If you can keep an opponent in it, Sickening Radiance is brutal! Banishment is a great spell too.
Like any area-effect spell, it works great if you have Repelling Blast, or Grasp of Hadar.
"Oh, he ran out of the Sickening Radiance area? Blast! Blast! Blast! Now he's back in it." Also, even if you can't keep the enemy in it, he's still got a level of Exhaustion which ain't bad.
My 4th level spells are Sickening Radiance, Banishment, Charm Monster, and Dimension Door. Most of those have been spoken for in this thread. Charm Monster I've found very useful as it fills a niche no one else in my party has covered.
I want to like Sickening Radiance but...Con Save plus concentration...ouch! I guess you can try E-Blast the creature back into the sphere...that's assuming it moves directly toward you. These combo's just never seem to work (for me) in practice...
Shadow of Moil. It has the effect of making you heavily obscured, which as per errata clarification makes any creature effectively blind when looking at you. So in terms of combat effectiveness it is on par with Greater Invisibility, meaning against creatures without blindsight you have advantage on any attacks, they have disadvantage, you can also not be targeted by spells and abilities that require sight (you also do not need to be close to an enemy for this to be effective).
This is also not something Darkvision helps with, same as how Darkvision does not help with fog or similar types of obscurement.
I want to like Sickening Radiance but...Con Save plus concentration...ouch! I guess you can try E-Blast the creature back into the sphere...that's assuming it moves directly toward you. These combo's just never seem to work (for me) in practice...
The invocation outlay for Grasp of Hadar and Repelling as well as Agonizing is heavy but it's great for the battlefield controller type. If you have a wizard or sorcerer in the party to help set up hazards it's even better.
As you've noted, Sickening Radiance is a CON save but you can keep punting them in or out, depending on how long a battle lasts. Placing the hazard behind enemies works well if you only have Repelling. Also depending on how the wording of Sickening Radiance is interpreted, if a creature stays in its field it will have to keep saving and taking damage on the start of their (next) turn. They have to try to get out in some direction, at which point... You get the idea.
Does the level of exhaustion stack? errata only says on fail, suffer one level of exhaustion, so if they fail again do they suffer an additional one level of exhaustion, or is it fixed at first level of exhaustion?
Shadow of Moil. It has the effect of making you heavily obscured, which as per errata clarification makes any creature effectively blind when looking at you. So in terms of combat effectiveness it is on par with Greater Invisibility, meaning against creatures without blindsight you have advantage on any attacks, they have disadvantage, you can also not be targeted by spells and abilities that require sight (you also do not need to be close to an enemy for this to be effective).
This is also not something Darkvision helps with, same as how Darkvision does not help with fog or similar types of obscurement.
I really want to love Shadow of Moil because it gives, damage, resistance and essentially invisibility. It's just that every adventure I've played makes it impossible due to the size of corridors or rooms. 10' on every side is a significant area of effect. For the melee type, it's potentially more useful but even then, it's problematic. How am I using this wrong?
Does the level of exhaustion stack? errata only says on fail, suffer one level of exhaustion, so if they fail again do they suffer an additional one level of exhaustion, or is it fixed at first level of exhaustion?
Our DM ruled that they did. Considering it's a CON save and exhaustion takes 2-3 levels to really start to hurt, it isn't unbalancing.
Edit: There was also a Sage Advice asking if targets remained dead if they reached the 6th level of exhaustion, so I assume it was the intention for the spell to stack exhaustion.
Shadow of Moil. It has the effect of making you heavily obscured, which as per errata clarification makes any creature effectively blind when looking at you. So in terms of combat effectiveness it is on par with Greater Invisibility, meaning against creatures without blindsight you have advantage on any attacks, they have disadvantage, you can also not be targeted by spells and abilities that require sight (you also do not need to be close to an enemy for this to be effective).
This is also not something Darkvision helps with, same as how Darkvision does not help with fog or similar types of obscurement.
I really want to love Shadow of Moil because it gives, damage, resistance and essentially invisibility. It's just that every adventure I've played makes it impossible due to the size of corridors or rooms. 10' on every side is a significant area of effect. For the melee type, it's potentially more useful but even then, it's problematic. How am I using this wrong?
Keep in mind that the magical heavy obscurement affects only you, ie a single 5ft square, nothing else. It does reduce the light in a 10ft area around you by one level, however that is not magical darkness, meaning party members with darkvision or carrying a light source will simply see through it as dim light, which only affects perception checks. In fact if you happen to have party members with darkvision and you are fighting monsters that don't, your party members can even use the darkness to their advantage and take cover in it.
Devil's Sight is useful because a) it penetrates the Darkness spell, which has a special clause blocking darkvision, b) it does not impose a Perception penalty in total darkness, and c) it has superior range to most races' darkvision.
Nothing in the rules you quoted indicates that darkvision is blocked by magical darkness from a source other than the Darkness spell. That's from previous editions. Lots of DMs will run it like older editions, though, or allow SoM obscurement to work regardless, which is why you should ask.
Devil's Sight is useful because a) it penetrates the Darkness spell, which has a special clause blocking darkvision, b) it does not impose a Perception penalty in total darkness, and c) it has superior range to most races' darkvision.
