How Spellcasting in Dungeons & Dragons Has Changed in 2024

Dungeons & Dragons has made a small but significant change to spellcasting in its 2024 Player’s Handbook. Since the release of Dungeons & Dragons’ 5th Edition ruleset back in 2014, many fans have been confused by how many spells they could cast in a single turn of combat. With both a bonus action and an action at their disposal, many players have assumed that they could use both to cast multiple spells in a turn, and the rules clarifying that you can’t were a bit ambiguous. In the rules for casting spells with a bonus action, the 2014 Player’s Handbook states “You must use a bonus action on your turn to cast the spell, provided that you haven’t already taken a bonus action this turn. You can’t cast another spell during the same turn, except for a cantrip with a casting time of 1 action.” 

In the 2024 Player’s Handbook, Wizards of the Coast provided some much-needed clarification and an intriguing twist for players. The 2024 Player’s Handbook explicitly states that players can only cast one spell that uses a spell slot per turn, regardless as to whether it requires an action or bonus action to cast. 

However, this rule seemingly synchronizes with certain species and class abilities that were introduced in the 2024 Player’s Handbooks. Several classes, subclasses, and species have class abilities that allow them to cast a spell a limited amount of times per short or long rest without expending a spell slot. In theory, this means that a Half Elf player at 5th Level could cast Misty Step to teleport to an advantageous position and then cast a second spell with an action. There’s nothing in the rulebook that prohibits this, although players generally have more potential uses of their bonus action on their turn, which could make trying to find dual-spell combos a bit less high priority except in certain situations.

The 2024 Player’s Handbook will be released on September 17th.