Magic Initiate in the 2014, current iteration, works the following way: you pick a class - namely Bard, Cleric, Druid, Sorcerer, Warlock, or Wizard, and you pick two cantrips from their spell list and one 1st level spell. You can then cast those cantrips at will, and you can cast that 1st level spell for free once per day - but only just that one time unless you have another way to cast it.
More importantly for our purposes here, you use the spellcasting ability of the class whose spells you took. If it's a Bard, Sorcerer, or Warlock spell, you use Charisma. If it's a Cleric or Druid spell, you use Wisdom, and if it's a Wizard spell, you use Intelligence. (Naturally, there's some overlap here, but you choose your class first, before your spells, and it's that class whose ability you use).
This does limit things somewhat - if you want to pick up, say, Guiding Bolt as a Wizard, you'd still have to use your Wisdom to cast it.
However, if we look at the Character Origins UA version of the feat, the design is significantly different.
First off, this is one of the free feats you can get as part of your background, which means it's far easier to justify picking it up.
Second, you can re-cast your leveled spell if you have spell slots to do so.
Another really big change is that, rather than dividing things by class, they instead sort spells into three categories - Arcane, Divine, and Primal. Rather than picking a class, you instead pick one of these three categories. There's also some overlap between these.
But, as you'll note, while the two classes that are generally "primal" casters both use Wisdom (Druids and Rangers) there are also instances where classes use different abilities - Clerics use Wisdom, but Paladins use Charisma, despite both being Divine spellcasters.
As such, the new version of Magic Initiate simply lets you pick your spellcasting ability for the spells in question.
And that opens things up significantly... and largely through a little spell called Shillelagh.
Shillelagh is a Druid cantrip. It's sort of a damage cantrip, though it doesn't actually do any damage on its own. Instead, you use it as a bonus action to empower a club or quarterstaff you have in hand - the wooded weapon grows more gnarled and bigger, and now, instead of using Strength to attack with it, you instead use your spellcasting ability. Its damage die also become a d8. Also, the weapon becomes magical for the 1-minute duration.
Because this is restricted to Druids, the main intentional use for it is that Druids can use it to get a bit more useful in melee situations, even though they're not built to be melee combatants (well, not as a baseline class at least).
Tasha's introduction of the Druidic Warrior fighting style, which would allow them to pick up this cantrip, is pretty great, as it allows a player to really focus in on being a Wisdom-based character (a good match for the updated Beast Master, who use their spell attack modifier to govern their pet's chance to hit).
But by adding it to this new feat, you open up a ton of possibilities:
Paladins would typically have to multiclass into Hexblade Warlocks if they wanted to be able to use Charisma as their melee weapon ability - a powerful combination, to be sure, but one that requires delaying or losing various paladin class features (most profoundly, delaying an Aura of Protection that is likely to be more powerful with a maxed-out Charisma).
This could also allow an Eldritch Knight Fighter to pour everything into Intelligence.
This also, in fact, opens up a lot more options for Pact of the Blade Warlocks. Bladelocks have been strongly incentivized to go with a Hexblade patron for their subclass ever since Xanathar's Guide to Everything came out. And while there's a thematic reason for that, it also limits your options. Taking the new Magic Initiate would make such a build much more viable for non-Hexblade subclasses (though it's tough to turn down medium armor and shields as well). Indeed, Warlocks have long used Pact of the Tome to get hold of a Charisma-based Shillelagh, but this locks them out of invocations like Thirsting Blade, which grant Extra Attack.
This would also likely be of real use to Valor and Swords Bards, who can fully invest in Charisma to boost their spellcasting and, thanks to their proficiency in Medium Armor, they only need 14 Dexterity to fully boost their AC.
A Bladesinger Wizard could also pick this up - because they only ever get light armor, they'll still probably want some Dexterity eventually, but early on they can really focus on Intelligence and still be quite effective in melee.
The point is, this little change to an existing feat can really revolutionize character builds for half-casters and other classes that wish to mix spellcasting and melee combat. Shillelagh is a cantrip that is somewhat forgettable when limited to Druids (except maybe in a Circle of Spores build that wants to make use of the bonus poison damage) but as soon as it branches out to other classes, it can be really good.
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