2:35 Bane [PHB 216] 4:48 Faerie Fire [PHB 239] 7:13 Hex [PHB 251] and Bestow Curse [PHB 218] 10:57 Heat Metal [PHB 250] 14:39 Slow [PHB 277] 20:20 Synaptic Static [XGTE 167] 22:57 Contagion [PHB 217]* *See November Errata here for the new version of Contagion: dnd.wizards.com/articles/sage-advice/errata-november-2018
Honorable Mentions: Blindness/Deafness: no concentration disadvantage and advantage. Darkness: blindness with no save. Silence: ends spell casting. Hold Person: you can still hit them, and hits auto-crits.
When a creature casts a spell while slowed, does it have to hold concentration until the next turn like when you prepare a spell to cast it with your reaction? Attacking a creature to end its concentration and lose the spell’s casting entirely would be amazing.
My DM's response to physic damage... Star Spawn. I didn't have a good time when I was in the melee of two giant star spawns and my bard just decided to hurl a Synaptic Static at the other one.
It is only a cantrip, but at low levels vicious mockery is brutal on hard hitting single attack monsters. Not to mention great fun from a roleplaying stand point.
@@Endershock1678 One time my party was attacked by bandits up in the trees. My bard used viscous mockery to insult one of the bandits telling him that he was a bad man and that he should feel bad. The bandit failed the save, and decided I was right, so he jumped out of the tree, landed on his head, and died. Then I ended up feeling bad. I love the vicious mockery spell, but it's always a bit weird when an enemy dies to it, because it usually gets played out as some sort of suicide, and that's sad. Words can hurt, guys.
Cantrips are more damaging than many levelled spells in 5e. In fact, in 5e, if you're given the choice between a cantrip or a single 1st level spell slot, you're usually better off taking a cantrip. Usually. not always.
@@walterbunn280 That's only the case if you're level 11 or higher and your cantrips deal 3 dice of damage or more, or if you're in a special circumstance like a warlock or dragon sorcerer who gets to add their main stat modifier to damage. Most 1st level damage spells deal 3d6 or 3d8 damage to a single target and are as good or better than cantrips in the majority of cases. And yes, I realize that a 2d10 firebolt is better than a 3d6 1st level spell, but if you have a 1st level spell that only deals 3d6, then it probably comes with some other benefit, like it being AoE or inflicting a condition. In most cases, if I'm casting a cantrip instead of a 1st level spell, it's not because the damage is better. It's because I'd rather save those 1st level slots for utility or defensive spells, like Shield. Sometimes I might up-cast a 1st level damage spell into a 2nd lvl slot though.
I'm a big proponent of Slow vs some other classic spells for one reason: It's not an actual listed "condition." By that I mean, a monster you cast it on won't ever be inherently immune to it at any point in a game. Slow keeps its viability throughout the game because of this-whether or not you cast it on the right creatures/while they're experiencing other stat penalty effects, is up to a smart player
I used to just cast web, entangle and cloudkill/fireball etc. When crowd control works its op. Slow is great on the good dps attackers. Hold person etc is powerful. Just dropping an attackers saving throws can allow cheese combos ending in finger of death. Polymorph can be helpfull as well. A melee attacker with high dps is useless if you Polymorph into a creature with 90% physical damage resistance. Same with a magic resistance, Polymorph musturd jelly for the 90% magic resistance. You can tank dragons this way. Protection against xyz can make some monsters or undead less dangerous. Fear of all kinds works if the other group cant buff a protection from fear. CC allows you to prevent high dps focusing on one player and thus killing him. It also allows you to focus on spell casters and kept the melee out of the fight. People like to cast buffs like haste along with strenght buffs from potions etc. You dont want buffed melee attacking players with such high dps and chance to hit. High level spell casters can be hard to kill and cast insane spells. By focusing them you hope to prevent spell casting and shut them down. It can take awhile to get a good spell casters protections down. You dont want strong melee dps killing and interrupting you. Thus cc everything you can. Debuff everyone you can. Basicly some mages can enter a spell casting loop and cast armies of powerful summons. In BG2 ToB one mage can kill everything in his path if left free to spell cast. The game had a summon limit of 5 summoned critters per map but this does not apply to clones. Project Image and Simulacrum clones can summon an unlimited number of critters in any area. This also allows you to summon multiple Devas or Planetars, bypassing the celestial summon limit of 1. Thus one mage can kill everything. You can abuse the wish spell this way as well. With BG2 casting Restoration on a Simulacrum clone will bump it up to the original caster's level. In the case of sorcerers, it will even give the clone the same spell slots as the caster. This is becuase clones were level drained and the restoration removes the level drain.
Another good thing about slow is that it sticks untill they actually make their saving throw. Nothing feels worse then casting hypnotic pattern on the BBEG and next turn one of his fodder minnions just slaps him back awake
So one time, a sorcerer villain of mine turned invisible to run away, and so my warlock pulled out the wand of wonder and casted it on the sorcerer's general area. He rolled faerie fire. I was upset.
*in magic item shop* Player: I wanna sneak into the room behind the counter and steak something Me, thinking about how this guy has frickin legendary items and will very easily kill the party when he finds out: you wanna what now
My wild magic sorcerer once accidentally turned everyone in a 30ft radius invisible, including the ogre we were fighting. Luckily I also had Faerie Fire which I cast on him the next turn. I love that spell so much. The drow in my group always forgets that he has that spell until it's too late.
@@tigert2092 Any self respecting magic item vendor should keep all of their magic items well warded to prevent them from being stolen. Put them in glass cases under Arcane Lock and possibly Glyph of warding for the more expensive pieces. Or one of my personal favorites, Enchant them with Magic Mouth that yells, "Get your hands off of me, thief!" if anyone but the shopkeep tries to get to them. You could even homebrew some sort of enchantment that prevents any of the magic items from leaving the shop unless the shopkeep removes the enchantment. If you're going to have a Magic Mart in your game, you can bet it's going to be well protected.
Just wanted to throw out how game changing it can be if your enemy fails the save against Feeblemind. Having a Lich who burned up its Legendary Resistances reduced to a barely sentient animal can really help
Feeblemind is game-winning when it lands but the really shitty damage and the very high spell slot makes it really unappealing to waste that slot on a spell that may do almost nothing. This is made worse by the fact that the enemies you really want to hit with Feeblemind (casters) tend to have good INT saves anyways. The one class that would be, IMO, the best user of Feeblemind - Sorcerers, due to the Heighten metamagic - does not even get it.
@@Archimonde259 Twinned Heightened or Subtle feeblemind... It's so hard to get it for sorcerers but really worth it. Also, wild magic sorcerers have ability to penalize saves even more.
You didn't mention the best part of Bestow Curse, which is: • While cursed, the target must make a Wisdom saving throw at the start of each of its turns. If it fails, it wastes its action that turn doing nothing. Doing NOTHING :D
That's a choice you have to make (you don't get all 4 effects listed), they were focusing on the saving throw debuff option since they grouped the spell with hex. However, I agree that causing foes to do nothing is generally the strongest option
Once I was in a session where the party was trapped in an arena. The DM unleashed an adult white dragon (way above anything we could handle) and I used bestow curse like this. While it wasted six (SIX) turns, our party went through the gate to the dragon's pen, locked said gate, and proceeded to escape from the arena.
True, but imagine how powerful it would be to have war caster and be able to caste bestow curse as a reaction opportunity attack. Enemy leaves your space. Boom! Cursed.
I always save a Curse for my Portent. First time I cast it though my DM thought it only wasted actions... really disappointing when I found out the truth later. The dragon shouldn't have been able to fly away.
What I really like about Bestow Curse is that paragraph: "At the GM's option, you may choose an alternative curse effect, but it should be no more powerful than those described above. The GM has final say on such a curse's effect." Which really makes this spell amazing narrative tool for both players and GMs.
And then you have DMs who ignore the "not more powerful" part and say "bro you upcast that thing with your 9th level slot to make it permanent. Give him an urge to eat his balls every twenty minutes and have them regrow or whatever" (highlevel campaigns are funny. That campaign was somewhat derailed or rather finished at that point. DM had to wing an entire next session because what the dice made out of his final fight was unsatisfying. Paladin. 5crits. So he kinda was on the "ridiculous wave" when the curse happened. And when our wizard cast the curse DM looked like he bit in a lemon. We all kinda wanted the "eat your own balls" curse now DM had said it but no our wizard had to sever this guy's connection to his god. (The cleric who was the main antagonist of our campaign, who already was a bloody pulp at our feet barely alive. So we brought a nearly dead, entirely worthless cleric to the city guard and had him busted instead of killed)
9th level alternative bestow curse effect 2d4 necrotic damage at the end of their turn. 9th level means it stays until removed. Curse then run away or have lot's of counter spells ready and watch them slowly die
I just wanted to advocate being a patron. These two produce great weekly content and are super approachable and happy to discuss mechanics and provide advice. An extremely worthwhile investment. You also get to learn why Kelly's character loves trench coats.
@@elgatochurro For one they're pretty active on the account itself. So you get alot of in jokes, advice, and behind the scenes of their production. Additionally, they usually post the videos on here early exclusively for patrons.
Funny thing I've done with Hex: I knew I was getting into an encounter with some Yuanti, so I prepared an action to cast it on the BBEG when the encounter started. So combat started, and before we rolled initiative, I casted Hex on it, targeting its Dexterity ability checks... So guess who rolled initiative with disadvantage?
Another shout out for Blindness. Search your monster ability descriptions for “can see”. Many very dangerous monster attacks, like dragon lair actions, demonic charms of creatures like vampires and succubi, and most gaze attacks, RAW can only be used on what the monster can see.
Yeah, a _lot_ of creatures (including spellcasters) lose much of what makes them special when they can't see. It's a 2nd-level spell that burns legendary resistances. And unlike most disabling spells, it _doesn't require concentration._ So you can maintain your other concentration spells (control, buff, debuff, summon), and the spell won't come undone if you take damage or become incapacitated. In some ways the blinded condition is harsher than the restrained condition. They both cause everyone's attacks against the affected creature to have advantage, and they both impose disadvantage on the affected creature's attacks, but based on the Unseen Attackers and Targets rule, a blind creature also has to guess the location of the target or they automatically miss. Some additional rules: Enemies can only make opportunity attacks against creatures they can see. The Dodge action only imposes disadvantage on attacks when the dodger can see the attacker. And when you make a ranged attack while within 5 feet of an enemy, you usually suffer disadvantage on the attack roll, but only when the enemy can see you. The main downside of the spell is how hard it can be to land. The range is only 30 feet. It targets Constitution saves, which tend to be high. All oozes are immune, as are a bunch of plants and eyeless constructs. And hundreds of other creatures (like dragons, snakes, insects, and creatures that burrow or swim) have blindsight or tremorsense as a backup. But there are still a ton of dangerous creatures that are seriously hampered by blindness.
The best spell is still 1st editions "Sticks to snakes" However it had to be removed as it was often being confused with another spell of the same name. That spell was later called "Adheres to Serpents"
Are you telling me some straight up Moses-style "your quarterstaff is now a cobra"? Cuz that's very good & almost as funny as "your body is now a magnet for slithering reptiles".
At that point, the Fighter/Paladin/Cleric wants to grapple the caster, cooking them and either using it to break their concenration or force them to break concentration, as a character of those classes can out HP other casters.
