Tier Ranking Cantrips in D&D 5e (Part 1)

[@carsonrush3352]

The greatest upside of druid craft is that it forces the DM to decide on a weather, which means that call lightning might get a boost from a storm.

[@SkaalKesh]

Yep. Plus, if you’re in a naval campaign, knowing the weather for the following day can save your bacon. Along with the crew and ship.

[@Mariwend]

It would also be really cool, as a DM, to set up a mystery on overly regular weather patterns, leading to discovering an elemental cult, or something.

[@oksuree]

I had a plan to have my characters get shipwrecked during a surprise storm, but my stupid druid kept casting druidcraft and convincing everyone to delay the trip.

[@SkaalKesh]

@@oksuree You could have a spellcaster be responsible for a change in weather, as Druidcraft is only predictive of natural weather. It’s not a literal divination spell.

[@lainalien]

@@SkaalKesh the gods controlling the weather have fallen into a rut. please or displease them enough to get them out of their funk and shake things up

[@koen2702]

As a war wizard, dancing lights being one of the few concentration cantrips is actually really useful, as you gain a +2 bonus to AC and saves while concentrating :)

[@MrDavidKord]

Nice. That brings it up to a B, maybe.

[@barnowl8563]

I was low level and out of spell slots, and dancing light's AC bonus saved my life. Not splitting the party also would have worked...

[@anmisem8355]

@@MrDavidKord it has actually A LOT of uses. Illumination in darkvision players vs darkvision creatures scenario when you can keep fires at 60-120 feet so that they dont shed light on you, but they shed light on your enemy. You can see them, they cant see you. Scanning territory at night. Distraction for guards, to lure them away. Decieving religious or stupid people with flaming humanoid shape. Flair gun and delivering messages through codes of shapes and colors. Helping with perfomances and storytelling visualisation. And many other much more niche uses. Its just slept on in my opinion.

[@MadnessOpus]

Just dip into Cleric and use it with Shield of Faith instead. Bumps it up to +4.

[@nathanfivecoate5848]

​@@MadnessOpus Costs spell slots doing that, and delays Wizard spell progression

[@royjaskowski905]

Friends: use both spell effects to your advantage. Get to sneak past the gatekeeper but do it disguised as someone else so it’ll continue to be a distraction. Don’t just disguise as captain of the guard, use friends on every guard you pass to sow discord in the ranks. If there is a rival gang going after the McGuffin, disguise as one of those gang members.

[@fiddleburg5520]

That’s a brilliant way to use the spell but I have a feeling many dms wouldn’t let that slide based off of rules as written

[@18narrowminded]

Yeah i always saw the "downside" as significantly stronger than the advantage on checks. In my experience friends and disguise self is pound for pound the strongest single player spell combo in the game

[@freman007]

Warlock with Mask of Many Faces and Friends. Which makes the Friends cantrip funnier than the Friends television show ever was.

[@comunistbanana]

This is my favorite way to use friends. It even works on creatures that are resistant or immune to charm effects.

[@theonlymatthew.l]

@freman007 I had the same thought, except I was thinking of using 'Friends' with a Changeling character

[@joshuah4952]

In Order of the Stick, they point out a good use of Dancing Lights: as a signal flare. A low level wizard creates a red diamond shape 120 feet in the air, alerting his allies of high level enemies. By changing the color and configuration of the lights, you could send any number of different signals. It also occurred to me that by moving the lights you could use semaphore signals to send out an arbitrary message.

[@sarduchehivalshan4265]

Think drone light show in the sky. Amazingly powerful if used correctly.

[@kanekopoint4273]

i thought of obstructing the sight of enimies have them dance right in their face unless the can grab it somehow

[@swissarmyknight4306]

S tier cantrip for military signalling, and uh, military operations use a lot of signalling.

[@lordzaboem]

I kind of wanted to play a Sorc who casts Dancing Lights and claims that's summoning will-o-wisps.

[@joshuah4952]

@@lordzaboem And sorcerers' spellcasting ability is charisma, so you would be naturally good at deception. That sounds like fun

[@hazmatcat3289]

One thing I noticed you missed on firebolt is that it is one of the few cantrips that let you target objects, not just creatures. So you can firebolt a carriage, or a ship, or blast a lock, blow up that gunpowder keg. Forget about just catching things on fire; Firebolt is one of the best spell-tools for outright destroying things that's not shatter.

[@TheJerbol]

tbf it is ridiculous that eldritch blast can't target objects, or most cantrips for that matter

[@rickau]

Yep. Used Firebolt to start a forest fire to flush out bandits. Worked as intended, no regrets.

[@Scottishstorm]

@@TheJerbol Agreed. But, as written, this is the case. It's also ridiculous that Acid Splash doesn't affect objects. With the current state of the game and rules-as-written, I'll try to always take Firebolt as an object-affecting cantrip.

[@Zack_Wester]

@@TheJerbol eldritch does make sense(at least untill you pick the move 5 feet option) , because its weird, that said why can´t I acid blast that look and melt it. or Frostbite/chill touch that clockwork machine so that it stops (spanner in the work).

[@chrisgee8441]

I mean... if you play RaW instead of RaI I guess?

[@MageLeaderInc]

Another huge plus for Chill Touch is that it leaves a skeletal hand on the target. So if they are invisible or can go invisible you can still see where they are.

[@zacharyburd2647]

You need to cast it on a target you can see though, so I don't think it is that huge of a plus

[@MageLeaderInc]

@@zacharyburd2647 nothing in the spell says you have to be able to see your target.

[@justinsmart581]

It's a Spell Attack Roll. By rules, you have Disadvantage to make an attack roll against a target you can't see.

[@justinsmart581]

From the PHB: When you attack a target that you can’t see, you have disadvantage on the attack roll. This is true whether you’re guessing the target’s location or you’re targeting a creature you can hear but not see.

[@MageLeaderInc]

@@justinsmart581 knowing which square to attack even with disadvantage is better than guessing what square to attack with disadvantage.

[@esbenherborg]

I have an aberrant mind sorcerer that has encode thoughts for thematic reasons. However, we once visited an island that had like a shroud of mind altering effects, and my character was gradually loosing all of his memories. So I used encode thought Memento style to make sure my character could remember all of the important events on the island.

[@Adam_Wilde]

So cool 💯

[@MostlyLucid]

Using friends as a changeling is actually really good. You go in as someone other than your normal self cast friends, leave and transform back into your normal form whatever that might be. They might try to come after you but they won't recognize you.

[@joshuamiller7502]

Or disguise self, or even maybe just a really good deception mixed with good roleplaying by having a quickchange scheme practiced and ready.

[@MoutainMannPro]

Should be called enemies

[@MrJerks93]

Truth. Friends is one of the best spells in the game. It's fun, highly conditional, and perfect in the right situations. I wish all magic had quirks that meant the players need to think creatively instead of spamming optimal attacks. Make magic dangerous again!

[@Joker-yw9hl]

Changelings are lowkey broken af and I love it

[@andrewweirny]

Their discussion of Friends is the best summary of the Drakkenheim campaign I could ever imagine.

[@redcapetimetraveler7688]

the greatness of "Friends" is to ensure to have advantage for succesfully and intentionally fail in order to get a fun narrative.. which you could easily do without any spell but just with roleplaying . other youtubers teach you how to min max skills and stats... the Dunjeon Dudes teach us how to optimize fun !! yeahhh ! 😎 For "Blade Ward" it would be S tier if you add that it forces all enemies in a 20/30 feet radius to only attack you ,, so you are the ultimate tank of the hour protecting the party..at this price : sacrifying the action would make sens. 😇

[@markj3169]

Its goofy but Armor of Agathys +Blade Ward and then run through a group of mundane enemies triggering all of their attack of opportunity is kinda fun

[@adaelion3772]

That could actually do a ton of damage, the ultimate thorns build. Lol

[@Hissingace110]

This is easily the best use for that cantrip, barring being an Earth Genasi.

[@YMasterS]

Even if we assume the first guy doesn't know what's going on and attacks, the second guy onwards certainly won't once they see what the first guy does. Enemies aren't dumb. Dnd isn't a badly coded videogame.

