Darkness can only affect a radiant damage spell in so far as it blocks line of sight. Most attack spells require the caster to be able to see the target. So if you can see through magical darkness then there is no impact. Cast away. If you can’t see the target then no, you can’t cast spells on them unless they have a large area effect such as fireball.
The only one objectively unaffected is Divine Favor. it doesn't require sight, and it doesn't create light of any kind.
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I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
The only one objectively unaffected is Divine Favor. it doesn't require sight, and it doesn't create light of any kind.
Such spells were attack spells not strictly radiant one, which only 1 listed is (#3) and doesn't require seeing the target.
We're talking about spells that deal radiant damage being nullified by the darkness spell. There are only 6 of them in consideration.
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I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
We're talking about spells that deal radiant damage being nullified by the darkness spell. There are only 6 of them in consideration.
I know, i was only clarifying Beardsinger 's post saying ''Most attack spells require the caster to be able to see the target'' that it wasn't the case. You quoted my reply and never really addressed what we were talking about and kind of got confusing. All i wanted to clarify is that most attack spells do not require you to see your target, radiant or not.
We're talking about spells that deal radiant damage being nullified by the darkness spell. There are only 6 of them in consideration.
I know, i was only clarifying Beardsinger 's post saying ''Most attack spells require the caster to be able to see the target'' that it wasn't the case. You quoted my reply and never really addressed what we were talking about and kind of got confusing. All i wanted to clarify is that most attack spells do not require you to see your target, radiant or not.
There may be some miscommunication going on, then. You took him saying "attack spells" to mean "Spells which require attack rolls". He seems to have meant "Spells that hurt enemies", given the context of both his comment and the topic. Attack spell isn't a game term, after all, so we should read it in context to the convo. ie If someone were to say Fireball is an attack spell, I'd most certainly agree with them. It is a fantastic attack spell. One of the best.
But the topic is darkness and radiant damage spells. His point was that line of sight blocks some of them because they require sight. He is correct. 2 of the 6 spells in question get blocked by darkness because it interferes with sight.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
It should be noted that the definition of the word radiant is produces light or heat,(Radiant) Heat is by definition a form of light whose color is redder than red. Light is not separate from radiant, they are synonyms, at least outside of D&D. Also, every light spell that does damage does radiant damage.
That said, I appear to be outvoted, everyone goes with the strictest definition, which lets magical darkness do nothing to protect against a spell like Guiding bolt that describes itself as being made of light:
A flash of light streaks toward a creature of your choice within range. Make a ranged spell attack against the target. On a hit, the target takes 4d6 radiant damage, and the next attack roll made against this target before the end of your next turn has advantage, thanks to the mystical dim light glittering on the target until then.
I appear to be outvoted, everyone goes with the strictest definition, which lets magical darkness do nothing to protect against a spell like Guiding bolt that describes itself as being made of light:
Darkness explicitly only dispels light with an area that overlaps its own, so there's no basis for it to have any impact on guiding bolt because guiding bolt does not have an area. It also arguably can't be dispelled as guiding bolt is not a persistent spell (it's instantaneous), you can't normally dispel instantaneous spells, you would need to counterspell them as they are cast. Darkness would need to say something like "spells that produce light or deal radiant damage cannot exist within its area" or something along those lines.
The area of magical darkness will certainly make the guiding bolt impossible to see within its area (if you don't have devil's sight or similar), and make it harder for you to be targeted by it, but it won't stop it from hurting you because that's simply not something the spell says that it does.
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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Any spell that produces any light produces an "area of light", regardless of how small that area might be. When a spell tells us however many feet, it defines an area beyond the source where the light is projected. In the case where the spell produces light, but does not define an area, we still know that if the source of the light-producing spell is within the area of the darkness, they overlap. Compare this with a spell that projects light beyond its source to a defined area, where the source of the light need not be within the darkness as long as the projected light overlaps the darkness.
It should be noted that the definition of the word radiant is produces light or heat,(Radiant) Heat is by definition a form of light whose color is redder than red. Light is not separate from radiant, they are synonyms, at least outside of D&D.
