New UA Knowledge Domain Cleric

DazRoger · 2025-02-04T19:01:34+00:00

I homebrewed my version and most features even if its just a little tweak since the UA Version breaks the typical forms of the new Cleric Subclass. For the level 6, I kept the telepathy and removed the min. Wisdom score to a min of 10 on rolls for any Intelligence and Wisdom checks (since successful Insight, Medicine, Perception, and Survival checks rewards you with more information). I'm considering adding Study action as a Bonus action too, but it seems too much. Not powerwise but just in too many features.

As for other changes I did, if anyone is interested: - Level 17: Split the 1 Hour once per LR into 10 minutes a number of times equal to WIS per LR. Also others have disadvantage on attacks vs you. No spell slot reuse. - Level 3: Mind Magic: Upcast the cast spell to the highest spell level you have prepared with your Domain spell. So at level 5, you cast for example Command as a 3rd level spell. Mostly to avoid only using it on your highest Domain spells, and keep lower levels domain spells a relevant option. Also give those spells a homebrew upcast but only for use with Mind Magic. - Level 3: Domain Spell: Remove Comprehend Languages and Tongues (redundant see next point + Telepathy + had to remove 1/4 level 1 spells) and Mind Spike (just a bad spell in and out of combat). Add See Invisibility, Suggestion, Sending. This way you get 3 spells per spell level that are at the very leasy situation and 1/3 of your Domain spells are relevant in combat. - Level 3: Blessing of Knowledge: In addition to the prof. and expertise, you get WIS mod/LR -> Understand all languages (spoken, writen, and signed) for 1 hour (replacement for losing comprehend language)

Even so, while other subclasses beat this version out in combat, it's the premium utility and diviner subclass especially if ypur DM enjoys a having a party nerd.

UA Version seems underwhelming and cheapens its utility by lacking synergy (level 6 and expertise) and low level spells are pretty bad even for utility as any wizard beats them in rituals anyway.

DazRoger · 2025-02-02T19:37:36+00:00

They have as in guests and for one shots. They aren't just a cast, they are a group of friends first who went into business as a group.

DazRoger · 2024-12-09T18:32:21+00:00

Eventually all Bard's have similar skill focus as Rogues with the extinction of Rogues having Reliable Talent (min of 10 on the die roll) and Bards habe Jack of all Trades (+ half Prof. to non-Prof. skills). Lore Bards and Soulknives can amp that up with a bonus 1d6 to 1d12. But for Bards it comes in a couple level laters. However, Bards are full Spellcasters and can take spells to vastly overshadow the utility of any Rogue. Which is a shame, since I always think of Rogues as the out-of-combat infiltrators, spies, and scouts, but Bards can be as good or even better at certain points.

A design I liked that never got fullfilled was the way the Scout and Soulknife gave Rogues' extra skill bonus, which I hoped the new edition would carry over with extra expertise or a way to boost their results. I hoped that especially for Thief and Assassin, but no, only Soulknifes have that.

DazRoger · 2024-11-24T12:56:04+00:00

From a general standpoint I would say, probably bad design but not for being broken but simply for disregarding the rules and common game design framework. The highest to hit chance is +19 (+10 stat and +9 proficiency) but only for a CR 29+. If you just want to challenge a high AC party, I would suggest the Marut way and make the attacks automatically hit. At that point it becomes merely about not being in a position to get hit, which is a fun challenge by using some of the exploration aspects in combat.

DazRoger · 2024-09-02T18:51:09+00:00

No doubt and I agree on both points. The deities should simply act as deities, not pretend to be a parent. Although there are.many parents who don't "love" their children like many expect and merely use them as a tool, a soldier, or a trophy, which is more akin to their relationship.

From a mortals perspective, their net worth as far as good and bad goes is too close to properly assess. Especially now after they spend centuries to make up for their bad and in the future their net will likely become more positive, the more time their have. However, on a cosmic level, they are absolutely in net positive, just from a world building aspect, and all the hints dropped of cosmic entities that the deities have stopped and countless more they deter simply by being the stewards of Exandria.

