D&D 5E Reworking Spell Lists (Reducing "Sameyness")

[doctorbadwolf]

Dont forget your ''song'' spells for the bard

Yes! Those are maybe the most important!

Those and a feat for gaining a “Beast of The whatever” style pet.

 

[Minigiant]

@Minigiant :

Here is another radical approach. It requires a great "rethinking" of the classes and their roles, etc.

Divide up each school to each caster/half-caster as follows...

Example:
Bards: Enchantment (Charm) - 40 spells
Cleric: Conjuration (Create) - 78 spells
Druid: Transmutation (Change) - 93 spells
Paladin: Abjuration (Protect) - 52 spells
Ranger: Divination (Find) - 32 spells
Sorcerer: Illusion (Deceive) - 31 spells
Warlock: Necromancy (Delve) - 36 spells
Wizard: Evocation (Manifest) - 100 spells

So, the "old" main casters have long spell lists (78, 93, and 100) and the others much shorter, but they all have other features (inspiration, warriors, metamagic, invocations) to make up for it.

Does it make some drastic changes? You BET! Cure Wounds, for instance, would become a WIZARD spell!

But, it automatically removes sameyness, makes each caster type very unique, etc.

That's how Mages and Minigiants, my own old spin on 2nd/3rd edition, works. Kinda.

Every caster is a full caster but they only get access to one school. The schools with less offensive spells are more weapons trained.

The few casters who can use multiple schools are seriously limited in spell list. Usually requiring multiple casting stats. Every caster is super unique there.

 

[DND_Reborn]

Nearly a year later, time for a bit of thread necro!

Below is the revised spell lists for our 5E mod. In the goal of reducing "sameyness", we've moved many spells around, shifted some in spell level, etc. Before, about 65% of spells had more than one class that could cast them. Now, only about 1/3 of spells can be cast by more than one class, and spells of 6th level and higher are exclusively either Cleric, Druid, or Wizard (no overlap at all!).

If you examine the lists, you also notice any new spells haven't been added.

Some of the changes we made are:

• Bards are half casters now (like Paladins and Rangers)
• Sorcerers are a subclass of Wizard
• Warlocks are a subclass of Cleric
• Wizard lost the most spells, over 100, but still have nearly 200 available