Has anyone come up with level advancement for the minor illusion cantrip? Obviously it is a cantrip, but attack cantrips become more powerful with level. On the flip, I don't want to overpower minor illusion. For say Warlocks, with so few options, it'd be nice to give it some additional functionality without encroaching on other illusion spells.
I had considered making the size of the object it can mimic larger. Or perhaps extending the range. Or, I had also considered increasing the number of object that could be created. Duration could also be increased.
While it is a cantrip, cantrips aren't the same as they used to be and for some, become the heart of the character. I'd like to hear what others have done to match minor illusion to other cantrip growth.
The 4M cantrips (Message, Mending, Minor Illusion, Mage Hand) are all SO good out of combat that I do not think they need a boost.
Minor Illusion for example lets you instantly show someone exactly what you mean, if in miniature. What is this "Fishman" you describe... then show them bullywog, triton, mermen, sahuagin, and have them pick.
It can always be used to hide behind, entertain, prove magic use, and a distracting sound.
To me it's clearly an inferior cantrip at higher levels. While we can create a scenario in which it can be used, it's forced rather than natural.
At 10 or even 15th level, there are very few things you need to show to another player. They're experienced and know what things look like. Even then, most of the time, they will usually encounter it the same time as the group. The use would be extremely rare. Entertain? Sure, but without a performance skill, you wouldn't know "how" to entertain. A SINGLE person could potentially hide behind an illusion assuming they crouch down and their perception rolls are low enough... again at higher level, would be easy enough to see past. 5 foot cube isn't much to work with.
I'm not sure what "prove magic use" would do at 10th level or higher. Assuming you mean proving that a PC could use a spell? Ok, but wouldn't any cantrip do that?
At 10th level and higher, it becomes almost entirely useless, save for "showing" something. The distance and duration are so short that using it for any sort of trap or provision for hiding would be difficult since there is still some point where one spell is canceled as you cast the next. However, duration is one of the aspects I considered expanding. A greater duration could subtly increase the usefulness, allowing the player to use minor illusion to disguise their escape for more than 1 minute... which is not very much time.
I routinely use Minor Illusion to show people things I saw, even at 16th level. Party, I mean THIS particular guy, not that guy. The puzzle only I can see via True Sight looks like this. Interacting with NPC: "We are looking for the Artifact that looks like THIS magical black sword with ghosts coming out if, not the +1 black sword your friend has." When I get visions via a scry spell or similar effects I show it to the other players using Minor Illusion.
This is the single cantrip that has NOT reduced in value. The others, while still useful, are much less so. Mage hand stopped being that important when our HP let us eat traps for breakfast, Message when we got Rary's Telepathic Bond, and Mending when our important stuff became magical.
That said, in our game the duration is not increased, but there is no point where one spell is cancelled. The DM allows seemless recasting, as the spell states that recasting it ends the last one. Since casting ends it, why would there be a time out?
Increasing the duration, size, or range changes it to a much more powerful spell, more like 1st level at a minimum.
Would you consider 4d12 damage more or less powerful than a 1st level spell? How about 5d10 damage? Cantrips in 5e aren't low power spells, but rather bread and butter spells. They are the arcane equivalent of a sword that is used over and over. If their intent was to be less powerful than a 1st level spell, they would never grow in power. Keep in mind that for a 1st level spell to do more damage, you have to spend a higher spell slot (unless a warlock and you're using one of your precious few spell slots). A cantrip is always cast at full power.
To be honest, I don't personally care for how cantrips are used in 5e, but the way they've crafted balance in the game it is what it is. Again, if you think it works well for you, I'm glad. However, the examples of use you've given are not specific uses that aren't easily accomplished via mundane means.
I personally have ruled that the act of casting it again dispels the previous version. While it's not a huge time gap, I'd say it's enough to "glitch". Even trying to align the two illusions perfectly, particularly at more than 5ft away would be incredibly difficult. But, even if I grant them seamless recasting, most NPCs (assuming they haven't already gained additional abilities common to higher level creatures/adversaries that would render the illusion useless) have a high enough perception to "notice clues" of an illusion. One of the problems is that the cast has to be within 30ft... practically on top of enemies, which means that the PCs are easily detected by other means, whether they are setting traps or trying to hide. And there is not enough duration to let a trap unfold. They nearly have to cast the illusion while something is walking towards them. A distracting sound seems useful except that they are almost close enough to shake hands with, particularly at 10th+.
