Caster Caster Divide: How much impact is spell choice? A LOT!

How heavily does spell choice impact combat effectiveness? Tuns out a lot
0:00 - Intro
2:45 - Cantrips and Level 1 Spells
6:14 - Level 2 spells
9:30 - Level 3 spells
12:29 - Level 4 spells
17:12 - Level 5 spells
20:00 - Level 6 spells
23:39 - Level 7 spells
26:10 - Level 8 spells
27:52 - Level 9 spells
29:33 - Overview of results
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[@DndUnoptimized]

NOTE: Fixed Magic Missile damage in spreadsheet. Should be 10.5 not 7.5 Also, made a mistake casting two leveled spells in one turn with Draconic Transformation. Switched that out for a cantrip in the spreadsheet, not a significant damage change. Measuring Combat Space (% of deadly encounter): kzbin.info/www/bejne/nl7LaJmBmNOJeas Martial Caster Divide: kzbin.info/www/bejne/jWbYpZhqrraMeJY Spreadsheet for this video: docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ogiKKAZcepo73WvxVO1F1_n6sUVSK4TKo7CcLsgMGLM/edit?usp=sharing

[@jag519]

I'd love a caster caster divide video for the other parts of casting too! Good control Vs. bad control/etc.

[@DndUnoptimized]

Alright! Thanks for letting me know!

[@Tickingclock4]

Yay

[@cascadianone]

Seconded

[@vinspad3]

29:30 I love how this showed at the end that levels 9 through 13 it doesnt matter what spells you choose, even the bad spells keep you at pace with everyone else. 'good' spells need massive nerfs based on the data and is likely reason why DMing levels 10-15 is so difficult due to player power imbalance. I'd love to see the "good" and "bad" control spells worked out.

[@DndUnoptimized]

I should mention that nobody here is using magic weapons, and that does help the martials more when it comes to damage, so they will end up a little higher comparatively. I think the bad ones need boosting a bit, but the high damage ones probably need huge nerfs, I agree. There are some levels where the good and bad spells aren't too far apart, and hopefully in the next version, every level will have lots of solid options and no giant outliers. Thanks for voicing that you'd be interested in a control one. If enough people are interested I'll do it!

[@AZombie48]

Regarding Melf’s acid arrow, there’s a video floating around of Luke Gygax (who played Melf) talking about the history of the spell. Basically, in the AD&D days, spellcasters would fail to cast their spell if they took any damage before their turn in initiative. And Luke liked exploring the greyhawk dungeons alone just using Melf. So Melf could fire his arrow at an enemy spellcaster, and the acid burn over multiple turns would prevent that enemy from casting spells while Melf dealt with any minions in melee. Definitely a spell that was made for a very specific use case that we don’t see nearly as much nowadays.

[@DndUnoptimized]

Oh wow, that's a really cool history lesson! Thanks for sharing. That makes it much more powerful back in the day. I guess it can force two concentration checks with one spell, so that's still doing it somewhat.

[@xolotltolox7626]

​@@DndUnoptimizedyeah, but you also have magic missile for that, which forces 3 at a lower spell level

[@DndUnoptimized]

For sure. There are better ways of doing it now. They probably could have adapted the idea better, like if it forces a concentration check they have disadvantage on it for both instances of the damage. Then it's the concentration killer, but still worse than an upcast MM...

[@couchpotato8729]

Would love to see a CPR analysis of the caster/caster divide! It really goes to show how important spell selection is for casters.

[@DndUnoptimized]

Awesome! Thanks for letting me know

[@stabieman]

Great analysis. I'd love to see martial-martial divide. Where you take one class and then take the same class but with all the best choices AND items you can think of

[@DndUnoptimized]

That would be an interesting one!

[@hackcubit9663]

Thank goodness for DMs who are chill with players who want to swap out one spell every level instead of every 4. That said since it's kind of on topic here, I once made a wizard with create/destroy water as one of his spells, with no idea how long I'd go before using it. Turns out, the first boss we fought had a flaming weapon I was able to douse by creating water right above it so it fell onto the weapon.

