I understand the Underwater rules, but I haven't found any rule in particular regarding ranged spell attacks under water; I known ranged weapon attacks are different, so is there any difference between them? And if there is rules regarding spell attacks underwater please link them. Unless they are the same.
The limitations of underwater combat only apply to weapon attacks, spell attacks don't have their ranges or attack advantage/disadvantage affected. The only limiting factor is for fire damage, since being immersed in water gives fire resistance.
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Helpful rewriter of Japanese->English translation and delver into software codebases (she/e/they)
There is one potential Issue. Verbal components. It’s very hard to speak with a mouthful of water. So unless you have water breathing or some other feature that’s tough
There is one potential Issue. Verbal components. It’s very hard to speak with a mouthful of water. So unless you have water breathing or some other feature that’s tough
Yeah, there is that. You'd need the ability to breathe water to cast spells with verbal components (and even then some DMs may not allow doing verbal components properly underwater.) Being a member of a race with Hold Breath won't do the job, since once you try to say something you're not holding your breath.
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Helpful rewriter of Japanese->English translation and delver into software codebases (she/e/they)
Every DM treats spells with verbal components differently underwater so you need to check with them as the rules do not say. I have experianced
You can not cast spells with verbal components underwater even with iunderwater breathing (the arguement goes that while you can breather underwater the sounds you make are totally different due to the different medium). I do think this is undully harsh
You can not cast spells with verbal components underwater unless you have underwater breathing
If you cast a spell with verbal components while underwater you stop holding your breath (i.e. you can only survive for a number of rounds equal to your con modifier before going to 0HP).
If you cast a spell with verbal components while underwater you use a proportion of your breath stop holding your breath (i.e. after you cast a nuber of such spells, usually, 2 or 3, you are out of breath).
Being underwater has no impact on spellcasting (the rules don't say you can not cast spells with verbal components underwater, or that they use your breath so there is no restictiopn
RAW I would have to go with the last option but I think it is unfairly advantagous to spellcasters so when I DM I tend to go with the 3rd option).
The only real valid one is that Verbal Components would require you to no longer hold your breath if you do not have a means to Breathe Underwater (this is why Air Bubble and Water Breathing Spells are so useful).
My note: I would use a similar standard for how long you can hold your breath as for how many spells you can cast.
Suffocating
A creature can hold its breath for a number of minutes equal to 1 + its Constitution modifier (minimum of 30 seconds).
When a creature runs out of breath or is choking, it can survive for a number of rounds equal to its Constitution modifier (minimum of 1 round). At the start of its next turn, it drops to 0 hit points and is dying, and it can’t regain hit points or be stabilized until it can breathe again.
Using the above rules, I would say creatures can as many spells as they have minutes of held breath, loosing a minute of held breath per spell (this is spell, not rounds of spells, so if you Cast an Action Spell and a Bonus Action Spell, one cantrip and one leveled in whichever version of the pairing you prefer, that is two lost minutes, same for a reaction spells), and yes, things like Tortles and Lizardfolk who have the Feature Hold Breath benefit way more from their specialized Lung Capacity... but then again Tritons, Sea Elves, Water Genasi, some Simic Hybrids, and the like are totally exempt from having to worry about this... the exception is Air Genasi, as they have a special Hold Breath, which I would say they get Proficiency bonus times the minutes of standard 1 + Constitution modifier (to represent their greater breath control). You can't cast spells while choking.
Jeremy Crawford's tweets are not part of the rules and there are several cases where they conradict each other or even sage advice.
I stand by what I said, which in essentially says RAW is consistent with the first tweet you posted. His second post is more inline with my third option though I would argue the rules do not say that if you cast a spell with verbal components you are no longer holding your breath which is an assumption by JC. This raises questions regarding other assumptions for example if casting a spell woth verbal components means you are no longer holding your breath does that mean the exhalation of air is necessary for verbal components, in that case even creatures who do not need to breath or can breath water would suffer a limit to the amount of verbal casting they can do. Assumptions such as these can easily justify any of the rules interpretations I have posted.
A quick note - the air bubble spell solves these problems as you are still surrounded by by air not water as far as verbal components go and the air bubble spell allows the air you need to enter from the water as long as the spell is up. Of course casting it when underwater is still problematic
A quick note - the air bubble spell solves these problems as you are still surrounded by by air not water as far as verbal components go and the air bubble spell allows the air you need to enter from the water as long as the spell is up. Of course casting it when underwater is still problematic
Both Water Breathing (Feature or Spell) and Air Bubble, work, since we have numerous examples of species that can cast spells underwater. Sahuagin are a great example, especially the Sahuagin Wave Shaper, as its Innate Spellcasting specifically says it casts its spells using ONLY Verbal Components, it actually forgoes somatic and material components but must use Verbal.
