If a person is comparing damage to martial damage from weapons, feats, and extra attacks then the single target damage from spells isn't great. It's a bit of a side note, however, because that's not relevant to a comparison between fireball and lightning bolt.
The difference between the two is damage type as it pertains to resistances, but lightning bolt also allows a lot more control over where that damage is dealt. That's not just other party members. It's treasure, plot devices like notes, or civilian collateral damage. Not everything is about the players and monsters. ;-)
It's also possible to hit more targets with lightning bolt than fireball even if it is unlikely. It depends on how many targets are positioned where.
Try remembering it isn’t either/or, it should be both, they are each situational and when used in the other’s situations they both suck, by the same token when used properly in their own situations they are fantastic. Enemies are 150’ away and grouped? Fireball! The beg is less than 100’ away and his minions have your front liners pinned in combat? Lightning Bolt! You have badguys charging down a hall? Lightning bolt! A room full of badguys? Fireball with your front liners blocking the doorway. My mages try to have both memorized so they have the right tool for the situation.
I took LB on my Bard as a magical secret because the party is very melee-oriented. It's not hard to find a good line that passes through several mob's spaces on a cast, you just have to be slick about it.
When I cast FB on my Wizard, I've hit a *ton* of enemies sometimes, but usually it's right around the same amount as I'd get off a lightning bolt, give or take.
The fix is even simpler than making it do some complicated path across the map or any of that silliness. Just make it ricochet off walls again. This is what Lightning Bolt actually used to do (amongst other things) Which made it not only more useful and potentially higher damaging but also potentially much more dangerous as well.
Complicated altering paths is just going to make lightning bolt miss more and be much more useless.
The fix is even simpler than making it do some complicated path across the map or any of that silliness. Just make it ricochet off walls again. This is what Lightning Bolt actually used to do (amongst other things) Which made it not only more useful and potentially higher damaging but also potentially much more dangerous as well.
Complicated altering paths is just going to make lightning bolt miss more and be much more useless.
(edit: Had to fix a word error.)
There's nothing to fix here. The caster moves to get a good line of effect and then casts lighting bolt. The advantage is lightning bolt is more party friendly and doesn't damage / ignite everything and everyone else because of the area it affects.
Does your DM ignore the "ignites flammable objects in the area that aren't being worn or carried" part of fireball? Fireball is the issue because without a way to control where the damage hits (such as sculpt spell) it hits everything in the area. Hitting a few more opponents is a good thing, but hitting everything and everyone else is a bad thing.
The fix is even simpler than making it do some complicated path across the map or any of that silliness. Just make it ricochet off walls again. This is what Lightning Bolt actually used to do (amongst other things) Which made it not only more useful and potentially higher damaging but also potentially much more dangerous as well.
Complicated altering paths is just going to make lightning bolt miss more and be much more useless.
(edit: Had to fix a word error.)
There's nothing to fix here. The caster moves to get a good line of effect and then casts lighting bolt. The advantage is lightning bolt is more party friendly and doesn't damage / ignite everything and everyone else because of the area it affects.
Does your DM ignore the "ignites flammable objects in the area that aren't being worn or carried" part of fireball? Fireball is the issue because without a way to control where the damage hits (such as sculpt spell) it hits everything in the area. Hitting a few more opponents is a good thing, but hitting everything and everyone else is a bad thing.
I meant more for people wanting a fix. my older group still plays with fireball ricocheting off of things. But even in groups that don't do that. I don't personally necessarily even take fireball despite so many people's obsession with it. I'm not caught up in the fireball crazy.
Sure it' AOE's and it's one of the first True AOE's that many wizards can pick up. But my oldest group actually refers to fireball as the beginner's spell. Because it's great for learning but it's boring and it just really doesn't do anything all thta special. Not even the burning affect is special, the splash damage, nothing.
That said your remark about ignoring the igniting flammable objects part of fireball is nonsensical. I never said anything about that and if your trying to imply it does more damage. It really doesn't. pure environmental damage is really low, doesn't work on anything people are carrying so unlikely to burn people that way. and the unattended objects are largely unlikely to create environmental damage in squares that is really going to have much effect unless you really go out of your way to try and use them. Many such fires also aren't likely to last long. Not to mention Lightning bolt does the same thing.