I've considered trying to make mages with really high mobility that use Damage Over Time effects as their primary tactic. Imagine this scenario: Level 8 Druid starts combat by casting an 4th level Heat Metal on a fighter in full plate. Next turn, he Wild Shapes into a bird and just flies away. Unless the fighter can cause him to lose his concentration or kill him before he gets away, where he will have disadvantage to hit due to Heat Metal, he has no choice but to try to find a way to survive the incoming 40D8 DAMAGE. If he's not really high level and can't get any magical assistance to remove the spell/armor, he's about as screwed as you can get.
Hex on Wisdom is a nice way to decrease opponent's perception checks. It you have rogues popping in and out of hiding, or you're out of combat and are sneaking, it can be pretty helpful.
I've recently realized what an amazing combo Synaptic Static + quicken spell is. Works well with action using spells like Sunbeam or Eyebite. Very heavy in resources, but a nasty combo.
@@revshad4226 That's the point. Spells like Eyebite and Sunbeam give you actions to do in subsequent turns (not casting a spell) so while you are maintaining those spells (both use concentration) you can quicken Synaptic Static on a subsequent round.
Faerie Fire - Each object in a 20-foot cube within range is outlined in blue, green, or violet light (your choice). Any creature in the area when the spell is cast is also outlined in light if it fails a Dexterity saving throw. Faerie Fire is not limited to hostile creatures.
That's exactly why Faerie Fire is useless to me. I love the concept but after 15 levels of playing a druid... i just can't use it because i'm always low on the initiative and everyone rushes into melee even when i tell them not to ahead of time. I'm going to have to start just throwing stuff out there and letting them take the heat... maybe they will learn the hard way to stay back. lol
@@DDGPro As long as your party members out number the enemy, it is still in the party's favour to do faerie fire even if they get hit as well, particularly if you can angle the cube so only your meatshield tank gets hit (that way the baddie might be more tempted by them than your squishies). 5 attacks at advantage/round > 2 attacks at advantage/round. Remember Faerie Fire hitting your party is no worse than a Barbarian using Reckless attacks.
That's why my bard has both Bane and Faerie Fire. Faerie Fire is my preferred choice, but only if I get a chance to fire it while multiple enemies are within a 20' cube without any allies inside. It shines (literally) if I get a high initiative and cast it before we close ranks, or if the battlefield creates a decent dividing line between allies and enemies (e.g. corridors). But if I can't use Faerie Fire, then Bane is a decent backup debuff. Of course, that all depends on whether I can get more mileage from another concentration spell. I got great mileage from Hypnotic Pattern once. We were riding griffons, when a hungry young dragon started chasing us for lunch. That was a serious threat for a 5th or 6th level group, especially when high above ground. One Hypnotic Pattern and poor saving throw later, and the hypnotized dragon plummeted to the ground, taking enough falling damage to lower it's HP to a one-digit number. It promptly decided that it would be suicidal to attack us with so few HP, and flew away.
I'm a fan of Bane. While DMing a Strahd campaign, I had run a test as a Bard up against a werewolf to see if my party could handle one. It was interesting, as through the use of Bane and Dissonant Whispers she was actually able to take on the werewolf fairly evenly. Enough that I could trust my party to fight a group of werewolves without instantly winning or instantly dying.
@@Quandry1 Especially in the fight against the Hydra^ reducing a multi head hydra from 5 attacks down to only 1 via the Slow spell from Caleb only connecting due to Cadueces's Bane was beautiful
@@koreanbbq2376 There have been fights where hits have been turned into misses at reasonable enough ammounts to be quite helpful as well. I'd have to go back and really look but I think Bane has blocked at least 1 hit for almost every member of the Mighty Nein.
Just wanted to add that you can also access Faerie Fire through the Drow/ Half Drow racial abilities not just through the class selections you mention in the video.
I remember a pretty funny thing that happened with Faerie Fire in one of my more recent campaigns. We were running Lost Mine, and we came up Nezznar prepping for a hell of a fight. We had a Goliath barbarian, a tiefling bard (me), two rangers, and a rogue. We had the barbarian bust the door through, followed up by me Faerie Firing about three of the things in there (Including Nezznar), with the rogue and two ranger proceeding to make Nezznar into a pincushion in just the first round we had. We were basically an FBI squadron with me throwing a flashbang. It was fun as hell.
My favorite debuff spell of all time was back in 3.5, a divination spell called Unluck. It forced the target to roll EVERYTHING twice and take the worse result. Basically the same as disadvantage in 5E, but on literally every roll including damage rolls.
@@carsonrush3352Unfortunately, my fighter is of the AFND school, so he would ultimately be worse off in that situation regardless. Best course of action: kill the caster.
@@carsonrush3352 WE got around it in our game via the lizardfolk Paladin being able to use his racial ability to make chitin armor out of giant bug shells.
Did you not know that when you are wearing Plate Armour no part of the metal touches you? Fair enough for something in your hands or even a helmet, but metal armour never touches the body as it's ALWAYS worn over the top of many layers of gambeson.
@@CycloneSP Shadows is always fun to work with re-skining!!! I think my friend's idea took the cake. In game time was midnight and he used Animate Object to make 'animated armor' by filling it with 'a pulsating dark mist' and the DM made it okay to combo with dancing lights for glowing eyes and background glare. Then our warlock used thaumaturgy to shake the ground and let off a deep echoing roar all so they could terrify an NPC merchant who sold the wizard a fake enchanted staff. XD
@Singularity I don't know what Matthew Mercer's plans are in regards to Dunamancy, but it's a field of magic he's created for Campaign 2 of Critical Role, and it's based on gravity/time.
I've been watching your videos for a while now and I want to say that y'all are great. I'm glad folks like you enjoy posting these videos for people like me!
Blindness:! Like Bestow Curse it does not require concentration. Unlike Bestow Curse, it doesn't require upcasting to get that either. It's not a huge debuff, but it's just as bad for spellcasters as darkness, and without messing up your friends.
Agreed. As a cleric, being able to debuff somebody with blindness while keeping your concentration open for the many good buffs and debuffs you have is a big thing.
I like color spray a lot for low-level adventures (under 4th or 5th). For lots of little monsters, it gives reliable no save blindness. It's only for one round, but being blind is such a crazy debuff (disadvantage for them, advantage for you) doing it to possibly multiple monsters in combat at once is super helpful. Once monster hp outpaces the average roll (6d10), you replace it with something else. But the lower level you are, the more broken it is.
I'm a really huge fan of LEVITATE as a debuff spell. When you Levitate a target that does not want to be Levitated, they make a Constitution save (the only bad part). If they fail, the CASTER gets to choose how they move, with that altitude change of 20 feet per round (up to 60 feet away from you). This means you can target that Big Bad Evil Fighter Type, work together to impose disadvantage, and then completely take him out of the fight for up to 10 minutes because his ranged attacks are either completely ineffective or non-existent. And besides, who doesn't like the idea of making that BBEG float upside down, so he can survey the wanton destruction of his minions while he's completely helpless.
@@VecnasLeftEye Spell specifically says no falling damage, but Levitate is a great multi-use spell: take an enemy melee creature out of the fight while you take care of his friends, or help your allies over a river of lava, or retrieve some loot from the bottom of an acid pit, or keep yourself out of melee while you throw your spells.
@@agilemind6241 Well, there certainly would be falling damage, if you've levitated them to a significant height, and then end the spell. Always remember, it's not the fall that hurts you, it's the sudden stop at the end. :)
Been watching your various videos over the course of a month. Your in-depth coverage of the technical aspects of D&D has been very useful , especially with the mid-high level campaign I'm running. Well done Dudes!
I know a lot of people don't like it, but in the right party Elemental Bane can be a fantastic choice. It would require knowing your party well and a little bit of luck but you can do some crazy stuff with it. As an example, I was playing in a group that did a lot of fire damage. We had a Light Cleric, Fiend Warlock, Red Dragon Sorcerer(me), and an Eldritch Knight Fighter with the flame arrows spell. I managed to land land Elemental Bane on a Beholder we were fighting. The next turn followed with three up-cast scorching rays and an action surge from the fighter. The one spell probably added about 30d6 fire damage in total.
My first and still favorite character I have is a High Eld Wizard Necromancer. My play style with "Thalion" is de-buffing while raising the dead. My party helps kill while I de-buff in the mean time. After two enemies go down I Animate Dead and go after the de-buffed enemies with the zombies. I use my zombies with polymorph and typically turn one into a Giant Centipede to paralyze opponents. I have Dance Macabre if I feel like polymorphing a zombie into a dinosaur isn't enough too. So my enemies are incredibly weakened while zombies are constantly clawing at them. It's very fun.
Tasha's Mind Whip is an amazing new spell that wasn't out when this video came out. Combine it with mind sliver (another debuff) and it helps to hit the spell by forcing disadvantage on saving throw! Then the target can only do an action, bonus action or move on a turn and losses reaction! Single target, yes, but a new favorite spell! Bane I love, and until you have you DM use it on you you don't realize how good it is! Faerie fire is a reason I LOVE playing druids or Fey warlocks, Ditto for Hex (I have picked up magic initiate (warlock) on sorcerers before to make a eldritch blast sorcerer that uses hex and bestow curse! (and since warlocks get to cast all spells at 5th leven when that sot is available, YOu don't concentrate on it then). SLow is amazing, and I usually pick it over haste, though HOld person and hypnotic patern as favorites along with fly and fireball at that level. Synaptic static is another favorite that doesn't require concentration! and contagion is jut good! Other spells I like is Darkness (with the right builds) and I love a couple of spells that debuff movement like sickening radiance and also plant growth and what you can do casting transmute rock twice (once to make it mod, then to make the mud rock again once the creatures are in it) Other favorites include sleet storm for breaking caster's concentration and imposing disadvantage on range attacks and difficult terrain, Phantasmal Killer is another great one that gives a creature the fightened condition and does damage on top (psycic) and fear or cause fear are good. (though like color spray I drop it when I can pick up blindness/deafness and hypnotic patern).
I love Bane and Faerie Fire, however I'm surprised that Feeblemind didn't make it into your list! Reducing 2 stats to 1 on a failed save for 30 in game days??? Yes please. Combine this with a divination wizard for the portent ability to make sure that the creature fails for extreme fun.
Probably because it's more rare and requires higher levels. Most campaigns don't last past level 10, so it's generally these lower level spells that become your bread and butter throughout your character's journey.
Great video! I think Bane is far better than most people give it credit for. A huge reason it's so effective is that it's a Charisma save (far better against most enemies than the Wisdom saves most debuff spells target), but also unlike many other spells it allows you to specifically target enemies in an area. In my party, my Bard has been using it far more than Faerie Fire simply because we have so many melee combatants that it's hard to target multiple enemies with my AoE debuffs without also hitting my friends. Critical Role has also showed me that the combo of Bane and Slow is incredibly nasty!