[@BeardkingOfAngmar]

@@YMasterS Even dumb enemies might not fall for it. Granted, maybe they think taking a little damage for damaging the PC is worth it. Especially not knowing they are actually taking away 'temp hp' and their damage is being resisted. On the other other hand they would probably see their attacks are having little or less-than-expected effect.

[@Guyoverthere07]

@@YMasterS I think it's reasonable to say this should work once against a bunch of enemies. Everyone's turn in a round is occupying 6 seconds in combat. Lots of things are going on at once. OAs are split decision Reactions most attack-based monsters would capitalize on during the chaos. Most of them are actually quite dumb as Int is one of the lowest scores on average. Next round, the tactic would likely be fully processed and less likely to get as much if any value imo, but to each their own on running the baddies. If it does work one round out each combat--that's quite nice! Ideal even probably. Each new fight is likely comprised of completely new enemies that don't know what the PCs can do even though the DM of course does.

[@Boomer2332]

I’ve used the encode thoughts spell as basically a poor man’s sending spell. For instance my game has a magical school and all of the students and staff have a familiar. Thus any time someone wishes to send a message to someone, they aren’t wasting a spell slot, instead they are sending their familiar to deliver the thought.

[@joshuah4952]

Very cool concept. It seems like writing a message would work just as well in most situations, though. Still, the idea of messenger familiars delivering literal thoughts is really interesting

[@jakobbraun5180]

also to get material to start a fire 😂

[@princevesperal]

My first thought was that this is definitely a "courtroom" spell!

[@willieoelkers5568]

It’s cool for an intrigue story as a way to pass intel/orders, especially if you go low or mid magic so only someone with the right background would recognize a thread for what it is. But yeah, this is definitely more DM tool than player tool.

[@mariovwcardoso5970]

I thought spies... How better way to extract info and send it to upper ranks of the organization than by pulling the thoughts forcibly out of their heads?

[@pernicious8523]

Control flame's most important use is to stop a fire from spreading (after you've been a bit careless with a fireball in the woods). Firebolt is one of the few damaging cantrips that can target an object. Most damage cantrips can only target creatures, so that should be taken into account. And use Friends in combination with disguise self if you like making enemies for your enemies. And since an enemy of your enemy is your friend, the friends cantrip can indeed make friends.

[@Siennarchist]

Control flames is nice for stealth missions, snuffing out candles and torches

[@remyb6854]

Control Flames is S tier. With only a S component you can do it without being heard. And if you're in the dark, dimming light sources along your path, you stay in the dark.

[@TheJerbol]

@@remyb6854 it's s tier in that one circumstance yes

[@toddhadley9002]

@@Siennarchist Prestidigitation can also do that, and it's a lot more versatile than control flames. I will admit, however, that Control Flames has no verbal component while Prestidigitation does, which makes it a little stealthier. Still, I'd choose Prestidigitation over Control Flames any day.

[@Siennarchist]

@@toddhadley9002 not really, prestidigitation has verbal components so it doesn't work for stealth missions. Its a better cantrip, but its much worse for this purpose

[@doubleg281]

I wish they combined firebolt with produce flame. They are so similar just give firebolt the lighting utility to give it some use over eldritch blast

[@epis8613]

One of my favorite rule changes in bg3. Firebolt can be used as a source of fire.

[@paximilian4037]

​@@epis8613IGNIIS!!!!

[@stratahawk_1]

One of my favorite use of the Friends cantrip is on a warlock with mask of many faces and the actor feat. Disguise as one of the enemy's allies, cast friends, sow discord in their alliance, and watch the chaos.

[@Kirk9019]

This is easily the most OP way to use friends 🤣

[@TheJerbol]

@@Kirk9019 only*

[@jrg305]

I played a warlock with this. The dm had everyone have high passive investigation and also had everyone running detect magic or had true seeing eye patches. He also cast wish against me. He also had priests use a sceptor to feel my horns as a tiefling. For any dms reading this, note that the spell requires them use an action to check, and the result is that they know you are disguised. Not that they know your identity through the disguise. They would have to have true seeing or witch sight to see your real identity. This was in a dragon heist campaign. Level 1-5. Fuck that dm.

[@Hissingace110]

@@jrg305 That DM sounds cringe as hell.

[@stratahawk_1]

@@jrg305 Holy crap! That's a level of DM metagaming rarely seen. Unless they do this for every campaign, that's taking out of game knowledge to determine the actions of NPCs. I understand if it's the paranoid wizard thinking everyone is disguised and out to get him. However, why would the local guards have true seeing eyepatches? Is this a common problem in that world where the local government has to spend resources to counter it?

[@TheJurzerker]

So many times at different tables i have used Dancing Lights to simulate 4 torches of a party walking down a hallway, spreading out to look through an area, or walking down a road at night. Its also really nice to light up an area without giving away your position, the casting Light on a rock trick always shows exactly where you are at first. You could put a rock in a bag, reach in and cast Light on it inside the closed bag, there are ways around it, but Dancing Lights definitely has a place and use

[@trantigone]

Encode Thoughts best use, as far as I've seen it used in a game, is in providing undeniable proof of an event to NPCs. My players witnessed a murder, and the wizard just encoded the memory of the crime and gave it to the NPC who was investigating them for being present at the crime and it basically proved they were innocent.

[@iododendron3416]

I was playing in a oneshot a while back where the party lost their memories over and over again. Encode thoughts would have been amazing in that situation.

[@0Fyrebrand0]

I could be wrong, but based on my reading of the spell it's not enough to accomplish anything like that. 1) The thought strand you pull from your head can't be absorbed or received by others, unless _they_ can cast Encode Thoughts on it themselves. 2) The spell lets you pull any memory, thought, or idea -- meaning, you can pull out a true memory or a falsehood -- and there's no way to prove which it is. This is just a magical way to express your claim that the Butler did it, with no proof other than your say so. 3) Zone of Truth is a 2nd level spell whose sole purpose is to verify claims as true. A cantrip should probably not be able to do this.

[@kidthegeek]

@@0Fyrebrand0 I was going to say pretty much what you said, well the first two points at least

[@charlesvanzee4879]

Ohh.... that would have been great for a trial I played in last week. The DM had to help out a lot because none of us could figure out how to prove our innocence.

[@blueshoals]

Idea: A wizard uses Detect Thoughts and Encode Thoughts on a native that is familiar with an area, in order to increase the accuracy of their Teleport Spell... Or use that combo on a family member of a missing person to learn enough about them to Scry!

[@Shaderox]

One interesting thought for "Encode thoughts" is if it's ruled that it pulls the entire memory (and same or recieving memories) so you don't remember it while you store it as a strand, that could be a way to safeguard information if you know enemies could potentially read or scry into minds, as well as circumventing Zone of Truth and such spells & effects.

[@princevesperal]

In that case, it could be used by the BBEG to brainwash people! Make a blank slate out of someone's mind, replace some memories with others, etc.

[@nutmegdoesstuff1339]

Or if you're playing a character with memory issues they could carry around a box of thoughts so they don't forget anything important.

[@derekschmidt5705]

​@@nutmegdoesstuff1339 and then they forget how they filed it.

[@cakeyeater7392]

​@@nutmegdoesstuff1339 That would probably require homebrew rules, cause it says the strands disappear when you cast the spell again

[@carsonrush3352]

One underrated use of the Friends spell is intimidation checks! The original point is to be hostile, and so the side effect doesn't matter!

[@bradwillis7415]

Absolutely

[@BeardkingOfAngmar]

I think this is the best way to use it. Even the disguise self/mask of many faces combo isn't that great. It can take 20-30 seconds to ask a simple question and wait for the answer. And then you have half a minute to make your escape. On top of that disguise self is VS so unless you have subtle spell it will be hard to be unnoticed. All in all though the help action can do most of the work this cantrip does without the drawbacks.

[@ryokirah]

New guidance can only affect an ally 1/day I think

[@anthonynorman7545]

@@ryokirah there's a newer version that got rid of that

[@derekstein6193]

At the starts with Good Cop/Bad Cop. It ends with Bad Cop/Bad Cop.

