D&D 5E - Lightning Bolt should be better.
Being a line just makes it impractical (and that goes for other line effects too). It's a red-letter day when you can hit three opponents with a line effect, where radius effects can affect multiple targets much, much easier.Sure if you have a lightning bolt prepared you can use it to pump 8d6 damage into a large single enemy with not too many problems. But by the time you're 5th-8th level, large single enemies won't be too frightened by that, and the archer ranger with hunter's mark and colossus slayer will be doing almost as much every round, at a longer range and not limited by spell slots.
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Chauncey Koziol
Update: 2024-07-10