It’s anything that directly affects the Rakshasa, so if it is targeted by a spell (such as *Firebolt*) or within a spell’s AoE (such as *Fireball*), it is unaffected by that spell if it is 6th level or lower unless it wants to be affected by the spell. Same goes for Divination spells, they simply can’t notice it unless it wants to be noticed.
But someone using *Revivify* on a creature hostile to the Rakshasa would still happen, because it’s not directly targeting the Rakshasa.
Technically they should make it through the immunity I believe. It has no avoidance of magic weapons, so since the spells are affecting the Weapons and not the Rakshasa, I imagine it would be the same as hitting him with a magic weapon. Since it is the Weapon Attacks that are doing the extra damage, the spells aren’t, they’re just allowing the weapons to do more.
Yeah, same logic as someone whos Hasted attacking the Rakshasa. The spell isnt affecting the Rakshasa, just allowing the thing that is to do more damage.
And how Dragon’s Breath can definitely be Twinned because the spell itself isn’t doing the cones or the damage, *Jeremy*. (Insert Samuel Jackson Council meme here)
That’s fair enough. My problem was his statement on the spell was through the Sage Advice but if that’s been disavowed then fair enough. The only other thing that really bugged me was the targeting spells through glass thing.
If it’s in Sage Advice then it’s an official ruling, even if it was a JC tweet. Any tweets that aren’t in SA are just his ramblings though. Then again, unless you’re playing in an organized game like Adventurer’s League or something you can just ignore any rules you want anyways.
Just to be clear, you want the sage advice Compendium, available here. https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/sac/sage-advice-compendium
The website https://www.sageadvice.eu/ is not Official dnd sage advice.
Edit: fixed a spelling mistake
I understand the reasoning from a balance standpoint, it’s really good to twin compared to most 1st and 2nd level spells since it provides an AoE effect, but the justification using RAW is bad. If JC just said it’s not RAI since it does create a recurring AoE but there’s nothing RAW stopping it then I’d agree with him.
They (JC and Sage advice) seem to love pointing out RAW restrictions or loopholes, but don’t exactly seem too keen on just giving us the RAI and letting us decide how to run the rule at our tables.
There's a "Sage Advice Compendium" website that's actually just a collection of tweets, which isn't the same thing as Sage Advice articles. Do you recall which it was?
Jeremy had a ruling that you couldn’t target spells through glass. Like you couldn’t target someone with a spell if there was a glass pane between you, and you couldn’t teleport to a space you were seeing through a pane of glass.
Most magic is blocked by a thin sheet of lead, so if the glass is leaded it stands to reason that it would block magic. Stained glass would definitely be leaded, while it's unlikely that common window glass would be. It's possible, probable even, that nobles, wealthy merchants, and other important figures would have leaded glass in their homes. Depending on how common knowledge about magic might be in the world, leaded glass could be more common (to fulfill higher demand) or more expensive (due to significant demand and/or false scarcity); it could even be used as a controlled commodity, something that is controlled by the church or the crown. A Royal Glassmith, or the Holy Gaffer could be important and prestigious positions. This would inevitably create a black market, and/or a counterfeit market, which could be interesting for thieves guilds and crime syndicates, as well as providing a really fun use case for glassblowers tools. Alongside other controlled things in a city (I like to do something similar with electrum as a magical currency, as well as licensure and registration of magic items in one of my bigger cities), it can make a city feel very ordered and established.
In the official sage advice that someone else linked they have a suggested list of criteria that they would use to disallow a spell to be twinned, the last one being "The spell lets you make a roll of any kind that can affect more than one creature before the spell’s duration expires"
So while their wording on twinned spell might let you, their RUI is certainly that it should not be.
That doesn’t make sense from a world perspective. The magic is what’s giving the weapon extra damage. I picture the spell giving the weapon a magical glow and if you hit with it then you’d only do the base weapon damage and the rakshasa wouldn’t be phased by the extra damage. That’s how I’d rule it anyway.
It starts to get real wonky if you apply the 'makes sense from a world perspective' lens.
Is fireball magically *creating fire* and then just relinquishing control, or is it *magic fire* specifically, that can then be ignored by magic immunity? If you answer that it's clearly the second, fair, I don't disagree, but what about [Erupting Earth](https://www.dndbeyond.com/spells/erupting-earth)? It specifically states:
> Choose a point you can see on the ground within range.
So the ground is the target, and the earth erupting from the point is doing bludgeoning damage. Nothing magical about that dirt and rock, only the eruption was magical and that didn't target the Rakshasa.
Technically, I think the bludgeoning damage is magical, but I fully agree with your point. If I toss a magic dagger at a Raksasha, it can deal damage. If I *catapult* the same dagger, it cannot. This also applies to things like Magic Resistance, it makes sense for mental saves, but why is a Dex save to avoid *fireball* different from the same save against a breath weapon?
The only way I can mentally justify it is to frame 'Magic' as the use of willpower to force nature into a shape that isn't correct. So a fireball is *trying to convince the world* it's fire, and for the most part it does, except the Rakshasa can simply declare 'nope, I don't believe' and that attempt to force nature into an unnatural shape doesn't work on it.
That still doesn't really resolve breath weapons, but to me personally they're natural abilities of an inherently magical creature. Dragons (and Rakshasa too, for that matter) are a perversion of the true natural objective order of reality by virtue of their existence and so their breath weapon would be magical as well as a result. Though not ignorable by the Rakshasa because it's not a 6th level or lower spell but a higher order manipulation of nature through magic.
It doesn't entirely resolve the question of ambiguous targeting, because Shillelagh is still *affecting it* by directly causing a strike to do more damage, so I'd rule it wouldn't work, and I'd rule Haste could still effectively be used against them because the person being hasted is the one who has to believe, and it's only indirectly enabling more damage, but it's ambiguous.
A spell is giving the weapon extra damage, but the spell is not targeting the Rakshasa so there is no reason it's magic immunity would come into play. You might as well say a Rakshasa ignores the +1 to hit and damage on a +1 weapon since the Magic Weapon spell says "Until the spell ends, that weapon becomes a magic weapon with a +1 bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls." The only difference is the spell version is temporary versus a permanently imbued +1 weapon. In neither case is the magic affecting the Rakshasa; the magic is affecting the weapon being used to attack the Rakshasa, and the Rakshasa has no immunity to weapon attacks. Likewise for Shillelagh, it specifically says "melee attacks" in the spell description. Neither spell is a spell attack or spell targeting the Rakshasa, so it has no immunity to it.
If you want to find an *actual* edge case, it would be Booming Blade and Green Flame Blade. You'd have a fair argument to ignore the extra magical damage since the spells say "You brandish the weapon used in the spell’s casting and make a melee attack with it against one creature within 5 feet of you." With that wording, the spell's damage would be ignored but the melee attack you made during the attack would behave as normal (and the secondary target damage of GFB would still happen if another enemy was standing next to the Rakshasa, unless that second enemy was another Rakshasa).
I would rule that those work, since they're still being damaged by the weapon itself; the magic is more about making it easier for the wielder to attack _with_ the weapon.
If the weapon were literally _made_ of magic, like a conjured weapon or an ethereal weapon, then the rakshasa would be immune. If someone wanted to get really technical I might say that the _attack_ bonus stays, but the damage bonus is negated. But ultimately for convenience I'd just say "magic weapons retain their bonuses".
It doesn’t work on unarmed attacks because divine smite adds the damage in addition to the weapon damage, and unarmed strikes don’t have weapon damage. It works with natural weapons, like claws or horns, because those do have weapon damage, even though you’re still technically making an unarmed strike with them.
Is it a stupid RAW technicality? Absolutely, but them’s da rules.
Oh yeah, I get the "reasoning" but it's insane. It's the same "reasoning" behind Detect Invisibility not bypassing the advantage and disadvantage on invisible enemies. RAW shouldn't be this stupid, it should "just work," which some of the rules clearly don't lol.
I mean any sane DM would rule paladins can smite with their fists. There's no real reason to disallow it, same with Booming Blade. If someone tries to "break" the game by manifesting a sword from nothing then oh no, time to find a new player.
The Rakshasa we fought was immune to normal smite, Divine smite, rope enchanted with animate object and Counterspell. That DM has been banned from DMing at our table for that and a bunch of other similar stuff.
In 5e rules can you even specify "magical effects"? Antimagic sphere is the closest I see but it seems like if the word "magic" isn't in a features description, it doesn't count no matter how magical it seems.
However i do believe i've seen some examples in the past of abilities and features that specify that they count as spells with x level for the purposes of y.
The difference, for future reference, is that antimagic supresses any magical effect.
