Thought I'd be Done By Now...

The "Mists of Lamordia" campaign is now very clearly into its final quarter - the PCs have to complete their investigations into the Amber Temple, which should both open the doors to the prison and resolve the Curse of the Neverborn, and then they can proceed to deal with the exorcism of Katya Rose, and finally deal with the Darklord and conclude the campaign.

All of which is good, except that I initially thought we'd be wrapping up in 2020, then I thought we'd be done by the time Surprise! made his appearance, and now it looks like we won't be done within this calendar year. It's not that I mind any of this, but I'm very much ready both for a break and then for a change!

Suggestion: Common and Uncommon Classes

One of the things introduced in the 5e PHB is the notion of common races (human, dwarf, elf, halfling) that are assumed to be present in 'every' campaign and uncommon races that may or may not be.

My suggestion for 5e Essentials would be to do much the same for classes - assume that the Cleric, Fighter, Rogue, and Wizard are found in 'every' campaign, but that other classes may or may not be. This then provides scope for other campaigns to introduce new classes of more specific utility, and indeed to replace some of the existing classes with local classes that fit better. And by encoding the split into the books, they also make it easier for the DM to sell the absences.

Addendum: Minor Spellcasting House Rule

Back in March I posted a house rule concerning "Minor Spellcasting" - where a character gains a small number of spells from their race, a feat, or other source, and where they also gain spellcasting from their class, the spellcasting ability from the minor ability is overridden by that from their class.

The addendum to that rule simply takes things a little further: the spells gained from Minor Spellcasting are simply added to the character's spells known (and considered "always prepared" in the case of prepared spellcasters such as Wizards), and slots added as appropriate.

For example, a 5th level Tiefling Sorcerer knows 5 cantrips and 6 spells. They also have 4/3/2 slots of each level. As a Tiefling, they also gain the thaumaturgy cantrip, hellish rebuke (as a 2nd level spell), and darkness (another 2nd level spell).

As a consequence of the house rule, they now know 6 cantrips and 8 spells, and have 4/5/2 spell slots of each level.

Finally, at various times the character has the ability to switch out some spells for others. This includes those spells and cantrips granted by the Minor Spellcasting trait.

It's worth noting that this does mean a small increase in flexibility, and consequently power, for such characters. But it's such a minor boost that the reduction in bookkeeping makes it worth it, at least for me.