Evocation Magic in 5e Dungeons & Dragons - Web DM
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 12 ก.ย. 2024
- BOOM! We're talking about the EVOCATION spell school! There's a ton more in there than fireball! Learn our best ways to fully wield the energy that makes magic itself! Don't forget to subscribe, comment & share. New episodes every Wednesday.
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This is a head cannon answer as far as I know. But, what if evocation is the oldest school of magic, it can functionally tap into all aspects of magic. But not to any intricate depth. Spells and abilities that just have singular purposes (send, burn, bend, freeze, etc). I know there are spells that dont lend to this theory. But I humor the theory.
Hey guys, You're really great! Also, this is like the second time your videos have only 5 recommended fallowups for me. Is that some algorithm affecting you guys?
So where's that Baldur's Gate longplay gentlemen? :^)
I did enjoy 2e take on necromancy, it was the manipulation of positive and negative energy. Good video guys
Somethig that me and my frind find funny is that when you look at spells that have a wizards's name like Melf's acid arrow often are said wihout the wizard's name, for example as just acid arrow. This, reasonably applied, gives you snowball swarm, tiny hut, and resilient sphere. However, it also means that Mordenkainen's sword can be referred to as Sword. You can cast Sword. This is also why I like to cast Hand (Bigby's hand.)
the way i like to play it out is that the schools of magic in fiction are purely academic, and this is the exact kind of discussion a couple of disgruntled wizards would have
Agreed
Lesbosmer are you telling me Pruitt and Davis AREN’T disgruntled wizards?
@@Karak971 Jim Davis definitely is; however, Pruitt is a monk/fighter.
@@pasp9866 Please explain how something can be less or more magical 'cause the way I see it, something is magical or it's not.
@@MrFForger Magic is everywhere and in everything...unless something specifically pushes that force out. So things with more magic have a greater capacity. Whether it be natural or engineered. Magic is part of the natural rules of the d&d world. Wizadry is the science of d&d. That magic is kinda capable of anything kinda makes the idea you can scientifically understand both magic and the d&d world seem a little overwhelming but then that maybe is how you should feel. Maybe this is how wizards feel.
“I didn’t say ‘I ask how big the room is’, I said ‘I cast fireball’”
UrbanBen killed my whole party doing that the second time I ever played .
Well done! (Or just a medium roast?) :P
If you didn’t you’d be called fried chicken
5e ruined fireball by not having it guaranteed to fill the full volume, taking whatever shape is available if the sphere doesn't fit.
@@fhuber7507 the spell description says that is goes around corners...
The wizard, a chem major:"Why can't I summon a base?"
the bard, who just got off his phone: "yeah, I'd like to summon a bass."
I cast Summon Bigger Fish.
The Druid: “DID ANYONE SAY BASS?”
Engineering major: summon? Why not just build a base?
Culinary arts major: if you’re going to build you’ll need food so I cast fried chicken
@@mls160 would the engineer be playing an artificer?
If magic would be real these guys would still be having the same discussion
Somewhere in 2e Planescape it mentions (albeit for comedic effect) that planar people and creatures are at risk of being unexpectedly conjured by prime material wizards. So in my mind Conjuration is something which summons material and energy from the Outer Planes, while Evocation summons it from the Inner (Elemental) Planes. That would mean Melf's Acid Arrow draws acid from one of the Elemental or Para-Elemental Planes, (most likely Ooze) while Acid Splash summons acid from somewhere in the Outer Planes. Likewise, Wall of Stone would draw from the Plane of Earth while Leomund's Secret Chest would be a real chest stored somewhere in the Outer Planes. Also important to note, I clearly have too much free time.
Leomund's secret chest takes a chest that already exists on the prime material plane that must be crafted to the specifications of the spell and stores it on the Ethereal plane and connects a tiny chest replica to the real chest.
@@BordrKing Yup. Probably should have re-read that first, haha.
That's a fun way to think of it.
I like how half of every spell-school video is about how loose the spell classification is.
This has made me homebrew that magic schools are academic constructs and that wizards constantly debate different spells. Might have to make a Jim & Pruitt pair of NPCs for my party to witness it the next time they are in the city.