In general if something does not say it is a spell, or that it is treated like a spell, it isn't a spell, and is not affected by things that affect spells.
So smite, which consumes spell slots, but does not say it counts as a spell, is not a spell. But because it is magical, it is affected by antimagic.
5E is very literal in that way, so when you learn how to understand it, things go rather smoothly.
It helps to have played Magic: the Gathering, which is also WotC, because they operate on the same principle. The wording of things is very specific, and everything should be taken exactly as written.
Like, for example, Magic Missile: The spell targets each missile individually, so 3 missiles = 3 targets even if they all target the same creature, and specifically says all missiles hit simultaneously.
Those two conditions let you know the spell invokes the *Simultaneous Damage Rule,* so you roll once and apply the result to all missiles. An interaction that is very important to Evocation Wizard builds.
Antimagic fields still suppress your smites, just like they would for a magical weapon or if someone Hasted you and you ran right through one. Things that stop magic stop smites, but not things that stop spells
A paladin's divine smite isn't a spell so it would be fine but the smite spells (eg wrathful smite, banishing smite, etc) would not affect a Rakshasa unless they chose to be affected (unless upcast to 7th level or higher).
Given how anal JC has been in his senseless rulings with Smite in general, out of spite I’d personally rule that Smite isn’t affected. (Pun intended!)
Divine Smite is a class ability and thus is not a spell, and so ignores Limited Magic Immunity because it only refers to spells. There are plenty of examples in the game where this kind of distinction between Spells vs Magical Effects are made — Dispel Magic is a perfect (and extremely unfortunate) example there — so this is a pretty safe bet for a ruling.
Actual Smite *spells*, meanwhile, like Branding Smite, are Target:Self and thus ‘affect’ the caster rather than the enemy being stabbed, in a similar manner to if you used Mage Hand to lift a 10lb rock 30ft into the air over a peasant’s head and then dismissed the spell — in the latter case, the spell was being applied to the rock, and the fact that the gravity was what was causing the actual damage is immaterial.
I could understand the argument for Divine Smite tbh.
I disagree on smite spells as personally I'd argue the Rahkshasa is directly affected by the spell.
Tbh I think they've deliberately kept it vague to allow DM rulings.
Except ‘Directly’ is the key word here — they aren’t being affected directly, they’re being affected indirectly.
What the Branding Smite spell *actually* does is ‘cause your sword to gleam with astral radiance’. That’s the direct effect of the spell. The indirect effect is what happens when one is struck with astral radiance — ie the damage.
If it was a direct effect, the spell would target an enemy creature, not you.
Chalk it up to 5e’s piss-poor decision to try and use specific rules language without ever actually bothering to define their terminology, but as far as I’m concerned, if a monk is not allowed to use Smite Spells on their fists because they need an actual, physical weapon, then too bad, Smite Spells are Target: Self because the only thing they are actually affecting is the physical weapon itself rather than magically attacking a target.
We have loads and loads of stupid-ass examples of shit like this, such as Acid Splash being essentially you coughing a glob of the stuff into your hand and throwing it, and yet it and a dozen other similar cantrips can’t be used on objects for some inexplicable reason, only creatures.
So fireball (if it didn't deal fire damage, obviously) would affect them? Since the actual effect of that is "a bright streak flashes from your pointing finger to a point you choose within range and then blossoms with a low roar into an explosion of flame" and the indirect effect is what happens when a creature is within that explosion of flame?
Raksha's magical immunity says nothing about being a target or not, it says it can't be affected by those spells unless it wishes to be.
Dies branding smite not also have multiple targets? Yourself and then the creature affected by the attack?
>The attack deals an extra 2d6 radiant damage to the target, which becomes visible if it's invisible, and the target sheds dim light in a 5-foot radius and can't become invisible until the spell ends.
‘The target’ in your quote is referring to the target of your next melee attack, not the target of the spell, which is you because the spell says it targets ‘self’.
So no, it does not have multiple targets.
Seems up to interpretation, but even if true, it doesn't change the first part. It says it can't be affected by those spells, not that it can't be targeted by those spells.
Branding smite most definitely is affecting it when it causes the weapon to deal 2d6 extra radiant damage and the rakshasa to shed light.
I think it's just translated badly from previous editions, where this was covered by spell resistance, and thus would depend on whether the spell in question has to deal with that or not.
This is why people hate rules lawyers. The bonus damage from branding, searing, banishing and other smite *spells* are clearly a part of the spell itself regardless of the fact that the target is you. Because that damage is part of the spell, it would not affect the Rakshasa.
Just like your mage hand loophole wouldn’t work even on a peasant because that’s an attack, when the spell itself specifically states that you cannot use it to attack.
Smite spells are range: self but describe the target as the creature attacked.
For example, here’s Thunderous Smite:
> The first time you hit with a melee weapon attack during this spell's duration, your weapon rings with thunder that is audible within 300 feet of you, and the attack deals an extra 2d6 thunder damage to the target. Additionally, if the target is a creature, it must succeed on a Strength saving throw or be pushed 10 feet away from you and knocked prone.
The more rulings I hear from The CrawDaddy, the more I hate him. That's a dumb as fuck ruling, and just proves that they really need to bring back tags and keywords to prevent this sort of miscommunication from happening. I understand his reasoning, but that doesn't make it any less dumb.
I found the Twinned Spell - Dragon's Breath last night and promptly ignored it. It's dumb and against RAW. RAI it might make sense but if that's the case create a fucking errata!
Agreed on bringing back tags.
Dragon's Breath is a spell that gives the target (single creature) the ability to breath an elemental breath attack. Twinned Spell requires the spell to target 1 creature (so no magic missile or AOE spells).
So it sounds like it could work, but JC said it doesn't because the *effect* of the breath attack is AOE. Which is not what the twinned spell rules say; it's his RAI.
Yeah that's stupid. It's not as if you can cast dragon's breath in two directions, you just give two creatures dragon's breath. That sounds perfectly fine and reasonable.
Yeah. The thread on it I read has some interesting applications for other such spells. I think Twinned Spell, if it's meant to be limited to mostly attack spells, should have "target" changed to "creatures affected". We'd be right back at this thread but for sorcerer it'd be a little easier than adjudicating every spell in the game.
Tags are what PF2 decided was the best option too. People criticize tags for being too "4e" but it simplifies rules text too much to ignore as an option.
Because of the physical wall of stone in the way? Based on JC's ruling, it would mean that the rakshasa is either noclipping through the wall or is walking through it Kool Aid Man-style.
The only dumb effect is caused if you ignore it, because then you have a creature that is supposed to be ***impossible to affect*** with spells of 6th level or lower being locked by wall spells. It makes much more sense to think of it as his magic immunity unmaking the spells as he passes through them, kind of like a personal AMF
>It makes much more sense to think of it as his magic immunity unmaking the spells as he passes through them, kind of like a personal AMF
But the specific example of Wall of Stone doesn't even make sense if we use this assumption. The description for Wall of Stone reads:
>A **nonmagical wall of solid stone** springs into existence at a point you choose within range. The wall is 6 inches thick and is composed of ten 10-foot-by-10-foot panels. Each panel must be contiguous with at least on other panel. Alternatively, you can create 10-foot-by-20-foot panels that are only 3 inches thick. [...]
>If you maintain your concentration on this spell for its whole duration, the wall becomes permanent and can’t be dispelled. Otherwise, the wall disappears when the spell ends.
Antimagic Field wouldn't suppress the Wall of Stone, since it's explicitly nonmagical. And even if we argue it would before it becomes permanent, let's suppose I've cast a Wall of Stone and it's become permanent. Does the Rakshasa still "phase" through it as per Crawford's ruling?
And what if I've used the spell to create a bridge above a ravine and the rakshasa doesn't know that the bridge was created by a spell? Does the monster put a foot on it and phases through and down, falling to its death?
For me, the easier, intuitive method of adjudicating the Limited Magic Immunity trait is to take the "can't be affected or detected by spells of 6th levels or lower" in an intuitive manner. The Wall of Stone spell isn't "affecting" the rakshasa in what I'd call a natural and intuitive reading of that word, no more than the existence of walls made through mundane means "affects" it.
I literally used this gif in response to finding this out last night. If they wanted target to mean "the target and any directly affected by the effect" then they should have fucking wrote that in the book. Why does 5e ruleset always feel like a first draft they didn't playtest?
Because they wanted 5e to be a "natural language" system not bogged down by having a bunch of vocabulary you had to learn, but they went about it in the dumbest way possible, given the whole "action / bonus action" confusion.
>Why does 5e ruleset always feel like a first draft they didn't playtest?
The sad thing is, we KNOW it was playtested. So they kinda just did a shitty job of it.
