D&D 5th Edition: Magic Initiate and Cantrips in General.

[Basement Cat]

I love 5th Edition D&D. I especially love that its appearance delivered the deathblow to that abomination called 4th Ed. D&D.

But mostly I love the Cantrips. With 5th Ed Cantrips can be cast at will and as many times as you please. This has changed the magic using classes' tactics enormously: No longer must a Wizard sweat in fear during battle as their precious few magic missile spells run out. Now a magic user can lob fire, acid, or rays of frost endlessly.

But it is the Magic Initiate feat that really makes me giddy. This feat permits anyone to select two cantrips and one 1st level spell from any class spell list (must be the same list). This means a barbarian choosing spells from the Warlock list can pick Eldritch Blast, Shocking Grasp, and, yes, Magic Missile and wield said spells throughout their career.

Best of all combat cantrips scale with character--not class--levels. Our good barbarian will be zapping buggaboos with increasingly powerful spells throughout his career. You bad, barbarian, you bad!

Do you think the new application of cantrips makes the game better or worse?

What do you think of this feat and cantrips in general? Do you have memorable character designs with which you incorporated this feat?

 

[Cowabungaa]

A Barbarian with cantrips will have a shit spell attack bonus and a shit spell save DC. Still, it's a nice ace up the sleeve.

But I like cantrips. It means casters aren't bored to tears in combat once they run out of the meagre spellslots they have. Especially on lower levels. I think they're pretty okay balanced too. Except Eldritch Blast. Goddamn Warlocks, goddamn.

 

[Basement Cat]

A Barbarian with cantrips will have a shit spell attack bonus and a shit spell save DC. Still, it's a nice ace up the sleeve.

Just for fun here's our barbarian.

Note: I'm making our developing barbarian female because Conan clones are boring.

Spoiler: Here are some options of what she may look like. I was surprised how little effort it took to find pictures of fantasy female barbarians who wear more than chainmail bikinis.

So, whoever comments throw in a suggestion for building our She-Conan. Perhaps beginning with a decent name.

 

[Dr.Susse]

Blade ward would be really good on a barbarian. You'd get resistance to bludgeoning, piercing and slashing without raging.
I think not picking any ranged cantrips would be sensible only because of the disadvantage if an enemy is within 5 feet and that's a barbarian's favorite place.

Would you allow spell casting during a rage? It may be hard to do any verbal or hand gestures when foaming at the mouth with anger.
(That's only meta-game thinking though.)

 

[Cowabungaa]

Note: I'm making our developing barbarian female because Conan clones are boring.

As boring as the side-shave haircut, heejooo. There's more ways to go about barbarians though. Mine is a big, burly black man with cornrows, a smile on his face, 12 Intelligence, 5 languages under his belt and is a total geek about herbalism. Writes a monthly letter to his apothecary parents detailing his travels, including sketches of interesting herbs he found. He's a good lad, helping villages with minor medical problems and all that. And because he hates to get angry he usually uses some of that herb knowledge for an extra er, kick in battle, so to speak. Good stuff man. Even the pictures of those ladies just depict angry, primitive warriors. That's dull regardless of gender if you ask me.

Would you allow spell casting during a rage? It may be hard to do any verbal or hand gestures when foaming at the mouth with anger.
(That's only meta-game thinking though.)

Not that meta if you're the GM though, which I usually am. That's actually something I never thought of before.

 

[Basement Cat]

Blade ward would be really good on a barbarian. You'd get resistance to bludgeoning, piercing and slashing without raging.
I think not picking any ranged cantrips would be sensible only because of the disadvantage if an enemy is within 5 feet and that's a barbarian's favorite place.

Would you allow spell casting during a rage? It may be hard to do any verbal or hand gestures when foaming at the mouth with anger.
(That's only meta-game thinking though.)

Definitely no cantrips during a rage. I ran across that very question and its definitely against the rules for someone Raging to be able to cast spells.

