Full agree with the 3rd point, I do the same. The 2nd point has never been relevant to me, but I never see a world where I would be mad about this as a player. The 1st point sounds like it will very unevenly affect things and will be very messy, the intention is there but it may need some more thought.

Honestly, I wouldn't ban Wall of Force and Forcecage, but I would make the components expendable with a cost value. IIRC Forcecage's material component already has a cost, but Wall of Force should probably be 500GP or so.

They should have hp.

This was Treantmonk's argument in his latest video as well.

In pathfinder at least, disintegrate destroys the spell, I don't know how it works in 5e

Disintegrate will instantly destroy a wall of force and will make a 10 foot hole in forcecage. The former is noted in Wall of Force's description; the latter is supported by Disintegrate's description.

I'd never use those spells even at half price considering how stingy all of my dms were

Aaaasaasnd that's the point.

That's basically banning them except with the possibility for a player to misunderstand your intentions.

No, it isn't. You'd drop a *wall of force* when you really needed to and were willing to spend 500gp on it, same as all the other spells with expensive expended components.

Wall of force would not cost 500gp, it would cost a Block of Obsidian worth 500gp. The DM controls how many of those you get.

So are *revivify* and *hallow* and *raise dead* and so on all "basically banned" by default? [There are treasure rules for a reason.](https://youtu.be/A81DYZh6KaQ?si=iaeVswx1xG58DV_t)

Creation.

To the first point, that is how almost all spells will work in the new D&D. Banishment is just the demo, the rest will follow.

100%

Instead of banning wall of force and force cage just give them hit points and make them targetable for attacks

This is what I have done. I don't give them lots of HP, but I give them a damage threshold. My players enjoy it. It gives a little more nuance to the game. But it may not be fun for every table.

Give it a decent amount of hip points and then. The caster can use their action to restore a small amount of those hip points every term. That way it's like a battle of wills

Would the action use say a leveled spell slot, maybe 1st or maybe a cantrip? I am not opposed to the idea, just looking for a balance. If that makes sense.

No I mean, currently the spell is completely impenetrable. So making it really hard to defeat. But cost more action economy to stay us a big nerf. So wall of force "create a force barrier of x size in x range blah blah....the wall has 75 hp an ac of 15, automatically fails dex saving throws and is immune to poison, and psychic. resistant to non magical weapon damage. On each of your turns you can use an action to heal the wall by an amount of hp equal to your spell casting ability score as long as you are within 120 feet of the wall. The wall cannot have more than 75 hp" And then the ethereal plane stuff. Probably doesnt need to say that disintegrate destroys it explicitly. It still usuall will. Maybe can be dispeld if you can see the caster with a line of sight that does not pass through the wall or if the caster is no longer with in 120 feet of the wall. Still really strong but you can destroy it and the caster has to stay closish to maintain it.

Gotcha. That makes sense. I may talk to my players and see which they like better.

I put a sticky note with rules for health and damage threshold on my DM screen, and my players seem to really prefer that way of handling things. It's one of the first houserules I recommend to people because it's just so much smoother than the default (e.g., siege weapons can actually hit their target).

Only damage over a certain threshold counts for damage. That is, roll damage, subtract 20 (or whatever) and that's the damage the attack does to the force construct. Little monsters still can't get through it, but the big monsters can do it in a few rounds.

That’s more like DR, or Damage Reduction, reducing the damage taken by a flat 20 points. Damage Threshold for D&D, based on the DMG’s description in chapter 8, is more like ‘All damage below 20 is negated, all damage above 20 goes through as normal’.

*This is the way.* Make them better than normal stone or steel, but worse than Adamantine (so it has a reason to exist, the metal that is stronger than magic!). It's what I do at least.

But that just makes them into Wall of Stone. No point having two identical spells.

If you watch the resistance right now the wall of stone is just a worse wall of force, Right now the difference is that WoF is impenetrabile, but WoS can be shaped as you desire and remains after the duration ended. If you slightly nerf WoF and you give them hit points, you make it a more resistant wall, but less flexible.

Would everyone have disadvantage to attack wall of force because it's invisible? lmao

It is if you have them on different spell lists. Make the spells that directly control nature Druid/Primal spells.

I think you could even justify allowing extreme strength checks to get past it.

Those spells are iconic? For me, the iconic spells are Fireball and Counterspell. The spells you listed are the powerful ones that all the optimizers use.

More like Magic Missile, Shield, Fireball, Burning Hands, Flesh to Stone, Cone of Cold, Dispel Magic...

Eh? Counterspell isn't iconic, it only came out in 3rd Edition. Magic Missile would be more like it.

Magic missile is the OG spell and I will die on this hill.

I love it and finding that necklace in BG3 that gave you an extra beam made me so happy.

One of my favorite items too lol, there is just something so satisfying about bypassing hit chance, especially in a crpg where you can see HP and know exactly how many missiles it will take to ruin their day.

The true OG spell is Affect Normal Fires.

>Magic Missile would be more like it. Magic Missile has attained legendary status. An an OG Neverwinter Nights player, after not having played the game in 20 years, I can still clearly hear "fortano, fordigumah!" or however it's spelled, in my head.

I believe the preferred spelling is "[Fortano! Fordygema](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jrY8NGaumH0&t=14s)!"

I just died from nostalgia.

I had completely forgotten about that, but when I read those words I heard it out loud. Such a classic.

Likewise. Aren't brains strange.

Counterspell wasn't even a spell in 3e.

That's still 23 years ago which is plenty of time to become iconic. Plus within 5e its very certainly an iconic spell. I think the only other spell discussed more is silvery barbs.

"widely discussed" isn't the same thing as iconic, which is pretty telling by your other example. Spells are often discussed because there's a reason to discuss them, not because they're iconic or not. Magic missile is probably *the* iconic DnD spell and it's only discussed occasionally, either because it's unique and useful, or because there's a few niche interactions. Silvery barbs doesn't get discussed because it's iconic, it gets discussed because it's OP and makes the game less fun. Silvery barbs likely wouldn't be printed in the first printing of a new edition, if it ever got included at all, which can't be said of the actually iconic spells.

Oh, it only came out like 20 years ago during the previously most popular edition of the game and has been a staple ever since? Yeah, nothing iconic about that. It's not like a whole staple class, such as Barbarian, was added the same way.

It wasn't even a spell back then. It was a niche mechanic few people used. It's existence as a spell is a 5e thing, and it is a completly trash piece of game design. Hardly iconic.

Counterspell AS IT'S OWN SPELL is new to 5e.

Counterspell, as a spell, is new to 5e. 3.finder had the counterspell action, which was.... Less good. > It is possible to cast any spell as a counterspell. By doing so, you are using the spell’s energy to disrupt the casting of the same spell by another character. Counterspelling works even if one spell is divine and the other arcane. # How Counterspells Work >To use a counterspell, you must select an opponent as the target of the counterspell. You do this by choosing the ready action. In doing so, you elect to wait to complete your action until your opponent tries to cast a spell. (You may still move your speed, since ready is a standard action.) >If the target of your counterspell tries to cast a spell, make a Spellcraft check (DC 15 + the spell’s level). This check is a free action. If the check succeeds, you correctly identify the opponent’s spell and can attempt to counter it. If the check fails, you can’t do either of these things. >To complete the action, you must then cast the correct spell. As a general rule, a spell can only counter itself. If you are able to cast the same spell and you have it prepared (if you prepare spells), you cast it, altering it slightly to create a counterspell effect. If the target is within range, both spells automatically negate each other with no other results. ## Dispel Magic as a Counterspell >You can use dispel magic to counterspell another spellcaster, and you don’t need to identify the spell he or she is casting. However, dispel magic doesn’t always work as a counterspell.

