D&D 5E WHY is there (still) no Class that allows you to use both Arcane and Divine magic...?

[Gadget]

Is there a way to for an Arcane spellcaster to get a "Raise Dead"-type spell? Even a weak one like Revitify? (I am aware of the Wizard school that lets you make a Philosopher Stone that can be used to raise the dead, but anything else?)

Yes, Bard chooses such a spell with Magical Secrets. Done.

 

[ChrisCarlson]

I disagree. It might be a winner if you use multiclassing. Multi-classing, however, is an optional rule that not all DMs allow.

I gotta admit. IMO, this is one of the most inane rotes currently coming out of certain camps. Really? It's an optional rule? Yes, we know, "it says so". But what rule isn't an optional rule? Point to any rule in the PHB that is not optional.

Many of those DMs that disallow multi-classing might however allow a mystic theurge type class.

So, let's play a game where the setting allows for there to be casters who can dip into both arcane and divine magic. But I guess we can't. Because it says multiclassing is optional and we just arbitrarily decided to not use it. So now we've screwed ourselves. Whatever shall we do now?

Tell me where something like that would ever actually happen at a real table and not just some theoretical white-room table.

Furthermore, for many D&D groups that allow multi-classing, multi-classing as a solution is far from a winner.

You sound like you are speaking from a position of superior knowledge. Please, provide data to back up this "many D&D groups" experiencing this issue you cited.

For such groups, it is ofen viewed as a weak solution that brings a lot of inappropriate baggage to the character and is best used when a character "changes" careers.

Everyone brings their own baggage to the table. I certainly don't have such hang-ups occurring at my tables as you outline here.

Otherwise, many multi-class concepts are viewed as better served by a new class or class variant

Says you. My considerable experience informs me otherwise. So now what? Do our votes on the matter cancel each other out?

 

[TheCosmicKid]

It sounds like your proposal is just to change the sorcerer's spells list to all the spells in the game? And done.

Not necessarily the whole sorcerer kit. Just the "Pick X spells, and that's all you can do" bit.

 

[Giant2005]

There isn't much point in making an Arcane/Divine hybrid class.
It would just be a half caster with Arcane Magic and a half caster with Divine Magic - the exact same thing that would occur if you simply took alternating levels as a divine class and arcane class.

 

[Tony Vargas]

What's the concept of this hypothetical class? An hermetic scholar who learns to invoke the secret names of deities to 'steal' some of their power in addition to having learned other occult secrets such as casting arcane spells? A devotee of a god of magic who's zeal aids him in mastering arcane spells? A 'priest' in a setting where the nature/existance of the gods is debatable, and magic comes from the knowledge/power of the faithful, not the thing they have faith in?


BTW, Clerics & Wizards already share 23 spells:

Animate Dead
Antimagic Field
Astral Projection
Banishment
Bestow Curse
Blindness/Deafness
Clairvoyance
Continual Flame
Control Water
Control Weather
Create Undead
Etherealness
Feign Death
Gate
Geas
Gentle Repose
Glyph of Warding
Hold Person
Legend Lore
Light
Magic Circle
Mending
Planar Binding
Plane Shift
Protection from Energy
Protection from Evil and Good
Remove Curse
Scrying
Sending
Stone Shape
Symbol
Tongues
True Seeing

 

[Patrick McGill]

Wizards get Wish, which can be used to bring someone back to life.

 

[Cognomen's Cassowary]

Not necessarily the whole sorcerer kit. Just the "Pick X spells, and that's all you can do" bit.

So the theme of the class is "no features, pick whatever spells you want"? I'm not sure that's a class.

Paladin and (theoretically) ranger spells are balanced around those classes gaining spell slots half as fast as full casters and capping out at fifth-level spells. This already creates a small problem with lore bards being able to snake their spells. A take-whatever class with unfettered access to paladin spells would pull ahead of other classes steadily until around tenth level, and then the others would slowly catch up moving toward twentieth.

Beyond that . . . think about what spells you would take at each spell level. You wouldn't have a school or elemental affinity or domain or theme steering you in any direction, so what would you take? All the best spells, right? So what happens when you have a class with all the best spells, a unified full-caster progression, and a single casting ability? It's a recipe for overpoweredness.

 

[Khisanth the Ancient]

Yeah, with even in 3E bards had some healing, and the arcane/divine divide is even weaker now.

So something like a mystic theurge doesn't really make sense in 5E... and even that required multiclassing to become.

 

[Rottle]

In D&D, there has traditionally been a sharp divide between Classes that use Arcane magic (i.e. Wizards, etc.) and Classes that have access to Divine magic (i.e. Clerics, etc.), such that Wizards and the like receive no healing or resurrection magic UNLESS they multiclass (the Bard being an exception).

However, in quite a few works of fantasy fiction - and other RPGs - Wizardly characters do not have any such limitation, freely casting any spells available in the fictional world or game system (i.e. GURPS mages are not prohibited from selecting healing or raise dead type spells - in fact, in GURPS Banestorm, the world of Yrth, only mages cast spells - any "cleric"-type character must be a mage to do so!) So why is there no such "blended" Class in D&D?

I understand that such a Class could not have all the "bells and whistles" of both a D&D Cleric and a D&D Wizard, or it would be overpowered... but surely there's some way to make a build that would not be game-breaking?

What do you mean still.....1e rangers had access to druid and magic-user spells.....

 

[The Crimson Binome]

I disagree. It might be a winner if you use multiclassing. Multi-classing, however, is an optional rule that not all DMs allow.

Multi-classing is as optional as any entirely new class you make. You need explicit DM permission in either case.

In D&D 5E, the common character concepts can be fully explored through the combination of class (and sub-class) and backgrounds. If you want to expand that out to include uncommon concepts, then the established method for doing so is to multi-class. The multi-class rules exist specifically to represent this sort of weird hybrid concept that you're talking about.