How many DMs don't let rogues sneak attack more then once a round even if they get an attack on a turn following a turn they already sneak attacked. I.e. a reaction attack after they've already attacked.
Hopefully none because the language once per turn is intentional, and forcing extra attacks in enemy turns requires either attacks of opportunity or some kind of combo; a Battle Master's Commander's Strike or an Order Domain Cleric's Voice of Authority would be the easiest ways I can think of, but both are limited, but a great way to absolutely ruin a single target.
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Can a rogue use Sneak Attack more than once per round? The Sneak Attack description specifies that you can use the feature once per turn, but it’s not limited to your turn. The feature also doesn’t limit the number of times you can use it in a round. You sometimes get a chance to use Sneak Attack on someone else’s turn. The most common way for this to happen is when a foe provokes an opportunity attack from you. If the requirements for Sneak Attack are met, your opportunity attack can benefit from that feature. Similarly, a fighter could use Commander’s Strike to grant you an attack on the fighter’s turn, and if the attack qualifies, it can use Sneak Attack. Both of those options rely on the use of your reaction, so you could do only one of them in a round. Because you get only one reaction per round, you’re unlikely to use Sneak Attack more than twice in a round: once with your action and once with your reaction.
I'd be very concerned if a DM does not know the difference between a turn and a round. Sneak attack is explicitly once per turn, not round. That's why Rogue / Fighter MC is so popular because you can use things like Riposte and Brace to get potential sneak attacks on other people's turns. It's also why I took a 1 lvl dip into Order Cleric on my Divine Soul Sorcerer so that I could cast things like bless and then get our rogue to make another sneak attack.
There are a fair number of players and DMs alike that don't closely read abilities. If neither notices that it's per turn instead of per round, there's a good chance they're going to assume it's per round. Also, there have been a significant number of players that have posted on the forums about their DMs coming from earlier editions and thinking that it's too easy for rogues to get sneak attack, changing the rules to require advantage for it. Accounting for those, I'd say there's a significant minority of DMs that wouldn't allow multiple sneak attacks per round.
That said, a lot of DMs will relent when it's pointed out that it's worded specifically to allow it and that for rogues' damage to keep up with other martials, they're assumed to get sneak attack almost every round at the very least.
You cant do this actually, the booming blade opportunity with warcaster. Booming blade is a target self. Warcaster requires the spell you cast to only take one action and to target the creature you are attacking.
You cant do this actually, the booming blade opportunity with warcaster. Booming blade is a target self. Warcaster requires the spell you cast to only take one action and to target the creature you are attacking.
Booming Blade's range is within 5ft of self. That's not the target at all. The target is the creature you make the melee attack against. It must be within the spell's range to work.
Unfortunately Crawford's tweets aren't official sage advice so while they can be useful for knowing the intention of a rule they're not always useful for Rules As Written; he doesn't give any justification for why it should work.
War Caster is pretty explicit that the spell you cast must only target the creature that triggered your attack of opportunity, but booming blade arguably targets the weapon you're using, which then enables you to attack with it. So strictly speaking it isn't applicable.
I'm pretty sure the intention is that they should work, but the updated SCAGtrips somehow managed to create as many problems as they solved.
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Unfortunately Crawford's tweets aren't official sage advice so while they can be useful for knowing the intention of a rule they're not always useful for Rules As Written; he doesn't give any justification for why it should work.
It's not official, but it states the logic clearly: "A note about D&D spells with a range of "Self (XYZ)": the parenthetical—which says "5-foot radius," "15-foot cone," or something else—means you are the spell's point of origin, but you aren't necessarily its target." (emphasis mine)
but booming blade arguably targets the weapon you're using, which then enables you to attack with it.