[@TrashJack3000]

Friends is best used in conjunction with a disguise (Disguise kit, Disguise Self and Alter Self spells, True Polymorph) and some way to mimic the disguised person's voice (e.g. Kenku, Actor feat, Minor Illusion). Disguise yourself as someone who the target already likes, cast Friends and quickly lie to them about something really simple (e.g. "There's intruders on the other side of the fortress! Go!" or "Your spouse is cheating on you. Bye!"; you don't even have to pass the check for this ploy), GTFO and drop/change the disguise where nobody's looking, then sit back and watch the chaos as the target is now pissed at their bewildered friend.

[@Utkarsh2811]

"Wait a second, those WERE the droids I'm looking for!" Love the way he said that. 😂

[@hecktate1763]

I get good use out of Dancing Lights on my bard. Aside from the obvious exploration uses of having lights you can control, it lets you put on a lightshow as part of your performance. In certain situations, creating a vaguely humanoid glowing figure can be used to spook or distract enemies, giving you an upper hand before starting combat where you'll then drop this spell for a different concentration spell.

[@derekstein6193]

Also good for springing low Int creature ambushes. For instance, if you walk into a dark cave with no light, you have disadvantage to see the group of giant spiders and their webs. If you have a torch, you can see but you just gave away your position, and if you drop it to pull weapons, it could ignite the webs, surrounding your group in flames. Use Light on a rock and throw it in? Yeah, it lights up the place, but it's stationary, and the creature most likely noticed it was thrown from the passageway, potentially seeing you when you cast the spell. Dancing Lights makes the light mobile, can allow it to appear away from your position, and because it can be humanoid in shape, dumb foes may swarm it. Those spiders now are no longer hidden, are fully visible, have no cover, don't know you're there (surprise!), and are close enough together for aoe attacks, such as Fireball or Lightning Bolt. Dancing Lights isn't A tier, but it deserved a better ranking.

[@seeker296]

Actual use of dancing lights: use lights to mimic your party's torches, so enemies go after the lights instead of your group

[@seeker296]

@@derekstein6193 its s tier for light cantrips imo

[@Deeleybop80]

Dancing lights is def a good bard cantrip, and vicious mockery obviously 👌🏼

[@carllomas4899]

I've actually seen war wizard builds where the concentration aspect of dancing lights is used to gain the AC bonus from concentrating more easily.

[@SaburoDK]

One time used Encode Thoughts to create a memorial album for fallens companions. The castle we were using as center of operation was destroyed while our party was away on a mision. When we came back, my wizard created a book using the cantrip so they could ve remebered.

[@snazzyfeathers]

I've been kicking around the idea of picking it up for my Kenku in our Waterdeep campaign.

[@genemiston6647]

I grabbed eldritch blast through the spell sniper feat on my sorcerer. Best combo ever!!! I use it almost every combat and my DM loves using cover, this has been super clutch in so many encounters where enemies are peeking and firing spells and arrows at our party. Also the extra range is insane 9/10 times I can get first and last shots in on enemies across the entire battlefield.

[@0Fyrebrand0]

Very cool idea, but the spell's duration is 8 hours. Wouldn't the thought strands disappear after that?

[@snazzyfeathers]

@@0Fyrebrand0 I think it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to make the spell permanent with some gold or maybe an arcana check. RAW it wouldn't work I think, but looking at it from a more creative angle its fun and cool so the DM probably allowed it. Imo this cantrip works best when the DM allows some leeway for creativity instead of just sticking strictly to the description.

[@0whatman]

@@snazzyfeathers mhm! it really should've been made with some ability to make them permanent

[@tscoff]

Dancing Lights can be moved ahead of you, and kept ahead of you, so you’re not lit but areas ahead of you are lit. I’ve found that it’s useful.

[@Heritage367]

You can light up a whole large chamber with Dancing Lights, which you cannot do with Light. I think they serious underscored thus one. Bare minimum it should have been at least a C.

[@MrPsych77]

I took it for my bard so he could give himself a light show for his performances lol

[@blame_bow]

I came here to hype up my boy Dancing Lights, too! I know it's not Booming Blade or Eldritch Blast, but I've found numerous situations to keep it on my Druid's list. A 10 ft. radius on each light helps protect my min-maxed V. Human Variant Fighter ally's butt in non-magical darkness, and ensures he doesn't roll with disadvantage in shadows. Additionally, dancing lights are used in real-life nature, to beguile and distract predators and prey alike. Big, Dumb Monsters will hunt the glowing, fleeing, shiny thing 9 times out of 10. And as a Bard, how on earth are you gonna put on a good show without it?

[@kristianchristensen9473]

@@blame_bow but the lights go out when you use a concentration spell, making it a trap option: either your caster is limited to non concentration spells, or you have to plunge your friends into darkness, when you summon beasts, or call lightning etc. Light performs the same duty, and can be cast on the fighters helmet or weapon st no cost, and does not require concentration

[@caseyobrien1082]

@@kristianchristensen9473 If you don't mind being bathed in the light yourself. There are reasons why you would want the light to be ahead or behind you.

[@itsallwayspouringo]

I’m surprised you guys couldn’t think of something useful for dancing lights. It’s one of my favorite cantrips because the things you can do when you have a high performance/deception character, especially with the prestidigitation type spells, is really fun. Like, you could convince a group of less intelligent enemies like bandits or kobolds that you’re their a ghost or spirit to make them afraid and leave an area. You can convince a devout person to do some sort of task for you if you convince them you are a servant of their god or the god themselves. You can lead creatures towards or away from a point. There’s a lot that a character can get from this, but does require the right situations present themselves and that that player is creative with it. I get it not being a high tier, but D tier I think is a vast understatement of it’s usefulness

[@evilsquirrel0573]

Already predicting that this might be one of my new favorite videos before I watch it, your videos about spells and the ranking videos are both my most frequently rewatched

[@lautaromoreno3916]

I thought exactly the same as soon as I saw the thumbnail. Let's go boooiiiis, this one will be a banger.

[@sandmanlives3]

Agreed!

[@sims1279]

Blade Ward is good in "oh shit, I'm surrounded" situations, but is very, very good for sorcerers. Quicken an offensive spell, and blade ward up for defense

[@BW022]

Sorry, I don't see that. 1. Unless completely (360) surrounded, you are better off taking the disengage action and moving away. Even if you want to quicken a spell. 2. If you are truly surrounded and can't disengage, you are better off casting a serious defensive, movement, or nerf spell than attacking. 3. If you are truly surrounded and are going to cast a quickened spell, a) You are probably better off casting a quickened defensive, movement, or nerf spell. b) You are better off finishing off a single foe with your offense spell, and then disengaging to moving away. You are at a strange CR if surrounded and you can't drop a single target. 4. If you are truly surrounded, we are talking about facing 8+ attacks from single attacks, or 4+ large creatures. a) Statistically you are going to die even with blade ward (or possibly dodge). That is 8+ attacks or 4+ from an ogre or worse. Remember, once dropped, every attack is at advantage and each hit counts as two failed death saves. b) Again, better off just trying so use a movement, defensive, or nerf spell vs. near certain character death. c) There is no way you can calculate that blade ward is somehow going to save you. There is an extremely narrow window of hit points and opponents (probably well below your tier) which blade ward would actually save you and that would only be statistically as they could role crits or completely miss you. Thus, you can't even know ahead of time whether it would actually save you. d) If you are actually worried about being 100% surrounded, you should probably have misty step or something like it. e) You are actually better off by nuking yourself. Even if you don't kill them, if you drop from your own spell, they might not choose to attack whereas if they are attacking you, they are far more likely to put an extra attacks into you. Even if none of these apply... 5. Statistically you will take less damage simply by taking the dodge action. You need specific cases (which aren't typically melee) which this doesn't apply. Further, dodge doesn't require a cantrip slot. 6. Statistically you are more likely to take no damage (great for concentration spells) if you take the dodge action. 7. Statistically you are more likely avoid secondary effects from attacks using the dodge action -- poison, trips, etc. 8. Dodge works against any attack which doesn't do deal piecing, bludgeoning, or slashing damage -- say an elemental or a fire bolt. (Yes, it doesn't project against save spells, but few of those are PBS anyway). 9. If you have the shield spell, a high base AC (say from multi-classing armor), dodge is considerably better. Swarm creatures near your tier will probably never hit. 10. Even if trapped like this, to cast BW (or dodge) you are also assuming none of your party members can or will help you. This is odd, if the creatures just moved up to you, any PC is presumably going to do something to help you out -- either between their initiative and your, or after your initiative and before the creatures. Far better to ask for help and hope someone drops a sleep, hypnotic pattern, darkness, levitates you away, makes you invisible, or blasts/hacks a way for you to escape. Both dodge and BW might be wasted. Sorry, it's just way too rare to be in this situation, not have other spells to actually get you out, that blade ward might save you (and the dodge action won't) and to have calculated this, and your party isn't willing/able to help out, etc. I'd certainly never trust blade ward over a dodge action and I'd be playing dead or picking up misty step or dimension door, long before I'd ever trust a blade ward to save me.