Obviously, we have two very different opinions on this, which is fine. Perhaps I am a jerk GM. But I'm trying to give players an honest reason to take minor illusion as one of their handful of cantrips they will ever get. A 1st level spell is just a 1st level spell, but a cantrip is now arguably the most important spell magic users get. For sorcerers and warlocks, more so. If minor illusion was a 1st level spell, I wouldn't care. But as a cantrip it's lack of range and duration at the minimum become increasingly a disadvantage at higher levels. Now, it sounds like your GM provides for opportunities that it can be used. Promising my players that it will be useful because I'll make it useful according to my own discretion, doesn't do much for them. I'll probably whip something up and leave it here in the next few days, just in case anyone was interested.
With Minor Illusion you can create an image of a 5×5×5 boulder (or whatever) and hide inside of it giving yourself total cover. That’s amazeballs for a cantrip level spell.
A target with total cover can't be targeted directly by an attack or a spell, although some spells can reach such a target by including it in an area of effect. A target has total cover if it is completely concealed by an obstacle.
Save-based spells scale with your proficiency bonus, making it easier to fool enemies that don't scale with you (usually basic guards and the like), so this spell already scales. This is unlike mage hand, mending, etc. which don't scale because they're always just as useful as they were to start with.
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Cantrips aren't minor level spells, but the workhorse of magic users. If you adventure solo, not so bad. Any animal with scent would find you regardless of the illusion. You have 1 minute to hope they pass. I personally don't believe a caster could create the same exact rock twice in a row, that is to say trying to keep the exact details of a rock fixed in your mind from the first rock to the second rock would be virtually impossible. You could draw two rocks right now, but the chance of them looking exactly alike is basically 0. Even the general details of the rock would change from rock to rock. Plus the whole "Hey, where did this boulder/box/mound of dirt come from suddenly, in this place I live in every day."
Again, if it's duration increased, that might be a plausible plan. Still won't help vs creatures that smell, any sort of tremor sense, detect magic, etc... all things you're much more likely to encounter as you gain higher levels. If you're still running 1st level adventures at 10th, I'm sure it works well. I don't however.
@Haravikk
In higher level adventures, how often do you still run into low levels mobs that you are still hiding from or can't otherwise deal with? The range and duration become increasingly more limiting in higher levels due to the additional abilities of high level NPCs/Creatures. To be honest mage hand suffers from some of the same issues. Mending I agree, but always felt it would be better off as a 1st level spell, if not a ritual. Taking up a precious cantrip is tough.
It is generally the case, that as you increase in level, general abilities to analyze the environment increase and usually at greater range. While not every cantrip needs to be eldritch blast or firebolt, minor illusion (and mage hand for that matter) loses effectiveness due to the NPCs increasing capabilities. I'm speaking purely mechanically. If you as DMs embellish the capabilities of minor illusion.. great. Basically what I'm looking to do as well, but mechanically. Take a look at the homebrew I linked above. It does a good job. It still can't create a moving creature like the 1st level spell, but increases usefulness and gives a reason to build a character around the concept, rather than it being a monkey on a shelf you wind up occasionally out of boredom... or more likely never to pick it up at all.
But if you're happy with it, no problem. I however am not. I'm not criticizing anyone for liking it the way it is, just asking for how other people who have had the same problem with minor illusion that I do, how they've addressed it.
Who needs to create the rock twice?!? Sit inside the rock, pop out, fire bolt/chill touch the Orc from 120 feet away, pop back inside the illusion and be safe until your next turn. Rinse & repeat for three rounds and that Orc (or pro’ly Orcs) is dead dead dead. Hiding behind/within a minor illusion has many uses both inside and outside of combat.
PS- Cantrips are minor level spells, they are literally “level 0” spells.
A cantrip is a spell that can be cast at will, without using a spell slot and without being prepared in advance. Repeated practice has fixed the spell in the caster's mind and infused the caster with the magic needed to produce the effect over and over. A cantrip's spell level is 0.
With Minor Illusion you can create an image of a 5×5×5 boulder (or whatever) and hide inside of it giving yourself total cover. That’s amazeballs for a cantrip level spell.