Another explanation is that each school has an underlying property in the construction its spells. The schools were named early on when not much was known about them ("oh this one has a bunch of spells for mind-controlling people, let's call it enchantment", "this one has a bunch of spells that let us kill people or bring them back, let's call it necromancy", etc.). As such, spells are grouped by cause instead of effect; and the names are just that... names.
@@SamFinklestein "Dim Javis" and "Phonathan Juitt" should be recurring NPCs in every D&D game.
@@Xocists Why not both?
@@SamFinklestein Wizard subclasses would become very murky indeed.
The best in world excuse for why the spell school sorting seems to damn wonky is to look at them like actual schools. Students at MIT have fundamentally different areas of focus than students at Stanford. Each school has it's own focus but they all have similar needs. Sending is evocation and message is transmutation because 5,000 years ago Evokers came up with Sending for their communication needs and Transmuters came up with message.
Healing isn't necromancy, even though it should be, because divine casters are students at Brigham Young University and don't care about what is going on in the rest of the educated world. While necromancers are the University of Pennsylvania, off doing god knows what so often that people forget they're also an "Ivy League" school like conjuration, and illusion.
I like that that explanation
Stealing this
The way I see it, when a spell is first developed, which school the developer of the spell belongs to gets the credit for the spell. Evocation is so broad spectrum because there were so many students blowing shit up and taking credit for it.
This, the inconsistencies in theme of the schools to the spells I think offers a fun exercise in coming up with the history of that spell's creation; Who made it? What was their relationship/class with magic? How did they invent that spell? Why did they invent that spell? When did this happen? I've honestly been tempted to make my own spellbooks for homebrew and having every (or almost every) spell named after its creator, like Mordenkainen's Magnificent Mansion, it adds more depth to the history of the world.
@@Vespuchian I'm picturing the example in the video of Flame Blade being created by a Wizard under the school of Evocation who just thought it would be cool; That's why it's lower level and Concentration, simply an ill-conceived party trick made by an old mystic trying to look like a cool knight with the magic at their disposal.
I agree so hard with this!
This is now canonical in my universe. Thank you for that.
For those curious: "Why the heck conjuration?" in 3.5 you literally just teleport in chunks of the Plane of Good Feels (Positive Energy Plane, which fuels life, the opposite of the Negative Energy Plane, which fuels undead boogers) to make the boo boo go away.
Which, honestly, I have a soft spot for that kinda shenanigans.
Sapphire Crook flaming sphere is a droplet if the plane of fire
I can’t wait to have enough experience with DnD to talk about and understand it like you guys. Thanks for all your help.
You will get there
And did you get there?
@@rikgales123 lmao fuckin no
I see Web DM, I watch Web DM, I explosive rune.
Fire is addition heat
Lighting is the movement of electrons
Cold is loss of heat
Acid is the motion of hydrogen (ie, it pulls compounds apart)
So then it's all transmutation
@@gerardoleal4590 In 3rd edition Burning Hands was actually Transmutation.
@@gerardoleal4590 "always has been"
@@gerardoleal4590 evocation Is energy manipulation. All atoms in universe connected due to energy. All transmutation should be evocation
"Evocation spells manipulate magical energy to produce a desired effect." So, by that extremely broad definition, wouldn't that make _all_ spells Evocation?
Leomund's Habitable Hemisphere. Genius.
I've said this before on another video on schools of magic, but these are hands down my favorite of Web DM's videos. I have learned so much from you guys. Great work! I'm not sure if you guys have tackled all of the eight schools or not, but I look forward to the next one if any.
We haven't done them all yet! Gonna make up a Playlist soon!
Thanks for this. I was hoping for some seriously wonkish discussion of this confusing school of magic, and you delivered. The standard D&D definitions are maddening.
in an Apatheist World:
Wizard: "prove to me that the gods exist!"
Cleric: "that's the only explanation for the schools inconsistencies!"
Wizard: "you got me there!"
Never have I so quickly wanted to revamp a portion of D&D than when I started actually looking at the spell schools and their associated spells. Just attempting to comprehend them requires a plethora of Sanity Checks.
#HabitableHemisphere
Also, best stinger yet, guys. ;D
Leomund's Tiny Hut. Also known as Leomund's Impervious Bunker
IMO Crown of Stars does not get nearly enough credit for being an amazing spell. Up to 28d12 damage that can crit, and it lasts for an hour. I guess it really depends on the types of games you're running, but if you're going into a dungeon or some sort of gauntlet of enemies, throw this up and blast through your enemies. Doesn't even require concentration.
phoenixking62 they could also all miss, doing no damage. Plus, each mote takes an action to throw.