Blade Ward is a practical spell for a hand to hand combatant. And though she can't cast it while Raging she'll be fighting without raging (which only lasts 1 minute--which is ridiculous) more often than not.

Note: I'm making our developing barbarian female because Conan clones are boring.

As boring as the side-shave haircut, heejooo. There's more ways to go about barbarians though. Mine is a big, burly black man with cornrows, a smile on his face, 12 Intelligence, 5 languages under his belt and is a total geek about herbalism. Writes a monthly letter to his apothecary parents detailing his travels, including sketches of interesting herbs he found. He's a good lad, helping villages with minor medical problems and all that. And because he hates to get angry he usually uses some of that herb knowledge for an extra er, kick in battle, so to speak. Good stuff man. Even the pictures of those ladies just depict angry, primitive warriors. That's dull regardless of gender if you ask me.

One thought I've had since reading 8 Bit Theater was having a character who was a berserker in battle but an eloquent bardic type outside of battle--a skald, I believe they're called.

Cantrip wise then our Barbarian would want the Prestidigitation Cantrip for performance use.

While she's a barbarian by class she's less the Conan type and more...something else?

So all we lack is her 1st Level Spell:

Spoiler: Optional images

Charming lass, but I wonder if that red hair suggests a temper?

Ah, she's a beauty! Probably cold as ice.

What do you mean we're out of replacement strings for the lute?

Barbarian

Race: Human
Sex: Female

Cantrips: Blade Ward, Prestidigitation.

Future Plans: Multiclass to Bard in order to become a Skald.

 

[Saelune]

It is easily in my top 3 improvements of 5e.

 

[Souplex]

I especially love that its appearance delivered the deathblow to that abomination called 4th Ed. D&D.

4E was good at what it was: Tactical and balanced.
4E was a huuuuuuuuuuuuuu(There aren't enough Us in the world, but assume I put a bunch more)ge improvement over 3X.
3X is MunchkinLand.
3X is soooo bad that it took 3 tries, and two companies to even make it come close to resembling a functional game.
Cantrips are just a re-visitation of one of the many great things about 4E: At Will abilities.
I like them, and I'm glad 4E added them.

I was fine with the Magic Initiate Feat until the Sword Coast Adventure Guide came around. Those cantrips are fine for a bladesinger wizard.
The problem is that asshole munchkin who doesn't want to stay in his 3X corner.
He'll come in with some weird combo of paladin (only 2 levels to get the power to smite, and better starting proficiencies, but before any of the teamwork boosting stuff or roleplay requirements) and cleric. (for the flat boost to attacks and the increased spell progression to smite harder and longer) Then he'll be stacking SCAG cantrips so his single hits are obscene, and I presume deliberately misreading some rules here and there about things like multiclass spellcasting.

Let's look at the rogue as another example: They get one attack per turn, so the SCAG cantrips are a straight damage boost, and stack with sneak-attack. (ignoring the silly flavor of it.) There is no reason for a rogue not to.

Here's the thing about Munchkins: They dominate everything they do to an obscene degree. This leaves everyone else feeling useless, and leaves the encounters as an insufficient challenge. At that point the GM...
A: Carries on. It continues to be a one man show and life is worse for everyone.
B: Scales things up so they're on par with the Munchkin. That can go one of two ways:
B1: Everyone else in the party becomes more useless than ever, and suffer for the munchkin's fun.
B2: Everyone has to become a Munchkin themselves to keep up. Everyone suffers for the Munchkin's fun.

Munchkins: Not even once. Send them back to 3X where they belong.

 

[Shdwrnr]

The solution to this is that feats and multiclassing are not in the base game; they are variant rules that the DM must first allow.

 

[Dr. Thrax]

Would you allow spell casting during a rage? It may be hard to do any verbal or hand gestures when foaming at the mouth with anger.

I don't think I've seen any system that allows a Raging Barbarian to cast spells without the use of class features or other feats/items. Pathfinder has the Hybrid Class Bloodrager, which could cast spells while raging once it hit 4th level. Most online resources I can find for 5e state that a Barbarian cannot cast spells or concentrate while raging.