The fix is even simpler than making it do some complicated path across the map or any of that silliness. Just make it ricochet off walls again. This is what Lightning Bolt actually used to do (amongst other things) Which made it not only more useful and potentially higher damaging but also potentially much more dangerous as well.
Complicated altering paths is just going to make lightning bolt miss more and be much more useless.
(edit: Had to fix a word error.)
There's nothing to fix here. The caster moves to get a good line of effect and then casts lighting bolt. The advantage is lightning bolt is more party friendly and doesn't damage / ignite everything and everyone else because of the area it affects.
Does your DM ignore the "ignites flammable objects in the area that aren't being worn or carried" part of fireball? Fireball is the issue because without a way to control where the damage hits (such as sculpt spell) it hits everything in the area. Hitting a few more opponents is a good thing, but hitting everything and everyone else is a bad thing.
I meant more for people wanting a fix. my older group still plays with fireball ricocheting off of things. But even in groups that don't do that. I don't personally necessarily even take fireball despite so many people's obsession with it. I'm not caught up in the fireball crazy.
Sure it' AOE's and it's one of the first True AOE's that many wizards can pick up. But my oldest group actually refers to fireball as the beginner's spell. Because it's great for learning but it's boring and it just really doesn't do anything all thta special. Not even the burning affect is special, the splash damage, nothing.
That said your remark about ignoring the igniting flammable objects part of fireball is nonsensical. I never said anything about that and if your trying to imply it does more damage. It really doesn't. pure environmental damage is really low, doesn't work on anything people are carrying so unlikely to burn people that way. and the unattended objects are largely unlikely to create environmental damage in squares that is really going to have much effect unless you really go out of your way to try and use them. Many such fires also aren't likely to last long. Not to mention Lightning bolt does the same thing.
The issue is fireball destroys treasure and damages hostages / bystanders. And party members. That's a big drawback lightning bolt avoids because of the differing areas of effect. Fireball only looks better if a person is ignoring that significant drawback and only looking at potential number of opponents. That's where I was going with my comments.
One spell gives a larger total area of coverage and the other does the same damage in a more controlled area. I don't think any changes are necessary for anyone.
The fix is even simpler than making it do some complicated path across the map or any of that silliness. Just make it ricochet off walls again. This is what Lightning Bolt actually used to do (amongst other things) Which made it not only more useful and potentially higher damaging but also potentially much more dangerous as well.
Complicated altering paths is just going to make lightning bolt miss more and be much more useless.
(edit: Had to fix a word error.)
There's nothing to fix here. The caster moves to get a good line of effect and then casts lighting bolt. The advantage is lightning bolt is more party friendly and doesn't damage / ignite everything and everyone else because of the area it affects.
Does your DM ignore the "ignites flammable objects in the area that aren't being worn or carried" part of fireball? Fireball is the issue because without a way to control where the damage hits (such as sculpt spell) it hits everything in the area. Hitting a few more opponents is a good thing, but hitting everything and everyone else is a bad thing.
I meant more for people wanting a fix. my older group still plays with fireball ricocheting off of things. But even in groups that don't do that. I don't personally necessarily even take fireball despite so many people's obsession with it. I'm not caught up in the fireball crazy.
Sure it' AOE's and it's one of the first True AOE's that many wizards can pick up. But my oldest group actually refers to fireball as the beginner's spell. Because it's great for learning but it's boring and it just really doesn't do anything all thta special. Not even the burning affect is special, the splash damage, nothing.
That said your remark about ignoring the igniting flammable objects part of fireball is nonsensical. I never said anything about that and if your trying to imply it does more damage. It really doesn't. pure environmental damage is really low, doesn't work on anything people are carrying so unlikely to burn people that way. and the unattended objects are largely unlikely to create environmental damage in squares that is really going to have much effect unless you really go out of your way to try and use them. Many such fires also aren't likely to last long. Not to mention Lightning bolt does the same thing.