OK, no, on a few counts:
1) Heat is not a form of light, it's a different form of energy. If you're arguing that all forms of energy are the same, then you're arguing that fire and lightning, at the very least, are also in the exact same bucket
2) The definition of the word 'radiant' isn't particularly relevant to a discussion of RAW rules. Maybe RAI. Even by its external definition, however, it's not "a synonym for light". Even by the definition that directly relates to light, it's a description of how the light is transmitted -- it'd be a synonym for a word like 'glowing'. But there are also definitions of the word 'radiant' that have nothing to do with light at all
3) If we're getting into some kind of RAI discussion of how magical darkness is meant to impact radiant damage, you'll have to start explaining why you think darkness would block heat
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Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
Any spell that produces any light produces an "area of light"
An area is a specific thing defined in the rules, a spell either has an area or it doesn't; light is also a defined thing in the rules, and defined in terms of its area. Everything else is incidental; it has no explicit influence on the rules or how they interact.
Projectiles etc. can be glowing, audible etc., but what that actually means is entirely up to your DM as the rules don't explicitly define any of that beyond "roll Perception to see something maybe".
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.
It's a mistake to think that radiant damage is light-based. Yeah, radiant has a certain meaning in physics, but that meaning is very clearly not relevant here, because the rules say that "Radiant damage, dealt by a cleric’s flame strike spell or an angel’s smiting weapon, sears the flesh like fire and overloads the spirit with power." There's no physical explanation for "overloading the spirit with power." It's magic.
I appear to be outvoted, everyone goes with the strictest definition, which lets magical darkness do nothing to protect against a spell like Guiding bolt that describes itself as being made of light:
Darkness explicitly only dispels light with an area that overlaps its own, so there's no basis for it to have any impact on guiding bolt because guiding bolt does not have an area.
It doesn't have a defined area. But it does have an area. Your DM will make this call.
It also arguably can't be dispelled as guiding bolt is not a persistent spell (it's instantaneous), you can't normally dispel instantaneous spells, you would need to counterspell them as they are cast.
IDK, an arguement could be made for someone readying an action to dispel magic a spell being cast. More important even, guiding bolt isn't instantaneous. It has a duration of 1 round.
Darkness would need to say something like "spells that produce light or deal radiant damage cannot exist within its area" or something along those lines.
It does say something along those lines. Spells which create area of light are dispelled if those areas overlap with it.
The area of magical darkness will certainly make the guiding bolt impossible to see within its area (if you don't have devil's sight or similar), and make it harder for you to be targeted by it, but it won't stop it from hurting you because that's simply not something the spell says that it does.
The target of a guiding bold sheds dim light. This dim light is the stated cause for an ally having advantage to attack it.
If you allow guiding bolt to be unaffected by the darkness spell you reach an impossible scenario.
You will shoot a glowing bolt of light into an area of darkness and then strike a creature, lighting them up for all to see. But no one can see them because of the darkness. But the light you can and cant see gives advantage to your attack which is nullified by the disadvantage you have for not seeing them.
Someone we're both seeing and not seeing a target.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
It should be noted that the definition of the word radiant is produces light or heat,(Radiant) Heat is by definition a form of light whose color is redder than red. Light is not separate from radiant, they are synonyms, at least outside of D&D. Also, every light spell that does damage does radiant damage.
That said, I appear to be outvoted, everyone goes with the strictest definition, which lets magical darkness do nothing to protect against a spell like Guiding bolt that describes itself as being made of light:
A flash of light streaks toward a creature of your choice within range. Make a ranged spell attack against the target. On a hit, the target takes 4d6 radiant damage, and the next attack roll made against this target before the end of your next turn has advantage, thanks to the mystical dim light glittering on the target until then.
thats....one of the many definitions there, your cherry picking to favor your argument
also while radiant may have a different meaning in other areas, we can only go by dnd standards which means, no, unless it emits actual light of its own in its description, its not affected by the darkness spell
Darkness explicitly only dispels light with an area that overlaps its own, so there's no basis for it to have any impact on guiding bolt because guiding bolt does not have an area.
