D&D 5E Spells cast at higher level spell slots. Worth it?

[clearstream]

Why not just have thew warlock swap out the lower level spells he no longer finds of value for higher level ones as he advances?

They can already do that. The concern is whether they should be forced to, i.e. whether they should be forced to carry only one foom spell because it is always optimal.

 

[Corwin]

They can already do that.

Exactly. Seems to work well enough for me (us).

The concern is whether they should be forced to, i.e. whether they should be forced to carry only one foom spell because it is always optimal.

Okay. Whatever floats your boat. Proceed.

 

[Gadget]

Tempo is action efficiency over time. If I will usually get 7 actions per fight, then casts 8-15 of Burning Hands aren't much help. Until I get into a second fight, of course.

This is what you have cantrips for. At a certain point using those lower level slots for some utility or defense is far more efficient than wasting them to do piddly damage. You have cantrips that auto-scale for that sort of thing, even if they don't have the area or some of the utility of first+ level spells.

I guess you've noticed that taking Burning Hands and Fireball optimises the total damage potential, right? You get to use all your slots efficiently. I feel like a possible difference in our evaluations is that I don't think of this in terms of a dichotomy. Taking both yields 98d6 of damage potential +75 with EE + 15d6 more with AR (taking all Burning Hands). That is significantly better than either alone. In trade, you give up two of your 15 or fewer spells in mind (i.e. at Level 10) instead of one.

Once again, unless I'm missing something (I could be missing something something), it is far more efficient to optimize damage over a shorter period of time. While theoretically doing Xd6 damage over a day with a mixture of slots using Fireball & Burning Hands might be more efficient, in practical terms, just using Fireball and Firebolt may get you further.

You see that I am arguing that balancing spells by looking at one cast in isolation isn't formally correct: its not a dichotomy, and players get to make more than one cast. They can cast one Meteor Swarm between rests, or two between long rests. For me it is very hard to ignore that intrinsic balancing. Arcane Recovery at that sort of level (i.e. 20th) can recover 30d6 worth of Burning Hands, or 20d6 worth of Meteor Swarm + 3d6 of Burning Hands. With EE, the former will do +50 damage while the latter will do +10. The more I dig into this, the neater a piece of design work I think it is.

I'm not sure how one recovers 20d6 of Meteor Swarm? Arcane Recovery is limited to 6th level slots or lower? I think what I'm arguing is that, no matter how 'neat' the math is, and each table and gaming style is different, many games do not value or reward situations that allow one to spread damage out over a long period of time. At high levels, one is usually confronted with foes who's HP total is such that small amounts of damage are not that effective, and in the rare case they are, well...cantrips. This is why the action economy is a big deal in D&D: "He who gets there the fastest with the mostess" is usually rewarded. You want to do something that stops the demon from eating your face Now!

At the end of the day, everyone's table is different and we enjoy different things. It may be that increasing the damage scaling of spells would be a bad thing for the game, but arguments like this do little to convince me. Especially when other, non-damaging (or where damage may not be the primary focus) spells seem to scale much better, or even for 'free' with your scaling save DC.

 

[Eubani]

Overall, do you find yourself ever, or even often, casting lower level spells using higher level spell slots? I see the utility in some obvious spells such as Cure Wounds and Bless, but overall I don't find myself doing so and don't really see the value. Am I missing something? With the way D&D spells scale, should a 3rd level Burning Hands be equivalent to 3rd level Fireball, or is the system made to give an edge to spells that are inherently a higher tier? Are there issues with the way spells scale, and if so, has anyone attempted to address the issues they find?

Personally in my table experience as a player (currently playing a Warlock), I have not really found much benefit to casting lower level spells at higher spell slots. Even though Warlock automatically upscales those lower spells to the highest spell slot I can cast, I find I pretty much stick to the higher level spells, with the exception of Hex and the occasional utility spell.

I ask because:

1) I'm always curious about other people's experiences and thoughts with using D&D.