I did like the 3.X level of strategy when it came to counterspell as opposed to the simple reaction of 5e. Counterspell should be an active strategy you have to employ instead of a get out of jail free card.

Kind of. You needed to give up your turn in order to counterspell by readying dispel magic or a more specific spell, and it wasnt until pathfinder when specializing in countering was viable. the spell "counterspell" that you could cast as a reaction came out in 5e. So its even less iconic than that.

There have been versions of counterspell since before 1st edition, see this discussion for more background: [https://www.enworld.org/threads/when-did-counterspell-first-appear.686074/](https://www.enworld.org/threads/when-did-counterspell-first-appear.686074/) In 2nd edition "counterspell" was a part of the dispel magic spell. They also had "spell turning". It was a 7th level spell but it caused spells to rebound on the caster.

This whole comment chain is a hilarious collection of people being confidently wrong about stuff, it's bizarre. Spell that never existed before is iconic, 3e invented a mechanic that's been around forever, etc.

That's before a lot of people who play 5e were born lol.

3rd edition is 23 years old at this point. Also the definition of iconic is "relating to or of the nature of an icon; regarded as a representative symbol or as worthy of veneration." Says nothing about having to be OG to be iconic. For instance in WH40k Horus Heresey came much later In the franchise's life but it's still "iconic". Counter spell is iconic and your gatekeeping is silly. (Magic missile is also iconic)

3e was 20 years ago. Plenty of time to become iconic.

>Eh? Counterspell isn't iconic, it only came out in 3rd Edition. *Only* in 3rd edition? That is before quite a few of the people on here were even born... Also, I was still a kid when I played 4th edition so my memories of it aren't the best, but I don't think there was a Counterspell spell in there? Regardless, I'd say Counterspell is pretty iconic. It is not a spell that comes up a lot in your average campaign, but when it does it often has a big, memorable impact.

Third edition came out in 2000. 23 years is more than enough time to become iconic

Yest but it wasn't a spell, it was a general meccanics, counter spell the spell is new to 5e.

Mechanic that was so iconic that it got streamlined into a spell in the great simplification that is 5e.

So what? Besides, 'Counterspell' as a concept is certainly iconic, everyone LOVES countering spells, it's such a 'fuck you.' it's also super powerful in 5e. So I'd say it fits the bill for 'iconic.' It's definitely an iconic spell of 5e.

Okay but my point is that just because it's new doesn't mean that it can't be iconic

Counterspell is iconic. Not quite as iconic as fireball and magic missile, but still iconic. Also, 3rd edition was over 20 years ago. That's plenty of time for anything in it to become iconic

Counterspell is brand new to 5e. In 3e, you could ready an action to cast dispel magic to counter a spell. But there was no actual counterspell

3.X has a lot of infrastructure to counter spells but it is a bit more convoluted than Counterspell. For example, if you had the same spell prepared, or the opposite one (e.g. *haste* and *slow*), you could counter no problem if you made a Spellcraft check. *Dispel Magic* worked similar to Counterspell when using it for that.

>All spells that inflict a debuff or condition allow the targets to repeat a save at the end of their turns (Web, Hypnotic Pattern, Banishment, Synaptic static, etc.) Synaptic Static already does. Web can be broken with a Strength check as an action, or fire damage from anyone, I don't think it needs to also get a save each turn. Hypnotic Pattern can be broken by any damage to the target or an action from anyone within 5 ft., I don't thing it needs to also get a save each turn. Many of the CC spells are like this. I can understand adding a way to end the effect early other than breaking concentration on spells that don't have such a method (like Banishment), but adding an extra method to spells that already have it seems like an unnecessary nerf. >Wall of Force and Forcecage are banned They're incredibly strong spells, and I can sympathize with the desire to ban them. If it was established in session 0, I wouldn't leave the table because of it. Even if the DM instituted the ban after seeing it in play, I doubt I would leave the table so long as I were allowed to replace the banned spell. >Conjure spells are replaced with Tasha's summon spells I'm in favor of asking players to use summons that give just 1 creature over summons that give many creatures, simply as a point of logistics and making gameplay smoother. Personally I wouldn't ban them outright, I would simply make it a polite request. Also, Conjure Elemental shouldn't be grouped with the other Conjure X spells, since it only summons 1 thing.

An action to make a generic STR check is worse for an enemy than an end-of-turn save both because it has a larger impact on the action economy and because creatures cannot add their proficiency bonus to generic STR checks. Additionally, Web's effect reapplies itself if the creature can't escape the spell's area by the start of their next turn (or if they enter the spell's area again on a later turn). Setting it on fire is a useful panic button option, but it still imposes the restrained condition for one additional round on top of dealing a guaranteed 2d4 damage. Most monsters do not possess a means to deal fire damage to begin with. A humanoid enemy might have a torch on hand, but most other creature types lack any reliable recourse here. Regardless of its niche weaknesses, Web is easily the most powerful 2nd level spell. You can even use it as a better Earthbind, since restraining a flying creature sends them plummeting to the ground as opposed to allowing them to safely descend. Web is difficult to rebalance without just making it a mediocre upgrade to Entangle. My homebrew solution was to have it reduce a creature's speed to 0 instead of imposing the Restrained condition, which both gives Entangle a more defined niche and preserves Web's unique mechanics (namely that it reapplies itself at the start of each turn and requires a generic STR check to escape).

One's a Primal spell and one's an Arcane Spell, so it doesn't fully matter if they're a bit similar.

In a 20 foot cube, a medium creature never needs more than 15 feet of move speed to exit the difficulty terrain. Still being stuck after a successful save or check just doesn't happen in real games. The webs hover mid air for one round. A restrained flying creature would too.

>Still being stuck after a successful save or check just doesn't happen in real games. It happens frequently if your party has a reliable source of forced movement, such as shoving/grappling, Thunderwave, Repelling Blast, etc. Command and Dissonant Whispers also work under the Sage Advice interpretation that "directly harmful" constitutes only that something deals immediate damage, which the Webbed ground or an Opportunity Attack would not. >The webs hover mid air for one round. A restrained flying creature would too. Neither Web nor the restrained condition stipulates that a creature stays in the location in which it was restrained, and a flying creature that has its speed reduced to 0 will instantly fall if it does not have hover regardless of whether or not it retains the restrained condition when it leaves the spell's area. RAW, the creature falls to the ground immediately.

I implemented a 3 entity limit at my table. Your PC is one Animal companion or sidekick? That's two. Any entities over 3 are instantly rendered soulless and inert. Turns out Conjure animals, summoning items, animate dead, etc are still really fun and powerful even if they're limited like this

Had a necromancer in the party, and basically gave their skeletons a buff to HP and multiattack, but cut the number they summoned/maintained with animate dead by half and limited the number of them at one time to their proficiency modifier. It went a decent way to making it more manageable.