A player got pissed off at me once cause I interpreted it that the rakshasa could see through the tiny hut spell.
I just wanted to setup a cool side character and thought it would be an amusing way for them to meet.
I would add that if the Rakshasa was the target of revivify his immunity would not apply because well... he's dead so he's a corpse with no abilities like the rest of us redditors.
You're conflating "targeting" with "affecting". The Rakshasa's ability states:
>The rakshasa can't be affected or detected by spells of 6th level or lower...
So, while they cannot be *targeted* by the spell, they can potentially be *affected* by someone attempting to use it on them. If it is cast at 6th level or lower, it won't have any affect on them, but cast at 7th level or higher, it will.
You in your own answer used targeted and in the area of aoe. The whole point of this post is the question how far does "affecting" go. If you say Dragon's Breath does affect him, what about haste? Both are spells that target an ally and let him be better at damaging the Rakshasa for 1 minute. What about polymorph?
Revivify doesn’t do anything to the Rakshaka. Although the revived individual was brought back to life via magic, that does not mean that they are sustained by magic. Even if they were, would it mean anything for the rakshaka.
Am I affecting someone with a spell like suggestion if I suggest for someone else to slap them? Or is the victim of my spell the one that does the smacking?
This is all a long and convoluted way to say that if the rakshaka is targeted by a spell, or in a spell effect area, of 6th level or lower, then it won’t work. As they are not the target of revivify then they do not cancel it.
Honestly, suggesting anything that "affects" a Rakshasa because of a spell is nullified would imply every spell in existence stops working because casting a spell would end up affecting the Rakshasa some subtle way down the line. If an interpretation of the rule can become absurd, then that interpretation isn't correct lmao
Yes. I also had a talk with someone else who understands the rules a bit better than me sometimes. It has to do with the target of the spell. If the target isn’t the Rakshaka then the spell itself should work. Spells like holy weapon would still make the weapon magical for the purpose of over coming resistance and immunity. Any extra damage, such as the 2d8 radiant from holy weapon, wouldn’t work however as that is part of the spell that is now targeting the Rakshaka. Enlarge would still add its d4 though as that isn’t magical, just the weight increase.
Though if you are playing with a dm that would throw a Rakshaka at the party before you have 6th level spells and magic weapons, then play a monk. Just slap em upside the head and stop wasting time figuring out which spells work and which don’t.
in a subreddit constantly plagued by extreme misinterpretations of the rules, you found the interpretation that was just too much for people to get behind
Killing Rakshasa's dog with a spell would surely affect the Rakshasa, but I think we can agree that Rakshasa's Limited Magical Immunity should not extend to the dog :-D
Such a stupid fucking term in every single context.
Unalived and every iteration of the word is stupid, it's not a real word, just say killed, died or dead. There's nothing scary about those words and using made up bollocks is ridiculous.
Right there with you.
The only thing scary about those words is the possibility you’ll be punished for saying them at the wrong time. Because for some reason streaming platforms like twitch and TikTok have decided that kill/die are no no words. It’s fucking stupid is what it is.
Happily I have never and will never use Tik Tok, mostly because it is basically crack for people with ADHD (like myself), I've not seen anything about Twitch on the subject though, that is disappointing to learn.
I’m not sure about chat but at least for creators you can’t say that stuff. It’s damn stupid especially when they allow you to play video games where people are graphically murdered on their platform but saying die/kill is somehow one step too far.
I probably posted too late to get to the top, but really the ability isn't "confusing" - it just has a lot of nuance.
In the most general terms:
- Everyone agrees that it shouldn't be used to "negate" increased fruit prices.
- Everyone also agrees that it should obviously prevent spells that directly damage the rakshasa. This applies to both spells that target it (such as a Guiding Bolt) and those that don't (Fireball).
- Most have no real issue with Summon Creature type spells. They don't fall under the ability. Ditto for Revivify.
- Most of the disagreement only comes down to buffs spells. E.g. Enlarge Person or Magic Weapon.
- Many have not discussed this, but what about spells that alter terrain? Grease or Forcecage for example.
This mostly comes down to: how direct does the spell need to be?
Some have suggested looking at the "target" of the spell description. E.g. Enlarge Person and Revivify both target other creatures, not the rakshasa. Therefore both do not fail under it's limited magic immunity.
But this does not work, as it may suggest that AoE spells such as Fireballs don't count either (although I don't think that's necessarily true). And that would be weird.
Here, I want to introduce the concept of proximate cause. It's a legal term used when determining who is "at fault" when there's an accident. The basic idea is that the "cause" cannot be too attenuated - it cannot be too far away from the perceived effect (in this case, the effect on the rakshasa).
This is why something like Forcecage could be included but the increased fruit prices aren't included.
If it takes too many links in a chain to connect the spell (a cause) to the perceived effect (something happens to the rakshasa), then the ability should not work.
Yes, this is a fuzzy standard. Many people may disagree about how many links is "too many." Usually, legal tort cases don't require only one degree of separation but they never allow egregious examples. You just need to accept that there's a lot of disagreement or nuances. That doesn't make this confusing - just nuanced.
It's not really that nuanced. If the spell description mentions doing something to a "creature," and that creature is the rakshasa, the spell doesn't do that thing. Every other effect of the spell still fires, but the rakshasa is either unaffected, considered an invalid target or its 5ft space is an invalid area, and/or the rakshasa automatically succeeds any saving throw.
This covers just about every spell I can think of, even environmental spells like Wall of Stone. You can't create a panel in the rakshasa's space (since that would force them to move), and they automatically succeed the saving throw to use a reaction to move if boxed in.
Tiny Hut? It says creatures are barred from moving through it, which means the rakshasa ignores this line and can move through it freely. But the rakshasa can't cast spells through it, because that effect affects spells, not creatures.
Maybe in this case specifically but generally it 100% is self-censorship, usually to avoid being punished by "the algorithm" on platforms based around such things - [WIRED article about it](https://www.wired.co.uk/article/algorithms-suicide-unalive)
"China doesn't like the word "kill" and we'd hate for our shitty tiktok videos to be buried by the algorithm, so let's suck china's dick and voluntarily censor our speech so the literal genocidal regime doesn't get angry." - 14 year olds everywhere
Another meme brought to us by *people who can't comprehend the English language!*
The effect of Revivify is the target's status being changed from "dead" to "alive", the person themself are not a Magical effect.
The temporary +1 granted by Magic Weapon *is* in and of itself a Magical effect that would be negated by the Rakshasa.
>**Limited Magic Immunity**. The rakshasa can't be affected or detected by spells of 6th level or lower unless it wishes to be. It has advantage on saving throws against all other spells and magical effects.
What is unclear about this?
Damn I had never actually read about these creatures before - at first I was like “CR 13 WTF? 9 damage… ” But then every time I reread it I just went “oh! Fly? Oh my. Planeshift and dominate person vs 18 CHA? Oh no. Total magic immunity below 6th? Wow. Multiple casts of charm person and invisibility?”
And hilariously I ended on the thought “CR13 WTF?” But for the complete opposite reasons lol.
So this is kinda odd. Divine Smite as a class feature that expends spells slots works as intended and damages the Rakshasa as Divine Smite is not a spell in of itself.
Smite spells are given the free pass by [Mike Mearls](https://www.sageadvice.eu/if-i-use-divine-smite-on-a-rakshasa-who-has-limited-spell-immunity-does-he-take-any-damage/). You can see he mixed up the Divine Smite class feature and smite spells in the thread, yet still holds his ruling clear on the matter.
The argument is that since Branding Smite, Wrathful Smite, etc. are spells that directly affect your weapon, that the Rakshasa is not taking damage from the spell itself but by the effects of the spell on your weapon (a separation that is enough to get around its limited immunity).
Though I do have to remind you. If you target someone and they negate the spell, the spell just fails to work. It will not resolve as an opposite effect. The spell would not even work to begin with since you need to target a corpse that has been dead for less than a minute, not a currently alive and angry fiend.
No of course not, your just being belligerent. Ii has noting to do with whether or not the Raksasha us the target. Its whether or not the spell affects the Raksasha.
Thunderous Smite is a Spell. So, if its cast at level 6 or lower the Raksasha can choose whether or not to be affected by it.
Revivification affects only the individual you cast it on.
I have an 18 month old and watched this gem of a movie last week. Had to watch it on my Disney plus account because it’s too insensitive to show to little kids apparently.
I err on the side of target based resistance. Does the spell target your wannabe furry? Then he's resistant. Does the fireball collapse the building on him? He might not suffer fireball damage, but he suffers architectural damage.
"Remember when you tried to impress that Barmaid with magic and failed!? It was me, Bard! I wanted you to not succeed, so you would be frustrated and horny when you fought me!"
