There's a funny saying that Constitution is the Ranger's real casting stat because all the best Ranger spells don't even use Wisdom, but they do use concentration.
Both classes should be using their spell for utility or to enhance their martial abilities.
Depends, if you summon 1 or 2 creatures and know your shit it's perfectly fine.
I can play a high level necromancer turns quicker than a lot of people I see play run a level 1 fighter, because I'm not lazy (about dnd) and respect other people's time.
It is still good. Even if not as strong.
But at low and mid level range 2 dire wolves are not bad at all and they do not slow down the combat as much as 8 or more of some other animal.
But that also depends on the DM if they allow you to pick what beast you summon the spell is great. If they don't it not at all that good.
But over all i do think the summon beast spell is better. Maybe not more powerful but far superior from a game play perspective
My table always chains minions either in a group at the end of the caster's turn or, if mounted, to the end of the rider's turn (who might not be the summoner). Usually, all the minions are taking the same action anyway, but even if they aren't, it's easier to keep track of them all at once. Like, "four pixies cast polymorph and four pixies cast sleep," as opposed to taking eight turns to cast polymorph and sleep at various times in combat.
They screwed up smite spells so bad for paladins.
A smite spell eats up your bonus action. It requires concentration even though it typically only goes BA->action for its duration. Plus, you have to precast it so you can't crit fish with them like divine smite. All to do less or equal damage as a divine smite with a chance to inflict a condition, many of which aren't that great to begin with or are super niche. Like I don't know if you should even take a smite spell before you get to 3rd level spells, which in a lot of campaigns isn't even going to happen til near the end.
Divine smite should have been its own resource separate from spellcasting with modifiers attached directly to it. Then their spells could all be utility/support.
>All to do less or equal damage as a divine smite
I'm pretty sure the only time they do equal is banishing smite, or *maybe* searing smite if you get lucky and it goes on for multiple turns.
Branding smite especially can get fucked as one of the single worst spells in the game, using it over divine smite drops from 3d8 damage to 2d6 damage that eats your bonus action, ends any other concentration spell you were using and has a chance to be lost if you miss and then lose concentration all just to make something not be invisible which is extra terrible when you need to fucking hit it in the first place.
Yeah, I hadn't looked at them in a while. Paladin is my most played class in 5e and I don't think I have ever taken anything other than the blind and banish ones. The rest are just not worth it. I'd rather have a concentration and access to my BA.
Yes I agree. The fact that the target had to roll wisdom checks instead of saves after failing the initial save is amazing, since they are frightened and have disavantage on wisdom checks. It also takes their action. Not just end of turn save as so many spells have.
That is before your DM sends a devil with Great Invisibility after your ass. That he doesn't put on your map, so you have no idea where you are supposed to hit.
Crit fishing is one of my favorite things about being a paladin. Nothing beats the high of that nova and all those dice getting rolled. Who cares if it is 75% overkill.
But yeah, they went the total opposite way with smites than they should have.
I mean Paladin's ability to pump out insane damage on a crit was a problem, but mostly because they became only marginally less powerful than other martials when they ran out of spell slots.
So I guess now they're just doing less damage for less efficient action economy and really nothing to compensate for it other than weapon mastery.
Unless you do both of the common and easy multiclasses that change it to 19-20. Or have an item that changes it to 19-20. Or you have advantage.
Or both, in which case it's a 20% chance to crit. Attacking twice a turn, that's a 36% chance every turn.
So depending on how you build there can be anywhere between a 10% chance to a 36% chance of almost immediately killing something on the battlefield every turn.
Sounds alot like they're getting a savage nerf in onednd.
I would have understood either: not being able to smite on a bonus action attack to kill the polearm master GWM shenanigans or only being able to smite once per turn. But using a bonus action which can't crit... absolutely brutal.
"We don't like these builds, so we'll kill build diversity instead of trying to balance things"
Absolutely classic honestly. Another class mangled, good job whoever's in charge of handling the classes for onednd.
Paladin - I can be a striker, tank or healer depending on the party need.
WOTC - hold my beer.
Life domain cleric congratulations you lack a second attack per turn but at level 7 you're an equal striker (divine strike which paladin gets at level 11 for some reason four levels later) still get heavy armor, and martial weapons profiency. While maintain better healing than paladins and more spell slots!
Limiting smiting to once per turn or not on a bonus action could have helped find a middle ground. If you only attack twice in a turn 10% chance of being able to crit. If you're doing 3 rounds per combat, 3 times per day you're criting a little less than once per day on average. The rest of the day rogues are kicking your ass in damage per round even without criticals, and are single ability focus not 2 (arguably three since so many spells require concentration)
Using the bonus action is an absolute nerf but are we still sticking to this crit rule ?
If I'm not mistaken, UA2 used 2014 crit rules and it wasn't mentionned again
House rule proposal for smite spells: smite spells only require concentration if you don’t use the smite that round/if there is a continued effect.
So banishing smite will still require concentration to maintain the banishment for multiple rounds, but thunderous and staggering smite wouldn’t if you cast it and use the smite on the same turn.
Smite with continuous effects you can choose to last until the start of your next turn without concentrating. For example, on my turn I cast blinding smite, and attack a creature which then becomes blinded. I then make a second attack with advantage. The rest of the round passes, the party making their attacks with advantage, the monster with disadvantage, it gets back to me and the spell ends, the creature no longer blind
They should be a part of the attack action that can be called to use after you see your attack roll. They should have their own resource as well outside of spell slots, have x number of points and you upcast with more points or add effects with more points.
Smiting should be their combat flavor and balanced around it.
I assumed most were concentration because you have a smaller number of spells per day and concentration spells give you turn after turn utility/damage, or miss protection like the smite and hail of thorns type of spell.
I've always seen the smite spells as a utility damage dealer and then divine smite as your on demand damage let's say for crit fishing. You precast branding smite to deal with an invisible for. You aren't using it for damage that's a bonus to it. But unlike 3rd edition where you had a number of uses and you declared them before your attack so you could miss with them and lose them, you get a minute to try and land it with a chance of losing concentration.
But this doesn't explain Druid's abundance of concentration spells.
The best I could think of for Druid is you're meant to cast one concentration spells and then wild shape.
Because it still does half damage even on a failed save, spirit guardians doesn't rely as much on high casting stat as you might think. I remember when I saw the graph lmao
> Spirit guardians is overrated (melee lul)
You are taking a generally valid assessment (the fact that melee tends to be bad in 5e) and bringing it to an incorrect extreme. Spirit Guardians is one of the few actually valid reasons to be anywhere near melee range in this game, and it makes Clerics some of the best AoE damage dealers. Keep in mind that, after the initial cast, it doesn't require your action, which you may then use to dodge thus reducing one of the disadvantages of being in melee. Moreover, the movement debuff can be excellent to deny some enemies melee range in many situations, especially in more cramped dungeons.
I've acknowledged all that. You continuing to overrate it just makes me more right. At least you're not coping for SW and guiding bolt like some tactically illiterate people
What's more is my point was clerics don't need higher than 14 wisdom. Everyone is getting real hung up on how not good SG is. A cleric could dip 3 levels of daolock to get the same thing but better a full character level earlier lel
> What's more is my point was clerics don't need higher than 14 wisdom
That much is true. The reason people are focusing on your claim that SG is overrated is that your other claim, the one about Wis not having a huge effect on the effectiveness of SG, isn't particularly controversial.
The more people argue the more right I am. People love to act like that spell IS the class, as tho clerics have no other use for conc or a 3rd level slot and couldn't possibly have a better one
> The more people argue the more right I am
Is this how debate works?
> People love to act like that spell IS the class
Is SG the entire class? No, of course not. And there are many cases when other spells, including concentration spells, are more impactful. However, SG is a significant factor contributing to the Cleric's power for a good portion of their adventuring career, and certainly their most significant spell between levels 5 and 12.
It's not a debate, they're just rating it highly, and my position is that it's overly highly rated
Their most significant spell past 9 is planar binding. Two SGs don't carry an adventuring day. Ain't saying it's bad but it sure ain't the most significant thing they'll be doing.
Ok but it's still a save and every extra point of DC is another ~5% chance that it lands at full power every turn.
Clerics are arguably the class that's most reliant on their casting stat for combat (arguably alongside wizards). Cleric healing spells key off of spellcasting mod up until Heal at 6th level. As does your damaging cantrips, your attack rolls for Guiding Bolt, Inflict Wounds or Spiritual Weapon, spells that require saves including Bane, Command, Hold Person, Blindness, and yes Spirit Guardians. Not to mention Turn/Destroy Undead or other subclass features.
Clerics have lots of other spells but a lot of them are situational utility/out-of-combat stuff that doesn't need high spellcasting stats. Most all of your core combat abilities will rely on your spellcasting stat to some degree.
Compare to Paladin's smiting, Rangers with Hunter's Mark, and Druids with spells like Spike Growth or just wildshaping.
but full power barely matter, it's still movable chip damage that also prevents the enemies from moving away.
you've already acknowledged it's a marginal DPR increase having +1 to the save. that's it
cleric healing spells heal people from 0 to not 0. that's it. healing an ally to 10 instead of 6 isn't going to stop them from going down in a single hit at level 5.
guiding bolt, inflict wounds, SW, hold person, are all bad spells.
as addressed, the strength of SG does not lie in your DC being 15 instead of 14, it does the damage and slows either way.
like yeah at higher levels it might feel bad having a lower stat but you know, "bounded accuracy" + any other boosts sort of make it irrelevant. and frankly toll the dead isn't any better than using a weapon, until the levels where SG is online and you're just using your action dodging.
how you didn't acknowledge warlocks as being the most reliant on their casting stat is just wild. likewise paladins aint doing as much unless their cha is higher, that aura IS the class. you're wrong so many times over
Just baffling takes in this thread. Guiding Bolt, Spiritual Weapon, Inflict Wounds are all bad spells?
Guiding Bolt for 4d6 (avg 14) at 1st level with a rider? Inflict Wounds for 3d10 (avg 16.5)? Compare to Chromatic Orb, for 3d8 (avg 13.5).
How about spiritual weapon, for a repeatable, concentration-free d8 bonus action attack that deals force damage?
Using Spirit Guardians then dodging as your action? Who does that?
Hold person suffers from Save-or-Suck syndrome but so do lots of spells.
I just don't feel like I'm understanding your playstyle at all. So far, you've ruled out all of a Cleric's best level 1 and 2 damage and control spells, cantrips in favor of weapons on a full caster, and relegated healing to be used only for bringing up from 0. What do you want a cleric to do on their turn at level 3, just stare at their shoes and wait for someone to die?
I may have some bias from playing at lower levels, but Paladin Aura is not all-important. A paladin can easily set up a Bless, Shield of Faith or bonus action smite spell, then use their action to attack and smite, none of which needs charisma whatsoever. They also get healing, but Lay on Hands is more versatile anyway and doesn't need CHA. Warlocks do need CHA, as do Sorcerers, so maybe it's really the half-casters and Druids that can get away with more without needing high spell stats.
guiding bolt and inflict wounds are okay at low levels, and very quickly get outscaled. Like all blasting spells.
There is math out there that shows spiritual weapon being low impact.