Absolutely untrue. That is a wild interpretation of the area of effect rules. Booming Blade specifies it's singular target quite clearly: "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. On a hit, the target suffers the weapon attack’s normal effects and then becomes sheathed in booming energy until the start of your next turn. If the target willingly moves 5 feet or more before then, the target takes 1d8 thunder damage, and the spell ends." (emphasis mine)
Absolutely untrue. That is a wild interpretation of the area of effect rules. Booming Blade specifies it's singular target quite clearly: "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. On a hit, the target suffers the weapon attack’s normal effects and then becomes sheathed in booming energy until the start of your next turn. If the target willingly moves 5 feet or more before then, the target takes 1d8 thunder damage, and the spell ends." (emphasis mine)
The range is Self, so initial target is absolutely yourself in Rules as Written, which is a part of why the rules are so poorly written for this case.
The fact that you can also then make a melee attack (with its own target) is part of the problem; because you've now got two targets (yourself/your weapon, and whatever you then attack with it), which also invalidates War Caster (which allows only a single target). A tweet after the fact doesn't change the fact that the rules don't support his view; the spellcasting range rule is absolutely clear:
The target of a spell must be within the spell's range.
And also:
Other spells, such as the shield spell, affect only you. These spells have a range of self.
So this means cantrips like booming blade are specifically targeting you (or your weapon) for an effect, and that effect is the ability to also make a melee attack against another target within 5 feet. But in RAW that's still two targets, one of which isn't the creature triggering your opportunity attack.
It's worth noting that a comparison with another Self range spell like thunderwave; again you are the target of the effect, which is to place an area (10 foot cube) at the edge of your space, so in a way your target is a point on the ground at your feet. The creatures that then get hurt/pushed are not strictly targets as per the range rule (they're not in range), though they are definitely affected.
Again, I'm not disputing the intention, I'd absolutely allow SCAGtrips to be used this way in game, I'm just pointing out that it's a very poorly structured and written spell that they somehow managed to introduce new problems to when they updated it. The original versions were fine (and worked with War Caster) but only specified "a weapon" as the material component which allowed things like using it with a shadow blade; all Wizards needed to do was add a cost to that, and make clear you had to attack using that same weapon. Instead they made other weird mechanical changes that introduced new problems, instead of just fixing the existing ones.
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The target of a spell must be within the spell's range.
And also:
Other spells, such as the shield spell, affect only you. These spells have a range of self.
The full text is
Most spells have ranges expressed in feet. Some spells can target only a creature (including you) that you touch. Other spells, such as the shield spell, affect only you. These spells have a range of self.
Spells that create cones or lines of effect that originate from you also have a range of self, indicating that the origin point of the spell’s effect must be you (see “Areas of Effect” later in the this chapter).
In other words, a range of "self" means several different things. I get that this is a common misreading, but it's dumb. In the case of Booming Blade, "the origin point of the spell’s effect must be you," which is also exactly what Crawford's tweet says. Point of origin is not the same as target. Furthermore
A spell’s description tells you whether the spell targets creatures, objects, or a point of origin for an area of effect
The description is what defines the target, not the range/area entry. Booming Blade's description describes the target as the target of the melee attack.
Most spells have ranges expressed in feet. Some spells can target only a creature (including you) that you touch. Other spells, such as the shield spell, affect only you. These spells have a range of self.
Spells that create cones or lines of effect that originate from you also have a range of self, indicating that the origin point of the spell’s effect must be you (see “Areas of Effect” later in the this chapter).
In other words, a range of "self" means several different things. I get that this is a common misreading, but it's dumb. In the case of Booming Blade, "the origin point of the spell’s effect must be you," which is also exactly what Crawford's tweet says. Point of origin is not the same as target.
Nothing that you've quoted here overrides the requirement that "the target of a spell must be within the spell's range".
In the case of an area of effect, the target is wherever you place the area of effect; for example, for a thunderwave the target is the ground at your feet (or more specifically the edge of your space) with the area being aligned against that edge (as clarified by the effect text).
Essentially all area spells are targeting a point to which their area is aligned (usually centred except for most cones and lines and some cubes), the effect of those spells is to then apply damage (or something else) to creatures within that area once it has been placed at the target location.
Furthermore
A spell’s description tells you whether the spell targets creatures, objects, or a point of origin for an area of effect
The description is what defines the target, not the range/area entry. Booming Blade's description describes the target as the target of the melee attack.