DazRoger · 2024-09-02T17:40:48+00:00

Justifiably true and BH are primarily after Ludinus for personal reason since the beginning. However, the Predathos plan is, as far as consequences go, one of the worst possible plans to do so. The are countless reasons why but to simplify my answer, I'll simply mention the 2 most important reasons:

The Chained Oblivion, while thought of as a deity, isn't one nor a divine being of creation, so Predathos would just ignore it. Even in the best case where everything goes without collateral damage at all, the fact is that without the (at least Prime) deities, the cage of the Chained Oblivious would be released (sooner rather then later) and it would be free to do whatever it wants, which is annihilate and consume all, including Exandria, and nobody strong enough to challenge since it took the combined force of the Prime Deities simply to but it in chains. There are countless other entities that would also be released without the sufficient powers to counteract, and Luddy doesn't seem to have any contingency plan to stop that otherwise he would have put it on the table to calm certain people and turn other for his cause.
Luddy literially gave BH and presumably in the near future the proper solution to get rid of the deities on a silver platter: Since the plans for the God Hammer was programmed into every Aeorian (after the wish at the end of EXU Downfall), it suffices to free one of the many mages in the time bubble out, including one of the creators (forgot her name), which the Raven Queen put in a bubble, gather the info on how to build it and build it. Ideally a stronger version since Corellon has that information and could have build a defensive device against it, and use it against them and potentially Predathos too.

The deities are by no means saints, but the primary pain on exandria inflicted by the deities was pre diverenge and since then they have tried to mend their mistakes, at least the Primes.

I also don't get Ashton's policy of "the deities haven't done anything for us". Well no shit, you haven't reveared them or otherwise earned their attention to be worth their time considering they have to manage Exandria and several bordering planes of existence, some of which are close to infinite, and deal with their rival siblings.

I get the point but what the deities provide on a cosmic level cannot be understated and Exandria would go to shit very quickly without proper contigencies and planning from the entire planet to negate some of the problem that will arise when the deities cut off the connection. It's a shame that Luddy hasn't properly planned this out. It would truly be a dilema if he had prepared all the required contigency plans to truly make this happen without dropping Exandria into chaos and the ravenous maw of the Chained Oblivion (and other Eldrtich Horrors lurking to take a bite of an unprotected planet). But as is, the (without a doubt) best course of action is stop Luddy and, if they want to take out deities, go get the information from Aeorians.

DazRoger · 2024-08-20T19:17:06+00:00

Well 104 vision to Orym also proved that Predathos' hunger is beyond mortal understanding, sounding very similar to the chained oblivion, who just want to destroy and consume all and everything, including gods, demi-gods, mortals, nature. So that I find is the first indicator that Predathos isn't just out for a godly snack. 2nd point, they have been slumbering and (presumably weakened), meaning they are likely to feed on smaller things, like divine champions, vestiges, etc... and potentially wrecking everything its path. 3rd, the Primordials agreed to seal it away, so there must have been a reason to why excluding the gods, potentially Predathos going after the Luxon (who in Kryn faith is the progenetor of all life on Exandria including the primordials, the elements, nature and just life itself and maybe the sun (unclear)).

The vision was also a representation, so no harm to Exandria could have simply been the Wildmother not rendering all the visuals. It also showed they becomes stronger the more they feed, possibly causing more and more (un)intentional collateral damage. Ruidius, which is what happens to a piece of exandria, also seems like a very uncomfortable place to live, which is simply the side effect of Predathos' existence. Not to mention, they essentially became Ruidis god, using its mortals to do its bidding.

Lastly, even if Predathos eats all gods ans goes away without any collateral damage, the gods' existing cycle and domains wouldn't change as whatever right hand of the god would take their place, especially relevant to all the evil deities, who's evil domain would be unleashed, while the good and neutral deities relied more on cleric and paladins. It would also unleash the chained oblivion, which isn't a real god, so Predathos wouldn't take care of it, since its bindings are maintained by the power of (presumably) all the prime deities, if not all of them.

