D&D 5E (2024) The 4 Classes I Would Not Play 1-20 In 5.5

[Gladius Legis]

Saving throws are another issue. Intelligence saves are so rare you might not even use one. Wisdom is a tertiary stat a best for wizards. In effect you have no great saves.

In comparison to the Sorcerer: Charisma saves are about as rare as INT saves, so that comparison is a wash. Constitution proficiency is good for concentration, obviously, and probably better than Wisdom proficiency overall, but it doesn't come without its tradeoffs. With no WIS proficiency for the Sorcerer, you can CC a Sorcerer much more easily than you can CC a Wizard. Moreover, a Wizard is more likely to take Resilient for CON than a Sorcerer is for WIS, since a CON increase is still welcome on a Wizard while a Sorcerer doesn't have much use for a WIS increase. Which leads to the next point that WIS is likely to be tertiary at best on both classes.

So Sorcerer's advantage over Wizard in saves is fairly minor at best.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Wizard being on this list is certainly ... a take.

Wizard is still the best full caster in 2024, and it still isn't close. Rituals you can cast directly out of your spellbook without preparing the spell and switching out your spells every day will always be king.

Zardnaar's analyses tend to be very focused on combat capability (not just whiteroom DPR, broader than that) rather than utility and flexibility, so definitely bear that in mind when reading them. I don't think that makes them valueless at all, but anyone's analysis is going to come from a specific place, and it's good to know what that place is.

That hasn't been my experience, can you give examples? There are some things magic can do (and if you want a magic using rogue the arcane trickster is an option), but that means that the caster is not preparing and casting other spells.

A typical example might be some kind of infiltration into a fortress or castle in order to scout or take something or be in position to do something (like drop the drawbridge and sabotage the ).

A Rogue attempting this is going to, depending on what exactly is happening, and depending on the DM, be likely to be making an from a few to potentially dozens of checks, whether they're Stealth, Athletics, Deception (potentially with a bonus from the Disguise Kit though it's unclear if that really works in 2024, it'd be a cruel DM who didn't allow it), Persuasion, Slight of Hand, Thieves’ Tools, etc. etc.

Because of the way D&D works, every one of those is a binary pass/fail. Now it's often up to the DM to interpret that, but my long experience in D&D is that easily 90% of DMs read a fail as a total failure, like you fail at Deception, the guard doesn't just become suspicious or decide to come with you, they immediately draw on you and you're in combat. Perhaps that's a DMing issue but it's incredibly common one. Climbing and Stealth check fails can be particularly bad. A kind DM or one who doesn't want to make people rely on magic might allows you to get away with a very few checks, but again, a lot of DMs will be asking for multiple climb checks to climb a single wall (certainly if it's tall enough that you can't scale it in one round - and I've also seen a lot of DMs object when they find out exactly how fast PCs can technically climb in 5E), and god knows how many Stealth checks to sneak around.

Casters using spells like Fly, Spider Climb, Invisibility, Mage Hand, Transmute Rock and so on can often just skip to the end point of these plans, or skip like, 80% of the checks involved. There can be synergy, where spells are cast for the Rogue's benefit, but my experience is that you're lucky if the Rogue doesn't just feel like beneficiary of the caster.

Arcane Trickster isn't really an option, it doesn't offer much because its spells are so low-level, and imo suggesting it isn't very helpful, because the Rogue typically wants to be a Rogue, not a really bad Sorcerer about 1/3rd of their level. They do get invisible Mage Hand at least!

I feel like from how you're discussing this, you're looking at this from a "single-player" perspective, where you're in charge of all the characters, and those characters operate in perfect harmony and people always pursue the most resource-efficient solution (rather than the one that sounds like it's going to work best). But that's not how most D&D groups operate.

As for "not preparing and casting other spells", sure but that's rarely an issue. Sorcerers/Bards/Warlocks cause less of a problem because they have fixed spells and can't change them frequently, but if they did pick a spell that's good for this, they're more likely to want to use it.

 

[AlViking]

Zardnaar's analyses tend to be very focused on combat capability (not just whiteroom DPR, broader than that) rather than utility and flexibility, so definitely bear that in mind when reading them. I don't think that makes them valueless at all, but anyone's analysis is going to come from a specific place, and it's good to know what that place is.


A typical example might be some kind of infiltration into a fortress or castle in order to scout or take something or be in position to do something (like drop the drawbridge and sabotage the ).

