D&D General Mike Mearls says control spells are ruining 5th Edition

[Zardnaar]

It's not just damage per attack and per round that was messed up. Much of the problem is rooted in pointless changes like the shift from 3 functional& thematic saves+totally neutral SR to a pointlessly minced to and distinguishable 6 saves +arbitrary feeling LR...or the fact that rather than casters using things like sling crossbow and racially proficient bow with mediocre results when not casting from a spell slot they can now be expected to pump out cantrips with scaling numbers of dice based on tier.

All of that kinda stuff degrades the impact of spike damage at cost abilities by raising the floor dramatically. Even worse is that with the shift to neovancian prep the system no longer has meaningful trafeoffs for the "at cost" part because any slot can be dynamically used on the fly as needed

I think the original sin lies with 3.0 and how saves scale. 4E used the nuke it approach but threw the baby out with the bath water.

6 saves. We are stuck with them until 6E. Go back to 3 imho add youre level to all saves or something. Landing them reliably should require debuffs imho.

Right now I would be happy bring back scaling damage, nuking control from orbit and improving SR/MR.

You can still summon, buff etc. 2 hybrid control/support and 3 strikers seems the most meta party ATM.