RAW, if you upcast it, then no. But casting it as a second level, then yes, it would. - That's never come up in game before. I'm sure it actually has but never thought about that dispelling the magic

​@@RulesLawyerDnDI like Continual Flame & Scribe Wizards for the win for making it for free & a higher level in a Spell Scroll.

Scribe wizard was amazing

Yes.

Going to do a video how what the changes to these spells means and how people will probably use them in the future

@@CuiBap2 I mean, it's a simple workaround & nothing that says it won't work after the cast. It's laughable~

@@RulesLawyerDnD Looking forward to it! I like the Verbal Component side note to make up your own & it is great!

Yeah, I know this was something that was in previous editions that rolled over. Those were just examples of what people did because It was easier to do that than do a roll off like the 2014 PHB suggests.

@@RulesLawyerDnD It doesn’t suggest a roll off either, that is an optional rule for ties between an enemy and a player. When players tie they decide who goes first. I think having players go first based on dexterity bonus is stupid. It equates to whoever rolled the lowest goes first…

Optionally, the DM can have the tied characters and monsters each roll a d20 to determine the order, highest roll going first. That's straight from the 2014 PHB which is their optional suggestion. - I agree I don't like it because it slows the game down.

Warlocks don't get it. I like your reasoning though.

Wizards have more than enough fun tools to play with. Edit - in my opinion.

@@RulesLawyerDnD Not nearly enough. They've the least amount of class features but loads of Spells.

That's the point of the wizard. The same amount of class features as other classes but they can have all the spells and without even needing to look for those spells will have more known spells then any other class in the game. - edit - Also this leave a big opening for those spells if you pick a lot of ritual spells. Giving them even more access and thus more versatility.

@@RulesLawyerDnD I mean lore-wise with the big Wizards creating their own Spells. We technically can create our own Spells with the DM but the small system Modify Spell has was ambitious ~

I believe the DMG had a template about creating spells that the DM and players could follow.

@ArchetypeLuna I'm going to have to respectfully disagree with you on a couple of points. This spell in 2014 was a strong spell in lower levels that most players stopped using by about 9th level and up. It wasn't perceived as strong it was strong. - I think if you are making a ranged cleric, it's great. Specially since the upcasting has been buffed to 1d8 per slot above 2ed. So a fifth level S.W. would 4d8 a hit on top or whatever action spell you are casting. Pairs well with guiding bolt. (Edit) - you are right about bless being an overall better spell and other concentration spells being better also. - I just don't think it's worthless.

​@@RulesLawyerDnD I updated my previous post with some math. The numbers do not show it as a powerful spell at all. A successful command spell will make a bigger impact than Spiritual Weapon, and that is done with the best case scenario, assuming the spell can always reach its target and there only being a single target encounter. Unless the enemy you are fighting is some serious glass cannon, even a 2nd level healing word will heal more than the damage spiritual weapon actually prevents. Also, how is a spell not worthless if there are spells that completely outclass the spell for a lower resource cost? Especially when you take into account concentration. Why use your concentration on Spiritual Weapon when using Bless will kill enemies faster? If we look at the 5th level damage, 4d8 on a single enemy on a successful hit and compare it with Spirit Guardians which is 3d8 on a failed save and half on success in an AoE around you, matching the raw damage on a single target if upcasted to 4th, and surpassing with 5d8 if upcasted to 5th, Spirt Guardians has a clear edge in damage, even when casted at a lower level as half damage on save is more reliable than requiring a hit. So at the base 2nd level, a 1st level Bless is going to be a better use of your concentration and spell slot (not to mention, you can always upcast bless to hit more of your party) and at 3rd level, Spirit Guardians is going to be better. When an at level or lower level spell is always worth using over the spell in question, how is that not indicative of a worthless spell? Mechanically of course; I should state that I am looking at this purely in terms of mechanics, not flavor. To sum things up, the spell was definitely only perceived as strong, even in 5E. The math does not support it the idea of Spiritual Weapon being a strong spell. Saving the spell slot for other spells like Command, which can be upcasted to 2nd to hit another creature, can make a bigger impact when you look at enemy turns or damage prevented, and spells like Spirit Guardians are more worthwhile spell slot uses than it at higher levels. If you do not need to worry about spell slot management then sure, Spiritual Weapon is decent. However, the moment you actually take into account the value of the spell slot, its value plummets.