[@DndUnoptimized]

What DM makes you wait 4 levels before swapping out a spell? I think a lot of DMs will let players repick spells if they aren't liking them even if they are spontaneous casters who aren't supposed to be allowed to until level up. That being said, the players that pick the bad spells likely just don't know that a spell is bad until they use the spell a lot. But usually I find a new player will pick whatever spell sounds cool, then if the first time they use it they get a great effect (maybe the final hit, or roll high damage, or it's an aoe that takes out tons of little guys) they continue using that spell a lot, even up casting many levels higher. Yes these are newer players, but the fact is that newish players make up a decent percentage of the tables. Cool create water story, and kudos to your DM allowing a fun and different use for a spell. Yea I think almost every spell has it's niche and can be good in the right circumstance, but some spells are just straight better in 90% of the circumstances, especially if it's this damage vs that damage without any other riders.

[@rockukaz4648]

that is one of the most informative vidoes(about dnd) i have seen on youtube. you are quickly becoming one of my favourite dnd chanells. could you prehaps make an tank build that also does good damage(i know you have your first build, the dad and the dauther, but for a strickt "tank" it was to squishy) ? i would love to see your calculations on it, since they are so detailed. i personaly started using percentage of a deadly encouter instead od dpr thanks to you. keep up the good work :)

[@DndUnoptimized]

Thanks for the love! I will put that on the list, I have been meaning to do a tank build for a while. Maybe I can do a damage/tank at the same time, but if not I'll do my best to create an interesting one!

[@tommihommi1]

A "use every highest slot available to upcast fireball" line would have been interesting too For the control comparison, it's of course kind of impossible to calculate. How do you measure a well played wizard being able to split almost any encounter/shut down most of the enemies, which doesn't change the total party DPR, but almost trivializes combat? I guess you could look at total damage dealt by the opponents over the course of the encounter to measure how effective control is.

[@DndUnoptimized]

Haha yes, just fireball with every spell slot would be an interesting one. For control, not sure if you are familiar, but I have a method of calculating control per round. Not perfect by any account, but gives an idea, that's what I'll use to compare control output of good vs bad spells.

[@onestorey6384]

Hi! Great vid, ive actually run some of the cpr calcs ur talking about and yes vortex warp and hypnotic pattern absolutely destroy spell like bestow curse or the smites and its almost silly looking at the numbers

[@DndUnoptimized]

I suspected as much! For damage it fluctuates around 2-3x, but with control I bet it's double that or more. Awesome that you are running those numbers!

[@rogerwilco2]

Great video again. Maybe a little on the slow side sometimes, but that makes sure everyone can follow along.

[@DndUnoptimized]

Thanks for that feedback, really appreciate it! I'll try to do a quicker pace next time.

[@gloryrod86]

​@@DndUnoptimizedi loved the video, but I do think that only looking at a few interesting spell levels and showing a chart of each level would have made it better.

[@DndUnoptimized]

@@gloryrod86 ok thanks, I'll keep that in mind if I do CPR. Basically you are hoping for a more succinct version too I gather.

[@gloryrod86]

@@DndUnoptimized just a bit.

[@quincykunz3481]

The bad wizard could keep up with martial damage at high levels, but they have weaker defenses and limited resources, so you'd hope they'd do more than break even. But also the good outliers are too much. Both definitely need to get closer to the middle. Also Mordenkainen's sword is so bad in 5e.

[@DndUnoptimized]

Agreed. They do have a ton of social, utility, or control potential though in their other spell picks. In this case, they have two more spells per spell level they can select. But to your point, this analysis is without magic weapons, and they do end up helping martials more than casters in straight damage. So the bad spell wizard would be left behind by the martials.

[@supersmily5811]

Elemental Bane's proposed use on Acid spells because of their repeat damage is even funnier when you realize it would function on Scorching Ray. There's just NO reason to not pick fire spells... :{

[@DndUnoptimized]

Well it only triggers once per turn, so scorching ray would only trigger it once, so acid arrow would actually be better than scorching ray in that situation. But normally, yea scorching ray is definitely a generally better spell!