2) I am the kind of person that looks at a system, tries to become an expert at that system, and then begins to use that knowledge to both homebrew new material and adjust the existing mechanics to refine balance. I did this with 3.5, basically rewriting the entire player's handbook. I have started doing this to an extent with 5e, but I have yet to tackle the spells and I just want to get a sense of what I might be in for if I try.

FYI Warlocks cast spells at their max level castable automatically.

 

[Hawk Diesel]

FYI Warlocks cast spells at their max level castable automatically.

I'm well aware of this. The problem is that a 5th level fireball outclasses a 5th level burning hands in damage so much that even when casting burning hands is the smarter choice, it feels like a waste.

 

[cbwjm]

Does it though? If casting burning hands is the smarter choice then I don't think I'd feel like it is a waste.

 

[Hawk Diesel]

Yea, it does. Look to my earlier posts if you don't understand where I'm coming from as I don't want to rehash it.

 

[clearstream]

Once again, unless I'm missing something (I could be missing something something), it is far more efficient to optimize damage over a shorter period of time. While theoretically doing Xd6 damage over a day with a mixture of slots using Fireball & Burning Hands might be more efficient, in practical terms, just using Fireball and Firebolt may get you further.

I think you are talking about the desirability of producing a high alpha. I agree that a high alpha is optimal in cases where total HP of targets including healing < damage output of available Fireball casts. (But not if it is sufficiently less that Burning Hands would do.) When the total HP of those targets is greater (again including healing), then a pure alpha approach hits a snag. Efficiency is the output divided by the input. Given the output of damage divided by the input of spell slot levels, Burning Hands is more efficient.

I think what I'm arguing is that, no matter how 'neat' the math is, and each table and gaming style is different, many games do not value or reward situations that allow one to spread damage out over a long period of time. At high levels, one is usually confronted with foes who's HP total is such that small amounts of damage are not that effective, and in the rare case they are, well...cantrips. This is why the action economy is a big deal in D&D: "He who gets there the fastest with the mostest" is usually rewarded. You want to do something that stops the demon from eating your face Now!

That is so true. The action economy matters within an encounter. Spanning encounters, efficiency comes into play. I've noticed that characters over about 8th level have incredible resources for an alpha (including class features like Portent!) So far in play they seem to be most interestingly challenged by the second, third or fourth encounter. To me the game looks best balanced around half a dozen encounters between long rests.

At the end of the day, everyone's table is different and we enjoy different things. It may be that increasing the damage scaling of spells would be a bad thing for the game, but arguments like this do little to convince me. Especially when other, non-damaging (or where damage may not be the primary focus) spells seem to scale much better, or even for 'free' with your scaling save DC.

Free auto-scaling was degenerate in 3.5. Casters came to overshadow other characters. So from experience we have some good reasons for caution. I'm generally arguing to take into account a broader view of balance: across classes and across encounters. The casters with narrow spell selections generally get to trade in lower spells for higher, suggesting a design intent that they should do that. If nevertheless it is important to a player that they can continue to use a spell like Burning Hands instead of their Eldritch Blast or a Fireball, then so far there doesn't seem to be a compelling reason to change spell damage scaling for every class! Consider first options like fixing the class you find too narrow.

Later this afternoon I'm giving a short talk on strategy mechanics in which I argue that good balance = diversity. Ideally, many competing choices are all valid. Through that lense, the problem could very well be that Fireball and Lightning Bolts pay over the odds. Rather than the other spells all need to auto-scale harder.

 

[cbwjm]

Yea, it does. Look to my earlier posts if you don't understand where I'm coming from as I don't want to rehash it.

Well if you really want to balance damage for spells then you might want to just start using the chart in the spell creation rules in the DMG. Forget about adding +1 die of damage, just follow the chart.

 

[seebs]

I think the key point is: They're intentionally generally-less-good than higher level spells would be, to make higher level spells more desirable, so you have a reason to know both low-level and high-level spells. You need low-level spells to use your low-level slots, and high-level spells to get the best output from the high-level slots.