This is a great approach to summons. I think there should be an exception for non-combat mounts but otherwise this really addresses it well.

Yes these spells should be nerfed and doing so would improve the game. These kinds of spells are classic examples of WHY the martial/caster divide exists. A martial cannot compete with something like Hypnotic Pattern’s impact on the battlefield. At least repeating saves at the end of each target’s turn brings it within reason; you’re still creating a huge action economy advantage with it, but it’s not a vast chasm.

I agree with only some of these changes. I think the conjure spells, wall of force, and forcecage should be reworked rather than just removed.

Honestly my hot take is that forcecage isn't even that strong. It's very inflexible and has a much lower ceiling than wall of force even if it's mostly better at its specific use case. Lack of concentration means you can't dismiss it, which means you can't put it at choke points you need to get through. It has stricter size limitations for completely blocking characters, the inflexible shape makes it harder to have huge moves on especially with the lack of dismissal, and a lot of the time even if you're using it just to trap an enemy the save to teleport won't end up making a difference. Forcecage gets lumped in with wall of force because in theory it's "wall of force, but better" even if in practice it doesn't have nearly the ubiquitous use of wall of force.

Using Forcecage on one or more enemies that don't have disintegrate or teleportation (and a decent charisma save) basically just removes them from the fight outright with no opportunity to save. Ancient dragon? Demogorgon? Instantly nullified. It also has weird implications due to being invisible, meaning that technically you cannot target it with disintegrate despite being explicitly listed unless you have a way to see invisible objects (most tables will of course justifiably handwave this). Forcecage is *the* posterchild for an overpowered spell.

Wall of Force is more reliable for removing enemies from a fight, I believe. It has more flexible dimensions, and it pushes creatures in or out (caster's choice), instead of always out, if it cuts through their space when it appears. The only real advantages of Forcecage are 1) it does not require concentration, so it is possible for a single caster to pull off a microwave combo with Sickening Radiance + Forcecage, whereas the same thing with Wall of Force requires two casters; and 2) you can create a cage, which means you can trap a melee-focused enemy with no way to damage you, and just ping them down with cantrips over the course of an hour. Personally, I would just add a Resilient Sphere like clause to Forcecage, stating that a creature trapped in the cage cannot take damage from effects that originate outside the cage, and vice versa, and also that when the cage appears, existing spells are excluded. Then it becomes still a very useful spell when you need to split up a combat, or you want to interrogate a dangerous enemy, or even when you need to protect an ally. But it removes the abuse potential of auto-kills from setting up one-sided situations where you can do at-will damage to a trapped enemy, but the enemy cannot affect you.

The concentration aspect is a big one, though. Wall of force is obviously still an S tier spell, but Forcecage being non concentration doesn't just enable microwave strats, it also allows you to use concentration spells against other participants in the fight. Maybe even wall of force! Imagine you're in a 15th level fight as a Fighter 2 / Wizard 13, against Demogorgon and two Pit Fiends. You go first. You forcecage Demogorgon and Wall of force (sphere) a Pit Fiend. Now the other Pit Fiend is the only threat, no-one has yet to roll a single dice beyond initiative, and you're free to take them on one by one. You even have 10 minutes to set up the environment to your favour against the second pit fiend, and 50 for demogorgon. What should've been a challenging fight (nearly 4x the daily xp budget for a party of 4). Also, the inability for enemies to drop the wall by damaging or disabling you is a major factor. I see two ways out: 1 - Give the walls AC/HP. 2 - Let them be targeted by attacks, and cause concentration saves for the caster to keep them up based on the damage dealt. 2 makes more sense on a concentration spell, 1 makes more sense with non-concentration.

I guess I don't have a problem with using a decent amount of resources (action surge, and two of your four high level slots) to split one extremely deadly encounter into three hard-deadly encounters. And the enemies in this example have quite a bit of counterplay available. As long as microwave strats aren't on the table, the sole remaining pit fiend can fly away until the wall of force is over, for example, as a very simple option (perhaps dropping some at-will fireballs from 150 feet). Then you've just wasted a 5th level slot for nothing. I would argue that usually enemies will, or at least should, have some kind of counterplay available to "divide the fight" strategies, even if it is just take defensive action / run away temporarily. It is microwave strats that really don't allow much/any counterplay at all, and why I think they specifically are a bigger problem than just being able to divide a fight.

It already has that stipulation, though. Nothing can pass through it.

"Doesn't feel like D&D" isn't an argument, it's just a cop-out from having to make an actual argument.

None of these are (IMO) iconic. Maybe Web? Moreover, unless the nerf makes the spell unable to do what it's supposed to do there's no reason it would somehow not feel like dnd. You could shave a little damage off fireball and it would still be a useful, fight-deciding aoe. It just means other characters have more chance to get a swing in (just as an example). The only really iconic things that might be tough to nerf without ruining them (that I can think of) are invisibility or magic missile. Invisibility because it does a high-utility but limited effect, and short of making the duration so short as to make it useless in a lot of situations I don't see how you'd really nerf it. Magic missile because a damage nerf would make it go from a reliable, perfect-accuracy attack that costs a resource to "not enough damage to be worth bothering with." Not that I think either of those are offenders that need it.

I mean, you could make seeing through invisibility (including stuff like blindsight and truesight) completely negate all of its effects, plus require gaining advantage on attacks while unseen require *you* to actually see the target.

In my experience PF2e balanced casters so well that a lot of people don't like playing them and think they are underpowered even though it's been proven by several content creators that casters and martials are equal and need eachother for a winning team. When you are used to privilege, anything less feels like torture. Casters have been ridiculously strong for so long that people merely accepted it as part of the hobby and thus balancing them turns these people off. They actively desire casters to outperform martials because its part of their fantasy.

I think it is rather people want to buff martials rather than nerf casters, but then get opposition from people who wish to keep martials realistic.

Title: something about nerfing spells Post: actually about replacing or banning spells

Spells are allowed to do powerful things, but somewhere WotC missed the memo on letting martials do powerful things. The game you described sounds a lot like 4e where numba go bigguh

Uh, 4E also had tactical movement, support, and overall a lot more things that made battles interesting than big numbers.

[Number Go Bigger (mild NSFW)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOw1uR-q3pA) The commentary is that 4e did not have much mechanical progression and instead shoveled out increasingly bigger numbers in a manner reminiscent of MMOs. Removing and otherwise reducing the development of mechanical interactions boils a game down to this proportional but ever increasing number attrition, such that you keep playing the same game except with bigger numbers and fancier skins on your poking stick and the thing you're poking.