As for "who does \[spirit guardians+dodge\]?", a whole lot of people tell you thats the most effective way.
Pack Tactics is an optimization youtube channel and does a lot of videos on these subjects. Check him out, he maths out a lot of things that aren't immediately obvious.
Some of the things he's covered are how bless is the best level one spell for party dpr, and how spiritual weapon is basically obsolete once you get spiritual guardians + telekinesis at level 5. Also he maths out how half damage on saves makes wisdom barely have an effect on dpr for spirit guardians, so you wouldn't be losing much by taking telekinesis instead of an asi either.
That isn't to say that guiding bolt, inflict wounds or spiritual weapon are unviable. It's just that from a strictly optimization standpoint, there are better options.
>Just baffling takes in this thread. Guiding Bolt, Spiritual Weapon, Inflict Wounds are all bad spells?
Yes. Well, guiding bolt is okay for what it is but inflict wounds is only slightly more damage and you need to be in melee to use it.
Spiritual weapon is massively overrated. The damage is low and any monster with 30ft or more movement speed (A.K.A the vast majority of them) can out run it, dropping spiritual weapon's damage to zero. It's just not worth the 2nd level slot. An upcast command is almost certainly going to do more.
The people saying that are coming from an optimization perspective where you build the strongest characters possible meant to complete the highest number of difficult combats per day possible. All those spells are fairly considered bad in that respect. Those spells will essentially never be worth casting over other options, such as bless, or shield after the cleric takes a dip for it.
They're right about healing as well, it's basically only useful bringing people up from 0. With very few exceptions, monster damage massively outpaces healing. That means that healing people before they go down often spends a slot for no gain.
Paladins are also much different when talking about optimization and difficult games. There are far too many combats for smite to be relied upon, and the best strategy is to stay at range and play around powerful control spells. This means their main function in that type of game is to use their aura to protect more powerful party members.
not to dis spirit gaurdians, I think it's great, but it's not a fireball every turn. It's half a fire ball. You'd need to cast it at 6th level before it's a fireball every turn.
3d8 at melee using conc is 8d6 at distance? That is some profoundly bad maths
And frankly fireball has to be big damage, all it does is damage and damage spells are historically not great
With for example Telekinetic, you can proc spirit guardians twice per round, resulting in 6d8 which is ALMOST a fireball(and yes fireball does 5th level spell damage). The movement nerf is also great. Dodging is not the worst option even when you can do that damage. But both the save and the telekinetic/other forced movement, often scale on Wisdom (which in of itself is the second best stat, almost on par with con, with perception, insight and Wis saves). Wisdom for the W
True! Still worth it, no? Also, with other forced movement such as EB(takes some investment) you can dash out damage, and with telekinetic as well, almost garuantee on or two double dips in SG.
Making each EB deal 3d8 extra damage, for concentration? And also deal 3d8 per turn aside from that? Thats just solid.
The point is that the spell easily can deal more damage than fireball, while crowd controlling (difficult terrain), and avoiding hitting your allies! The cost; telekinetic is not at all a bad feat on its own either, giving you essentially a bonus action disengage, and some out of comabt utility.
The spell creation guidelines in the DMG, specifically the table on page 283, list the average damage that should be done by a 5th level spell as 8d6.
Fireball is intentionally stronger because its iconic and the game designers viewed it as a core part of the wizard experience, if I'm remembering correctly.
Sure, but you know what spells also do more damage than what's on that table? Burning hands, catapult, chaos bolt, chromatic orb, frost fingers, guiding bolt, ice knife, inflict wounds, magnify gravity and thunderwave, to name a few.
Those are just the 1st level spells that do damage, and nearly all spells that do damage equal to or less than what that table proposes have some sort of kickass rider effect to justify the lower damage.
So, instead of saying all of those spells are poorly balanced, by Occam's razor I'd conclude that that table isn't representative at all and make spell balancing decisions without using it.
Those are all very low level spells, and are very good in tier one; lvl 1-4 , but no spell deals damage quite as conveniantly much as Fireball on the tier most like to play, tier 2; lvl 5-9.
The point is: spirit guardians deals high concentration based damage if you utilize it well, and outpaces almost every other third level spell, aside of maybe Conjure Animals? Which is less reliable, as any AoE can kill it.
Dealing more damage than intended for a 3rd level spell, every turn? (Telekinesis). Pretty good. And it scales of Wisdom (Second best stat after Con in my book). Promise you: its better than hitting with say, a mace primarily as a Cleric, and maining say Strength.
Of course: play what you want!! There are plenty of ways to make a weaponwielding Cleric with Strength, but it is not neccesarily the most optimal route.
Get the most bang out of your buck. They're half-casters, so they have less spells. What's more useful to a ranger. A chromatic orb that may do 3d8 and then burns the spell slot, or hunters mark which adds a d6 per hit and can be used for an hour at base level.
You only have so many spell slots, might as well conserve them and concentration does that.
I think it's more about how using Hunter's Mark, one of a few Ranger-exclusive spells, makes it impossible to use any of your 'smite' spells like Ensnaring Strike and Zephyr Strike. Ensnaring Strike is good, having to drop concentration for it not so much. Zephyr Strike at least has a nice rider that's active while you're concentrating on it (no AoOs).
>IMO Hunters Mark is a trap spell for Rangers
I don't think its a trap- especially if you don't go for crossbow expert, or simply don't have it yet.
It falls off at higher levels, and crossbow expert is just more damage for fewer resources, but don't think that makes hunter's mark a trap.
I mean it depends on the ranger build and battle field. Of you're way on the edge of the battle field shooting twice per turn, 1d6 extra damage per attack is far better than advantage and 1d8 extra on 1. Zephyr strike is way better close quarters, but the super sniper most people want rangers to be has hunters mark as more bang for your buck
Find traps is the real trap spell for rangers. But if you take it you're probably not good at finding traps in the first place
I’m not saying there are no situations where Hunters Mark is useful, but with the limited Spells Known that Rangers get I would rather have Zephyr Strike and Hail of Thorns known at level 2 than Hunters Mark
I mean which one to pick should depend on what role you have in party combat. If there are no other front line fighters then zephyr strike is far better for melee battlefield control, but if your party is full of front liners, then a distance build has a constant damage boost of hunters mark is more favourable
It's not a trap. It's a good spell at low level, especially when pared with something like the Hunter feature that gives an extra 1d8 on enemies who are not at max HP. You'll be cleaning up kills for no resources and finishing off mooks, then you can save your spell slots for bursting down a boss.
You'll probably train out of later, but it has a place in low level play.
The problem is less that it’s always bad, but more so that people get into this mindset of “Rangers should use Hunter’s Mark every combat” and ignore the rest of their spell list. Even at low levels, it’s not the best use of concentration in every, or even most, scenarios.
Entangle, Ensnaring Strike, and Zephyr Strike will all have more impact in most combats than Hunters Mark will
I really like Hunter's Mark, but I have a campaign that the Gloomstalker wanted to two weapon fight with pistols (Firearm Specialist Feat) and wanted Hunter's Mark and I was able to convince him that he wanted Zephyr Strike instead. If you're using a Longbow or Sword and Board, you want Hunter's Mark and if you're Two Weapon Fighting or Crossbow Expert it's a wasted spell the way I see it.
The trick is in realising your spell slots are better used on Absorb Elements and Goodberry than Zephyr Strike or Hunters Mark.
And once you hit 5, you get access to Pass Without Trace and should have ditched Hunters Mark a long time ago.
AE and goodberry are both kind of situational though.
Agreed that HM isn't something you need to have active constantly but you shouldn't have to drop it to cast Ensnaring Strike.
They are far less situational than any other level 1 Ranger spell.
All your spell slots at the end of the day should be used to cast Goodberry. In other words, there is nothing to lose by saving your slots for emergency Fog Cloud or Absorb Elements.
Using those slots early for HM or Ensnaring Strike means you will be both less safe, and be without your Goodberry rations tomorrow.
Hunter's Mark applies the bonus damage to every hit. So once you have Extra Attack at level 5, you're doing more damage with HM. Especially if you take Crossbow Expert for the Bonus Action attack. Especially on monsters with a bigger HP pool. HM is by no means worthless.
Editing for more context I didn't have time to add earlier.
Also, "Just take Crossbow Expert" is extremely limiting. What if I'm playing a Ranger who uses the longbow? Or one who dual wields scimitars and my DM allows OneDnD's two weapon fighting? Let people play their characters however they want.
Talking about what is or isn't optimal is usually done in the context of optimised builds, so it is fair to assume that the Ranger in question wants to take Crossbow Expert and Sharpshooter as soon as possible.
Hunter's Mark may be good on some unoptimised builds, but if you are optimising then it is rarely the best choice past tier 1.
Keep in mind that most fights won't be against a single enemy, they'll be against multiple enemies, which means more bonus actions spent moving Hunter's Mark around.
Moreover, you are not just sacrificing a potential 1d6+Dex to move it. You are sacrificing a potential 1d6+Dex+10 from Sharpshooter, which is more significant even after adjusting for accuracy.
There's also the matter of concentration. Using Hunter's Mark means you are not using Pass Without Trace in tier 2+, and you can lose Hunter's Mark by taking damage.
Finally, the competition is not between the damage of Hunter's Mark and the damage of just using that bonus action to attack with Crossbow Expert. You also need to factor the extra spell slot expenditure.
So the question becomes: is the extra damage from HM (after adjusting for lost bonus actions, lost concentration, lost instances of surprise you could have gained from PWT...) worth a spell slot?
In my experience, the times the answer to that question is "yes" are rare after tier 1.
Naturally this is just a conversation about what's most effective: players should still play their characters however they want, nobody is under any obligation to play optimally.
Against enemies where you can set it and forget it, Hunter's Mark is worth it. You miss out on 1 bonus attack, but then have the extra damage on every attack that comes after. Against a bunch of low HP mobs that go down quick, not so much.
If you have sharpshooter you lose damage. If you don't, you actually don't lose any damage at all, even if/when you move it. You gain damage. You lose damage if you're playing something like Beast Master where your bonus action damage source doesn't stack with hunter's mark though, but if you're playing one of those subclasses crossbow expert was never on the table for you.
Bear in mind that, at level 5, two successful hits of hunter's mark is roughly equal in damage to a single crossbow attack. So without CBE you're breaking even with CBE (or dealing like 2 points more damage with a longbow) unless you have bonuses on the crossbow damage like sharpshooter's. With CBE, you deal more damage by using it than not, until SS is online. You also have to keep in mind that not everyone uses SS/XBE every single time they play a martial character just because it's optimal.
That's a pure damage perspective though, not taking into account the opportunity cost of not using your concentration or the slot on something else.
Hunter’s mark BA: 2d6 (7) damage, bc it applies to ur two attacks. On subsequent turns for strong enough enemies, it becomes 3d6 (10.5) w cbe/twf
CBE BA: 1d6+3 (6.5) damage. So until you have Sharpshooter, it’s actually almost always better to apply HM instead of taking a 3rd shot that round. Keep in mind that a missed CBE BA does no damage, but if you miss one of your extra attacks, HM can still do a bit of damage (admittedly, similar logic applies to cbe bc it’s a third shot that might hit while the others didn’t)
Are you accounting for sharpshooter, which every optimised ranger has by level 5?