As someone who plays druid a lot I can also reccomend these debuff spells: Entangle: 1st level spell, creates difficult terrain, enemies inside the radius must make a strength saving throw or be restrained. The restrained condition means they can't move, get disadvantage on both attack rolls and dexterity saves, and all attacks against them have advantage. They must waste an action to attempt to break free and still lose half their movement due to difficult terrain. A good alternative to use against enemies who are too slippery for Fairie Fire. Plant Growth - Super difficult terrain in a 100 ft radius. Enemies must spend 4 feet of movement to move 1 foot. Meaning that a creature with 30ft movement speed is reduced to 7.5 feet. But you always round down so they can only ever move 5 feet, 10 if they dash. This can effectively immobilize a lot of ground based heavy hitters, and you can create safe areas where your party can move unhindered at the risk of allowing the enemy to get out of the thicket early
One of my favorites is Sickening Radiance from Xanathar's Guide to Everything. It's a 4th level spell that does 4d10 radiant damage in a 30 foot sphere. But the real kicker is that if they fail their CON save, they take a level of exhaustion. Many of the effects of exhaustion are effects that are listed in the other 7 spells the Dungeon Dudes picked. Our group likes to stack it with other movement impairing spells like Plant Growth (another of our group's favorite) to keep them stuck in the area to keep making the checks. Here are the effects of exhaustion: 1 : Disadvantage on ability checks 2 : Speed halved 3 : Disadvantage on attack rolls and saving throws 4 : Hit point maximum halved 5 : Speed reduced to 0 6 : Death
Pair that with bestow curse and if they fail the wisdom saving throw they spend their round doing nothing! And then it just stacks until they die. Imagine diggin a hole however deep and then disguise it like a trap and when the enemy falls in just curse them and then hit them with sickening radiance
The text of the spell says they have to save or take the spell's damage, but the level of exhaustion seems unconnected to the save. You can apply levels of exhaustion automatically as long as you maintain concentration.
I'm planning on taking Magic Initiate (Warlock) with my Naga Paladin. Eldritch Blast, Toll the Dead (for ranged options), and Hex as the 1st level spell. If/when we fight a BBEG, or at least the 'big bad' for the current quest or dungeon.. I want to Hex their Str or Dex, and Constrict them. Restraining the enemy, giving everybody Advantage on their attacks, and the Hex will make it harder for them to escape my deadly hug. Maybe I just love the idea of my Naga hugging a BBEG to death, but.. You can't argue that the image isn't awesome.
Great list. I never really thought much about fairy fire, but now that you mention it every time I've used it, it really turns the fight around. Good call on that one! - Innkeeper Vase Odin
Personal idea I’ve had for uniquely weaponizing Heat Metal. 1 level of rogue before the rest of the game as a Forge Cleric. Have one of your expertise be in athletics from sake of grappling. Gaining resistance and eventually immunity to fire damage means that you can totally just hold onto an enemy and heat up your own armor to cook them alive.
I would also advocate for the cantrip Frostbite at low levels: the imposition of disadvantage of weapon attack rolls on my enemies has saved my party more than once. Unfortunately it's not readily available to supporting classes save for druids. TL;DR good at low levels for one shots
I had a game where I countered Heat Metal. They cast it on my Fighter, so I grappled them and held them to the armour. I had more health, so they lost consciousness before me and the spell ended.
Chill Touch is one of my favorites. D8 damage that scales with levels, per cantrips. But the clutch debuff ability of making it that the target cannot regain hit points until the start of your next turn. This means they can’t heal from cure spells, heal, regeneration abilities, potions, or healing kits. Or other abilities. Further more, if they’re undead they have disadvantage to attack you. I have found this spell, as a cantrip, to change the outcome of so many difficult fights. It’s absolutely overlooked.
@@Spiceodog this did not even cross my mind yet, you sir are brilliant. However "any creature in contact" i think i´d know some DMs who would say "nope this creature IS the object and not in contact. you just gave it 2d8 fire damage on its next attack" (i really know a DM who would do this. He is a typical the rules as he reads it vs the player and he wonders why nobody shows up to the campaign anymore) i definitely would say "yo udamn son of a biscuit" and let you have it but i can see thew mental gymnastics to make it not work on constructs.
@@Metalhammer1993 at that point, you bring up an even further level of rules lawyering. "I cast it on his torso, which is in contact with his head and limbs. also, it doesn't do damage unless I use my bonus action, and I didn't use that while he was attacking me".
Just discovered this channel, and love the content. Plus 1 to Hypnotic Pattern > Slow: when fighting mobs, especially those with low Wisdom, it's practically an auto-win. In general, I prefer to exploit an action economy advantage by taking some enemies out of the fight altogether, rather than suppressing the whole force but still dealing with their combined actions (albeit scaled back) and entire HP pool. Having some enemies knocked out of the fight clarifies your targets, essentially creating two stages of the combat: kill the ones who aren't unconscious; kill the others, one by one (preferably with readied attacks.)
You guys didn't mention that anything that causes a penalty to ability checks, effects casters who use counterspell. If you throw bane on a wizard or bard caster, or use hex and say INT on a wizard, or CHA on a bard, they are going to have a hard time counterspelling anything higher than what they cast counterspell on.
Hex is still great even though it is not saves. Your Rogue will love you if you target WIS to give DAdv on perception checks. Your Wizard would love you if you target INT to lower chances of Counterspell/Dispel Magic checks As they brought up the DAdv for grapple checks. The fact that it upcasts well (up to 24 hours depending on concentration at 5th level slot) and Warlocks auto upcast is amazing
I feel like Grease is a bit underrated. Provides difficult terrain and multiple Dex saves without any Concentration. Having the save occur at the end of the turn for anyone inside the area of effect means they won't be able to simply stand up. I've also talked with a few DMs who have said that since the grease covering the ground could be considered flammable, so this in conjunction with a readied firebolt. So it's basically Web where you sacrifice size for not needing Concentration. And since it's a lvl 1 spell, you don't have to invest too much to stack it with other debuffs.
I’ve always liked the idea of Grease also slipping people up, so you can set all sorts of traps then ring the warning bell that the monsters have to tell others of intruders or whatever... and watch them all rush down and slide into Hell :)
I love when you guys do these videos - they're great. Something pretty key which i think you left out about Bestow Curse which makes it worse in my opinion. Is that the Range on it is touch. So the characters that can cast this won't likely be casting it combat too often. Still a great spell, but worth noting. Thanks again!
Please remember that faerie fire affects all creatures in the radius. This effected my rogue once (because I have a tendency to roll nat 1's) thus making me the brightest thing in the room.
You could take Thief of the Five Fates and blow an invocation for 1 spell, usable 1 per day, burning one of the Warlocks very limited spell slots... OR, you could take Magic Initiate, have Bane to use once per day, use no spell slot, and get 2 additional cantrips to help bolster the Warlock's spell list. So... Which gives the most bang for the buck?
deadpoet4 The invocation would go best unless you pick Bard, because if you pick Cleric you’d have to use your wisdom. But going Bard and then getting something extra Cha based cantrips is nice. The way I run things gives Warlocks extra invocations, but people also get extra feats. So it depends on how much you value your invocations and feats. Bards have some nice utility/role play cantrips, but if you wanna save your feats for other things, then the invocation is the way to go.
Wouldn't Vicious Mockery be worth to mention? As always, great video guys, very often I overlook Heat Metal, sounds like a great debuff and capable of interactions few spells offer, which makes for great narrative material, and Faerie Fire is my favorite spell in the game
Hey guys, instead of just naming the spell you could place its description too while you are explaining them. That way we can pause read it and then continue listening with a better understanding of the spell.
I've been liking Synaptic Static because it's both versatile and potent (usually you have to choose one or the other), but Contagion sounds worth looking into if it can burn through a legendary creature's Legendary Resistance, since I can't think of any other spell that forces that many saving throws at that high a level of urgency. Heat Metal suffers from the drawback that if it works too well, the DM will compensate by adjusting what you fight. The thing about Swiss army knife spells is that it's difficult to nerf or bypass them by encounter design.
I have had DMs that are like that before, and it kind of derails the campaign for me as an individual. "Suddenly the 'Order of the Dragon Knights' stop trying to take your team down, and instead the 'Lousy Amalgamation of Druids and Monks' have taken up their cause!"
That's overdoing it a bit. Instead shift the balance away from humanoids and toward monsters. Not every encounter has to be cheese-proofed, but some of them should be.
I'm shocked you didn't mentioned Blindness/Deafness, my personal favorite debuff spell. Only a 2nd level, doesn't require concentration, and is a really powerful debuff. Perfect spell to burn through a boss's legendary saves.
a good pick up for a divine soul sorcerer who can twin that on top of concentrating on bane, hold person, or whatever. especially because you learn so few spells as a sorcerer, having a cheap debilitating debuff that leaves your concentration free is quite handy
I know it’s spell slot intensive, but if you wanted to mess up a big or a nasty monster in general, a party could work together to combo bestow curse, targeting consitution disadvantages, then contagion going for the vulnerability to all damage if the monster fails all three saving throws, which just became more likely. I know its intensive, and it’s banking on a lot of communication/coordination, but i think if there is 1 enemy that you can’t abide and really want them to fail a specific debuff, having bestow curse in someone’s back pocket with a little planning could change the tide of a big battle. Great vid at well DDudes. I’m glad that contagion got reworked, as it was before it was a virtually useless long shot.
I would love to use slow in situations where the environment becomes a factor. Slow someone trying to escape a blast, or lava flow... legendary monsters should love this to keep the players in trouble from lair effects.
I'm currently playing through Dragon Heist as a tanky, frontline, high Con (20) Lizardfolk Cleric of Knowledge who specializes more in buffs/debuffs (Bane is his go-to) and utility over healing (Healing Word is pretty much the extent of his healing, with Spare the Dying as last resort and the ability to craft Healing Potions being the longterm method of healing he'll bring to the party). Really enjoying the character, especially since he loves books as much as I do, and a quirk I spontaneously gave him is that he tries to eat most kills for new taste experiences (he was a hermit, exiled by his clan and raised by an old human hunter near Daggerford who eventually died of old age). Apparently stirges and gazers are disgusting, but I rolled 20+ on my Con Saves for them, so no lunch was lost. The party did have a primary healer/buffer in the form of a Favored Soul Sorcerer, but just this past session, the player continued his decades-old tradition and changed character (to a Barbarian) after only a few sessions (four, in this case). We'll see how long this character lasts. :/
I'm playing a drow bardlock right now. I have like most of the things on this list lol. Getting to pick HP OR Slow is really entertaining. Super excited about getting Synaptic Static! Y'all make a really strong case for Heat Metal. I'll definitely have to consider it when I level in Bard.
In my campaigns Heat Metal is the reason druids don't use metal armor. Another creative use of that spell is to cast protection from fire spells in the armored fighter/barbarian/paladin then cast Heat Metal on him and let him grapple the enemy.
My Cleric and I (Wizard) tend to stack bestow curses, one giving disadvantage on wisdom saving throws and the other forcing the monster to make a wisdom saving throw or lose it action that turn. It's definitely made a few bigger enemies hate us. Especially when we cast at level 5 and there is no concentration.
One of my players used heat metal on a wooden ship... And forgot to drop concentration! Took the party a solid 5 minutes to figure out why the ship was burning after they fought off the pirates.
The legendary resistance issue is why you need a secondary control caster. A Warlock makes a great backup, since they have some invocation help. If it sticks, great. If the BBEG uses his legendary, it clears the way for the next control spell to hit.
An honorable mention should go to Ray of Frost, the cantrip. While the damage is nice, the fact that it lowers your enemy's movement by 10 feet can add up, especially if they're trying to close in on your caster or flee.
If multiple casters targeted the same creature, or if a sorcerer uses twinned spell you could potentially delete the creatures movement speed entirely.