Acid Damage: When the mage drops the base!
boo...
Woo!
Here’s my hypothesis about what’s really going on with d&d magic.
PH says that magical effects are created by manipulating the strands of the Weave. The only two real things you can do with strings are loop them and vibrate them.
I propose that making a loop out of the Weave creates a magical feedback loop that provides the actual energy used in spells, while vibrating those strings alters the properties of that energy or of other objects. That might seem kind of one-note, but that’s what all the arcane symbols and gestures are for: to add more complex vibrational modes and thus more nuanced effects.
Conceptually, this explains the spell schools evocation, transmutation, illusion, enchantment, abjuration (implied with the principle of negation), the animating and cursing parts of necromancy (although the definition of “energy” starts to get annoyingly broad) and the detecting half of divination (required secondary power). To get all of conjuration, the scrying half of divination, and the spirit summoning part of necromancy, we have to add a magical property to these magic strings, for which I would suggest that two ends of a Weave-string are always in the same physical location, even when they’re not (i.e. portals).
What does this mean for the spell schools?
It’s all arcane gibberish.
The way I've been doing Mordenkainen's sword, all it's spell text as written is the same, but if it hits a target the target must make a Con save, on a fail the target is petrified. A target under the stone skin spell has disadvantage on this save. A petrified or stone target struck by the sword is shattered, destroying it.
I love the image of a Wizard slicing through a mountain and causing an avalanche. I also feel like the players don't have enough access to one of the coolest status conditions in the game. It's a 7th level spell, let's have some fun with it here.
While I agree that I wouldn't take Witch Bolt as a wizard, I do think I know a good niche for that spell: Warlocks. The multiple rounds of damage Witch Bolt provides for the cost of only one spell slot works well with the warlock's very limited number of spell slots. Eldritch Blast is nice and all, but you have to roll for each attack, and Witch Bolt provides a way around that. Also, it scales as you cast it with higher-level spell slots, so you're getting a lot of damage in right off the bat before settling into maintaining it. The result is pretty cool.
Nintendo Loyalist that’s true, except the problem is the damage on subsequent turns is 1d12 not matter how high of a level you initially cast it at.
Nintendo Loyalist that said, there is one place where it is useful: on a blue dragon Sorcerer before they get access to Lightning Bolt. You CAN add the Charisma damage bonus on the subsequent turns after the first, which makes it viable
You are almost always better off not using witch bolt, even as a warlock. The following damage does not scale and the action cost is not worth it. Eldritch Blast, particularly with agonizing blast, is better, even with with a miss chance.
I homebrew it to make subsequent attacks scale up with spell level like the original attack does, to make it a lot better, but not overpowered.
I once designed a kind of gish weapon that had a special effect of allowing spells like witch bolt to be activated as a bonus action that made it really good, but that was me just kind of patching it with an easy cheat.
I actually ran a game in which one of the characters was an Evoker who was debating such things whenever he could. One of the best scenes we roleplayed was when he challenged a master in a certain magical academy in order to gain propriety of a certain magical item. The duel was one of words and they debated about school appropriation of Melf's Acid Arrow, one arguing that it belongs to Evocation and the other to Conjuration. They ended up falling in love through that conversation and sharing said magical item. Fun times were had.
I had a evil boss cleric cast Guiding Bolt on the cocky ranger in the back. They were level 4, and the guiding bolt got a crit and did 39 damage. Almost killing the ranger in 1 hit.
Blood-Lord I fucking love bringing my players to the brink of death (or even killing them sometimes lol) just to scare the shit outta them. A personal favorite spell to shock them with is Inflict Wounds. They never expect the 3rd lvl inflict wounds that crit to do 50 dmg :P
I have a funny crit story, I casted inflict wounds on a succubus and crited and when I almost rolled max damage instantly killing it I said," Begone thot!" That got a laugh out of the table.
@@mylesdrake2949 This is why I play D&D.
5e : "Everything is evocation for no good reason."