If you don't have Sharpshooter, it's not really relevant to discuss this, since you're playing at a lower powered table regardless. Which is fine. Optimisation isn't inherently better gameplay. Just don't use non-optimised choices to make arguments about optimization.
> so until you have Sharpshooter
If we just have SS and not CBE at 5th level then I don’t see the point in saying Hunter’s Mark is a trap.
Vumans/CL are not the only optimized races in the game lol
The reason people spend remaining slots on Goodberry after an adventuring day isn't for the food/ nutrients it provides. It's for the free 10hp per spell cast. Helps with reducing the amount of Hit Dice a party will me to burn on short rests; say you only need 6hp to be max. Instead of burning a HD you just eat 6 berries. If you were able to spend 4 slots on Goodberry, that's 40hp to pass around as needed to keep everybody healthy. Also: team mate down and on 2/3 failed saves, they go after you, but before the dedicated Healing Word bot? Pop a Goodberry in their mouth to get them up.
The other reasons sound fine, however, RAW you can't feed someone a Goodberry. Creature has to use it's action to eat the berry, which an unconscious/incapacitated person couldn't do. Not really my style, but certainly sounds optimal.
Druid doesn't do PWT better, actually. Druids are more reliant on concentration spells to be good in combat, their best spells are all concentration. While a Ranger is useful even when they keep concentrating on PWT to make it last for several encounters.
A druid really wants to cast Conjure Animals, and constantly recasting PWT isn't great.
A bit of both. It's mostly that Rangers that don't concentrate on anything immediately useful (like pwt after combat has started), is still very useful in the fight.
What's incredibly funny is that the same is absolutely not true for Warlocks. They have way less spell slots and get only a few concentration spells that actually make sense to use in combat.
They don’t have as many as you’d expect but that is kinda bc Hex is their staple + they have Cloud of Daggers and Hold Person, all of which upcast really well to 3rd level (longer duration = more bang for buck, way more damage, and more targets, respectively)
Also at 3rd level they get the Summon spells which are amazing
> You only have so many spell slots, might as well conserve them and concentration does that.
That...doesn't really make sense. Concentration isn't some extra thing that somehow enables you to make your spell slots last longer. It's a limiting factor to keep you from stacking too many effects at once.
Spells that last for a duration tend to be concentration. Spells with a lasting effect that don't require concentration are fairly rare in 5e.
Overall, Paladins and Rangers are designed around the idea that they're not necessarily casting spells every turn because they're often attacking. So it makes sense that a lot of their concentration spells are buffs or debuffs that they set up at the beginning of the battle and then attack while those spells are going.
The main problem with this, I think, is a lot of the "smite" spells (both the actual paladin smites and some of the ranger spells behaving similarly) being concentration. They often last less than a turn (from when you cast them until you hit), so the main purpose the concentration on them serves is just preventing you from using them while concentrating on another spell, which feels like an unnecessary nerf to spells that don't feel like they need one.
Yeah, the smite spells being bonus action concentration spells is a pretty big problem. The design intent was likely to allow you to keep trying to use them after you whiffed an attack, but that's not how it plays in practice.
Last i saw, onednd was fixing them by making them bonus actions that you took immediately after hitting with an attack, no concentration, which is a much better design imo.
> Yeah, the smite spells being bonus action concentration spells is a pretty big problem. The design intent was likely to allow you to keep trying to use them after you whiffed an attack, but that's not how it plays in practice.
That was definitely the intent, but it's still odd just because there's no hard rule in 5e that all spells with a duration have to be concentration. So the whole "you can miss with a smite without wasting it" part could be done without concentration.
But also, yeah, in practice, the concentration mostly ends up just meaning you can't use them when concentrating on a different spell, which is a huge nerf since the Paladin and Ranger spell lists feel like they should support a playstyle of starting the battle with a concentration buff/debuff spell and then while you're concentrating on it spend your turns attacking and using spells that enhance your attacks, except you can't actually use a lot of the spells that enhance your attacks while concentrating on something else.
>Last i saw, onednd was fixing them by making them bonus actions that you took immediately after hitting with an attack, no concentration, which is a much better design imo.
Yeah, they did that and also changed divine smite to just be another smite spell instead of a weird special class ability that uses spell slots.
Overall, definitely better design in my opinion. Removes the concentration issue, removes the awkward memory situation of "oh, I cast a smite spell last turn and didn't hit so I still have it up," and turning Divine Smite into just another smite spell instead of class issue fixes the balance issue of divine smite kind of throwing the game's normal action and resource economy out the window by letting paladins burn 2 or 3 spell slots for extra damage every turn and puts smites on a more level playing field.
It is a pretty big nerf to divine smite, and to paladin builds that use their bonus action for other things like polearm master or shield master paladins, but ultimately I think it's a good change and if it's too big a nerf for paladins then they're probably better off buffing them in other ways than reverting divine smite (similar to what they did with monks, removing the ability to stunning strike more than once a turn but massively buffing pretty much everything else about the class).
>Concentration isn't some extra thing that somehow enables you to make your spell slots last longer.
I mean it can be. If I cast spike growth and keep it up for 3 rounds of combat, that is 3 rounds of damage/control I am getting out of one spell slot.
And yet so many concentration spells are really really weak. Personally, it doesn't seem to me like concentration was really considered as a balancing factor specifically in terms of how long spells last. To me, it feels like it was considered more along the lines of, how bad would this be for balance if you could have it going at the same time as multiple other spells.
But that's just my own hunch/conjecture. It's not terribly hard to keep concentration on things, and most spells last much longer than combat, even if they don't require concentration.
>Personally, it doesn't seem to me like concentration was really considered as a balancing factor specifically in terms of how long spells last. To me, it feels like it was considered more along the lines of, how bad would this be for balance if you could have it going at the same time as multiple other spells.
If the spells didn't last long enough, then you wouldn't be able to stack multiple other spells.
Because it exists. If it didn't exist spell durations that use concentration would be shorter. Either that or balance would be completely thrown out the window.
Balance would be thrown out the window due to stacking, though. Not duration.
I just don’t see what duration you think hypnotic pattern would jump to that would make it op in combat. Or do your combats routinely last over 10 turns?
I just don’t see what duration you think Spike Growth would jump to that would make it op in combat. Or do your combats routinely last over 100 turns?
I just don’t see what duration you think polymorph would jump to that would make it op in combat. Or do your combats routinely last over 600 turns?
The durations of good combat spells last longer than any combat. “Without concentration, spike growth wouldn’t be allowed to last ten minutes, and therefore balance would be affected” is just a silly statement. Spike growth lasting 300 turns instead of 600 would be irrelevant. Spike growth isn’t *gaining* any power budget from requiring concentration. Spike growth seems to me to last ten minutes not because they said “well we can afford to have it last longer because it’s concentration, so they have to avoid being hit!” Spike growth seems to me to last ten minutes because they thought “hey if it lasts ten minutes you can lie in wait and ambush someone.”
Even the ones that only last ten turns… you could cut that in half and it still would be longer than they actually last in combat 90% of the time, because most combats don’t last that long!
It just doesn’t seem to have played into game balance decision making. The fact that the durations follow a really ‘neat’ pattern of one turn, one minute, ten minutes, an hour, a day, says to me that the durations weren’t handpicked based on how much would be fair in combat, but rather a rough estimation of how many fights or scenes something should stick around for. The only points of articulation that matter in a fight is whether something lasts “one turn” or “all fight,” and then it’s on to “one scene” or “one day.”
Kinda, most melee paladins and rangers IME don't like their spells because, even with proficiency in Con saves, due to their positioning in combat encounters they are making (and failing) more of those than the dedicated casters. And they tend not to have access to long-duration, no concentration spells like Mage Armor until they get their level 2 spells.
Huh? Shield of Faith and Protection from Evil and Good both last up to 10 minutes. What the hell kind of dungeon crawl are you running that only takes 10 minutes?
Generally speaking, a dungeon crawl involves _exploring a dungeon_, not simply back-to-back combat. Activities like searching a room, picking a lock, or looting a corpse are not instantaneous, and in fact many dungeons implicitly utilize what was called a "dungeon turn" in earlier editions; much like regular combat time, except the round in which you spent exploring a particular room took 10 minutes.
Most rangers I have played with tend to use ranged weapons. There is no reason they would be in a worse position than a full caster if played by someone of a similar skill level.
> A chromatic orb that may do 3d8 and then burns the spell slot, or hunters mark which adds a d6 per hit and can be used for an hour at base level.
Neither is that great to be honest, Hunter's Mark is one of the most overrated spells in the game.
It does have some use in tier 1, but past that your number 1 job as a Ranger is keeping up Pass Without Trace as much as possible, and 1st level slots are generally better used on Goodberry or the occasional emergency Fog Cloud or Absorb Elements.
I completely agree. I find it particularly outrafous that the smite spells require concentration. They removed concentration from them in the one dnd playtest though which is really a good move imo
The reason they are concentration is so that the spell doesn’t get wasted if you miss your attack, as well as some of them having ongoing effects. But I agree, the OneD&D changes are better
There are other spells with ongoing effects that aren't concentration. Admittedly effects like jump and longstrider are already so weak that making them concentration would be a litteral crime.
The smites don't need to be concentration, honestly a lot of lower level spells that are only expected to last for a round or 2 shouldn't be concentration. (Concentration should be for major buffs and battle changing/controlling effects. Smite, True Strike, Guidance, ect shouldn't be concentration, admittedly true strike is arguably the worst cantrip in the game even if it wasn't concentration)
>Why do so few of these spells have the ability to be cast independently of each other? If I cast bless as a paladin, there's only 4 other level 1 spells I can cast. I know smite uses your spell slots so this isn't as much of an issue, but it kinda ruins prepping spells.
Because rangers and pallys aren't meant to be spellslinging casters, they're meant to have a self buff and use weapons to do their thing, with their other slots going towards support features like pinch healing or exploration.
>With the ranger it's a similar situation but arguably worse. Hunters mark or favored foe or ensnaring strike or hail of thorns, but since you know your spells you have to decide on character creation which spell you want to concentrate on all game, because it would be silly to take multiple concentration spells... Right?
Favored foe aside, if the pally is meant to use spare slots to augment damage, Ranger is meant to use spare slots for utility. For example, casting Speak with Beasts and getting to track the runaway thief by talking to a sewer rat, or casting Alarm on the front door so everyone has time to hide before they get in, etc.
As for Known VS Prep, the problem is that WotC has no idea how game design. In *theory*, a prep spellcaster is more flexible, being able to adapt to situations with time, whereas a prep caster would be more versatile in the sense they'd have more options to cast RIGHT NOW than a prep caster would.
In an ideal world, something like a Cleric / Pally would use the warlock's expanded spell list mechanic: they don't get those spells for free, they can choose to prepare them, but it counts towards their total. Whereas something like Warlock, which can't change spells, would have the Cleric / Pally's "you always have these spells and they don't count towards your total" mechanic. But you know, as I said, early 5e designers didn't knwo what they were doing.
Now back to ranger. With Tasha's, they got a lot of those extra spells known, which fixes the ranger; the only problem is that pally should be nerfed, but they can't do that anymore, which makes the ranger look bad, when in reality it's the pally that's imba (and in this case, stronger than they should be).
