Simple Sorcerer
This is a homebrew version of the D&D 5th edition Sorcerer class. This version is designed to be simple and intuitive while bringing back the new-player friendliness and versatility the Sorcerer had in 3rd edition. The Simple Sorcerer is minimally changed, easy to learn, and different from other spellcasters.
Overview
The Sorcerer wields innate magic passed down from its heritage. Its powers are raw and unexplained. Rather than gaining power through study or servitude, Sorcerers gain power by learning to better understand themselves. Because their magic is innate, it is more limited than those who gain magic through study. However, this closeness gives Sorcerers a better understanding of and greater degree of control over their limited magic than other spellcasters possess. In that regard, a Sorcerer can be considered to be a magical specialist.
Class Features
All Sorcerer features are unchanged except for those listed below.
Sorcery
Replaces Spellcasting and Font of Magic
An event in your past, or in the life of a parent or ancestor, left an indelible mark on you, infusing you with arcane magic. This font of magic, whatever its origin, fuels your spells.
Cantrips
Unchanged
Sorcery Points
You have a pool of Sorcery Points equal to your Sorcerer Level, and you use this pool to fuel your spells. You can cast a spell you know by spending Sorcery Points equal to the spell's level. For example, a second-level spell would cost two Sorcery Points to cast.
You can also "upcast" a spell by spending additional Sorcery Points. For example, if you spend two Sorcery Points when casting the spell Burning Hands, you can cast Burning Hands as a second-level spell. You can never cast a spell at a higher level than the highest level spell you're capable of casting.
You recover Sorcery points equal to your level when you finish a short rest, and you recover your full Sorcery Point pool when you finish a long rest. Your total Sorcery Points can never exceed the size of your Sorcery Point pool.
Starting at Sorcerer Level 5, your total Sorcery Point pool increasse two times your Sorcerer Level. Starting at Sorcerer Level 11, your total Sorcery Point pool increases to three times your level.
Spells Known of 1st Level and Higher
Unchanged. Use the PHB table for spells known, and treat the highest level spell slot at a given level as the highest level spell the Sorcerer can cast.
Casting Spells of 6th Level and Higher
Spells of 6th level and higher are particularly taxing to cast. Once you've cast one of these spells, you cannot cast that spell again until you finish a Long Rest.
Spellcasting Ability
Unchanged
Spellcasting Focus
As the Sorcerer's magic is innate, you do not need a spellcasting focus and only need to provide spell components when they have a listed cost.
Innate Magic
Your Sorcerous origin grants you the ability to cast certain spells innately. You know these spells, and they do not count agains your total spells known. You cannot forget or replace these spells.
Sorcerous Recovery
Starting at Sorcerer Level 7, you learn to draw magical energy from your surroundings to replenish yourself. As a bonus action on your turn, you may regain Sorcery Points equal to your charisma modifier. Additionally, the next metamagic you use this round has no Sorcery Point cost. You must finish a long rest before you can use this feature again.
Innate Mastery
Replaces Sorcerous Restoration
Through practice, you've learned to alter your innate magic effortlessly. Starting at Sorcerer Level 20, Metamagic used on spells granted by your Innate Magic feature has no Sorcery Point cost.
Origin Changes
All origins are assumed to be the same except where changed. If a feature has the same name as an existing feature, it replaces that feature. Otherwise, use the origins as written. Each origin has been given five Innate Magic spells and a unique magical effect. The goal is to make the origins more impactful while also being mechanically and thematically distinct.
Draconic Bloodline
Colour of Magic
Sorcerers with the Draconic Bloodline can change the element of their damaging spells. When you cast a spell that includes damage rolls, you may change the type of those damage rolls to match the damage type of your Draconic Ancestry. You also have resistance to this damage type.
Innate Magic
| Sorcerer Level | Spell |
|---|---|
| 1st | Burning Hands |
| 3rd | Dragon's Breath |
| 5th | Fireball |
| 7th | Wall of Fire |
| 9th | Dominate Person |
Wild Magic
Wild Magic Surge
With a surge of uncontrolled magic, you weave the stuff of magic into a barely cohernt shape with only the shred of a purpose. You spend your action to cast a spell you don't know from the Sorcerer Spell list. You must spend the Sorcery Points necessary to cast this spell, it must be a spell of a level you could know, and you cannot cast spells of 6th level or higher using this feature.
Whenever you use this feature, immediately roll on the Wold Magic Surge table after you cast the spell.
You may use this feature a number of times equal to your Charisma modifier, regaining all uses when you finish a long rest.
Innate Magic
| Sorcerer Level | Spell |
|---|---|
| 1st | Catapult |
| 3rd | Enlarge/Reduce |
| 5th | Enemies Abound |
| 7th | Hallucinatory Terrain |
| 9th | Animate Objects |
Divine Soul
Divine Restoration
Whenever you spend Sorcery Points, you can restore a hit points to a creature you can see equal to the number of Sorcery Points spent.
Innate Magic
| Sorcerer Level | Spell |
|---|---|
| 1st | Cure Wounds (remove from Divine Magic) |
| 3rd | Spiritual Weapon |
| 5th | Beacon of Hope |
| 7th | Guardian of Faith |
| 9th | Dawn |
Shadow Magic
Eyes of the Dark
Darkvision unchanged. Darkness and related removed from feature. Add: you are always able to see clearly through spells and magical effects you create with Sorcery, such as the Darkness spell. Additionally, you do not need to concentrate to maintain the spell Darkness.
