D&D 5E This is a directory of posters who think the sorcerer needs fixing

[Hawk Diesel]

Personally, I don't have a problem with sorcery points recovering on a long rest. Yes, the wizard can recover 1/2 their level worth of spell slots once per long rest during a short rest (that is a weird sentence).

On the surface, this seems unfair, as the wizard can recover spell slots, while the sorcerer’s sorcery points are meant to power metamagic AND provide opportunities to create spell slots.

However, I think the big difference is the way a sorcerer can cannibalize lower level spell slots to create higher level spell slots, and power metamagic.

This is a big difference and allows the sorcerer to have more access to higher level spell slots AND power metamagic. The flexibility is pretty huge. When a wizard gets down to their lowest level spell slots, they become much weaker. Yes, I know there are lower level spells that are still useful/provide utility (shield comes to mind). But when a sorcerer is down to their lowest level spell slots, they can convert them into a couple higher level slots if need be. Something a wizard can never do.

The big issue I have with sorcery points is the uneven conversion rate. I forgot to include this in my post above, but in my games cannibalizing a spell slot for sorcery points gives the same number you would get to create that level spell slot. You wanna dump a 1st level spell slot for sorcery points? You get two sorcery points, not 1. You wanna eat a 3rd level slot for sorcery points? You get 5 sorcery points, not 3.

This allows sorcery points to go farther, simplifies conversion, and makes eating spell slots a more viable option.

 

[Wednesday Boy]

I would like to see additional spells that have a randomness aspect or otherwise jive well with the wild magic theme. I thought the wild magic sorcerer from 4E had cantrips, higher level spells, and class features that played up that theme well.

 

[DizzyWood]

A few simple changes we are working on at my table. S-points refresh on a short rest once per long rest. In our campaign that goes a long way to making a Sorcerer much better. Then for the future we are working on a few other tweaks.
Wild Sorcerer: Once per long rest when an enemy hits you with with a single target spell that dose damage you can harness the forces of chaos to create additional effects. Roll a D20 if you roll between x&y the caster receives 1d4 damage of the same type caused by the original spell, a-b you take 1D4 less damage, m-n you take full damage but for the next 1 min you are resistant to the damage type of the original spell. ect. We haven't worked it all out yet.

Dragon Sorcerer: Once per long rest you may transform your hands into dragon claws. These claws allow you to make a melee basses on your CHA. This is still in the works...mostly because I am not sure how claws should work.

All: Ritual magic, find familiar, identify all need to be accessible in some way shape or form probably just by giving ritual caster at say 4th lvl

 

[Volund]

I am currently playing a 4th level draconic sorcerer and overall I like it a lot. Some quibbles:

They are the only full caster class without ritual casting (bard, cleric, druid, warlock, wizard)
They are the only arcane casters without access to a damned familiar (bard, EK, AT, warlock, wizard)
Yes I know that these issues can be worked around with feats.

On to my major gripe: Arcane Recovery lets wizards do something for free that sorcerers have to use SP to do. Since the sorcerer's entire cantrip and spell list is a subset of the wizard's, and there are no unique sorcerer spells, it's natural to compare sorcerers to wizards, and I think they would compare favorably if it weren't for wizard's Arcane Recovery. Arcane Recovery creates a classic case of a D&D resource tax in that I have this resource - SP - that ostensibly is there to make sorcerers unique and flexible through the use of metamagic, but in actuality I am forced to spend it on something else in order to keep up with the power output of a similar class. In game terms, SP is the currency that quantifies the unique abilities of sorcerers vis a vis wizards. So in terms of SP, how much extra can a sorcerer do that a wizard can't? Anywhere from 1 SP at 4th level up to 6 SP at 20th level. For example, at 4th level a wizard would use Arcane Recovery after a short rest to recover one 2nd level spell slot. My sorcerer can spend 3 of his 4 SP to also recover a 2nd level slot as a bonus action. These two actions are a wash in terms of spell power output, and after that I am left with 1 SP to use to quicken a spell. So in effect, the payoff for my sorcerer having to use the truncated list of wizard spells is that 1) I can use a bonus action instead of a short rest to recover a spell slot, and 2) once per day I can quicken a first level spell to a bonus action and then still have my action to do something else like cast a cantrip. Maybe I will feel less burdened by the Arcane Recovery tax once I am higher level and have access to spells that are more beneficial to twin, esp at 4th level (Banishment, Greater Invisibility, Polymorph). I would reduce or eliminate the Arcane Recovery tax and create a more separation between the two classes by doing one of the following:

1) Get rid of Arcane Recovery (This ain't happening)
2) Give the sorcerer something akin to Action Surge.
Arcane Surge: on your turn, you can take an additional action to recover one spell slot and immediately use it to cast a sorcerer spell without using SP. You cannot use this feature again until you finish a long rest. You can use this feature twice between long rests starting at 17th level. I don't think is terribly OP, but an alternate version could use a bonus action instead.
3) Restoring the Font: Once per day when you finish a short rest, you can choose to recover expended SP equal to or less than half your sorcerer level (rounded up).