[@bulldozer8950]

I’d say perhaps the best use is bladesinger wizard. Assuming you’re 6th level (or higher) with booming blade you can attack with your first attack from extra attack and then attack with booming blade or use blade ward. Assuming a rapier and 16dex booming blade at 6th level does 12 damage if you don’t proc the extra damage. If you can find a way to get the extra damage it might be worth it, but if you can’t you might prefer to use blade ward with the cantrip part of extra attack and you can still make an attack which can let you use twf so you’re still dealing some damage. Obviously if you’d cast a leveled spell instead it’s better to cast the spell, but if you’re comparing booming blade (which is the go to for bladesinger) and blade ward it can be worth it fairly often to go with the blade ward if you’re trying to actually tank a bit. And you’re not losing out on that much damage. For most other characters I don’t think blade ward is good but I do think bladesingers can love it if they plan to be an off tank which I’d say they do better than an off damage dealer

[@BW022]

@@bulldozer8950 Good catch, but a pretty specific class/build. Given up the extra attack for half-damage is a neat idea, but still highly situational. If you are already 6th-level and its typically far better at those levels to cast a big spell vs. taking that kind of damage. The extra d6+3 damage isn't likely to make a difference against say a hill giant or six bugbears so if you really need to hang in there, you are probably still better off with the dodge action and letting someone else finish them off -- if you are out of spells, can't disengage, etc.

[@ChocolateFishBrains]

Notable fact to consider for Blade Ward is that the Earth Genasi can use it as a bonus action. Literally the one character that can use it in the most effective way.

[@grahamready1065]

This is a good point, but it works better on some builds than others. I thought I'd use it to make a tankier bladesinger, but there are too many bonus action abilities/spells of greater importance for it to be worth it until further into a fight.

[@ChocolateFishBrains]

@Graham Ready Yeah it suits some concepts better than others, but for anyone that's engaging in combat a regular amount it's a top tier choice. Very situational indeed.

[@Kirk9019]

I have it on an earth genasi hexadin, and it's AMAZING. Limited use for sure, PBxDay, but it means that my 3rd level paladin can tank VERY nicely

[@JuckiCZ]

And Eldritch Knight or Bladesinger can cast this and still attack.

[@ChocolateFishBrains]

@@JuckiCZ on a Bladesinger you're better off attacking with a cantrip like Booming Blade, and if you're an Eldritch Knight you'll get better results by going with sharpshooter/crossbow expert or great weapon master/polearm master for your bonus actions.

[@leahwilton785]

Vicious Mockery will forever be my favourite cantrip. It's just so fun to yell insults at enemies and have it hurt them

[@Owlinsweatpants]

Yeah. It’s basically “emotional damage” spell

[@christopherfleetwood5252]

That’s how most Bards find out they’re magic

[@G-Blockster]

My Bard is the king of "Yo Mama" jokes.

[@sephikong8323]

The fact that a high level bard is so good at diss tracks that he can kill a civilian from how devastating his insults are even with his worst one is immensely funny to me

[@Bidniss.]

Encode Thoughts storytime: I was DMing Tomb of Annihilation, and the party was knee deep in a mess between the Lich Valindra Shadowmantle and Ras Nsi's Yuan-Ti army. On one hand, they had a Lich "ally" who also wanted to explore the Tomb of the Nine Gods because the Soulmonger was rerouting the souls she needed to sustain her phylactery. The party was still very mistrusting of the Lich (as they should've been) because they knew she could double cross them once they got to the Soulmonger. On the other hand, the party was captured by Ras Nsi and scheduled to be sacrificed for trespassing into Omu. The party was offered one last option to save themselves: they had to kill the Lich because Ras Nsi didn't like the idea of someone being able to meteor swarm his temple. The party went back to the Lich, explained the situation, and decided to have a fake battle with the Lich and used Encode Thoughts to record the entire thing. They gave Ras Nsi the memory, he had a good look at it, thought it looked legit, and let the party free. The party wizard then cast sending to the Lich and gave the signal. The lich teleported in, and wiped out every last Yuan-Ti with the help of the party. Still a D tier cantrip, but it saved the party from a certain tpk having to battle a Lich and an entire Yuan-Ti cult at the same time.

[@Hissingace110]

This is a cool story, but couldn't they have just said they were going to go kill Valindra and then just not done that, and still ambushed Ras Nsi later?

[@joshwalton25]

​@@Hissingace110Ras likely asked for some form of proof ahead of time, so the Yuan-ti would be on alert around the party until they thought Valindra was dead.

[@joshwalton25]

If the players end up coming into conflict with Valindra while in her base, the module says that after commanding her hidden undead minions to kill the party, she uses her teleportation circle to head to Thay and returns a day or two later, assuming any hostiles will have either been killed by her minions, or at least left the location. Her added caution is due to the fear the Soulmonger may cause her phylactery to not work, causing her permanent death.

[@Bidniss.]

@@Hissingace110 Ras Nsi wanted proof. The party told him that her body would probably dissolve after she was killed because of the whole Lich thing. He told them "Then find another way. Your life depends on it." They came up with that crazy plan and I loved it so I allowed it.

[@Bidniss.]

@@joshwalton25 I played her a lot cockier than the book recommends because I knew that Valindra would most certainly wipe my level 7 party since if they REALLY pissed her off, all she could wipe the party with her eyes closed. If a Dm wants to play Valindra as intelligently as her statblock says she is there is absolutely nothing a lower level party can do to stop her. All she has to do is scry on the party and get decently close, dimension door in for a surprise attack, power word kill a member, and plane shift out. Rinse and repeat until tpk is complete. I'm not suggesting that it's a fun tactic or that you should do this to your players, but a Lich has no reason to be scared of a T2 party unless they get surprise on them, which is highly unlikely considering they never have to sleep, have a passive perception of 19 and truesight out to 120ft.

[@josiahfalls5304]

I love the idea of taking gust goodberry and thorn whip as a dhampir in the spell jammer setting and just floating along in a solo campaign

[@xySuperManxy]

Glad they nodded to the synergy of Control Flames and Gloomstalkers. I think it’s a very cinematic combo. The campfire goes out, then from the darkness comes a flurry of deadly arrows or bolts. So rad.

[@SkaalKesh]

To be fair, they could do the same thing with Druidcraft. Both are really sweet for individual applications though.

[@xySuperManxy]

@@SkaalKesh That’s true, but the range is shorter on Druidcraft, which increases the chance you’ll be seen before you can extinguish the fire.

[@Quirkee37]

@@SkaalKesh A big difference between the two is that control flames is only somatic while druidcraft is also verbal which makes it waaay worse in stealthy situations

[@derekcampbell2686]

Chill touch, mind sliver, booming blade, sacred flame, shillelagh, sapping sting, shocking grasp, thorn whip, and word of radiance are all my favorite cantrips. Shout out to prestidigitation, Eldritch blast, and fire bolt for being pretty dang good.

[@nonstickpansexual]

Gust is my favorite cantrip! I had a druid once who's go-to was always gust. We had ship battles and she pushed people into the ocean with it, and also she blew wind into the sail to control where we went. And later, with war caster and moonbeam, she pushed people back into moonbeam as a reaction. Definite great combat and utility options.

