What solution for "Cantrips don't feel magical"?

[5ekyu]

To answer your point, 5ekyu, look at the two issues of the OP:

A) at-will magic makes magic feel mundane that several people have stated
B) have that casters can contribute meaningfully in a magical way without having to resort to mundane actions

My post addresses issue A in that at-will magic feels mundane for many because the caster has to resort to the same cantrip repeatedly, such as Fire Bolt. Having variety will help stop it from feeling mundane because the caster is not doing the same action over and over and has more options.

My post addresses issue B in that by offering a variety of cantrips that can affect combat (at least in that situation), the caster has other options without having to resort to mundane (non-magical) actions such as attacking with a ranged or melee weapon.

Those were my points to help the OP and others who feel at-well magic makes it feel less magical. I address one possible reason why at-will magic feels mundane, but in fairness, part of the issue for some is they simply don't want a caster using cantrips every round because they run out of slots. As others have presented, to obvious options are:

• increase the number of spell slots available for 1-9,
• use a recharge or drain system, or
• grant other magical abilities

Anything else is possible of course, but those are the easy ones. Implementing any of them, like the options I posted, require discussion in the group with keeping balance in mind.

EDITED: to remove snarkiness, it has been a rough morning, my apologies.

"My post addresses issue A in that at-will magic feels mundane for many because the caster has to resort to the same cantrip repeatedly, such as Fire Bolt. Having variety will help stop it from feeling mundane because the caster is not doing the same action over and over and has more options."

Once you assume the cause is the lack of variety, you have gone outside the scope of the OP claim. You have added your own interpretation to the issue and right after telling others to move on if they do that.

Secondly, your proposal does not address variety and deal with the only firebolt at all. Frankly easily half the casters I see have at least two attack cantrips by tier-2 (to cue different effects like cannot heal, slower, disadvantage, etc or just the attack vs save vs range options) so they do already **choose to have** have some variety. But more to the point whether that one csnttio was chosen yesterday or a month ago does not matter for "we all spam the ssme attack" malaise. In fact, it makes it worse. If we know the enemy is a fire resistant guy, we all learn ray of frost and then we spam ray of frost so even more chance of three different classes all spam the same thing.

You proposal allows them to get to the exact same example of the problem "in play" as exists now *if* that is what the players want.

As for B, there are quite a few combat cantrips now and yet the claim is the players wind up screwing the magical fella by their choices and optimizations. How will there bring more to choose from make a difference?

In your answer to B you leave it so that the same case can occur as was stated as the problem. They can all wind up with the same spells spamming from different classes against the threats **if that is what they want**,

"More to choose from" meets optimization planning (asdumed by those who claim it's the rules driving the choices) and just means more cantrips in the "not used" pile.

Even if you plan to add new cantrips which make it to the top of the heap and get taken, you are just changing which ones are spammed, a new set of "ssme dpell spam".

In order to change the casting choices you need to increase the number of cantrips available- cantrips active at a time, like double it, so that each can have not 3-4 csnttips and maybe 2 attacks but maybe 4 attacks to choose from.

But even then, what stops or dissuades them from all looking at the siame situation or campaign series and all deciding firebolt is the good call here and spamming firebolt side by side resulting in again Tom Cruise lip syncing "We lost that magic feeling, ohnohnoh, that magic feeling?" on the games' soundtrack?

 

[5ekyu]

If you want to address ssme spell spam bringing more Tom Cruise into your game, you need something like the pro-wrestling rule of the well.

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"Going to the well too often" - Unlike slotted spells, cantrips drawn power from you, from your own reserve or well of magic. Cantrips may be cast over and over but the well gets lower and lower and they get less effective if used repeatedly in a short time. "

"Each time you cast a cantrip, apply a -1 cumulative to any subsequent cantrip (all its values including attack roll, save DC, and effect roll or fixed value) Casting any slotted spell recharges your "well" and removes all cantrip penalties. A short or long rest also fills the well."


**********

So, using the shallow well, folks cannot effectively spam cantrips but can use them as filler stretching out their spell use between slotted spells. The four casters all throwing firebolt have to mix in cast slotted spells to keep refilling that well and use of slotted spells brings maybe a bit more class features in play.


Might also impact some **not this thread** issues like folks who go nuts over Guidance.

Easy to track - red poker chip for each dip in the well.

Obviously, Warlock is an issue due to it bring built to spam EB but a class feature for them solves it with "but if any invocation is used with EB it is not going to drain the well - no -1 applied"

Of course, this still allows the players to all choose to take warlock if they all want to spam cantrips - so the "*thwart the players choices* goal is not reached entirely.

Off the cuff guessing, my bet is most of the time, by the time you get to -2 or more, players will look to refill that well with a spell. That leads to maybe 2-3 can trips between each spell cast max or a net of 3-4 times your spell slots in total castings plus 2-3 more per short rest.

That feels like it goes a long way to meet a goal of "filling an encounter day of rounds" but changing the "same effect round affect round" etc.

The odd impact it would have is on "long" spell use. Each slotted spell cast is a free "well refill" so if you cast mage armor an hour ago that is a wasted well fill. So, do you hold off mage armor to cast after a cantrip or two - risky but optimizing each slot to get the most cantrips.