A target with total cover can't be targeted directly by an attack or a spell, although some spells can reach such a target by including it in an area of effect. A target has total cover if it is completely concealed by an obstacle.
The illusion of the boulder doesn't create an actual obstacle that provides cover, so you can still be targeted by an attack. But if they can't see you because they don't see through the illusion, then they wouldn't be able to target you with a spell that requires seeing the target, and a weapon attack against you would have disadvantage.
It's still extremely useful for adding "extra" rock to a broken rock wall, so that you have partial cover from the actual wall, or such. My gnome rogue used it allllll the time for things to Hide in or behind.
With Minor Illusion you can create an image of a 5×5×5 boulder (or whatever) and hide inside of it giving yourself total cover. That’s amazeballs for a cantrip level spell.
A target with total cover can't be targeted directly by an attack or a spell, although some spells can reach such a target by including it in an area of effect. A target has total cover if it is completely concealed by an obstacle.
The illusion of the boulder doesn't create an actual obstacle that provides cover, so you can still be targeted by an attack. But if they can't see you because they don't see through the illusion, then they wouldn't be able to target you with a spell that requires seeing the target, and a weapon attack against you would have disadvantage.
I can understand why a DM would see it that way, but at the very least the hidden creature would be heavily obscured.
The most fundamental tasks of adventuring--noticing danger, finding hidden objects, hitting an enemy in combat, and targeting a spell, to name just a few--rely heavily on a character's ability to see. Darkness and other effects that obscure vision can prove a significant hindrance.
A given area might be lightly or heavily obscured. In a lightly obscured area, such as dim light, patchy fog, or moderate foliage, creatures have disadvantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks that rely on sight.
A heavily obscured area--such as darkness, opaque fog, or dense foliage--blocks vision entirely. A creature effectively suffers from the blinded condition when trying to see something in that area.
Oh, if you want an Improved Minor Illusion, take 2 levels of Wizard for the School of Illusion feature that makes your existing Minor Illusion able to make both an image and a sound. Otherwise, it's still extremely useful for not just hiding or trickery. As another example that hasn't been mentioned yet, I've used it to provide subtitles for the other party members when we were talking to someone who didn't speak Common and that most of them couldn't understand. (Heck, I was able to provide subtitles both ways since I knew Gnomish!)
Edit: One very important thing about Minor Illusion is that it doesn't have a Verbal component. Meaning, if you're Hidden from the enemy when you cast it, you don't reveal your position. So it's very useful for making a distracting sound to draw them away.
In higher level adventures, how often do you still run into low levels mobs that you are still hiding from or can't otherwise deal with?
Pretty often, because it's not the lower level enemies that are the problem, it's the higher level ones that they can alert. It doesn't matter if I'm breaking into a hostile area at level 1 or level 20, I'd still prefer to go unnoticed if possible, that's what a cantrip like minor illusion is good for; hiding things or creating distractions, with no resource cost, these remain as useful as you let them.
I actually misspoke earlier as while minor illusion follows the principle of a save based spell, I forgot it's actually a check, which enemies are even more likely to be bad at (most monsters have two or three skills at most, and high Intelligence is somewhat rare). This means that the spell remains useful at high levels against high level creatures as well, since the only threat is from truesight which a lot of high level creatures actually don't have (most have blindsight instead in 5th edition).
This means the spell remains as useful as you're willing to make it, same as mage hand etc. (which don't scale at all).
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I think minor illusion can be expanded to provide more usefulness but in my opinion it would/might go against the 5e keep things as simple as possible. You could have the realism of the illusion scale with level, skills, stats and tool knowledge (and maybe experience and other knowledge). One of the classic examples I have seen in the past is, I make an illusion of "creature" and the GM asks "Have you seen "creature" and what do you know about "creature" to make the illusion realistic?".
As to the popping in and out of cover, illusions and things that give bonuses, in some games these "bonuses" can be powerful and unbalancing so depending on the game/GM/setting we have often modified the rules to keep balance. For the about example of jumping/moving in and out of an illusion to block sight I might impose some penalty on the caster's rolls or provide a roll to opponents that notice the caster moving in and out of an illusion (ie breaking the laws of game world physics, I know that some spells and abilities allow for movement in and out of stone but at the same time in regions in which this is rare I would allow for disbelief to take hold and negate the illusion) could/would allow the opponent a roll to see through/disbelieve the illusion. Again I would scale the believability with level, stats, skills and caster's experience but again that might be too much info for 5e's keep it simple style.