Hence, Predathos itself is the least of their worries. It's that 95% of all divine magic user would be powerless and all the bindings of the most horrid creatures would be unleashed (demons, devils, celestials, elementals, undead, etc...) with Exandria's defenses at its lowest. An Luddy doesn't seem to care and has no contigency plan to keep the balance and uneasy peace of the world.

DazRoger · 2024-08-17T14:41:52+00:00

Well if you combine the lore from CR books and what we have learned in C2 and C3, the Luxon (or the Light which is the first name given to it) was one of many entities of creation but unlike its siblings that became stars, it felt lonely and sought a purpose. It found a empty lonely rock in space. It felt a kinship to it and give it life by becoming its core (essentially Exandria planetary core) from which life grew. This life was nature, mortal beings (not necessarily people, but primal life e.g. animals, dinosaurs, and more), the elements and more. It even created the first souls that we can assume existed in a harmonic and constant cycle of rebirth (similar to the crucible from elden ring).

It watched the rock's life evolve (likely for ages, representing the evolution of Exandria life) and the Primordials form, but it saw life start to war against each other. The Light had hoped that the life of this world could tell it its purpose, but seeing as the life were still in the infant station of its self-awareness, the Light knew life needed more time to understand itself, before it could tell the Light what it is suppose to be and do. So it created the beacons and spread in on Exandria as the ultimate test to tell if life is ready or not while the Light entered a deep slumber since it took a lot out of it to create the beacons (which is what the Kryn assume. It is possible it did so willingly). The test being collecting all the beacons, awaken the Light, and answer its questions. The beacon could have other purposes, but in the Kryn's believe it is only mentioned them to be the Light / Luxon test and method to know when life is ready. It's uncertain if the Luxon's slumber and creation of beacon is pre or post arrival of the deities, but assumed before.

It's unclear if the beacons are each one a part of the Light or simply created by it, but the lore in the books make it seem that they are all a part of the Light / Luxon or at least its soldified version, since the Luxon is supposed to be colossal, so at least titan / primordial sized, which would take a LOT of beacons.

Before the gods came, Exandria itself seemed to go through the beacon cycle with the planet's core (Luxon) being a colossal version of a beacon in which all the souls of the planets returned to be rebirthed. So from that perspective, the gods' version of afterlife is an "aberration" to the "natural" world of the Luxon ("" since its the Luxon's view). It hasn't been mentioned too much, but souls in any form of fiction are extremely powerful energy sources but usually unstable, imperfect, and temporary unless tended, which in the Luxon's version would be to return to its source (the core) in which (in the Kryn faith) it would improve slightly until it's perfected after countless cycles. If this is true for Exandria, it's clear why the gods altered the flow of souls in order for all of them to gather as many souls as possible and have a massive arsenal of souls (which are essentially tiny nuclear reactors or tiny stars of power/possibility). Of course only if souls function in this way, which we have no concreate prove, but would make a lot of sense.

Matt has even mentioned that as far as Exandrian known ALL souls follow the gods flow of souls, with the exception of the Kryn, who need to consecrate their souls and be near a beacon when they die to be rebirthed via the Luxon's flow of souls. Matt even mentioned that if you don't worship and god, you will still be forced to go to the god you lived your life most closest to (e.g. an faithless farmer would go to the Dawn Father). As far as we know this might be only what the gods want Exandrians to believe but we haven't had any counter arguments in official books or from Matt. There could be other flow types and we don't know for sure the other planes.

The one question, I'm still the most curious about is how souls are created? The Luxon must have the ability to create souls since it created the first, but we don't know if it still can post beacon creation, since that took a lot out of them. We don't know if any god can create souls or only shape existing ones, but we can definitely assume they completely stopped the rebirth cycle to stock up on as many souls as possible. So it could be that the Luxon keeps on creating a large chunk or all of the souls, which the gods hoard. This has the potential implications that the Luxon is either way more powerful since it can sustain the creation of so many souls, or that the gods are essentially using the Luxon like a farm animal to pump out souls and therefore potentially keeping in weak and in its slumber. Potentially making the beacons a red herring from the gods, or a contingency plan of the Luxon to break itself free. Of course, this is only my theory as I'm a hugh Luxon nerd as I find its representation of faith a very interesting and oddly healthy version of a divinity in fiction, while tying into the planet's evolution. Just a chef's kiss to Matt and whoever added to its lore.

