D&D (2024) Wizard subclasses are a missed opportunity.

[A2Z]

Thinking more on it, I think the eight schools of magic should have been bundled into a single subclass. Maybe a specialist mage subclass, a la 2E. You could choose a school and get different features similar to having them as they are now.

That would have left room for the war mage, bladesinger and order of scribes to give the wizard subclasses some variety and not have required dumping the remaining schools.

As it stands the 2014 school subclasses have fairly different abilities. It might require some redesign of the features to roll them in to one subclass. Sure, the old subclasses should mostly work fine with the 2024 wizard. I feel there was an opportunity to change things up a bit in the new core book. Thoughts?

 

[Stormonu]

I was thinking along the same lines, though they'd become a bit bland as you'd lose some neat-o unique abilities unless they were turned into spells that are only available to certain specialists. I wouldn't be opposed to that, and having certain spells that are only available to one subclass wouldn't be a bad idea.

 

[Xeviat]

I wouldn't have minded if they had all of the Cleric and Wizard subclasses from 2014 PHB in 2024. They can have more than the other classes, as their core is genetic enough to cover multiple things.

If I was Dungeon Dragons, I would have had 10 subclasses for each class in the PHB. I'm finding so much room for making the wording and layout more efficient, I could probably have fit them.

 

[CreamCloud0]

I was thinking along the same lines, though they'd become a bit bland as you'd lose some neat-o unique abilities unless they were turned into spells that are only available to certain specialists. I wouldn't be opposed to that, and having certain spells that are only available to one subclass wouldn't be a bad idea.

rather than turning yet more features into spells you could instead do the totem barbarian thing where you get the selection of mutually exclusive abilities at set levels all in the same subclass, only instead of totems it's the features of your specialised spell school.

 

[abirdcall]

I'm pretty satisfied with what is core.

Blade singer would need to be reimagined as it is too powerful and dance bard fills the archetype well.

War mage is uninteresting to me. It has similar issues to fighter subclasses not having flavour.

Order of scribes is an interesting thought but I think diviner works well for a scholarly wizard.

I'm glad necromancer and enchanter are out. I don't mind the glamour bard as it can be themed to be beguiling with entertainment rather than just mind control.

Conjuration is a fun archetype but needs to be limited in scope or it gets out of hand.

I've always liked transmutation but I would have it as 5th choice.

 

[Stormonu]

rather than turning yet more features into spells you could instead do the totem barbarian thing where you get the selection of mutually exclusive abilities at set levels, only instead of totems it's the features of your specialised spell school.

True, but that'd run the subclass over several pages. Personally, I'd rather have a short subclass entry and point them to the ever-expanding spell section.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I agree to some extent.

Maybe combining two schools would also have been nice.

Illusion and enchantment (beguiler)
Evocation and abjuration (war mage)
Divination and necromancy (medium)
Conjuration and transmutation (summoner)

 

[CreamCloud0]

True, but that'd run the subclass over several pages. Personally, I'd rather have a short subclass entry and point them to the ever-expanding spell section.

i'd imagine putting them all into spell format would ultimately take up far more room, especially if as part of the subclass you could compact the features into an efficient table.

what's the value in making them spells? i don't see any.

 

[Li Shenron]

Thinking more on it, I think the eight schools of magic should have been bundled into a single subclass. Maybe a specialist mage subclass, a la 2E. You could choose a school and get different features similar to having them as they are now.

That would have left room for the war mage, bladesinger and order of scribes to give the wizard subclasses some variety and not have required dumping the remaining schools.

As it stands the 2014 school subclasses have fairly different abilities. It might require some redesign of the features to roll them in to one subclass. Sure, the old subclasses should mostly work fine with the 2024 wizard. I feel there was an opportunity to change things up a bit in the new core book. Thoughts?

I agree that Wizard subclasses could be more imaginative than just the 8 traditional schools, but bundling all schools in a single subclass would very probably end up being like 3ed wizard specializations: standardized and unimaginative. A mere set of bonuses, discounts or numeric adjustments. At least the 2014 subclasses had each something unique.

In theory, the design space for wizard (and sorcerer, and cleric) subclasses is huge. They could have taken inspiration from 3ed prestige classes to find some unique character concept. Instead, I found the War Mage and Bladesinger a lot more boring than the traditional 8 specializations. Frankly, to me any "combat mage" variant is boring, it doesn't matter if one is about "wizard with a sword" and another "wizard with bombs", they all feel samey for me when they are just about offensive abilities, which the base wizard class doesn't lack since the start anyway.

So I'd rather have diviners, illusionists, enchanters and such at the end.

 

[Mistwell]

The new Illusionist subclass is one of the true gems of the new PHB and I wouldn't wish for anything that would eliminate it or diminish it.