The issue is fireball destroys treasure and damages hostages / bystanders. And party members. That's a big drawback lightning bolt avoids because of the differing areas of effect. Fireball only looks better if a person is ignoring that significant drawback and only looking at potential number of opponents. That's where I was going with my comments.
One spell gives a larger total area of coverage and the other does the same damage in a more controlled area. I don't think any changes are necessary for anyone.
Except this is incorrect. It is not something that Lightning Bolt avoids at all. It just changes the area that it happens within. Both spells actually have the same effect. Any place the lightning bolt hits does this too. It's just a different shape. That does not equate to not lighting things on fire.
Huh, I don't think I've ever noticed that Lightning Boltalso ignite things.
Still, it's a lot easier to avoid igniting stuff with a line-based attack than a spherical one; with a well placed lightning bolt you might ignite a few things, with a Fireball you've got yourself a room full of on fire stuff no matter what (better hope you've got Create or Destroy Water on standby, or that there's nothing valuable in the room).
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
Huh, I don't think I've ever noticed that Lightning Boltalso ignite things.
Still, it's a lot easier to avoid igniting stuff with a line-based attack than a spherical one; with a well placed lightning bolt you might ignite a few things, with a Fireball you've got yourself a room full of on fire stuff no matter what (better hope you've got Create or Destroy Water on standby, or that there's nothing valuable in the room).
Imagine if lightning bolt still reflected off of surfaces it hit (default back at the caster. optionally in a more physics based way.) Blasted through wooden doors, or blasted chunks out of stone, and had a variable starting point along it's casting range before traveling it's full distance, on top of the lightning spell of 5e. This is the power of the second edition Lightning Bolt I know and love and miss. 3.x neutered the crap out of it. But once upon a time a clever caster and a small room made a fireball look tame. Both "destruction" wise that people get caught up on... And in Coolness Factor with it's ability to hit multipe times for high damage, potentially fire around corners, etc.
My one group doesn't even use half that in 5e. But we do remember the days. And always thought it was dumb it didn't at least ricochet even in 3.x/PF.
Huh, I don't think I've ever noticed that Lightning Boltalso ignite things.
Still, it's a lot easier to avoid igniting stuff with a line-based attack than a spherical one; with a well placed lightning bolt you might ignite a few things, with a Fireball you've got yourself a room full of on fire stuff no matter what (better hope you've got Create or Destroy Water on standby, or that there's nothing valuable in the room).
Another option might be thunder wave, the blast might well blow out the fires as it tosses the objects back 10 feet. I had a DM agree with me that the air blast doing the shoving would blowout the flames on the oil slick my foes had just ignited. Yes the oil slick was completely within the range of the spell so there were no flames left to reignite the flames. Best part is that you get to do more damage to any foes still standing in a 15- radius area around you.
The fix is even simpler than making it do some complicated path across the map or any of that silliness. Just make it ricochet off walls again. This is what Lightning Bolt actually used to do (amongst other things) Which made it not only more useful and potentially higher damaging but also potentially much more dangerous as well.
Complicated altering paths is just going to make lightning bolt miss more and be much more useless.
(edit: Had to fix a word error.)
There's nothing to fix here. The caster moves to get a good line of effect and then casts lighting bolt. The advantage is lightning bolt is more party friendly and doesn't damage / ignite everything and everyone else because of the area it affects.
Does your DM ignore the "ignites flammable objects in the area that aren't being worn or carried" part of fireball? Fireball is the issue because without a way to control where the damage hits (such as sculpt spell) it hits everything in the area. Hitting a few more opponents is a good thing, but hitting everything and everyone else is a bad thing.
I meant more for people wanting a fix. my older group still plays with fireball ricocheting off of things. But even in groups that don't do that. I don't personally necessarily even take fireball despite so many people's obsession with it. I'm not caught up in the fireball crazy.
Sure it' AOE's and it's one of the first True AOE's that many wizards can pick up. But my oldest group actually refers to fireball as the beginner's spell. Because it's great for learning but it's boring and it just really doesn't do anything all thta special. Not even the burning affect is special, the splash damage, nothing.