 

[5ekyu]

"No child left behind" right?

Nope just years of play by some of us who found that very much not to produce a satisfying experience.

But guess what... in the current rules if you want to not use your spells you can. You can heroically save your slots and staff or dart ot grapple or whatever. That preferred awesome you want is still there.

 

[5ekyu]

The skill of the caster is in the save DC for the spell.

In general, the precept is that any given spell has one die roll associated with it connecting with the target - either it is a spell attack roll by the caster (like a wizard's Flre bolt) or a save by the target (like a cleric's Sacred Flame). You generally don't see double-jeopardy, having to roll a to-hit and *also* the target having a save. Having two die rolls would substantially reduce the spell's effectiveness.

Yeah... just like with weapons etc proficiency comes with gaining the feature. Casters apply their proficiency to the spells but not ssy to greataxe or longbow - so it's good at aiming spells".

 

[Maxperson]

3ed still had the linear fighter / quadratic wizard issue. Part of the fix for that is 5e encourages more encounters per day. So actual spell slots need to stretch further, and at-will attacks from martial characters do more than cantrips so sometimes a caster is casting one of their higher level spells and doing more than the martial characters, and sometimes they aren't are are doing less than the martial characters, to average out about the same over a long enough period of time. (Since individual situations can and should favor different types and provide variety.)

Sure, but that isn't my issue. My issue isn't that wizards are able to cast in all or virtually all rounds of combat. My issue is that cantrips are unlimited, which takes the magic feel away from magic for me.

 

[Maxperson]

Some possibilities to fill the "action gap" with magical activities that aren't necessarily at-will spells.

1) Turn "cantrips" into the ability to craft "cantrip wands". A cantrip wand has 10 charges, and regains its charges after a long rest. (Possible tuning would be to lower the number of charges, or regain 1d6+X number of charges per long rest, to keep that old-school randomness). If you lose a cantrip wand, you can craft a new one in eight hours and with 25 gp of materials. Cantrip wands are attuned specifically to their creator and can only be used by their creator.

2) Buff up spells that allow magical actions, like Witch Bolt, Flame Blade, and the various Investiture spells. Rather than "one spell slot = one action", this allows one spell slot to support multiple turns in combat.

I really like that wand idea.

 

[MoonSong]

One thought would be to take away all attack cantrips and then reintroduce those as wand/implement attacks. It would then feel like something the spellcaster has as a tool without it being their own power

1) Turn "cantrips" into the ability to craft "cantrip wands". A cantrip wand has 10 charges, and regains its charges after a long rest. (Possible tuning would be to lower the number of charges, or regain 1d6+X number of charges per long rest, to keep that old-school randomness). If you lose a cantrip wand, you can craft a new one in eight hours and with 25 gp of materials. Cantrip wands are attuned specifically to their creator and can only be used by their creator.

This feels like a non-starter to me. It sounds cool on paper, but remember that wizards aren't the only casters in the game. Part of the appeal of casters like the sorcerer is that the power comes from within, that it is second nature and an integral part of the caster, not something external that can be chosen freely, changed on a whim or taken away.

Sure, but that isn't my issue. My issue isn't that wizards are able to cast in all or virtually all rounds of combat. My issue is that cantrips are unlimited, which takes the magic feel away from magic for me.

Granted ten thousand ways to fry a goblin doesn't really feel magical. But the at-will nature of cantrips is integral to the feeling of warlocks and sorcerers, specially sorcerers. Would you be happy with something like "you can cast cantrips freely as long as you have spell slots available. Once you run out of spell slots you cannot cast cantrips"?

 

[robus]

The skill of the caster is in the save DC for the spell.

In general, the precept is that any given spell has one die roll associated with it connecting with the target - either it is a spell attack roll by the caster (like a wizard's Flre bolt) or a save by the target (like a cleric's Sacred Flame). You generally don't see double-jeopardy, having to roll a to-hit and *also* the target having a save. Having two die rolls would substantially reduce the spell's effectiveness.

Yeah I get that, but it still irks me.

 

[Immortal Sun]

On another note, I think this is a great argument to get rid of the Vancian casting system. If the spellcasting system used points instead of "slots", you could simply say any Cantrip costs 1 point. So a player could either make a caster with an "at will" magic approach, similar to a fighter where every round they get to cast a small spell and will rarely, if ever run out; or a player could build a "nova" caster who could fire off some big stuff, but do very little of it.

You could add a similar system for martials "fatigue", which would accomplish [MENTION=23751]Maxperson[/MENTION]'s goals of limiting physical exertion. Similarly, a martial could use maneuvers which take up larger amounts of fatigue in order to replicate the options of "make lots of little hits" or "make a few really big hits".

Though at this point you're basically using the Elder Scrolls system. Which I think is a darn fine system.

 

[Maxperson]

Granted ten thousand ways to fry a goblin doesn't really feel magical. But the at-will nature of cantrips is integral to the feeling of warlocks and sorcerers, specially sorcerers. Would you be happy with something like "you can cast cantrips freely as long as you have spell slots available. Once you run out of spell slots you cannot cast cantrips"?

No, that doesn't work for me like the wand idea does. Casters would just always leave a slot filled and there would be no effective difference.