For me right now I for the situation of popping in and out of a minor illusion providing cover I would give the opponents a chance to disbelieve the illusion and target the caster without penalties, I would provide a penalty of -1 to -x up to disadvantage to attacks based on a number of factors in combat. And if the combo provided too much advantage to the PC I would have the combo only work once or provide a larger bonus to disbelieve the illusion and attack without penalties.
I also think that I would provide a bonus to people who have disbelieved the illusion attacking the caster. Why? Because they are relying on a defense that is not their and not actively defending themselves as if their was no defense...if they are acting like there is no defense then again that would/could aid in the opponents disbelief roll.
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Has anyone come up with level advancement for the minor illusion cantrip? Obviously it is a cantrip, but attack cantrips become more powerful with level. On the flip, I don't want to overpower minor illusion. For say Warlocks, with so few options, it'd be nice to give it some additional functionality without encroaching on other illusion spells.
I had considered making the size of the object it can mimic larger. Or perhaps extending the range. Or, I had also considered increasing the number of object that could be created. Duration could also be increased.
While it is a cantrip, cantrips aren't the same as they used to be and for some, become the heart of the character. I'd like to hear what others have done to match minor illusion to other cantrip growth.
The 4M cantrips (Message, Mending, Minor Illusion, Mage Hand) are all SO good out of combat that I do not think they need a boost.
Minor Illusion for example lets you instantly show someone exactly what you mean, if in miniature. What is this "Fishman" you describe... then show them bullywog, triton, mermen, sahuagin, and have them pick.
It can always be used to hide behind, entertain, prove magic use, and a distracting sound.
I do not think it needs an improvement.
If you feel it's fine, then that's up to you.
To me it's clearly an inferior cantrip at higher levels. While we can create a scenario in which it can be used, it's forced rather than natural.
At 10 or even 15th level, there are very few things you need to show to another player. They're experienced and know what things look like. Even then, most of the time, they will usually encounter it the same time as the group. The use would be extremely rare. Entertain? Sure, but without a performance skill, you wouldn't know "how" to entertain. A SINGLE person could potentially hide behind an illusion assuming they crouch down and their perception rolls are low enough... again at higher level, would be easy enough to see past. 5 foot cube isn't much to work with.
I'm not sure what "prove magic use" would do at 10th level or higher. Assuming you mean proving that a PC could use a spell? Ok, but wouldn't any cantrip do that?
At 10th level and higher, it becomes almost entirely useless, save for "showing" something. The distance and duration are so short that using it for any sort of trap or provision for hiding would be difficult since there is still some point where one spell is canceled as you cast the next. However, duration is one of the aspects I considered expanding. A greater duration could subtly increase the usefulness, allowing the player to use minor illusion to disguise their escape for more than 1 minute... which is not very much time.
I routinely use Minor Illusion to show people things I saw, even at 16th level. Party, I mean THIS particular guy, not that guy. The puzzle only I can see via True Sight looks like this. Interacting with NPC: "We are looking for the Artifact that looks like THIS magical black sword with ghosts coming out if, not the +1 black sword your friend has." When I get visions via a scry spell or similar effects I show it to the other players using Minor Illusion.
This is the single cantrip that has NOT reduced in value. The others, while still useful, are much less so. Mage hand stopped being that important when our HP let us eat traps for breakfast, Message when we got Rary's Telepathic Bond, and Mending when our important stuff became magical.
That said, in our game the duration is not increased, but there is no point where one spell is cancelled. The DM allows seemless recasting, as the spell states that recasting it ends the last one. Since casting ends it, why would there be a time out?
Increasing the duration, size, or range changes it to a much more powerful spell, more like 1st level at a minimum.
Would you consider 4d12 damage more or less powerful than a 1st level spell? How about 5d10 damage? Cantrips in 5e aren't low power spells, but rather bread and butter spells. They are the arcane equivalent of a sword that is used over and over. If their intent was to be less powerful than a 1st level spell, they would never grow in power. Keep in mind that for a 1st level spell to do more damage, you have to spend a higher spell slot (unless a warlock and you're using one of your precious few spell slots). A cantrip is always cast at full power.