[@roll_another_one]

RAW she couldn't use gust this way. You can't push boats with guts And as per using it to move ppl around: that's not bad at all, I guess most of us underestimated this aspect, but the problem here is "5 feet away *from you*" so it is about bulky positioning

[@Hubabuba258]

Friends + Mask of Many Faces is a nice combo, with little to no drawbacks.

[@spiceyicey]

literal interpretation of the spell, the person who you chose to be affected by the spell (who isn't the target) knows that *you* cast the spell on them edit: as an addition, friends has a range of self. whoever you choose to get the advantage on can be anywhere on any plane and when the spell ends, they'll be angry at *you*

[@_bats_]

@@spiceyicey I've seen that discussion come up before, but I really don't see how they'd know who "you" are unless they also passed a check to see through the disguise. I don't see the spell as providing some sort of magical insight into the identity of the caster.

[@spiceyicey]

@@_bats_ it's magic, and if the rules of the spell says it does something, that means it does something. just because it doesn't make sense for fireball to suddenly ignite a 40ft area without leaving the worn clothes of anyone inside even a little singed, it makes sense that friends, that specifies that whoever is affected by the spell knows that you cast it, the person who is affected by the spell knows that you cast it

[@princevesperal]

@@spiceyicey Yes, they are angry at you, but they have no way to recognize who you are, because you were wearing a disguise at the time. And if you used magic to look like someone else, they'll think that someone else is you! Claiming otherwise would imply that the person can no longer be deceived by any costume or transformation. If they magically know who you are at all times, regardless of your appearance, you could polymorph into a dog, and the guy would still recognise you as the magic user who cast Friends on him ten years ago. This would open the door to abusing this spell the other way around. Use a stronger charm spell on the trickster illusionist NPC to compel him to cast Friends on you, and voilà! You can no longer be tricked by all his future disguises, as you'll always magically know it's him! I think it's rather common sense that the rule as intended is that the victim of the spell is hostile towards you, within the limits of their knowledge and perception. You could also get someone to be hostile towards you by punching them in the face, but if you do so while in disguise, they won't know who you really are.

[@aaronhumphrey2009]

Agreed. Impersonations of leader NPCs to sow dissent amongst the rank n file works well.

[@sniffledorpmcdrumptenstein]

I love the Friends cantrip. Using it in combination with Disguise Self to make your enemies more enemies is really fun!

[@Tupadre97]

This

[@S1leNtRIP]

Chill Touch is absolutely my non-warlock go-to cantrip. The rider is just too good!

[@vxicepickxv]

It's a shame bards can't get it.

[@Tombofresh]

@@vxicepickxv They can, through the Magical Secrets feature

[@OneWingedAngelsBand]

@@vxicepickxv There's always magic initiate. As a bard, choosing Warlock cantrips mean that you're still using your Charisma. Just pick Eldritch Blast and Chill Touch. Then maybe pick Hex or Armor of Agathys as your first level spell. 🙂

[@jameshill2450]

Dancing Lights is the only one that lets you place a light away from your own party, if you want to keep yourself hidden.

[@WhimsicalINTP]

Mage Hand with a torch will do this also.

[@futurecaredesign]

One can use Control Flames to turn a Hooded Lantern from 60 bright / 60 dim light into 120 bright / 120 dim light. That's now 240 feet vision that you have. In dungeons during combat you can also angle the Hooded Lantern just right so that your Gloomstalker buddy is in the darkness, but the enemies are perfectly illuminated.

[@Captain_thunda]

I feel like they were so close to hitting the benefits of control flame, then whiffed it. But you nailed it with the sheer amount of illumination it can provide, while also, being able to extinguish enemy lanterns and torches silently which is some strong utility that prestidigitation can't do.

[@remyb6854]

Also rave lights.

[@grantstratton2239]

Also if you already have firebolt and are setting the environment on fire regularly, it's nice to have a way to make sure it spreads (or doesn't) in the right direction

[@carlterwedow5000]

I think that as a player, the one time you would want to take the Encode Thoughts cantrip is if you played a Dimir deck in MtG during the Ravnica sets and really wanted to carry that over to your D&D character. Playing as a hooded figure slinking through the shadows, using Detect Thoughts to evade the paths of patrolling guards, then pouncing on an important NPC to steal a closely kept secret straight from their head before slitting their throat is about as close as you'll get to living out a scene straight from the artwork on a Dimir card.

[@Intender]

I’m so glad you guys are making this series. Chill Touch is definitely a sleeper.

[@0Fyrebrand0]

I wish I had that spell for Curse of Strahd. Hot dang, it would have been useful!

[@Peter_Cordes]

It's interesting, but unless your enemy is a troll or something that will regenerate up from 0 hp, the healing blocked is really just extra damage that you need to weig against how much damage you might have done with a different spell. e.g. Laudna on Critical Role (sorlock) sometimes tries Chill Touch instead of Eldritch Blast, like one attack roll for 2d8 (9) vs. two for 1d10+4 (9.5) each. If a monster was going to heal for 10 per round, that's one all-or-nothing chance to do effectively 19 damage (9 actual damage and 10 prevented-healing) vs. 19 average damage split up between two attack rolls. Laudna's also had terrible luck with Chill Touch, almost always missing on the attack roll. So it's barely worth casting Chill Touch if you have Eldritch Blast plus Agonizing Blast, unless the target is definitely going to heal for more than 10, or that's necessary to make them killable. Or if you have a spell slot available to do something like Scorching Ray. But if you're not a multi-class warlock, yeah, Chill Touch is a solid cantrip if you didn't want to cast a leveled spell this turn.

[@Intender]

Vampires are a better example, they heal 20 a round plus what the damage they do with bite. That can be up to 40 hp a round. It can really drag out a fight, especially at CR8, this would shut that down. I also like to put healing spells on humanoids to give them a shaman overlay, it allows me to keep some monsters around longer or bring things back up from ‘dead’. It has made some fun moments where the Sorcerer got to say “Not in my house”.

[@Peter_Cordes]

@@Intender - Ok yeah, for vampires specifically that's huge. Especially if you have a source of sunlight to stop their regeneration. Just wanted to remind people that some monsters that heal don't heal for much per turn, so it's not always worth much sacrificing damage output to block it.

[@adamglenen734]

Fire Bolt is definitely A tier. You failed to mention that you can target objects with it. None of the other blaster cantrips can do that (unless your DM is lenient of course). Yeah, Eldritch Blast is the goat, but RAW only Fire Bolt can spam destroy things like doors and boxes and even some walls. It also sets things on fire, leading to potential AoE hazards in the right conditions.

[@kolai1987]

RE: Create Bonfire. The bonfire itself lasts 1 minute, but it can ignite some logs or whatever to make a longer lasting fire.

[@seymourfields3613]

Eh. Druid craft and prestidigitation can ignite a bon fire

[@kolai1987]

@@seymourfields3613 but they don't do damage, so it sort of gets the survival aspects of that for free. That's the point.

[@dirmusloner7963]

@@seymourfields3613 you are wrong, druidcraft can produce flowers wilt as long as druid walks or anything that it has to do with druid interact with plants according to phb. So reread druidcraft

[@chrismedcalf5607]

“Druidcraft Whispering to the spirits of Nature, you create one of the following Effects within range: You create a tiny, harmless sensory Effect that predicts what the weather will be at your Location for the next 24 hours. The Effect might manifest as a golden orb for clear skies, a cloud for rain Falling snowflakes for snow, and so on. This Effect persists for 1 round. You instantly make a flower blossom, a seed pod open, or a leaf bud bloom. You create an Instantaneous, harmless sensory Effect, such as Falling leaves, a puff of wind, the sound of a small animal, or the faint odor of skunk. The Effect must fit in a 5-foot cube. You instantly light or snuff out a Candle, a torch, or a small campfire.”

[@dirmusloner7963]

@@chrismedcalf5607 I forgot the last phrase about the torch

[@malachilynch2979]

Friends has no limit to how far away the creature you affect can be. You can use it on literally anyone.

[@epis8613]

Unbelievably true. RAW unlimited range. Range is self and the description does not specify any distance from target. Friends on things scrying on you.