[@boraxkid]

the whole time I was wondering how the martials stacked up, glad you threw some examples in at the end. I think that a caster focused solely on damage should be doing more than a martial because they're burning through their slots - at least I would think that if casters didn't have so many slots at high levels to the point they'll likely never use them all before getting a long rest in. With all the control they can get on top with the spells, the disparity is actually crazy. Also - you asked if you were missing something with circle of death. You were, the size of the target area. While I don't think that it completely makes up for the high level of the spell, I think such a large area could, in theory, be useful in situations where you're fighting massive armies of enemies. Looking at general design choices of some PHB spells, I think fighting armies may have been what the designers expected of high level DnD. I also think they expected necrotic damage to be much better than fire, cold, or other "early-game" type damage because there seems to be a bit of a trend that the rare types seem to do less than expected damage.

[@DndUnoptimized]

Great points! I agree that casters focusing on damage should do more than martials when using their highest spell slot, but after that I think it should be about the same or slightly less. I wish casters had more ways to dedicate build choices to damage, instead it's just whatever spell you pick, which are often pretty flexible. Circle of death has a huge area, and it does necrotic damage instead of fire, which might be better depending on your setting. There ARE a lot of huge AOE spells as you get higher and I guess that can be fantastic if you are facing hordes of monsters. You are right, it does feel like they expect you to be fighting armies at this point, but I've never seen that and I don't think that kind of combat is in any published campaign (that I know of), and I don't think there are good enough rules for running that kind of battle. (Hopefully martials in that kind of battle could focus on enemy generals while casters destroy all the little folk, otherwise martials would just be totally useless) So in the end... It's usually just tougher encounters of the same size, and increasing AOE beyond a 20' radius doesn't get you better results. Unfortunately...

[@nGuy1901]

@24:05, are you remembering that you can't cast 2 leveled spells with an action and bonus action? If you were to cast a (7th) level spell with your bonus action, you can only cast a cantrip with your Action.

[@DndUnoptimized]

Lol. What a fumble on my part. Thanks for pointing that out! I'll have to use a cantrip there. I don't think the damage will be too different there, but I'll run the real numbers and update the spreadsheet. Thanks!

[@gloryrod86]

Great video, i really shows that the problem is with the divide between casters and martials is not in spell casting itself, but broken spells. I do get the sense that you think that casters out damaging martials is problematic just in the way you talk about the high level spells. I disagree, if the casters is using their most valuable resource to do the dammage, it should be great.

[@DndUnoptimized]

Overpowered spells is a huge problem for sure! If I were to map it out, I'd want casters to deal more damage with their highest level spell slot at spell slot 6+, then after the highest is used, it should be slightly less than martials. That's my opinion. I really wish casters had to specialize more in damage though. It's weird that a utility caster can pick up one spell and do more damage than a warrior who has dedicated every feature and build decision to maximize damage.

[@gloryrod86]

@@DndUnoptimized i understand what you are saying, but every time the utility casters is casting his damage spell, thats a slot hes not spending on utility. Also if they only have the one damage spell, often it will be a spell poorly suited for the situation, like if its fireball, you become useless against creatures immune to fire, or even just encounters against single creatures. I can't think of a damage spell that is good in every encounter, and if there is one it should definitely be nerfed.

[@DndUnoptimized]

@gloryrod86 true, I get you. It is a hard line to walk, and no matter how carefully you thread the needle, there will be some takes where it is totally on one side. But at least I think most people can agree that some spells need big nerfs and some spells need huge buffs and that'll go a long way.

[@gloryrod86]

@@DndUnoptimized well said. We can squabble over where the line should be, but we can all agree that witch bolt is bellow it and that animate objects is above it.

[@someusername9591]

Magic missile is avg 10.5 damage due to the static +1 to each of the 3 darts

[@DndUnoptimized]

Doh! Thanks for that

[@someusername9591]

@@DndUnoptimized Lol, no worries. It's just been recency bias for me. I was looking at a build that opmizes Magic Missile in specific not too long ago.

[@ebensirges]

I think what you missed about Circle Of Death is that it has a _huge_ area (and scales slightly faster than Fireball). ...doesn't make it _good_ , I'm just saying there is technically an advantage there-though I'm not sure I can think of many situations where a 60-foot sphere is that much better than a 20-foot sphere.

[@DndUnoptimized]

Agreed, there are some situations where circle of death would be much better, but I think once the AOE hits a certain size it ends up being more annoying to place in regular combat. You've gotta have the jump on a big group of spread out enemies. The other benefit is that it's necrotic damage so would combo better with necromancers.

