Originally Posted by Haravikk
Originally Posted by 1varangian
I hate the gimmicky "EK cantrips" (Booming Blade and Green Flame Blade) that were some kind of an attempt to make War Magic decent. Those cantrips didn't fix the class, but trapped it into using those exact Cantrips and nothing else. EK needs to be flexible like a 5th level EK attacking once, and then throwing a Fire Bolt at another distant enemy. That gives them something unique.
Those cantrips aren't that good for Eldritch Knights anyway; they're best on classes that only get one attack, or have a maximum of two attack with no action surge.

Ultimately Eldritch Knight in Baldur's Gate 3 is a lot like Eldritch Knight in 5th edition D&D, exactly as they aimed for it to be; it's a Fighter with a little bit of spellcasting sprinkled on top. You don't want to use action spells because that means you're not doing what Fighter is best at, namely making a bunch of attacks; you want spells you can do in addition to that, and which don't care too much about your Intelligence. That's why Shield is so good, likewise Magic Missile, some other highlights for combat are Expeditious Retreat (ironically for running towards enemies) and Fog Cloud. For cantrips it's all about the utility options like Friends for advantage on charisma checks, Dancing Lights or Light to cope with darkness, Mage Hand for fondling distant objects, and maybe Minor Illusion for triggering traps (since distracting enemies still uses the DC).

The EK is not working as they intended. They gave them Evocation spells, but the most effective way to play one is to ignore Evocation and dump your spellcasting stat, on a spellcaster subclass.

Your main class is the Fighter, but EK's ability directly contradicts Extra Attack, your main ability. That's why the EK feels off. An 11th level EK casting a 1st or 2nd level spell instead of attacking three times gets a really bad deal.

They have recognized that in One DnD playtest and War Magic now allows you to do exactly as I suggested all along - replacing one of your attacks with a Cantrip. It's a good step in fixing the subclass, but I think they should also allow leveled spells. It wouldn't break anything with the meager amount of spell progression EK's get. If you invest in Intelligence, burn a spell slot and trade one attack for a Scorching Ray, you should spike in damage. You're still going to be more efficient using that spell slot for Blur before attacking, but at least you would have some kind of a choice if you need a damage spike to save an ally or something.