I have this speculation. That all the spells were listed in a spreadsheet and the default was evocation after they wrote the description for it, then they went through & added the appropriate school, on a one by one basis & the weird ones were just the ones they didn't get to before the book had to be printed.
Btw spiritual weapon only increases damage every 2 levels. It’s a 3d8+spell mod at 6th level
And Mordenkainen's is a bonus action to attack on subsequent turns.
I was just looking that up too. Conquest Paladin over here
Mordenkainens can attack twice on the round its cast. Once when you cast it as an action, and again as a bonus action. Still not great for 7th level but it has a couple of benefits.
Love the discussion on all the spell schools that don’t make sense. LOL It would be incredibly interesting to get one of the designers - Mearls or Crawford - to give an honest explanation of their choices... Either there is some crazy genius at work behind the scenes, or the different owners of the spell schools had an auction or something to see who got what.
The way I would justify some acid being evocaton and others being conjuration is that some summon a physical acidic liquid, and others are a blast of magical energy that corrodes things similarly to acid. It isn't actually summoning a vitriolic sphere of acid, it is creating a sphere of magical energy that corrodes substances similarly to acid.
I like to think of certain spells belonging to certain schools due to where the energy for the spell comes from. This typically determines what types of spells can be seen belonging to their schools, but it also means that nearly identical results can be derived from entirely different sources. This probably is just as mixed up as the descriptions in the PHB, but you can see below roughly how I break it down. Hope it helps.
Transmutation, physical energy
abjuration, magic energy in yourself
conjuration, magical energy from another plane
divination, spiritual energy
enchantment, emotional energy
evocation, magical energy in the environment
illusion, mental energy
necromancy, life force/energy
I've always had the same view of the planes and magic as Pruitt. (All the planes are parallel, like layers, and magic permeates vertically.) It makes the most sense to me.
About necromancy not having the healing spells, you explained It yourself, evocation generates the energy, necromancy manipulates it, so it can not make it's own
Q: "Is there a plane of magical force?"
A: Yes.
Q: "Can you visit there?"
A: Uh... That depends on how you're looking to do so. The Plane of Force technically has gates, but they're completely indistinguishable from a Wall of Force. If you manage to Plane Shift into the Plane of Force, you're gonna have a bad time, because the whole thing is a mess of invisible movement. It completely destroyed everything I Plane Shifted in, and spat it out through a gate into the Astral. And before you ask, it's impossible to attune yourself to Force energy. I've tried.
Series summarised: Complaining about mislabelled spells.
yes! and we need more of it!
Yeah and it’s sucks. Talk about the spells more.
@@jgr7487 Why? Like, even just on the face of it, isn't that kinda self-evidently tedious?
The easy out, and one that isn't necessarily wrong, is that the schools are literally, in some sense, schools; we're accepting the fictional premise that all spells were at some point developed by some wizard, who developed it from the perspective of his/her singular school of expertise. Flaming sphere is a ball of otherwise simple fire, developed by an unknown conjurer; flame sword was developed by some unknown Evoker, fire can be energy but it's also a thing that exists. The real, REAL answer is that for the sake of balance, there's a time in every edition of D&D where people sit around and deal out spells for each school, then have arguments for or in favor of where one or another should go THIS time, with tons of edge cases, and eventually they just stop and say 'man, we gotta get this edition published' and the spell schools are sometimes not satisfying for the sake of not stripping 20 other spells away from some other school and going down an infinite rabbit hole. In a practical sense they also help magic users who concentrate on one school to avoid missing out on all heals, or all buff/debuff, or all damage dealing, by sprinkling a few edge case spells into their school.
@@monicabower5022 Except that in the 5e rule books, literally the only caster class who cares what school a spell comes from is the wizard, and wizards CAN learn spells from other schools, it's just easier to learn something in their field of expertise...and to muddy those waters even more, that is only applicable to spells they found a spellbook for. So the exact placement of a spell in a particular school doesn't even matter to most casters. Get rid of spell schools altogether and only the wizard would even notice that element was gone.
Lol that stinger got me, usually its some upbeat joke, this time you both just look super melancholy and then it ends haha
I always thought of evocation as sort of like a specialized form of conjuration. I think it makes sense that the schools of magic would be derivative and build on / off each other etc. When you cast an evocation spell I always think of it as very briefly "summoning" or, one might say "evoking" the energies of the elemental plane of fire, say. Using the spell as like a brief planar short-circuit, rather than the conjurer who in this metaphor is basically "grounding" the planar energy so it doesn't dissipate away as soon as he summons the thing.