To be honest, I don't personally care for how cantrips are used in 5e, but the way they've crafted balance in the game it is what it is. Again, if you think it works well for you, I'm glad. However, the examples of use you've given are not specific uses that aren't easily accomplished via mundane means.
I personally have ruled that the act of casting it again dispels the previous version. While it's not a huge time gap, I'd say it's enough to "glitch". Even trying to align the two illusions perfectly, particularly at more than 5ft away would be incredibly difficult. But, even if I grant them seamless recasting, most NPCs (assuming they haven't already gained additional abilities common to higher level creatures/adversaries that would render the illusion useless) have a high enough perception to "notice clues" of an illusion. One of the problems is that the cast has to be within 30ft... practically on top of enemies, which means that the PCs are easily detected by other means, whether they are setting traps or trying to hide. And there is not enough duration to let a trap unfold. They nearly have to cast the illusion while something is walking towards them. A distracting sound seems useful except that they are almost close enough to shake hands with, particularly at 10th+.
Obviously, we have two very different opinions on this, which is fine. Perhaps I am a jerk GM. But I'm trying to give players an honest reason to take minor illusion as one of their handful of cantrips they will ever get. A 1st level spell is just a 1st level spell, but a cantrip is now arguably the most important spell magic users get. For sorcerers and warlocks, more so. If minor illusion was a 1st level spell, I wouldn't care. But as a cantrip it's lack of range and duration at the minimum become increasingly a disadvantage at higher levels. Now, it sounds like your GM provides for opportunities that it can be used. Promising my players that it will be useful because I'll make it useful according to my own discretion, doesn't do much for them. I'll probably whip something up and leave it here in the next few days, just in case anyone was interested.
I forgot there was a homebrew section here.
Here is one, not too far from what I was thinking.
https://www.dndbeyond.com/spells/923928-minor-illusion-scaled
With Minor Illusion you can create an image of a 5×5×5 boulder (or whatever) and hide inside of it giving yourself total cover. That’s amazeballs for a cantrip level spell.
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Save-based spells scale with your proficiency bonus, making it easier to fool enemies that don't scale with you (usually basic guards and the like), so this spell already scales. This is unlike mage hand, mending, etc. which don't scale because they're always just as useful as they were to start with.
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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Cantrips aren't minor level spells, but the workhorse of magic users. If you adventure solo, not so bad. Any animal with scent would find you regardless of the illusion. You have 1 minute to hope they pass. I personally don't believe a caster could create the same exact rock twice in a row, that is to say trying to keep the exact details of a rock fixed in your mind from the first rock to the second rock would be virtually impossible. You could draw two rocks right now, but the chance of them looking exactly alike is basically 0. Even the general details of the rock would change from rock to rock. Plus the whole "Hey, where did this boulder/box/mound of dirt come from suddenly, in this place I live in every day."
Again, if it's duration increased, that might be a plausible plan. Still won't help vs creatures that smell, any sort of tremor sense, detect magic, etc... all things you're much more likely to encounter as you gain higher levels. If you're still running 1st level adventures at 10th, I'm sure it works well. I don't however.
@Haravikk
In higher level adventures, how often do you still run into low levels mobs that you are still hiding from or can't otherwise deal with? The range and duration become increasingly more limiting in higher levels due to the additional abilities of high level NPCs/Creatures. To be honest mage hand suffers from some of the same issues. Mending I agree, but always felt it would be better off as a 1st level spell, if not a ritual. Taking up a precious cantrip is tough.
It is generally the case, that as you increase in level, general abilities to analyze the environment increase and usually at greater range. While not every cantrip needs to be eldritch blast or firebolt, minor illusion (and mage hand for that matter) loses effectiveness due to the NPCs increasing capabilities. I'm speaking purely mechanically. If you as DMs embellish the capabilities of minor illusion.. great. Basically what I'm looking to do as well, but mechanically. Take a look at the homebrew I linked above. It does a good job. It still can't create a moving creature like the 1st level spell, but increases usefulness and gives a reason to build a character around the concept, rather than it being a monkey on a shelf you wind up occasionally out of boredom... or more likely never to pick it up at all.
But if you're happy with it, no problem. I however am not. I'm not criticizing anyone for liking it the way it is, just asking for how other people who have had the same problem with minor illusion that I do, how they've addressed it.