[@1989MR1]

How do you weight the saving throws? INT is the best and CON is the worst one but by how much?

[@DndUnoptimized]

Great question. It depends on what monsters you use for analysis, but here are some of the average saving throws I use for example. CR 1: +1.15 Con vs -0.97 Int CR 5: +3.06 Con vs +0.16 Int CR 9: +4.97 Con vs +1.28 Int CR 13: +6.88 Con vs +2.40 Int CR 17: +8.78 Con vs +3.53 Int For example, if we have a DC 19 effect targeting Con vs Int, the chance the CR 17 enemy fails will be 46% to fail Con save, and 72% to fail Int save. Hope this gives a good idea into the difference between the saving throws.

[@1989MR1]

@@DndUnoptimized Thank you, again a very interesting video.

[@xolotltolox7626]

For damaging spells the saving throe barely matters since the majority of the damage comes from dealing half on a successful save anyways Now for control/save or suck spells, there the saving throw difference is actually relevant

[@sleidman]

I wonder if the dip in the "good wizard's" dpr at 11-12th level would have gone away if you had just upcasted Animate Objects.

[@DndUnoptimized]

It for sure would! Animate objects is extremely good. I'm trying to avoid up casting in this analysis because I want to give a decent view of the spells at each level. Otherwise both sides would probably be overwhelmed by up casting to get the best and worst results.

[@ericpeterson8732]

Abi-Dalzim (Abbey- Dahlzeem) Sucks the water out of your enemies!! I realize that you're only considering raw damage, but there is something instinctively more terrible about sucking water out of foes vs just another fireball. And Horrid Wilting is not as messy a spell. But yeah, that's about it. I felt that in previous editions, this spell seemed more powerful, but I'm not sure how.

[@DndUnoptimized]

Ah, thanks for the pronunciation! Yea I would agree that is a scarier idea for the most part, but flavor is free, and I could see someone saying that intense heat to dry the enemies out being a way to flavor fireball. I'll have to check out the previous editions' versions of this spell. Maybe it was great at some point haha

[@isaragnor]

For 9th level spell the caster caster divide is worse than that cause instead of meteor swarm you can cast prismatic wall average damage of 175 per pass through and concentrate on summons and have the summons use the shove or grapple/move back and forth through the wall + telekinetic

[@DndUnoptimized]

Yea that's true for sure, there are a lot of other options for you at level 9 like wish for simulacrum, yea, prismatic wall, and true polymorph shenanigans. I went the simple option that I think is a pretty realistic option for the average non optimizer player with good spell picks. Prismatic wall is pretty crazy!

[@BenMeadows013]

The theory of a martial-caster divide definitively has validity. But in actual play at my table, I find it rather insignificant. There are just enough ways to outright negate spellcasters from making a high impact occasionally by throwing anti-magic fields on them or add some counterspelling enemies into the mix. And that’s when the stage light shifts to the martial characters. To me, your video here impressively visualizes though that there are some BIG outlier spells in the game, that are in need for a redesign

[@DndUnoptimized]

I'm glad the martials have ways to shine at your tables. I wager other tables have much less anti-magic fields, and counter spelling going on, but I think the average caster player doesn't select all the best spells so it isn't as bad as it could be.

[@scarletsilveriron]

Personally I think the divide comes from the fact spells often are used as a replacement for interactions with the world. Creating situations where everyone but the spell casters don't have roll for anything. Or worse non magical solutions getting discouraged.

[@notsochosenone5669]

Problem is - to counter spellcasters you need spellcasting (anti-magic fields, counterspells - all of that). To counter melee martials you need fly. On top of that - i don't think that "litteraly disabling superior class to make inferior class fell better" is a good way to fix a divide. In good systems both are actively helping each other all the time.

[@xolotltolox7626]

​@@notsochosenone5669you don't even need fly, an enemy with a crossbow and more than 30ft movespeed and you can go cry as a melee. In general everything with more than 30 ground speed, not even getting into flyspeeds Also, many aura's enemies have punish you for being in melee etc.

