Top 3 Most Overlooked Cantrips for D&D

Greetings and well met fellow dorks, welcome to the Forge, courtesy of Nerdarchy’s hospitality. Today we have for you just a quick post about those fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons overlooked cantrips that tend not to get picked. Be it they seem underwhelming or, to some players, they’re not combat relevant so why bother? 

Top 3 D&D cantrips worth a second look

Let’s kick things off with blade ward, a cantrip that is definitely combat orientated but always left on the side whilst cooler, flashier cantrips are picked for the team. Blade ward gives you resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage until your next turn, and that’s where it falls flat for most folk. It takes an action to cast and why not spend that time attacking, dodging, disengaging etc.? But… what if you were a sorcerer with quicken spell metamagic? For one measly sorcery point you can bonus action cast any cantrip you dork well please and that makes blade ward incredibly useful. Maybe you’ve gone the gish route (a melee fighting caster), getting into the thick of things and then compensating for all those d6 hit die with some half damage. Or perhaps you’re just a normal sorcerer and you want the security of knowing you can tough out a sticky situation if need be.

I’m going to also mention true strike here as it’s a cantrip that benefits somewhat from casting at a bonus action. However, due to the spell wording specifying on your next turn, it remains of limited use.

Next up is the veritable hair dryer of household spells, gust. The long and short of this fellow is that you can create a gust of wind that can: push a medium or smaller creature up to 5 feet away from you, move an object less than 5 lbs. up to 10 feet away from you or create an affect (rustling leaves, doors slamming and so on). Using a full action to potentially knock a hostile a whopping 5 feet away! It’s a bit lackluster, isn’t it? Unless that 5 feet is the edge of blade barrier or some such, you’re at best attempting to gain the Disengage action in a more risky way (you daredevil you). So firstly, a cantrip is always going to be more useful if you cast it as a bonus action, let’s just get that out the way. More interesting is the second ability. What if the object in question was a bag of flour when the big bad has just turned invisible to flee? Or a bag or spices just waiting to get into the eyes of that large number of guards the Dungeon Master knows you can’t outfight? Well the latter, you just invented medieval, magical mace.

Finally we have mending. You wave your magical hands and as long as a tear or break isn’t greater than 1foot in diameter, you magically repair it. Besides some side work as a tailor, you could use this to essentially create an undetectable secret pocket.

Think about it, no hidden flap or zip, no signs of restitching a pesky investigation check could reveal. You open it with a blade, you close it with a cantrip and in the meantime, that treasure map stays safely and securely hidden in the lining of your cloak. Not as fancy as the other options, but a nice little touch that may pay off in a pinch when the city watch couldn’t find those last few lock picks you squirreled away.

So, there you have it, a short read on some of the lesser chosen cantrips in D&D. You’ve got your nerdy content here at Nerdarchy, get yourself some dorkiness to go alongside it at the Forge.

For more outside-the-box DMing, subscribe to the Dork Forge newsletter and RSS feed at the Dork Forge, but before you go, comment below on what cantrips do you think are under picked?

By Paul Hughes

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