Each spell description begins with a block of information, including the spell's name, level, school of magic, casting time, range, components, and duration. The rest of a spell entry describes the spell's effect.
It feels like you're latching onto the word "target" used in the spell effect, but what that word is describing is the target of the melee attack it just told you to make, not the target of the spell (which was you). Again, this is why the change to the spell was so silly, because it puts it in line with similar spells that don't do what I think was intended for the SCAGtrips.
For example, branding smite, which is essentially the same thing with a timer; the target of this spell is again you, because the effect is placed upon you alone. That effect is that the next creature you hit takes extra damage. Another similar example is vampiric touch, the target is again yourself because that's where the spell is; but for its duration you can make attacks with their own target.
And yet again, I'm not arguing against intention; I think they absolutely intend for the spell to just be a simple instant melee weapon attack like it was before, but what they've done is created new problems for themselves by using rules that don't support what they were trying to do (and which they didn't need to change). It's basically a classic example of a rules writer writing a new rule on the basis of their own understanding of the rules that came before it, without double checking what they actually wrote; it might be perfectly clear to them what they meant, but what matters to us are the words on the pages.
If they wanted to do something custom to avoid the oddities to the 5 foot range, they should have just given it a range of "reach" and clarified in the description that the reach is determined by the weapon used to cast (and attack) with. They could then have just put out a sage advice to confirm that a "reach" weapon is not eligible for Distant spell/Spell Sniper because it doesn't have an explicit range.
(btw, you can delete a post entirely by clicking "Tools" at the bottom, to the left of Edit).
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Nothing that you've quoted overrides the requirement that "the target of a spell must be within the spell's range".
Why would anything want to override that? Of course the target must be within range. The range of Booming Blade is a 5ft sphere centered on the caster; the target must be within that area. (In particular, even if you're using a weapon with the Reach property, your target must be within 5ft.)
There are however some similar examples, such as branding smite, which is essentially the same thing with a timer; the target of this spell is again you, because the effect is placed upon you alone. That effect is that the next creature you hit takes extra damage. Another similar example is vampiric touch, the target is again yourself because that's where the spell is; but for its duration you can make attacks with their own target.
Branding Smite is not the same. Its range is only "self" (no 5ft sphere). It is cast on yourself and imbues your next hit with an effect. Same for Vampiric Touch. (If I had to guess why they designed Booming Blade and Green Flame Blade differently, it's because each has a chaser effect that happens after the attack, but based from the target, so they wanted to be clear that the spell's target is not yourself.)
The target is the target. The range is the range. The point of origin is the point of origin. These are all different things with distinct meanings. If you don't mix them up these spells aren't so confusing.
Nothing that you've quoted overrides the requirement that "the target of a spell must be within the spell's range".
Why would anything want to override that? Of course the target must be within range. The range of Booming Blade is a 5ft sphere centered on the caster; the target must be within that area. (In particular, even if you're using a weapon with the Reach property, your target must be within 5ft.)
The value in brackets is not the range; the range is Self. A value in brackets is an area of effect, though in this case it's weirdly just limiting the reach of your weapon attack.
Branding Smite is not the same. Its range is only "self" (no 5ft sphere). It is cast on yourself and imbues your next hit with an effect. Same for Vampiric Touch.
They are both spells that reference a target that is not the target of the spell, but the target of an attack that the spell enabled you to make; this exactly the same as booming blade. The only difference with booming blade is that it doesn't let you use the full reach of the weapon if it's greater than 5 feet.
If you don't mix them up these spells aren't so confusing.
I have never argued that they were confusing, I have pointed out that they're poorly written for the rules they rely upon to function which creates a disconnect between rules as written and rules as intended.
People don't argue that these cantrips won't work with War Caster in RAW because they are "confused" but because there are actual rules to point to that support that position. I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and hope your intention wasn't to insult everyone that disagrees with you, but that's how this statement comes across.
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Nothing that you've quoted overrides the requirement that "the target of a spell must be within the spell's range".
Why would anything want to override that? Of course the target must be within range. The range of Booming Blade is a 5ft sphere centered on the caster; the target must be within that area. (In particular, even if you're using a weapon with the Reach property, your target must be within 5ft.)