Who needs to create the rock twice?!? Sit inside the rock, pop out, fire bolt /chill touch the Orc from 120 feet away, pop back inside the illusion and be safe until your next turn. Rinse & repeat for three rounds and that Orc (or pro’ly Orcs) is dead dead dead. Hiding behind/within a minor illusion has many uses both inside and outside of combat.
PS- Cantrips are minor level spells, they are literally “level 0” spells.
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The illusion of the boulder doesn't create an actual obstacle that provides cover, so you can still be targeted by an attack. But if they can't see you because they don't see through the illusion, then they wouldn't be able to target you with a spell that requires seeing the target, and a weapon attack against you would have disadvantage.
It's still extremely useful for adding "extra" rock to a broken rock wall, so that you have partial cover from the actual wall, or such. My gnome rogue used it allllll the time for things to Hide in or behind.
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I can understand why a DM would see it that way, but at the very least the hidden creature would be heavily obscured.
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Oh, if you want an Improved Minor Illusion, take 2 levels of Wizard for the School of Illusion feature that makes your existing Minor Illusion able to make both an image and a sound. Otherwise, it's still extremely useful for not just hiding or trickery. As another example that hasn't been mentioned yet, I've used it to provide subtitles for the other party members when we were talking to someone who didn't speak Common and that most of them couldn't understand. (Heck, I was able to provide subtitles both ways since I knew Gnomish!)
Edit: One very important thing about Minor Illusion is that it doesn't have a Verbal component. Meaning, if you're Hidden from the enemy when you cast it, you don't reveal your position. So it's very useful for making a distracting sound to draw them away.
Helpful rewriter of Japanese->English translation and delver into software codebases (she/e/they)
Pretty often, because it's not the lower level enemies that are the problem, it's the higher level ones that they can alert. It doesn't matter if I'm breaking into a hostile area at level 1 or level 20, I'd still prefer to go unnoticed if possible, that's what a cantrip like minor illusion is good for; hiding things or creating distractions, with no resource cost, these remain as useful as you let them.
I actually misspoke earlier as while minor illusion follows the principle of a save based spell, I forgot it's actually a check, which enemies are even more likely to be bad at (most monsters have two or three skills at most, and high Intelligence is somewhat rare). This means that the spell remains useful at high levels against high level creatures as well, since the only threat is from truesight which a lot of high level creatures actually don't have (most have blindsight instead in 5th edition).
This means the spell remains as useful as you're willing to make it, same as mage hand etc. (which don't scale at all).
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.
I think minor illusion can be expanded to provide more usefulness but in my opinion it would/might go against the 5e keep things as simple as possible. You could have the realism of the illusion scale with level, skills, stats and tool knowledge (and maybe experience and other knowledge). One of the classic examples I have seen in the past is, I make an illusion of "creature" and the GM asks "Have you seen "creature" and what do you know about "creature" to make the illusion realistic?".
As to the popping in and out of cover, illusions and things that give bonuses, in some games these "bonuses" can be powerful and unbalancing so depending on the game/GM/setting we have often modified the rules to keep balance. For the about example of jumping/moving in and out of an illusion to block sight I might impose some penalty on the caster's rolls or provide a roll to opponents that notice the caster moving in and out of an illusion (ie breaking the laws of game world physics, I know that some spells and abilities allow for movement in and out of stone but at the same time in regions in which this is rare I would allow for disbelief to take hold and negate the illusion) could/would allow the opponent a roll to see through/disbelieve the illusion. Again I would scale the believability with level, stats, skills and caster's experience but again that might be too much info for 5e's keep it simple style.
For me right now I for the situation of popping in and out of a minor illusion providing cover I would give the opponents a chance to disbelieve the illusion and target the caster without penalties, I would provide a penalty of -1 to -x up to disadvantage to attacks based on a number of factors in combat. And if the combo provided too much advantage to the PC I would have the combo only work once or provide a larger bonus to disbelieve the illusion and attack without penalties.
I also think that I would provide a bonus to people who have disbelieved the illusion attacking the caster. Why? Because they are relying on a defense that is not their and not actively defending themselves as if their was no defense...if they are acting like there is no defense then again that would/could aid in the opponents disbelief roll.