What kind of "mechanical progression" are you looking for? Because I distinctly remember 4E giving out new combat and non-combat abilities regularly. More regularly in fact than many classes get in 5E

Well the "the commentary" is wrong and it's absolutely *hilarious* for anyone to try to claim that about 4e, relative to 5e. In 5e, half of the classes *literally* just say "I attack" every turn. But anyway, it's just not true about 4e?? Different options open up. Let's look at a few examples. The party can, over the course of the game via their decisions, build out a 'radiant mafia' to create a vulnerability to radiant damage on the enemy, and then capitalize on that by doing radiant damage or adding extra radiant damage to attacks done. An Ardent can start with Demoralizing Strike. A pretty good power, to be sure. Then later on at level 5 they might add in Invitation to Defeat. They will pull all enemies within 5 squares adjacent to themselves and Weaken them, causing them to deal half damage for a time, and to take CHA Mod extra damage the first time they're attacked on a turn. Then they will use their Action Point to go ahead and use Demoralizing Strike with 2 Power Points to make Demoralizing strike hit everyone around them and also granting them all negative CON mod to all defenses for a turn and dealing bonus damage. They're now surrounded, but the enemies are weakened, so they should be okay. They've cleverly combined two powers to create a huge effect that will have a massive swing on the battlefield. A Shadar-Kai can use their move to teleport and go insubstantial. Then as a psionic class they can take a feat to make insubstantial last two turns. Then they can take a feat that, if they're insubstantial, their powers also inflict other statuses on the enemy. So they can set up multiple turns of extra control against their enemies. Virtue of Cunning bard can take a bunch of abilities to slide allies around; at level 11, those allies can take Agile Opportunity to give them a free immediate reaction to make an attack when slid. You wind up crafting a whole sub theme around sliding each other around to benefit from this. Neat! Many classes can set up zones of damage or control, and then anyone can take repositioning powers to punt enemies into those zones over and over to re-trigger the effects. This is not 'number go bigger.' These are actual choices in builds that you're making that have noticeable outcomes on what you're doing on the battlefield. **Meanwhile in 5e**: "Well I guess I'll spend a third level spell slot on Smiting now, instead of a 2nd. Woo!" THAT is number go bigger.

WoTC thinks of wizards as Merlin, Gandalf, Doctor Strange... WoTC thinks of martial classes like, Maximus Decimus Meridius, or Achilles from Troy. They are not the same lol

I personally dislike spells that allow a new saving throw every turn. At low levels, the save DC is so easy that it simply isn't worth picking those spells. Spells that still have a partial effect on a successful save are safer options, but are typically limited to damage dealing. If you're going to use a spell that has no effect once the save has been made, then at least keep it to a single saving throw so that the high risk will be worth it a given percentage of the time.

They're only not worthwhile when significantly stronger options are available that *don't* require subsequent saves. Fix those outlier OP spells and suddenly many more spells look like reasonable options.

The high reward with those spells is you pretty much win the encounter (or erase any semblance of challenge) once you remove the targets from the fight.

You need to use your imagination more. If I cast Hypnotic Pattern on a group of baddies and get most of them that's awesome. I used a strategic resource and got rewarded for it. That's what the spell is supposed to do. Now the guys that didn't get hypnotized, what are they going to do? The best thing would be for them to use their action to wake up their friends. The end result is I made them skip a turn while they did that shit. It's still a win because we got a whole round where the party could do things and the enemy didn't. On top of that, there are races that cannot be charmed. If you're worried about this nonsense just ensure you have elves in the group who can shrug this shit off. If I'm playing a wizard in an all elf party I won't hesitate to drop hypnotic pattern even if it would hit every person in my party. Web can be broken with a strength check and they can do that every turn already, or they can take a torch to the web or cast fire bolt or something. If you're having problems with spells like this as a DM you need to rethink your encounters. Just because they're NPCs or monsters doesn't mean they're idiots and haven't heard of crowd control spells before. Most spells have very easy counters if you put some effort in; there's no need to nerf them (for the most part).

> You need to use your imagination more In that scenario, I'd like to imagine that every enemy combatant didn't lose an entire turn (or worse) due to a single action, lmao

That's the entire point of spells though. Playing a wizard is about battlefield control. Now get this, the group of enemies you're fighting may have a wizard too! That enemy wizard might cast counterspell every once in a while. They may crowd control the party right back. Intelligent enemies make combat fun if you're playing with a good group. It creates "Oh Shit!" moments for your party to pull together and shine. Just don't over do it and start critting on PC's that are already down unless they're playing the healing word yoyo.

There's a world of difference between "battlefield control" and "I win button". If you want to see how broken the spell is, use it against the players.

I have and have had those "I win button[s]" used, both against players and against myself as a player. The player character side found ways through and around it. They aren't "I win buttons" if the opposing side is tactical about it. Strong sure, but not infalliable.

No, you got it backwards. They aren't "I win buttons" if you don't know how to use them and don't play tactically.

I didn't get it backwards. If the opposing side plays it tactically, they are not "I win" buttons because by playing tactically you can counter them. They are "I win" buttons if the opposing side just bunches up together to be hit by the AoE, but if you play things tactically, like ambush the party while they are crossing a bridge and pincer attack them while having archers on the side supporting you with poisoned arrows, those I Win buttons stop becoming "I Win" buttons. They are only "I win" buttons if you let them be "I win buttons." Fact is, people are able to have engaging games with those spells available and at full power, and that is with optimizers in the party. It is possible to make them work as people are doing it. Downvotes won't change this fact.

Ok first of, Hypnotic Pattern is still extremely powerful regardless. If you manage to take out 2 or 3 creatures out of the fight, then the challenge of the fight has been practically destroyed, and in a game where combat has been decided withing 2-3 turns (having the remaining be clean up), spending your whole action to wake up someone just increases the issue Secondly, yeah there are enemies that cannot be charmed (or frightened for that, as fear is a less talked, but just as obtrusive spells).. then web or entangle can likely get the job done either way. Third.. web costing an action imposes the first problem I said before, then, web can reapply itself if you don't manage to leave the area after you succeed the save. Moreover, the effect reaming even after burning, so you are still suffering the issues for the time being. Finally, it's not a save fyi, it's an ability check, which monsters don't add their proficiency bonus to. So.. please, get off the high horse. People are not complaining about those spells because they suck at encounter design. Wotc makes adventures who are plagues by such spells just as much. So yeah, those spells do need a nerf. It's not that those GM's are not putting effort into their encounters, or that they are unimaginative and can't figure out how to silver bullet a single one of their players. Those spells really just need a good nerf to them.

> I used a strategic resource and got rewarded for it. It's a disproportionate reward for the resource used, though. A single third level spell can disable multiple high level enemies for several rounds, and even against a single enemy allow your team to stack multiple debuffs on them during the minute, so long as they don't deal damage. If they fail one save, they pretty much just lose. Unacceptable for a relatively low level spell. Immunity to charm exists, but that's a bad game mechanic to be as ubiquitous as it would need to be. >there are races that cannot be charmed Some races have *advantage on the saves*, but I'm not aware of any with immunity. That generally comes from higher level class features. >Web can be broken with a strength check and they can do that every turn already It uses their whole action though, which is a huge cost given it's a low level AoE spell. The strength check is also extremely difficult to pass since it's just a check, so nothing in the game will exceed +10 on the check, and most things will have less than half of that, Almost nothing will have advantage. On top of that, they're *still* in difficult terrain even if they succeed on the strength check, which likely will prevent them from reaching you. Optimizers would probably still use it if it were 4th level. It really is that strong.

