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Potential Class Homebrew Feature: Prepared Spellshapes
I'm considering a class feature, or potentially a feat granted at the GM's discretion, that would allow a prepared spellcaster to incorporate Spellshapes into their spell preparation.
The basic concept is to trade spell strength for action economy:
* Normal Spellshape: Cast the spell at its full rank, but spend the additional action required by the Spellshape.
* Prepared Spellshape: The Spellshape requires no additional action, but the spell's effects are determined as though the spell were heightened to one rank lower than the rank of the spell slot used.
The intent isn't to simply grant free Spellshapes. Instead, the caster chooses between full spell strength and better action economy.
Prepared Spellshapes
If you have access to a Spellshape that normally requires 1 action and does not change the number of actions required to Cast the subsequent spell, you can prepare that Spellshape with a particular spell.
When you cast a spell using a prepared Spellshape:
* You do not spend the Spellshape's normal action.
* The spell's effects are determined as though it were heightened to one rank lower than the rank of the spell slot used.
* You still expend the spell slot at its actual rank.
* The reduction cannot cause the spell to be treated as lower than its lowest spell rank. If reducing the spell by one rank would place it below its lowest spell rank, you cannot use the prepared Spellshape with that casting.
For example, if a 3rd-rank spell is cast using a 5th-rank spell slot with a prepared Spellshape, the spell still expends a 5th-rank spell slot, but its effects are determined as though it were a 4th-rank spell.
Conversely, a 2nd-rank spell with a lowest spell rank of 2nd cannot use a prepared Spellshape when cast from a 2nd-rank slot, because reducing it by one rank would place it below its lowest spell rank.
This creates three basic options:
Normal spell: Full rank, no Spellshape.
Normal Spellshape: Full rank, but spend the additional action.
Prepared Spellshape: One rank lower, but without spending the additional action.
The goal is for the third option to be a meaningful action-economy tradeoff rather than simply being a free version of the Spellshape.
Daily Mastered Combination
There is a problem at 1st level: all spell slots are 1st rank, so applying the normal −1-rank reduction would make prepared Spellshapes unusable on 1st-rank spells. The same issue can occur with a cantrip at its lowest spell rank.
To address this, during daily preparations, choose one spell prepared in one of your highest-rank spell slots, or one cantrip, and one of your prepared Spellshapes that can be applied to it. This spell and Spellshape form your Daily Mastered Combination.
If you choose a slotted spell
The first time each day you cast that spell using the Daily Mastered Combination, you can use the prepared Spellshape without reducing the spell's rank.
Any subsequent casting of that spell using the prepared Spellshape follows the normal prepared Spellshape rules, treating the spell as though it were heightened to one rank lower, provided that doing so does not place it below its lowest spell rank.
If the spell cannot be reduced by one rank because doing so would place it below its lowest spell rank, you cannot use the prepared Spellshape for that subsequent casting.
This provides a single full-strength use of a prepared Spellshaped spell while still preserving the normal tradeoff for additional uses.
If you choose a cantrip
A cantrip chosen as a Daily Mastered Combination can be cast with its prepared Spellshape without reducing its rank.
You can use the prepared Spellshape with that cantrip once per 10 minutes. The effect of the casting of the combination results in the full normal rank, instead of the reduced rank.
The cantrip can always be cast normally without the Spellshape.
The intent here is that the cantrip option functions roughly as an encounter-level benefit rather than a once-per-day resource. Since cantrips are intended to be cast repeatedly, limiting the mastered Spellshape to once per 10 minutes makes the choice useful without allowing the caster to apply the Spellshape to every cantrip they cast.
This also creates an interesting choice as the character gains higher-rank spell slots: the player can decide whether the action-economy benefit on a frequently used cantrip is more valuable than the full-strength use of a Spellshape on a highest-rank spell.
Curriculum Interaction
For a Wizard with a Curriculum, a Curriculum spell prepared with a Spellshape could provide an additional choice at the time of casting.
A prepared Curriculum spell could be cast either:
Normally: At its full rank without the prepared Spellshape.
With its prepared Spellshape: Without spending the Spellshape's additional action, but with the spell treated as one rank lower.
This would give Curriculum spells a particularly interesting interaction with the system.
For example, a Wizard could prepare a Curriculum spell with a Spellshape and decide at the time of casting whether the situation calls for:
the full-strength spell without the Spellshape,
the full-strength spell with the Spellshape by spending the normal additional action, or
the lower-rank spell with the prepared Spellshape for improved action economy.
This seems thematically appropriate for a Wizard, since Curriculum already represents specialized familiarity with particular spells.
Spellshape Access
The number and level of Spellshapes that can be prepared would be based on the caster's spellcasting proficiency:
Spellcasting Rank
Prepared Spellshapes
Trained
1 Spellshape of 1st level
Expert
1 additional Spellshape no higher than 2nd level
Master
1 additional Spellshape no higher than 6th level
Legendary
1 additional Spellshape no higher than the caster's current level
The Spellshape must be one available to the caster's class.
Whenever you gain a level, you can replace one prepared Spellshape with another Spellshape which you qualify for at approximately the same level.
If you later gain permanent access to one of your prepared Spellshapes, you can replace that prepared Spellshape with another Spellshape of approximately equivalent level.
The intent is to allow the character's collection of prepared Spellshapes to evolve as they gain experience without allowing them to freely change them every day.
Who Should Get This?
I'm currently undecided whether this should be:
a Wizard class feature,
a feat available to prepared spellcasters,
or potentially something granted by the GM as an alternative class option.
I'm leaning toward it being a Wizard class feature because the mechanic strongly reinforces the Wizard's identity as a prepared spellcaster, and the interaction with Curriculum makes the concept particularly compelling for Wizards.
It also gives daily preparation another meaningful dimension without simply increasing the number of spells a Wizard can prepare.
What I'm Trying to Accomplish
The basic design goal is:
Preparation lets you trade some spell power for action economy.
A normal Spellshape says:
Spend an additional action to modify the spell while keeping the spell at full strength.
A prepared Spellshape says:
Prepare the modification in advance and accept a one-rank reduction in the spell's effects in exchange for not spending that action.
The Daily Mastered Combination then represents one particularly practiced spell/Spellshape pairing that the caster can execute at full strength, with cantrips instead providing a once-per-10-minutes option.
I think this gives prepared casters with specifically the wizard in mind, an interesting reason to think about how they prepare their spells, rather than simply which spells they prepare.
The main question I'm interested in feedback on is whether there are particular Spellshapes—or specific spell + Spellshape combinations—that make this tradeoff disproportionately favorable.
In particular, I'm interested in whether any Spellshape becomes problematic when its action cost is removed in exchange for reducing the spell's effective rank by 1.
I feel this could be a fitting upgrade to the Experimental Spellshaping arcane thesis, which is currently really underwhelming, and if you do that you may not even need to downgrade the spell's heightening. If this lets you still use an action to layer an additional spellshape on top, this would make that particular Wizard the best at playing with spellshapes.
As for the power level of this, I would say most spellshapes tend to be situational, or their usefulness comes from things like adding a bit more range or the like, so in most cases this would probably feel more like a nice bit of added customization than a raw power boost. If the intent is to give this to classes besides the Wizard, one of the spellshapes I'd be careful with though is the one you get at 20th level that lets you cast lower-rank spells without expending a spell slot, like Bloodline Conduit: in those particular cases, the extra action I think is part of the intended cost, and baking the spellshape into those spells means you could toss out a free slow or the like at no spell slot or added action cost. Probably not the most outrageous thing classes can do at that level, but still worth bearing in mind.