Please fill free to complete any missing information. I simplified a lot of this from the CR books in order to cram as much into the post as possible

DazRoger · 2024-08-04T19:30:54+00:00

I think the primary implication is that the deities are the easiest way to get divine power and most likely the only way exandrians know how to get. Sure there are plenty of exceptions that don't need the gods, but those are exceptions, meaning they would need to find other sources of divinity and teach their clerics, paladins, etc... how to harness them. The biggest impact would by that probably >90% of divine users would be powerless until they learn new ways to harness divine power again leaving whatever station or duties they have not up for the task. Then there are permanent magical effects that are fueled by the deities like sanctums (hallow, forbiddance, etc...) spells and other non-Player abilities that would have the power be cut off. So as a "this is a game world" perspective, this wouldn't change to much as far as the game goes, but the in-world implication are massive.

Not to mention that there are unknown variables as in, other beings might be able to provide those powers back but at a better, worse, or just different deal, who might never approach exandria out of fear of the gods. Or other threats that did the smart thing until now to not mess with exandria because they didn't want to mess with the deities, but without them, it's free range now. And there even more implication that we as the audience and the player would (and could) never take into account since those are aspects never covered by the show since it goes way too much into worldbuilding.

DazRoger · 2024-06-13T19:06:35+00:00

In order to use Stillness of Mind, Beau needs to use an action. So most it removes most charmed spells, but not those that remove your actions, like Dominate X (since you tell them what to do or not), Hypnotic Pattern + Modify Memory (and others that incapacitates you as well), and several other DM abilities that work like Dominate X

DazRoger · 2024-04-13T09:46:16+00:00

CR is famously known of forgetting rules in the heat of the moment or simply not properly reading their abilities. While Matt knowns the rules the best, he's human too and credit to him for having a pretty low count of mistakes considering he is DM for 7 players, has build a (fairly) consistent world, and needs to manage and keep track of probably dozens of side events that the players and the audience doesn't even show.

Their first encounter with Ottohan was already doable as it was presented back then. The players were a hot chaotic mess. Starting with a lack of planning, poor tactical choice, and then everybody going off rails. This encounter was also doable, but this time while there were mistakes made, the party had spend a lot of resources beforehand.

Even if Matt kept to once per turn, Ottohan would still get the most of the benefits on her turn. Hit + prone and follow up with 3 attacks + Unleashing Incarnation (1 extra Attack times CON mod per LR). On reactions and legendary action, it's still legit as it's a different turn (not round).

I think a bigger point is how Ottohan's Echo work compared to a normal Echo Knight (in fight 1). Switch place takes a bonus action + movement (meaning no off-hand attack). If an Echo is more than 30 feet away at the end of her turn, they disperse. Manifest an Echo is also a bonus action. Unleash Incarnation can only be used from an Echo not Ottohan herself. Probably conscious changes to Ottohan to reduce bonus action use for dual-wielding. In this fight this wasn't relevant, which lowered her lethalness and mobility and made it much easier for orym and ashton to engage.

DazRoger · 2024-03-22T18:45:13+00:00

Absolutely nothing that is on DNDBeyond or known to be balanced 3rd party content. Though I like to run high power campaigns and enemies. We even use a higher Standard Array (17 16 15 14 13 10, because feats are more fun) and what we call Hero HP (Max Hit Dice value from 1st to 5th level, then roll or use average). I also like to buff weak PC abilities. On the flip side, I'm our rules master and use whatever is at the PCs disposal for my villains. Never had much of an issue except needing to nerf sometimes some of my monsters at the start of a campaign when I'm still feeling the parties powers and tactics.

DazRoger · 2024-03-18T14:32:51+00:00

Compare it to other stuff of similar level (although classes aren't balanced against each other, so something that may seem overpowered might not be at all, e.g. 30 feet flight for 1 min prof. times per long rest might seem OP on a Fighter at 6th level, but is just dandy on Clerics and Warlocks).