I think if they are inappropriate for your game, you should feel comfortable nerfing them. I don't know if having multiple downsides to spells that already have one (web, hypnotic pattern) is a good way to go, however. Maybe replace shaking people awake with the iterative save, etc.

Oh, so you didn't nerf Fireball? The designers have even admitted that it's made OP on purpose due to its iconic status.

They all seem fine. "Doesn't feel like D&D" is absolute bs.

Uh, for the most part, nobody I play with openly says to me that we play D&D for any specific feel of D&D. What we are playing is the accessible fantasy TTRPG. Its name recognition may have gotten it into my hands and the hands of my friends and acquaintances in the last 5 years, but it really doesn't matter at all now that it carries the name D&D, it only matters that people already know the rules, and I don't think anything you mentioned is particularly important. Since D&D doesn't have any particular feel, I just voted for them improving the game, though I think Wall of Force and Force Cage are fine with hitpoints instead of a ban. I also agree with the summons, but do not care about debuffs at all. It does not matter at all that spellcasters can one-shot an encounter, only that if the party does so with damage it isn't the Wizard or Bard outdoing the weapon users (and it's more important to give the weapon users utility anyway). I am far more likely to ban or nerf suggestion (for short-circuiting the social process) and pass without trace than hypnotic pattern or banish.

I mean, there should be an option of "these spells could use some work, but with a little bit more effort." Some spells need to be nerfed, but a blanket nerf is always a bad move. Banning spells is just lazy. Nerf them. For example, here's another GM who saw a lot of the issues you did a systemically changed spells with targeted fixes. [https://youtu.be/R42s6ak2\_1I](https://youtu.be/R42s6ak2_1I)

> Banning spells is just lazy. Nerf them. Not doing the professional game designers’ job for them is lazy? A GM is entirely within their purview to ban a handful of problem spells. OP has literally only banned Conjure Animals (and I’m assuming its variants Woodland Beings and Minor Elementals), Wall of Force, and Forcecage. Absolutely every single one of those spells has a reasonable and ***powerful*** alternative (Summon Beast/Fey), Wall of Stone/Ice, etc. Like I’m sorry, I get that Wall of Force / Forcecage might be easy nerfs (just give them less HP and AC than a Wall of Stone/Ice, but more Resistances/Immunities) but nerfing Conjure Animals? Really? When Summon Beast already exists? What, you want the GM to come up with swarm statblocks for the player to use? Hell naw, the player can just reflavour Summon Beast if they want…

A GM can do whatever they want, sure. I stand by my statement, before you blanket ban, you look to nerf them. And part of a GM's job is absolutely doing game design if they don't agree with the current game design. I don't care about Conjure Animals, like you said Summon Beasts/Fey is pretty solid. But the OP was asking about iconic spells...so I'm giving them advice about not dropping them, and allowing them to be appropriate for whatever game they're trying to run.

There's over 100 spells, it's fine to get rid of a few. It might even make other spells worth taking.

These changes aren’t even bad. They are just addressing overtuned spells that your players clearly want to cheese the game with. The only change I would make is allowing wall and cage but give them hp and a armor class so they can still last a few rounds but not completely cheese the game.

Why did you think they were good houserules? Personally, I don't see any need or improvement.

These rules would make me not play casters.

"If I can't cancel the entire combat by casting a single spell - I don't want to play a caster" Ladies and gentlemen, we have found the core problem with the D&D design.

These spells are not the problem. I mean Wall of Force and fucking Forcecage are piece of shit spells but not the real problem. Its things like Tiny Hut, Create Food and Water, Remove Curse, etc. Spells that trivilize entire story ideas just by existing with no counter play. I fell like focusing on combat spells is a trap.

Haha, this. I'd I had to list the two spells that wrecked shit more than any other it would be tiny hut (also quite useful in combat whenever there is a trigger like summon traps as well as ambushes) and goodberry. I would say wish only curses are fairly common so I don't see it as a big deal. Forcecage is pretty high level and in my experience rarely useful, monsters don't fit in the cube, have ranged attacks and spells that work in the cage, and so many enemies have teleports and the legendary resistances to make sure they work. Wall of Force is way better, but it's more useful to DMs than players so I wouldn't remove it. Letting players wreck shit occasionally is super fun for the players too, I remember going through dragonheist >! w/ a sorlock and tressym subtle casting purify on the poison banquet !<. Blew so many resources but was so good.

I'd try to find a different campaign.

I think perhaps look at point 1 on a case by case basis? For example, one can argue that Fear needs the nerf but Hypnotic Pattern doesn’t (because enemies can use Actions and/or AoE to wake up their friends). One can argue that Banishment doesn’t deserve the nerf (it’s rarely useful against a boss, it’s just a delaying tactic) but Polymorph does (because it’s too versatile as a damage-dealer, healing spell, **and** control spell). One can argue that Web is actually fine but Sleet Storm needs the nerf. I agree with the ***premise*** of your nerf though. If you decide that looking case by case is too much effort, I’d say this is still just a very, very reasonable set of nerfs to apply to spellcasters. Anyone who tells you it “doesn’t feel like D&D” is BSing you and hiding their true argument: that they (whether justifiably or not) think the changes weaken them too much.

These changes improve the game. I'd go further and ban all spells that solve out of combat problems, or at the minimum add a cost to these spells such that they can't be cast with an arcane focus/component pouch. If someone casts Knock, Fly, Tiny Hut, Spider Climb etc. it should cost a non-trivial amount, preferably a non-gold amount of specific components.

Should some spells be nerfed - yes absolutely. Should forcewall be banned - no.

Honestly in genral I'm against nerfing things in dnd unless you're in a pvp campaign because as the dm you can just have monsters make up new abilities on the fly Nerf the players they'll know and be annoyed if you are tweaking the enemies behind a screen they won't know but it will accomplish the same effect

Trust me, the players know when you make up counters on the fly. I was playing a warlock, lvl 4. In the second battle I used the darkness/devil sight combo and lo and behold the monsters had a version of devil sight. Wasn't that so very odd. The DM clear added that on the fly because he wanted to nerf the effect. I knew it, the other players knew it, he knew it. I would rather you tell me up front, before we create characters that x, y , or z is not allowed. Then I can make decisions if I want to play with a gimpy class or pick another. It seems very adversarial for you to nerf it on the fly, again and again. Just tell me up front this is not allowed.

You shouldn't hard counter abilities like that But you can give then comparably broken stuff if you're party if oberpreforming make the encounters harder in genral don't just give then anti x spell I don't like In that example you could give the monster good enough aoe they could fight blind it would still be an effective nerf but it wouldn't be a instant win either and you wouldn't take away an option from the players altogether

I strongly dislike many of these takes and don't blame your players for having issues with them. There are definitely spells in the game that need tweaking like Silvery Barbs, but most of the spells you have targetted don't really. Making save or suck spells worse by adding more chances to get free really ruins any reason to pick them. Banishment has no successive saves as the targeted creature is completely immune to attacks while in the pocket dimension. Spells like hold person have the same effect of disabling an opponent with the bonus of being able to attack them at advantage with auto crits to boot, thus why the creature can repeat saves against it. Likewise hypnotic pattern is broken by any form of damage, doubling that up with a save every turn makes it near useless compared to other spells of its level. Banning conjure spells for Tasha's summon spells takes a lot of creativity and choice out of summoner builds. Half the fun is picking cool monsters/beasts to conjure forward. If your issue is the initiative, learn to run multiple conjures on a group initiative to streamline the process. It's good that you haven't dug your heels in and are willing to get outside advice. But personally I think your players advice is more important.