That said your remark about ignoring the igniting flammable objects part of fireball is nonsensical. I never said anything about that and if your trying to imply it does more damage. It really doesn't. pure environmental damage is really low, doesn't work on anything people are carrying so unlikely to burn people that way. and the unattended objects are largely unlikely to create environmental damage in squares that is really going to have much effect unless you really go out of your way to try and use them. Many such fires also aren't likely to last long. Not to mention Lightning bolt does the same thing.
The issue is fireball destroys treasure and damages hostages / bystanders. And party members. That's a big drawback lightning bolt avoids because of the differing areas of effect. Fireball only looks better if a person is ignoring that significant drawback and only looking at potential number of opponents. That's where I was going with my comments.
One spell gives a larger total area of coverage and the other does the same damage in a more controlled area. I don't think any changes are necessary for anyone.
Except this is incorrect. It is not something that Lightning Bolt avoids at all. It just changes the area that it happens within. Both spells actually have the same effect. Any place the lightning bolt hits does this too. It's just a different shape. That does not equate to not lighting things on fire.
That's the point. Those other considerations are no longer within that area of effect because of the different shape.
If my PC casts fireball the area of effect covers more things I don't want damaged. If my PC casts lightning bolt then I can avoid having the area of effect hitting targets or areas I don't want damaged far more easily.
EDIT: to keep it in perspective:
Fireball is about the targets you want to hit.
Lighting bolt is about the targets you want to avoid hitting.
Imagine if lightning bolt still reflected off of surfaces it hit (default back at the caster. optionally in a more physics based way.) Blasted through wooden doors, or blasted chunks out of stone, and had a variable starting point along it's casting range before traveling it's full distance, on top of the lightning spell of 5e. This is the power of the second edition Lightning Bolt I know and love and miss. 3.x neutered the crap out of it. But once upon a time a clever caster and a small room made a fireball look tame. Both "destruction" wise that people get caught up on... And in Coolness Factor with it's ability to hit multipe times for high damage, potentially fire around corners, etc.
My one group doesn't even use half that in 5e. But we do remember the days. And always thought it was dumb it didn't at least ricochet even in 3.x/PF.
Aww man, wish I'd played a caster back in 3.xe days; I always felt drawn to the martials back then, it's only in more recent years I've gone properly nuts with my character ideas (and it usually seems to involve some amount of spellcasting).
Not sure why they'd change it so drastically though; you could still make the ricochet work if you just stipulate that you can't hit the same creature more than once (or more than twice for large, three times huge etc.?), i.e- you assume the first "hit" knocks them out of the way enough that they're no longer perfectly lined up to be hit again. To avoid any billiards/pool/snooker-style trick-shotting every enemy to death in a single turn.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
Imagine if lightning bolt still reflected off of surfaces it hit (default back at the caster. optionally in a more physics based way.) Blasted through wooden doors, or blasted chunks out of stone, and had a variable starting point along it's casting range before traveling it's full distance, on top of the lightning spell of 5e. This is the power of the second edition Lightning Bolt I know and love and miss. 3.x neutered the crap out of it. But once upon a time a clever caster and a small room made a fireball look tame. Both "destruction" wise that people get caught up on... And in Coolness Factor with it's ability to hit multipe times for high damage, potentially fire around corners, etc.
My one group doesn't even use half that in 5e. But we do remember the days. And always thought it was dumb it didn't at least ricochet even in 3.x/PF.
Aww man, wish I'd played a caster back in 3.xe days; I always felt drawn to the martials back then, it's only in more recent years I've gone properly nuts with my character ideas (and it usually seems to involve some amount of spellcasting).
Not sure why they'd change it so drastically though; you could still make the ricochet work if you just stipulate that you can't hit the same creature more than once (or more than twice for large, three times huge etc.?), i.e- you assume the first "hit" knocks them out of the way enough that they're no longer perfectly lined up to be hit again. To avoid any billiards/pool/snooker-style trick-shotting every enemy to death in a single turn.