4:10 By definition, Necromancy is literally Death Divination; basically asking ghosts for answers that only the dead would know.
The thing i love about D&D is that if something doesn't work for you you can change anything you want i think the spell system is a perfect playground for doing that
I invested in a new stock that rises by 0.1% every time either Davis or Pruitt repeats something the other has said and now I own one third of Apple
I generally think that effects like flaming sphere and flame blade, which do almost the same thing, but are different schools, has to do with how the spell accomplishes that task. Long ago some druidic nerd was like "i can draw magical energy from the nature spirits and contort it into a blade of fire in my hand", and some wizard was like "yeah or you could just conjure a little flame up from the plane that's MADE OF IT."
i personally like evocation containing all non-resurrecting healing spells since it explains those spells in a very straight forward way, that they are simply summoning positive energy and working it the right way to do healing.
''Decent'' damage? 4d6 for a first level spell is absolutely incredible. The only first level spell that compares to that damage output is Chromatic orb,and that requires you to have a 50gp diamond,which many people might not have when first starting out.
My main is an Evoker, Immolation spells dusted one and almost another White Dragon a few sessions ago. Being able to exclude friendlies when using AoE boom spells is EPIC!
The way I see it is that evocation is like straw you "suck" magic through, nothing big can get through intact but you can get energy through it. Conjuration on the other hand is like a door/portal you open, where thing can get through intact. The challenge with evocation is to shape the magic on the other side of the "straw" whilst the challenge with conjuration is to keep the things you don't like out of your portal.
If your not stuck running Adventure League as a DM try lowering the level of those spells that you feel are to weak are useless for there original level, after all you are the DM. I also like the idea of changing spells that require both concentration and allow a saving throw every round to read no extra saves every round if the caster continues concentrating for the duration or you may make a save every round if the caster stops concentrating and just lets the spell run for its full duration. Keep in mind as the DM you have to allow these spells to run for there full duration now.
Second part of the video was really good ! The first part was multiple castings of Beating on a dead horse (Beating is an evocation spell btw, not a conjuration)
Maybe I got it from another game or older edition but I always thought the difference between Evocation and Conjuration was Evocation created energy from nothing and Conjuration summoned energy from elsewhere. So an Evoker would create a fireball from nothing but a Conjurer would call energy from the Plane of Fire for the same effect.
I've always felt like Evocation IS the "all" school. It's pretty much the catch-all for everything that doesn't fit somewhere else, along with a few things that would. Gotta say though, you definitely named some of my personal favorite spells in your list of good ones. Sickening Radiance is one I'd love to see used at the double gate of a castle in place of murder holes, because who needs to throw rocks or boiling water on enemies when you can just exhaust them to death while they're trying to break through the gate? Also, I'd love to see Leomund's Tiny Hut renamed as Leomund's Bubble Bunker or similar. It's a cool spell, and I get what it was meant for, but ohhhh there is so much more it can do. By the way, the spell description says *nothing* can enter, so presumably even flooding the room won't affect your players until the spell wears off. Doesn't say anything about being able to breathe, though.
i really enjoyed this and, as you mentioned, evocation seems to be a subschool of conjuration, for this i personally like the way warcraft deals with this, mages use evocation for their primary elementals (fire and frost) as they learn to use the magic energies that surrounds them, and on the other hand, we have the shamans, shamans use what would be conjuration, they ask for the aid and permission of the elements to use their strenght, wether it be causing an earth shock or a lava surge, evocation uses the magic weave of the planar world whilst conjuration may need some sort of agreement from both parties to work (like letting the elements in this case, be channeled through you)
With Mordenkainen's Sword, you have the possibility of dealing an extra 3d10 on the same turn you cast spell (3d10 action, 3d10 bonus action). So up
to 6d10 on the initial turn. Makes it a somewhat better spell when you realize this.
Lightning Lure can be really fun if you're playing a lizardfolk wizard. Draw them to you with the spell, and use hungry jaws for a bonus action cronch. I had a lot of fun doing that to, like goblins and kobolds at low levels.