- Spiritual Weapon wasn't a powerful spell by itself. It was powerful when combined with other things like Spirit Guardians. That's an amazing combo. Spirit Guardians + Spiritual Weapon + Dodge is still one of the best 2014 combos a cleric at low and some high levels can do. - You are right about Command and 2ed level Healing word being better but the problem thus lies in the fact that those are more costly then a single cast of Spiritual Weapon. Because Spiritual weapon is a single cast that will be on the battle field the whole time unless you roll poorly and drop concentration check. 3-4 rounds of attacks can be more damage then a single 2ed level casting of Healing Word or the usefulness of a single command spell. You would have to cast multiple spells to be higher at that point. That's seems like wasting resources unless you know a long rest is coming up. - Now in 2024 Spiritual Weapon is more to just get a hit in at a distance while you cast other spells, cantrips, or heals. The up cast is nice though. Sometimes Clerics want to be doing some damage and not just healing. This is their way of doing that. Double down on a cantrip for extra damage or a little damage and heal. - Now one thing I will say is that using Spiritual Weapon can be a good distraction spell if used out of combat. 60 ft can be pretty far as long as you can see and you don't have to worry about it taking damage. Plus it could be any weapon. - I find it very difficult for a spell to be worthless. Are there some worthless spells? FOR SURE THERE ARE!! I just don't believe that this is one of them. Spirit Guardians is the superior spell and I will not argue with you on that. It's also a third level spell. Again Bless is going to be a better use of your concentration I don't disagree with that. These spells are better and on average will do better than spiritual weapon in most combats. I still don't believe that this makes spiritual weapon a worthless spell. It's not the optimal spell to cast but also it's not as bad some people think. - These are my 5 reasons why I don't believe it's a worthless spell. 01. Because not many creatures have resistance to FORCE damage. 02. This is magical damage to help bypass Bl,Pier, and Slashing resistance for the early level NPCs or monsters. 03. This could be that extra hit that causes an NPC to lose concentration. 04. The Upcast is nice. A 4th level Spiritual Weapon is doing 3d8+mod a round if it hits. For just a B.A. Action Dodge so you get hit less. 05. Dice can make other spells suck more. Also I know Spiritual Weapon can roll low as well but at least you aren't having to recast it the next turn unless you failed concentration check. - Healing Word can roll low (10 on average if cast at 2ed level) 6-9 hp low, which would make losing a 2ed level spell slot kinda suck. - Command is a save and suck spell. If they save, that sucks because you just wasted a spell slot. Spiritual Weapon misses well then it gets another try next turn. - Spirit Guardians will draw a lot of agro to your cleric that Spiritual Weapon probably won't. - Bless might draw some agro but most likely not. That's just a really solid spell. Unless everyone is rolling 1s because the dice gods hate you and your table.