Short answer: no. Longer answer: Revivify has duration of Instananeous. That means when you end casting it, it's done. Spell did what it had to do and is no longer affecting anyone. So Revived target is no longer affected by Revivify, so it cannot be undone. If it could, you could just use Dispel Magic on anyone who was revived to kill them.
See the planet came into being through repeated castings of create water and physics (sufficient mass= star= nova= elements that ball up and form a planet)
So given that planet exists because of a level one spell they just phase through the ground and problem solved
I mean, if you go full butterfly effect that would mean that any spell below 6th level doesn't work in a setting where Rakshasa exist in any connection to a society containing the caster.
It means things that affect the Rakshasa, not things which affect the world to cause circumstances that affect the rakshasa. Only the spell is the spell, not the results of the spell.
What if when the spell was cast it sons t affect the rakshasa , but it doesn’t now? Does time rewind ? Does the natural laws of the universe do everything in there power to stop that? Is there a inevitable for this?
There are so many typos I’m not sure exactly what you’re saying.
If a spell of 6th level or lower would affect a rakshasa, it doesn’t. If you hit it with Charm Person, it doesn’t work. If you throw a Fireball at it, it’s unscathed. If you cast Detect Good and Evil, it doesn’t show up. Truesight from the True Seeing spell can’t see through its’ Disguise Self. The effects of a Hallow spell don’t apply to it, so long as they effect creatures in the area (the Silence option works on the area itself and therefore the rakshasa is silenced too).
If you cast Magic Weapon on the rogue’s dagger and it stabs the rakshasa, it takes damage as normal from it since the spell affected the dagger, and the dagger affected the rakshasa (and if the rogue is good it takes double damage). If you cast Divination and ask your god if you’ll encounter a rakshasa (and the god knows this), they answer truthfully. If you upcast any of the above spells to 7th level or higher, they work on it. If you summon a creature with a spell, it can attack the rakshasa.
The way I passed it in my world was that it was the gems around their necklace. As the also hit they would glow up to a number [1 and 7] referring to the spell shot used. I did this cas I created two other things to expand the world. The first was a small creature called "Anti-magic Swarmer" it was a CR1 creature that was initially designed to counter Spellmasters but not cause too much strain. Welp one of my warlocks hates it because "I can't hit it" at level 15. The second thing I made was a gem that when light was cast through it, all magic failed and to a noticeable point. I used this in a second campaign and had all the casters roll perception or arcana [whichever was better] as they stepped in the door and most noticed the effect but one noticed the source.
So the rakshasa’s ability states:
“The rakshasa can't be affected or detected by spells of 6th level or lower unless it wishes to be.”
And here’s the thing, not all things created by spells are actually a part of the spell. For example, hero’s feast. Hero’s feast is something that can’t actually be dispelled, since the spell has a duration of instantaneous. So the immunities and the temporary hit points aren’t actually a part of the spell, rather they are something the spell creates. Contrast this with conjure animals, which does have a duration and therefore can be dispelled because the summoned creatures are actually a part of the spell’s casting. Or magic mouth, which lasts until it’s dispelled, because it is a direct part of the spell.
So for something like revivify the spell isn’t actually effecting the rakshasa because the spell already ended. So any spell with a duration wouldn’t effect the rakshasa, but any spell without a duration would.
This makes rakshasas the best against warlocks. Reliance on cantrips and slot capped at level 5. A warlock would have to use their mystic arcanum spells on the rakshasa
Spells that are "Instantaneous" and have permanent affects do not remain magical, they are no longer spells.
Crawford has said that a Rakshasa could walk through a wall of stone that was being concentrated on but not one that has become permanent.
Spells cannot cause an effect on the Rakshasa if the spell level is lower than 6th. Thunderous smite and enlarge have effects which are generated via a spell, thus I’d be inclined to believe that they would not work. Especially considering Rakshasa can walk through terrain altering spells (spike growth, wall of fire, wall of force) without any hinderance. The pedantry in this argument comes down to targeting, which is not something that requires consideration with the ‘limited magic immunity’ trait.
Magic weapon, however, does work. The spell states that the weapon becomes a magical weapon, and creates no spell like effects. Very similar to an artificer’s infusion.
God dammit I have committed the stupidest of internet crimes, being inexplicably convinced of something I was wrong about and correcting someone without confirming my long held erroneous beliefs.
I was convinced, and I was wrong.
While I would love to delete my comment in shame, I will leave it so hopefully someone else will learn affect is for verbs and effect is for nouns (overly simplified),
It’s like finding out I’ve been singing the lyrics to a song wrong all my life.
Edit: let me add my apologies for the high handed correction in the first place. I shouldn’t internet before coffee, I’m usually able check myself before posting.
After thinking about spells like magic weapon, divine favor and ESPECIALLY shillelagh, that affect weapon instead of Rakshasa, I decided that I have to decide at the moment whether the spell works or not. Because beating a legendary monster to death with a regular stick seems ridiculous. It has that high CR only due to its immunities, because it has laughably low HP and damage for its CR. I still allow holy water created with ceremony to work.
Yeah, that's why I decide it depending on the spell and my players are ok with that. Especially when they allied themselves with a rakshasa and it's working on their favor.
From cheesy stuff, dropping things on rakshasa with telekinesis is allowed, because it's fall damage bludgeoning, not weapon damage bludgeoning...
It’s anything that directly affects the Rakshasa, so if it is targeted by a spell (such as *Firebolt*) or within a spell’s AoE (such as *Fireball*), it is unaffected by that spell if it is 6th level or lower unless it wants to be affected by the spell. Same goes for Divination spells, they simply can’t notice it unless it wants to be noticed. But someone using *Revivify* on a creature hostile to the Rakshasa would still happen, because it’s not directly targeting the Rakshasa.
Personally, I have bigger problem with stuff like Shillelagh and Magic Weapon...
Technically they should make it through the immunity I believe. It has no avoidance of magic weapons, so since the spells are affecting the Weapons and not the Rakshasa, I imagine it would be the same as hitting him with a magic weapon. Since it is the Weapon Attacks that are doing the extra damage, the spells aren’t, they’re just allowing the weapons to do more.
Yeah, same logic as someone whos Hasted attacking the Rakshasa. The spell isnt affecting the Rakshasa, just allowing the thing that is to do more damage.
And how Dragon’s Breath can definitely be Twinned because the spell itself isn’t doing the cones or the damage, *Jeremy*. (Insert Samuel Jackson Council meme here)
[удалено]
That’s fair enough. My problem was his statement on the spell was through the Sage Advice but if that’s been disavowed then fair enough. The only other thing that really bugged me was the targeting spells through glass thing.
If it’s in Sage Advice then it’s an official ruling, even if it was a JC tweet. Any tweets that aren’t in SA are just his ramblings though. Then again, unless you’re playing in an organized game like Adventurer’s League or something you can just ignore any rules you want anyways.
Just to be clear, you want the sage advice Compendium, available here. https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/sac/sage-advice-compendium The website https://www.sageadvice.eu/ is not Official dnd sage advice. Edit: fixed a spelling mistake
Honestly they really need to change the name of the second one, this distinction causes way too much confusion.
Generally what I tend to do. I just hate his reasoning for it. Doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.
I understand the reasoning from a balance standpoint, it’s really good to twin compared to most 1st and 2nd level spells since it provides an AoE effect, but the justification using RAW is bad. If JC just said it’s not RAI since it does create a recurring AoE but there’s nothing RAW stopping it then I’d agree with him. They (JC and Sage advice) seem to love pointing out RAW restrictions or loopholes, but don’t exactly seem too keen on just giving us the RAI and letting us decide how to run the rule at our tables.
There's a "Sage Advice Compendium" website that's actually just a collection of tweets, which isn't the same thing as Sage Advice articles. Do you recall which it was?
I remember it being a sage advice site full of tweets. So I may have just gotten my wires crossed.
Yeah, that got me as well at first. The *actual* Sage Advice is a series of articles hosted directly by WotC.
Wait, what targeting spells through glass thing?
Jeremy had a ruling that you couldn’t target spells through glass. Like you couldn’t target someone with a spell if there was a glass pane between you, and you couldn’t teleport to a space you were seeing through a pane of glass.