*sigh* Now I miss playing my lizard wizard.
I cast Fireball!
I cast counterspell!
@@MauroDraco I counter your counter spell
Lunar Star I counter your counterspell that's countering his counterspell.
@@ianmoone8640 My barbarian turns up and kills you all.
@@ianmoone8640 you activated my trap card which reduces all of my enemies Hit Points to 0 and it can't be negated and they also fail 3 death saving throws and there body is destroyed and they can't be resurrected by any means
I’ve barely played Magic: The Gathering and I know next to nothing about it, but I do know that I love the way it categorises magic. The colour-coded system is so much better than D&D’s spell schools IMO. It’s simultaneously nebulous enough to feel magical an mysterious, being organised by theme and feel rather than scientific semantics, while making it perfectly clear which spells should belong in which categories.
Someone has to fix all that magic stuff and make a consistent magic system.
The way I see it, evocation is the Projection of energy to create desired effects. Each school has an opposite that is either projecting or absorbing energy.
Abjuration is the opposite since it's all about negating or absorbing energy.
I don't know where I read this but I loved his description of Evocation.
"Evocation is the most flashing, most spectacular, most effect heavy and most boring school of magic. Don't get me wrong, I love it but it is a school made for simply blasting stuff. It is a blunt instrument of destruction without finesse. Then again when 90% of the Problems are nails, I guess the Hammer is the king of the tools."
After that my next D&D Charakter I created was a Fire Genasi city guard who is kinda the loose, trigger happy, cannon. (Evocation wizard with spellsniper)
I've saved party members by striking them with lightning lure (very situational I know) pulling them out of witches hut in CoS, and from a fall later on. I also used it to pull the druids into the standing stones at the hill.
For the Flaming sphere and flame blade questions. I imagine it is the same as a lighter and a match. They both produce flame but are vastly different in how they do it
You can only have one Contingency, but you can have as many Glyphs of Warding as you want
I need a Web DM Intro compilation in my life.
If I have interpreted the text in Mordenkainen’s Sword correctly, you get two attacks on your first round; one with the casting and one other with your bonus. There after you use a bonus action to use the sword, but it is a concentration spell. I’m not sure if this contradicts the observations presented, but I felt it did
So, funny thought I had when I saw someone else's comment about the different schools of magic being literal schools. What if the spells all used to be perfectly organized and logically consistent within the different schools? Then one day some students from one of the schools (probably necromancy, which would explain why everyone dislikes necromancers) thought it would be a hilarious senior prank to break into each school, remove random spells from the school's master spell book, and then magically insert them into different school's books? All the magic books in each school were synced to the master spell book, so now they're all messed up.
I feel like that would be more of a illusion thing to do
@@andrewknorpp9415, Yeah, that does fit the flavor of the school a little more. I was mainly looking for yet another reason for everyone to dislike necromancers...
Maybe the illusionist school also left horribly obvious clues framing the necromancy school?
Illnorean, yes, zombie's and black eyeliner everywhere!
In my world Enchanters and Illusionists are the hated ones. Illusionists because they are annoying clowns who flaunt all rules and traditions, while Enchanters are hated because many of them routinely violate the idea of consent (yeah, #metoo would have a fit about them). So by contrast Necromancy is okay, since after the defeat of Orcus a while back most undead aren’t evil. In fact, there’s a whole playable race of sentient humanoid undead called “The Risen.”
22:30 Just FYI, if you're a melee Sorcerer with a 3 level dip in Hexblade Warlock, you can absolutely wreck shit by Twinning Lightning Lure and then Quickening Green-Flame Blade or Booming Blade while having a Shadow Blade conjured.
I love Jim's expression as he thinks about Witch Bolt + Lightning Lure. "Yeah, that's a really cool...I actually really like that image." (It is a sweet visual)
I always see schools as having a purpose at their center.
Evocation- the school that destroys
Transmutation-the school the turns things into other things
Divination-spells that gain you information
Necromancy-spells that deal with life and death
Abjuration- the school that blocks and protects
Enchantment- the school that alters what people think and believe
Illusion- the school that changes what people see and sense
Conjuration- the school that makes things that you use
It’s not perfect, but it works better than most.