I'd just say if hit multiple times by the same bolt you save at disadvantage, so its useful but not insane. In 1e/2e not sure if 3e since you could pick the origin point and direction of the bolt, and it reflected picking a ceiling/floor orientation on one or two enemies would make it the most damaging effect in the game which I'd think was not its intent. a single reflection would generally get it past all but the highest level spells. Even in that era I saw many rulings that they had to save multiple times but the damage was just one pass of the bolt, so it increased a chance of a failed save but didn't turn it into 50d6 of damage or something insane.
One big difference that I liked that was mentioned above is the damage these spells did to the environment. It wasn't oh it might set fire to flammables(which from table to to table seems to vary drastically) but it smashed through doors, chipped away stone walls, melted metals etc. Honestly most spells just did damage, yeah a DM would say necromantic damage might not effect a inanimate objects and fire vs stone doesn't work well but if you hit a wall for 40 damage with your spell, the wall took 40 damage.(3e added resistances etc) you didn't have to look through the spells description to see if it highlighted that it hit objects as well as creatures, hitting everything was the default it was more looking for the opposite like magic missile specifying it did not effect objects. As much as they claim the rules are written for a natural language ruling in 5e, I think earlier editions did that better well not 1e Gygax was hard to read.
Imagine if lightning bolt still reflected off of surfaces it hit (default back at the caster. optionally in a more physics based way.) Blasted through wooden doors, or blasted chunks out of stone, and had a variable starting point along it's casting range before traveling it's full distance, on top of the lightning spell of 5e. This is the power of the second edition Lightning Bolt I know and love and miss. 3.x neutered the crap out of it. But once upon a time a clever caster and a small room made a fireball look tame. Both "destruction" wise that people get caught up on... And in Coolness Factor with it's ability to hit multipe times for high damage, potentially fire around corners, etc.
My one group doesn't even use half that in 5e. But we do remember the days. And always thought it was dumb it didn't at least ricochet even in 3.x/PF.
Aww man, wish I'd played a caster back in 3.xe days; I always felt drawn to the martials back then, it's only in more recent years I've gone properly nuts with my character ideas (and it usually seems to involve some amount of spellcasting).
Not sure why they'd change it so drastically though; you could still make the ricochet work if you just stipulate that you can't hit the same creature more than once (or more than twice for large, three times huge etc.?), i.e- you assume the first "hit" knocks them out of the way enough that they're no longer perfectly lined up to be hit again. To avoid any billiards/pool/snooker-style trick-shotting every enemy to death in a single turn.
The version that had all the fun was the second edition version. The 3.x version was close to the same thing as the 5e version. Though you still picked where it started within the casting range that affected how far it really traveled i believe.
But it was a notorious spell for casting at angles in tight hallways or through doors into guard rooms that you knew were filled with enemies. Because it would decimate basically everything inside as effectively as setting off a big explosion in it. And the walls would be damaged to a certain thickness based upon what they were made out of (and I think what level of the spell you cast but I could be remembering wrong). But it was a great way to blast your way into fights regardless because it basically always destroyed doors (unless you got stupidly unlucky on the doors save which usually wasn't good anyway) or windows and carried into the room beyond. And yes. it's damage was potentially high in the right hands.
And the Best way to limit the 2e lightning bolt was that the DM could decide that when it reflected it always went straight back towards the caster. it made ricocheting less and likely self murdering higher which meant people were more careful how to use it. So it was best to know how your DM handled the matter of ricochet before casting it. But even if it came straight back towards you there were lots of ways to handle that and still meant you could likely hit enemies at least twice in a lot of instances.
When you finally hit your 3rd level spells I think everyone wants to grab Fireball for their Wizard. It is the quintessential Blow-Em-Up-Real-Good spell. I know I did for my Wizard playing Mad Mage. When we got farther down (spoiler haha) and stuff started having fire resistance I picked up Lightning Bolt as well. Instead of AoE it is directional - so if you can line up your foes, it can be super effective! But don’t get me wrong - the first time you cast Fireball with your character it is an awesome thing. You just have to watch your foe’s resistances and be careful not to blow up your friends.