Reading up on Barbarian, I'm not too sure I like the limitations on how many times per day you can rage. While it was a little tedious to keep track of how many rounds per day I raged, I didn't get fucked out of one of my daily uses of rage if a battle only lasted for ~4 rounds instead of 10, I still had my other ~16 or so rounds per day I could use throughout the day in as short or long an interval I wanted/needed. Perhaps it becomes less of an issue once you've hit the first couple milestones, I guess I'll see if I decide to roll up a Barbarian in an upcoming 5e game.

 

[The Jovian]

(SNIP)

Munchkins: Not even once. Send them back to 3X where they belong.

Well thankfully there is a simple solution to this problem, the GM can just not allow the feats and that way the rogue/paladin munchkin can't use the cantrips.

 

[Cowabungaa]

The solution to this is that feats and multiclassing are not in the base game; they are variant rules that the DM must first allow.

Eh? Multi-classing is in the 5e Player's Handbook alright, and it's legal in the Adventurer's League as well. I mean sure the DM has to allow them, but the DM has to allow everything.

snip

Skald-style hm? That's more like it. You'll better make sure you have enough Charisma though. 13 Might be the lower limit, but you need at least 16 if you ask me to be effective. Given, I've multiclassed before into Cleric with only 13 Wisdom and it worked alright, especially if you go down the buffing route.

snip

I'm so glad to hear this. I'm not a huge fan of 4e, but way too many people forget how it compares to 3X and what the 3X editions really entail.

 

[Basement Cat]

snip

Skald-style hm? That's more like it. You'll better make sure you have enough Charisma though. 13 Might be the lower limit, but you need at least 16 if you ask me to be effective. Given, I've multiclassed before into Cleric with only 13 Wisdom and it worked alright, especially if you go down the buffing route.

Barbarian first or second, though. First would be true role playing and be in keeping with OotS's non-maximized approach. Meta-thinking would oblige the Bard class first to get all of the Bard toys. But then she wouldn't get all of the Barbarian toys.

Decisions...decisions...

I was fine with the Magic Initiate Feat until the Sword Coast Adventure Guide came around. Those cantrips are fine for a bladesinger wizard.
The problem is that asshole munchkin who doesn't want to stay in his 3X corner.
He'll come in with some weird combo of paladin (only 2 levels to get the power to smite, and better starting proficiencies, but before any of the teamwork boosting stuff or roleplay requirements) and cleric. (for the flat boost to attacks and the increased spell progression to smite harder and longer) Then he'll be stacking SCAG cantrips so his single hits are obscene, and I presume deliberately misreading some rules here and there about things like multiclass spellcasting.

Let's look at the rogue as another example: They get one attack per turn, so the SCAG cantrips are a straight damage boost, and stack with sneak-attack. (ignoring the silly flavor of it.) There is no reason for a rogue not to.

Here's the thing about Munchkins: They dominate everything they do to an obscene degree. This leaves everyone else feeling useless, and leaves the encounters as an insufficient challenge. At that point the GM...
A: Carries on. It continues to be a one man show and life is worse for everyone.
B: Scales things up so they're on par with the Munchkin. That can go one of two ways:
B1: Everyone else in the party becomes more useless than ever, and suffer for the munchkin's fun.
B2: Everyone has to become a Munchkin themselves to keep up. Everyone suffers for the Munchkin's fun.

Munchkins: Not even once. Send them back to 3X where they belong.

I don't have the SCAG and don't play with any munchkins, thank goodness. My group is all about flavor. We don't obsess over maxing out combat talents, etc.

My Paladin (Green Knight) took the hermit background and the Magic Initiate feat.

He's an animist so he doesn't worship gods. He chose the Druid spell list and selected cantrips in keeping with his background:
1. Druidcraft: He communes with nature.
2. Produce Flame: He'll never be without a source of light (no small thing when you don't have electricity and light bulbs) and he'll always have a potential weapon.