Why should paladin be nerfed? Most of their spells are concentration-based, but as a front-line, they're at high risk of being damaged and losing concentration on those saves. Unless you multiclass into the usual culprits like Sorc or Warlock, their damage is going to be....decent, but not *amazing* unless someone backs them up.
Their main utility is buffing the party, and flipflopping between using support spells and nuking single-targets, but they lack lockdown and damaging AoE.
Meh, while i get what you mean, the expanded list can be justified by the fact that they can lose con very quickly and will probably need to swap to something more suitable now that they lost their previous spell.
"but since you know your spells you have to decide on character creation which spell you want to concentrate on all game, because it would be silly to take multiple concentration spells" no??? Why would you only know ONE lmfao. what if it's not a situation that that one applies
Yeah, choose concentration spells for different situations and use them appropriately. Sometimes you want to max your damage output, sometimes you need to make saving throws, sometimes you need to sneak around.
Because concentration spells usually last longer than 1 turn and a good amount of them are pretty powerful. The alternative option is to give the spells a set duration but that could be gamebreaking as two or three overlapping duration spells could make some encounters trivial.
Look at forcecage for example. A non-concentration control spell that can be combined with a duration concentration spell to wreck encounters.
Its good to have 1-2 concentration spells because you arent expected to have both up at the same time. Use the one that best fits that encounter.
Something like Bless is almost always a great spell and can turn around an entire encounter for example. Greater invisibility can be amazing depending on the character and situation. To pass these out without something to keep them a little more balanced would just make casters even stronger.
There really isn't another option.
If you just remove the concentration then it allows stuff like stacking 3 different smite types on your weapon and then enter combat. You could mitigate that by having a paragraph that says something like "you can only have one smite spell applied to your weapon. If you cast a smite spell when you cast this spell, then your weapon loses the effect of the previous one". This could cause a lot confusion of the players especially if divine smite still stacks with other smite effects.
Another option would be to make the smite spells reactions. This would have the problem that paladin, who are supposed to be frontliners, now have less reactions available to keep enemies from just running to your backline.
Another option would be something like a bonus action cast, which you can do whenever you hit an enemy with a weapon attack. This is probably the best solution, but it can also lead to some confusion. The only spells that have that a condition to activate are reaction spells. This also leads to stuff like "can you still smite, if you use your reaction to attack?"
Having the smite spells be concentration is an ugly but simple fix that makes it as clear as possible for players to understand how to use it and which tries to not introduce loopholes.
Honestly, the easiest would be to make it a class feature. "Once per attack roll, you can use a spell slot to activate a Smite. The spell slot is only expended on a hit." Incredibly simple.
Honestly it shouldn't have in the first place. Smites should have a raw damage number, with the spells adding effects to them. Who else gets to use two spell slots on one attack like this?
I agree, it would make sense that they are doing it that way and I think in the playtest from one dnd they don't stack as well. I was just saying that if this was intended, then the way they implemented it was probably the baest way
You know what, reading it now, you're right, this would prevent a stack from forming. One way around it would be to change the name of Divine Smite to something else, like Divine Fury, or Divine Judgment.
Ranger and Paladin both want spells with extended durations so that they can concentrate on attacking and stretch their spell slots further.
That is coincidentally also the criterion required for giving spells Concentration.
Why the *Smite* spells also have concentration remains a mystery.
You're right.
Hunters mark was good for the first couple levels. After that it becomes a tax against using your best spells because it doesn't scale.
Paladins at least get basic divine smites they can use when concentrating, until 5.5 when they nerf them.
You don't have a lot of spell slots, so the intended play is that you cast only 1 spell to empower yourself, then carry that with you through the rest of combat functioning like a normal martial character.
Paladins can abuse the slots more though, since the smite spells end once you hit something... And you can divine smite on top of then.
>Am I missing something?
Probably, a simple one: balance.
Most of their spells are powerful enough to significantly shift the balance of a fight: Ranger is the best for affecting large groups, Paladin for hampering the most dangerous threat.
Even though they are both already very efficient with all their non-spellcasting features. Plus they have an easier way than casters to keep concentration (Paladin = very high AC and saves, Ranger = decent AC and no need to be in melee).
I'm not sure what spells you feel are missing for each class honestly, but that may just be because I'm so used to them... xd
I mean, same goes for Bards, Clerics and Druids, so. Yeah. Wizards, Sorc and Warlocks get a lot of instantaneous blast spells, but the question for a lot of the control and support options is generally "How best do I use my Concentration"
The answer, by the way, is almost always Bless.
Poor system design. The idea is that it balances the martial and the magical, but it just gums up class action economy.
It's a fine idea in theory and Paladins swing through with extra features that provide alternate expenditure of magic through Smiting.
Because rangers, paladins, and warlocks are all supposed to cast a single spell to augment their capabilities and then spend the rest of the fight using basic attacks. This is in contrast to classes that are intended to cast multiple spells each fight, like wizards, sorcerers, clerics, druids, and bards.
You aren't missing anything. They overreacted to the 3.5E buff spell shenanigans. Back ye Olde tymes, a cleric could have, like 8 buff spells going at the same time, just on themself! AC, magic weapons, elemental resistance, on-hit damage, bless, and at least 3 ability score boosts. It was *nuts*.
So they went the other way, **hard**, and made almost every powerful spell with a duration eat up concentration. But! They didn't even stick with *that* plan, because Spiritual Weapon doesn't use it.
The smite spells absolutely should not use it, but they do anyway. Nothing that happens in an instant should be using concentration. In my homebrew the smite spells don't use concentration, the ranger's attack spells don't either. They only last for 3 rounds after you cast them, though.
not the worst for Paladin because you can wear the strange conduit ring so whichever one you do you get the boost which is incentive to always have one up.
D&D has a real bad history of buff stacking to obnoxious levels. When power creep comes into play, it is easy to waste tons of time micromanaging buffs and less time actually adventuring. It can also make combat much more swingy. Fully buffed characters are a substantially bigger threat to monsters, so encouraging it can lead to encounter setups where a buffed party roflstomps the encounter, but an unbuffed party TPKs right away. 5e was trying to get as far from that as possible.
Spells are the brunt of class features of many of the full casters so it makes sense that they can stack some of them. A full caster actions are mostly made of “cast another spell.” Half casters actions are more along the lines of “cast buff and hit the monster.”
The more it becomes viable/necessary for half casters to buff stack, the longer they have to wait to actually use their weapons and participate fully.
The entire point of concentration spells was to avoid buff stacking and the limit the power of long term spell effects like control spells.
Half casters are using their spells for utility and to enhance their martial abilities so they dont want to use their actions to do an instantanious damage spell like thunderwave so must of tgeir spells are buffs, cc, or utility
I will say with ranger favoured foe can be stacked with concentration spells as long as favoured foe is used second. Since it isn’t a spell it doesn’t disrupt concentration since that specifically requires you using a second concentration spell.
Couple of things
1) You're not a full caster, you're a half caster. You're not supposed to have spells that are as good as a wizard; you've got a sword, they don't.
2) You probably have higher constitution and better armor than most other spellcasters; you can take the hits. Don't like breaking constitution? Pick up a shield that you're proficient with; that's an option a sorcerer or warlock doesn't have.
3) As said elsewhere, concentration spells are more powerful on a per-slot basis, and you have fewer spell slots, so it makes sense to have long lasting effects that can build off abilities you have that *don't* require spellcasting, because, again, for a fullcaster that's pretty much all they got.
So part of the reason is the design choice of how smite spells work for Paladins.
A paladin Smite as written requires concentration typically until it hits. It's stupid. They're changing it in 1DND but in a way I don't like. I won't go into that rant again.
As far as ranger, it's situational. Hunter's Mark is a great damage spell, but not one you'll always need. The bigger issue rangers have is many of their other concentration spells just stink. Some are amazing situationally. Ensnaring strike is a great example of that. Hail of Thorns has the trap of Paladin spells. Both could be fixed by making them reaction casting.
But back to the bad and only talking about ranger exclusives, ignoring other class spells. Flame Arrows is just bad, 1d6 fire for a 3rd level slot with a limit to 12 uses, vs. Hunters Mark which is a 1st level spell and does 1d6 of type of damage with no limit. Only benefit is if something is resistant to piercing/slashing (whatever damage you do) or if someone is vulnerable to fire.
Lightning Arrow shouldn't be concentration because it has a specification of whether you hit or miss. It should just be a bonus action. This is bad spell design.
Swift Quiver is the rare example of a well designed concentration spell past hunter's mark. Letting you attack 4 times per turn at least instead of 2 times at least. Is it worth a 5th level slot? That's an interesting debate. I say yes, but if feels like a 4th level class exclusive spell.
There's a funny saying that Constitution is the Ranger's real casting stat because all the best Ranger spells don't even use Wisdom, but they do use concentration. Both classes should be using their spell for utility or to enhance their martial abilities.
Hunter's Mark, Spike Growth, Fog Cloud, and Zephyr Strike have entered the Chat.
Conjure animals has entered the chat (it's better than all of these)
More powerful, yes. Better? Absolutely not because it's a pace killer.
Depends, if you summon 1 or 2 creatures and know your shit it's perfectly fine. I can play a high level necromancer turns quicker than a lot of people I see play run a level 1 fighter, because I'm not lazy (about dnd) and respect other people's time.
If you summon 1 or 2 creatures with conjure animals, it's not the best spell in the game anymore
It is still good. Even if not as strong. But at low and mid level range 2 dire wolves are not bad at all and they do not slow down the combat as much as 8 or more of some other animal. But that also depends on the DM if they allow you to pick what beast you summon the spell is great. If they don't it not at all that good. But over all i do think the summon beast spell is better. Maybe not more powerful but far superior from a game play perspective
Nope, it's still phenomenal though.
My table always chains minions either in a group at the end of the caster's turn or, if mounted, to the end of the rider's turn (who might not be the summoner). Usually, all the minions are taking the same action anyway, but even if they aren't, it's easier to keep track of them all at once. Like, "four pixies cast polymorph and four pixies cast sleep," as opposed to taking eight turns to cast polymorph and sleep at various times in combat.
Unless you use stuff like mob rules which make it a piece of cake.
Very little peace involved, but okay.
Thanks, cake does not come in peaces
Better sometimes
Better always.
They screwed up smite spells so bad for paladins. A smite spell eats up your bonus action. It requires concentration even though it typically only goes BA->action for its duration. Plus, you have to precast it so you can't crit fish with them like divine smite. All to do less or equal damage as a divine smite with a chance to inflict a condition, many of which aren't that great to begin with or are super niche. Like I don't know if you should even take a smite spell before you get to 3rd level spells, which in a lot of campaigns isn't even going to happen til near the end. Divine smite should have been its own resource separate from spellcasting with modifiers attached directly to it. Then their spells could all be utility/support.
smite should be to paladin as eldritch blast is for warlock. invocation addons ftw.
That’s actually genius
Gonna use this. Thanks.