A Rogue attempting this is going to, depending on what exactly is happening, and depending on the DM, be likely to be making an from a few to potentially dozens of checks, whether they're Stealth, Athletics, Deception (potentially with a bonus from the Disguise Kit though it's unclear if that really works in 2024, it'd be a cruel DM who didn't allow it), Persuasion, Slight of Hand, Thieves’ Tools, etc. etc.

Because of the way D&D works, every one of those is a binary pass/fail. Now it's often up to the DM to interpret that, but my long experience in D&D is that easily 90% of DMs read a fail as a total failure, like you fail at Deception, the guard doesn't just become suspicious or decide to come with you, they immediately draw on you and you're in combat. Perhaps that's a DMing issue but it's incredibly common one. Climbing and Stealth check fails can be particularly bad. A kind DM or one who doesn't want to make people rely on magic might allows you to get away with a very few checks, but again, a lot of DMs will be asking for multiple climb checks to climb a single wall (certainly if it's tall enough that you can't scale it in one round - and I've also seen a lot of DMs object when they find out exactly how fast PCs can technically climb in 5E), and god knows how many Stealth checks to sneak around.

Casters using spells like Fly, Spider Climb, Invisibility, Mage Hand, Transmute Rock and so on can often just skip to the end point of these plans, or skip like, 80% of the checks involved. There can be synergy, where spells are cast for the Rogue's benefit, but my experience is that you're lucky if the Rogue doesn't just feel like beneficiary of the caster.

Arcane Trickster isn't really an option, it doesn't offer much because its spells are so low-level, and imo suggesting it isn't very helpful, because the Rogue typically wants to be a Rogue, not a really bad Sorcerer about 1/3rd of their level. They do get invisible Mage Hand at least!

I feel like from how you're discussing this, you're looking at this from a "single-player" perspective, where you're in charge of all the characters, and those characters operate in perfect harmony and people always pursue the most resource-efficient solution (rather than the one that sounds like it's going to work best). But that's not how most D&D groups operate.

As for "not preparing and casting other spells", sure but that's rarely an issue. Sorcerers/Bards/Warlocks cause less of a problem because they have fixed spells and can't change them frequently, but if they did pick a spell that's good for this, they're more likely to want to use it.

I'm looking at this from a team perspective, what can the caster do that is so much of an improvement over a rogue that the trade-off of having to use limited resources is worthwhile. Sorcerers/Bards/Warlocks are even worse off than wizards because their choice of spells is so limited. The wizard can always prepare a different set of spells to face a different challenge after a long rest. Invisibility (which doesn't mean you are hidden), fly, spider climb are all concentration spells so you aren't going to be able to do those at the same time. Transmute rock only appears in the elemental evil supplement, it's not a common spell and I don't see how it would aid in any way for someone who is trying to be stealthy. I don't allow it in my game but if you're turning a wall into mud, I sure hope you've taken into consideration if it's a supporting wall. Meanwhile if a DM hard nerfs rogues skills, there's no guarantee they won't do the same with spells.

But this goes back to the assumptions that the caster has exactly the right spell prepared, spell slots to cast it and also has other spells to make every other class obsolete. In practice it's just not something that I see.

 

[jayoungr]

there's a key and vital difference between Rogue skill checks and spells, and that's that spells always succeed. So when the chips are down, and you really need to succeed, you use a spell. You don't rely on a roll.

Only if there's a time constraint, in my experience. Otherwise, you try the free resource (rogue skill check) first.

Also, sometimes the spell has its own cost. If you're talking about the difference between Thieves' Tools and knock, for example, a Thieves' Tools check doesn't alert the entire dungeon to what you're doing.

D&D's binary-pass-fail and zero ability to mitigate failed checks

D&D gives the DM freedom to assign success at a cost if the player doesn't make the roll. You can criticize DMs for not making use of the opportunity, or not using it often enough, but it's not fair to blame the rule system there.

 

[jayoungr]

Because of the way D&D works, every one of those is a binary pass/fail. Now it's often up to the DM to interpret that, but my long experience in D&D is that easily 90% of DMs read a fail as a total failure, like you fail at Deception, the guard doesn't just become suspicious or decide to come with you, they immediately draw on you and you're in combat. Perhaps that's a DMing issue but it's incredibly common one.

I do think the folks at WotC could be doing a lot more to emphasize the different options for what failing a roll means, but interpretations other than complete binary failure are in their books. So yeah, I'd call it mostly a DMing issue, or maybe a wider "game culture" issue.