D&D (2024) 2024 Player's Handbook Reveal: "New Wizard"

Baumi said:

Sorry have to vent a bit. You can just simply ignore this and think I'm a silly man, but I want to get that out of my system..

I always loved and played the Wizard until 5E, where spellcasting become so common that it felt mundane instead of wonderous. A class thats only feature is spellcasting therefore became simply bland compared to Warlocks, Bards, Clerics who have not only a interesting non-spellcasting flair but also special features that make them unique. So I hoped that they would spice up the master of arcane and make it more interesting in 2024, but no one got less rework than the Wizards (except the Illusionist Subclass).

Wizards got one major new Feature (Spell Memorization), but thats so limited that you will get to use it maybee once per adventure or you will be constantly begging for short rest just to make it usefull. But worse, the Cleric gets the new Divine Intervention that does conceptionaly the same but 1000x better.

Also it is said that the Wizard don't need the cool features because he got the best spells, but Bards and Feat users can pick from wizards while not from Classes like Paladins and Rangers are protected (I know why smite and co are important to them, but so are fireball, find Familiar and the like to a wizard). Also non-wizard spell lists get stronger and more diverse with each book so the difference gets smaller.

It's also said that a great Wizards advantage is his massive ammount of spells, but thats quite useless when he cannot prepare more than any other full-caster and he also learn only a subset of them unlike a Cleric and Druid's and the like who learn all their spells automatically.

Then they still don't get any Weapon/Armor Proficienies, which fits the theme, but as soon as the spells run out they only have cantrips to relly on, but Clerics and Druids are even better with that.

Most of these points also fits the Sorcerer, who's only feature was metamagic which felt to limited to differentiate himself from other spellcasters (know to few effects, limited uses, often subtle). But the new Sorcerer Rage, Metamagic Recovery, rebalanced Metamagic and the new subclasses will hopefully make it stand out more now.

So thats enough .. sorry for my rant. I actually hope most are happy with the Wizard and have fun playing him, but I wanted to get the frustrations about my once most beloved class out.

To end it on a positive note, I am still very happy with everything else I saw about the new Edition so far and cannot wait to play one of the other new Classes! 8D

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I'm not convinced that WotC's priority in 5.5 was to make any of the classes more interesting. Instead, most of them were made some degree of more powerful, and specific places where people complained were "spot-fixed". No one though the wizard needed for power, so very little was done with it.

It looks to me like the design philosophy featured small changes to appease public complaint, and power boosts to induce folks to switch over and buy all their books again.

And more art, I guess.

Baumi said:

And how many spells does a Cleric or Druid knows?

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Quick estimate of Druid looks to be 130 or so.

Baumi said:

The Wizard is a better Ritual Caster, but that advantage/differentioations is actually a bit less in the new Version since everyone can now cast Rituals,

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Sure. But that's still your preparation.

Level 20 Druid, including subclass, has something like 30 prepared.

Wizard, including rituals, could reasonably have 40 "prepared". And 14 more if they got a short rest. And can trade out cantrips.

I'm withholding judgment on weather that's "worth" +1 to save DCs until I have time to go though the spells. Like if Arcane Eye, Arcane Gate, and Tiny Servants become rituals that could certainly tip the scales in favor of the wizard.

But the wizards do get something others don't.

Treantmonk just said that he thinks the wizard is still the most powerful class, mostly becaise of their spells. But he says that although bards can also get them. So probably the wizard is in agood spot.

UngeheuerLich said:

Treantmonk just said that he thinks the wozard is still the most powerful class, mostly becaise of their spells. But he says that although bards can also get them. So probably the wizard is in agood spot.

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Bards can get them, but only ~2 per level starting at 10, and they still only prepare like half as many of them as Wizards do, and they can't swap them out during a LR like Wizards can do with the spells they've added to their spellbook. Bards have the most versatility in access to spells, but Wizards have access to the most spell options on any given day. Clerics and Druids can prepare spells each day from a larger range than Wizards as well, but they can't swap out the ones from their non-existent spellbook during Short Rests and they can't cast tons of other spells on a given day as Rituals because they can only Ritual cast the spells they've prepared.

Warlocks can do a small number of things very well, and can do them all day as their powerset is full of at-will invocations and short-rest spells, and they have the quickest recovery of their spells. Sorcerers also have fewer spells than most others, but they have versatility in HOW they cast those spells, and they have the most cantrips to boot.

I really like how each of the "full" spell-casting classes has a different approach to magical versatility, so none of them step on each others toes.

Baumi said:

Sorry have to vent a bit. You can just simply ignore this and think I'm a silly man, but I want to get that out of my system..

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We're all silly people here. You're among friends.