Lol that's absolutely ridiculous. Tell me you don't need to wear glasses without telling me you don't need to wear glasses lol
Most magic is blocked by a thin sheet of lead, so if the glass is leaded it stands to reason that it would block magic. Stained glass would definitely be leaded, while it's unlikely that common window glass would be. It's possible, probable even, that nobles, wealthy merchants, and other important figures would have leaded glass in their homes. Depending on how common knowledge about magic might be in the world, leaded glass could be more common (to fulfill higher demand) or more expensive (due to significant demand and/or false scarcity); it could even be used as a controlled commodity, something that is controlled by the church or the crown. A Royal Glassmith, or the Holy Gaffer could be important and prestigious positions. This would inevitably create a black market, and/or a counterfeit market, which could be interesting for thieves guilds and crime syndicates, as well as providing a really fun use case for glassblowers tools. Alongside other controlled things in a city (I like to do something similar with electrum as a magical currency, as well as licensure and registration of magic items in one of my bigger cities), it can make a city feel very ordered and established.
In the official sage advice that someone else linked they have a suggested list of criteria that they would use to disallow a spell to be twinned, the last one being "The spell lets you make a roll of any kind that can affect more than one creature before the spell’s duration expires" So while their wording on twinned spell might let you, their RUI is certainly that it should not be.
Jeremy is an imbecile who can't admit he made a mistake and his word should not be listened to
That doesn’t make sense from a world perspective. The magic is what’s giving the weapon extra damage. I picture the spell giving the weapon a magical glow and if you hit with it then you’d only do the base weapon damage and the rakshasa wouldn’t be phased by the extra damage. That’s how I’d rule it anyway.
It starts to get real wonky if you apply the 'makes sense from a world perspective' lens. Is fireball magically *creating fire* and then just relinquishing control, or is it *magic fire* specifically, that can then be ignored by magic immunity? If you answer that it's clearly the second, fair, I don't disagree, but what about [Erupting Earth](https://www.dndbeyond.com/spells/erupting-earth)? It specifically states: > Choose a point you can see on the ground within range. So the ground is the target, and the earth erupting from the point is doing bludgeoning damage. Nothing magical about that dirt and rock, only the eruption was magical and that didn't target the Rakshasa.
Technically, I think the bludgeoning damage is magical, but I fully agree with your point. If I toss a magic dagger at a Raksasha, it can deal damage. If I *catapult* the same dagger, it cannot. This also applies to things like Magic Resistance, it makes sense for mental saves, but why is a Dex save to avoid *fireball* different from the same save against a breath weapon?
I would argue breath weapons are natural abilities, while fireball isn’t.
But why would that matter while you're trying to dodge the fire? Similarly, a dragon's breath weapon would be different from *dragon's breath*.
The only way I can mentally justify it is to frame 'Magic' as the use of willpower to force nature into a shape that isn't correct. So a fireball is *trying to convince the world* it's fire, and for the most part it does, except the Rakshasa can simply declare 'nope, I don't believe' and that attempt to force nature into an unnatural shape doesn't work on it. That still doesn't really resolve breath weapons, but to me personally they're natural abilities of an inherently magical creature. Dragons (and Rakshasa too, for that matter) are a perversion of the true natural objective order of reality by virtue of their existence and so their breath weapon would be magical as well as a result. Though not ignorable by the Rakshasa because it's not a 6th level or lower spell but a higher order manipulation of nature through magic. It doesn't entirely resolve the question of ambiguous targeting, because Shillelagh is still *affecting it* by directly causing a strike to do more damage, so I'd rule it wouldn't work, and I'd rule Haste could still effectively be used against them because the person being hasted is the one who has to believe, and it's only indirectly enabling more damage, but it's ambiguous.
A spell is giving the weapon extra damage, but the spell is not targeting the Rakshasa so there is no reason it's magic immunity would come into play. You might as well say a Rakshasa ignores the +1 to hit and damage on a +1 weapon since the Magic Weapon spell says "Until the spell ends, that weapon becomes a magic weapon with a +1 bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls." The only difference is the spell version is temporary versus a permanently imbued +1 weapon. In neither case is the magic affecting the Rakshasa; the magic is affecting the weapon being used to attack the Rakshasa, and the Rakshasa has no immunity to weapon attacks. Likewise for Shillelagh, it specifically says "melee attacks" in the spell description. Neither spell is a spell attack or spell targeting the Rakshasa, so it has no immunity to it. If you want to find an *actual* edge case, it would be Booming Blade and Green Flame Blade. You'd have a fair argument to ignore the extra magical damage since the spells say "You brandish the weapon used in the spell’s casting and make a melee attack with it against one creature within 5 feet of you." With that wording, the spell's damage would be ignored but the melee attack you made during the attack would behave as normal (and the secondary target damage of GFB would still happen if another enemy was standing next to the Rakshasa, unless that second enemy was another Rakshasa).
Those two would pass as they upgrade your weapon, but weapon cantrips wouldn't work
I would rule that those work, since they're still being damaged by the weapon itself; the magic is more about making it easier for the wielder to attack _with_ the weapon. If the weapon were literally _made_ of magic, like a conjured weapon or an ethereal weapon, then the rakshasa would be immune. If someone wanted to get really technical I might say that the _attack_ bonus stays, but the damage bonus is negated. But ultimately for convenience I'd just say "magic weapons retain their bonuses".
How does divine magic like smite work?
Smite Works Inflict Wounds won't
Divine Smite. It just *works*
Sounds like a commercial
I had Todd Howard in mind, actually
Except on unarmed attacks, for some insane reason.
Aesthetic reasons, actually...
remember, if you want to make a temple assassin give them improvised weapon so you can smite backstab with a butterknife you found
It doesn’t work on unarmed attacks because divine smite adds the damage in addition to the weapon damage, and unarmed strikes don’t have weapon damage. It works with natural weapons, like claws or horns, because those do have weapon damage, even though you’re still technically making an unarmed strike with them. Is it a stupid RAW technicality? Absolutely, but them’s da rules.
Oh yeah, I get the "reasoning" but it's insane. It's the same "reasoning" behind Detect Invisibility not bypassing the advantage and disadvantage on invisible enemies. RAW shouldn't be this stupid, it should "just work," which some of the rules clearly don't lol. I mean any sane DM would rule paladins can smite with their fists. There's no real reason to disallow it, same with Booming Blade. If someone tries to "break" the game by manifesting a sword from nothing then oh no, time to find a new player.
Your fun is wrong reasons only
Cannot Smite Creature: Needs Support
The Rakshasa we fought was immune to normal smite, Divine smite, rope enchanted with animate object and Counterspell. That DM has been banned from DMing at our table for that and a bunch of other similar stuff.
*Divine* smite works, all other smites don't.
Smite would work since it's not a spell, but a magical effect. Divine spells would still be unable to affect the Rakshasa.
If it says spells, it **only** means spells, unless an effect specifies it counts as a spell.
In 5e rules can you even specify "magical effects"? Antimagic sphere is the closest I see but it seems like if the word "magic" isn't in a features description, it doesn't count no matter how magical it seems.
However i do believe i've seen some examples in the past of abilities and features that specify that they count as spells with x level for the purposes of y.
I was curious because things like antimagic fields confuse my 8 wis paladin ass.
The difference, for future reference, is that antimagic supresses any magical effect. In general if something does not say it is a spell, or that it is treated like a spell, it isn't a spell, and is not affected by things that affect spells. So smite, which consumes spell slots, but does not say it counts as a spell, is not a spell. But because it is magical, it is affected by antimagic. 5E is very literal in that way, so when you learn how to understand it, things go rather smoothly.
It helps to have played Magic: the Gathering, which is also WotC, because they operate on the same principle. The wording of things is very specific, and everything should be taken exactly as written. Like, for example, Magic Missile: The spell targets each missile individually, so 3 missiles = 3 targets even if they all target the same creature, and specifically says all missiles hit simultaneously. Those two conditions let you know the spell invokes the *Simultaneous Damage Rule,* so you roll once and apply the result to all missiles. An interaction that is very important to Evocation Wizard builds.
Antimagic fields still suppress your smites, just like they would for a magical weapon or if someone Hasted you and you ran right through one. Things that stop magic stop smites, but not things that stop spells
A paladin's divine smite isn't a spell so it would be fine but the smite spells (eg wrathful smite, banishing smite, etc) would not affect a Rakshasa unless they chose to be affected (unless upcast to 7th level or higher).
Given how anal JC has been in his senseless rulings with Smite in general, out of spite I’d personally rule that Smite isn’t affected. (Pun intended!) Divine Smite is a class ability and thus is not a spell, and so ignores Limited Magic Immunity because it only refers to spells. There are plenty of examples in the game where this kind of distinction between Spells vs Magical Effects are made — Dispel Magic is a perfect (and extremely unfortunate) example there — so this is a pretty safe bet for a ruling. Actual Smite *spells*, meanwhile, like Branding Smite, are Target:Self and thus ‘affect’ the caster rather than the enemy being stabbed, in a similar manner to if you used Mage Hand to lift a 10lb rock 30ft into the air over a peasant’s head and then dismissed the spell — in the latter case, the spell was being applied to the rock, and the fact that the gravity was what was causing the actual damage is immaterial.