The value in brackets is not the range; the range is Self. A value in brackets is an area of effect, though in this case it's weirdly just limiting the reach of your weapon attack.
"Spells that create cones or lines of effect that originate from you also have a range of self, indicating that the origin point of the spell’s effect must be you (see “Areas of Effect” later in the this chapter)."
It's an area of effect originating from self (the caster is the point of origin).
"Spells that create cones or lines of effect that originate from you also have a range of self, indicating that the origin point of the spell’s effect must be you (see “Areas of Effect” later in the this chapter)."
It's an area of effect originating from self (the caster is the point of origin).
In which case you or your position are the target, because the target is the point of origin for the area of effect as specified in the target rules:
A spell's description tells you whether the spell targets creatures, objects, or a point of origin for an area of effect
So once again, you are the target of the spell, and while another creature can be the target of its effect, at best that means there are two targets (itself grounds to prevent War Caster from working).
However that's not actually how it works, because with a range Self spell you are the only possible target for the spell, and it is you to which the effect is applied; that effect being that you get to make a melee attack (which in turn its own target).
It's worth noting that this is the same problem that affects primal savagery, but not shocking grasp, because the former has a range of Self, and the latter has a range of Touch.
But I'm going to wash my hands of this thread at this point; I feel like I really can't really be any clearer in explaining why the wording of War Caster and the interaction with the rules is problematic, and this isn't even the rules and game mechanics sub-forum.
So for the last time, while I fully expect the intention is that range Self instantaneous melee attack spells like these are supposed to work with War Caster, with the way it's worded (and how explicitly a spell's target is tied to its range) it currently does not work in Rules As Written. It's a shame that Crawford has posted a tweet that contradicts what the rules say without bothering to publish an errata/actual sage advice about it, but that's not uncommon (and a big reason why Crawford's tweets can often be unhelpful in RAW, even if they help understand the intent).
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How many DMs don't let rogues sneak attack more then once a round even if they get an attack on a turn following a turn they already sneak attacked. I.e. a reaction attack after they've already attacked.
Hopefully none because the language once per turn is intentional, and forcing extra attacks in enemy turns requires either attacks of opportunity or some kind of combo; a Battle Master's Commander's Strike or an Order Domain Cleric's Voice of Authority would be the easiest ways I can think of, but both are limited, but a great way to absolutely ruin a single target.
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Probably very few if any since it's intended by design to be unlimited usage per round. Here's officual ruling for confirmation https://dnd.wizards.com/articles/sage-advice/sage-advice-compendium
That sounds like it could get nasty with booming blade as an arcane trickster with warcaster.
I'd be very concerned if a DM does not know the difference between a turn and a round. Sneak attack is explicitly once per turn, not round. That's why Rogue / Fighter MC is so popular because you can use things like Riposte and Brace to get potential sneak attacks on other people's turns. It's also why I took a 1 lvl dip into Order Cleric on my Divine Soul Sorcerer so that I could cast things like bless and then get our rogue to make another sneak attack.
There are a fair number of players and DMs alike that don't closely read abilities. If neither notices that it's per turn instead of per round, there's a good chance they're going to assume it's per round. Also, there have been a significant number of players that have posted on the forums about their DMs coming from earlier editions and thinking that it's too easy for rogues to get sneak attack, changing the rules to require advantage for it. Accounting for those, I'd say there's a significant minority of DMs that wouldn't allow multiple sneak attacks per round.
That said, a lot of DMs will relent when it's pointed out that it's worded specifically to allow it and that for rogues' damage to keep up with other martials, they're assumed to get sneak attack almost every round at the very least.
You cant do this actually, the booming blade opportunity with warcaster. Booming blade is a target self. Warcaster requires the spell you cast to only take one action and to target the creature you are attacking.
Booming Blade's range is within 5ft of self. That's not the target at all. The target is the creature you make the melee attack against. It must be within the spell's range to work.