I would say Air Bubble is better overall once you get level 3 spells, as it can effect far more than an upcast Air Bubble, but Air Bubble has more environments where it can benefit (Underwater, Space, anyplace with toxic air or Poison Gas) but at the cost of being more an individual spell. They both last 24 hours, they both work without concentration, and their spell level is only one different, but Water Breathing affects considerably more people (a 9th level Air Bubble can only affect 8 people total, a normal base 3rd level Water Breathing can affect 10 willing allies but has no upcast capabilities but if you have 9th level spell slots you also likely have more than one 3rd level slot as well as other spell slots so a second Water Breathing would add another 10 willing targets) and can be ritual cast to not require a spell slot (and now you can just spend 20 minutes and no spell slots to have 20 willing targets Water Breathing, or spend an hour and that is 60 people).
It's interesting that the game does not seem to consider massive amounts of water that completely fill many spaces to be an obstacle that will cause a violation of the Clear Path rule for spellcasting. Beyond certain ranges this substance effectively creates total cover against ranged weapon attacks although in the case of the Longbow that range is pretty far.
I guess this baseline fact might be useful for a DM that is trying to determine if a particular substance is actually an "obstacle" that provides enough of a "degree of protection" to qualify as something that provides Cover according to the rules for Cover. If a very large volume of water doesn't do it then the bar for this is set pretty high. No more gaining Total Cover bonuses by ducking behind a sheet of thin cloth that is blocking a doorway or a thin pane of glass since it should clearly be easier to shoot through such things than a massive amount of water. This also means that if such things are not ruled as providing Total Cover, then spells can be targeted through such things according to the Clear Path rule.
The DMG includes rules for Visibility Underwater, so a DM could use them to disallow certain spells if the target can't be seen.
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Visibility Underwater. Visibility underwater depends on water clarity and the available light. Use the Underwater Encounter Distance table to determine the encounter distances underwater.
2 different things - 1) because of the speed differences water distorts sounds spoken in air. So air based and water based verbal components might not be the same. Creatures that regularly work in both (sauhaugin, sea elves, etc) would generally practice in both be prepared. A land based caster that never experimented underwater could easily have problems hence the use of air bubble vs water breathing. However, that calls for a fair realistic game play style and so the rules simply allowing for casting underwater suit normal gameplay balance better. 2) I have been diving in water clear enough to have good visibility well past 150’. I’ve also been diving (very briefly) in water with true 0’ visibility. I suspect the listed encounter distances actually have as much to do with missile weapon effective ranges as with visibility. Modern spearguns ( the equivalent of bows and bows) have effective ranges of only 5-6 meters (15-18 ft), well within melee closing ranges. This basically gives missile weapons a single round before disadvantage starts applying. Ranged magic potentially works better unless the visibility conditions provide effective cover. Without the limitations provided in clear well lit waters the fights would be over via magic almost before melee would be possible.
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I understand the Underwater rules, but I haven't found any rule in particular regarding ranged spell attacks under water; I known ranged weapon attacks are different, so is there any difference between them? And if there is rules regarding spell attacks underwater please link them. Unless they are the same.
The limitations of underwater combat only apply to weapon attacks, spell attacks don't have their ranges or attack advantage/disadvantage affected. The only limiting factor is for fire damage, since being immersed in water gives fire resistance.
Helpful rewriter of Japanese->English translation and delver into software codebases (she/e/they)
There is one potential Issue. Verbal components. It’s very hard to speak with a mouthful of water. So unless you have water breathing or some other feature that’s tough
Yeah, there is that. You'd need the ability to breathe water to cast spells with verbal components (and even then some DMs may not allow doing verbal components properly underwater.) Being a member of a race with Hold Breath won't do the job, since once you try to say something you're not holding your breath.
Helpful rewriter of Japanese->English translation and delver into software codebases (she/e/they)
Thank You.
Every DM treats spells with verbal components differently underwater so you need to check with them as the rules do not say. I have experianced
RAW I would have to go with the last option but I think it is unfairly advantagous to spellcasters so when I DM I tend to go with the 3rd option).
Jeremy Crawford has denounced most of this.
Crawford on Spellcasting Underwater 1
Crawford on Verbal Components Underwater 1
The only real valid one is that Verbal Components would require you to no longer hold your breath if you do not have a means to Breathe Underwater (this is why Air Bubble and Water Breathing Spells are so useful).
My note: I would use a similar standard for how long you can hold your breath as for how many spells you can cast.