I bet wild magic sorcerer is at the bottom of class archetype rankings by popularity. I haven't ever been in a game with one. I would suggest giving Wild Magic sorcerers some control over their surges by letting them use their reaction to roll on the table whenever they take damage, up to a number of times per day equal to their Cha mod (sort of like Tempest cleric's Wrath of the Storm).

 

[Wednesday Boy]

I would suggest giving Wild Magic sorcerers some control over their surges by letting them use their reaction to roll on the table whenever they take damage, up to a number of times per day equal to their Cha mod (sort of like Tempest cleric's Wrath of the Storm).

That would be a wonderful addition!

 

[Dausuul]

I think that 3E offered us the perfect class (or rather, set of classes) to serve as a model for 5E sorcerers: The "dedicated casters," that is, the warmage, dread necromancer, and beguiler.

For those not familiar with them, these were ultraspecialized arcane casters. Each one had a reasonably substantial list of known spells, but the list was tightly bound to a single theme: Blasting magic for the warmage, necromancy for the dread necro, and enchantment/mind control for the beguiler. You didn't pick spells--if you were a warmage, you got everything on the warmage list, cast spontaneously. You also got a sturdy set of thematic abilities to flesh out the character. You did one thing, but you did it really really well.

The 5E sorcerer should follow that model. Instead of picking individual spells, you pick maybe two "packages," such as fire magic or chaos magic, rather similar to clerical domains. Each package comes with maybe 2 known spells per spell level, and some thematic abilities. Maybe you get to pick a handful of extra spells to fine-tune your concept. But the packages should be the central focus.

 

[Quickleaf]

[MENTION=6689464]MoonSong[/MENTION] I've done a version of the Sorcerer for my 5e Witcher conversion that incorporates some of the ideas being exchanged (e.g. sorcerers are magic and don't needed components/foci) along with other stuff more thematically linked to the Witcher setting.

I've seen 5e sorcerers in play from 1st to 11th level so far, and they've absolutely held their own in my games. No mechanical issues really, unless you consider a hyper-focus on blasting to be a mechanical issue.

However, I do consider them to be suffering from a lack of identity, though this was a problem when the class was introduced in 3e as well.

As they are now, they're not meaningfully differentiated from a wizard. I mean, you could have a sidebar about a wizard giving up Ritual Casting and Spellbook in order to use non-prepared casting (i.e. limited spells known) instead, and 75% of the sorcerer is handled right there.

How to meaningfully differentiate the sorcerer is where it gets interesting.

For example, some people say "Give them bloodlines"...but then you have the question how is a "Fiend" or "Archfey" sorcerer different from a "Fiend" or "Archfey" warlock?

Others say "Just swap in the UA mystic instead" or "make a class with its own spell-like powers instead of spells"...but then you have like 30 pages of material dedicated to just one class and that can be overwhelming during character creation...doubly so when you have new players wanting to play a magic-user leaning toward the sorcerer (at least that's my experience at my tables).

It's a real decision challenge. And one I wished they'd tackled during 5e's playtesting.

I think the err made during design was that they felt the 3e sorcerer was something that should be closely emulated, rather than what they did with the warlock which was take bits and pieces from 3e and 4e but give it a real overhaul to drive home its uniqueness.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

[MENTION=6689464]I've seen 5e sorcerers in play from 1st to 11th level so far, and they've absolutely held their own in my games. No mechanical issues really, unless you consider a hyper-focus on blasting to be a mechanical issue.

Were these draconic bloodline sorcerers with fire as their element? That's a problem, because we should not only be able to choose to do something other then blasting, but we should have comparable choices for blasting with multiple types of draconic bloodlines. I shouldn't have to suffer mechanically, or be forced to choose an additional cantrip of another damage type for regular usage because I want to play a black dragon bloodline.

 

[Quickleaf]

Were these draconic bloodline sorcerers with fire as their element? That's a problem, because we should not only be able to choose to do something other then blasting, but we should have comparable choices for blasting with multiple types of draconic bloodlines. I shouldn't have to suffer mechanically, or be forced to choose an additional cantrip of another damage type for regular usage because I want to play a black dragon bloodline.

Let's see, IIRC we had...

Sorcerer (Dragon) 1st-5th level, face-to-face / Roll20 game
Sorcerer homebrew (Elder Blood homebrew) 3rd level, Pbp game
Sorcerer homebrew (Storm) 3rd level, Pbp game
Sorcerer (Elementalist homebrew) 11th level, Pbp game

 

[FrogReaver]

I think sorcerer should get access to most all metamagic abilities. Of those he picks a smaller set of preferred metamagic abilities that he can use once or twice per short rest for free.