Baumi said:

I always loved and played the Wizard until 5E, where spellcasting become so common that it felt mundane instead of wonderous. A class thats only feature is spellcasting therefore became simply bland compared to Warlocks, Bards, Clerics who have not only a interesting non-spellcasting flair but also special features that make them unique. So I hoped that they would spice up the master of arcane and make it more interesting in 2024, but no one got less rework than the Wizards (except the Illusionist Subclass).

Wizards got one major new Feature (Spell Memorization), but thats so limited that you will get to use it maybee once per adventure or you will be constantly begging for short rest just to make it usefull. But worse, the Cleric gets the new Divine Intervention that does conceptionaly the same but 1000x better.

Also it is said that the Wizard don't need the cool features because he got the best spells, but Bards and Feat users can pick from wizards while not from Classes like Paladins and Rangers are protected (I know why smite and co are important to them, but so are fireball, find Familiar and the like to a wizard). Also non-wizard spell lists get stronger and more diverse with each book so the difference gets smaller.

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I get where you are coming from. I can't engage in depth in the analysis of the D&D rules, because I find the class and skill system in D&D to be constraining. I like Warhammer Fantasy because you have so many options to mix careers, buy skills, and advance attributes in a way to make some very interesting character concepts. Yet it still has packaged sets of skills, talents, and attribute advancements tied to careers and those careers are tied meaningfully to the setting. So you can optimize xp point spend and still to a traditional wizard career, but you don't have to.

I could play a medieval Dresden-type character in WFRP, much easier than I could in D&D (without a lot of homebrew).

At the same time, I don't really want D&D to totally cut off its roots and become a different game. When I play D&D, I like the comfort and nostalgia, of classes. I also think having fewer fiddly bits serves most players better. I guess I've gotten to the point where when running or playing D&D, I lean into its tropes and mechanics and enjoy it for what it is. If I want more options for tweaking character concepts there are other systems that do it better and I run or play in those.

Baumi said:

It's also said that a great Wizards advantage is his massive ammount of spells, but thats quite useless when he cannot prepare more than any other full-caster and he also learn only a subset of them unlike a Cleric and Druid's and the like who learn all their spells automatically.

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How much a Wizard's ability to learn new spells matters depends a lot on the adventures being run and the DM. You can throw more magic books around in the game or have the party go on adventures to help the wizard find more spells, but that can lead to the wizard getting the spot light more than other characters and may make magic even more commonplace and mundane. Having some simple mechanics where I wizard has a chance to learn spells encountered would be interesting. If they encounter a spell caster casting a spell they don't know, they could have a chance of learning it.

Baumi said:

Then they still don't get any Weapon/Armor Proficienies, which fits the theme, but as soon as the spells run out they only have cantrips to relly on, but Clerics and Druids are even better with that.

Most of these points also fits the Sorcerer, who's only feature was metamagic which felt to limited to differentiate himself from other spellcasters (know to few effects, limited uses, often subtle). But the new Sorcerer Rage, Metamagic Recovery, rebalanced Metamagic and the new subclasses will hopefully make it stand out more now.

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I'm less focused on the mechanical benefits, I have more an issue with the lack of differentiating flavor among spell casters. I would prefer to have radically different mechanics for Clerical, Druidic, and Bardic powers. But when I go down this line of thinking, I get back to the point of looking at other systems. D&D is built on the spell as a fundamental mechanic for giving classes their abilities. I've often thought that they should just lean into this more. Combine spells and feats into one thing. Call it "Powers". Different classes gain access to powers in different ways.

Baumi said:

So thats enough .. sorry for my rant. I actually hope most are happy with the Wizard and have fun playing him, but I wanted to get the frustrations about my once most beloved class out.

To end it on a positive note, I am still very happy with everything else I saw about the new Edition so far and cannot wait to play one of the other new Classes! 8D

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Yeah, I'm overall fine with the 2024 rules. I've come to the point that instead of trying to make D&D support any style of game, I instead rotate among a few favorite game systems. When I'm not only playing D&D, I'm less concerned with trying to make it support styles of play that it doesn't support well.

UngeheuerLich said:

Treantmonk just said that he thinks the wozard is still the most powerful class, mostly becaise of their spells. But he says that although bards can also get them. So probably the wizard is in agood spot.

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To be fair.

Treantmonk could probably set a death trap using alarm and tensors floating disk.

mellored said:

Not entirely sure what your trying to say.

If it's the fact that wizards can choose their spells is more powerful than being given spell by a subclass, then I agree.

An Arch Fey warlock could go a whole undead campaign without using dominate beasts, effectively wasting a spell preparation.