​@@RulesLawyerDnD If a spell is not powerful by itself, then it isn't proper to call it a powerful spell. In an AoE Situation, Spiritual Weapon's numbers are rather negligible compared to the output that Spirit Guardians is outputting. When you take into account resource expenditure, aka the value of that spell slot Spiritual Weapon is using, you are better off just doing Spiritual Weapon and then dodging on subsequent turns than using Spiritual Weapon. You need something like Death Cleric's Channel Divinity that adds 5 + twice your cleric's level in damage to make Spiritual Weapon be worthwhile. Command and Healing Word are not more costly than Spiritual Weapon. If casted at 2nd level, they cost exactly the same in resource expenditure: a 2nd level spell slot. 3-4 rounds of attacks from Spiritual Weapon is not more useful than a 2nd level healing word or a single command spell. As I stated in my first post, we can calculate how much damage we prevented in an encounter by Spiritual Weapon by taking the inverse of the number of rounds it would take to kill an enemy to determine the number of turns Spiritual Weapon denies said enemy by killing them faster. Then you can use that with the Enemy's Target AC, the enemy's chance to hit, and their average damage per hit to determine how much damage Spiritual Weapon prevented by killing said enemy faster. Unless the enemy is a super glass cannon, both Healing Word and Command prevent more damage to the party than Spiritual Weapon. This is taking into account Spiritual Weapon attacking multiple times throughout the encounter. Most encounters will be 4 rounds or less, so you are only getting 3 rounds of attacks if you are using your first turn casting something like Bless or Spirit Guardians. In 2024, you are better off using your concentration on Bless as the boost to accuracy boosts your party damage more than Spiritual Weapon will add. There are cheaper alternatives than a 2nd level spell slot to create a distraction. Creating a sound coming from a specific point using thaumaturgy is a cantrip, so no cost. Even just throwing a rock to make a sound somewhere else is a far cheaper alternative. Unless the game is lax enough where you can just throw spell slots into the void, spending a 2nd level slot on a distraction is rather expensive. A spell is worthless if there is always a better spell to be casted for the same or less resource expenditure, which is true for spiritual weapon, especially with the concentration requirement. We are looking at pure mechanical effectiveness when determining whether or not a spell is worthless, and if there is always a better use of the resource expended by that spell, then it is a worthless spell because there is no pure mechanical reason to cast it. By saying that Bless is going to be a better use of our concentration, you are supporting this very notion. For a spell to have worth, it needs to be the optimal spell to cast in some situations. Again, this isn't to say you are bad at the game if you use the spell; this is simply looking at the pure mechanical value of a spell to determine if it is a powerful spell or not and whether or not the concentration nerf was needed or superfluous (it was superfluous). Also to your 5 reasons: 1) If your DM is constantly causing Resistances and Immunities to be an issue, to the point where the Force Damage is truly valuable to make Spiritual Weapon the optimal spell to use, and not giving you any other ways of bypassing it or counteracting it, you have other problems in your game, namely how hellish it must be to be a martial character. This requires both radiant, necrotic, and all physical damage types to be resisted or completely ineffective at the very least. Otherwise casting Bless is just going to be better still. 2) See point 1 on how this is hell for martials and is a bigger problem. Also, a number of cleric subclasses get access to Magic Weapon, which may actually be more ideal to concentrate on considering how the output of a martial character should be a decent amount higher than the output of a Spiritual Weapon, especially with a +1 to their rolls. And if Martials get a way to also get around that BPS resistance/immunity, then bless goes back to being top king. 3) So can Bless making a miss from an ally's attack into a hit. Bless is a bigger DPR boost because it is making your allies more accurate, turning some of those misses into hits. An average +2.5 to hit is quite significant. 4) You are better off using Spirit Guardians if you want to employ this strategy. Even at 3rd level, it will be more consistent damage and especially more damage in general if there are multiple enemies due to it being an AoE. 5) You can't use specific rolls as evidence. It is a fallacy to look at edge cases and consider them to be norm. Sure Healing Word could roll low, but it could also roll high; hence why you look at the average. Sure Command could fail several times in a row, but it could also succeed multiple times in a row, so when determining its statistical worth, you multiply the success rate with the enemy's DPR. Spiritual Weapons have attacks in later rounds doesn't mean as much when the math shows that its average impact is lower than spells like Healing Word and Command, and especially against spells like Bless and Spirit Guardian now that concentration is required. Also, aggro is not a thing in D&D. That is all DM determinant and any DM that is playing their enemies intelligently should be targeting fullcasters due to the potential threat of a fullcaster. So Spirit Guardians drawing aggro is not really a reason for Spiritual Weapon, especially with how you call Bless a really solid spell.

@ArchetypeLuna well if we are talking purely mechanical and combat, then I have to agree with you. - The only way spiritual weapon would even be useful is if you were 3rd or 4th level and were solo fighting. Solo meaning one vs. one, not solo monsters. - or if you are a war priest and can cast it without concentration.