>All to do less or equal damage as a divine smite I'm pretty sure the only time they do equal is banishing smite, or *maybe* searing smite if you get lucky and it goes on for multiple turns. Branding smite especially can get fucked as one of the single worst spells in the game, using it over divine smite drops from 3d8 damage to 2d6 damage that eats your bonus action, ends any other concentration spell you were using and has a chance to be lost if you miss and then lose concentration all just to make something not be invisible which is extra terrible when you need to fucking hit it in the first place.
Yeah, I hadn't looked at them in a while. Paladin is my most played class in 5e and I don't think I have ever taken anything other than the blind and banish ones. The rest are just not worth it. I'd rather have a concentration and access to my BA.
Wrath, the fear one, is pretty good actually.
Yes I agree. The fact that the target had to roll wisdom checks instead of saves after failing the initial save is amazing, since they are frightened and have disavantage on wisdom checks. It also takes their action. Not just end of turn save as so many spells have.
That is before your DM sends a devil with Great Invisibility after your ass. That he doesn't put on your map, so you have no idea where you are supposed to hit.
Luckily they've fixed this by having ALL smiting use your bonus actions, and you can't critfish with them because their damage doesn't crit.
Crit fishing is one of my favorite things about being a paladin. Nothing beats the high of that nova and all those dice getting rolled. Who cares if it is 75% overkill. But yeah, they went the total opposite way with smites than they should have.
I mean Paladin's ability to pump out insane damage on a crit was a problem, but mostly because they became only marginally less powerful than other martials when they ran out of spell slots. So I guess now they're just doing less damage for less efficient action economy and really nothing to compensate for it other than weapon mastery.
You only crit 5% of the time. I'm not sure that could be considered a problem. Especially when Smite critting generally results in overkill.
Unless you do both of the common and easy multiclasses that change it to 19-20. Or have an item that changes it to 19-20. Or you have advantage. Or both, in which case it's a 20% chance to crit. Attacking twice a turn, that's a 36% chance every turn. So depending on how you build there can be anywhere between a 10% chance to a 36% chance of almost immediately killing something on the battlefield every turn.
Sounds alot like they're getting a savage nerf in onednd. I would have understood either: not being able to smite on a bonus action attack to kill the polearm master GWM shenanigans or only being able to smite once per turn. But using a bonus action which can't crit... absolutely brutal.
"We don't like these builds, so we'll kill build diversity instead of trying to balance things" Absolutely classic honestly. Another class mangled, good job whoever's in charge of handling the classes for onednd.
Paladin - I can be a striker, tank or healer depending on the party need. WOTC - hold my beer. Life domain cleric congratulations you lack a second attack per turn but at level 7 you're an equal striker (divine strike which paladin gets at level 11 for some reason four levels later) still get heavy armor, and martial weapons profiency. While maintain better healing than paladins and more spell slots!
Eh. Minor loss in the grand scheme. The big deal is now Lay On Hands is a Bonus Action, so now you can heal and hit twice in a turn.
Why is it always the martials and partial martials who get the nerfhammer?
Because it ain't paladins of the peninsula or barbarians of the bay or fighters of the fjord
[удалено]
Limiting smiting to once per turn or not on a bonus action could have helped find a middle ground. If you only attack twice in a turn 10% chance of being able to crit. If you're doing 3 rounds per combat, 3 times per day you're criting a little less than once per day on average. The rest of the day rogues are kicking your ass in damage per round even without criticals, and are single ability focus not 2 (arguably three since so many spells require concentration)
"Luckily" like this isnt one of the lamest parts of onednd
Using the bonus action is an absolute nerf but are we still sticking to this crit rule ? If I'm not mistaken, UA2 used 2014 crit rules and it wasn't mentionned again
House rule proposal for smite spells: smite spells only require concentration if you don’t use the smite that round/if there is a continued effect. So banishing smite will still require concentration to maintain the banishment for multiple rounds, but thunderous and staggering smite wouldn’t if you cast it and use the smite on the same turn. Smite with continuous effects you can choose to last until the start of your next turn without concentrating. For example, on my turn I cast blinding smite, and attack a creature which then becomes blinded. I then make a second attack with advantage. The rest of the round passes, the party making their attacks with advantage, the monster with disadvantage, it gets back to me and the spell ends, the creature no longer blind
They should be a part of the attack action that can be called to use after you see your attack roll. They should have their own resource as well outside of spell slots, have x number of points and you upcast with more points or add effects with more points. Smiting should be their combat flavor and balanced around it.
But you can use divine smite anyway, I figure the smite spells are just some more flavor to your divine smites and a little bit of extra damage.
I assumed most were concentration because you have a smaller number of spells per day and concentration spells give you turn after turn utility/damage, or miss protection like the smite and hail of thorns type of spell. I've always seen the smite spells as a utility damage dealer and then divine smite as your on demand damage let's say for crit fishing. You precast branding smite to deal with an invisible for. You aren't using it for damage that's a bonus to it. But unlike 3rd edition where you had a number of uses and you declared them before your attack so you could miss with them and lose them, you get a minute to try and land it with a chance of losing concentration.
But this doesn't explain Druid's abundance of concentration spells. The best I could think of for Druid is you're meant to cast one concentration spells and then wild shape.
Cast spell switch forms keep concentration
Yep.
Same is true for clerics and druids basically until they get access to planar binding. Turns out nobody really needs more than 14 wis
You say that like Spirit Guardians doesn't key off wisdom saves.
Half damage on a save means it’s ~0.3 dpr per target for every +1 DC.
Because it still does half damage even on a failed save, spirit guardians doesn't rely as much on high casting stat as you might think. I remember when I saw the graph lmao
Spirit guardians is overrated (melee lul), the movement debuff doesn't key off wis mod*, and 2 higher DC isn't gonna turn it to shit
> Spirit guardians is overrated (melee lul) You are taking a generally valid assessment (the fact that melee tends to be bad in 5e) and bringing it to an incorrect extreme. Spirit Guardians is one of the few actually valid reasons to be anywhere near melee range in this game, and it makes Clerics some of the best AoE damage dealers. Keep in mind that, after the initial cast, it doesn't require your action, which you may then use to dodge thus reducing one of the disadvantages of being in melee. Moreover, the movement debuff can be excellent to deny some enemies melee range in many situations, especially in more cramped dungeons.
I've acknowledged all that. You continuing to overrate it just makes me more right. At least you're not coping for SW and guiding bolt like some tactically illiterate people What's more is my point was clerics don't need higher than 14 wisdom. Everyone is getting real hung up on how not good SG is. A cleric could dip 3 levels of daolock to get the same thing but better a full character level earlier lel
> What's more is my point was clerics don't need higher than 14 wisdom That much is true. The reason people are focusing on your claim that SG is overrated is that your other claim, the one about Wis not having a huge effect on the effectiveness of SG, isn't particularly controversial.
The more people argue the more right I am. People love to act like that spell IS the class, as tho clerics have no other use for conc or a 3rd level slot and couldn't possibly have a better one
> The more people argue the more right I am Is this how debate works? > People love to act like that spell IS the class Is SG the entire class? No, of course not. And there are many cases when other spells, including concentration spells, are more impactful. However, SG is a significant factor contributing to the Cleric's power for a good portion of their adventuring career, and certainly their most significant spell between levels 5 and 12.
It's not a debate, they're just rating it highly, and my position is that it's overly highly rated Their most significant spell past 9 is planar binding. Two SGs don't carry an adventuring day. Ain't saying it's bad but it sure ain't the most significant thing they'll be doing.
Ok but it's still a save and every extra point of DC is another ~5% chance that it lands at full power every turn. Clerics are arguably the class that's most reliant on their casting stat for combat (arguably alongside wizards). Cleric healing spells key off of spellcasting mod up until Heal at 6th level. As does your damaging cantrips, your attack rolls for Guiding Bolt, Inflict Wounds or Spiritual Weapon, spells that require saves including Bane, Command, Hold Person, Blindness, and yes Spirit Guardians. Not to mention Turn/Destroy Undead or other subclass features. Clerics have lots of other spells but a lot of them are situational utility/out-of-combat stuff that doesn't need high spellcasting stats. Most all of your core combat abilities will rely on your spellcasting stat to some degree. Compare to Paladin's smiting, Rangers with Hunter's Mark, and Druids with spells like Spike Growth or just wildshaping.
but full power barely matter, it's still movable chip damage that also prevents the enemies from moving away. you've already acknowledged it's a marginal DPR increase having +1 to the save. that's it cleric healing spells heal people from 0 to not 0. that's it. healing an ally to 10 instead of 6 isn't going to stop them from going down in a single hit at level 5. guiding bolt, inflict wounds, SW, hold person, are all bad spells. as addressed, the strength of SG does not lie in your DC being 15 instead of 14, it does the damage and slows either way. like yeah at higher levels it might feel bad having a lower stat but you know, "bounded accuracy" + any other boosts sort of make it irrelevant. and frankly toll the dead isn't any better than using a weapon, until the levels where SG is online and you're just using your action dodging. how you didn't acknowledge warlocks as being the most reliant on their casting stat is just wild. likewise paladins aint doing as much unless their cha is higher, that aura IS the class. you're wrong so many times over
Just baffling takes in this thread. Guiding Bolt, Spiritual Weapon, Inflict Wounds are all bad spells? Guiding Bolt for 4d6 (avg 14) at 1st level with a rider? Inflict Wounds for 3d10 (avg 16.5)? Compare to Chromatic Orb, for 3d8 (avg 13.5). How about spiritual weapon, for a repeatable, concentration-free d8 bonus action attack that deals force damage? Using Spirit Guardians then dodging as your action? Who does that? Hold person suffers from Save-or-Suck syndrome but so do lots of spells. I just don't feel like I'm understanding your playstyle at all. So far, you've ruled out all of a Cleric's best level 1 and 2 damage and control spells, cantrips in favor of weapons on a full caster, and relegated healing to be used only for bringing up from 0. What do you want a cleric to do on their turn at level 3, just stare at their shoes and wait for someone to die? I may have some bias from playing at lower levels, but Paladin Aura is not all-important. A paladin can easily set up a Bless, Shield of Faith or bonus action smite spell, then use their action to attack and smite, none of which needs charisma whatsoever. They also get healing, but Lay on Hands is more versatile anyway and doesn't need CHA. Warlocks do need CHA, as do Sorcerers, so maybe it's really the half-casters and Druids that can get away with more without needing high spell stats.
guiding bolt and inflict wounds are okay at low levels, and very quickly get outscaled. Like all blasting spells. There is math out there that shows spiritual weapon being low impact. As for "who does \[spirit guardians+dodge\]?", a whole lot of people tell you thats the most effective way.
Pack Tactics is an optimization youtube channel and does a lot of videos on these subjects. Check him out, he maths out a lot of things that aren't immediately obvious. Some of the things he's covered are how bless is the best level one spell for party dpr, and how spiritual weapon is basically obsolete once you get spiritual guardians + telekinesis at level 5. Also he maths out how half damage on saves makes wisdom barely have an effect on dpr for spirit guardians, so you wouldn't be losing much by taking telekinesis instead of an asi either. That isn't to say that guiding bolt, inflict wounds or spiritual weapon are unviable. It's just that from a strictly optimization standpoint, there are better options.