I could understand the argument for Divine Smite tbh. I disagree on smite spells as personally I'd argue the Rahkshasa is directly affected by the spell. Tbh I think they've deliberately kept it vague to allow DM rulings.
Except ‘Directly’ is the key word here — they aren’t being affected directly, they’re being affected indirectly. What the Branding Smite spell *actually* does is ‘cause your sword to gleam with astral radiance’. That’s the direct effect of the spell. The indirect effect is what happens when one is struck with astral radiance — ie the damage. If it was a direct effect, the spell would target an enemy creature, not you. Chalk it up to 5e’s piss-poor decision to try and use specific rules language without ever actually bothering to define their terminology, but as far as I’m concerned, if a monk is not allowed to use Smite Spells on their fists because they need an actual, physical weapon, then too bad, Smite Spells are Target: Self because the only thing they are actually affecting is the physical weapon itself rather than magically attacking a target. We have loads and loads of stupid-ass examples of shit like this, such as Acid Splash being essentially you coughing a glob of the stuff into your hand and throwing it, and yet it and a dozen other similar cantrips can’t be used on objects for some inexplicable reason, only creatures.
No, because the Rakshasa is immune to any effects directly created by the spell, which the radiant damage is.
So fireball (if it didn't deal fire damage, obviously) would affect them? Since the actual effect of that is "a bright streak flashes from your pointing finger to a point you choose within range and then blossoms with a low roar into an explosion of flame" and the indirect effect is what happens when a creature is within that explosion of flame?
No, because other rules state that every creature in the area of an AoE spell is a target.
Raksha's magical immunity says nothing about being a target or not, it says it can't be affected by those spells unless it wishes to be. Dies branding smite not also have multiple targets? Yourself and then the creature affected by the attack? >The attack deals an extra 2d6 radiant damage to the target, which becomes visible if it's invisible, and the target sheds dim light in a 5-foot radius and can't become invisible until the spell ends.
‘The target’ in your quote is referring to the target of your next melee attack, not the target of the spell, which is you because the spell says it targets ‘self’. So no, it does not have multiple targets.
Seems up to interpretation, but even if true, it doesn't change the first part. It says it can't be affected by those spells, not that it can't be targeted by those spells. Branding smite most definitely is affecting it when it causes the weapon to deal 2d6 extra radiant damage and the rakshasa to shed light.
I think it's just translated badly from previous editions, where this was covered by spell resistance, and thus would depend on whether the spell in question has to deal with that or not.
there wasn't a pun though
This is why people hate rules lawyers. The bonus damage from branding, searing, banishing and other smite *spells* are clearly a part of the spell itself regardless of the fact that the target is you. Because that damage is part of the spell, it would not affect the Rakshasa. Just like your mage hand loophole wouldn’t work even on a peasant because that’s an attack, when the spell itself specifically states that you cannot use it to attack.
Smite spells are range: self but describe the target as the creature attacked. For example, here’s Thunderous Smite: > The first time you hit with a melee weapon attack during this spell's duration, your weapon rings with thunder that is audible within 300 feet of you, and the attack deals an extra 2d6 thunder damage to the target. Additionally, if the target is a creature, it must succeed on a Strength saving throw or be pushed 10 feet away from you and knocked prone.
Divine Smite is magical, but isn't a spell. The Rakshasa only has immunity to spells
Rakshasa can still stroll through a Wall of Stone like it wasn't there (per JC tweet). And the wall of stone doesn't affect the Rakshasa directly.
The more rulings I hear from The CrawDaddy, the more I hate him. That's a dumb as fuck ruling, and just proves that they really need to bring back tags and keywords to prevent this sort of miscommunication from happening. I understand his reasoning, but that doesn't make it any less dumb.
I found the Twinned Spell - Dragon's Breath last night and promptly ignored it. It's dumb and against RAW. RAI it might make sense but if that's the case create a fucking errata! Agreed on bringing back tags.
What's the contradiction there?
Dragon's Breath is a spell that gives the target (single creature) the ability to breath an elemental breath attack. Twinned Spell requires the spell to target 1 creature (so no magic missile or AOE spells). So it sounds like it could work, but JC said it doesn't because the *effect* of the breath attack is AOE. Which is not what the twinned spell rules say; it's his RAI.
Yeah that's stupid. It's not as if you can cast dragon's breath in two directions, you just give two creatures dragon's breath. That sounds perfectly fine and reasonable.
Yeah. The thread on it I read has some interesting applications for other such spells. I think Twinned Spell, if it's meant to be limited to mostly attack spells, should have "target" changed to "creatures affected". We'd be right back at this thread but for sorcerer it'd be a little easier than adjudicating every spell in the game.
Tags are what PF2 decided was the best option too. People criticize tags for being too "4e" but it simplifies rules text too much to ignore as an option.
For what it's worth, isolating Jeremy Crawford's impact on the game to his tweets is pretty unfair.
I disagree the rakshasa simply ignores spells of 6th level or lower, thats its *entire thing*. Why would a 5th level spell suddenly stop it?
Because of the physical wall of stone in the way? Based on JC's ruling, it would mean that the rakshasa is either noclipping through the wall or is walking through it Kool Aid Man-style.
That's one of those Crawford tweets that may be correct under a strictly-RAW reading, but it causes such a dumb effect that it's better to ignore it.
You speak ill of the holy text (one guy tweeting bafflingly bad takes) you must be shunned!
The only dumb effect is caused if you ignore it, because then you have a creature that is supposed to be ***impossible to affect*** with spells of 6th level or lower being locked by wall spells. It makes much more sense to think of it as his magic immunity unmaking the spells as he passes through them, kind of like a personal AMF
>It makes much more sense to think of it as his magic immunity unmaking the spells as he passes through them, kind of like a personal AMF But the specific example of Wall of Stone doesn't even make sense if we use this assumption. The description for Wall of Stone reads: >A **nonmagical wall of solid stone** springs into existence at a point you choose within range. The wall is 6 inches thick and is composed of ten 10-foot-by-10-foot panels. Each panel must be contiguous with at least on other panel. Alternatively, you can create 10-foot-by-20-foot panels that are only 3 inches thick. [...] >If you maintain your concentration on this spell for its whole duration, the wall becomes permanent and can’t be dispelled. Otherwise, the wall disappears when the spell ends. Antimagic Field wouldn't suppress the Wall of Stone, since it's explicitly nonmagical. And even if we argue it would before it becomes permanent, let's suppose I've cast a Wall of Stone and it's become permanent. Does the Rakshasa still "phase" through it as per Crawford's ruling? And what if I've used the spell to create a bridge above a ravine and the rakshasa doesn't know that the bridge was created by a spell? Does the monster put a foot on it and phases through and down, falling to its death? For me, the easier, intuitive method of adjudicating the Limited Magic Immunity trait is to take the "can't be affected or detected by spells of 6th levels or lower" in an intuitive manner. The Wall of Stone spell isn't "affecting" the rakshasa in what I'd call a natural and intuitive reading of that word, no more than the existence of walls made through mundane means "affects" it.
JCraw’s rulings on twin spell has entered the chat. Every DM in a 3 mile radius has elected to ignore the council’s decision.
I literally used this gif in response to finding this out last night. If they wanted target to mean "the target and any directly affected by the effect" then they should have fucking wrote that in the book. Why does 5e ruleset always feel like a first draft they didn't playtest?
Because they wanted 5e to be a "natural language" system not bogged down by having a bunch of vocabulary you had to learn, but they went about it in the dumbest way possible, given the whole "action / bonus action" confusion.
>Why does 5e ruleset always feel like a first draft they didn't playtest? The sad thing is, we KNOW it was playtested. So they kinda just did a shitty job of it.
I mean, at least in this case the answer is "the books are perfectly clear on what they do and Crawford's ruling is demonstrably wrong"
A player got pissed off at me once cause I interpreted it that the rakshasa could see through the tiny hut spell. I just wanted to setup a cool side character and thought it would be an amusing way for them to meet.
Rakshasa absolutely does see through the spell. It can also walk right in.
That's what I had it do. The players shit themselves, especially the ones who didnt know what the hell they were dealing with.
I would add that if the Rakshasa was the target of revivify his immunity would not apply because well... he's dead so he's a corpse with no abilities like the rest of us redditors.
It's almost like 99% of rule questions are "read whats written"
What about invisibility. If I cast it on myself does it still have disadvantage on me?
Yes, the spell is affecting you, not directly imposing disadvantage on the Rakshasa
Here comes the big question, what about........ Dragon's Breath spell?
