D&D General What Should Magic Be Able To Do, From a Gameplay Design Standpoint?

[Micah Sweet]

A question about this one. Ever since most buffs became concentration in 5e, I've noticed very little buff casting from my casters, as they always have better things to do with concentration. Which means that the non-spellcasters receive very few buffs, which used to be a big deal in older editions. Have you had a different experience, or are you concerned about self-buffing?

I think the prevailing opinion is that buff spells in 5e often aren't worth the concentration squeeze.

 

[Micah Sweet]

To some extent yes. A character should be able to research in a library instead of cast legend lore. I also think magic items or locations can give access to things like scrying or divination.

I don’t really want to see martial’s applying area damage much, or physically changing the battlefield.

Depends on the technology level to me. All those those things are possibly through the right tech.

 

[dave2008]

I want spellcasting to be more focused.

So if you are an Evocation wizard, you (generally) only pick evocation spells. The reason being is that a prerequisite for picking higher level spells is having lower level spells in that school and you can only pick spells (generally) from your school. So for an Evocation wizard to learn a Transmutation spell, the must take 1 level of Transmutation school. However, you can only select spells of level you have in that school, not your class or character level. So you could have a general 20th level wizard with 5 levels of of 4 different schools, but the highest level of spell they could cast is a 3rd level spell. Where as a 20th level Necromancer would have much less flexibility, but could cast up to 9th level necromancy spells.

This would require the magic schools to be more balanced than they are now (which I would like regardless).

 

[payn]

Im gonna come at this sideways, and look at tiers. I think what magic can/should do changes with tiers. Lowers ones like the traditional dungeon crawl skill play experience it should be powerful, but very limited. As the tiers expand it should become more frequently available.

Whether controlling, blasting, buffing, etc.. Magic power and capability should be in line with its tier. Also, it should be developed with the three pillars in mind, combat/exploration/social. If a class has magic, it shouldnt be hackable with spell in a can a'la 3E. This allows you to break out of not just the tier, but also out of adventure day design. Finally, casters should live in the magic realm, and not be strong in skills also a'la 3E like the wizard.

I don't really think that spells themselves are the problem- it becomes quite a chore to justify why a spellcaster can do X but not Y. Personally, the big problem is being able to swap out your spell list easily.

Look at the Sorcerer class. They get very few spells that have to be carefully chosen. Take a useful utility spell? Then you do without another spell. Niche spells become very difficult to justify, so you select only those ones that are useful most of the time.

I actually took a lot of utility spells on my 5E Sorc. I was able to do this becasue of the unlimited scaling cantrips. I thought I was going to hate them, but they opened up my spell choices a lot for utility and I didnt feel like I was forced to grab the usual spells. It flet like older D&D where less emphasis was on combat (although I was able to cast attack in every one of them) and could use utility magic to cool effect.

I remember a conversation I had with someone griping about Goodberry in modern D&D and I was like "now wait a minute, that's been a Druid spell since AD&D! How come it's a problem now, and it wasn't back then?"

And his reply was simply that 2nd-level Druid spells (which Goodberry was at the time), were generally as many Cure Light Wounds as you could cast (since CLW was a 2nd-level spell for Druids)! The opportunity cost for having Goodberry meant there was little magical healing you could provide!

If we didn't have modern Clerics and Druids able to swap their spell lists around daily, that would cut back a lot of issues, I think. As for Wizards, since it takes time + money + opportunity to greatly expand their spell lists, I don't think it's as big a deal for them to be able to swap spells around, but YMMV.

If it were up to me id probably lean away from spell lists for druids and clerics and more towards divine favors and abilities based on specific tenets and philosophies of their belief and power sources. While old tradition might nod in agreement to this, I think modern or recent tradition would likely scoff.

 

[Corinnguard]

Spellcasting as a skill. Casting a spell seems to be rather effortless and error free in D&D. Casters need to learn how to be proficient when casting a spell.

 

[Reynard]

Anything, if you're powerful enough, but not reliably, not safely, and not very often.

Interesting. D&D has only ever embraced the last of those.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Interesting. D&D has only ever embraced the last of those.

I know. I think magic would be more interesting if it did.

 

[CreamCloud0]

1. Single person damage (limited to less than a competent martial)
2. Area damage
3. Buff - limited largely by concentration
4. Debuff - limited largely by concentration
5. Utility - lightly limited but able to fill gaps in a party.
6. Battlefield control - usually limited by concentration
7. Entrenchment - wardings that come with material costs.
8. Information gathering - methods learning about the world
9. Healing/de-debuffing - To keep PCs going
10. Reality reshaping - spells that change the world - reverse gravity etc that make the world a bit bizarre.

All of these things should be possible with magic in my opinion.

i agree with all of these though the importance of each IMO varies (though i don't think you wrote your list in any order other than that which it came to you), if i were to prioritize these most to least important for magic to be able to perform, i think i'd end up with something like:
1) reality bending
2) buffing
3) battlefield control
4) healing/de-debuffing
5) utility
6) debuffing
7) information gathering
8) area damage
9) entrenchment
10) single target damage

i've put reality bending first, because as circular as it may sound i think the most important things for magic to do is the things only magic can do, the things i'd consider to fall into this category is stuff like stoneshape, water walking, unseen servant.

 

[Willie the Duck]

I think if there is little to no risk or opportunity cost,

Personally, the big problem is being able to swap out your spell list easily.

I know. I think magic would be more interesting if it did.

D&D has certainly paid a price for magic being reliable modular rule-changes that rarely risk anything other than opportunity cost, rarely take more than one game-time-unit, come in large option arsenals, and are all recoverable overnight (+ maybe 10 minutes/spell level reading time).

There's rarely as much continuous pushback against the magic-nonmagic dichotomy with game systems where spells cost HP, or can cause you to suffer/explode/become corrupt*, or take days to cast, or you can only generally solve 1-5 types of problems with being a caster at any given time, etc.
*these often have their own issues, depending on implementation (such as all-or-nothing consequences, wide differences in GM interpretation, or long-term consequences being meaningless in one-offs).

I've long-since thought that some spells would simply work better outside that framework. Spells like Earthquake have slowly gotten less impressive (until it is more like 'localized earth tremor') once the worldbuilding consequences had to be taken into account. Well, what if it was a spell that took two weeks of casting to make happen*? Now every wizard can't just invalidate castles*. Likewise, each edition we keep having another Wish hornets nest of limits and word parsing and loopholes and an inevitable infinite loop**. That one I think would work better as simply following the rules for magic item crafting, rather than spellcasting.
*kinda like the 'cast every day for a year to make permanent' spells in 5e
**unless they are hidden underground in precise locations for two weeks, which is a great plot hook
***or toothless consequence, like simulacrum doing it for you or the ageless race in wishes-age-you editions

Everything execpt 10(maybe) should also be something that non-magic can do.

I think that's the other side of the coin. Spells are also 'such a big problem*' for D&D because D&D traditionally gates off large swaths of activity behind magic-only (or magic-only-consistently, or magic-only-well-defined).
*YMMV

 

[dave2008]

As I am ever designing my D&D hack (no the 5e edition) I am 95% I am going with casting spells requires the caster to roll, either a to hit or ability check. I don't think both, but you never know! The exception may be cantrips in some cases or signature spells.