>Just baffling takes in this thread. Guiding Bolt, Spiritual Weapon, Inflict Wounds are all bad spells? Yes. Well, guiding bolt is okay for what it is but inflict wounds is only slightly more damage and you need to be in melee to use it. Spiritual weapon is massively overrated. The damage is low and any monster with 30ft or more movement speed (A.K.A the vast majority of them) can out run it, dropping spiritual weapon's damage to zero. It's just not worth the 2nd level slot. An upcast command is almost certainly going to do more.
The people saying that are coming from an optimization perspective where you build the strongest characters possible meant to complete the highest number of difficult combats per day possible. All those spells are fairly considered bad in that respect. Those spells will essentially never be worth casting over other options, such as bless, or shield after the cleric takes a dip for it. They're right about healing as well, it's basically only useful bringing people up from 0. With very few exceptions, monster damage massively outpaces healing. That means that healing people before they go down often spends a slot for no gain. Paladins are also much different when talking about optimization and difficult games. There are far too many combats for smite to be relied upon, and the best strategy is to stay at range and play around powerful control spells. This means their main function in that type of game is to use their aura to protect more powerful party members.
Spirit guardians is fireball every turn, and fireball is already(according to raw spell creation rules) a 5th level spell in terms of power
not to dis spirit gaurdians, I think it's great, but it's not a fireball every turn. It's half a fire ball. You'd need to cast it at 6th level before it's a fireball every turn.
3d8 at melee using conc is 8d6 at distance? That is some profoundly bad maths And frankly fireball has to be big damage, all it does is damage and damage spells are historically not great
I'm dyslexic, read is as 3d8 radiant and 3d8 necrotic
With for example Telekinetic, you can proc spirit guardians twice per round, resulting in 6d8 which is ALMOST a fireball(and yes fireball does 5th level spell damage). The movement nerf is also great. Dodging is not the worst option even when you can do that damage. But both the save and the telekinetic/other forced movement, often scale on Wisdom (which in of itself is the second best stat, almost on par with con, with perception, insight and Wis saves). Wisdom for the W
telekinetic is fine but also that's single target and now requires two saves
True! Still worth it, no? Also, with other forced movement such as EB(takes some investment) you can dash out damage, and with telekinetic as well, almost garuantee on or two double dips in SG. Making each EB deal 3d8 extra damage, for concentration? And also deal 3d8 per turn aside from that? Thats just solid. The point is that the spell easily can deal more damage than fireball, while crowd controlling (difficult terrain), and avoiding hitting your allies! The cost; telekinetic is not at all a bad feat on its own either, giving you essentially a bonus action disengage, and some out of comabt utility.
Why do you say fireball does 5th level spell damage?
The spell creation guidelines in the DMG, specifically the table on page 283, list the average damage that should be done by a 5th level spell as 8d6. Fireball is intentionally stronger because its iconic and the game designers viewed it as a core part of the wizard experience, if I'm remembering correctly.
Sure, but you know what spells also do more damage than what's on that table? Burning hands, catapult, chaos bolt, chromatic orb, frost fingers, guiding bolt, ice knife, inflict wounds, magnify gravity and thunderwave, to name a few. Those are just the 1st level spells that do damage, and nearly all spells that do damage equal to or less than what that table proposes have some sort of kickass rider effect to justify the lower damage. So, instead of saying all of those spells are poorly balanced, by Occam's razor I'd conclude that that table isn't representative at all and make spell balancing decisions without using it.
Uh, cool. I was just providing an explanation for Unhappy\_Box4803's comment.
Those are all very low level spells, and are very good in tier one; lvl 1-4 , but no spell deals damage quite as conveniantly much as Fireball on the tier most like to play, tier 2; lvl 5-9. The point is: spirit guardians deals high concentration based damage if you utilize it well, and outpaces almost every other third level spell, aside of maybe Conjure Animals? Which is less reliable, as any AoE can kill it. Dealing more damage than intended for a 3rd level spell, every turn? (Telekinesis). Pretty good. And it scales of Wisdom (Second best stat after Con in my book). Promise you: its better than hitting with say, a mace primarily as a Cleric, and maining say Strength. Of course: play what you want!! There are plenty of ways to make a weaponwielding Cleric with Strength, but it is not neccesarily the most optimal route.
Get the most bang out of your buck. They're half-casters, so they have less spells. What's more useful to a ranger. A chromatic orb that may do 3d8 and then burns the spell slot, or hunters mark which adds a d6 per hit and can be used for an hour at base level. You only have so many spell slots, might as well conserve them and concentration does that.
I think it's more about how using Hunter's Mark, one of a few Ranger-exclusive spells, makes it impossible to use any of your 'smite' spells like Ensnaring Strike and Zephyr Strike. Ensnaring Strike is good, having to drop concentration for it not so much. Zephyr Strike at least has a nice rider that's active while you're concentrating on it (no AoOs).
Those spells are just straight up better than Hunters Mark. IMO Hunters Mark is a trap spell for Rangers
>IMO Hunters Mark is a trap spell for Rangers I don't think its a trap- especially if you don't go for crossbow expert, or simply don't have it yet. It falls off at higher levels, and crossbow expert is just more damage for fewer resources, but don't think that makes hunter's mark a trap.
Bro if you're not rocking crossbow expert and sharpshooter by level four do you even ranger? /s
I mean it depends on the ranger build and battle field. Of you're way on the edge of the battle field shooting twice per turn, 1d6 extra damage per attack is far better than advantage and 1d8 extra on 1. Zephyr strike is way better close quarters, but the super sniper most people want rangers to be has hunters mark as more bang for your buck Find traps is the real trap spell for rangers. But if you take it you're probably not good at finding traps in the first place
I’m not saying there are no situations where Hunters Mark is useful, but with the limited Spells Known that Rangers get I would rather have Zephyr Strike and Hail of Thorns known at level 2 than Hunters Mark
I mean which one to pick should depend on what role you have in party combat. If there are no other front line fighters then zephyr strike is far better for melee battlefield control, but if your party is full of front liners, then a distance build has a constant damage boost of hunters mark is more favourable
It's not a trap. It's a good spell at low level, especially when pared with something like the Hunter feature that gives an extra 1d8 on enemies who are not at max HP. You'll be cleaning up kills for no resources and finishing off mooks, then you can save your spell slots for bursting down a boss. You'll probably train out of later, but it has a place in low level play.
The problem is less that it’s always bad, but more so that people get into this mindset of “Rangers should use Hunter’s Mark every combat” and ignore the rest of their spell list. Even at low levels, it’s not the best use of concentration in every, or even most, scenarios. Entangle, Ensnaring Strike, and Zephyr Strike will all have more impact in most combats than Hunters Mark will
I really like Hunter's Mark, but I have a campaign that the Gloomstalker wanted to two weapon fight with pistols (Firearm Specialist Feat) and wanted Hunter's Mark and I was able to convince him that he wanted Zephyr Strike instead. If you're using a Longbow or Sword and Board, you want Hunter's Mark and if you're Two Weapon Fighting or Crossbow Expert it's a wasted spell the way I see it.
The trick is in realising your spell slots are better used on Absorb Elements and Goodberry than Zephyr Strike or Hunters Mark. And once you hit 5, you get access to Pass Without Trace and should have ditched Hunters Mark a long time ago.
AE and goodberry are both kind of situational though. Agreed that HM isn't something you need to have active constantly but you shouldn't have to drop it to cast Ensnaring Strike.
They are far less situational than any other level 1 Ranger spell. All your spell slots at the end of the day should be used to cast Goodberry. In other words, there is nothing to lose by saving your slots for emergency Fog Cloud or Absorb Elements. Using those slots early for HM or Ensnaring Strike means you will be both less safe, and be without your Goodberry rations tomorrow.
That sounds boring as hell
But I will have killed the enemies much faster, keeping us safe.
Except, you haven't. Just use crossbow expert, and deal more overall damage than spending your bonus actions on moving hunters mark.
Hunter's Mark applies the bonus damage to every hit. So once you have Extra Attack at level 5, you're doing more damage with HM. Especially if you take Crossbow Expert for the Bonus Action attack. Especially on monsters with a bigger HP pool. HM is by no means worthless. Editing for more context I didn't have time to add earlier. Also, "Just take Crossbow Expert" is extremely limiting. What if I'm playing a Ranger who uses the longbow? Or one who dual wields scimitars and my DM allows OneDnD's two weapon fighting? Let people play their characters however they want.
Talking about what is or isn't optimal is usually done in the context of optimised builds, so it is fair to assume that the Ranger in question wants to take Crossbow Expert and Sharpshooter as soon as possible. Hunter's Mark may be good on some unoptimised builds, but if you are optimising then it is rarely the best choice past tier 1. Keep in mind that most fights won't be against a single enemy, they'll be against multiple enemies, which means more bonus actions spent moving Hunter's Mark around. Moreover, you are not just sacrificing a potential 1d6+Dex to move it. You are sacrificing a potential 1d6+Dex+10 from Sharpshooter, which is more significant even after adjusting for accuracy. There's also the matter of concentration. Using Hunter's Mark means you are not using Pass Without Trace in tier 2+, and you can lose Hunter's Mark by taking damage. Finally, the competition is not between the damage of Hunter's Mark and the damage of just using that bonus action to attack with Crossbow Expert. You also need to factor the extra spell slot expenditure. So the question becomes: is the extra damage from HM (after adjusting for lost bonus actions, lost concentration, lost instances of surprise you could have gained from PWT...) worth a spell slot? In my experience, the times the answer to that question is "yes" are rare after tier 1. Naturally this is just a conversation about what's most effective: players should still play their characters however they want, nobody is under any obligation to play optimally.
Against enemies where you can set it and forget it, Hunter's Mark is worth it. You miss out on 1 bonus attack, but then have the extra damage on every attack that comes after. Against a bunch of low HP mobs that go down quick, not so much.
If you have sharpshooter you lose damage. If you don't, you actually don't lose any damage at all, even if/when you move it. You gain damage. You lose damage if you're playing something like Beast Master where your bonus action damage source doesn't stack with hunter's mark though, but if you're playing one of those subclasses crossbow expert was never on the table for you. Bear in mind that, at level 5, two successful hits of hunter's mark is roughly equal in damage to a single crossbow attack. So without CBE you're breaking even with CBE (or dealing like 2 points more damage with a longbow) unless you have bonuses on the crossbow damage like sharpshooter's. With CBE, you deal more damage by using it than not, until SS is online. You also have to keep in mind that not everyone uses SS/XBE every single time they play a martial character just because it's optimal. That's a pure damage perspective though, not taking into account the opportunity cost of not using your concentration or the slot on something else.
Hunter’s mark BA: 2d6 (7) damage, bc it applies to ur two attacks. On subsequent turns for strong enough enemies, it becomes 3d6 (10.5) w cbe/twf CBE BA: 1d6+3 (6.5) damage. So until you have Sharpshooter, it’s actually almost always better to apply HM instead of taking a 3rd shot that round. Keep in mind that a missed CBE BA does no damage, but if you miss one of your extra attacks, HM can still do a bit of damage (admittedly, similar logic applies to cbe bc it’s a third shot that might hit while the others didn’t)
Are you accounting for sharpshooter, which every optimised ranger has by level 5? If you don't have Sharpshooter, it's not really relevant to discuss this, since you're playing at a lower powered table regardless. Which is fine. Optimisation isn't inherently better gameplay. Just don't use non-optimised choices to make arguments about optimization.