Is there a place somewhere that explains this use officially?
https://www.sageadvice.eu/the-booming-blade-spell-continues-to-work-with-the-war-caster-feat/
Unfortunately Crawford's tweets aren't official sage advice so while they can be useful for knowing the intention of a rule they're not always useful for Rules As Written; he doesn't give any justification for why it should work.
War Caster is pretty explicit that the spell you cast must only target the creature that triggered your attack of opportunity, but booming blade arguably targets the weapon you're using, which then enables you to attack with it. So strictly speaking it isn't applicable.
I'm pretty sure the intention is that they should work, but the updated SCAGtrips somehow managed to create as many problems as they solved.
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It's not official, but it states the logic clearly: "A note about D&D spells with a range of "Self (XYZ)": the parenthetical—which says "5-foot radius," "15-foot cone," or something else—means you are the spell's point of origin, but you aren't necessarily its target." (emphasis mine)
Absolutely untrue. That is a wild interpretation of the area of effect rules. Booming Blade specifies it's singular target quite clearly: "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. On a hit, the target suffers the weapon attack’s normal effects and then becomes sheathed in booming energy until the start of your next turn. If the target willingly moves 5 feet or more before then, the target takes 1d8 thunder damage, and the spell ends." (emphasis mine)
The range is Self, so initial target is absolutely yourself in Rules as Written, which is a part of why the rules are so poorly written for this case.
The fact that you can also then make a melee attack (with its own target) is part of the problem; because you've now got two targets (yourself/your weapon, and whatever you then attack with it), which also invalidates War Caster (which allows only a single target). A tweet after the fact doesn't change the fact that the rules don't support his view; the spellcasting range rule is absolutely clear:
And also:
So this means cantrips like booming blade are specifically targeting you (or your weapon) for an effect, and that effect is the ability to also make a melee attack against another target within 5 feet. But in RAW that's still two targets, one of which isn't the creature triggering your opportunity attack.
It's worth noting that a comparison with another Self range spell like thunderwave; again you are the target of the effect, which is to place an area (10 foot cube) at the edge of your space, so in a way your target is a point on the ground at your feet. The creatures that then get hurt/pushed are not strictly targets as per the range rule (they're not in range), though they are definitely affected.
Again, I'm not disputing the intention, I'd absolutely allow SCAGtrips to be used this way in game, I'm just pointing out that it's a very poorly structured and written spell that they somehow managed to introduce new problems to when they updated it. The original versions were fine (and worked with War Caster) but only specified "a weapon" as the material component which allowed things like using it with a shadow blade; all Wizards needed to do was add a cost to that, and make clear you had to attack using that same weapon. Instead they made other weird mechanical changes that introduced new problems, instead of just fixing the existing ones.
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Citation needed. Where does it say that?Partial citation provided in edits.The full text is
Most spells have ranges expressed in feet. Some spells can target only a creature (including you) that you touch. Other spells, such as the shield spell, affect only you. These spells have a range of self.
Spells that create cones or lines of effect that originate from you also have a range of self, indicating that the origin point of the spell’s effect must be you (see “Areas of Effect” later in the this chapter).
In other words, a range of "self" means several different things. I get that this is a common misreading, but it's dumb. In the case of Booming Blade, "the origin point of the spell’s effect must be you," which is also exactly what Crawford's tweet says. Point of origin is not the same as target. Furthermore
A spell’s description tells you whether the spell targets creatures, objects, or a point of origin for an area of effect
The description is what defines the target, not the range/area entry. Booming Blade's description describes the target as the target of the melee attack.
Nothing that you've quoted here overrides the requirement that "the target of a spell must be within the spell's range".
In the case of an area of effect, the target is wherever you place the area of effect; for example, for a thunderwave the target is the ground at your feet (or more specifically the edge of your space) with the area being aligned against that edge (as clarified by the effect text).
Essentially all area spells are targeting a point to which their area is aligned (usually centred except for most cones and lines and some cubes), the effect of those spells is to then apply damage (or something else) to creatures within that area once it has been placed at the target location.
The range etc. are also part of a spell's description:
It feels like you're latching onto the word "target" used in the spell effect, but what that word is describing is the target of the melee attack it just told you to make, not the target of the spell (which was you). Again, this is why the change to the spell was so silly, because it puts it in line with similar spells that don't do what I think was intended for the SCAGtrips.