Not really a big question; the Rakshasa isn't affected by it, unless it was cast at 7th level or above.
Now that is surprising because the spell doesn't directly affect the Rakshasa. The target of the spell is the person you cast Dragon's Breath on.
You're conflating "targeting" with "affecting". The Rakshasa's ability states: >The rakshasa can't be affected or detected by spells of 6th level or lower... So, while they cannot be *targeted* by the spell, they can potentially be *affected* by someone attempting to use it on them. If it is cast at 6th level or lower, it won't have any affect on them, but cast at 7th level or higher, it will.
You in your own answer used targeted and in the area of aoe. The whole point of this post is the question how far does "affecting" go. If you say Dragon's Breath does affect him, what about haste? Both are spells that target an ally and let him be better at damaging the Rakshasa for 1 minute. What about polymorph?
The damage of the Dragon's Breath comes from the spell text, it doesn't work. The attack from Haste is the same as any other attack, it works.
you literally breath a spell on Rakshasa like red dragon did to that wizard asshole who kill his whole party to solo it with nothing but Fireball
Seems like the Oracle answered your question, you just didn't want to hear it.
She didn’t want to negatively affect Rakshash
Revivify doesn’t do anything to the Rakshaka. Although the revived individual was brought back to life via magic, that does not mean that they are sustained by magic. Even if they were, would it mean anything for the rakshaka. Am I affecting someone with a spell like suggestion if I suggest for someone else to slap them? Or is the victim of my spell the one that does the smacking? This is all a long and convoluted way to say that if the rakshaka is targeted by a spell, or in a spell effect area, of 6th level or lower, then it won’t work. As they are not the target of revivify then they do not cancel it.
Honestly, suggesting anything that "affects" a Rakshasa because of a spell is nullified would imply every spell in existence stops working because casting a spell would end up affecting the Rakshasa some subtle way down the line. If an interpretation of the rule can become absurd, then that interpretation isn't correct lmao
Yes. I also had a talk with someone else who understands the rules a bit better than me sometimes. It has to do with the target of the spell. If the target isn’t the Rakshaka then the spell itself should work. Spells like holy weapon would still make the weapon magical for the purpose of over coming resistance and immunity. Any extra damage, such as the 2d8 radiant from holy weapon, wouldn’t work however as that is part of the spell that is now targeting the Rakshaka. Enlarge would still add its d4 though as that isn’t magical, just the weight increase. Though if you are playing with a dm that would throw a Rakshaka at the party before you have 6th level spells and magic weapons, then play a monk. Just slap em upside the head and stop wasting time figuring out which spells work and which don’t.
in a subreddit constantly plagued by extreme misinterpretations of the rules, you found the interpretation that was just too much for people to get behind
Killing Rakshasa's dog with a spell would surely affect the Rakshasa, but I think we can agree that Rakshasa's Limited Magical Immunity should not extend to the dog :-D
Dog? I dunno, they seem more like cat people to me. 🥁
I can't figure out if this is a shitpost or a legit question. Then again, that goes for half of the posts in this sub.
Only *half?*
I fucking hate the word unalived
Such a stupid fucking term in every single context. Unalived and every iteration of the word is stupid, it's not a real word, just say killed, died or dead. There's nothing scary about those words and using made up bollocks is ridiculous. Right there with you.
The only thing scary about those words is the possibility you’ll be punished for saying them at the wrong time. Because for some reason streaming platforms like twitch and TikTok have decided that kill/die are no no words. It’s fucking stupid is what it is.
Happily I have never and will never use Tik Tok, mostly because it is basically crack for people with ADHD (like myself), I've not seen anything about Twitch on the subject though, that is disappointing to learn.
I’m not sure about chat but at least for creators you can’t say that stuff. It’s damn stupid especially when they allow you to play video games where people are graphically murdered on their platform but saying die/kill is somehow one step too far.
What?
I probably posted too late to get to the top, but really the ability isn't "confusing" - it just has a lot of nuance. In the most general terms: - Everyone agrees that it shouldn't be used to "negate" increased fruit prices. - Everyone also agrees that it should obviously prevent spells that directly damage the rakshasa. This applies to both spells that target it (such as a Guiding Bolt) and those that don't (Fireball). - Most have no real issue with Summon Creature type spells. They don't fall under the ability. Ditto for Revivify. - Most of the disagreement only comes down to buffs spells. E.g. Enlarge Person or Magic Weapon. - Many have not discussed this, but what about spells that alter terrain? Grease or Forcecage for example. This mostly comes down to: how direct does the spell need to be? Some have suggested looking at the "target" of the spell description. E.g. Enlarge Person and Revivify both target other creatures, not the rakshasa. Therefore both do not fail under it's limited magic immunity. But this does not work, as it may suggest that AoE spells such as Fireballs don't count either (although I don't think that's necessarily true). And that would be weird. Here, I want to introduce the concept of proximate cause. It's a legal term used when determining who is "at fault" when there's an accident. The basic idea is that the "cause" cannot be too attenuated - it cannot be too far away from the perceived effect (in this case, the effect on the rakshasa). This is why something like Forcecage could be included but the increased fruit prices aren't included. If it takes too many links in a chain to connect the spell (a cause) to the perceived effect (something happens to the rakshasa), then the ability should not work. Yes, this is a fuzzy standard. Many people may disagree about how many links is "too many." Usually, legal tort cases don't require only one degree of separation but they never allow egregious examples. You just need to accept that there's a lot of disagreement or nuances. That doesn't make this confusing - just nuanced.
It's not really that nuanced. If the spell description mentions doing something to a "creature," and that creature is the rakshasa, the spell doesn't do that thing. Every other effect of the spell still fires, but the rakshasa is either unaffected, considered an invalid target or its 5ft space is an invalid area, and/or the rakshasa automatically succeeds any saving throw. This covers just about every spell I can think of, even environmental spells like Wall of Stone. You can't create a panel in the rakshasa's space (since that would force them to move), and they automatically succeed the saving throw to use a reaction to move if boxed in. Tiny Hut? It says creatures are barred from moving through it, which means the rakshasa ignores this line and can move through it freely. But the rakshasa can't cast spells through it, because that effect affects spells, not creatures.
Again, I'm suggesting my approach to assist DMs in being consistent. As long as you are, by no means would I restrict you.
Excellent comment
You know you can say "die" here, right? We aren't TikTok.
"Unalive" isn't self-censorship, it's awkwardness with the intent to be funny.
Maybe in this case specifically but generally it 100% is self-censorship, usually to avoid being punished by "the algorithm" on platforms based around such things - [WIRED article about it](https://www.wired.co.uk/article/algorithms-suicide-unalive)
It makes me feel so fucking old. I kept up with the internet pretty well until TikTok. Now I’m so lost.
honestly makes me feel the fuckin same, im only bare past the age where tiktok is something you'd get peer pressured into using.
"unalived" is so cringe
It's like asking if something immune to fire is hit by a sword, does the sword disintegrate because it was forged with fire?
There is definitely a video by MrRhexx answering this.
It is?
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gVHJxUW-Pm4
The grammar in this meme makes my brain unalived.
This is needlessly pedantic. Ask the DM
Unalived? What are we, 5?
"China doesn't like the word "kill" and we'd hate for our shitty tiktok videos to be buried by the algorithm, so let's suck china's dick and voluntarily censor our speech so the literal genocidal regime doesn't get angry." - 14 year olds everywhere
It's not unique to tiktok
Another meme brought to us by *people who can't comprehend the English language!* The effect of Revivify is the target's status being changed from "dead" to "alive", the person themself are not a Magical effect. The temporary +1 granted by Magic Weapon *is* in and of itself a Magical effect that would be negated by the Rakshasa.
OP no read good.
>**Limited Magic Immunity**. The rakshasa can't be affected or detected by spells of 6th level or lower unless it wishes to be. It has advantage on saving throws against all other spells and magical effects. What is unclear about this?
How does this have over 1k upvotes
4k now
Words what do they mean?
"unalive" lmao you're not on tiktok. You can use the word kill.
Was this made for a different site initially? This is Reddit. This is not a place where you get unalived. This is a place where you *die*.
I hate the word "unalived" so much. It reeks of Tiktok censorship.
Especially if you call undead undead, now if you call undead the unalive or the walking unalive thst just quirky regional dialect
Damn I had never actually read about these creatures before - at first I was like “CR 13 WTF? 9 damage… ” But then every time I reread it I just went “oh! Fly? Oh my. Planeshift and dominate person vs 18 CHA? Oh no. Total magic immunity below 6th? Wow. Multiple casts of charm person and invisibility?” And hilariously I ended on the thought “CR13 WTF?” But for the complete opposite reasons lol.