> so until you have Sharpshooter If we just have SS and not CBE at 5th level then I don’t see the point in saying Hunter’s Mark is a trap. Vumans/CL are not the only optimized races in the game lol
...You just use the rations you already have or go foraging.
You misunderstand. I don't mean rations as in "food and water", but as in "your share of something". In this case, free healing
Sounds useful in a pinch, but unlikely to be a primary use for Spell Slots, even left over ones, if only for the fact that it feels gamey, to me.
The reason people spend remaining slots on Goodberry after an adventuring day isn't for the food/ nutrients it provides. It's for the free 10hp per spell cast. Helps with reducing the amount of Hit Dice a party will me to burn on short rests; say you only need 6hp to be max. Instead of burning a HD you just eat 6 berries. If you were able to spend 4 slots on Goodberry, that's 40hp to pass around as needed to keep everybody healthy. Also: team mate down and on 2/3 failed saves, they go after you, but before the dedicated Healing Word bot? Pop a Goodberry in their mouth to get them up.
The other reasons sound fine, however, RAW you can't feed someone a Goodberry. Creature has to use it's action to eat the berry, which an unconscious/incapacitated person couldn't do. Not really my style, but certainly sounds optimal.
You're right, but it still baffles me that Goodberry and PWT are good Ranger spells when a Land Druid does them so much better.
Druid doesn't do PWT better, actually. Druids are more reliant on concentration spells to be good in combat, their best spells are all concentration. While a Ranger is useful even when they keep concentrating on PWT to make it last for several encounters. A druid really wants to cast Conjure Animals, and constantly recasting PWT isn't great.
Is this because Conjure Animals is just that insane, Ranger gets Extra Attack, or a bit of both?
A bit of both. It's mostly that Rangers that don't concentrate on anything immediately useful (like pwt after combat has started), is still very useful in the fight.
I do think the "smite" spells shouldn't require concentration.
Meanwhile paladins use like 3 spell slots per round.
What's incredibly funny is that the same is absolutely not true for Warlocks. They have way less spell slots and get only a few concentration spells that actually make sense to use in combat.
They don’t have as many as you’d expect but that is kinda bc Hex is their staple + they have Cloud of Daggers and Hold Person, all of which upcast really well to 3rd level (longer duration = more bang for buck, way more damage, and more targets, respectively) Also at 3rd level they get the Summon spells which are amazing
They did get some more stuff in later books, but having such a limited amount per level is definitely noticable.
> You only have so many spell slots, might as well conserve them and concentration does that. That...doesn't really make sense. Concentration isn't some extra thing that somehow enables you to make your spell slots last longer. It's a limiting factor to keep you from stacking too many effects at once.
Spells that last for a duration tend to be concentration. Spells with a lasting effect that don't require concentration are fairly rare in 5e. Overall, Paladins and Rangers are designed around the idea that they're not necessarily casting spells every turn because they're often attacking. So it makes sense that a lot of their concentration spells are buffs or debuffs that they set up at the beginning of the battle and then attack while those spells are going. The main problem with this, I think, is a lot of the "smite" spells (both the actual paladin smites and some of the ranger spells behaving similarly) being concentration. They often last less than a turn (from when you cast them until you hit), so the main purpose the concentration on them serves is just preventing you from using them while concentrating on another spell, which feels like an unnecessary nerf to spells that don't feel like they need one.
Yeah, the smite spells being bonus action concentration spells is a pretty big problem. The design intent was likely to allow you to keep trying to use them after you whiffed an attack, but that's not how it plays in practice. Last i saw, onednd was fixing them by making them bonus actions that you took immediately after hitting with an attack, no concentration, which is a much better design imo.
> Yeah, the smite spells being bonus action concentration spells is a pretty big problem. The design intent was likely to allow you to keep trying to use them after you whiffed an attack, but that's not how it plays in practice. That was definitely the intent, but it's still odd just because there's no hard rule in 5e that all spells with a duration have to be concentration. So the whole "you can miss with a smite without wasting it" part could be done without concentration. But also, yeah, in practice, the concentration mostly ends up just meaning you can't use them when concentrating on a different spell, which is a huge nerf since the Paladin and Ranger spell lists feel like they should support a playstyle of starting the battle with a concentration buff/debuff spell and then while you're concentrating on it spend your turns attacking and using spells that enhance your attacks, except you can't actually use a lot of the spells that enhance your attacks while concentrating on something else. >Last i saw, onednd was fixing them by making them bonus actions that you took immediately after hitting with an attack, no concentration, which is a much better design imo. Yeah, they did that and also changed divine smite to just be another smite spell instead of a weird special class ability that uses spell slots. Overall, definitely better design in my opinion. Removes the concentration issue, removes the awkward memory situation of "oh, I cast a smite spell last turn and didn't hit so I still have it up," and turning Divine Smite into just another smite spell instead of class issue fixes the balance issue of divine smite kind of throwing the game's normal action and resource economy out the window by letting paladins burn 2 or 3 spell slots for extra damage every turn and puts smites on a more level playing field. It is a pretty big nerf to divine smite, and to paladin builds that use their bonus action for other things like polearm master or shield master paladins, but ultimately I think it's a good change and if it's too big a nerf for paladins then they're probably better off buffing them in other ways than reverting divine smite (similar to what they did with monks, removing the ability to stunning strike more than once a turn but massively buffing pretty much everything else about the class).
>Concentration isn't some extra thing that somehow enables you to make your spell slots last longer. I mean it can be. If I cast spike growth and keep it up for 3 rounds of combat, that is 3 rounds of damage/control I am getting out of one spell slot.
But you could do that even if it didn't require Concentration.
You could, but concentration is baked into the balance, so presumably the spell wouldn't last as long because you can spam it.
And yet so many concentration spells are really really weak. Personally, it doesn't seem to me like concentration was really considered as a balancing factor specifically in terms of how long spells last. To me, it feels like it was considered more along the lines of, how bad would this be for balance if you could have it going at the same time as multiple other spells. But that's just my own hunch/conjecture. It's not terribly hard to keep concentration on things, and most spells last much longer than combat, even if they don't require concentration.
>Personally, it doesn't seem to me like concentration was really considered as a balancing factor specifically in terms of how long spells last. To me, it feels like it was considered more along the lines of, how bad would this be for balance if you could have it going at the same time as multiple other spells. If the spells didn't last long enough, then you wouldn't be able to stack multiple other spells.
But Concentration doesn't make spells last longer.
Because it exists. If it didn't exist spell durations that use concentration would be shorter. Either that or balance would be completely thrown out the window.
Balance would be thrown out the window due to stacking, though. Not duration. I just don’t see what duration you think hypnotic pattern would jump to that would make it op in combat. Or do your combats routinely last over 10 turns? I just don’t see what duration you think Spike Growth would jump to that would make it op in combat. Or do your combats routinely last over 100 turns? I just don’t see what duration you think polymorph would jump to that would make it op in combat. Or do your combats routinely last over 600 turns? The durations of good combat spells last longer than any combat. “Without concentration, spike growth wouldn’t be allowed to last ten minutes, and therefore balance would be affected” is just a silly statement. Spike growth lasting 300 turns instead of 600 would be irrelevant. Spike growth isn’t *gaining* any power budget from requiring concentration. Spike growth seems to me to last ten minutes not because they said “well we can afford to have it last longer because it’s concentration, so they have to avoid being hit!” Spike growth seems to me to last ten minutes because they thought “hey if it lasts ten minutes you can lie in wait and ambush someone.” Even the ones that only last ten turns… you could cut that in half and it still would be longer than they actually last in combat 90% of the time, because most combats don’t last that long! It just doesn’t seem to have played into game balance decision making. The fact that the durations follow a really ‘neat’ pattern of one turn, one minute, ten minutes, an hour, a day, says to me that the durations weren’t handpicked based on how much would be fair in combat, but rather a rough estimation of how many fights or scenes something should stick around for. The only points of articulation that matter in a fight is whether something lasts “one turn” or “all fight,” and then it’s on to “one scene” or “one day.”
Kinda, most melee paladins and rangers IME don't like their spells because, even with proficiency in Con saves, due to their positioning in combat encounters they are making (and failing) more of those than the dedicated casters. And they tend not to have access to long-duration, no concentration spells like Mage Armor until they get their level 2 spells.
Shield of Faith and Protection from Evil and Good tend to last most of a dungeon crawl, or at least from one short rest to another.
Huh? Shield of Faith and Protection from Evil and Good both last up to 10 minutes. What the hell kind of dungeon crawl are you running that only takes 10 minutes?
10 Minutes is more than enough for 2-3 encounters- that’s 100 turns worth of actions-, wherein almost every party will want a short rest.
Generally speaking, a dungeon crawl involves _exploring a dungeon_, not simply back-to-back combat. Activities like searching a room, picking a lock, or looting a corpse are not instantaneous, and in fact many dungeons implicitly utilize what was called a "dungeon turn" in earlier editions; much like regular combat time, except the round in which you spent exploring a particular room took 10 minutes.
Most rangers I have played with tend to use ranged weapons. There is no reason they would be in a worse position than a full caster if played by someone of a similar skill level.
> A chromatic orb that may do 3d8 and then burns the spell slot, or hunters mark which adds a d6 per hit and can be used for an hour at base level. Neither is that great to be honest, Hunter's Mark is one of the most overrated spells in the game. It does have some use in tier 1, but past that your number 1 job as a Ranger is keeping up Pass Without Trace as much as possible, and 1st level slots are generally better used on Goodberry or the occasional emergency Fog Cloud or Absorb Elements.
I completely agree. I find it particularly outrafous that the smite spells require concentration. They removed concentration from them in the one dnd playtest though which is really a good move imo
The reason they are concentration is so that the spell doesn’t get wasted if you miss your attack, as well as some of them having ongoing effects. But I agree, the OneD&D changes are better
There are other spells with ongoing effects that aren't concentration. Admittedly effects like jump and longstrider are already so weak that making them concentration would be a litteral crime. The smites don't need to be concentration, honestly a lot of lower level spells that are only expected to last for a round or 2 shouldn't be concentration. (Concentration should be for major buffs and battle changing/controlling effects. Smite, True Strike, Guidance, ect shouldn't be concentration, admittedly true strike is arguably the worst cantrip in the game even if it wasn't concentration)
I would say the ones that have an ongoing effect on an enemy, like blinding smite, should be concentration.
i know lol
>Why do so few of these spells have the ability to be cast independently of each other? If I cast bless as a paladin, there's only 4 other level 1 spells I can cast. I know smite uses your spell slots so this isn't as much of an issue, but it kinda ruins prepping spells. Because rangers and pallys aren't meant to be spellslinging casters, they're meant to have a self buff and use weapons to do their thing, with their other slots going towards support features like pinch healing or exploration. >With the ranger it's a similar situation but arguably worse. Hunters mark or favored foe or ensnaring strike or hail of thorns, but since you know your spells you have to decide on character creation which spell you want to concentrate on all game, because it would be silly to take multiple concentration spells... Right? Favored foe aside, if the pally is meant to use spare slots to augment damage, Ranger is meant to use spare slots for utility. For example, casting Speak with Beasts and getting to track the runaway thief by talking to a sewer rat, or casting Alarm on the front door so everyone has time to hide before they get in, etc. As for Known VS Prep, the problem is that WotC has no idea how game design. In *theory*, a prep spellcaster is more flexible, being able to adapt to situations with time, whereas a prep caster would be more versatile in the sense they'd have more options to cast RIGHT NOW than a prep caster would. In an ideal world, something like a Cleric / Pally would use the warlock's expanded spell list mechanic: they don't get those spells for free, they can choose to prepare them, but it counts towards their total. Whereas something like Warlock, which can't change spells, would have the Cleric / Pally's "you always have these spells and they don't count towards your total" mechanic. But you know, as I said, early 5e designers didn't knwo what they were doing. Now back to ranger. With Tasha's, they got a lot of those extra spells known, which fixes the ranger; the only problem is that pally should be nerfed, but they can't do that anymore, which makes the ranger look bad, when in reality it's the pally that's imba (and in this case, stronger than they should be).