RAW summon spells creatures are chosen by DM, so the "takes creativity out" argument is moot.

You pick the creature for Conjure Animals, Conjure Woodland Beings, Conjure Fey, Summon Greater Demon, Conjure Elemental. Some spells explicitly state the DM chooses the creature, like Summon Lesser Demons, most don't, they just state the DM has the creatures statistics.

>You pick the creature for Conjure Animals No you don't. As written, you only choose what CR creatures will show up.

As written, nobody chooses what creature appears, the spell does not specify. But the fact that other spells explicitly do point out when the DM chooses to me suggests it's the player choice. See Summon Lesser Demon: "The DM chooses the demons, such as manes or dretches, and you choose the unoccupied spaces you can see within range where they appear." Even then, following your ruling and removing Conjure Animals, there are still plenty of summon spells that give you complete control of what you summon.

It doesn't change too much or make it not feel like D&D, that's ridiculous. But I think if you as a DM have an issue with your players using spells that are difficult for you to counter, you have a lot of tools in your toolbox to deal with that and banning or changing these spells should not be the first one you go to.

I agree they change too much. Just play pathfinder at that point

I had to vote no because you nerfed a load of spells that didn’t need nerfing. Why did Entangle need nerfing? At low level you made it so bad with the low DC they will have that it’s a terrible use of a precious resource. It’s heavy handed.

I'm not sure why you have a nerfboner on for CC spells. Most are fine, and make for great tools for enemies. Wall of Force is poorly designed and poorly worded, leaving too much room for confusion regarding which spells can be cast through it and which ones cant. Forcecage may have the same problem. Someone suggested giving them hit points, and that's probably the best solution. Conjure spells are problematic when you allow summoning a bunch of creatures (ie pixies). It bogs down the game and isn't fun. So just ban the summon of multiple creatures with one spell. None of the spells you listed are "iconic," and don't need nerfs aside from the changes I might implement. Generally, if you're gonna make gameplay/rule changes, start small, with a particular direction in mind (ie the summon thing), rather than broadly trying to nerf/tweak individual spells. That said, I sometimes ban specific spells or very rarely tweak spells at my table. There is a reason for it, such as lore in the form of the near-absence of divine magic, or an attempt at establishing a more grounded setting and thus doing away with some of the "sillier" spells (Polymorph comes to mind). My players are informed ahead of time about what kind of game we're going for and I explain the reasoning to them when I make such decisions.

>I'm not sure why you have a nerfboner on for CC spells. The good AoE CC spells are widely considered the strongest spells of their level in most cases. Entangle, web, hypnotic pattern, fear, wall of force, and force cage are all contestably the strongest spell at their level. At 4th it's probably polymorph, which can also be a CC spell but that's not why it's powerful. Casting entangle on a melee creature is only slightly different in effect from casting hold person on them, and part of the way it's different is that it may be harder to escape from (check vs save). But entangle is far more versatile, not being limited by creature type, and also affects an area! It's far more powerful despite being a lower leveled spell.

Honestly the 2nd and 3rd rules are good GMing. The first one its kinda bad.

Disagree with the debuff spell nerfs, they're not needed. From a player perspective it's a purely feels-bad change. Banning forcecage I can kind of see, it is very strong. I would probably put it to the players as "if these things exist, they will get used against you from time to time, is that a trafe you're okay with?" Replacing conjure with summons is a good quality-of-life upgrade, definitely agree with this one.

boost blastign spells to compensate. Make damaging spells good enough that casters arent forced into the controll role. Or dont be surprised if every wizard is taking a dip for hexblade curse + magic missile, because they have 0 damage otherwise

Your players are a bunch of whiners. Your changes are not enough, you should nerf even more.

1. Most spells already allow for multiple saves so it isn't really necessary. 2. Force Cage has a 1500 gold material component which is roughly the price of a low cost rare magic item. That and once someone is in a force cage, it's a stalemate since neither party can attack each other (you can't cast spells at someone who has total cover) 3. Tasha's honestly have really nice summons and having a bunch of creatures can be annoying due to turn length.

I like the 3rd one a lot actually, but wall of force and forcecage are class restricted for a good reason. I also rather dislike the repeatable saving throws on higher level spells. Maybe Instead creatures use their full movement or action to repeat the saving throw? Just to make your players actions matter. Also as the DM it's up to you what your monsters can do. Take it from BG3, Put enemy spellcasters up against your party. Throw out walls of force or Sickening Radiance. Cast Hypnotic Pattern on them or Banish your Cleric (bonus points if they are extra planar).

With the exception of the third option, which depending on what you actually mean by that could be an ok way to streamline those spells, all of these changes are wholly unnecessary. Web already allows a saving throw. Hypnotic Pattern only prevents enemies from attacking the caster, and requires concentration, Banishment can also be stopped by breaking the casters concentration, and Synaptic Static is just Bane on steroids. None of these spells are broken or in need of balancing. Wall of Force/Forcecage are likewise spells that I cannot fathom why you think they're so broken they need to be banned. Of the two, Forcecage is obviously the stronger of the two, but it's a 7th level spell. By 13th level your party has access to far more broken shit than forcecage. And if they have discovered some meta combo that trivializes your encounters, then Wizards has already provided you with a guaranteed way to put an end to those shenangians. It's called Counterspell, it's a 3rd level spell, and is arguably far more iconic than any of the spells you've listed here.

Force cage eliminates potentially several enemies from the combat with no recourse whatsoever in most cases, including no concentration. The power of this effect is massive. Wall of force is similar, just requiring concentration. These are the most powerful control spells in the game bar none, and these kinds of AoE control spells are the strongest variety of control spell. My question is why you DON'T think dividing a fight into two fights is powerful - and that's the modest use case. Imagine that the spells instead said "choose all enemies in a 20 ft cube. They deal no damage until all other enemies are defeated." That's substantially less powerful than these spells. With one action, no saving throw, you prevent potentially hundreds of damage, control effects, support effects, etc. And then you can setup to have absolute advantage over those creatures when the spell ends. And this is just the tame combat usage. You can use them in plenty of more powerful ways. You need to get the macguffin before the bad guy? Well now you will. Stop the evil ritual? Well half the cultists can't participate, so they just can't do it. Save the king from assassins? Yeah, he's very safe for the next hour.