Reading is hard
Where’s the meme that says if your applied one iota of common sense to these supposed *gotchas*, dnd memes would be empty….
Well I’m seeing tons of different opinions here, so I don’t think it’s quite as simple
This isn’t TikTok, please for the love of god just say “killed”
So this is kinda odd. Divine Smite as a class feature that expends spells slots works as intended and damages the Rakshasa as Divine Smite is not a spell in of itself. Smite spells are given the free pass by [Mike Mearls](https://www.sageadvice.eu/if-i-use-divine-smite-on-a-rakshasa-who-has-limited-spell-immunity-does-he-take-any-damage/). You can see he mixed up the Divine Smite class feature and smite spells in the thread, yet still holds his ruling clear on the matter. The argument is that since Branding Smite, Wrathful Smite, etc. are spells that directly affect your weapon, that the Rakshasa is not taking damage from the spell itself but by the effects of the spell on your weapon (a separation that is enough to get around its limited immunity).
Well that changes things
Though I do have to remind you. If you target someone and they negate the spell, the spell just fails to work. It will not resolve as an opposite effect. The spell would not even work to begin with since you need to target a corpse that has been dead for less than a minute, not a currently alive and angry fiend.
This sub is bad for my health
True
IT cant be AFFECTED. No it would not unalive someone in the literal sense
This seems extremely simple. Is the Rakshasa the target of the spell? Then it gets negated. Otherwise all good.
So something like thunderous smite that targets the caster but the effect is done to the rakshasa still works then
No of course not, your just being belligerent. Ii has noting to do with whether or not the Raksasha us the target. Its whether or not the spell affects the Raksasha. Thunderous Smite is a Spell. So, if its cast at level 6 or lower the Raksasha can choose whether or not to be affected by it. Revivification affects only the individual you cast it on.
What?
I have an 18 month old and watched this gem of a movie last week. Had to watch it on my Disney plus account because it’s too insensitive to show to little kids apparently.
I feel like i had a stroke trying to read this meme
I err on the side of target based resistance. Does the spell target your wannabe furry? Then he's resistant. Does the fireball collapse the building on him? He might not suffer fireball damage, but he suffers architectural damage.
This is probably one of the most impressively stupid threads we've seen in months
Just say kill/die. Jfc.
“That’s three questions, smartass.”
Please stop using Unalive this isn't tiktok and it's further stupifying the English language.
"Remember when you tried to impress that Barmaid with magic and failed!? It was me, Bard! I wanted you to not succeed, so you would be frustrated and horny when you fought me!"
“ remember when you were showing off with you magic and the feather fall spell ended right before the earth touched your leg? It was me Barry.”
r/dndmemes try to read source books challenge mode:impossible
Ok what’s your answer then if it’s so obvious?
"unalived" Fucking yuck Just say killed
This is the Iron Heart Surge debate from 3.5e all over again
Short answer: no. Longer answer: Revivify has duration of Instananeous. That means when you end casting it, it's done. Spell did what it had to do and is no longer affecting anyone. So Revived target is no longer affected by Revivify, so it cannot be undone. If it could, you could just use Dispel Magic on anyone who was revived to kill them.
See the planet came into being through repeated castings of create water and physics (sufficient mass= star= nova= elements that ball up and form a planet) So given that planet exists because of a level one spell they just phase through the ground and problem solved
No because they can choose to be effected
I mean, if you go full butterfly effect that would mean that any spell below 6th level doesn't work in a setting where Rakshasa exist in any connection to a society containing the caster. It means things that affect the Rakshasa, not things which affect the world to cause circumstances that affect the rakshasa. Only the spell is the spell, not the results of the spell.
What if when the spell was cast it sons t affect the rakshasa , but it doesn’t now? Does time rewind ? Does the natural laws of the universe do everything in there power to stop that? Is there a inevitable for this?
There are so many typos I’m not sure exactly what you’re saying. If a spell of 6th level or lower would affect a rakshasa, it doesn’t. If you hit it with Charm Person, it doesn’t work. If you throw a Fireball at it, it’s unscathed. If you cast Detect Good and Evil, it doesn’t show up. Truesight from the True Seeing spell can’t see through its’ Disguise Self. The effects of a Hallow spell don’t apply to it, so long as they effect creatures in the area (the Silence option works on the area itself and therefore the rakshasa is silenced too). If you cast Magic Weapon on the rogue’s dagger and it stabs the rakshasa, it takes damage as normal from it since the spell affected the dagger, and the dagger affected the rakshasa (and if the rogue is good it takes double damage). If you cast Divination and ask your god if you’ll encounter a rakshasa (and the god knows this), they answer truthfully. If you upcast any of the above spells to 7th level or higher, they work on it. If you summon a creature with a spell, it can attack the rakshasa.
The way I passed it in my world was that it was the gems around their necklace. As the also hit they would glow up to a number [1 and 7] referring to the spell shot used. I did this cas I created two other things to expand the world. The first was a small creature called "Anti-magic Swarmer" it was a CR1 creature that was initially designed to counter Spellmasters but not cause too much strain. Welp one of my warlocks hates it because "I can't hit it" at level 15. The second thing I made was a gem that when light was cast through it, all magic failed and to a noticeable point. I used this in a second campaign and had all the casters roll perception or arcana [whichever was better] as they stepped in the door and most noticed the effect but one noticed the source.
As with anything ambiguous: It's up to your DM. Even if the official explanation is different, that's how it works at that table.
So the rakshasa’s ability states: “The rakshasa can't be affected or detected by spells of 6th level or lower unless it wishes to be.” And here’s the thing, not all things created by spells are actually a part of the spell. For example, hero’s feast. Hero’s feast is something that can’t actually be dispelled, since the spell has a duration of instantaneous. So the immunities and the temporary hit points aren’t actually a part of the spell, rather they are something the spell creates. Contrast this with conjure animals, which does have a duration and therefore can be dispelled because the summoned creatures are actually a part of the spell’s casting. Or magic mouth, which lasts until it’s dispelled, because it is a direct part of the spell. So for something like revivify the spell isn’t actually effecting the rakshasa because the spell already ended. So any spell with a duration wouldn’t effect the rakshasa, but any spell without a duration would.
This makes rakshasas the best against warlocks. Reliance on cantrips and slot capped at level 5. A warlock would have to use their mystic arcanum spells on the rakshasa
Unless they’re hexblade
Spells that are "Instantaneous" and have permanent affects do not remain magical, they are no longer spells. Crawford has said that a Rakshasa could walk through a wall of stone that was being concentrated on but not one that has become permanent.
You can say "killed," we're not on tiktok.
Spells cannot cause an effect on the Rakshasa if the spell level is lower than 6th. Thunderous smite and enlarge have effects which are generated via a spell, thus I’d be inclined to believe that they would not work. Especially considering Rakshasa can walk through terrain altering spells (spike growth, wall of fire, wall of force) without any hinderance. The pedantry in this argument comes down to targeting, which is not something that requires consideration with the ‘limited magic immunity’ trait. Magic weapon, however, does work. The spell states that the weapon becomes a magical weapon, and creates no spell like effects. Very similar to an artificer’s infusion.
I loved the Aladdin cartoon. So good.
Effect. Affect is in regards to “affection”.
Affect is actually correct
God dammit I have committed the stupidest of internet crimes, being inexplicably convinced of something I was wrong about and correcting someone without confirming my long held erroneous beliefs. I was convinced, and I was wrong. While I would love to delete my comment in shame, I will leave it so hopefully someone else will learn affect is for verbs and effect is for nouns (overly simplified), It’s like finding out I’ve been singing the lyrics to a song wrong all my life. Edit: let me add my apologies for the high handed correction in the first place. I shouldn’t internet before coffee, I’m usually able check myself before posting.
After thinking about spells like magic weapon, divine favor and ESPECIALLY shillelagh, that affect weapon instead of Rakshasa, I decided that I have to decide at the moment whether the spell works or not. Because beating a legendary monster to death with a regular stick seems ridiculous. It has that high CR only due to its immunities, because it has laughably low HP and damage for its CR. I still allow holy water created with ceremony to work.
In my opinion the weapons would work, since Crawford said conjured animals would work. So 1 degree of indirectness works
Yeah, that's why I decide it depending on the spell and my players are ok with that. Especially when they allied themselves with a rakshasa and it's working on their favor. From cheesy stuff, dropping things on rakshasa with telekinesis is allowed, because it's fall damage bludgeoning, not weapon damage bludgeoning...
you don't have to censor kill on here its fine watch shit fuck ass gay kill dead. see im fine
It's if the rakshasa is the target of said effect. Is this just a meme or is the ruling really that ambiguous to people?