For example, branding smite, which is essentially the same thing with a timer; the target of this spell is again you, because the effect is placed upon you alone. That effect is that the next creature you hit takes extra damage. Another similar example is vampiric touch, the target is again yourself because that's where the spell is; but for its duration you can make attacks with their own target.
And yet again, I'm not arguing against intention; I think they absolutely intend for the spell to just be a simple instant melee weapon attack like it was before, but what they've done is created new problems for themselves by using rules that don't support what they were trying to do (and which they didn't need to change). It's basically a classic example of a rules writer writing a new rule on the basis of their own understanding of the rules that came before it, without double checking what they actually wrote; it might be perfectly clear to them what they meant, but what matters to us are the words on the pages.
If they wanted to do something custom to avoid the oddities to the 5 foot range, they should have just given it a range of "reach" and clarified in the description that the reach is determined by the weapon used to cast (and attack) with. They could then have just put out a sage advice to confirm that a "reach" weapon is not eligible for Distant spell/Spell Sniper because it doesn't have an explicit range.
(btw, you can delete a post entirely by clicking "Tools" at the bottom, to the left of Edit).
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Why would anything want to override that? Of course the target must be within range. The range of Booming Blade is a 5ft sphere centered on the caster; the target must be within that area. (In particular, even if you're using a weapon with the Reach property, your target must be within 5ft.)
Branding Smite is not the same. Its range is only "self" (no 5ft sphere). It is cast on yourself and imbues your next hit with an effect. Same for Vampiric Touch. (If I had to guess why they designed Booming Blade and Green Flame Blade differently, it's because each has a chaser effect that happens after the attack, but based from the target, so they wanted to be clear that the spell's target is not yourself.)
The target is the target. The range is the range. The point of origin is the point of origin. These are all different things with distinct meanings. If you don't mix them up these spells aren't so confusing.
The value in brackets is not the range; the range is Self. A value in brackets is an area of effect, though in this case it's weirdly just limiting the reach of your weapon attack.
They are both spells that reference a target that is not the target of the spell, but the target of an attack that the spell enabled you to make; this exactly the same as booming blade. The only difference with booming blade is that it doesn't let you use the full reach of the weapon if it's greater than 5 feet.
I have never argued that they were confusing, I have pointed out that they're poorly written for the rules they rely upon to function which creates a disconnect between rules as written and rules as intended.
People don't argue that these cantrips won't work with War Caster in RAW because they are "confused" but because there are actual rules to point to that support that position. I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and hope your intention wasn't to insult everyone that disagrees with you, but that's how this statement comes across.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
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"Spells that create cones or lines of effect that originate from you also have a range of self, indicating that the origin point of the spell’s effect must be you (see “Areas of Effect” later in the this chapter)."
It's an area of effect originating from self (the caster is the point of origin).
In which case you or your position are the target, because the target is the point of origin for the area of effect as specified in the target rules:
So once again, you are the target of the spell, and while another creature can be the target of its effect, at best that means there are two targets (itself grounds to prevent War Caster from working).
However that's not actually how it works, because with a range Self spell you are the only possible target for the spell, and it is you to which the effect is applied; that effect being that you get to make a melee attack (which in turn its own target).
It's worth noting that this is the same problem that affects primal savagery, but not shocking grasp, because the former has a range of Self, and the latter has a range of Touch.
But I'm going to wash my hands of this thread at this point; I feel like I really can't really be any clearer in explaining why the wording of War Caster and the interaction with the rules is problematic, and this isn't even the rules and game mechanics sub-forum.
So for the last time, while I fully expect the intention is that range Self instantaneous melee attack spells like these are supposed to work with War Caster, with the way it's worded (and how explicitly a spell's target is tied to its range) it currently does not work in Rules As Written. It's a shame that Crawford has posted a tweet that contradicts what the rules say without bothering to publish an errata/actual sage advice about it, but that's not uncommon (and a big reason why Crawford's tweets can often be unhelpful in RAW, even if they help understand the intent).
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.