Thanks for that explanation. I hope this helps others understand as well.

@xiongray Yes, this is true. At 6th level they can cast it without a spell slot if they expend a channel divinity and it will also not have concentration. If done in this way they would also be able to use their action to cast another spell in the same turn. - side note if cast this way it's always at the lowest level possible which would be 2ed level.

@@RulesLawyerDnD Is it still worth it (without Concentration) when at its lowest level?

@xiongray I think yes but only depending on the build you make.

Holy Moly I didn't even notice that the range was touch now meaning you can give it to other people now. Mind blowing

Since it doesn't wrap around corners anymore then yes. RAW

Easier to use on the VTT then the HP system. Also I knew that about the exhaustion but couldn't fit it into the video.

I'm so confused on how you thought that?

😮​@@RulesLawyerDnD "WHAT DO YOU MEAN I SLEEP IN A 20 FT RADIUS! OF A POINT IIIII CHOOSE?! FOR SHAME!

Or for fun

@@ianwallace3192 I like you Wallace

@@RulesLawyerDnD oh, then I'll tell you a story of why my friend won't let me play d&d with him: my friend made me a test campaign. My first ever. I followed an over leveled NPC into a kobold cave and beat up the peeps for the town... However! The kobolds could speak and suddenly I found myself trying to befriend the kobolds with rations and healing the one we just wounded. The knight leading me there wasn't thrilled... But I made it clear it was about finding information. Especially when I tried to stab him and feed him to my new misunderstood friends :D but I made it seem like I stabbed a giant centipede crawling on his armor when I did 0 damage to the man. I used my turns to move out of combat under the guise of "I think I saw something important" and winning on deception. I then left the cave, found a boulder above the entrance, waited for the NPC to come out, and crushed him with the boulder easily. Maybe I married a kobold... Maybe I didn't. Moral of the story is he was a great friend but we don't talk much anymore and that's my only ever game of d&d.

I think that depends on the type of distraction. In combat, things that are closer tend to have more attention focused on them. That's why the Mastermind Rogue has the special ability that allows it to be used at a distance.

Well this will effect players differently than NPCs. - I like what you're saying. That would have given it a different feel and flavor for sure.

I mean RAW the slot was not expended just the action. Therefore you would be able to use your action to cast the spell again or a different spell. O wow that's going in the long deep dive counterspell video

Yeah. I had to check it out. Now that I have it sucks for Sorcerer's but I understand why. Sorcerer's really got shafted quite a bit in comparison to the other full caster classes.

@@RulesLawyerDnD On the contrary, I believe Sorcerers are going to be having fun. Their renewed Twinned Spell reduced SP cost & new requirements will make them "upcast" earlier than their full caster peers, so long as the upcast can target an additional creature. Heightened reached new heights. Combining Metamagics will be fun.

Agreed fully on that. I'm talking about other things like I wish there was more than one spell that was sorcerer only. Also how did Chaos bolt not make the list?

​@@RulesLawyerDnDTechnically, it still exists, just not "reprinted". Chaos Bolt is completely legal. But Chromatic Orb inherited a lot of it Chaos Bolt.

@@xiongray Yeah. Outside of Meta magic which can be obtained with a feat. There isn't anything that is truly sorcerer only. They redid Chromatic Orb which is basically the new Chaos bolt. Also Chromatic Orb is on my list of upcoming videos.

Yes. It's a great distinction that they have made but still little ways around it like you have said.

David and Goliath.

Interesting. I just got access to the new PHB 2024 so I'm going to be going through some content soon. Sorry I also agree the actor fest could have used this.

@@RulesLawyerDnD You're good. I'm going through the free rule set (2024).

I'm curious how this breaks the spells?

@@RulesLawyerDnD if spell states you have control over something which can roll will save you can order that to fail the will safe and it now can't succeed the will save 😅

@xezzee yeah that's true, but it also doesn't do anything else just fail the save and that's it.