The positive energy plane is in the PHB. Go check the cosmology section again, it and the negative energy plane encapsulate all the other planes.
if you think about it, lightning lure puts more emphasis on "magnet" in "electromagnetic" than most other spells. it'd be cool to play a magnetic knight EK.
Aaaahhh,new episode of WebDM. Just what I needed to start my day at work. Love listening to you guys while I go about my day.
Glad to make the work day a little better!
In the Elder Scrolls universe the sun and stars are holes ripped by Magnus and the Magna Gi as they fled Nirn (the mortal plane) to their original relm of Atheries (the realm of the Gods) when they realized they where tricked by Lorkhan which then allowed magic to flow into Nirn
Little late mentioning the hold and melt combo with Sickening Radiance. I (kinda stupidly) house ruled that difficult terrain stacked so my four man party turned a massive set piece battle into a slaughter as no one inside the area could move more than 5 feet.
I found one situation in which witch bolt was useful. A level 17 character tempest cleric dipped with sorcerer with 18s for wis/cha and channel divinity. A level 9 witchbolt is 9d12 for automatic 108 lightning dmg on hit.
Witch Bolt is great if you can cast it without having to concentrate on the spell. For example, I was playing in a campaign as a warlock servant of the villain of the story, actively working against the other PC's. Disguised as a different character, I undermined the heroes' attempts to get a Warforged king to aid them, and they challenged me to a duel. Lending an arena, the PC's were sent to rest before the match, while I was given full freedom allowing me to visit the arena beforehand. One of my allies, an evil Cleric, had prepared the spell Warding Glyph, and teamed up with me to lay into the arena three fifth level Witch Bolt casts set to target the closest creature on a key phrase of "Unlimited Power." The duel was set for sunrise, so I positioned myself on the side of the arena that faced the sun, and bantered with my opponent before the duel began, ending with the phrase "You will come to kneel before my UNLIMITED POWER!" lightning surging from the ground and horribly maiming my opponent, causing them to immediately panic.
I still lost that fight, but it's just an example of there being great ways to sustain the spell without having to concentrate yourself.
Sometimes you are calling forth the substance, sometimes you are using energy to split the molecules of the air into the acid.
One is evocation or transmutation, the other is conjuration.
So acid effects can have any one of the 3 as the primary school.
Its pretty much... which energy plane are you tapping to activate the spell?
You could make a necromatic variant "fireball" doing necrotic damage instead of fire damage. Tap the negative energy plane and it draws life force out of the sphere, instead of tapping the fire plane and letting a little bit out.
Guys, I TOTALLY agree with your frustration.
Here’s how I see the schools:
Evocation: draws magical energy to produce an instantaneous magical effect.
Conjuration: draws magical energy to summon a substance, creature, or lasting elemental energy from elsewhere
Necromancy: summons and controls the energies of life and death.
Enchantment: magical energies that affect behaviour or that alters how an object behaves.
Illusion: magic that affects or alters the senses in an effort to control or deceive them.
Transformation: changes one energy, object, or creature into another.
Abjuration: blocks or defends against and attack, energy or creature
Divination: magical information gathering.
The spells as they are labeled fails to match these descriptions, but that’s just my opinion.
Fireball, if my math is correct, occupies 34 ten foot cubes. That means hallways become tubes of fire, and tight confines fill with flame.
And you’re right, Witch Bolt is the worst. A spell that locks the CASTER in place but is only 30’ in range? As in... one move away? Caster casts, fighter walks up and takes his lunch money. Ugh.
One idea that came to mind when listening to the various tales of oddball spells is that the spells might be arranged as they are not based on what necessarily makes sense, with how magic is understood, but moreso the school/tradition that formulated the spell.
So, while Stone Wall might make more sense as a Conjuration spell, and there certainly might be variations of the spe that are cast this way, it is the school of Evocation that either first codified, or made popular, their method for casting the spell.
Maybe there is some really pisses off archmage Conjurer out there who curses the Evoker who beat him to the patent. Sort of a magical Apple vs Android.
With regards to how the positive and negative plans of energy are in 5e. The PHB describes those planes as domes that encompass all the other planes in a SUPER DETAILED (not really) sidebar on page 300.