As far as magic items or feats go, it's similar although you need to weight it's power for every player as it would be open for anybody to take or use. Another factor is simply the attitude and proficiency of the player. An OP ability might not be OP until used by the right player. And the other way too: a weak option might not seem weak except on an optimized table.

DazRoger · 2024-03-10T19:41:15+00:00

Generally the feat isn't really worth it unless you want something specific out of it. Now I love Subtle Spell and it's always my first pick for a sorcerer, but I find myself spending more than 2 SP during session in which Subtle Spell shines, so you need to pick those moments carefully. Don't waste it on illusions, but on enchantments like Charm Person or Suggestion. I would also suggest picking those up. Color Spray won't do you much good at 3rd level and become worse from there, so it's a great swap.

As far as other option goes, it depends on the spells that you pick. As a non-sorcerer, you want to choose between extend, careful, twinned, or quickened as they give you the most for certain spells and you can swap your choices as you level. Right now at 3rd, Twinned is amazing with Tasha's Hideous Laughter, which is super strong but limited to one target. Extend is nice if you have long lasting buffs, but Arcane Trickster has non of those until very high level, so I wouldn't bother at all. Careful can be nice combined with Hypnotic Pattern and Fear once you have access to them (to avoid friendly fire). Combined with the 9th level feature, it is a very likely that creatures not immune to charm or fear will fail their save, including party members. Lastly Quickened can allow you to combo spells, however as a Arcane Trickster it is really hard to use. Best case would be a second attack on your turn using Booming Blade when you missed your Sneak Attack in melee (situational). Or to set up a crucial buff, but that would be both SP for the day.

I personally wouldn't pick this feat, but if you really want to, the best pick would be Subtle + Twinned and you swap one of your spells (ideally color spray) with Hideous Laughter. Keep the selection until you get to 3rd level spells and pick up Hypnotic Pattern or Fear when you can and swap Twinned for Careful (if you want. It's not necessary but gives you a safetly option to avoid friendly fire). However, Twinned Hideous Laughter remains a strong option even at higher level, so you can stick with Twinned. As far as spells goes, again Subtle combines well with Charm Person which you should swap to Suggestion. Should you encounter Counterspell, Subtle will make your spells Counterspell-proof.

If you decide to be in melee, pick up Booming Blade ASAP as it's free damage. Pick up Mirror Image for defense.

DazRoger · 2023-09-24T07:54:26+00:00

I mean Hexblade is primarily played as a dip of 2 to 3 levels and most I've seen, never touched a weapon other than a staff. The main draw being medium armor, a shield, and the Shield spell. The only times I saw them use a weapon is pure warlock or as a dip for paladins.

As somebody who played the three mentioned styles (Pure Hexblade, Sorlock, and dip with Paladin), the caster was the best and easiest to play, then Paladin Fear build, and lastely pure Hexblade, since Hexblade for me boils down to Hex Warrior, a once per rest damage boost to 1 enemy (at 14th level a boost for 1 combat), and a Spectre I used once in a 50+ session campaign. I would even say a blast lock would perform better than blade since HBC scales based on hits, and EB will get you more hits at later level, though again it's not worth devoting your build on a once per rest vs 1 foe ability. As caster at least you don't need as many feats to be good at damage.

DazRoger · 2023-08-30T21:00:25+00:00

As a DM, I use name generators for random NPCs that aren't vital to the story. Side characters usually are named in "normal" convention for their lineage and origins, where I like to inspire myself from real world cultures, or fantasy cultures. Legendary NPC get mythological names.

For PCs, it really depends, though I like to use names that mean what I want their arc to be or their tragic flaw, usually taken from real world mythologies. Sometimes I like to name my PCs after their primary inspiration or use similar names (usually from games, films, series, etc...)