For his 1st level spell he selected Goodberry: "I'll never be hungry again!"

Just how bad/O.P. are cantrips from the non-core rule books?

 

[Shdwrnr]

Eh? Multi-classing is in the 5e Player's Handbook alright, and it's legal in the Adventurer's League as well. I mean sure the DM has to allow them, but the DM has to allow everything.

PHB page 163, Chapter 6: Customization Options - "This chapter defines two optional sets of rules for customizing your character: multiclassing and feats... Your DM decides whether these options are available in a campaign."

Multiclassing and feats are variant rules and not a part of vanilla 5e, just like the variant human race and all the other sidebars that describe variants rules.

 

[Cowabungaa]

PHB page 163, Chapter 6: Customization Options - "This chapter defines two optional sets of rules for customizing your character: multiclassing and feats... Your DM decides whether these options are available in a campaign."

Multiclassing and feats are variant rules and not a part of vanilla 5e, just like the variant human race and all the other sidebars that describe variants rules.

And this matters how, exactly? Multiclassing is pretty much universally excepted. I mean, even the fun-killers in the Adventurer's League allow it, which is as close as a 'legal authority' you'll get in D&D to mirror a GM's decisions to, so I'm not sure what you're trying to say here.

Barbarian first or second, though. First would be true role playing and be in keeping with OotS's non-maximized approach. Meta-thinking would oblige the Bard class first to get all of the Bard toys. But then she wouldn't get all of the Barbarian toys.

Decisions...decisions...

Barbarian second, I feel. A Valor Bard is pretty martial as is so it's not like you can't fight with it. You could play it like a Bard who went into battle to fight alongside her society's warriors, or simply to fight with the party, to gather their stories as close to the source as possible and found out she has an inner battle rage she didn't know she had before.

 

[Souplex]

I was fine with the Magic Initiate Feat until the Sword Coast Adventure Guide came around. Those cantrips are fine for a bladesinger wizard.
The problem is that asshole munchkin who doesn't want to stay in his 3X corner.
He'll come in with some weird combo of paladin (only 2 levels to get the power to smite, and better starting proficiencies, but before any of the teamwork boosting stuff or roleplay requirements) and cleric. (for the flat boost to attacks and the increased spell progression to smite harder and longer) Then he'll be stacking SCAG cantrips so his single hits are obscene, and I presume deliberately misreading some rules here and there about things like multiclass spellcasting.

Let's look at the rogue as another example: They get one attack per turn, so the SCAG cantrips are a straight damage boost, and stack with sneak-attack. (ignoring the silly flavor of it.) There is no reason for a rogue not to.

Here's the thing about Munchkins: They dominate everything they do to an obscene degree. This leaves everyone else feeling useless, and leaves the encounters as an insufficient challenge. At that point the GM...
A: Carries on. It continues to be a one man show and life is worse for everyone.
B: Scales things up so they're on par with the Munchkin. That can go one of two ways:
B1: Everyone else in the party becomes more useless than ever, and suffer for the munchkin's fun.
B2: Everyone has to become a Munchkin themselves to keep up. Everyone suffers for the Munchkin's fun.

Munchkins: Not even once. Send them back to 3X where they belong.

I don't have the SCAG and don't play with any munchkins, thank goodness. My group is all about flavor. We don't obsess over maxing out combat talents, etc.

My Paladin (Green Knight) took the hermit background and the Magic Initiate feat.

He's an animist so he doesn't worship gods. He chose the Druid spell list and selected cantrips in keeping with his background:
1. Druidcraft: He communes with nature.
2. Produce Flame: He'll never be without a source of light (no small thing when you don't have electricity and light bulbs) and he'll always have a potential weapon.

For his 1st level spell he selected Goodberry: "I'll never be hungry again!"

Well that all sounds wonderfully fluffy. Nothing is bad when it's done sub-optimally for flavor. The problem is the Munchkins.

Just how bad/O.P. are cantrips from the non-core rule books?