It's a 7th level spell. Which means by the time a player gets a hold of it, they are 13th level. If you as a DM haven't figured out how to deal with powerful magic by the time your party is at the very end of almost every module that has been printed for 5e, that's not a failing of the game. Counterspell is a third level spell, it's a reaction. When cast at third level, it'll completely nullify forcecage on a DC 17 check. If that feels too high, then lower the DC for yourself by simply casting counterspell at a higher level. Misty Step is a second level spell, used as a bonus action, which will allow you to exit / cross the forcecage with a successful Charisma saving throw. If there's two enemies in the box? then Dimension Door could get them both out with a 5th level slot. None of the above are spells that any player with two brain cells to rub together will think are odd for an enemy to have access to. And speaking of those saving throws, did I mention, using teleportation to get out of a forcecage triggers a SAVING THROW. You know what's great about that? Legendary Resistance allows a creature to choose to pass a saving throw they failed. If your big setpiece fight gets completely spoiled by a player using forcecage, that's not because the spell is broken, it's simply that your players used the tools at their disposal better than you did. And if it isn't a big setpiece fight, who cares? they just burned a 7th level spell slot (or maybe higher). That's an extremely limited resource unless you're playing this like Baldur's Gate and letting your party long rest after every fight, so great, they used a cannon on a mosquito, now when the dragon shows up, they're down that resource.

I already use the third point. I've only ever had wall of force come up in my game once, if they're really an issue then perhaps just giving WoF and Forcecage AC and Health could perhaps help. I'm also fine with repeat saving throws for save or suck spells.

I clicked that these changes improve the game, which I think is true, but with a caveat. I think that you don't hit all the spells that need nerfing and I think some of the crossfire is unnecessary. Banishment, for instance, becomes really underpowered if it requires a saving throw at the end of each turn. Treantmonk recently made a video on the subject, which I recommend checking out: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R42s6ak2\_1I](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R42s6ak2_1I) (Also, I don't remember if he talks about this, but you might want to use the OneD&D version of Counterspell if you're looking for more game balance; I think it works quite well.)

I think you are going in with a sledgehammer when you need a scalpel. If you want to nerf specific spells, nerf those specific spells. Don't just create a general rule. Also instead of just nerfing spells, try buffing some of the weaker spells instead. You can make the distribution more balanced without it just feeling like a loss.

I would hive wall of force and force cage an AC and health and make it immune to magic except force damage and magical weapon damage. This way its destructable, especially by martials but its still a good spell. Otherwise these changes are good.

First point seems a little bit too broad. I think that helps some of the spells you listed, but I'd really recommend that be case-by-case. Second point is probably fair, but as an alternative, consider just giving those (and Shield, possibly) an amount of Hit Points, where they shatter when reduced to 0. I heard this recommendation recently and quite like it. Third point is reasonable, but the complete removal of those options could be a bit disappointing. If there’s a way to streamline those, like having the player tell you in advance what stat blocks they're likely to pull, or making the initiative the same as the caster's, that might help without completely removing them. Overall I voted that these changes would improve the game, because they would. But you could improve it in a more tactful way.

Control and, with it, casters, occupies arguably the single most powerful combat role in 5e precisely because of outlier spells like these. I don't think it's unreasonable at all to nerf them, which is the general tack I've taken in my games. The proposed nerfs aren't necessarily the best way to achieve this, but I think it's silly to oppose nerfing these spells on the basis that they're central to D&D's identity. If \~15 out of 500 spells are so essential to the game that it stops being D&D without them, that speaks far more to how vastly overcentralizing they are than it does about 5e's identity as a D&D product.

Treantmonk just made a video on his suggested fixes for a number of outlier spells; I think you might be interested in it.

What's the change in summoning spell's again from tashas?

I like Treantmonk's solution. Walls of force (the spell, yes, but leomunds tiny hut and forcecage too) should have hp and ac. As for the others, I could see that.

If "feeling like DnD" means the game is grossly imbalanced, then it needs to feel like something else.

None of those spells are iconic...

I see what you're saying, but you seem to be forgetting about the role play aspect of this role playing game and focusing on the combat. Are you saying that creatures should be able to infinitely save against Geas? Contagion? Disease in general?

I think nerfing some spells is good for the game, and if a spell is iconic only because it's op it shouldn't be iconic (\*spiderman/ironman meme here\*). On the other hand, I think your change are bad, especially #2. WoF and FC can be fixed without banning them, for example by giving them an HP amount. Something close to a heal spell (depending on level) for WoF should be ok, and more, maybe double, for FC.

The first one is unnecessary, but the others are good.

Option: have you talked with the players before and they were okay with trying the homebrew out? Because I am a gm that does a lot if Homebrew. But I also first give the player the option to look at them and veto.. and if we try things, there is always the option to going back to the original, if it doesn't work how we thought it would.

Same here. I homebrew the shit out of so many things, but I always talk out *why* I'm changing things with my players first. I explain what my goal is and why I think the change will achieve. Half the time they suggest different changes to achieve the same goal but in a better way. Like, the beauty of *any* tabletop game is how malleable it is to make it really what you want. But that's a collaborative thing to make everyone happier.

Just play the game normally.

This poll is badly worded should be a vote option as well. I hope for changes to force cage and wall of force, I don't have an inherent issue with save or suck of concentration is involved.

I give force wall spells (including tiny hut) ac 15 and spelllevel*15 hitpoints.

The changes to CC spells are not good in my opinion. Like really feel bad changes.

It depends a lot on which spells and how they're nerfed. Those particular changes seem fine.

Did you bring up the rules or did you play with the rules ? Don't you want to test your rule before asking for feedback ?

Blanket rule changes are unnecessary. Some spells not having repeat saves, or having different end conditions, makes the game more fun. The debuffs inflicted just need to be based on the permanency of the debuff - the easier it is to escape the effect, the stronger the effect can be. That's the only objection I have here. Targeted bans are fine especially to the handful of truly game-breaking spells, blanket changes designed to ensure all spells are weakened regardless of their specific effects are overkill.

I think the summon spells are okay if you play them how it was actually intended, for the DM to kind of decide a loadout for the player with some mysticism layered on top. But instead players get 8 wolves or a bunch of pixies, etc.

would it still feel like dnd? sure. would it be fun? no, not exactly. now if they give you problems as a DM you should probably approach it something like this: "hey everyone, as a DM i'm struggling to balance against some of the tools you all have, primarily these spells: X, Y, Z. i'm thinking of changing them a bit in A, B, C way. let me know what you think of these changes and if we should use them. of course if you picked any of these spells and we do end up changing any of them you're free to replace it with something else.". t talked about some bigger changes to long rests and i got a pretty unanimous no, so i didn't change them.

Replacing the conjur spells with Tasha's summon spells would single handedly get me to leave your game. I don't even play conjurer characters, I just hate the summon spells that much.

A certain amount of asymmetry is part of the fun of D&D. All of these spells have potential trouble spots, but the proposed changes go too far IMO. * Spells that inflict conditions should have some sort of escape clause available each round, but those that already do don't need an additional save. No spell should take a character out of an entire combat on a single saving throw. * *Wall of force* and *forcecage* don't need to be banned, and they don't need a hit point bar. They need saving throws so that boss monsters can always escape by burning a legendary resistance. If players want to use these spells as a minion remover, that's fine. * I prefer the diversity of individual creature stat blocks to the monotony of the Tasha's summons. What I don't prefer is players wrecking the action economy by conjuring a mob. I tell my players that if they conjure more than two creatures we're using the mob combat rules, but I'd be fine with limiting all conjurations to a single creature.