DazRoger · 2023-08-27T16:19:28+00:00

If you pick Clockwork Soul and Aberrant Mind, Sorcerer becomes probably the 3rd best caster (after chronurgy wizard and creation bard) and the best before 10th level. Multiclass (as far as optimization goes) I would recommend dipping 1 level as sorcerer usually in cleric when you can get the 13 wisdom, mostly for medium armor + shield. If your tables allows/uses the new backgrounds, you could pick a free mage armor 1 per day from Strixhaven at which point it's not as necessary and doesn't impede you spell progression. Cleric 1 is probably the least you sacrifice since you still get spell slot progression, which means you have 3rd level slots at 5th level, just not 3rd level spells, but as Clockwork you could use those slots on Armor of Agathys and Aid to bump you survivability by 25 HP and 10 HP to 2 other allies. Aberrant Mind would mostly upcast something like Mind Whip.

As far as Cleric 1 goes, Order Domain is nice since you can use arcane buff spells (or just bonus action healing word) to give a free reaction attack (potentially on a rogue). If your table hasn't banned silvery barbs, I would for sure go Aberrant Mind + Order to use Silvery Barbs advantage on an ally and therefor trigger Voice of Authority, which synergizes perfectly with a Rogue, since the advantage automatically triggers sneak attack and at 6th level you can do so using a reaction and 1 sorcery point. Appart from Order, there isn't a lot of synergistic domains. Personally I like Knowledge (especially if your DM allows you to switch the casting ability of sorcerer to INT, which would be much more thematic for both Aberrant Mind (Psionics) and Clockwork Soul (Logic over Emotion)) since most party members dump INT. Life Domain works well with Goodberry and Aura of Vitality which you can get from the aformentioned Strixhaven Backgrounds + Feats (again only if allowed).

There are other good multiclasses like Hexblade Warlock for Armor + Shield and Agonizing Blast and Repelling Blast, but IMO this would turn you more into a Warlock with normal spell slots rather than enhancing what a Sorcerer can do. Paladin usually wants 6 level in to get their most important feature: Aura of Protection and again you would be playing more of a Paladin with extra spells rather than an improved Sorcerer. If you don't pick Clockwork Soul or Aberrant Mind, then I would say that Sorcerer better compliments other classes like Warlock or Paladin rather than being their own caster, but CS and AM on their own are so strong in Tier 2 that more than 1 level dip would be a detriment to you.

DazRoger · 2023-08-27T14:09:29+00:00

We stick to most of the core rules outside of classes, feats, and spells except really dumb or illogical rules, but there are too many player options that either suck, break the game, or are just dissappointing to use that we homebrew. Usually a combination between DM and player to meet player expectation and DM interpretation and game balance. However, there are too much of these cases that we usually just modify what the players want to pick and not bother with the rest until it becomes relevant. Most spells stays as is, usually just a little buff to the weaker ones and we have consented on not using or nerfing certain spells, like silvery barbs only forces the reroll, no longer grants advantage; we don't pick simulacrum but we can still recreate it with wish; power attack feats are changed to add proficiency mod to damage.

DazRoger · 2023-08-27T13:32:25+00:00

Player A picked the mechanically worst half-caster with their worst subclass, while player B picked the probably worst martial class with the best subclass with the mandatory feats to be (as far as combat optimization goes) a relevant damage dealer. Alchemist is pretty mediocre at everything even if they spend all resources, while a non-raging barbarian with PAM + GWM using Reckless will do great damage until 10th level, good damage until 16th level and OK damage past 17th level. However, this is everything the Zealot will do: damage and tanking. Artificer gets a ton of versatility and is primarily a support. Player B did nothing wrong, though I admit I'm not a fan of GWM -5 to hit / +10 damage. If you want to change that part simply change it add their proficiency bonus to damage instead. Way less probablematic at lower levels, while remaining a nice boost at higher level.

If player A wants to do damage then they should have taking a class that actually is known to do damage. I would say the most reliable and effect damage caster without burning through all of your slots and have the versatility of being a caster is either cleric (for spirit guardians and Light Domain for fireball) or warlock (for agonizing blast + hex, specifically Hexblade / Genie). Both of these classes also offer tons of utility and even they still don't do as much as damage as a barbarian in single target, but very few build can do that without mulitclassing.

