Hello spellcasters of all shapes and sizes! Welcome to my spellbook and thank you so much for checking out the 72nd episode of our second level spell series. Today we have one of my all-time favorite spells in store for you. Both mechanically and because i have a pretty cool story to go along with it.
Today we’re gonna be taking a look at dnd 5e spiritual weapon spell. This spell is found exclusively on the clerics spell list and it is found in the good old players handbook as well. To be quite frank if you’re a cleric i would highly recommend always picking this spell, it is such a good choice and being a cleric and having access to the full spell list anyways there’s no real downside to having this in there. Now without further ado let’s take a quick look at the mechanics and lets you can tell me what’s so good about it.
Table of Contents
Mechanics
- Level: 2nd
- Casting Time: 1 Bonus Action
- Range/Area: 60 ft
- Components: V, S
- Duration: 1 Minute
- School: Evocation
- Attack/Save: Melee
- Damage/Effect: Force
So your damage is 1d8 plus your spellcasting modifier and you get an additional d8 per two slot levels above 2nd so 4, 6 etc etc. The effect at a glance is as followed: Create a floating weapon, make a melee spell attack. You can move it 20 feet and make another melee spell attack as a bonus action.
Your cast time is also a bonus action, the range is 60 feet, the duration is 1 minute and the components are somatic and verbal. The school is evocation and the damage type is force. Now if you were to look at this what would you say to me the best part, i mean force damage pretty great, the damage potential is also pretty nice it’s a great use of a bonus action. You may also have interested in spirit guardians 5e.
The best thing about this is that it does not require concentration! That’s right, you essentially gain an extra attack every turn that deals force damage and a pretty decent amount of it and it’s all for nothing you can just move it around as you wish you can get hit, you can actually technically die, you can’t obviously move or do anything else with it but you can potentially belly speeding capacity and then it’ll kind of still just stay there floating around, but that’s incredible it really is like flaming sphere for example concentration, dust devil concentration, this guy no concentration it’s pretty great actually i really do love it such a good one. Now let’s take a look at the full description and i’ll tell you a quick story about it as well.
Description
You create a floating, spectral weapon within range that lasts for the duration or until you cast this spell again. When you cast the spell, you can make a melee spell attack against a creature within 5 feet of the weapon. On a hit, the target takes force damage equal to 1d8 + your spellcasting ability modifier.
As a bonus action on your turn, you can move the weapon up to 20 feet and repeat the attack against a creature within 5 feet of it. The weapon can take whatever form you choose. Clerics of deities who are associated with a particular weapon (as St. Cuthbert is known for his mace and Thor for his hammer) make this spell’s effect resemble that weapon.
At Higher Levels: When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 3rd level or higher, the damage increases by 1d8 for every two slot levels above 2nd.
Very good stuff! So something very very cool is that you can kind of pick whatever form right! So when i was playing my forged cleric named forge i made mine across like a holy cross but instead of the two horizontal slats i had to ripped arms just like muscular arms attached to a wooden plank basically.
And it would go around and i would just punch people that was its attack is very cool thematically but i’d always play around with it, like i’d have in chase me and we play a game of tag it for example so would be running around a fire would be trying to tag me but it’s movement was only 20 feet mine was 30 feet so i’d always be opacing it affords was something of a narcissist,
In anyways one of the gentlemen i was playing with went to high-five the cross because i had crossed me to high-five gestures he was walking past and he ended up taking 3d8 forced damage as a direct result of that high-five, so it’s pretty interesting. In any case let’s take a look at some alternative uses here and see if we can get that creative juices flowing. Also read spiritual weapon 5e attack roll.
Alternative Uses
So one of my personal favorite uses for this is to use it to just completely destroy an enemy encounter. This is a best done in the early sessions of the game, i’m gonna lower see our enemies but what you do is, you basically summon this inside one of their encampments. Also read 5e when to give magic weapons.
The reason this works so well is that no point in the spell does it mention that you have to able to see what’s going on. So it’s logical to assume that all, the only requirements are for an enemy to be within five feet of it. So you just go around swing and hit a bunch enemies and they don’t know what’s going on, all they know is a cross with muscular arms appeared in the middle of their tent and just wrecking them.
So that’s a really great way to use this, ultimately it’s best use is probably bouncing encounters, getting that extra force damage in with no real negative repercussions is super nice, it’s basically a consistent reliable source of damage, it’s just really really nice.
Another great use for it is proving your validity trip to the church. If they ever questioned you just be like listen i’m so emboldened with divine faith in fury that i can summon a manifestations of my god’s will and then some and this is proof.
Naturally this only works in societies that are only loosely based around magic anything too intense would be a harder sell but it’s still possible i suppose.
So what spiritual weapon 5e unconscious! Here is the answer for that If your PC casts this spell and goes into an unconscious state, the spell doesn’t end (because it is not a concentration spell). However, your PC can’t attack with the weapon while incapacitated.
But do you think that can you cast spiritual weapon and a spell in the same turn? No you can not cast 2nd level spells on a similar turn. So in that particualr scenario if you cast this spiritual weapon 5e concentration as a bonus action, you can’t cast another leveled spell as an action. but, you have a chance to cast a cantrip spell such as Sacred Flame or Toll the Dead as an action or make a weapon attack.
Mainly here the spiritual weapons aren’t get an attack of opportunity why because the the opportunity of attacks needs an attacker to be a creature. But here this spell is not a creature. So make sure to beware of it.
Conclusion
In any case if you have any alternative uses, ideas, thoughts, questions, comments, concerns please out it down beneath in the comment section, i really do appreciate it. That being said, i hope you all have a wonderful day and as always happy casting everyone.