[RPG] Is this homebrew Chromatic Blade spell balanced

dnd-5ehomebrew-reviewspells

Honestly, this spell was my Eldritch Knight player's idea but I thought it interesting and am trying to work out the balance. It's sort of a hybrid of the chromatic orb and green-flame blade spells.

Spell Concept

The idea is to imbue chromatic orb's ability to pick the element, a powerful ability, into a melee attack with similar-ish splash damage. Something akin to the dragon's breath spell's short-range cone felt right.

Current Draft

Chromatic Blade

2nd-level evocation

Casting Time: 1 action
Range: 5 feet
Components: V, M (a weapon)
Duration: Instantaneous

Your weapon gleams with incandescent light. You choose acid, cold, fire, lightning, poison, or thunder for the type of glow you create. As part of the action used to cast this spell, you must make a melee attack with a weapon against one creature within the spell's range, otherwise the spell fails. On a hit, the target suffers the attack's normal effects, and elemental energy of that type bursts forth from your weapon in a 5-foot cone directed at the point of attack. Creatures within the cone's area of effect take 2d6 damage of the chosen elemental type.

At Higher Levels. When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 3rd level or higher, the damage increases by 1d6 for each slot level above 2nd.

Wording clarifications for reading purposes

  • "Incandescent" tends to mean "glows from being heated" (like an
    incandescent light bulb). The nearest alternative I could think of
    was radiant, and while I think that's a better fit semantically, that
    is already its own damage type (and intentionally not one of the
    options here to keep in line with chromatic orb). I could just say
    "chromatic light", but chromatic is just the light spectrum already
    so that's lame/nonsense.

  • "directed at the point of attack" is a little awkward, but the intent
    is "from you in the direction of the attack". Unsure on the best wording
    there to represent this.

  • "Cone of 5-ft. radius": The intent of the spell is to represent an
    area like so:

     | | |X|
     |O|X|X|
     | | |X|
    

    With the O being the caster, and the Xs being the targets. So the
    cone would include the hit target of the melee attack (like
    green-flame blade) and proceed to jump to the 3 adjacent/back tiles
    (back, diagonal up, diagonal down). If there's a better way to word
    that part in general, I'd be open to it.

Balance considerations

My thinking was that being able to pick your element is a powerful feature of chromatic orb, and giving it an AOE effect both warranted it dealing less direct damage than the nearest equivalents (1 casting of chromatic orb and 1 spray of dragon's breath). Math comparisons of similar abilities/attacks/spells:

  • chromatic orb: 1st-level spell, does 3d8 of chosen type to a
    single target based on spell attack roll (averaging 13.5 on a hit)
  • dragon's breath: 2nd-level spell, does 3d6 per breath (average 10.5
    per target) but with a save so at least some guaranteed damage
    (average 5.25 on a save per target) and across a 15-foot cone (bigger
    area than proposed)
  • dragonborn breath weapon: once per short rest and character-specific
    (like from a red dragonborn), does 2d6 of your draconic ancestry's
    elemental type (average 7 per target) with an associated save for
    half damage (average 3.5 per target) for a 5-foot cone (same area)
  • scorching ray: 2nd-level spell, 3 individual ranged attack rolls
    for 2d6 fire damage per hit (average 7 per hit)
  • green-flame blade: cantrip, melee hit + fire damage on additional
    creature within 5 feet based on your spell modifier (1-5 realistically)

All of the above scale to include an extra damage die per level, or in the case of green flame blade, being a cantrip, at select player levels.

Alternatives/options speculated

  • Could perhaps use a save for the elemental damage, Dex or Con
    respective to the element chosen like normal)

    • Pro(s): fits closer to the dragon's breath spell's damage per
      target (also 2nd level)
    • Con(s): spell already requires a struck melee attack before it does
      anything and that then means its a roll per target, which I know
      lots of spells do but just adds to the complexity of the mechanics
  • Could make it just a single additional target within 5ft of the melee
    attack target.

    • Pro(s): Would make it fit a little closer to Green Flame Blade's effect
    • Con(s): then the damage at face value seems a little underwhelming
      being 2d6 per target (though in its current form of not needing
      a secondary save for each target in the cone, it's potentially up to
      melee weapon + 8d6 damage in total, compared to 6d6 for all 3 rays
      hitting for scorching ray, and you get to pick the damage type for
      this, though a more realistic situation of melee target + 1 extra
      is melee + 4d8 chosen damage)
  • Could increase/decrease the damage dealt or increase the range if the
    damage seems right but maybe not enough AOE (more similarly scoped to
    dragon's breath spell, also 2nd-level)

    Overall, is this homebrew chromatic blade spell balanced? How could it be improved?

Best Answer

This is a great start

I always love when player's have a idea for a unique ability they want for their character so even if this was slightly over-powered I would consider allowing it. Overall it looks pretty good and I think you've done a good job and thinking through the balance of the spell overall. I'll just highlight a few things that I noticed from reading it.

"Incandescent light" is ambiguous

While I thematically understand what you were going for. Emitting light is a mechanical term in D&D and "incandescent" isn't one of the types. It would be better to simply stick with "dim light" or "bright light" and specify a distance. Or if you don't intend for it to emit light, consider rewording or removing this entirely.

The area of effect is wrong

A 5 foot cone would only hit the first target. I think the correct area for the effect you want is a 10 foot cone originating from you and directed toward the target of the attack.

Damage is underwhelming

For a second level spell the damage isn't that spectacular. Of the spell you compare it too, Scorching Ray has significantly more range and Dragon's breathe has up to 10 activation per casting. I think you could consider increasing this, consider spells such as Burnings Hands and Ice Knife in your comparison.

No save for additional targets

Basically this is a AoE spell that only requires an attack roll against the closest enemy in the range. If used cleverly you could attack a low AC target and have a high AC target as one of the additional targets which would then take automatic damage. Instead I would consider something like the Ice Knife mechanic where the additional effect is trigger hit or miss but allows a saving throw for half damage.

Missing the attack roll is a big cost

Currently there is a huge opportunity cost to cast this spell. Assuming the fighter is at least level 5 they are giving up their extra attack and a second level spell slot for the chance to do some extra damage. If they miss the attack roll it is all wasted.

I would suggest either activating the effect hit or miss as mentioned above or looking at the Paladin's smite spells that activation on the next melee hit instead of as part of the action to cast it.

Conclusion

I like the spell overall, I think its a good start. And while I think it could be improved I don't think it is so unbalanced that I would ban it at my table. If you do make changes remember that each of the comments I made were to that issue in isolation. Some of the issues are related so if you modify one consider how it effects the others.

Good luck and remember to wait at least 3 days before posted an new iteration to give time for multiple answer to come in.

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