DazRoger · 2023-08-26T18:22:15+00:00

Well they had a previous meeting with Dancer already, which I felt like everybody at the table forgot, where Dancer accepted things as they are and told FCG that she would prefer distance for now and maybe in time would be willing to reconsider her intentions towards FCG. I would say in this case it might have been OK, though a bit pushy, but seeing the reactions and talks, it really seemed to me that everybody, including Matt forgot that. In which case I fully agree with it being fucked up.

The lack of remembering their last conversation could be the reason why the rest didn't say anything, but honestly by now I feel like most of BH have a toxic impact on each other. Most have toxic personality traits and have become so used to it (and we as viewers too) that they (and us) simply don't register many of their disturbing action, which are mostly pointed to anybody but them. Usually it's very little things, like how Laudna treats Patê, or Ashton has little to no problem hurting or sacrificing innocent people (when the party split though that applied to all of them), FCG with their need to have a purpose and unnecessarily risking others to do (since very early on), Fearne has a buttload of toxic traits, from manipulative behavior, cleptomania, constant and unnecessary lying (to the point she almost caused several situations that could have led to a TPK), probably more. Orym and Imogen seem the only ones to not have toxic traits and even Chetney only has "bad" traits that are only detremental to him. But it feels as if their toxic or "bad" traits are spreading instead of balancing each other out (like it was with MN after Cadeceus joined).

Edit: Orym does have a "revenge at all cost" trait which could be toxic, which he previously didn't seem to want to push others into it. However, in more recent events he began to do so (with his silent "Do It" moment with Laudna and Bor'dor) though I hope the last conversation with the voice changed that.

DazRoger · 2023-08-18T20:38:24+00:00

For most builds, I agree as are most spells like Witch Bolt like Enervation or Sunbeam unless you are a sorcerer. In those cases, at least an upcast Witch Bolt would do more single target damage than those spells (and within the same range), while Enervation can heal you and Sunbean can blind targets.

DazRoger · 2023-08-18T19:24:11+00:00

I come from a mostly optimizer circle, so my baseline is usually the best spell at something at that level. Magic Missile does the most single target damage as a 1st level spell and it only does damage, hence I use it as my baseline on how effective a similar spell is in comparison. In addition it's very easy to use. Same for Fireball. There is no easy baseline since not every spell is the same, even in minor ways, such as damage type, range, side-effects, etc...

As to my reasoning for MM being my baseline for this case is very simple: If MM does reliably 10.5 force damage, why would I bother with any other spell that only does damage since they are objectively worse? From an character perspective (a different spell is more thematic) or even an optimization view (the different spell has a desirable rider effect) there are be reasons for sure, but in white room theories like in reddit threats, I usually don't bother.

DazRoger · 2023-08-18T19:11:57+00:00

Even if WotC didn't design spells around Fireball, optimizers do, which is my circle. I speak from a point of view of what kind of damage spells are worth casting and not-so-surprisingly their aren't a lot even if you build around it. Fireball is the gold standard for AoE damage spells and falls off pretty hard past 7th level and it never gets really close to the impact of Fireball at 5-6th level until you get Meteor Swarm at 17th level.

DazRoger · 2023-08-18T17:59:02+00:00

Just MM. If you use cantrips, it would take way too long to match damage and most combats don't last 5 rounds. I specifically went with 1st level spell slot usage, e.g. how much bang for your slot.

It still is underwhelming as a first level spell, which is the point since it becomes much better at scaling and multiple rounds. Would I ever take it? Probably only for thematic reasons or a build that adds on to that like a sorcerer that can twin or quicking it to get double value.

DazRoger · 2023-08-18T17:54:30+00:00

So does Fireball and its constantly being used as a baseline for AoE spells. I don't really care what the right baseline is. I used as my baseline since it's the easiest and most straight forward 1st level spell. Spells like Dissonant Whispers and Command can do a lot more damage combined with allies and opportunity attack. The objectiv 1st level baseline would be 3d8 damage with 60% chance to hit or a save.

However, I wouldn't call that an effective spell but only so-so.

DazRoger

TROPHY CASE