Innate Magic
| Sorcerer Level | Spell |
|---|---|
| 1st | Cause Fear |
| 3rd | Darkness |
| 5th | Bestow Curse |
| 7th | Evard's Black Tentacles |
| 9th | Cloudkill |
Storm Sorcery
Weathershaper
You are immune to strong winds and non-damaging weather-related effects such as Sleet Storm, but not including things like lightning. In addition, when a spell or magical effect you control creates strong winds, weather effects, or deals thundering or lightning damage, you may exclude certain areas and creatures from the effect as you see fit. You may change this designation at any time as a free action while you are conscious.
Innate Magic
| Sorcerer Level | Spell |
|---|---|
| 1st | Thunderwave |
| 3rd | Choose Gust of Wind OR Warding Wind |
| 5th | Choose Call Lightning OR Sleet Storm |
| 7th | Control Water |
| 9th | Choose Control Winds OR Maelstrom |
Notes, Design Philosophy, and Q&A
This version of the Sorcerer class is designed with three goals in mind:
- Simplicity: I wanted to create a version of the class that is friendly to new players. The existing Sorcerer is unfriendly to new players given its excessively limited feature use and lack of flexibility.
- Class Fantasy: I believe the existing Sorcerer's features do not properly reflect its Class Fantasy. The Sorcerer should feel like it has raw magic and powers granted by its Origin, and it should also use magic in a different way since the magic is coming from within. This homebrew makes alterations that change the way the class plays, making it more reflective of those ideas.
- Unique: Sorcerers should feel different from other spell casters. If the spell casters are sufficiently different and serve different purposes, then one is not better than another. Thus, it's in everyone's interests for the Sorcerer to feel like a Sorcerer, not like a Wizard with Metamagic and far fewer spells.
Spells Per Day
You can calculate a base Sorcerer's total spell power as the combined total of all of their spell slots' levels plus their Sorcery Point. For my Sorcery Pool, I came up with simple formula that, when combined with Sorcerous Recovery and assuming two short rests per day, results in the Sorcerer having Sorcery Points roughly equal to the current Sorcerer's combined points. The formula to calculate expected Sorcery Points per day is as follows:
SP per day = Level X Multiplier + Bonus
| Level | Multiplier | Bonus (optimal CHA) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 3 | 0 | |
| 5 | 4 | 0 | l |
| 7 | 4 | 4 | |
| 8 | 4 | 5 | |
| 11 | 5 | 5 |
For example, a 3rd-level Sorcerer would have about 9 Sorcery Points per day, which is two points lower than a level 3 Sorcerer's combined spell slots and Sorcery Points. However, a 12th level Sorcerer is expected to have 65 points, 6 more than the base Sorcerer's 59. Sorcery Points using this formula fall within 7 points of the base Sorcerer's combined total at all levels.
Wwon't this result in the Sorcerer casting more spells than another caster?
This may result in the Sorcerer casting more leveled spells per day than a full caster of comparable level. However, that's only if the Sorcerer favors lower level spells and uses few Metamagic options that day. This new system gives the Sorcerer power in flexibility but only a small increase, if any, in the number of spells cast per day.
Note that using Sorcery Points on spells directly competes with using Sorcery Points on Metamagic. Additionally, the Sorcerer's fewer spells known, lack of ritual casting, and relative lack of features besides Metamagic should be balanced by their relative flexibility in this system.
Also note that a Wizard using Arcane Recovery actually has a comparable number of converted spell points relative to this Sorcerer's Sorcery Points, and that's not counting rituals, Signature Spell, or other Wizard subclass features.
Hey, this system allows Sorcerers to cast multiple 6th+ level spells per day!
That's true, but never the same spell more than once. A different spellcaster could potentially cast the same 6th level several times per day depending on how many 6th+ slots they have, but not this Sorcerer. Additionally, this Sorcerer must give up a limited spell known in order to gain a spell of level 6 or higher. So, knowing that you can only cast a spell like that once per day, do you take more 6th+ spells and sacrifice your lower level, more flexible spells? Or do you forgo the more powerful spells to focus on low-level spells that can be cast much more freely? This kind of simple but impactful choice, I believe, is the stuff of good game design.
Lower level spells can potentially be upcast into 6th+ slots an increased number of times per day. However. upcasting a spell seldom changes what it does in any meaningful way - it just makes it more powerful. This effect can be thought of as a sort of bonus Metamagic, and one that will have a hefty cost if the Sorcerer makes frequent use of it.
What's with the Wild Magic origin?
Being able to cast a spell from the Sorcerer list that you don't currently know was a common suggestion, but it made the most sense to me for the Wild magic Sorcerer to gain this feature. It also made sense for this feature to trigger the Wild Magic Surge table, giving the player some control over when that feature gets used and thus killing two birds with one stone.
For the Innate Magic, rather than picking spells with "random" or chaotic effects, I chose ones likely to create chaos on the battlefield - ones I thought would be fun for the sort of player who would choose this origin. A table catapults across the room, a door suddenly grows much larger or smaller, friends attack each other, the terrain takes on a strange and troublesome appearance, and random objects come to life and attack - now this is podracing Wild Magic.
Why not just use Spell Points?
The spell point system in the DMG is clunky and unintuitive, in my opinion. I understand why they made each spell cost what it does, but I don't think it was the right approach for this kind of system. It creates an odd weighting effect where spells of a given level are more or less appealing simply due to the way point costs are broken down.
Additionally, it would interact weirdly with Sorcery Points. In order for Metamagic to be balanced, I would either need to change the cost of Metamagic in a strange way or I would need to require the player to track Spell Points and Sorcery Points separately, which would defeat the purpose of making a simpler, friendlier Sorcerer.