I've was always under the impression that once you "cast" another c-spell, that was when the previous ended and not when you began casting. Granted, it's the same result either way, since bane ending right as you cast another would still mean they no longer suffer the effect. Just wanted to make sure i/everyone had the clear picture here. Cody from Taking20 covered this in a previous video, different subject, but this was what he had to say [paraphrasing] Spell1 remains in effect until you finish casting Spell2. So for as long as it takes for you to complete the cast, let's imagine a 1min casting time or 10rounds, then spell1 applies in the interim.
@@M0ebius How come hypnotic gaze is more versatile? Your allies can't be in the area of effect, everyone have to be well coordinated to not attack the ones under it's effect, the environment have to be stable enough so that they don't get hit and therefore put out of trance. Slow doesn't take any of this under account and you and your allies can keep the damage coming. Also, the DM should make some enemies have countermeasures for this overused spell, like making a familiar (lv 1 wizard spell) wake those in trance.
Khaons Hypnotic Pattern has the more powerful effect with only a single save, and assuming the same number of targets will generally eat more enemy actions than Slow. There are also many ways to mitigate the friendly fire such as Aura of Devotion or Careful Spell, or having a signal for the party to avert their eyes. Slow is very good too though, not quite as devastating but more reliable. There are trade offs.
I think it’s worth mentioning that since alot of these are in the cleric spell list, it means that divine soul sorcerer can make use of them, not only adding a class that can cast them, but in the case of a DS Sorc they can also benefit from meta magics
Bestow Curse and Slow are both my favorite debuffs to use in most combats. Yes they are both Wisdom Saves to resist, but when they hit the enemy is done for. And even against bosses with Legendary Resistances they are a good for making the Boss expend that limited resource to allow a better chance of them actually failing against something that can win the fight later in the battle.
Glad to see Bane here. I don't see it talked about a ton, but I built my bard to be primarily a controller / off healer, and so keeping my party alive through damage prevention was a big focus. Especially at low-mid levels, I got huge mileage out of Bane - certainly moreso than if I tried to heal that damage instead. Combined with Cutting Words, and later Synaptic Static, I am the arbiter of who gets hit, and it's great
Bane also makes for a great combo debuff with Vicious Mockery! While holding Concentration on Bane for 3 creatures, cast Vicious mockery (which is now more likely to work because of Bane) on one of those as well and on its next attack it has disadvantage AND has to subtract 1D4 from its roll!
Don't forget, Counter Spell and Dispel Magic are also ability checks. Hex is great for protecting against getting your 4th level and above spells foiled or for protecting 4th level+ buffs already running.
Honorable mention should go to the damage cantrips that also introduce a secondary effect. Ray of frost reduces speed a flat 10ft, chill touch prevents healing, shocking grasp prevents reactions, infestation forces movement, frostbite and vicious mockery give disadvantage on attacks. Also ray of sickness for the poison effect and ray of enfeeblement for halving damage from strength based enemies.
Small thing to consider about Slow. If the DM does know the slow spell and knows how debilitating the effect is, like you said, they WILL burn a legendary resistance on it. But that doesn't mean you wasted the spell, you got the boss to burn a resistance and they only have so many of them. Full casters get enough slots that can cast slow you can quickly burn through all of a boss's resistances then hit them with the big one. For example; burn through a powerful Demon Lord's resistances with slow, then hit them with a high level banish.
No mention of blindness?? A second level spell available to almost all casters, based on a con save, imposing disadvantage to your baddie for everything, if not completely negating their action (ie spells requiring sight), AS WELL as advantage on all attacks against it and automatic failures on dex saves?? And multiple targets? Seems like an oversight
With Slow you can use it on an ennemy that would want to make multiple attacks or a caster that want to cast or any of the use presented in this video. With counterspell you can only counter a spell. Slow is less potent for specific stuff but is very versatile
2:35 Bane [PHB 216] Level 1 Classes: Bard, Cleric 4:48 Faerie Fire [PHB 239] Level 1 Classes: Bard, Druid 7:13 Hex [PHB 251] and Bestow Curse [PHB 218] Level 1 Classes: (Hex) Warlock Level 3 Classes: (Bestow Curse) Bard, Cleric, Wizard 10:57 Heat Metal [PHB 250] Level 2 Classes: Bard, Druid 14:39 Slow [PHB 277] Level 3 Classes: Sorcerer, Wizard 20:20 Synaptic Static [XGTE 167] Level 5 Classes: Bard, Sorcerer, Warlock, Wizard 22:57 Contagion [PHB 217]* Level 5 Classes: Cleric, Druid Count per class and level: Level 1: 2 Bard, Cleric, Druid, Warlock Level 2: Bard, Druid Level 3: Bard, Cleric, 2 Wizard, Sorcerer Level 5: Bard, Sorcerer, Warlock, Wizard, Cleric, DruidCount per class: 4 Bard, 3 Cleric, 3 Druid, 2 Sorcerer, 2 Warlock, 3 Wizard This doesn't necessarily tell you which class is *best* at debuffing, but it will tell you which class has access to the most debuff spells, and at what level. Bard is looking pretty strong, with at least one debuff at every spell level from 1-3 and 5. The combination of Hex and Bestow Curse by the Dungeon Dudes is weird and makes this table more complicated than it needed to be. They threw out some babble for justification, but it really made zero sense and was dumb and bad and they should have just covered Bestow Curse as a different spell instead of the weird shoehorning they tried here.
My favorite use of Heat Metal is casting it on an arrowhead in flight. It requires a lot of trust between my Bard and Ranger player, with the Bard using a prepared action to cast it right after the Ranger shoots but before she knows if it hits or not. This gets around the requirement to see the metal you're heating in a fun and dangerous way :D
Glad that Synaptic Static got a mention. Concentration free and works in combination with Bane. Both spells can be accessible to a Lore Bard which has Cutting words. Cutting Words: -D6/D8/D10/D12 to attack/damage/ability check as a reaction Synaptic Static: -D6 to attack/ability checks for 1 minute. Int save at the end of turns to remove this debuff once afflicted. Bane: -D4 to attack/saving throws up to 1 minute. No save once afflicted, but concentration. So if you total it up. Attack rolls: Up to -D22 to an attack roll if using cutting words. -D10 normally. Saving throws: -D4 to saving throw, benefits the int saves required by synaptic static. Ability checks: Up to -D18 if using cutting words, -D6 normally, works well against counterspelling or grappling. Surprisingly mid game, Bane works well still. It makes stunning strike from Monk work more often even should your DC be 10. I thought I would still use Bless more but now I cannot let go of Bane. It just prevents damage and enables a lot of things to work. Slow is also really nice. It cripples a young red dragon enough so that it can only attack once and its only threat is that fire breath. A party of four level 5s can take it on, though the drawback of this spell is that it makes the caster the first on the dragon shit list. That fire breath, oof, better have absorb elements prepared that day.
I mean, I’m making a spell caster class with at has almost no spell slots but makes up for it by learning all its spell and having a all of them prepared, with their spelling being heavily buff/debuff -centric. So it is practically just the dragon slayer’s best friend
2:35 Bane [PHB 216]
4:48 Faerie Fire [PHB 239]
7:13 Hex [PHB 251] and Bestow Curse [PHB 218]
10:57 Heat Metal [PHB 250]
14:39 Slow [PHB 277]
20:20 Synaptic Static [XGTE 167]
22:57 Contagion [PHB 217]*
*See November Errata here for the new version of Contagion:
dnd.wizards.com/articles/sage-advice/errata-november-2018
Fairie fire is against all creatures, not enemies...
Thank you soooooo much for putting this in the description. Skipping to the good parts and hearing the useful info is a godsend.
Honorable Mentions:
Blindness/Deafness: no concentration disadvantage and advantage.
Darkness: blindness with no save.
Silence: ends spell casting.
Hold Person: you can still hit them, and hits auto-crits.
When a creature casts a spell while slowed, does it have to hold concentration until the next turn like when you prepare a spell to cast it with your reaction? Attacking a creature to end its concentration and lose the spell’s casting entirely would be amazing.
My DM's response to physic damage... Star Spawn. I didn't have a good time when I was in the melee of two giant star spawns and my bard just decided to hurl a Synaptic Static at the other one.
Heat Metal. Huh, that's a funny name for "Detect Piercings."
Oh that could be terrible.
I'm a non-player who knows the phrase cook'n'book. Thanks, Animated Spellbook.
Oh no
gods of Olympus no
Funny name for "boil blood"
I've seen it used in that manner. Guy was paralyzed with Hold Monster and the wizard declared, "I cast Heat Metal on his Prince Albert."
Dungeon Dudes discuss deadly debuffs in Dungeons and Dragons.
Dude, that was a dastardly delightful dump of Dungeon Dudes data about deadly debuff spells using alot of D's. Well done. 🤣
What a tonged twister
@@gamecavalier3230 Jokes on you I rolled a 1
Dam.
Those are 7ds for the 7 deadly spells video.
It is only a cantrip, but at low levels vicious mockery is brutal on hard hitting single attack monsters. Not to mention great fun from a roleplaying stand point.
Imagine the enemy dying because you walked up to them and called their penis small.
@@Endershock1678 One time my party was attacked by bandits up in the trees. My bard used viscous mockery to insult one of the bandits telling him that he was a bad man and that he should feel bad. The bandit failed the save, and decided I was right, so he jumped out of the tree, landed on his head, and died. Then I ended up feeling bad.
I love the vicious mockery spell, but it's always a bit weird when an enemy dies to it, because it usually gets played out as some sort of suicide, and that's sad. Words can hurt, guys.
Yeah it's so fun killing the BBEG by insulting their mom
Cantrips are more damaging than many levelled spells in 5e.
In fact, in 5e, if you're given the choice between a cantrip or a single 1st level spell slot, you're usually better off taking a cantrip. Usually. not always.
@@walterbunn280 That's only the case if you're level 11 or higher and your cantrips deal 3 dice of damage or more, or if you're in a special circumstance like a warlock or dragon sorcerer who gets to add their main stat modifier to damage.
Most 1st level damage spells deal 3d6 or 3d8 damage to a single target and are as good or better than cantrips in the majority of cases.
And yes, I realize that a 2d10 firebolt is better than a 3d6 1st level spell, but if you have a 1st level spell that only deals 3d6, then it probably comes with some other benefit, like it being AoE or inflicting a condition.
In most cases, if I'm casting a cantrip instead of a 1st level spell, it's not because the damage is better. It's because I'd rather save those 1st level slots for utility or defensive spells, like Shield.
Sometimes I might up-cast a 1st level damage spell into a 2nd lvl slot though.
I'm a big proponent of Slow vs some other classic spells for one reason:
It's not an actual listed "condition." By that I mean, a monster you cast it on won't ever be inherently immune to it at any point in a game. Slow keeps its viability throughout the game because of this-whether or not you cast it on the right creatures/while they're experiencing other stat penalty effects, is up to a smart player
I used to just cast web, entangle and cloudkill/fireball etc. When crowd control works its op. Slow is great on the good dps attackers. Hold person etc is powerful. Just dropping an attackers saving throws can allow cheese combos ending in finger of death. Polymorph can be helpfull as well. A melee attacker with high dps is useless if you Polymorph into a creature with 90% physical damage resistance. Same with a magic resistance, Polymorph musturd jelly for the 90% magic resistance. You can tank dragons this way. Protection against xyz can make some monsters or undead less dangerous. Fear of all kinds works if the other group cant buff a protection from fear.