When you finally hit your 3rd level spells I think everyone wants to grab Fireball for their Wizard. It is the quintessential Blow-Em-Up-Real-Good spell. I know I did for my Wizard playing Mad Mage. When we got farther down (spoiler haha) and stuff started having fire resistance I picked up Lightning Bolt as well. Instead of AoE it is directional - so if you can line up your foes, it can be super effective! But don’t get me wrong - the first time you cast Fireball with your character it is an awesome thing. You just have to watch your foe’s resistances and be careful not to blow up your friends.
I literally (like, two hours ago) hit fifth level with a wizard, and chose Lightning Bolt over Fireball for three reasons:
1) Mobility -- I'm a tabaxi with Misty Step. I can zip around a battlefield pretty well, which means getting in position to line up multiple foes isn't as tough for me as it might be other wizards
2) Utility -- Thinking back over the battles in the campaign so far, I really wouldn't have had as many good opportunities to use Fireball as I would have LB, and as a Divination wizard I can't carve out spots for my party in an AoE. Lightning Bolt seems both more adaptable and safer
3) Story -- I took Ray of Frost over Fire Bolt at first level as my main attacking cantrip because he learned magic while at Candlekeep, and practicing fire spells in a library was frowned upon. I decided to keep shying away from fire spells just as a quirk
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Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
Here's a good way to get Lightning Bolt back into fun play...
Use a 10 feet wide zig-zagging lightning bolt path 100 feet long that hits all non-allies in its path. If you want more precision, allow only 1 target to be struck for each 5 feet distance out, but the caster can choose between two side-by-side targets as the bolt travels along its 100 feet destruction.
This style allows more parity with fireball, yet allows more control in combat with allies, making it worth while, though sacrificing still some targets that fireball would get. After all, pyromancers in fiction literature, never really spare allies the flame in the blast, that's always been a cheat style with adepts in D&D.
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If a person is comparing damage to martial damage from weapons, feats, and extra attacks then the single target damage from spells isn't great. It's a bit of a side note, however, because that's not relevant to a comparison between fireball and lightning bolt.
The difference between the two is damage type as it pertains to resistances, but lightning bolt also allows a lot more control over where that damage is dealt. That's not just other party members. It's treasure, plot devices like notes, or civilian collateral damage. Not everything is about the players and monsters. ;-)
It's also possible to hit more targets with lightning bolt than fireball even if it is unlikely. It depends on how many targets are positioned where.
Try remembering it isn’t either/or, it should be both, they are each situational and when used in the other’s situations they both suck, by the same token when used properly in their own situations they are fantastic. Enemies are 150’ away and grouped? Fireball! The beg is less than 100’ away and his minions have your front liners pinned in combat? Lightning Bolt! You have badguys charging down a hall? Lightning bolt! A room full of badguys? Fireball with your front liners blocking the doorway. My mages try to have both memorized so they have the right tool for the situation.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
I took LB on my Bard as a magical secret because the party is very melee-oriented. It's not hard to find a good line that passes through several mob's spaces on a cast, you just have to be slick about it.
When I cast FB on my Wizard, I've hit a *ton* of enemies sometimes, but usually it's right around the same amount as I'd get off a lightning bolt, give or take.
The fix is even simpler than making it do some complicated path across the map or any of that silliness. Just make it ricochet off walls again. This is what Lightning Bolt actually used to do (amongst other things) Which made it not only more useful and potentially higher damaging but also potentially much more dangerous as well.
Complicated altering paths is just going to make lightning bolt miss more and be much more useless.
(edit: Had to fix a word error.)
There's nothing to fix here. The caster moves to get a good line of effect and then casts lighting bolt. The advantage is lightning bolt is more party friendly and doesn't damage / ignite everything and everyone else because of the area it affects.
Does your DM ignore the "ignites flammable objects in the area that aren't being worn or carried" part of fireball? Fireball is the issue because without a way to control where the damage hits (such as sculpt spell) it hits everything in the area. Hitting a few more opponents is a good thing, but hitting everything and everyone else is a bad thing.