[@user-ni7ji3fb8m]

Real "caster martial-caster divide" comes from the fact that people run this game wrong. People ignore so many rules like components, time, action economy with bonus action spells and even concentration. But most important problem- DM give to much agency over long rest to the players. Game designed around 6 encounters per long rest, and so many people play with 1 or 2. If played as intended and below level 9 (where majority of game played)- wizard probably in top 3 worst classes in the game with monk and sorcerer. Lowest HP, worst main stat with useless skills, no features outside of spellcasting. And with spellcasting alone- you cant cast 2 spells per encounter until level 7, considering that you wont spend any on utility. Plus all those "crazy level 20 builds" with "white room damage calculation" videos and posts crate wrong perception of the real game.

[@DndUnoptimized]

That's an interesting take I haven't heard. In my experience casters have all been pretty powerful depending on spell pick. Even one big spell is a game changer in a sticky situation. Bless, faerie fire,, web, hypnotic pattern, wall of force, banishment, these can be pivotal to winning battles even if you spend the rest of your turns just using cantrips. And those are just the low level ones (under 9 as you said). I do think the average caster is not normally as good as the optimizer community makes them out to be. I think that's due to the caster caster divide and piloting. Totally agree about the number of encounters per day though.

[@user-ni7ji3fb8m]

@@DndUnoptimized while it is true that some spells are good (or too good even) to be used as only spell per encounter, but there are some problems even in this list of examples: -Bless and faerie fire are from Cleric and Druid that have smaller and more noob friendly lists, and allow players to frilly swap spells. While wizards and sorcerers permanently commit to the choices, and their list filled with noob traps spells. On top of that "cast bless and dodge every turn after" is very counterintuitive playstyle for new players. -Web is strong spell, but you cant use it every encounter until level 4, save with hypnotic pattern and level 7. And all 3 of those spells are team-focused too, which is great, but make them op only if you have party of martials to take advantage of all control. -Wall of force is 5th level, and wizards are fine after 9th level (i meant class level not spell level in original comment), and wall of force on of the reasons why. And I'm glad that you included banishment, because in my opinion that is what all spells should be- super strong against specific targets and still useful in other situations. For example if bless only gave targets +1, but if they fighting fiends and undead it become 1d4, web stick for full duration only if casted inside caves and rooms, witch bolt automatically crits against targets in metal armor, acid arrow reduce target natural AC for some time, etc. That what spells used to b, and this helps to boost lover level and nerf high level. But woth struggling with game identity and wont commit to any path so we stuck with what we got.

[@notsochosenone5669]

Game is "designed" (no, it doesn't, if you actually read the part of DMG you refering to it is just a suggestion, nothing more) around 6-8 MEDIUM encounters per day (if you make harder combat - then less. It is in the same section). Medium encounters are so easy something like Tasha's summon + cantrip (let alone any of the broken Conjure X spells) can sweep whole 3 of them without a problem. XP budget is actual metric that at least kind of work (problem is - tons of monsters have flat out wrong CRs, and some abilities of monster just dosn't count to CR at all). Both wizard and sorcerer could armor dip easilly. On top of that, spells like Sleep are encounter-enders at tier 1. And after level 5 most martials would be out of HP sooner, than casters would be out of slots (we also have barbarian who would lose a subclass after 2 to 3 combats because Rage is a resource too, and almost every subclass needs Rage). "You can't cast two spells until level 7" is a problem if spells in question aren't powerful - and they fucking are.

[@user-ni7ji3fb8m]

@@notsochosenone5669 this "suggestion" is all we got, and you know yourself they didn't use any CR or XP when planning encounters in their own published adventures, so this metric definitely doesn't work. Sleep will end the encounter only if your dm is chat-gpt. There are some outstanding spells there, but that the whole point of the class, unless you removing vancian casting all together. I can finish a hyperoptimized level 5 party with 5 goblin ambush and any decent dm can do the same, because its not all "white room autobattler". If you don't have featherfall prepared- one shove near the cliff will end you. DnD does not provide any tanking, so any enemy with int of 7 that live in the realm of the game should understand that you rush and end funny spellcaster dude first, as a common sense knowledge, so HP argument works only if your DM is AI too. While barbarian can lose subclass, wizard is the only class that can permanently lose it whole class main feature to the single failed perception check.