CC allows you to prevent high dps focusing on one player and thus killing him. It also allows you to focus on spell casters and kept the melee out of the fight. People like to cast buffs like haste along with strenght buffs from potions etc. You dont want buffed melee attacking players with such high dps and chance to hit. High level spell casters can be hard to kill and cast insane spells. By focusing them you hope to prevent spell casting and shut them down. It can take awhile to get a good spell casters protections down. You dont want strong melee dps killing and interrupting you. Thus cc everything you can. Debuff everyone you can.
Basicly some mages can enter a spell casting loop and cast armies of powerful summons. In BG2 ToB one mage can kill everything in his path if left free to spell cast.
The game had a summon limit of 5 summoned critters per map but this does not apply to clones. Project Image and Simulacrum clones can summon an unlimited number of critters in any area. This also allows you to summon multiple Devas or Planetars, bypassing the celestial summon limit of 1. Thus one mage can kill everything. You can abuse the wish spell this way as well.
With BG2 casting Restoration on a Simulacrum clone will bump it up to the original caster's level. In the case of sorcerers, it will even give the clone the same spell slots as the caster. This is becuase clones were level drained and the restoration removes the level drain.
It’s also good for burning through legendary resistance, especially with intelligent enemies who know what you’re doing
blindness/deafness is only second level, not concentration, and can be twinned by a divine soul sorcerer
Another good thing about slow is that it sticks untill they actually make their saving throw. Nothing feels worse then casting hypnotic pattern on the BBEG and next turn one of his fodder minnions just slaps him back awake
Another great feature is that it will never hit your own allies. You target six specific targets in the area, so friendly fire is never a problem.
So one time, a sorcerer villain of mine turned invisible to run away, and so my warlock pulled out the wand of wonder and casted it on the sorcerer's general area. He rolled faerie fire. I was upset.
When you get bamboozled as DM it feels bad, but good for the players; glad they got to overcome your pranks.
*in magic item shop* Player: I wanna sneak into the room behind the counter and steak something
Me, thinking about how this guy has frickin legendary items and will very easily kill the party when he finds out: you wanna what now
My wild magic sorcerer once accidentally turned everyone in a 30ft radius invisible, including the ogre we were fighting. Luckily I also had Faerie Fire which I cast on him the next turn. I love that spell so much.
The drow in my group always forgets that he has that spell until it's too late.
@@tigert2092 Any self respecting magic item vendor should keep all of their magic items well warded to prevent them from being stolen. Put them in glass cases under Arcane Lock and possibly Glyph of warding for the more expensive pieces. Or one of my personal favorites, Enchant them with Magic Mouth that yells, "Get your hands off of me, thief!" if anyone but the shopkeep tries to get to them.
You could even homebrew some sort of enchantment that prevents any of the magic items from leaving the shop unless the shopkeep removes the enchantment.
If you're going to have a Magic Mart in your game, you can bet it's going to be well protected.
Dan yah, I didn't know about that stuff at the time and didn't actually think they'd try so called it safe, especially with the dudes high perception
Just wanted to throw out how game changing it can be if your enemy fails the save against Feeblemind. Having a Lich who burned up its Legendary Resistances reduced to a barely sentient animal can really help
Feeblemind is more likely if you combine it with bestow curse and bane. But it is very debilitating.
Feeblemind is game-winning when it lands but the really shitty damage and the very high spell slot makes it really unappealing to waste that slot on a spell that may do almost nothing. This is made worse by the fact that the enemies you really want to hit with Feeblemind (casters) tend to have good INT saves anyways. The one class that would be, IMO, the best user of Feeblemind - Sorcerers, due to the Heighten metamagic - does not even get it.
In my personal opinion i think it might be best on a warlock of some kind.
@@Archimonde259 Twinned Heightened or Subtle feeblemind... It's so hard to get it for sorcerers but really worth it. Also, wild magic sorcerers have ability to penalize saves even more.
@@yargolocus4853 I guess if you dipped into Warlock or Bard at high levels you could get Feeblemind as a sorc
"Hmm, I should really do something productive..."
*Dungeon Dudes uploaded a new video*
"Tommorow is fine too"
You didn't mention the best part of Bestow Curse, which is:
• While cursed, the target must make a Wisdom saving throw at the start of each of its turns. If it fails, it wastes its action that turn doing nothing.
Doing NOTHING :D
That's a choice you have to make (you don't get all 4 effects listed), they were focusing on the saving throw debuff option since they grouped the spell with hex. However, I agree that causing foes to do nothing is generally the strongest option
Once I was in a session where the party was trapped in an arena. The DM unleashed an adult white dragon (way above anything we could handle) and I used bestow curse like this. While it wasted six (SIX) turns, our party went through the gate to the dragon's pen, locked said gate, and proceeded to escape from the arena.
Well, If they do make the save, then, you wasted that curse that round. You could give them bane or disadvantage, and then try that.
True, but imagine how powerful it would be to have war caster and be able to caste bestow curse as a reaction opportunity attack. Enemy leaves your space. Boom! Cursed.
I always save a Curse for my Portent. First time I cast it though my DM thought it only wasted actions... really disappointing when I found out the truth later. The dragon shouldn't have been able to fly away.
What I really like about Bestow Curse is that paragraph:
"At the GM's option, you may choose an alternative curse effect, but it should be no more powerful than those described above. The GM has final say on such a curse's effect."
Which really makes this spell amazing narrative tool for both players and GMs.
And then you have DMs who ignore the "not more powerful" part and say "bro you upcast that thing with your 9th level slot to make it permanent. Give him an urge to eat his balls every twenty minutes and have them regrow or whatever" (highlevel campaigns are funny. That campaign was somewhat derailed or rather finished at that point. DM had to wing an entire next session because what the dice made out of his final fight was unsatisfying. Paladin. 5crits. So he kinda was on the "ridiculous wave" when the curse happened. And when our wizard cast the curse DM looked like he bit in a lemon. We all kinda wanted the "eat your own balls" curse now DM had said it but no our wizard had to sever this guy's connection to his god. (The cleric who was the main antagonist of our campaign, who already was a bloody pulp at our feet barely alive. So we brought a nearly dead, entirely worthless cleric to the city guard and had him busted instead of killed)
I absolutely homebrew that casting with higher slots allows for more powerful effects
I’ve gotten away with some NASTY shenanigans via Bestow Curse with a little bit of discussion with some of my DMs. Absolutely bonkers spell.
9th level alternative bestow curse effect
2d4 necrotic damage at the end of their turn. 9th level means it stays until removed. Curse then run away or have lot's of counter spells ready and watch them slowly die
@@director1336 It is strictly more powerful than the ' add 1d8 of necrotic damage every time you hit the target' though
I just wanted to advocate being a patron. These two produce great weekly content and are super approachable and happy to discuss mechanics and provide advice. An extremely worthwhile investment.
You also get to learn why Kelly's character loves trench coats.
They easily add mystery and prestige to whoever dons them, magical items of our own day and age.
They easily hide your truckload of weapons and gear of course.
Totally agree.
And also people sell their souls to you in exchange for Magic.
@@elgatochurro For one they're pretty active on the account itself. So you get alot of in jokes, advice, and behind the scenes of their production. Additionally, they usually post the videos on here early exclusively for patrons.
Funny thing I've done with Hex: I knew I was getting into an encounter with some Yuanti, so I prepared an action to cast it on the BBEG when the encounter started. So combat started, and before we rolled initiative, I casted Hex on it, targeting its Dexterity ability checks...
So guess who rolled initiative with disadvantage?
Best debuff against non-undead non-constructs is still the spell barbarian greataxe. Can't debuff better than casting death.
Muscle wizard casts fist?
@@darktrent182 But first, I'd like to rage!
@@otacon2587 a fellow Critter? Hurray!
Also works on undead and constructs.
@@darktrent182 I think you mean hazah!
Another shout out for Blindness. Search your monster ability descriptions for “can see”. Many very dangerous monster attacks, like dragon lair actions, demonic charms of creatures like vampires and succubi, and most gaze attacks, RAW can only be used on what the monster can see.
*Casually casts blindness on a beholder*
@@adromea5628 Lol
*casualy casts slow on a time dragon*
Yeah, a _lot_ of creatures (including spellcasters) lose much of what makes them special when they can't see. It's a 2nd-level spell that burns legendary resistances.
And unlike most disabling spells, it _doesn't require concentration._ So you can maintain your other concentration spells (control, buff, debuff, summon), and the spell won't come undone if you take damage or become incapacitated.
In some ways the blinded condition is harsher than the restrained condition. They both cause everyone's attacks against the affected creature to have advantage, and they both impose disadvantage on the affected creature's attacks, but based on the Unseen Attackers and Targets rule, a blind creature also has to guess the location of the target or they automatically miss.
Some additional rules: Enemies can only make opportunity attacks against creatures they can see. The Dodge action only imposes disadvantage on attacks when the dodger can see the attacker. And when you make a ranged attack while within 5 feet of an enemy, you usually suffer disadvantage on the attack roll, but only when the enemy can see you.
The main downside of the spell is how hard it can be to land. The range is only 30 feet. It targets Constitution saves, which tend to be high. All oozes are immune, as are a bunch of plants and eyeless constructs. And hundreds of other creatures (like dragons, snakes, insects, and creatures that burrow or swim) have blindsight or tremorsense as a backup. But there are still a ton of dangerous creatures that are seriously hampered by blindness.
The best spell is still 1st editions "Sticks to snakes"
However it had to be removed as it was often being confused with another spell of the same name. That spell was later called "Adheres to Serpents"
Are you telling me some straight up Moses-style "your quarterstaff is now a cobra"? Cuz that's very good & almost as funny as "your body is now a magnet for slithering reptiles".
On Heat Metal, heavy armor takes 5 MINUTES to remove!! Deadly, in that case.
At that point, the Fighter/Paladin/Cleric wants to grapple the caster, cooking them and either using it to break their concenration or force them to break concentration, as a character of those classes can out HP other casters.
Might as well just keep it on and chug a potion
@@davidsmith7752 That's why after casting it, your next action should be "run away."
I've considered trying to make mages with really high mobility that use Damage Over Time effects as their primary tactic. Imagine this scenario: Level 8 Druid starts combat by casting an 4th level Heat Metal on a fighter in full plate. Next turn, he Wild Shapes into a bird and just flies away. Unless the fighter can cause him to lose his concentration or kill him before he gets away, where he will have disadvantage to hit due to Heat Metal, he has no choice but to try to find a way to survive the incoming 40D8 DAMAGE. If he's not really high level and can't get any magical assistance to remove the spell/armor, he's about as screwed as you can get.
@@jamesoakes4842 This is why all of our casters (who can) always take Dispel Magic.
Hex on Wisdom is a nice way to decrease opponent's perception checks. It you have rogues popping in and out of hiding, or you're out of combat and are sneaking, it can be pretty helpful.
rouges have so big stealth already, and there are so few creatures with prof in perception, they are always hidden
Dont forget in a stelth or hiest campaign hex someone ahead of time and disadvantage applies a -5 to passive perception
I've recently realized what an amazing combo Synaptic Static + quicken spell is. Works well with action using spells like Sunbeam or Eyebite. Very heavy in resources, but a nasty combo.
Except it can't be done in a single turn, if you cast a spell as a bonus action you can only cast a spell as an action if it is a cantrip
@@revshad4226 That's the point. Spells like Eyebite and Sunbeam give you actions to do in subsequent turns (not casting a spell) so while you are maintaining those spells (both use concentration) you can quicken Synaptic Static on a subsequent round.
