thats just a personal wish, he didn't talk about 4E Design, but instead about that the Spell-lists, Power and how to use Spells should differe more between classes.

 

[Emerikol]

yeah I didn't even see a mention of martials.

 

[bsss]

I'm sure none of this is new new information, but I think it's interesting how direct of a line he draws connecting varied classes being more interesting and stronger design-wise, but that would have also been more difficult so they couldn't because of timelines, and how that continues to impact the game 12+ years later.

 

[Baumi]

Yeah in the 5E Playtest there was a completely different Sorcerer, but this was so late in the Playtest that it seems they have scraped it because of the timeline.

 

[dave2008]

yeah I didn't even see a mention of martials.

It was all about magic using classes. His thoughts are very similar to mine. I've said for several years now that my preference is for, at the minimum, divine magic to not use spells. I think there is a decent argument to be made that only wizards should be full casters and most, if not all, other magic using classes should use a different mechanic to express their magic abilities.

 

[Johngernaut]

Yeah I give Arcana Unleashed a bad review for this same reason. And I was horrified when 5e24 was talking about collapsing spell lists into divine, arcane etc. He can only talk about broken wizard spells and how they need to be fixed now that he's out of WOTC and won't cause an uproar with wizard fanboys.

Also I really did get the feeling that some of the subclasses were built to a deadline and look rushed. This confirms they did have some time pressure which explains a lot for me.

 

[Emerikol]

Yeah I give Arcana Unleashed a bad review for this same reason. And I was horrified when 5e24 was talking about collapsing spell lists into divine, arcane etc. He can only talk about broken wizard spells and how they need to be fixed now that he's out of WOTC and won't cause an uproar with wizard fanboys.

Also I really did get the feeling that some of the subclasses were built to a deadline and look rushed. This confirms they did have some time pressure which explains a lot for me.

I'm dubious myself of taking the spells out of D&D. Many are iconic. So if he had any fear about it at all I was glad to exert whatever pressure I could to keep him fearful.

 

[AlViking]

I was typing this up as I watched to sorry if it's a bit long winded ...

Can't say I agree with most of this. Yes, wizards used to be more glass cannons and clerics were sort-of fighters. With 3e instead of the copy/paste we had in previous versions for shared spells we got a unified spell list but in some cases the spells were a different level. He then seems to jump to the assumption that spells are completely imbalanced, some are broken - he uses fireball as an example of an encounter ending spell. Therefore a cleric casting fireball (because they aren't a glass cannon) is inherently bad. By this logic multiclassing and feats that give a wizard access to armor and more HP along with several other things is also bad.

Except fireball is rarely an encounter ending spell in any game I've played. It's situationally powerful if you can safely target a bunch of relatively low CR monsters that are in fireball formation. But it also has several downsides of hitting teammates and setting everything flammable not currently being held on fire. It sounds at times like he doesn't even want spells at all - or at the very least a complete rewrite of the spell list.

I don't see it as a huge issue and it's never been something that has had a huge impact; after all we've had cleric domains that gave clerics fireball for a while now and it hasn't caused an issue. It's not like you can have that many spells prepared at the same time and you still have limited spell slots.

What he's talking about is almost a completely different game with a different approach that he admits would be harder to design. Which is great! More power to him and maybe it would be a better game for some people. I just don't see the abuse of the options that we have being all that prevalent and the changes he suggests would likely also add significant complexity to a game that is already complex.

I agree there can be a certain level "sameness" to some classes and I would personally like more non-caster options, but caster options are what a lot of people seem to want.