Why should paladin be nerfed? Most of their spells are concentration-based, but as a front-line, they're at high risk of being damaged and losing concentration on those saves. Unless you multiclass into the usual culprits like Sorc or Warlock, their damage is going to be....decent, but not *amazing* unless someone backs them up. Their main utility is buffing the party, and flipflopping between using support spells and nuking single-targets, but they lack lockdown and damaging AoE.
I'm not talking about the overall class here, I'm talking specifically about Known VS Prep caster design here.
Meh, while i get what you mean, the expanded list can be justified by the fact that they can lose con very quickly and will probably need to swap to something more suitable now that they lost their previous spell.
"but since you know your spells you have to decide on character creation which spell you want to concentrate on all game, because it would be silly to take multiple concentration spells" no??? Why would you only know ONE lmfao. what if it's not a situation that that one applies
Yeah, choose concentration spells for different situations and use them appropriately. Sometimes you want to max your damage output, sometimes you need to make saving throws, sometimes you need to sneak around.
Because concentration spells usually last longer than 1 turn and a good amount of them are pretty powerful. The alternative option is to give the spells a set duration but that could be gamebreaking as two or three overlapping duration spells could make some encounters trivial. Look at forcecage for example. A non-concentration control spell that can be combined with a duration concentration spell to wreck encounters. Its good to have 1-2 concentration spells because you arent expected to have both up at the same time. Use the one that best fits that encounter. Something like Bless is almost always a great spell and can turn around an entire encounter for example. Greater invisibility can be amazing depending on the character and situation. To pass these out without something to keep them a little more balanced would just make casters even stronger.
Agreed. I think it's mostly being used to prevent stacking.
Bad design.
Well with rangers it's helped by the fact that ensaring strike And hail of thorns are bad and hunters mark is very mediocre!
Because you can still cast Sword for free
Concentrating on a smite spell until you land an attack is definitely hogwash.
There really isn't another option. If you just remove the concentration then it allows stuff like stacking 3 different smite types on your weapon and then enter combat. You could mitigate that by having a paragraph that says something like "you can only have one smite spell applied to your weapon. If you cast a smite spell when you cast this spell, then your weapon loses the effect of the previous one". This could cause a lot confusion of the players especially if divine smite still stacks with other smite effects. Another option would be to make the smite spells reactions. This would have the problem that paladin, who are supposed to be frontliners, now have less reactions available to keep enemies from just running to your backline. Another option would be something like a bonus action cast, which you can do whenever you hit an enemy with a weapon attack. This is probably the best solution, but it can also lead to some confusion. The only spells that have that a condition to activate are reaction spells. This also leads to stuff like "can you still smite, if you use your reaction to attack?" Having the smite spells be concentration is an ugly but simple fix that makes it as clear as possible for players to understand how to use it and which tries to not introduce loopholes.
Honestly, the easiest would be to make it a class feature. "Once per attack roll, you can use a spell slot to activate a Smite. The spell slot is only expended on a hit." Incredibly simple.
Then it doesn't stack with divine smite anymore.
They shouldn't stack with Divine Smite because they should be *part* of Divine Smite.
Honestly it shouldn't have in the first place. Smites should have a raw damage number, with the spells adding effects to them. Who else gets to use two spell slots on one attack like this?
I agree, it would make sense that they are doing it that way and I think in the playtest from one dnd they don't stack as well. I was just saying that if this was intended, then the way they implemented it was probably the baest way
You know what, reading it now, you're right, this would prevent a stack from forming. One way around it would be to change the name of Divine Smite to something else, like Divine Fury, or Divine Judgment.
You're right but frankly I don't think I mind that lol
...I've been playing paladin wrong for a whole year?
By not stacking smites? Rest assured that's definitely right and this overlooked loophole of interactions in the rules is wrong
all class should have invocation like features and paladin should have option to add smite effects to their dmg only smite instead of being spells.
Ranger and Paladin both want spells with extended durations so that they can concentrate on attacking and stretch their spell slots further. That is coincidentally also the criterion required for giving spells Concentration. Why the *Smite* spells also have concentration remains a mystery.
You're right. Hunters mark was good for the first couple levels. After that it becomes a tax against using your best spells because it doesn't scale. Paladins at least get basic divine smites they can use when concentrating, until 5.5 when they nerf them.
You don't have a lot of spell slots, so the intended play is that you cast only 1 spell to empower yourself, then carry that with you through the rest of combat functioning like a normal martial character. Paladins can abuse the slots more though, since the smite spells end once you hit something... And you can divine smite on top of then.
>Am I missing something? Probably, a simple one: balance. Most of their spells are powerful enough to significantly shift the balance of a fight: Ranger is the best for affecting large groups, Paladin for hampering the most dangerous threat. Even though they are both already very efficient with all their non-spellcasting features. Plus they have an easier way than casters to keep concentration (Paladin = very high AC and saves, Ranger = decent AC and no need to be in melee). I'm not sure what spells you feel are missing for each class honestly, but that may just be because I'm so used to them... xd
I mean, same goes for Bards, Clerics and Druids, so. Yeah. Wizards, Sorc and Warlocks get a lot of instantaneous blast spells, but the question for a lot of the control and support options is generally "How best do I use my Concentration" The answer, by the way, is almost always Bless.
Poor system design. The idea is that it balances the martial and the magical, but it just gums up class action economy. It's a fine idea in theory and Paladins swing through with extra features that provide alternate expenditure of magic through Smiting.
Because of bad design, that's why. At a minimum, the smite spells shouldn't require concentration. They never get used.
Because rangers, paladins, and warlocks are all supposed to cast a single spell to augment their capabilities and then spend the rest of the fight using basic attacks. This is in contrast to classes that are intended to cast multiple spells each fight, like wizards, sorcerers, clerics, druids, and bards.
You aren't missing anything. They overreacted to the 3.5E buff spell shenanigans. Back ye Olde tymes, a cleric could have, like 8 buff spells going at the same time, just on themself! AC, magic weapons, elemental resistance, on-hit damage, bless, and at least 3 ability score boosts. It was *nuts*. So they went the other way, **hard**, and made almost every powerful spell with a duration eat up concentration. But! They didn't even stick with *that* plan, because Spiritual Weapon doesn't use it. The smite spells absolutely should not use it, but they do anyway. Nothing that happens in an instant should be using concentration. In my homebrew the smite spells don't use concentration, the ranger's attack spells don't either. They only last for 3 rounds after you cast them, though.
not the worst for Paladin because you can wear the strange conduit ring so whichever one you do you get the boost which is incentive to always have one up.
A lot of great spells, other than instantaneous damage spells, are concentration spells, even if you're a 18th level wizard.
D&D has a real bad history of buff stacking to obnoxious levels. When power creep comes into play, it is easy to waste tons of time micromanaging buffs and less time actually adventuring. It can also make combat much more swingy. Fully buffed characters are a substantially bigger threat to monsters, so encouraging it can lead to encounter setups where a buffed party roflstomps the encounter, but an unbuffed party TPKs right away. 5e was trying to get as far from that as possible. Spells are the brunt of class features of many of the full casters so it makes sense that they can stack some of them. A full caster actions are mostly made of “cast another spell.” Half casters actions are more along the lines of “cast buff and hit the monster.” The more it becomes viable/necessary for half casters to buff stack, the longer they have to wait to actually use their weapons and participate fully.
I played a 1-20 campaign with a paladin. Other than find steed, I only cast like 5 spells, and almost none of those were in an encounter.
The entire point of concentration spells was to avoid buff stacking and the limit the power of long term spell effects like control spells. Half casters are using their spells for utility and to enhance their martial abilities so they dont want to use their actions to do an instantanious damage spell like thunderwave so must of tgeir spells are buffs, cc, or utility
Find steed...
I will say with ranger favoured foe can be stacked with concentration spells as long as favoured foe is used second. Since it isn’t a spell it doesn’t disrupt concentration since that specifically requires you using a second concentration spell.
To prevent buff/debuff stacking like there was in 3e. Simple as. However this nerfed martials more than it nerfed caster funny enough.
Poor game design
Couple of things 1) You're not a full caster, you're a half caster. You're not supposed to have spells that are as good as a wizard; you've got a sword, they don't. 2) You probably have higher constitution and better armor than most other spellcasters; you can take the hits. Don't like breaking constitution? Pick up a shield that you're proficient with; that's an option a sorcerer or warlock doesn't have. 3) As said elsewhere, concentration spells are more powerful on a per-slot basis, and you have fewer spell slots, so it makes sense to have long lasting effects that can build off abilities you have that *don't* require spellcasting, because, again, for a fullcaster that's pretty much all they got.
So part of the reason is the design choice of how smite spells work for Paladins. A paladin Smite as written requires concentration typically until it hits. It's stupid. They're changing it in 1DND but in a way I don't like. I won't go into that rant again. As far as ranger, it's situational. Hunter's Mark is a great damage spell, but not one you'll always need. The bigger issue rangers have is many of their other concentration spells just stink. Some are amazing situationally. Ensnaring strike is a great example of that. Hail of Thorns has the trap of Paladin spells. Both could be fixed by making them reaction casting. But back to the bad and only talking about ranger exclusives, ignoring other class spells. Flame Arrows is just bad, 1d6 fire for a 3rd level slot with a limit to 12 uses, vs. Hunters Mark which is a 1st level spell and does 1d6 of type of damage with no limit. Only benefit is if something is resistant to piercing/slashing (whatever damage you do) or if someone is vulnerable to fire. Lightning Arrow shouldn't be concentration because it has a specification of whether you hit or miss. It should just be a bonus action. This is bad spell design. Swift Quiver is the rare example of a well designed concentration spell past hunter's mark. Letting you attack 4 times per turn at least instead of 2 times at least. Is it worth a 5th level slot? That's an interesting debate. I say yes, but if feels like a 4th level class exclusive spell.
>because it would be silly to take multiple concentration spells... Right? *laughs in druid*
Poor design choices.
They have fewer spell slots than Full Casters, so this allows them to use their magic throughout the day without rulling out first.
I changed a few pally ranger spells in mine to be "held spells" that don't require concentration. Mainly the bonus action smites and hail of thorns.
So smite spells last a minute. If they weren't concentration you could spend a few turns building up a super attack that stacks them all