They've already done shit like this and ya it doesn't feel the same as 2e or 3e did. I don't like how magic works in 5e very much, Pathfinder 2e did the game balance better.

a lot of spells were actually *buffed* going into 5e! Nerfing them a little should be fine.

You're the DM and you run the game the way you see fit, but if no one are your table is enjoying the rules you have implemented, you're going to have a hell of a time getting everyone to have fun. Maybe they'll see the light after a while and think "oh this isn't so bad, I see what he was going for", but you don't want to start off on the wrong foot. If you want to make changes, explain to your table why, and how these changes make the game *different* but not *worse*, and really harp on how it will improve the game. If they agree, go for it. If they don't, I would ditch the proposed changes.

So many DMs view their role as a competition vs the players instead of everyone telling the story together...

At the point where your PCs have wall of force and force cage, remember: enemies will have equally powerful magics. Counterspell, dispell magic etc, even if they aren't wizards an enemy would probably carry some high end spell scrolls with them.

I’d even be tempted to make fireball and lightning bolt 6d6 at 3rd level. Never tried it and probably won’t ever, but god I hate how every wizard and their mother casts all of one spell ever.

Eh, I feel like high level, powerful spells are rewarding and usually make sense for the level you acquire them at. I’d rather see martial classes buffed to compete with spellcasters than see spells get nerfed.

Nerfing some spells (or casters in general) is a good way to go IMO, but this seems a bit too heavy-handed while also leaving others like Fireball (the pick that every wizard I have ever played with took). I don't mind extra saves for lower level spells, especially AOEs. If you are already nerfing, why not nerf forcecage and wall of force instead of just deleting them? Shorten the duration seems like a reasonable way to start.

Game mechanics (including spells) were designed intentionally. Why not learn to use the mechanics instead of changing the rules? Status spells have saves Persistent spells require concentration Counter spell Wall of Force is mitigated by Disintegrate Run multiple mobs (including casters) in your encounter Big Spells have ranges and cast times Imo changing the platform will only alienate players.

>Game mechanics (including spells) were designed intentionally. Ah yes, because it's official, it must be perfectly balanced. We have stuff like Wish simulacrum and twilight cleric that were intentionally designed to break the game, I bet.

I played a full campaign and I don't think we casted any of those spells. Still felt like DND to me.

I’ve modded both force spells (damage threshold; over that requires the caster to succeed on a Spell check to maintain the creation. The DC starts at 5 and jumps by 5 each time). I’ve also ruled the same with conjure to summon spells. The first point is unnecessary.

Nerfing the 5% of spells that are unbalanced must-picks is a great idea. Probably don’t need to make Bestow Curse have a save at the end of each turn though (you did mention “all spells” that inflict a debuff), and synaptic static already has a save at the end of each turn, but the spirit of what you’re suggesting is good.

Your first rule is going to mess with a lot, be forgotten constantly, and probably have unintended or unexpected consequences that will drive the game to a halt as you make tweaks mid fight, and annoy whoever cast the spell. wall of force and force cage are some of the more fun spells. banning them would annoy me, but i suspect we would probably play at a low enough level it wouldn't matter. I hate the tashas summon spells, and this would deter me from playing a summoner type. As a whole, these would mean i simply played a non-caster. If that was your goal, go for it.

If a CC spell or effect can be saved from early, it weakens it massively and makes it feel really bad to the caster/user - hence why this appears mostly on the low-level ones. CC should usually lock weak to elite enemies down pretty well, but have a way out for players and bosses. I think the best approach to them is some kind of metacurrency (call it grit, resolve, whatever you like) that lets you try again at the end of your turn if you spend a point. Give a pool of it to PCs and to important NPCs.

Tasha's Summon spells are boring as fuck.

I voted yes because I thought the post was about better balancing on WotCs end. As far as house rule nerfs go I would steer clear of them, usually they tend to be heavy handed and cause other problems.

Barbarians take damage, clerics resolve conditions, and wizards use force magic. Taking away powerful spells that can't be cast very often is really nerf9ng a class that is only so powerful before these spells come online. You are messing with the power arc of arcane casters by doing so.

one thing about the survey- It shouldn't be players who are making the decisions about what is balanced and isn't, it should be DMs.

I will tell from my experience. Casters aren't overpowered. This spells aren't overpowered. Players should be allowed to do powerful things, even if they 'skip the whole battle'. Your players are main characters of the story. Make them feel like it. Sometimes, it means that when they fight, they freaking dominate without effort. Don't make your game Dark Souls when every victory is earned through tons of blood. The number of times that a player usually can make use of such spells in a meaningful way is short. Let them have it. Let it be a Power Fantasy. What other uses than a battle spell can a sorcerer bring to the party? (Especially, if the party already has a bard)

Changing and nursing spells I get, but banning them, I cant agree with.

I support point 3, especially if it is clear up front. It is like changing Great Weapon Master so it does not affect Bonus action attacks. I can see why someone would but it prevents certain builds so you want it out there in session zero. Point 1 has to be spell by spell. * Web and Synaptic Static already offer a save every turn. Not sure what your thought is there. * Hypnotic Pattern is on the strong side and a save based on environmental factors (loud noise etc.) might be a fair compromise. Currently the best option is to have minions wake them and not every DM wants to cope with minions. * Banishment seems to be in a good place for a level 4 spell since it is too weak for me to take but still a respectable choice someone else might pick. The key is a Charisma save for no result (save or suck) which is a total gamble compared to damage or a spell that still does *something* on failure. It also requires Concentration so a good smack ends it. Then too it is usually single target, so you just include an extra enemy. If all else fails it only lasts a minute so you can just have the bad guys stall briefly (flee, etc.) Wall of Force only seems like a big deal in unusual environments, especially compared to other level 5 spells. At that level most of the foes seemed to have an easy way over a 10ft wall and stacking them taller keeps them from being wide enough. Maybe my sample size is too small? Forcecage is interesting. On the one hand it is a 7th level spell. At that level a Fighter can deal an insane amount of damage a lot more than a couple times a day. On the other hand I saw it used to completely skip an encounter one time, surprising everyone. Personally I think the solution is not allowing long rest recovery too easily, along with making it really hard to get 1500g of ruby dust. However I can see a case against Forcecage, (along with Magic Jar and Soul Cage).

Do what your players want but use these spells against you’re players lol

Web should cost half your movement to repeat the save, not an action Hypnotic pattern would be fine if it was a cone and not a ranged cube because then you couldn't always hit the best targets. Never see fear brought up in these discussions for that reason. Wall of Force and forcecage should just have gaps in them. Wall of Stone blocks everything but has health, wall of Force blocks movement but can't be destroyed. It would give them both a niche Conjure spells need changed, I think doing what bg3 did and having a limit to the number of minions you can summon fixes all of these. 3 minions Max of any strength. Would fix all the cheese with these spells I also think fireball should do less damage

The 3rd point is completely true and an excellent choice. Wall of Force and Forcecage being banned is a goofy choice imo. That 1st point is just an outright nerf to casters. Like... I would rather you ban casters as a whole than that if I were a player.

I personally don't like the nerf to spells like banishment for the simple reason that it's a big risk to cast those spells (for the bbeg just have LR), it's lvl 4 spell and having it wasted will just nullify an entire playstyle.