[@tadious9415]

In defense of Friends, it does give advantage on intimidation checks too. If you're giving a threat they'd already be hostile after so no problem. It also works very well with mask of many faces or just disguise self you can use friends, go around the corner and disguise self. Or disguise self beforehand to make them mad at someone else.

[@Pandamex187]

I took dancing lights for my first ever campaign and I was able to use it trick a construct into a trap. Dancing lights is a decent pick in my book.

[@Smeelio]

Your discussion of Chill Touch is even more inspiration and build advice for my dream Van Helsing/Solomon Kane/Victor Saltzpyre monster-hunter character, I really like that angle on it and I never considered it before, even though I have noted and appreciated the fairly unique heal-blocking ability before! Excellent work all-around again

[@beatricepfeiffer8280]

Chill touch is absolutely underated. I fell in love with the cantrip when one of my players continuously chill touched my bbeg and made what I had planned to be a three hour fight into just one hour. Now whenever I get the chance to be a player I try to always have it.

[@MrNickT]

For encode thoughts - it isn't said explicitly, but this is basically what Marisha's character uses in EXU Calamity. If you haven't seen it, it's well worth the time, and she uses it to great effect.

[@wildbanana5527]

Dancing light is for sending them go ahead as a human shape, and not only provoking attacks from ambushing enemies, but also seeing said enemies

[@jpjfrey5673]

There's an arguably great use for Druidcraft specifically for Druids when it comes to predicting weather - preparing for a siege in a location. If you predict that it's going to rain or storm next day, you can make use of it by preparing Call Lightning next day - it expands the range of the spell and increases its' damage as if upcast by 1 level Yes niche, but there's an actual practical use for it Also Frostbite might be slightly higher ranking because it's the only attack cantrip for Druids that has a range of 60 feet instead of their usual 30. Druids are known for being squishy and uncomfortably close to the front so having an option that keeps them at a distance is good

[@Heritage367]

One of these days I hope to show how terrifying druids can be during a siege.

[@shaynecarter-murray3127]

Are squishy druids common? In my experience they're usually the off tank of the party, between medium armor, shape-shifting, healing, defensive spells...even when not a moon druid, the extra HP and mobility from a wild shape can have huge impact

[@jpjfrey5673]

@@shaynecarter-murray3127 those must be very permissive GMs. Druids can't wear real medium armor cuz all of it save Hide is made of metal, so their AC is effectively capped at 14 (or higher with Studded Leather if you have good DEX) Wild Shaping during combat is dumb as a non Moon Druid because you're sacrificing spellcasting to scratch at the enemy with your feeble forms that aren't much faster than you on foot (even Moon Druid isn't any better - spellcasting will always beat Wild Shape damage). Healing and defense are something Druids have but those slots are best used for crowd control. One Entangle/Spike Growth/Maelstrom can turn the tide while defending yourself is a waste of concentration

[@tinear4]

Dudes, I have to say that your organizational method of tier items tops most other channels. I hate having to wade through the deck to get to the good spells - but with an alphabetical sequence, it all becomes relevant.

[@ad9aggie]

I played AD&D/2e from 1980-1990. I stepped away from the game until about 7 months ago. Imagine my surprise to find out Friends and Chill Touch are now cantrips when they used to be 1st level spells! Keep on keepin' on dudes!

[@j.troydoe1278]

Yea, cantrip was a level one spell too.

[@ad9aggie]

@@j.troydoe1278 Only in 2e, and the effects mentioned became Prestidigitation.

[@GoldfishEmpire]

For Guidance, there is no reason why you can't hold your action on Guidance to trigger when a skill check comes up (unless you're concentrating on another important spell). And if you know you're about to come into combat, such as spotting an ambush or heading into a lair, you can start casting Guidance to give yourself or someone else (such as an assassin rogue) a bonus to their initiative rolls, and because it's a cantrip, there is no reason not to constantly spam it. The only tricky situation I've been in when using Guidance is in social interactions (because casting a spell with components can alert the NPCs), but a sorcerer can use Subtle Spell to get around that.

[@marshallwilver8831]

I agree with the C tier ranking for Blade Ward. The coolest use I’ve seen for it though was a video that your boy Colby did over on D4. He took three levels of armorer artificer and then went blade singer. And used the extra attack can trip to cast blade Ward. Made for an interesting tank build

[@OathQuake]

I remember using dancing lights to distract a shopkeeper by pretending it was a new species called a Light Genasi. Good times.

[@tabaxi_enthusiast]

In a campaign I was in recently, we were pretty frequently coming up against memory-altering affects in puzzles and other non-combat encounters. Because of this, our warlock picked up Encode Thoughts, and whenever we found important information they would put it on a ribbon so it would stick. It was pretty good.

[@edfreeman4202]

So glad to see someone agrees with my opinion on Chill Touch! I've always thought about making a character who takes encode thoughts and detect thoughts who is a secret agent or something that's leaving these thought ribbons behind to assist in gathering Intel for an invasion or something like that.

[@ryanedgerton1982]

Fun fact about Druidcraft: if you have the right plants on hand (say, for example, the unripe seed pods of the Sandbox Tree), this Cantrip can trigger some 100% natural chaos. It's niche, sure... but there's nothing quite like walking into battle with a renewable supply of organic hand grenades.

[@OmniGman]

Also, when Monty mentioned he could never think of a situation where he would want to recreate a skunk's odor, I immediately thought of using the odor to disturb beasts/monsters with a strong sense of smell (wolves, wargs, etc.) since that is exactly what skunks use it for, or projecting the stench of a dead animal near a guard post, so that one of the guards would inevitably be sent to find out what's causing that 'awful stink', thus isolating him for capture/interrogation/impersonation/etc.

[@bonniemann8360]

Was playing in a campaign about a year back and our warlock took Chill Touch instead of Eldritch Blast. That was pretty much the primary reason we were able to defeat an oni in a fighting tournament when we were way undercoordinated - if he'd been able to keep regenerating, I think that fight would've gone on far too long

[@andrewshaughnessy5828]

When Ginny Di created Aisling (her warlock/druid character) she took Chill Touch instead of Eldritch Blast because she felt it was more thematic for her patron, and drew some flak as a result. What her critics missed is that the "best" cantrip is always the one that works for YOU, regardless of what others think.

[@habanayadana6884]

No way, I remember being exactly that warlock in that exact scenario around a year or so ago, although I was just learning to play, it was a blast 😄

[@urtoryu_dy_althraidn]

The biggest strength of Fire Bolt isn't the damage, it's the range. It has a lot more range than most other options.

[@brandonschmitz6696]

Epic use of encode thoughts: I'm running a Theros game. The river to the underworld strips Returned from their Eidolon (body from soul) when they swim back to the mortal realm. Make a 'cloak of identity' out of your entire mind before starting the swim, and you can reintegrate on the other side, whether you're breaking in or escaping the underworld

[@joebrammer9094]

Hi guys, your content has been very helpful to me in my first DnD experience. This video in particular because I chose a Warlock as my first! Just wanted to let you know I found a use for Blade Ward which you didn't think of (or maybe you did and didn't mention). I have been comboing it with Armour of Agathys in sticky situations to keep the temp HP and cold damage coming (as the resistance halves the damage done to the temp HP)

[@underthedice1231]

In defense of FrostBite, it's part of a set of cantrips for a protector spellcaster. Each individually are not that great but being able to have a catrip that works on every kind of enemies is amazing. Between Frostbite, Vicious Mockery and Shocking Grasp, my artificer can always protect his team mates while putting damage on the board.

[@Kirk9019]

This is an awesome way to tank tbh

[@underthedice1231]

@@Kirk9019 Yeah. If you want to push this logic to the max, an abjuration wizard with acces to Armor of Agatus can really be an insane damage migitator. My favorite variation is with a Mountain Dwarf. The weapons and armor proficiencies let you fight in melee which you need to be able to do to use Shocking Grasp safely. With magic Initiate at 4th level, your build is online rather early.

[@0Fyrebrand0]

I love the concept of Frostbite, but when I used it in practice it just always seemed to fail. The fact it only imposes disadvantage on weapons attacks and not spell attacks is a punch in the gut as well. Like, really? Did they think it would be overpowered otherwise? I hope spells like this get some serious reexamination in One D&D.

