D&D 5E Looking for a Flame Blade fix

[Sword of Spirit]

You see the problem with the spell, or you don't.

What fixes have you made for it?

 

[ClockworkNinja]

No, I don't see. What is the problem with the spell?

 

[Wepwawet]

What fixes have you made for it?

The players must do whoosh sounds every time they attack with it.
*NOT* lightsaber sounds. If someone does lightsaber sounds they lose a level.

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

Without knowing what you regard as the problem, can't really suggest a fix for you.

Nothing in there seems broken: you can't use it for extra attacks so that issue is already averted. Its concentration, so stacking with other effects is limited.

It seems to be a good option for, for a druid wanting to make a spell slot last for a possible couple of encounters. The Fire damage and potential increased damage through higher spell slots gives it a boost over, for example, simply using Shillelagh.

 

[cbwjm]

I'm curious what the issue is. I haven't had our druid use it so can't tell if there is an issue or not. It looks fine on paper.

 

[Bitbrain]

My only complaint against flame blade is that the secondary DM vetoed my asking if I could replace flaming sphere with flame blade on my Light cleric/Fighter lizardfolk as one of his domain spells, even though flame blade felt more thematically appropriate for my character.

 

[CapnZapp]

No, I don't see. What is the problem with the spell?

I'm not SoS, but I can google:

So observe the spell flame blade. It's a concentration spell, bonus action, which allows one to spend one's action to make a melee spell attack. Okay, so far so good. 10 minute duration, not bad. Concentration? This thing better be good. 2nd level is 3d6 fire damage for your action, comparable to a rogue's attack + sneak attack at that level. That's fine. And it increases by 1d6 for every two spell levels past second...

That's horrible. Out of a fourth level slot, level 7, one can attack for 14 average damage per turn in melee range. Compare that to firebolt, a cantrip, which doesn't take concentration and deals 11+ damage at the same level. Then if one spends an 8th level slot at level 15+, one can have it deal 6d6, or 21 damage. An eldritch blast two levels later deals 42 damage across multiple targets if one has the agonizing invocation.

Why is this spell so awful? The blade can't even be used for opportunity or bonus action attacks, so it's pretty much worthless.

To this I say the damage isn't bad at the level you get the spell. You'll quickly outgrow it though. But that isn't what makes it bad.

Myself, the main warning bell is having a melee spell require Concentration. That just ain't right. If you're entering melee voluntarily, it's a horrible idea to use a weapon you risk dropping merely because you take damage, which you will, since you're in melee.

And if you're in melee involuntarily, you don't use this spell - you Dodge the hell out of Ghett.

I really would like to see a tradition where the specific designer of really inexlicably bad spells were asked to justify their poor decisions, so we could finally have an edition without such obvious Orcish Grandmothers.

Who at WotC thought it to be a good idea to combine melee with Concentration, without making the spells kind of awesome to compensate for this fact?!

It's the same issue that plagues Hunter's Mark. Sure it's useful - for an Archer. Not so much for a dual-wielder, since a) you're in frikkin' melee, damage is what you will be taking, and b) your bonus action is already supremely busy. Yet another instance where MMearls & Co hates melee and wants everybody to go ranged...

Before publication the design team really needed to do a pass where they looked at every spell with melee range that had Concentration, and either gave a real good justification or redesigned the spell. (I am aware that merely dropping Concentration is often too good a boost)

In this case, I'm getting the vibe they really didn't want to give Druids this, but decided they had to, hoping the nostalgia of the spell name would blind people to its crappiness.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

Basically, it has always seemed underpowered to me. A friend of mine who is currently making a druid is always extremely unsatisfied with it. Compare it, for instance, to moonbeam. After that, compare it to a scaled cantrip like produce flame. You need to be getting more bang for your buck. The problem is that it is easy to overdo it and make it too good. I mean, if you made it do similar damage to moonbeam (including scaling), you'd essentially be handing out some some sort of paladin smite every round, which would seem odd. At the same time, you could do the same thing with moonbeam or call lightning. It's devilishly hard to get it to do just the right amount of damage for just the right amount of time to be an appealing option without being too good.

So I figured I'd see what solutions other have come up with for ideas, since we haven't come up with a revision that hits the right balance yet.

 

[CapnZapp]

It's devilishly hard to get it to do just the right amount of damage for just the right amount of time to be an appealing option without being too good.

So I figured I'd see what solutions other have come up with for ideas, since we haven't come up with a revision that hits the right balance yet.

So my hunch in posting that GitP thread was right - you are concerned about damage.

If so, sorry, but I can't help you. The problem, see, is that even if the spell did do good damage, when would you ever use it? Against brutish monsters where you need to deal massive damage? No, because you're a spellcaster in humanoid form.

This spell seems designed for the case when you're facing small foes, the kind of foe you can deal with in melee yourself. But you don't want to spend a level two slot on trivial opponents, and even if you do, there are far better options.

The final scenario is when you're surprised to find yourself in melee, but for some reason don't want to spend your action on escape. In order for this scenario to be plausible, you would need to expect the battle to end shortly (or you'd better escape or wildshape or use a real killer spell).

So, if the spell was redesigned to last only the one round, we would gain the design space to make it worth our while. The reason it is so crappy is because the damage needs to be dished out in portions over several rounds, and because that kind of spell rightly needs Concentration.

Freed from having to calculate multi-round effects, we could up the damage, or perhaps allow you to do a "whirlwind" maneuver with it.

Take the latter example: duration until the end of your turn, no Concentration (not to buff the spell but because there isn't Concentration for such short durations), and use your action to attack every foe within reach for the 3d6 dmg. Then the spell ends.

This way, I could see an actual goddam use for the spell - when you're surrounded by weak foes, and you expect the spell to actually down some of them (not just deal 10.5 points of damage to them).

If you deal this damage to three foes (say you hit three goblins but miss two), it's the same total damage as the regular Flame Blade over three rounds, except you don't need to deal with the crap that is using a crap weapon (no OAs, no EAs, no weapon at all when you fail Conc).

 

[Mephista]

Hmmm? My big problem with Flame Blade is that its a melee spell for a class that is either a back row dedicated caster, or a Moon druid that's not going to be casting spells like that in the first place. It just doesn't -fit- the druid design. Couple that with Concentration. You're competing against Entangle, Faerie Fire and Hold Person at minimum at the same level. At higher levels? I'm honestly going to say you're better off with the Conjure spells for your Concentration slot.

Now, the spell could be good if we made a druid subclass built around damage with melee spells. There's a couple of spells like that in the druid class already. But, without a subclass? The druid just doesn't want to use weapons in melee. No matter how good of a spell you make it, its not really going to be desirable. Strip Concentration, better damage scaling, and its still an iffy spell.