Honestly, on their own they're fine. It's when they get stacked with sneak-attack, Divine Smites, divine strike, or any other form of multiclass munchkinry that they become obnoxious.
https://www.dnd-spells.com/spell/green-flame-blade
https://www.dnd-spells.com/spell/booming-blade
By default they're only available to Sorcerers, Warlocks and Wizards. In the hands of those classes they're fine.
Although that munchkin I mentioned before decided to go completely overboard when we did a character switch-up before starting our high-level spelljammer campaign. He created a Paladin 2 (For equipment proficiencies and smites)/Weird UA Warlock 1 (For the first level ability that lets you add your charisma to fire/radiant damage. (Side-note, Unearthed Arcana straight-up says it's not balanced with multi-classing in mind yet. If someone multi-classes a UA at your table, they are a Munchkin. Stab them.)) and then 11 levels of Dragon Sorcerer (for spellcasting progression, and the dragon bloodline's ability to add your charisma to fire spells.)
The character also had rolled stats at a table where everyone else had arrays/point-buy. He swears he just happened to roll 2 18s and a 16. Our GM at the time was overworked and coming in late, so he didn't have time to police our sheets.
To top it all off this character was an Aasimar (Half-angels introduced in the Volo's splatbook, (The other races in that book are functional, balanced and not munchkin-bait, but fuck Aasimars) who have the daily ability to power up so they can add their level to one attack or spell a turn) bringing the character up to 2 splats, a UA, 3 classes, and 2 feats.
So basically whenever he Green Flame Blade'd he'd add double his charisma, + his dex, plus his level, plus the smite.
Then we went into a battle where there was a wild-magic field and he couldn't immediately dominate everything. (It was super-fun. Whenever we cast a spell it had a chance of failing and being replaced with a roll on the wild magic table. There were flumphs and potted plants everywhere)
He quit in a huff after that.

 

[Shdwrnr]

And this matters how, exactly? Multiclassing is pretty much universally excepted. I mean, even the fun-killers in the Adventurer's League allow it, which is as close as a 'legal authority' you'll get in D&D to mirror a GM's decisions to, so I'm not sure what you're trying to say here.

I'm saying that, while a DM has fiat to nix anything they want, in this particular case, they can point to the book and say, "This isn't part of the base game and we're not using it." and come at it from a position that is harder to argue against.

 

[The Madman]

I've had a half-serious vendetta against cantrips in 5e ever since I put together a fun dungeon run and one of the players made a character for it we now affectionately call the Eldrich machine-gunner. ************ blew up a boss with rapid-fire Eldrich blasts after having engineered a character specifically all around that one goddamn cantrip.

All above-board, hilarious at the time, but my god did it make balancing what followed a pain in the ass. See it's easy enough to negate cantrips when planning an encounter, but then that wouldn't have been any fun for the player since, well, eldrich blast is all they had so instead I had to try and find some balance between the two.

My half-assed solution was to tweak the fights so that while certain enemies had resistances and immunities to his rapid-fire-cantrip, there were others that didn't who could sometimes threaten to overwhelm the group, or there would be some task that the cantrip could be put to use doing. Luckily this was just for a two or three session dungeon run and not a full campaign or it would have gotten tired super quick.

 

[Kotaro]

Infinite cantrips were a thing in 4E, just to provide a minor correction. Or at least, most of what are considered cantrips in 3E and 5E were at-will powers for wizards in 4E, so they were functionally infinite cantrips.
Not to say I particularly like 4E, because I don't, but it's technically incorrect to state that this is a new thing for 5E. I just wanted to bring this up.

 

[Souplex]

Infinite cantrips were a thing in 4E, just to provide a minor correction. Or at least, most of what are considered cantrips in 3E and 5E were at-will powers for wizards in 4E, so they were functionally infinite cantrips.
Not to say I particularly like 4E, because I don't, but it's technically incorrect to state that this is a new thing for 5E. I just wanted to bring this up.

The thing I've realized is that almost none of the 4E haters have actually played 4E, it's just a massive hate-train.