Hello magic casters of all shapes and sizes! Welcome to my spellbook and thank you so much for checking out the 67th episode of our first level spell series. Today we’re going to be taking a look at the best snare dnd 5e spell. Now this particular jam is usable by the druid, ranger, wizard and artificer and so quite a variety of the casting classes and it is found in the xanathar’s guide to everything book. So it’s pretty cool! I really like this one. With that out of the way let’s take a look at its mechanics.
Table of Contents
Mechanics
- Level: 1st
- Casting Time: 1 Minute
- Range/Area: Touch
- Components: S, M *
- Duration: 8 Hours
- School: Abjuration
- Attack/Save: DEX Save
- Damage/Effect: Restrained
The cast time is one minute which is quite long for a first level spell and it’s the main reason people do not choose this one, however i’ll explain a way around that pretty quick. The range is a touch, the duration is an impressive 8 hours. And the effect at a glance is as followed:
Prepare a five foot radius magical trap. When a small to large creature moves over the area, they must make a dexterity save. On a failed save they are hoisted upside down 3 feet into the air and have the restrained condition until the end of the spell. The saving throw is repeated at the end of each turn. The trap can be detected by an investigation check versus your spell save dc. A creature can release another by making a successful arcana check against your spell save dc.
The components are somatic and material. If you’re curious about that material component you should be it’s a 25 feet of rope which this spell consumes, so it is necessary component, you can’t get away with just using any all focus and the somatic meaning you have to gesture with one hand. The school is abjuration which is pretty interesting, i would have thought enchantment but whatever abjuration works too.
And just something they quickly touch on please not that in the component section verbal is not a component that plays in later. All right, now let’s take a look at the full description.
Description
As you cast this spell, you use the rope to create a circle with a 5-foot radius on the ground or the floor. When you finish casting, the rope disappears and the circle becomes a magic trap.
This trap is nearly invisible, requiring a successful Intelligence (Investigation) check against your spell save DC to be discerned.
The trap triggers when a Small, Medium, or Large creature moves onto the ground or the floor in the spell’s radius. That creature must succeed on a Dexterity saving throw or be magically hoisted into the air, leaving it hanging upside down 3 feet above the ground or the floor. The creature is restrained there until the spell ends.
A restrained creature can make a Dexterity saving throw at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect on itself on a success. Alternatively, the creature or someone else who can reach it can use an action to make an Intelligence (Arcana) check against your spell save DC. On a success, the restrained effect ends.
After the trap is triggered, the spell ends when no creature is restrained by it. * – (25 feet of rope, which the spell consumes)
Very cool stuff! If you are curious about the restrained condition and of itself. A restrained creature speed becomes zero and it can’t benefit from any bonus to speed. Attack rolls against the creature have advantage and when the creature rolls its attack rolls that has disadvantage. Here is sleep spell 5e explained.
The creature has disadvantage on dexterity saving throws as well. Very cool stuff and very interesting because it has to make a dexterity saving throw to a try and get out of there so it does so with disadvantage which is pretty cool! it’s kind of a built-in failsafe kind of mechanic and it makes sense from a logical perspective as well.
Needless to say i really like this one, i haven’t personally used it to some pretty cool effects over the years and you know honestly i know why it gets a bad rep but i’m gonna share with you kind of good ways around that. Without further ado let’s take a look at some alternative uses.
Alternative Uses
The main alternative use that i’ve had the most success with is using it to booby-trap an object. A good example would be a chest of drawers that are likely to be rummaged through, it makes a lot of sense to put the trap there and as soon as i stand there hoist them up and if you use an alarm spell or something like magic stone and you can actually make that a little bit more pronounced like you can alert yourself basically if that makes sense.
Another great way to take advantage of this spell and this is a great way to get over the cast time and the range of touch is have your familiar set up the spell. The familiars usually have quite good stealth, in this example we’re gonna be using the cat which has a bonus of stealth which is really nice. Check out the familiar articles if you’re not familiar with all of them and you can just deliver through the familiar.
Makes sense set it up on a doorway or some other fairly open space you know and just sit back and watch the action play out. Personally i really like this one a lot of DMs usually use it as well. So it’s something they’d be alert for if you’re in someone’s home doing a B&E campaign or and it particularly overly trapped dungeon. Do you want to learn about how do you detect traps in 5e?
Conclusion
That being said, thank you so much guys, i really appreciate having you here and if you have any cool ideas on how do you use a snare in 5e? please put them down in the comment section below and as always happy casting. Also check out these articles on intellect snare 5e | entangle 5e | catapult 5e | zephyr strike 5e | ensnaring strike 5e | 5e familiar names |