[@IceMan-6468]

I’m going to GREATLY agree with you on chill touch being S tier. Only reason I would see it as less is the frequency I use it compared to others is low. Don’t often fight enemies with healing capabilities, don’t often fight undead. Despite this I ALWAYS take it bc you never know

[@russellstanley8884]

Fire Bolt is also one of the few (only?) cantrip that target objects. So you can set things on fire and destroy unattended objects.

[@kingofnerds7693]

Fuck that window in particular

[@Taven03]

Simple changes makes a radical difference for some of these cantrips. Changing blade ward to bonus action it's a great cantrip, change acid splash to 1d8 makes it pretty good.

[@shawnbrynelson5333]

Booming blade is amazing on a swashbuckler rogue. I took one on my tabaxi. It's so fun to run 60ft, slab someone for 2d8 + 4d6 (sneak attack), then dash + feline agility to run another 60ft without them getting an OA.

[@GroovyLemming]

I think there's 3 good uses for Friends: 1) Combine with Disguise Self and you can make someone think that someone *else* did this, while potentially getting whatever benefit you were after. 2) Intimidation checks. While using Friends to lie to or persuade another creature will often backfire with this, using this to intimidate a creature won't necessarily *stop* them from being intimidated by you. They will be hostile and know you used magic on them, but they won't necessarily be less cowed. 3) Starting fights. This can actually be great with subtle spell and an appropriately violent NPC. Sometimes you want to start a bar fight, and getting the other guy to throw the first punch when no one else can see what happened? Priceless. Just cast Friends, prep a Dodge action, and then drop the spell.

[@timclose7661]

I took control flames with my multiclass gloomstalker/arcane tricks . Very handy putting flames out to get that sweet invisibility in darkness and I love the thematic of sneaking up to a campsite putting the fire out before you jump and and slay the campers

[@Guyoverthere07]

It's also just a Somatic component and 60ft range whereas Prestidigitation (10ft) and Thaumaturgy (30ft) have a Verbal component. Good luck sneaking around as you jibber jab near or next to the enemies. I really like the option to double the area of light as well. Get yourself a Bullseye Lantern for 10gp and blast a 120/240ft cone of light in front of the party. This arguably keeps most if not the whole party still shrouded. Combo with Mage Hand to hold the lantern if need to ensure the bearer isn't illuminated. Just an absurd amount of range to reveal enemies. The last bullet point has a ton of flexibility too for similar at-will features. Leave signs for up to an hour that others might overlook. Relay detailed information of an area in the fire. Trick someone that an object of importance is burning away in the flames. Bait monsters that something tasty is cooking within.

[@kazz94]

This video was most interesting, I learned a lot. Besides, having two people giving their own perspective, even having different opinions on some of the cantrips, helped open my mind a little more. Thank you for this vid! You got a new subscriber here :D

[@darthnapagaming3557]

Your content is fantastic. Keep it up dudes. S tier channel.

[@lloydlineske2642]

Gust of Wind is great! Remember that people take Telekinetic feat mainly for the 5 feet of movement. Wouldn't it be so much better to just use a cantrip slot for the same effect? Then you can use that feat for an ability score improvement or a feat that drastically improves your character.

[@Addddam0]

Re: Dancing Lights. I used this to great effect when we were level 2 and came across a Banshee in a forest. Not knowing for certain it was a banshee, I summoned the "glowing vaguely humanoid form" in its path, and the Banshee used its Wail while the rest of the party were well out of its range. Then I used Protection of Evil and Good on myself and we closed the distance and managed to defeat it, at level 2! Granted I only had Dancing Lights because I was playing a Drow, and don't think I've ever chosen it otherwise, so D tier is probably still fair. Maybe a low C for this *one* situation that is was very useful.

[@Natt_Skapa]

Friends with enchantment wizard's "alter memories". They won't even remember you charmed them.

[@EliteslayerX]

Acid Splash does have one situational but nice bonus, which I've put to good use on one of my characters: healing for clay golems as a cantrip. And if that golem is in melee with another enemy that you can also damage with it, all the better!

[@kylesimone6140]

i take acid splash just cuz its cooler than throwing a spark of fire at someone

[@Leonidous]

Friends gets infinitely more useful after you get Disguise Self, especially if you have a Hat of Disguise or Mask of Many Faces, because as soon as the guard you used Friends on turns the corner they see someone completely different. Additionally, it also help with extracting information from non hostile NPCs who don't wanna give up said information, sure they know you charmed them after, but you've already learned what you need to learn.

[@TheSeventhChild]

Blade Ward is actually kind of interesting and weirdly enough scales better than most other cantrips when you look at the maths. Early on its pretty bad but monsters that actually attack you tend to start getting very high attack and damage bonuses to the point where if you would dodge, Blade Ward might be a better consideration. Put on top of that the fact that at higher levels your Wizard is going to be either conserving slots or concentrating on some big fight ending spell, the use of an action for Blade Ward raises in value again.

[@TheTdroid]

Blade Ward isn't that great early on, but I legitimately think that an Eldritch Knight with Blade Ward will be one of the best scaling single class martial characters in the system. It's obviously hard, borderline impossible, to properly compete with something like a Sorcadin for higher lvl scaling, but an EK does it better than most. Part of the reason for this, in my opinion, is their excellent defensive traits that compliment the baseline Fighter kit and Blade Ward very much is part of that. Simply having the tactical flexibility to tank like a Barbarian when the party needs it is really good for party optimization, even if it looks like a suboptimal choice on your character in a vacuum.

[@WolfHreda]

Another subclass that can actually use Blade Ward to good effect is the Bladesinger, being able to substitute one of their attacks in the Extra Attack feature with a cantrip. So, if you find yourself a little deeper in the shit than you intended, you can attack once, cast Blade Ward, and wait out your next turn. They also put Shocking Grasp to better use than most.

[@futurecaredesign]

Its also great as a backup Feather Fall. Sure its only one person and you don't negate damage all together. But sometimes you need those preparation slots and Feather Fall has been benched for 8 games. Edit: Damnit! It specifies weapon attacks! Oh well....

[@Fr3ddyM3hrCurry]

Also (i think "Pack Tactics" covered this) if you need to concentrate on a big spell, a common example would be Spirit guardiance, then bladeward is better that dodging at higher levels. So a cleric casting Spirit Guardiance and then just using bladeward for most of their actions to not loose the spell is better than using those actions to attack.

[@ikaemos]

Something that, at best, puts Blade Ward in B (for "build-reliant") is using it alongside Armor of Agathis, as it makes it last longer. Especially if you're a (MotM) Earth Genasi who can cast it as a bonus action PB times per day.

[@TheEphemeralEternity]

Ok so.... buckle up cuz I love encode thoughts and have ran it effectively in some awesome niche situations and builds. 1. Tin foil hat: encode thoughts doesnt need concentration or limit the length of the thought. A player I had used this to encode a single, long, useless thought (some random speech they memorized) and stuffed the ribbon into a wearable hat. This made it more difficult for enemies to accurately read or influence their mind. Effectively making a version of mind blank for no cost (minus the psychic damage immunity). 2. Cover my tracks: This is one combo that I pulled off that Kelly will love. Encode thoughts specifically says that when you are CONCENTRATING on a spell or ability that allows you to read or manipulate the thoughts of others; meanwhile, the friends spell says that they WILL realize the target was under its influence once the spell ends (ie. the spell is directly impeding the target's thoughts while active). This would mean you can use friends and follow up with encode thoughts to enforce that you really became steadfast friends before the spell ended (this of course assuming that your dm agrees that encoding thoughts removes them from the original target). 3. Memory Mischief: Beautifully messing with peoples' memories and using modify memory before returning them. Allowed me to turn the party against each other, trick the party into believing a member never existed or has always been with them, and produce alibis on multiple occasions. In short, very useful for a creative assassin(s).

[@ZombieMonkey7]

If you play an Earth Genasi you get Blade Ward as a bonus action

[@crownlexicon5225]

A couple useful things about dancing lights: yes, a lot of creatures have 120' dark vision, but for those who have 60 or none, you can have them illuminated and stay in darkness yourself. Against enemies with darkvision, that's still disadvantage on perception checks to see you. It was quite useful against a dragon in a campaign I played. The dragon flew away into the darkness, farther than any of us could see. The drow sent his dancing lights out to the dragon 120' away. Now our ranged characters could see the dragon to target it.