Nothing in the rules you quoted indicates that darkvision is blocked by magical darkness from a source other than the Darkness spell. That's from previous editions. Lots of DMs will run it like older editions, though, or allow SoM obscurement to work regardless, which is why you should ask.
Devil's Sight is useful because a) it penetrates the Darkness spell, which has a special clause blocking darkvision, b) it does not impose a Perception penalty in total darkness, and c) it has superior range to most races' darkvision.
Nothing in the rules you quoted indicates that darkvision is blocked by magical darkness from a source other than the Darkness spell. That's from previous editions. Lots of DMs will run it like older editions, though, or allow SoM obscurement to work regardless, which is why you should ask.
On page 185-186 of the Players Handbook you can see that the only "sight" that pierces Magical Darkness from spells like Darkness is Truesight.
And Devil's Sight is the other exception that pierces magical darkness from spells like Darkness. It's why Devil's Sight is so awesome!
This is correct. Specific beats general and as the Devil's Sight invocation specifically says it sees through magical darkness, it is an exception to the general rule.
Sorry for the necro post. I am new to Warlock and I am starting at level 8 due to the campaign we are in. I want to like Sickening Radiance but if I read it right, there is no half damage if they save correct? So if I am not specing my invocations for battlefield control via EB, it seems like Sickening Radiance usefulness declines heavily. Thoughts?
Sickening Radiance is useful for hitting a number of opponents at once. Because a save negates it's effect, it's not so great when you're targeting one opponent with it.
Agreed. I use it when there’s a detachment of orcs or something similar, that way, I’m bound to see Multiple failures. Then I just use my EB to bounce them back into the radius.
Just out of curiousity Jayne, what is your pact and what do you want to do with your warlock?
Edit: never mind the last question. I see you posted separately, I’ll reply there.
Shadow of Moil. It has the effect of making you heavily obscured, which as per errata clarification makes any creature effectively blind when looking at you. So in terms of combat effectiveness it is on par with Greater Invisibility, meaning against creatures without blindsight you have advantage on any attacks, they have disadvantage, you can also not be targeted by spells and abilities that require sight (you also do not need to be close to an enemy for this to be effective).
This is also not something Darkvision helps with, same as how Darkvision does not help with fog or similar types of obscurement.
The invocation outlay for Grasp of Hadar and Repelling as well as Agonizing is heavy but it's great for the battlefield controller type. If you have a wizard or sorcerer in the party to help set up hazards it's even better.
As you've noted, Sickening Radiance is a CON save but you can keep punting them in or out, depending on how long a battle lasts. Placing the hazard behind enemies works well if you only have Repelling. Also depending on how the wording of Sickening Radiance is interpreted, if a creature stays in its field it will have to keep saving and taking damage on the start of their (next) turn. They have to try to get out in some direction, at which point... You get the idea.
Does the level of exhaustion stack? errata only says on fail, suffer one level of exhaustion, so if they fail again do they suffer an additional one level of exhaustion, or is it fixed at first level of exhaustion?
I really want to love Shadow of Moil because it gives, damage, resistance and essentially invisibility. It's just that every adventure I've played makes it impossible due to the size of corridors or rooms. 10' on every side is a significant area of effect. For the melee type, it's potentially more useful but even then, it's problematic. How am I using this wrong?
Our DM ruled that they did. Considering it's a CON save and exhaustion takes 2-3 levels to really start to hurt, it isn't unbalancing.
Edit: There was also a Sage Advice asking if targets remained dead if they reached the 6th level of exhaustion, so I assume it was the intention for the spell to stack exhaustion.
Keep in mind that the magical heavy obscurement affects only you, ie a single 5ft square, nothing else. It does reduce the light in a 10ft area around you by one level, however that is not magical darkness, meaning party members with darkvision or carrying a light source will simply see through it as dim light, which only affects perception checks. In fact if you happen to have party members with darkvision and you are fighting monsters that don't, your party members can even use the darkness to their advantage and take cover in it.
https://twitter.com/quadhund/status/1006987008626122752
On page 185-186 of the Players Handbook you can see that the only "sight" that pierces Magical Darkness from spells like Darkness is Truesight.
And Devil's Sight is the other exception that pierces magical darkness from spells like Darkness. It's why Devil's Sight is so awesome!
Professional computer geek
This is correct. Specific beats general and as the Devil's Sight invocation specifically says it sees through magical darkness, it is an exception to the general rule.
Sorry for the necro post. I am new to Warlock and I am starting at level 8 due to the campaign we are in. I want to like Sickening Radiance but if I read it right, there is no half damage if they save correct? So if I am not specing my invocations for battlefield control via EB, it seems like Sickening Radiance usefulness declines heavily. Thoughts?
Sickening Radiance is useful for hitting a number of opponents at once. Because a save negates it's effect, it's not so great when you're targeting one opponent with it.
Professional computer geek
Agreed. I use it when there’s a detachment of orcs or something similar, that way, I’m bound to see Multiple failures. Then I just use my EB to bounce them back into the radius.
Just out of curiousity Jayne, what is your pact and what do you want to do with your warlock?
Edit: never mind the last question. I see you posted separately, I’ll reply there.