@@revshad4226 Yes, Eyebite on round 1, then eyebite + Quickened spells on subsequent turns. Very potent.
Faerie Fire - Each object in a 20-foot cube within range is outlined in blue, green, or violet light (your choice). Any creature in the area when the spell is cast is also outlined in light if it fails a Dexterity saving throw. Faerie Fire is not limited to hostile creatures.
Friendly Faerie Fire is on!
That's exactly why Faerie Fire is useless to me. I love the concept but after 15 levels of playing a druid... i just can't use it because i'm always low on the initiative and everyone rushes into melee even when i tell them not to ahead of time. I'm going to have to start just throwing stuff out there and letting them take the heat... maybe they will learn the hard way to stay back. lol
@@DDGPro As long as your party members out number the enemy, it is still in the party's favour to do faerie fire even if they get hit as well, particularly if you can angle the cube so only your meatshield tank gets hit (that way the baddie might be more tempted by them than your squishies).
5 attacks at advantage/round > 2 attacks at advantage/round.
Remember Faerie Fire hitting your party is no worse than a Barbarian using Reckless attacks.
That's why my bard has both Bane and Faerie Fire. Faerie Fire is my preferred choice, but only if I get a chance to fire it while multiple enemies are within a 20' cube without any allies inside. It shines (literally) if I get a high initiative and cast it before we close ranks, or if the battlefield creates a decent dividing line between allies and enemies (e.g. corridors). But if I can't use Faerie Fire, then Bane is a decent backup debuff.
Of course, that all depends on whether I can get more mileage from another concentration spell. I got great mileage from Hypnotic Pattern once. We were riding griffons, when a hungry young dragon started chasing us for lunch. That was a serious threat for a 5th or 6th level group, especially when high above ground. One Hypnotic Pattern and poor saving throw later, and the hypnotized dragon plummeted to the ground, taking enough falling damage to lower it's HP to a one-digit number. It promptly decided that it would be suicidal to attack us with so few HP, and flew away.
I'm a fan of Bane. While DMing a Strahd campaign, I had run a test as a Bard up against a werewolf to see if my party could handle one. It was interesting, as through the use of Bane and Dissonant Whispers she was actually able to take on the werewolf fairly evenly. Enough that I could trust my party to fight a group of werewolves without instantly winning or instantly dying.
Cadueces on CR uses bane to great effect at the times he uses it. It's saved them more than once.
@@Quandry1 Especially in the fight against the Hydra^ reducing a multi head hydra from 5 attacks down to only 1 via the Slow spell from Caleb only connecting due to Cadueces's Bane was beautiful
@@koreanbbq2376 There have been fights where hits have been turned into misses at reasonable enough ammounts to be quite helpful as well. I'd have to go back and really look but I think Bane has blocked at least 1 hit for almost every member of the Mighty Nein.
@@Quandry1 one of my favorites was when Nott used Counterspell on (spoilers)
Vecna which i'm pretty sure made Matt SO mad
@@CorvusCorone68 Matt actually expected that usage. He had a mix of emotions when that landed. Sam as I recall was having frustrations as a bard.
Just wanted to add that you can also access Faerie Fire through the Drow/ Half Drow racial abilities not just through the class selections you mention in the video.
I remember a pretty funny thing that happened with Faerie Fire in one of my more recent campaigns. We were running Lost Mine, and we came up Nezznar prepping for a hell of a fight. We had a Goliath barbarian, a tiefling bard (me), two rangers, and a rogue.
We had the barbarian bust the door through, followed up by me Faerie Firing about three of the things in there (Including Nezznar), with the rogue and two ranger proceeding to make Nezznar into a pincushion in just the first round we had.
We were basically an FBI squadron with me throwing a flashbang. It was fun as hell.
**BOOMBOOMBOOM** *[FBI, open up!!]*
@@Zombiewithabowtie basically, yeah!
Seven Spells, Seven Sins:
Envy: Bane
Gluttony: Contagion
Greed: Heat Metal
Lust: Hex/Bestow Curse
Pride: Faerie Fire
Sloth: Slow
Wrath: Synaptic Static
My favorite debuff spell of all time was back in 3.5, a divination spell called Unluck. It forced the target to roll EVERYTHING twice and take the worse result. Basically the same as disadvantage in 5E, but on literally every roll including damage rolls.
I've been on the receiving end of Heat Metal as a plate armour-wearing fighter. I can attest that it is a terrifying spell to be affected by.
This is why you invest in some armor of doffing, or whatever it's called. It's in Xanathar's and lets you remove your armor as an action.
@@carsonrush3352Unfortunately, my fighter is of the AFND school, so he would ultimately be worse off in that situation regardless.
Best course of action: kill the caster.
@@carsonrush3352 WE got around it in our game via the lizardfolk Paladin being able to use his racial ability to make chitin armor out of giant bug shells.
Did you not know that when you are wearing Plate Armour no part of the metal touches you? Fair enough for something in your hands or even a helmet, but metal armour never touches the body as it's ALWAYS worn over the top of many layers of gambeson.
I love Slow because it can be re-skinned for a Time themed PC.
Wish there were more Time based spells outside of Time Stop & Haste.
slow'd also be great for shadow sorcs too. flavor it like the targets are ensnared with threads of shadows, hindering their minds and movements
@@CycloneSP Shadows is always fun to work with re-skining!!! I think my friend's idea took the cake. In game time was midnight and he used Animate Object to make 'animated armor' by filling it with 'a pulsating dark mist' and the DM made it okay to combo with dancing lights for glowing eyes and background glare. Then our warlock used thaumaturgy to shake the ground and let off a deep echoing roar all so they could terrify an NPC merchant who sold the wizard a fake enchanted staff. XD
Hold person/monster could be time themed for a little flavor
@@mitchc6059 ooh!!! Like a time stop for that person! Thats a good one!
@Singularity I don't know what Matthew Mercer's plans are in regards to Dunamancy, but it's a field of magic he's created for Campaign 2 of Critical Role, and it's based on gravity/time.
I've been watching your videos for a while now and I want to say that y'all are great. I'm glad folks like you enjoy posting these videos for people like me!
Blindness:! Like Bestow Curse it does not require concentration. Unlike Bestow Curse, it doesn't require upcasting to get that either. It's not a huge debuff, but it's just as bad for spellcasters as darkness, and without messing up your friends.
Agreed. As a cleric, being able to debuff somebody with blindness while keeping your concentration open for the many good buffs and debuffs you have is a big thing.
I would add Silence as well. Stopping communication with your enemies as well as any spell casting inside the sphere is great to as well.
I like color spray a lot for low-level adventures (under 4th or 5th). For lots of little monsters, it gives reliable no save blindness. It's only for one round, but being blind is such a crazy debuff (disadvantage for them, advantage for you) doing it to possibly multiple monsters in combat at once is super helpful. Once monster hp outpaces the average roll (6d10), you replace it with something else. But the lower level you are, the more broken it is.
I'm a really huge fan of LEVITATE as a debuff spell. When you Levitate a target that does not want to be Levitated, they make a Constitution save (the only bad part). If they fail, the CASTER gets to choose how they move, with that altitude change of 20 feet per round (up to 60 feet away from you).
This means you can target that Big Bad Evil Fighter Type, work together to impose disadvantage, and then completely take him out of the fight for up to 10 minutes because his ranged attacks are either completely ineffective or non-existent.
And besides, who doesn't like the idea of making that BBEG float upside down, so he can survey the wanton destruction of his minions while he's completely helpless.
Levitate is underrated.
Don't forget the falling damage imposed if he falls from over 20 feet. Helpful in high ceilinged areas or outside.
@@VecnasLeftEye Spell specifically says no falling damage, but Levitate is a great multi-use spell: take an enemy melee creature out of the fight while you take care of his friends, or help your allies over a river of lava, or retrieve some loot from the bottom of an acid pit, or keep yourself out of melee while you throw your spells.
@@agilemind6241 Well, there certainly would be falling damage, if you've levitated them to a significant height, and then end the spell. Always remember, it's not the fall that hurts you, it's the sudden stop at the end. :)
@@Hawkwinter01 it specifically says that when the spell ends the target gently floats to the ground
Superb work as always. Excellent choices across the board
Been watching your various videos over the course of a month. Your in-depth coverage of the technical aspects of D&D has been very useful , especially with the mid-high level campaign I'm running. Well done Dudes!
Thank you :)
I know a lot of people don't like it, but in the right party Elemental Bane can be a fantastic choice. It would require knowing your party well and a little bit of luck but you can do some crazy stuff with it. As an example, I was playing in a group that did a lot of fire damage. We had a Light Cleric, Fiend Warlock, Red Dragon Sorcerer(me), and an Eldritch Knight Fighter with the flame arrows spell. I managed to land land Elemental Bane on a Beholder we were fighting. The next turn followed with three up-cast scorching rays and an action surge from the fighter. The one spell probably added about 30d6 fire damage in total.
My first and still favorite character I have is a High Eld Wizard Necromancer. My play style with "Thalion" is de-buffing while raising the dead. My party helps kill while I de-buff in the mean time. After two enemies go down I Animate Dead and go after the de-buffed enemies with the zombies. I use my zombies with polymorph and typically turn one into a Giant Centipede to paralyze opponents. I have Dance Macabre if I feel like polymorphing a zombie into a dinosaur isn't enough too. So my enemies are incredibly weakened while zombies are constantly clawing at them. It's very fun.
Tasha's Mind Whip is an amazing new spell that wasn't out when this video came out. Combine it with mind sliver (another debuff) and it helps to hit the spell by forcing disadvantage on saving throw! Then the target can only do an action, bonus action or move on a turn and losses reaction! Single target, yes, but a new favorite spell!
Bane I love, and until you have you DM use it on you you don't realize how good it is! Faerie fire is a reason I LOVE playing druids or Fey warlocks, Ditto for Hex (I have picked up magic initiate (warlock) on sorcerers before to make a eldritch blast sorcerer that uses hex and bestow curse! (and since warlocks get to cast all spells at 5th leven when that sot is available, YOu don't concentrate on it then). SLow is amazing, and I usually pick it over haste, though HOld person and hypnotic patern as favorites along with fly and fireball at that level. Synaptic static is another favorite that doesn't require concentration! and contagion is jut good!
Other spells I like is Darkness (with the right builds) and I love a couple of spells that debuff movement like sickening radiance and also plant growth and what you can do casting transmute rock twice (once to make it mod, then to make the mud rock again once the creatures are in it)
Other favorites include sleet storm for breaking caster's concentration and imposing disadvantage on range attacks and difficult terrain, Phantasmal Killer is another great one that gives a creature the fightened condition and does damage on top (psycic) and fear or cause fear are good. (though like color spray I drop it when I can pick up blindness/deafness and hypnotic patern).
I love Bane and Faerie Fire, however I'm surprised that Feeblemind didn't make it into your list! Reducing 2 stats to 1 on a failed save for 30 in game days??? Yes please.
Combine this with a divination wizard for the portent ability to make sure that the creature fails for extreme fun.
Probably because it's more rare and requires higher levels.
Most campaigns don't last past level 10, so it's generally these lower level spells that become your bread and butter throughout your character's journey.
Level 8 probably.
I thought there was a weaker version of it though.
I'd almost always rather cast bless than bane, because there's no save. It's a party wide buff that just works!
I remember coming across this and the first thing on my mind was; "God, I hope this doesn't hit me."