I like to believe that the channel energy feature for pathfinder clerics is just them opening a pinprick sized portal to the positive or negative energy plane for a split second, and as they become more experienced the hole gets bigger and bigger
I'll just throw this idea out here. Conjuration is transporting matter. Evocation is creating and manipulating energy. That's why acid spells can exist in both schools. You can either summon ready-made acid, or condense the moisture in the air and manipulate it's pH. Evocation spells that heal may boost tissue regeneration by making cellular ATP production more favorable. Evocation spells that send messages may be literally messing with the electrical signals in your brain.
I think when it comes to similar spells using different schools, i think of it as one magic school trying to copy that spell, sometimes resulting in a more/less powerful version or a slightly different effect.
As for game logic i think its so every school individually is more flexible and allows better use of wizards who specify on a specific school
I believe there is latent magical energy that permeates every plane. Evocation is the translation of present magical energy into fire/lightning etc. Conjuration pulls things or energy from other planes.
Awesome Video! Would love to see these kind of videos generalised for like Arcane and Divine magic etc
The positive and negative planes are mentioned once in the 5e dmg on page 43. They get a single sentence about the pair of them.
In The Elder Scrolls, the sun and stars are wholes ripped into the by gods fleeing the mortal material world in order to not become a part of it's foundations. (The way I see the Aedra is as if they have been woven into the vary fabric of the Material plane of the Elder Scrolls setting) and that's how magic seeps into the physical world, from the openings in the sky.
It might easier to collapse down the spell school in your world when world build so there are only 4 school because of how unclear dnd tends to be on the topic.
- Evocation/Conjuration
- Enchantment/Illusion
- Divination/Abjuration
- Necromancy/Transmutation
Wizards already have sub-classes not tied to specific spell schools
Sometimes I think the spells in schools of magic are like course curriculum for different literal schools. Like you learn Flame Blade at Evoker City College and Flaming Sphere at the Summoner Technical Institute.
Thinking about Tiny Hut, and the idea of the archer holding a corridor and firing out at enemies gave me a mean revelation.
Imagine: a band of gnolls are charging down the corridor after the players, who find themselves stuck. The wizard casts Tiny Hut over the entrance they came from, to buy them some time, while the archer begins to fire arrows out at the gnolls, whos own arrows they return with plink harmlessly off the wall.
However.....one of the gnolls then looks down at the arrow that is embedded in its shoulder, and pulls it out, turning it over in its fingers a bit, a thought on its gnarled, fanged maw......before knocking the arrow to its own bow, and firing back.................and watching as it passes right through, and strikes the archer.
For clarification: The spells wording states "Creatures and objects within the dome when you cast this spell can move through it freely. All other Creatures and objects are barred from passing through it." While this means that enemy arrows can't enter, as they weren't inside when it was cast...the *players* arrows were, so every arrow they fire out, is a piece of ammo they are also giving the enemies to fire back at them. Just in case you needed a way to make the players mildly shit themselves on realizing their "perfect defense" is not so perfect.
Otherworldly Form: Finally, the dream is beginning to be realized. The Gish whom casts their fighting prowess.
Pruitt must’ve multiclassed into rogue cause that post opening fade away was AMAZING
I love these Magic School videos! Which school will you be covering next? My guess would be conjuration, if only because y'all talked so much about it in this episode.
On our first quest on one of my first adventures the Cleric destroyed the boss with a Guiding bolt (Not so tough but with some magic and minions) when the rest of us were going out of the dungeon, which made the minions drop their weapons inmediately.
I’ve played a war cleric the last few campaigns and I’ve always described guiding bolt as the clerical laser cannon, doing as much damage as possible. Softening up the enemy and then letting the guys in front finish them off.
Holy shit-balls, I've been through Xanathar's spells a hundred times: how did I never see sickening radiance!?!? I know what my necromancer is going to be taking now when she gets her 4th level spells.
As always, great episode! Much love from the ATX D&D crowd.
if you want a bunch of fireballs, it is costly but the effect is epic. Use Glyph of Warding with Fireball. It will explode if triggered or dispelled! for even more craziness, cast it on several pages, let someone elses unseen servant carry it or mage hand it. find the location for your "Nuclear Option" triggered by either magic or opening the book. Then grab a calculator!
Its good to see that there are other people that use Crown bags for dice.
That thumbnail alone sold me on this vid!
I love the new banners with the spell when you discuss a spell!
As Harry Dresden would say, "Kaboom magic"