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Would that be the fey warlock with eldritch blast and a bunch of invocations or was there a fey warlock in 3.5/4e that you were referring to? It's the double dip on justifying extras that causes problems.

mellored said:

Quick estimate of Druid looks to be 130 or so.

Sure. But that's still your preparation.

Level 20 Druid, including subclass, has something like 30 prepared.

Wizard, including rituals, could reasonably have 40 "prepared". And 14 more if they got a short rest. And can trade out cantrips.

I'm withholding judgment on weather that's "worth" +1 to save DCs until I have time to go though the spells. Like if Arcane Eye, Arcane Gate, and Tiny Servants become rituals that could certainly tip the scales in favor of the wizard.

But the wizards do get something others don't.

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No not 30, wizards don't even have that much.... Just checking the last packet from each we saw the druid cleric & sorcerer cap out at 22+all 10ish subclass granted spells prepared to the wizard's 25. Likewise the warlock caps out at 15 spells known plus the ~10ish always prepared/known ones granted by their subclass.

Also I believe that you are vastly overstating the capabilities of memorize spell even before considering the realities of play☆ that ensure spell prep lists are almost never altered to that extreme of a degree in any edition let alone on a short rest.

☆ Those tend to differ from the needs of movie & paramount+ series storyboarding

Marandahir said:

Bards can get them, but only ~2 per level starting at 10, and they still only prepare like half as many of them as Wizards do, and they can't swap them out during a LR like Wizards can do with the spells they've added to their spellbook. Bards have the most versatility in access to spells, but Wizards have access to the most spell options on any given day. Clerics and Druids can prepare spells each day from a larger range than Wizards as well, but they can't swap out the ones from their non-existent spellbook during Short Rests and they can't cast tons of other spells on a given day as Rituals because they can only Ritual cast the spells they've prepared.

Warlocks can do a small number of things very well, and can do them all day as their powerset is full of at-will invocations and short-rest spells, and they have the quickest recovery of their spells. Sorcerers also have fewer spells than most others, but they have versatility in HOW they cast those spells, and they have the most cantrips to boot.

I really like how each of the "full" spell-casting classes has a different approach to magical versatility, so none of them step on each others toes.

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I'm going to make a quibble with this. In past editions there was reason to value being able to swap out spells because of two reasons 5e kicked from the ruleset's umbrella. Even beyond that the other classes had their own edition specific identity that interacted with those things. Without vancian casting/prep, 5e's neovancian prep largely removes the value in being able to swap spells from a book rather than having a shorter spells known list. Without spells scaling by caster level that problem is exacerbated because every level of spells has a set of spells that are generally going to be most optimal no matter the PC's level. The two combined results in incredibly static spell lists for everyone. In 3.x sorcerer had a smaller pool of spells known but more spell slots with the wizard the other way around having fewer slots but a bigger list in their spellbook to pull from. In 2e there was a similar split where the wizard had more slots & often got them earlier but the bard was far more durable before things got complicated to summarize from there with speed of leveling with exp table differences & system specific crunch

tetrasodium said:

No not 30, wizards don't even have that much.... Just checking the last packet from each we saw the druid cleric & sorcerer cap out at 22+all 10ish subclass granted spells prepared to the wizard's 25. Likewise the warlock caps out at 15 spells known plus the ~10ish always prepared/known ones granted by their subclass.

Also I believe that you are vastly overstating the capabilities of memorize spell even before considering the realities of play☆ that ensure spell prep lists are almost never altered to that extreme of a degree in any edition let alone on a short rest.

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25, but that's just preparing from the spellbook. Wizards can also cast any of the spells in their spellbook as rituals regardless of preparation. And they can swap out a prepared spell each short rest. Wizards gain 2 spells for their spellbook every level, and can also scribe additional spells they find in their adventures into the spellbook. 2 x 19 = 38 + 6 = 44 spells recorded MINIMUM for the Wizard at max level.

Marandahir said:

25, but that's just preparing from the spellbook. Wizards can also cast any of the spells in their spellbook as rituals regardless of preparation. And they can swap out a prepared spell each short rest. Wizards gain 2 spells for their spellbook every level, and can also scribe additional spells they find in their adventures into the spellbook. 2 x 19 = 38 + 6 = 44 spells recorded MINIMUM for the Wizard at max level.

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+8 (or 9) from their subclass/chosen school.

So 52(53).

Baumi said:

I always loved and played the Wizard until 5E, where spellcasting become so common that it felt mundane instead of wonderous. A class thats only feature is spellcasting therefore became simply bland compared to Warlocks, Bards, Clerics who have not only a interesting non-spellcasting flair but also special features that make them unique. So I hoped that they would spice up the master of arcane and make it more interesting in 2024, but no one got less rework than the Wizards (except the Illusionist Subclass).