[@megatenshi]

I like to give my players Prestidigitation, Druidcraft, Thaumaturgy, those types of spells for free if they play a spellcaster, since they're just pretty fun to have and kinda feel like generic "I'm a mage, I can do x" flavor stuff. Pretty fun stuff.

[@brmac5231]

I do the same.

[@kylesimone6140]

dang mind if i steal that for my campaign?

[@megatenshi]

@@kylesimone6140 Go for it. I'm defo not the only one to come up with it, haha. It's a fun bonus

[@kylesimone6140]

@@megatenshi ok ty!

[@DanDanChair3427]

I used Chill Touch to great effect in Curse of Strahd.

[@AzureIV]

Guidance is one of my most favorite cantrips. I toss it on my fellow party members all the time. It is so useful.

[@brucebrown2241]

I started playing in 1978. Back then, we used dancing lights as a distraction when we wanted to sneak in somewhere. It was a 1st level spell. There were no cantrips. It was described to us that it looked like a party of adventurers carrying torches. Cast that to draw off the guards, then sneak into the tunnel. We did not bother with concentration.

[@Heritage367]

Still a good use of it, in my opinion

[@kennethmadsen6474]

I'm still rolling my very first DnD character (a druid) in our 1,5 year going campaign. I can thank your guides for the character to still be alive. Love your Drakkenheim series as well. I'm 37 episodes in now. Excellent stuff. It has learnt me a lot about the dynamics within the characters within a group.

[@karatekoala4270]

0:45 Kelly: keep in mind, this is just OUR opinion... Me: but your opinion is gospel my liege!

[@IgnoreMeImWrong]

I love the friends cantrip, the amount of times I used this with a Warlock running many faces is outrageous.

[@scottballentine1846]

Blade ward is a great defensive cantrip on a blade singer in certain situations

[@1_Acre_Empire]

Especially with the level 6 extra attack on bladesinger allowing a normal attack and you can swap an attack with a cantrip

[@MitchT97]

Been using this in my current campaign and has been nice as a secondary thing to do in tandem with other defensive measures when I get surrounded or outnumbered or just gonna be distract a few enemies until my party can finish off what they’re dealing with. Honestly it just makes bladesinger that much more untouchable with all the defensive magics and abilities they gain.

[@godsamongmen8003]

​@@1_Acre_Empire Or an artillerist with the bonus action cannon.

[@tarrickmerdev2324]

I think it also has some interesting use as a defensive option on an Eldritch Knight. War Magic allows you to still make 1 attack with your bonus action. You do give up some offense but if you're surrounded or have disadvantage for some reason or some other debuff then it can still be a great option to have. And, while you lose more offense at higher levels as you get a third and potentially fourth attack, it does mitigate more damage as well as monster damage scales up. The limitation of only applying to weapon attacks, in my opinion, is what hurts it more than anything. I would give it a solid C.

[@kennyryuken]

It's a real good option for a higher level Wizard Necromancer

[@radriel6983]

For Dancing Lights, it combos pretty well with Minor illusion to give your glowing humanoid a voice or sound effects. It's also very good for signals from afar. Lastly, the ability to spread a light in a broad area is actually useful in exploration. Its not worse than the Light spell at this anyway. The downside is concentration to be sure, but that just adds it to the list of useful spells you dont do in combat like Detect Magic. I think its C tier, B for illusionists.

[@kylesimone6140]

yeah i've had this idea i havent done yet to make a humanoid and trick and enemy into thinking it was a higher being

[@arniepage1662]

Aren’t they both concentration spells tho

[@radriel6983]

@@arniepage1662 Minor illusion is not concentration

[@SpaceW-]

I reject that Dancing Light is D tier. Yes, in most scenarios it is only as good as Light if not a little worse, but in some scenarios it absolutely excels depending on where you need light. Properly spacing out the orbs can allow you to see a very large area, or specifically light up areas further away which Light *cannot* do. I think this is B tier at worst

[@cfalkner1012]

I agree. Plus, you can often position the lights far enough away from you so they don’t illuminate you and your party, and serve as a distraction to any dim witted enemies.

[@gabeschoenfeld317]

Should be noted you cast light on an object, so if you wanted you can cast light on a rock and just huck it where you want light, or if you have a familar it can carry it

[@talongreenlee7704]

I disagree. Dancing lights is D tier solely on the basis that each orb produces 10 ft. of dim light. That’s pathetic. You can barely see anything with that. If it were at least 10 ft. bright light and 10 ft. dim light beyond that, then it would be B tier.

[@buttmunchmcnugget328]

I agree that the fact it is Dim Light is the thing that holds it back, that being said i dont see why you couldnt allow it to be bright light if you so chose to make it better

[@dswenneker]

I always get prompted to like a video by something that interests me a lot, entertains me, or I think is really high-quality. Honestly, Monty screaming "green flame blade" + Kelly's reaction at 33:26 is all those things together :') Insta-like!

[@brandoncurtis1636]

Such an awesome surprise to still have a Dungeon Dudes video over the holidays 😁 Love you guys!

[@joshuatran1556]

Dancing Light's humanoid form is actually decent at searching for traps, anything that might react to a visual of a humanoid would reasonably attack it if they see it first

[@sandmanlives3]

Thank you. I really like the Druid using Create Bonfire and Gust. I also like Create Bonfire for a Warlock that is out of spell slots.

[@Joker-yw9hl]

Doubt you'll read this but in the Summer I watched so many of your videos that I actually dreamt I was having a session zero with you guys (and other people), but I couldn't remember your names for some reason. So in the dream instead of Monty and Kelly, you were called Mark and Lawrence. Maybe it's just me but I think the names fit!

[@terryroraus]

Had an interesting use for Create Bonfire. It was actually a neat trick. I was a wizard supporting my crew as we were trying to escape an enemy fortress. As we were trying to exit the fort, the crew on the ramparts tried to throw boiling oil to prevent us from escaping. I started a turn directly under said rampart and I asked my DM: "How thick is the wood of the rampart?" He appeared curious, but responded "3 or so feet, why?" On the start of my turn, I ended up casting Create Bonfire, which caused the fire to start at the bottom of the rampart and burn upward. It ended up cooking one of the jars of oil off, exploding in the rampart crew's face, and actually causing one of them to fly over the edge to their death. Cantrips are so useful if you think of them as utility to create effects from causes, instead of just using them as direct damage.

[@cmoore6547]

Don't overlook the automatic damage from green-flame blade. As long as there is someone you can hit next to their AC tank

[@chakrafist]

For Encode Thoughts, after an npc was attacked and put into a coma in the campaign I DM, the party hired on another character to use the spell and detect thoughts to get a picture of what he saw before his attack. Incredibly incredibly niche spell, but it was fun finding a reason to use it!

[@notsochosenone5669]

Friends is actually have good use combined with Disguise Self/Changeling feature. Just turn yourself into someone, use Friends, then go away and turn yourself back. It is niche, but still

[@5-Volt]

Yeah. My warlock player with mask of many faces does this all the time. Lol. He likes to turn into someone that is behind the character he's casting friends on to make them mad at them & cause chaos.

[@TheJerbol]

About half of the top comments mention this. A cantrip should be useful outside of in combination with a spell

[@18narrowminded]

@@TheJerbol a cantrip only needs to be one thing, useful. The degree to which this combo punches well above its weight class with all but the most adversarial or combat focused dungeon masters makes it well worth a spot. Almost every caster is already going to want disguise self anyway for stealth and social engagements.

[@jakekoepnick1729]

Best use of Friends I ever had: We had snuck into an enemy hideout and skipped all the guards to get to the wizard/researcher the bad guy had hired to do something or other for them. We stumble into the room and he asks who we are. I used Friends to convince him we were supposed to be there long enough for the barbarian to casually walk around him and them grapple him from behind. I was able to get some information out of him while this happened. Then the rogue one shotted him with a sneak attack before he could take an action in combat. Got some info and didn't have to fight a wizard. Great success!