I could really use some advice from someone with experience with new players dealing with D&D spell analysis paralysis.
I'm about to kick off a second D&D 5e campaign for a set of friends interested in trying D&D for the first time. They've got nearly zero experience with the game, and we're hitting some hurdles I didn't expect.
One of these is that two of them are playing classes with spells, and they've ended up with total choice paralysis. Both of them are terrified of choosing the "wrong" spells and keep changing their minds on a practically minute-to-minute basis. (Seriously, the amount of texts I've gotten from each of them…)
The difficulty is that it's hard to explain what the spells do or how useful they'll be when your audience has no personal experience with the game. I frequently end up in a circular conversation with a player asking me "how often will I x" where my response is "well…it depends on where you guys take the story" which is basically useless advice.
TL:DR; I'd like to make choosing spells more newbie-friendly from the get-go, but I don't know how.
I'm particularly looking for out-of-game DM solutions, rather than in-game roleplay ones. For that reason I don't believe this question is a duplicate — its answers are focused on giving the players a chance to change their minds later in the game, or offering other during-play ways to trial spells. I'm looking for an up-front solution (if there is one).
In response to a comment asking why I'm not looking for "later" solutions; I've already told them if they really hate their spells we can discuss swapping them later. This has had zero impact on their paralysis. If anything, it's made it worse because now spells that they previously (reluctantly) dismissed as undesirable are now contenders again. We've already pushed our game back a week because they couldn't make up their minds and they're threatening to need another week for further thought after I mentioned swapping later.
Post Mortem:
We managed to hold our session on time, and everyone had a blast. I ended up using a combination of some of the top answers;
Based on Shem's answer: I sent both of them lists of their spell options broken down into very basic descriptions. I probably over-simplified some of them and used a lot of incorrect terminology to put them in contexts my players would understand (and left out a few I felt would be useless in our campaign in particular), but it helped them rule out spells they either thought were too complicated to cast, or weren't something their character would like to use.
Based on crunchykids answer: I also emphasized that every spell would have a use somehow if they were creative about it, and that as a DM I was on their side and would try to accommodate them. I took time to differentiate between in- and out-of-combat spells and explain why having a mix was useful. I also reminded them that I was okay with on the fly switching (one player took advantage of this after deciding Light would be functionally useless in a party where 2/3 have darkvision…)
A big thank you to everyone who replied to this question; my best advice to others finding this later is to really sit down and listen to your players; everyone's different and tailoring your responses can help them get past the paralysis faster.
Best Answer
When I had a new player start playing with us about 6 months ago, she had this exact problem. My solution was two-fold.
Reduce the number of options
She wanted to play a druid, so there were lots of spells to pick from. So I reduced the spell list from 7 cantrips and 16 level 1 spells to a list of 3 cantrips and 6 spells (1st level druids pick 2 and 4 respectively).
In my case, she didn't know what sort of role she wanted to fill, or what sort of things she wanted out of her spells, so I picked a decent range of generally useful spells. If your player(s) have a better idea (healing, DPR, charm, illusion, utility, etc...) then you can tailor the selection to that.
I highly suggest if doing this for a caster with semi-permanent spell selection (Bard, Eldritch Knight, Ranger, Arcane Trickster, Sorcerer, Warlock, Wizard) that you allow them to change out their spells more frequently than is permitted in the books as they learn what they do and don't like. For example, if your Bard finds out they aren't a fan of Charm Person, let them swap it out for free, even if they haven't just leveled up.
Make short descriptions of the spells
I also did this for my new player, as druids frequently change out spells. I wrote up short descriptions of each spell, and their general purpose. Some examples:
This way, she had a quick idea of what each spell does, and could make the selection from there.
Final Notes
This method seemed to work well, although it's a sample size of 1, so YMMV. I think it requires a certain amount of trust between player and GM (since the GM is reducing their choices), but it gets them on their feet quickly, and if you allow them to change after the fact, it doesn't penalize them for their choices, which will make it easier on them to make a choice.