I meant more for people wanting a fix. my older group still plays with fireball ricocheting off of things. But even in groups that don't do that. I don't personally necessarily even take fireball despite so many people's obsession with it. I'm not caught up in the fireball crazy.
Sure it' AOE's and it's one of the first True AOE's that many wizards can pick up. But my oldest group actually refers to fireball as the beginner's spell. Because it's great for learning but it's boring and it just really doesn't do anything all thta special. Not even the burning affect is special, the splash damage, nothing.
That said your remark about ignoring the igniting flammable objects part of fireball is nonsensical. I never said anything about that and if your trying to imply it does more damage. It really doesn't. pure environmental damage is really low, doesn't work on anything people are carrying so unlikely to burn people that way. and the unattended objects are largely unlikely to create environmental damage in squares that is really going to have much effect unless you really go out of your way to try and use them. Many such fires also aren't likely to last long. Not to mention Lightning bolt does the same thing.
The issue is fireball destroys treasure and damages hostages / bystanders. And party members. That's a big drawback lightning bolt avoids because of the differing areas of effect. Fireball only looks better if a person is ignoring that significant drawback and only looking at potential number of opponents. That's where I was going with my comments.
One spell gives a larger total area of coverage and the other does the same damage in a more controlled area. I don't think any changes are necessary for anyone.
Except this is incorrect. It is not something that Lightning Bolt avoids at all. It just changes the area that it happens within. Both spells actually have the same effect. Any place the lightning bolt hits does this too. It's just a different shape. That does not equate to not lighting things on fire.
Huh, I don't think I've ever noticed that Lightning Bolt also ignite things.
Still, it's a lot easier to avoid igniting stuff with a line-based attack than a spherical one; with a well placed lightning bolt you might ignite a few things, with a Fireball you've got yourself a room full of on fire stuff no matter what (better hope you've got Create or Destroy Water on standby, or that there's nothing valuable in the room).
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
Imagine if lightning bolt still reflected off of surfaces it hit (default back at the caster. optionally in a more physics based way.) Blasted through wooden doors, or blasted chunks out of stone, and had a variable starting point along it's casting range before traveling it's full distance, on top of the lightning spell of 5e. This is the power of the second edition Lightning Bolt I know and love and miss. 3.x neutered the crap out of it. But once upon a time a clever caster and a small room made a fireball look tame. Both "destruction" wise that people get caught up on... And in Coolness Factor with it's ability to hit multipe times for high damage, potentially fire around corners, etc.
My one group doesn't even use half that in 5e. But we do remember the days. And always thought it was dumb it didn't at least ricochet even in 3.x/PF.
I know I still run lightingbolt this way at my table it’s simply what it is supposed to do
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
Another option might be thunder wave, the blast might well blow out the fires as it tosses the objects back 10 feet. I had a DM agree with me that the air blast doing the shoving would blowout the flames on the oil slick my foes had just ignited. Yes the oil slick was completely within the range of the spell so there were no flames left to reignite the flames. Best part is that you get to do more damage to any foes still standing in a 15- radius area around you.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
That's the point. Those other considerations are no longer within that area of effect because of the different shape.
If my PC casts fireball the area of effect covers more things I don't want damaged. If my PC casts lightning bolt then I can avoid having the area of effect hitting targets or areas I don't want damaged far more easily.
EDIT: to keep it in perspective:
Aww man, wish I'd played a caster back in 3.xe days; I always felt drawn to the martials back then, it's only in more recent years I've gone properly nuts with my character ideas (and it usually seems to involve some amount of spellcasting).
Not sure why they'd change it so drastically though; you could still make the ricochet work if you just stipulate that you can't hit the same creature more than once (or more than twice for large, three times huge etc.?), i.e- you assume the first "hit" knocks them out of the way enough that they're no longer perfectly lined up to be hit again. To avoid any billiards/pool/snooker-style trick-shotting every enemy to death in a single turn.
