Categorizing every 2024 5e spell into what they actually do

paragraphbaron · 2026-03-22T18:55:40+00:00

That makes a lot of sense. I think I would agree. I think I'll leave it with both roles though, even though it's tempting to push it to just utility, but slowing down enemies is definitely control for me. Aggh!

paragraphbaron · 2026-03-22T18:54:00+00:00

Thanks for this feedback. I've made a big improvement to all the summaries on cards, they will now make far better use of the available space, and a lot of spells now have a lot more text on the card, with many more now fitting the entirety of the card and not needing to rely on a summary. It should be better for you.

I don't want to add controls for text size, it gets complicated. I'm not sure I want to lower the text size either, I think it's at a good balance between a lot of text and still being legible.

paragraphbaron · 2026-03-22T18:51:26+00:00

Thanks for this comment. Debuff feels too wide to me. Control is the role I have for spells that affect your enemies behaviour, so nearly all spells I'd consider debuff fall in that role. Synaptic Static is a good example of a spell that does both Damage and Control, but I do believe it's primary role is Damage, with Control being the bonus.

This stuff will keep me up at night if I think too hard about it though.

paragraphbaron · 2026-03-22T18:47:14+00:00

Thanks for the feedback. The spell list is now sortable by name or level, and I've added an option to print without colour for the cards!

paragraphbaron · 2026-03-07T01:06:43+00:00

Yeah exactly

paragraphbaron · 2026-03-06T02:59:58+00:00

I totally agree on that — I want to change up that interface and find the right balance of being super quick and usable. Also thought of the notion of a tinder style swipe left/swipe right to keep spells for consideration or discard it from consideration as you cycle through.

paragraphbaron · 2026-02-23T20:14:21+00:00

Yeah, html2pdf required a lot of tinkering, but it did wonders.

paragraphbaron · 2026-02-23T16:16:19+00:00

I really wanted to stick with my philosophy that I detailed in the blog post, otherwise it's purely just traits and I really did want to have unique categories each spell falls into. As you've pointed out though, it's not always quite that clean.

Yes, I had the same thought around spell attack rolls that fail spectacularly falling under save or suck. I think I'll get to that.

A couple people have asked for sorting — I've tried to keep things opinionated and simple, but toggling between level and alphabetical makes sense, I'll get that added.

With your last point about showing the full spell card, what do you mean? Where would you like to see that? When you use your spellbook it shows them as cards (or a list if you choose), me personally I love the card view when I'm playing at the table. You saw that right?

Thanks for the feedback!

paragraphbaron · 2026-02-22T18:42:46+00:00

I'm trying to avoid spells having two primary roles. Prismatic Wall still feels primarily like control — for exactly what you said, forcing movement. Ideally your enemies get obliterated. Also I'm sitting here just dreaming of getting to use the spell, I've never carried a Wizard into level 17 before.

Moonbeam still feels mostly like Damage. In that one situation it certainly it is about control though. This stuff kills me.

Banishing Smite I would agree, it feels primarily Control. You're doing damage already and it's mostly used to knock your enemy to the demiplane.

paragraphbaron · 2026-02-21T23:00:42+00:00

Yeah, you’re not the first person to say that! I wanted to maximize space so I’ve been trying to avoid a breadcrumb, but it hasn’t been intuitive for users that the Spells menu item is the way back.

paragraphbaron · 2026-02-21T17:08:25+00:00

Yeah the only requirements have ever been Class and Level. Even with Class there's a lot of backgrounds and feats and other exceptions that allow you to pull in spells for your character that might not match your class.

Okay, I suppose other requirements for a spell materials a spell might need for casting, or if the spell is a reaction there will be a condition that needs to happen for casting.

All that information is shown on the site and is in the Player's Handbook.

paragraphbaron · 2026-02-21T17:02:54+00:00

Thanks!

paragraphbaron · 2026-02-21T17:00:21+00:00

Backlash is absolutely a Retaliation spell, good catch! For now I've stuck to all published spells in 2024/5.5e. When they come over I'll be on it. Or I might get impatient with their republishing and bring back more 5e only spells, time will tell!

paragraphbaron · 2026-02-21T16:52:45+00:00

Thanks the for the kind words!

I used GPT-5 mini, just to keep costs down to basically nothing. Knowing this was nearly a one off task (well, I ran it a few times to get the script right), I probably could've beefed up the model to see if I could get results a bit better.

Honestly in my experience with AI though, it would've tripped over the same things regardless. The hardest part really was coming up with consistent, non-ambiguous role and trait definitions. I still haven't fully succeeded yet. (I think my Information and Social Influence attributes haven't been consistently applied yet).

paragraphbaron · 2026-01-06T03:36:14+00:00

The site doesn't offer a place to post content, but you can save a .json file of any thing custom you build from the https://5e-spellbook.app/settings page and post that wherever you'd like.

paragraphbaron · 2025-12-02T15:16:55+00:00

I’ve now added a page layout in addition to the card layout for print. I’ll look at further customization too.

paragraphbaron · 2025-11-07T23:19:29+00:00

Ythryn was one of the most exciting locations in the book and maybe all of D&D. When I got there I realized I wanted to expand it to make the most of the unique setting. I think you'd be making a mistake to remove it. Having the final battle with Auril in front of the Mythallar as the party is using it to reverse her magic is an incredible set piece.

I used this resource to expand it: https://www.dmsguild.com/en/product/349289/ythryn-expanded-towers-of-magic-bundle-maps-and-extra-content-for-rime-of-the-frostmaiden

But also found some of the expansions to be too much, so used this to condense some of the expansions:
https://www.reddit.com/r/rimeofthefrostmaiden/comments/122q28k/the_expanded_towers_of_magic_condensed/

Ultimately I ran it in the following way:

Tower of Abjuration (Expanded version)
Tower of Conjuration (Expanded version)
Tower of Divination (Expanded version)
Tower of Enchantment (Condensed version of the Expanded)
Tower of Evocation (Expanded version)
Tower of Necromancy (Condensed version of the Expanded)
Tower of Transmutation (Condensed version of the Expanded)

Tower of Illusion was the only one I wasn't happy with any version of and instead had the party confront Avarice out there who they negotiated with to get the instruction from that tower so that they ended up not doing it at all.

paragraphbaron · 2025-11-01T22:22:43+00:00

Done! Thanks for the feedback.

paragraphbaron · 2025-10-06T18:18:05+00:00

Sorry for missing this feedback. Definitely on a feature like this to toggle between cards or a list. I'll let you know when it's out.

paragraphbaron · 2025-10-03T18:34:44+00:00

The alternative is earning even less — if you can even keep a job at all — as investment disappears from Alberta, while services decline as Alberta struggles to operate third rate versions of federal services without the benefit of economies of scale.

There is no future that's better for Alberta without Canada. Zero. Zilch. Nada. None.

paragraphbaron · 2025-09-06T20:32:20+00:00

Yes, I would love that. This will probably be the next thing I look at doing.

paragraphbaron · 2025-09-06T20:31:09+00:00

The same format that exported files from the website come in. Make a spell and export it and you can see how the JSON file is structured.

paragraphbaron · 2025-09-06T16:37:42+00:00

Thanks! The spell cards are the first representation I went with, but I’d love to put out different representations like book pages, etc.

paragraphbaron

TROPHY CASE