@@xiongray yeah this might come up more often than not

I have jacked up quite a few parties with surprise 2014. Ouch.

@@xiongray probably not because that weapon has to have the light property and nets don't.

@@RulesLawyerDnD A little switcheroo

Always love the input. I really hope this helps other DM/GMs out there.

@@RulesLawyerDnD Same to you for your hard work. I love the idea of Speed Factor, as it really affects the Initiative order, as well as benefitting Dual Wielders with Light Weapons to increase your initiative, which seems to be the Meta direction in 2024. And Heavy Weapons & Spellcasting decreasing your Initiative order (Spellcasting decreases Initiative by Spell level). It's a little more work for the DM, but not by very much, & changes battle pacing just enough.

@xiongray did you ever hear about the old way of rolling initiative every round but you had to tell what action you were going to do first. That determined the amount of dice you rolled for initiative. Also lower numbers went first. (Example: move 1d6. Action to attack 1d6. Cast a spell 2d6. Bonus action 1d6. Bonus action to cast a spell 2d6.) Something like that.

@@RulesLawyerDnD That sounds oddly like Speed Factor. How old was that initiative?

@xiongray That's was an old first edition rule but they had a UA on it about three years ago.

@geoffreyperrin4347 fun fun. I always thought nets were great.

@@RulesLawyerDnD the old problem was there was no way to avoid disadvantage on the attack except sharpshooter and some niche options so most didn't take it

@geoffreyperrin4347 The change is that now it's for sure the DMs choice by the rules. The rules in 2014 said the DM may decide if the tie is between PC and NPC. Now it's clearly stated that DM has the decision. Not a vague the DM can decide or roll off.

@@RulesLawyerDnD oh, that's extremely subtle but technically a change.

@geoffreyperrin4347 yeah it's a subtle one. I really want the new one so I can just deep dive into it. But we have to wait

@@RulesLawyerDnD I basically ran it as "If PCs tie, they choose their order" though they often acted like the dex rule was in play when it wasn't but it was their call so I said nothing. If a monster and PC tied, i let the player go first since the monster's initiative was like a DC and if you match a DC you succeed.

@@geoffreyperrin4347 I did things like who had the higher initiative bonus. But I kinda like your approach

@@ComicBookGuy420 agreed.

@@ComicBookGuy420 kzbin.info/www/bejne/gIqqd5aMf8x0sJI That's the link to part one

@@RulesLawyerDnD sweet thanks Was telling a mate about your channel and I thought the rule changes would be a good intro

@@ComicBookGuy420 Thanks. I'll keep that in mind

@@xiongray hahahaha

@xiongray I mean depending on the wording yes. But this is also why whenever I play of game of D&D one of my homebrew rules is that cantrips level with class and not character. - it never made since to me that a 17fighter 3 level warlock can eldritch blast just as good as a 20th level warlock.

@@RulesLawyerDnD Agreed. They should've kept the Cantrip scaling by Class level instead of Character Level. If not that, at least Spellcaster Level.

@xiongray I still don't like that either. What does a 17 bard 3 level warlock know about eldritch blast that a 20 level or even a 17 level warlock know. They actually took time to use, practice, and become skilled with. - now one level dip and I can blast with the best of them. I don't agree with that.

@@RulesLawyerDnD That's completely fair. I was going to say, "Magic" but that's akin to having a Doctorates in Marine Biology & expected to also know Astrophysics.

@xiongray I probably sould have said cleric/warlock build

@xiongray if you can see them, you can determine if they can see you. Basically means you and the DM determine if they can see each other. O how I miss facing rules. As 5E is now, when using a grid all creatures Basically have 360 field of vision.

@@RulesLawyerDnD Facing rule actual benefits duel wielding Shields since they only cover your front and Shield arm side. But yeah, when hiding, th DM determines quickly if the target notices them, but yeah, 360⁰ field of vision is stupid.

@@xiongray yeah. Quite so

I know right. It's kinda crazy the changes they put on it. Also I guess you'll have to blindfold them now.