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I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
I'd just say if hit multiple times by the same bolt you save at disadvantage, so its useful but not insane. In 1e/2e not sure if 3e since you could pick the origin point and direction of the bolt, and it reflected picking a ceiling/floor orientation on one or two enemies would make it the most damaging effect in the game which I'd think was not its intent. a single reflection would generally get it past all but the highest level spells. Even in that era I saw many rulings that they had to save multiple times but the damage was just one pass of the bolt, so it increased a chance of a failed save but didn't turn it into 50d6 of damage or something insane.
One big difference that I liked that was mentioned above is the damage these spells did to the environment. It wasn't oh it might set fire to flammables(which from table to to table seems to vary drastically) but it smashed through doors, chipped away stone walls, melted metals etc. Honestly most spells just did damage, yeah a DM would say necromantic damage might not effect a inanimate objects and fire vs stone doesn't work well but if you hit a wall for 40 damage with your spell, the wall took 40 damage.(3e added resistances etc) you didn't have to look through the spells description to see if it highlighted that it hit objects as well as creatures, hitting everything was the default it was more looking for the opposite like magic missile specifying it did not effect objects. As much as they claim the rules are written for a natural language ruling in 5e, I think earlier editions did that better well not 1e Gygax was hard to read.
The version that had all the fun was the second edition version. The 3.x version was close to the same thing as the 5e version. Though you still picked where it started within the casting range that affected how far it really traveled i believe.
But it was a notorious spell for casting at angles in tight hallways or through doors into guard rooms that you knew were filled with enemies. Because it would decimate basically everything inside as effectively as setting off a big explosion in it. And the walls would be damaged to a certain thickness based upon what they were made out of (and I think what level of the spell you cast but I could be remembering wrong). But it was a great way to blast your way into fights regardless because it basically always destroyed doors (unless you got stupidly unlucky on the doors save which usually wasn't good anyway) or windows and carried into the room beyond. And yes. it's damage was potentially high in the right hands.
And the Best way to limit the 2e lightning bolt was that the DM could decide that when it reflected it always went straight back towards the caster. it made ricocheting less and likely self murdering higher which meant people were more careful how to use it. So it was best to know how your DM handled the matter of ricochet before casting it. But even if it came straight back towards you there were lots of ways to handle that and still meant you could likely hit enemies at least twice in a lot of instances.
When you finally hit your 3rd level spells I think everyone wants to grab Fireball for their Wizard. It is the quintessential Blow-Em-Up-Real-Good spell. I know I did for my Wizard playing Mad Mage. When we got farther down (spoiler haha) and stuff started having fire resistance I picked up Lightning Bolt as well. Instead of AoE it is directional - so if you can line up your foes, it can be super effective! But don’t get me wrong - the first time you cast Fireball with your character it is an awesome thing. You just have to watch your foe’s resistances and be careful not to blow up your friends.
I literally (like, two hours ago) hit fifth level with a wizard, and chose Lightning Bolt over Fireball for three reasons:
1) Mobility -- I'm a tabaxi with Misty Step. I can zip around a battlefield pretty well, which means getting in position to line up multiple foes isn't as tough for me as it might be other wizards
2) Utility -- Thinking back over the battles in the campaign so far, I really wouldn't have had as many good opportunities to use Fireball as I would have LB, and as a Divination wizard I can't carve out spots for my party in an AoE. Lightning Bolt seems both more adaptable and safer
3) Story -- I took Ray of Frost over Fire Bolt at first level as my main attacking cantrip because he learned magic while at Candlekeep, and practicing fire spells in a library was frowned upon. I decided to keep shying away from fire spells just as a quirk
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
Here's a good way to get Lightning Bolt back into fun play...
Use a 10 feet wide zig-zagging lightning bolt path 100 feet long that hits all non-allies in its path. If you want more precision, allow only 1 target to be struck for each 5 feet distance out, but the caster can choose between two side-by-side targets as the bolt travels along its 100 feet destruction.
This style allows more parity with fireball, yet allows more control in combat with allies, making it worth while, though sacrificing still some targets that fireball would get. After all, pyromancers in fiction literature, never really spare allies the flame in the blast, that's always been a cheat style with adepts in D&D.