Using the above rules, I would say creatures can as many spells as they have minutes of held breath, loosing a minute of held breath per spell (this is spell, not rounds of spells, so if you Cast an Action Spell and a Bonus Action Spell, one cantrip and one leveled in whichever version of the pairing you prefer, that is two lost minutes, same for a reaction spells), and yes, things like Tortles and Lizardfolk who have the Feature Hold Breath benefit way more from their specialized Lung Capacity... but then again Tritons, Sea Elves, Water Genasi, some Simic Hybrids, and the like are totally exempt from having to worry about this... the exception is Air Genasi, as they have a special Hold Breath, which I would say they get Proficiency bonus times the minutes of standard 1 + Constitution modifier (to represent their greater breath control). You can't cast spells while choking.
Wow that was a long time to reply.
Jeremy Crawford's tweets are not part of the rules and there are several cases where they conradict each other or even sage advice.
I stand by what I said, which in essentially says RAW is consistent with the first tweet you posted. His second post is more inline with my third option though I would argue the rules do not say that if you cast a spell with verbal components you are no longer holding your breath which is an assumption by JC. This raises questions regarding other assumptions for example if casting a spell woth verbal components means you are no longer holding your breath does that mean the exhalation of air is necessary for verbal components, in that case even creatures who do not need to breath or can breath water would suffer a limit to the amount of verbal casting they can do. Assumptions such as these can easily justify any of the rules interpretations I have posted.
A quick note - the air bubble spell solves these problems as you are still surrounded by by air not water as far as verbal components go and the air bubble spell allows the air you need to enter from the water as long as the spell is up. Of course casting it when underwater is still problematic
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
Both Water Breathing (Feature or Spell) and Air Bubble, work, since we have numerous examples of species that can cast spells underwater. Sahuagin are a great example, especially the Sahuagin Wave Shaper, as its Innate Spellcasting specifically says it casts its spells using ONLY Verbal Components, it actually forgoes somatic and material components but must use Verbal.
I would say Air Bubble is better overall once you get level 3 spells, as it can effect far more than an upcast Air Bubble, but Air Bubble has more environments where it can benefit (Underwater, Space, anyplace with toxic air or Poison Gas) but at the cost of being more an individual spell. They both last 24 hours, they both work without concentration, and their spell level is only one different, but Water Breathing affects considerably more people (a 9th level Air Bubble can only affect 8 people total, a normal base 3rd level Water Breathing can affect 10 willing allies but has no upcast capabilities but if you have 9th level spell slots you also likely have more than one 3rd level slot as well as other spell slots so a second Water Breathing would add another 10 willing targets) and can be ritual cast to not require a spell slot (and now you can just spend 20 minutes and no spell slots to have 20 willing targets Water Breathing, or spend an hour and that is 60 people).
It's interesting that the game does not seem to consider massive amounts of water that completely fill many spaces to be an obstacle that will cause a violation of the Clear Path rule for spellcasting. Beyond certain ranges this substance effectively creates total cover against ranged weapon attacks although in the case of the Longbow that range is pretty far.
I guess this baseline fact might be useful for a DM that is trying to determine if a particular substance is actually an "obstacle" that provides enough of a "degree of protection" to qualify as something that provides Cover according to the rules for Cover. If a very large volume of water doesn't do it then the bar for this is set pretty high. No more gaining Total Cover bonuses by ducking behind a sheet of thin cloth that is blocking a doorway or a thin pane of glass since it should clearly be easier to shoot through such things than a massive amount of water. This also means that if such things are not ruled as providing Total Cover, then spells can be targeted through such things according to the Clear Path rule.
The DMG includes rules for Visibility Underwater, so a DM could use them to disallow certain spells if the target can't be seen.
---
Visibility Underwater. Visibility underwater depends on water clarity and the available light. Use the Underwater Encounter Distance table to determine the encounter distances underwater.
Underwater Encounter Distance
2 different things -
1) because of the speed differences water distorts sounds spoken in air. So air based and water based verbal components might not be the same. Creatures that regularly work in both (sauhaugin, sea elves, etc) would generally practice in both be prepared. A land based caster that never experimented underwater could easily have problems hence the use of air bubble vs water breathing. However, that calls for a fair realistic game play style and so the rules simply allowing for casting underwater suit normal gameplay balance better.
2) I have been diving in water clear enough to have good visibility well past 150’. I’ve also been diving (very briefly) in water with true 0’ visibility. I suspect the listed encounter distances actually have as much to do with missile weapon effective ranges as with visibility. Modern spearguns ( the equivalent of bows and bows) have effective ranges of only 5-6 meters (15-18 ft), well within melee closing ranges. This basically gives missile weapons a single round before disadvantage starts applying. Ranged magic potentially works better unless the visibility conditions provide effective cover. Without the limitations provided in clear well lit waters the fights would be over via magic almost before melee would be possible.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.