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The current PHB describes wizards as "scholars of the arcane" and "defined and united as a class by the spells they cast". "Master of arcane" seems like an insertion that places them on a pedestal above other spellcasters that doesn't and shouldn't exist, IMO.

I think you're correct that the wizard essentially casts spells but seem to be missing the main point. They have the biggest list from which they can access with the easiest ability to access that list among all the arcane spellcasters.

2024 adding expertise to the class grants flavor and non-magical capability while memorize spell look really good when a person considers accessing spells from that huge list even if it is restricted by spells scribed in the spell book, but the spell book has free spells at start plus free spells at level up plus free spells from subclass. That's a minimum 53 spells in the book by 20th level that can all be accessed by prepared spells, unprepared rituals, or (worst case scenario) a short rest using memorize spell. Plus subclasses can grant always prepped spells plus spell mastery plus signature spells and more spells can be added. Other spellcasters don't come close to that based on spell prep rules.

That seems like the flavor of the class that's pretty much always existed. 5e doesn't seem to have made spellcasting more common to me because, the number of spell slots has been reduced from previous editions and the number of spell casting classes hasn't changed. It's giving "simpler times fallacy" vibes. ;-)

Baumi said:

Wizards got one major new Feature (Spell Memorization), but thats so limited that you will get to use it maybee once per adventure or you will be constantly begging for short rest just to make it usefull. But worse, the Cleric gets the new Divine Intervention that does conceptionaly the same but 1000x better.

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That seems like an odd conclusion. Spell memorization is based on a short rest. Divine intervention is limited to 5th level cleric spells and lower and usable once per long rest. I'm not convinced that's 1000x better. Greater divine intervention comes late, allows the use of the wish spell, and takes about 5 days to recharge. Wizards are already casting wish levels earlier so still not 1000x better. ;-)

Baumi said:

Also it is said that the Wizard don't need the cool features because he got the best spells, but Bards and Feat users can pick from wizards while not from Classes like Paladins and Rangers are protected (I know why smite and co are important to them, but so are fireball, find Familiar and the like to a wizard). Also non-wizard spell lists get stronger and more diverse with each book so the difference gets smaller.

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Wizards do have the biggest spell list and the 2024 dev team has already indicated that new spells are geared towards the wizard list as noted on the first page of this thread.

Bard access to the wizard list is incredibly limited compared to the wizard access to the wizard list because magical secrets doesn't come into play until tier 3 and the access is very slow. Bards can replace on spell at each level up with a wizard spell (which is an opportunity cost in itself) or add wizard spells only on levels where they increase spells prepared, which is 8 instead of 6 based on the UA playtest.

That's a fraction of what the wizard can do with their own list and ignores those subclass enhancements. You might mention fireball but bard could already do that in 2e (which was the exact same list and you liked previous editions per your post) or in 3e via PrC's very easily.

Baumi said:

It's also said that a great Wizards advantage is his massive ammount of spells, but thats quite useless when he cannot prepare more than any other full-caster and he also learn only a subset of them unlike a Cleric and Druid's and the like who learn all their spells automatically.

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I agree that wizards do not typically scribe their entire spell list in their spell books, but it is still better access than those to which any other spellcaster can access at any given time. I would also argue that access to the full list on a long rest isn't necessary to be effective, or even a huge benefit given the apples to oranges lists mentioned.

Baumi said:

Then they still don't get any Weapon/Armor Proficienies, which fits the theme, but as soon as the spells run out they only have cantrips to relly on, but Clerics and Druids are even better with that.

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Which past editions do you prefer your wizards? They used to rely on darts a lot. Cantrips iin this format weren't really a thing for these classes for quite a bit of history of the game. ;-)

I don't believe clerics and druids are better with their cantrips. Wizards also have the largest cantrip list and easiest option to swap them out too as of 2024 rules.

Baumi said:

Most of these points also fits the Sorcerer, who's only feature was metamagic which felt to limited to differentiate himself from other spellcasters (know to few effects, limited uses, often subtle). But the new Sorcerer Rage, Metamagic Recovery, rebalanced Metamagic and the new subclasses will hopefully make it stand out more now.

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Sorcerers have a good spell list and metamagic is the reason to play them. The sorcerer improvements are QoL changes to increase using that benefit and look good. They're also getting more spells prepped moving forward and the sorcerous rage looks nicely thematic.

Baumi said:

So thats enough .. sorry for my rant. I actually hope most are happy with the Wizard and have fun playing him, but I wanted to get the frustrations about my once most beloved class out.

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I responded because I don't agree with a lot of your frustrations, but I am sorry that you're frustrated with the class. I would give my comments some thought. I find wizards are still an excellent class.