5:00 - just as an FYI - Drow also get Faerie Fire starting at 3rd-level
Great video! I think Bane is far better than most people give it credit for. A huge reason it's so effective is that it's a Charisma save (far better against most enemies than the Wisdom saves most debuff spells target), but also unlike many other spells it allows you to specifically target enemies in an area. In my party, my Bard has been using it far more than Faerie Fire simply because we have so many melee combatants that it's hard to target multiple enemies with my AoE debuffs without also hitting my friends.
Critical Role has also showed me that the combo of Bane and Slow is incredibly nasty!
As someone who plays druid a lot I can also reccomend these debuff spells:
Entangle: 1st level spell, creates difficult terrain, enemies inside the radius must make a strength saving throw or be restrained. The restrained condition means they can't move, get disadvantage on both attack rolls and dexterity saves, and all attacks against them have advantage. They must waste an action to attempt to break free and still lose half their movement due to difficult terrain. A good alternative to use against enemies who are too slippery for Fairie Fire.
Plant Growth - Super difficult terrain in a 100 ft radius. Enemies must spend 4 feet of movement to move 1 foot. Meaning that a creature with 30ft movement speed is reduced to 7.5 feet. But you always round down so they can only ever move 5 feet, 10 if they dash. This can effectively immobilize a lot of ground based heavy hitters, and you can create safe areas where your party can move unhindered at the risk of allowing the enemy to get out of the thicket early
One of my favorites is Sickening Radiance from Xanathar's Guide to Everything. It's a 4th level spell that does 4d10 radiant damage in a 30 foot sphere. But the real kicker is that if they fail their CON save, they take a level of exhaustion. Many of the effects of exhaustion are effects that are listed in the other 7 spells the Dungeon Dudes picked. Our group likes to stack it with other movement impairing spells like Plant Growth (another of our group's favorite) to keep them stuck in the area to keep making the checks. Here are the effects of exhaustion:
1 : Disadvantage on ability checks
2 : Speed halved
3 : Disadvantage on attack rolls and saving throws
4 : Hit point maximum halved
5 : Speed reduced to 0
6 : Death
Yeah, XGE has the deadliest spells.
Pair that with bestow curse and if they fail the wisdom saving throw they spend their round doing nothing! And then it just stacks until they die. Imagine diggin a hole however deep and then disguise it like a trap and when the enemy falls in just curse them and then hit them with sickening radiance
The text of the spell says they have to save or take the spell's damage, but the level of exhaustion seems unconnected to the save. You can apply levels of exhaustion automatically as long as you maintain concentration.
@@josiahneal7455 Jeremy Crawford tweeted a clarification saying that all the non damaging effects are tied to the save also.
@@landonkryger Oh, that's a lot better then. Thanks!
I like to think of synaptic static as the barbarian killer.
Light Domain Clerics are freaking rockstars!!!
I'm planning on taking Magic Initiate (Warlock) with my Naga Paladin. Eldritch Blast, Toll the Dead (for ranged options), and Hex as the 1st level spell.
If/when we fight a BBEG, or at least the 'big bad' for the current quest or dungeon.. I want to Hex their Str or Dex, and Constrict them.
Restraining the enemy, giving everybody Advantage on their attacks, and the Hex will make it harder for them to escape my deadly hug.
Maybe I just love the idea of my Naga hugging a BBEG to death, but.. You can't argue that the image isn't awesome.
Great list. I never really thought much about fairy fire, but now that you mention it every time I've used it, it really turns the fight around. Good call on that one!
- Innkeeper Vase Odin
Personal idea I’ve had for uniquely weaponizing Heat Metal. 1 level of rogue before the rest of the game as a Forge Cleric. Have one of your expertise be in athletics from sake of grappling. Gaining resistance and eventually immunity to fire damage means that you can totally just hold onto an enemy and heat up your own armor to cook them alive.
I would also advocate for the cantrip Frostbite at low levels: the imposition of disadvantage of weapon attack rolls on my enemies has saved my party more than once. Unfortunately it's not readily available to supporting classes save for druids. TL;DR good at low levels for one shots
Magic Initiate would crack that open for other classes.
sorcerer get it too, so say a divine soul as support
Unfortunately the problem with frostbite is it is a con save, so easy to miss
It's learnable by druid, sorcerer, warlock and wizard. And I think the Artificer too.
I had a game where I countered Heat Metal. They cast it on my Fighter, so I grappled them and held them to the armour. I had more health, so they lost consciousness before me and the spell ended.
Chill Touch is one of my favorites.
D8 damage that scales with levels, per cantrips.
But the clutch debuff ability of making it that the target cannot regain hit points until the start of your next turn.
This means they can’t heal from cure spells, heal, regeneration abilities, potions, or healing kits. Or other abilities.
Further more, if they’re undead they have disadvantage to attack you.
I have found this spell, as a cantrip, to change the outcome of so many difficult fights. It’s absolutely overlooked.
Heat Metal is also effective when you are interrogating someone wearing metal.
Using it on metal constructs is awsome
@@Spiceodog oh yes.
@@Spiceodog this did not even cross my mind yet, you sir are brilliant. However "any creature in contact" i think i´d know some DMs who would say "nope this creature IS the object and not in contact. you just gave it 2d8 fire damage on its next attack" (i really know a DM who would do this. He is a typical the rules as he reads it vs the player and he wonders why nobody shows up to the campaign anymore) i definitely would say "yo udamn son of a biscuit" and let you have it but i can see thew mental gymnastics to make it not work on constructs.
@@Metalhammer1993 at that point, you bring up an even further level of rules lawyering. "I cast it on his torso, which is in contact with his head and limbs. also, it doesn't do damage unless I use my bonus action, and I didn't use that while he was attacking me".
@@Metalhammer1993 i would do both it atks with disadvantge takes the dmg but so will you also if it cab grapple you thats going to hurt
Just discovered this channel, and love the content.
Plus 1 to Hypnotic Pattern > Slow: when fighting mobs, especially those with low Wisdom, it's practically an auto-win. In general, I prefer to exploit an action economy advantage by taking some enemies out of the fight altogether, rather than suppressing the whole force but still dealing with their combined actions (albeit scaled back) and entire HP pool.
Having some enemies knocked out of the fight clarifies your targets, essentially creating two stages of the combat: kill the ones who aren't unconscious; kill the others, one by one (preferably with readied attacks.)
Another quality video. Would love for you to do one on smart or tactical uses of sorcerer metamagics.
You guys didn't mention that anything that causes a penalty to ability checks, effects casters who use counterspell. If you throw bane on a wizard or bard caster, or use hex and say INT on a wizard, or CHA on a bard, they are going to have a hard time counterspelling anything higher than what they cast counterspell on.
On man, great point! As if hex wasn't good enough already
Bane only effects saves and attacks but not checks, so not great for weakening counterspell.
@@dabaron7015i thought it only affects checks and attacks but NOT safes...
@@crkTyphoon that's Hex, they even say in the video Bane is one of the few spells to penalize saves.
Bane, Faerie Fire and Hex outright won my party our last encounter. It was great.
Hex is still great even though it is not saves.
Your Rogue will love you if you target WIS to give DAdv on perception checks.
Your Wizard would love you if you target INT to lower chances of Counterspell/Dispel Magic checks
As they brought up the DAdv for grapple checks.
The fact that it upcasts well (up to 24 hours depending on concentration at 5th level slot) and Warlocks auto upcast is amazing
0 dislikes. As it should be.
Zachinator (un)balanced, as all things should be
Been loving your videos lately, they’ve really helped elevate my plays in games.
I feel like Grease is a bit underrated. Provides difficult terrain and multiple Dex saves without any Concentration. Having the save occur at the end of the turn for anyone inside the area of effect means they won't be able to simply stand up. I've also talked with a few DMs who have said that since the grease covering the ground could be considered flammable, so this in conjunction with a readied firebolt. So it's basically Web where you sacrifice size for not needing Concentration. And since it's a lvl 1 spell, you don't have to invest too much to stack it with other debuffs.
Flaming Grease spells are my speciality!
I’ve always liked the idea of Grease also slipping people up, so you can set all sorts of traps then ring the warning bell that the monsters have to tell others of intruders or whatever... and watch them all rush down and slide into Hell :)
"Heat Metal", also known as the "Nut Roaster".
Yes, I'm a child on the inside and don't regret it.
I love when you guys do these videos - they're great. Something pretty key which i think you left out about Bestow Curse which makes it worse in my opinion. Is that the Range on it is touch. So the characters that can cast this won't likely be casting it combat too often. Still a great spell, but worth noting. Thanks again!
Please remember that faerie fire affects all creatures in the radius. This effected my rogue once (because I have a tendency to roll nat 1's) thus making me the brightest thing in the room.
This makes me wanna make seven debuff spells around the sins XD
You could take Thief of the Five Fates and blow an invocation for 1 spell, usable 1 per day, burning one of the Warlocks very limited spell slots... OR, you could take Magic Initiate, have Bane to use once per day, use no spell slot, and get 2 additional cantrips to help bolster the Warlock's spell list. So... Which gives the most bang for the buck?
deadpoet4 The invocation would go best unless you pick Bard, because if you pick Cleric you’d have to use your wisdom. But going Bard and then getting something extra Cha based cantrips is nice. The way I run things gives Warlocks extra invocations, but people also get extra feats. So it depends on how much you value your invocations and feats. Bards have some nice utility/role play cantrips, but if you wanna save your feats for other things, then the invocation is the way to go.
Wouldn't Vicious Mockery be worth to mention?
As always, great video guys, very often I overlook Heat Metal, sounds like a great debuff and capable of interactions few spells offer, which makes for great narrative material, and Faerie Fire is my favorite spell in the game
Really appreciate the video, these and others like it on spells have really helped me with running my wizard in adventurer's league
Played a Bard once with Bane and Synaptic Static. It was a disgustingly powerful debuff combo.
Hey guys, instead of just naming the spell you could place its description too while you are explaining them. That way we can pause read it and then continue listening with a better understanding of the spell.
I've been liking Synaptic Static because it's both versatile and potent (usually you have to choose one or the other), but Contagion sounds worth looking into if it can burn through a legendary creature's Legendary Resistance, since I can't think of any other spell that forces that many saving throws at that high a level of urgency.
Heat Metal suffers from the drawback that if it works too well, the DM will compensate by adjusting what you fight. The thing about Swiss army knife spells is that it's difficult to nerf or bypass them by encounter design.
I have had DMs that are like that before, and it kind of derails the campaign for me as an individual. "Suddenly the 'Order of the Dragon Knights' stop trying to take your team down, and instead the 'Lousy Amalgamation of Druids and Monks' have taken up their cause!"
That's overdoing it a bit. Instead shift the balance away from humanoids and toward monsters. Not every encounter has to be cheese-proofed, but some of them should be.
I'm shocked you didn't mentioned Blindness/Deafness, my personal favorite debuff spell. Only a 2nd level, doesn't require concentration, and is a really powerful debuff. Perfect spell to burn through a boss's legendary saves.
a good pick up for a divine soul sorcerer who can twin that on top of concentrating on bane, hold person, or whatever.
especially because you learn so few spells as a sorcerer, having a cheap debilitating debuff that leaves your concentration free is quite handy
I know it’s spell slot intensive, but if you wanted to mess up a big or a nasty monster in general, a party could work together to combo bestow curse, targeting consitution disadvantages, then contagion going for the vulnerability to all damage if the monster fails all three saving throws, which just became more likely. I know its intensive, and it’s banking on a lot of communication/coordination, but i think if there is 1 enemy that you can’t abide and really want them to fail a specific debuff, having bestow curse in someone’s back pocket with a little planning could change the tide of a big battle.
Great vid at well DDudes. I’m glad that contagion got reworked, as it was before it was a virtually useless long shot.
That incredible intro had so much awesome alliteration that I laughed loudly through my whole house
I would love to use slow in situations where the environment becomes a factor. Slow someone trying to escape a blast, or lava flow... legendary monsters should love this to keep the players in trouble from lair effects.
I'm currently playing through Dragon Heist as a tanky, frontline, high Con (20) Lizardfolk Cleric of Knowledge who specializes more in buffs/debuffs (Bane is his go-to) and utility over healing (Healing Word is pretty much the extent of his healing, with Spare the Dying as last resort and the ability to craft Healing Potions being the longterm method of healing he'll bring to the party). Really enjoying the character, especially since he loves books as much as I do, and a quirk I spontaneously gave him is that he tries to eat most kills for new taste experiences (he was a hermit, exiled by his clan and raised by an old human hunter near Daggerford who eventually died of old age). Apparently stirges and gazers are disgusting, but I rolled 20+ on my Con Saves for them, so no lunch was lost.
The party did have a primary healer/buffer in the form of a Favored Soul Sorcerer, but just this past session, the player continued his decades-old tradition and changed character (to a Barbarian) after only a few sessions (four, in this case). We'll see how long this character lasts. :/
Bardic Inspiration't is op.
It reverses the effects of Bardic Inspiration.
Bardic Expiration
I'm playing a drow bardlock right now. I have like most of the things on this list lol. Getting to pick HP OR Slow is really entertaining. Super excited about getting Synaptic Static!
Y'all make a really strong case for Heat Metal. I'll definitely have to consider it when I level in Bard.
In my campaigns Heat Metal is the reason druids don't use metal armor.
Another creative use of that spell is to cast protection from fire spells in the armored fighter/barbarian/paladin then cast Heat Metal on him and let him grapple the enemy.
My Cleric and I (Wizard) tend to stack bestow curses, one giving disadvantage on wisdom saving throws and the other forcing the monster to make a wisdom saving throw or lose it action that turn. It's definitely made a few bigger enemies hate us. Especially when we cast at level 5 and there is no concentration.
Everyone forgets about Divine Soul sorcerers :(
Awesome vids, thanks crew, Monty, and Kelly
Thank you!
One of my players used heat metal on a wooden ship... And forgot to drop concentration! Took the party a solid 5 minutes to figure out why the ship was burning after they fought off the pirates.
The legendary resistance issue is why you need a secondary control caster. A Warlock makes a great backup, since they have some invocation help. If it sticks, great. If the BBEG uses his legendary, it clears the way for the next control spell to hit.
The thing about casters is that more is always better!
Amen. I'd totally roll with an all caster crew. Hell, I'd love to see 5 different wizard builds own a campaign in robes w/o a single melee weapon. 😁
I run with a Hexblade Sorcerer, a Hexblade Paladin, two Hexblade Bards of Sword and Lore, and a Hexblade Eldritch Knight myself.
An honorable mention should go to Ray of Frost, the cantrip. While the damage is nice, the fact that it lowers your enemy's movement by 10 feet can add up, especially if they're trying to close in on your caster or flee.
With the spending of an additional invocation, Eldritch Blast can fall into this as well.
If multiple casters targeted the same creature, or if a sorcerer uses twinned spell you could potentially delete the creatures movement speed entirely.
I've was always under the impression that once you "cast" another c-spell, that was when the previous ended and not when you began casting. Granted, it's the same result either way, since bane ending right as you cast another would still mean they no longer suffer the effect.
Just wanted to make sure i/everyone had the clear picture here.
Cody from Taking20 covered this in a previous video, different subject, but this was what he had to say [paraphrasing]
Spell1 remains in effect until you finish casting Spell2. So for as long as it takes for you to complete the cast, let's imagine a 1min casting time or 10rounds, then spell1 applies in the interim.
Tödliche Verwüste
I'd paraphrase it to:
The moment you start concentrating on spell2 you lose your concentration on spell1.
My favorite dnd channel! Keep it up!
I appreciated your astute alliteration at the beginning of the episode
The perks of Slow is that you can chose who to target with it
Slow is one of those spells that sounds good on paper and is even better when using it
Slow is good but the targets get so many saves that Hypnotic Pattern always seems more versatile.
@@M0ebius How come hypnotic gaze is more versatile? Your allies can't be in the area of effect, everyone have to be well coordinated to not attack the ones under it's effect, the environment have to be stable enough so that they don't get hit and therefore put out of trance.
Slow doesn't take any of this under account and you and your allies can keep the damage coming.
Also, the DM should make some enemies have countermeasures for this overused spell, like making a familiar (lv 1 wizard spell) wake those in trance.
Khaons Hypnotic Pattern has the more powerful effect with only a single save, and assuming the same number of targets will generally eat more enemy actions than Slow. There are also many ways to mitigate the friendly fire such as Aura of Devotion or Careful Spell, or having a signal for the party to avert their eyes.
Slow is very good too though, not quite as devastating but more reliable. There are trade offs.
I think it’s worth mentioning that since alot of these are in the cleric spell list, it means that divine soul sorcerer can make use of them, not only adding a class that can cast them, but in the case of a DS Sorc they can also benefit from meta magics
Bestow Curse and Slow are both my favorite debuffs to use in most combats. Yes they are both Wisdom Saves to resist, but when they hit the enemy is done for. And even against bosses with Legendary Resistances they are a good for making the Boss expend that limited resource to allow a better chance of them actually failing against something that can win the fight later in the battle.
Glad to see Bane here. I don't see it talked about a ton, but I built my bard to be primarily a controller / off healer, and so keeping my party alive through damage prevention was a big focus. Especially at low-mid levels, I got huge mileage out of Bane - certainly moreso than if I tried to heal that damage instead. Combined with Cutting Words, and later Synaptic Static, I am the arbiter of who gets hit, and it's great
Bane also makes for a great combo debuff with Vicious Mockery! While holding Concentration on Bane for 3 creatures, cast Vicious mockery (which is now more likely to work because of Bane) on one of those as well and on its next attack it has disadvantage AND has to subtract 1D4 from its roll!
Don't forget, Counter Spell and Dispel Magic are also ability checks. Hex is great for protecting against getting your 4th level and above spells foiled or for protecting 4th level+ buffs already running.
Kelly's beard coming in nice!
Yeah, but how does it interact with that lip ring?
I feel that blindness/deafness should have been put on here by the sheer virtue of it not having concentration.
Honorable mention should go to the damage cantrips that also introduce a secondary effect. Ray of frost reduces speed a flat 10ft, chill touch prevents healing, shocking grasp prevents reactions, infestation forces movement, frostbite and vicious mockery give disadvantage on attacks. Also ray of sickness for the poison effect and ray of enfeeblement for halving damage from strength based enemies.
Small thing to consider about Slow. If the DM does know the slow spell and knows how debilitating the effect is, like you said, they WILL burn a legendary resistance on it. But that doesn't mean you wasted the spell, you got the boss to burn a resistance and they only have so many of them. Full casters get enough slots that can cast slow you can quickly burn through all of a boss's resistances then hit them with the big one. For example; burn through a powerful Demon Lord's resistances with slow, then hit them with a high level banish.
24:24 Elementals, fiends, constructs and undead are generally immune to the poisoned condition so Contagion is often useless.
No mention of blindness?? A second level spell available to almost all casters, based on a con save, imposing disadvantage to your baddie for everything, if not completely negating their action (ie spells requiring sight), AS WELL as advantage on all attacks against it and automatic failures on dex saves?? And multiple targets? Seems like an oversight
With Slow you can use it on an ennemy that would want to make multiple attacks or a caster that want to cast or any of the use presented in this video. With counterspell you can only counter a spell. Slow is less potent for specific stuff but is very versatile
2:35 Bane [PHB 216] Level 1 Classes: Bard, Cleric
4:48 Faerie Fire [PHB 239] Level 1 Classes: Bard, Druid
7:13 Hex [PHB 251] and Bestow Curse [PHB 218] Level 1 Classes: (Hex) Warlock Level 3 Classes: (Bestow Curse) Bard, Cleric, Wizard
10:57 Heat Metal [PHB 250] Level 2 Classes: Bard, Druid
14:39 Slow [PHB 277] Level 3 Classes: Sorcerer, Wizard
20:20 Synaptic Static [XGTE 167] Level 5 Classes: Bard, Sorcerer, Warlock, Wizard
22:57 Contagion [PHB 217]* Level 5 Classes: Cleric, Druid
Count per class and level:
Level 1: 2 Bard, Cleric, Druid, Warlock
Level 2: Bard, Druid
Level 3: Bard, Cleric, 2 Wizard, Sorcerer
Level 5: Bard, Sorcerer, Warlock, Wizard, Cleric, DruidCount per class: 4 Bard, 3 Cleric, 3 Druid, 2 Sorcerer, 2 Warlock, 3 Wizard
This doesn't necessarily tell you which class is *best* at debuffing, but it will tell you which class has access to the most debuff spells, and at what level.
Bard is looking pretty strong, with at least one debuff at every spell level from 1-3 and 5.
The combination of Hex and Bestow Curse by the Dungeon Dudes is weird and makes this table more complicated than it needed to be. They threw out some babble for justification, but it really made zero sense and was dumb and bad and they should have just covered Bestow Curse as a different spell instead of the weird shoehorning they tried here.
My favorite use of Heat Metal is casting it on an arrowhead in flight. It requires a lot of trust between my Bard and Ranger player, with the Bard using a prepared action to cast it right after the Ranger shoots but before she knows if it hits or not. This gets around the requirement to see the metal you're heating in a fun and dangerous way :D
Glad that Synaptic Static got a mention. Concentration free and works in combination with Bane.
Both spells can be accessible to a Lore Bard which has Cutting words.
Cutting Words: -D6/D8/D10/D12 to attack/damage/ability check as a reaction
Synaptic Static: -D6 to attack/ability checks for 1 minute. Int save at the end of turns to remove this debuff once afflicted.
Bane: -D4 to attack/saving throws up to 1 minute. No save once afflicted, but concentration.
So if you total it up.
Attack rolls: Up to -D22 to an attack roll if using cutting words. -D10 normally.
Saving throws: -D4 to saving throw, benefits the int saves required by synaptic static.
Ability checks: Up to -D18 if using cutting words, -D6 normally, works well against counterspelling or grappling.
Surprisingly mid game, Bane works well still. It makes stunning strike from Monk work more often even should your DC be 10. I thought I would still use Bless more but now I cannot let go of Bane. It just prevents damage and enables a lot of things to work.
Slow is also really nice. It cripples a young red dragon enough so that it can only attack once and its only threat is that fire breath. A party of four level 5s can take it on, though the drawback of this spell is that it makes the caster the first on the dragon shit list. That fire breath, oof, better have absorb elements prepared that day.
I mean, I’m making a spell caster class with at has almost no spell slots but makes up for it by learning all its spell and having a all of them prepared, with their spelling being heavily buff/debuff -centric. So it is practically just the dragon slayer’s best friend
Great topic and episode. I play a bard and this gave me some great ideas. Thanks, guys!