As written guiding bolt creates dim light glittering on the target, which provides no area of illumination even 1 foot radius to overlap with darkness.
It's not an area of light though; you might argue that magical darkness would supersede the dim light and thus guiding bolt wouldn't granted advantage if the target stays within the magical darkness, but I don't think there's an argument for it being dispelled. This would mean that the effect will persist, so if they left the area of darkness, or if you were able to see through it (devil's sight etc.), then you'd still get advantage as normal.
The dispelling effect definitely requires an explicit area of light, and guiding bolt doesn't produce one unlike say, faerie fire.
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.
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Radiators also mostly cool via convection not radiation, so not a great example.
Darkness can only affect a radiant damage spell in so far as it blocks line of sight. Most attack spells require the caster to be able to see the target. So if you can see through magical darkness then there is no impact. Cast away. If you can’t see the target then no, you can’t cast spells on them unless they have a large area effect such as fireball.
Most doesn't you mean, 3/36 attack spells on Dndbeyond actually require it.
There are only 6 such radiant damage spells of 2nd level or lower, not 36.
The only one objectively unaffected is Divine Favor. it doesn't require sight, and it doesn't create light of any kind.
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
Such spells were attack spells not strictly radiant one, which only 1 listed is (#3) and doesn't require seeing the target.
We're talking about spells that deal radiant damage being nullified by the darkness spell. There are only 6 of them in consideration.
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
I know, i was only clarifying Beardsinger 's post saying ''Most attack spells require the caster to be able to see the target'' that it wasn't the case. You quoted my reply and never really addressed what we were talking about and kind of got confusing. All i wanted to clarify is that most attack spells do not require you to see your target, radiant or not.
There may be some miscommunication going on, then. You took him saying "attack spells" to mean "Spells which require attack rolls". He seems to have meant "Spells that hurt enemies", given the context of both his comment and the topic. Attack spell isn't a game term, after all, so we should read it in context to the convo. ie If someone were to say Fireball is an attack spell, I'd most certainly agree with them. It is a fantastic attack spell. One of the best.
But the topic is darkness and radiant damage spells. His point was that line of sight blocks some of them because they require sight. He is correct. 2 of the 6 spells in question get blocked by darkness because it interferes with sight.
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
Oh sorry if any miscommunication then.
Back to topic; the two last spells wouldn't be dispelled even if they didn't require sight since they're instantaneous.
It should be noted that the definition of the word radiant is produces light or heat,(Radiant) Heat is by definition a form of light whose color is redder than red. Light is not separate from radiant, they are synonyms, at least outside of D&D. Also, every light spell that does damage does radiant damage.
That said, I appear to be outvoted, everyone goes with the strictest definition, which lets magical darkness do nothing to protect against a spell like Guiding bolt that describes itself as being made of light:
Darkness explicitly only dispels light with an area that overlaps its own, so there's no basis for it to have any impact on guiding bolt because guiding bolt does not have an area. It also arguably can't be dispelled as guiding bolt is not a persistent spell (it's instantaneous), you can't normally dispel instantaneous spells, you would need to counterspell them as they are cast. Darkness would need to say something like "spells that produce light or deal radiant damage cannot exist within its area" or something along those lines.
The area of magical darkness will certainly make the guiding bolt impossible to see within its area (if you don't have devil's sight or similar), and make it harder for you to be targeted by it, but it won't stop it from hurting you because that's simply not something the spell says that it does.
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.
Any spell that produces any light produces an "area of light", regardless of how small that area might be. When a spell tells us however many feet, it defines an area beyond the source where the light is projected. In the case where the spell produces light, but does not define an area, we still know that if the source of the light-producing spell is within the area of the darkness, they overlap. Compare this with a spell that projects light beyond its source to a defined area, where the source of the light need not be within the darkness as long as the projected light overlaps the darkness.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
OK, no, on a few counts:
1) Heat is not a form of light, it's a different form of energy. If you're arguing that all forms of energy are the same, then you're arguing that fire and lightning, at the very least, are also in the exact same bucket
2) The definition of the word 'radiant' isn't particularly relevant to a discussion of RAW rules. Maybe RAI. Even by its external definition, however, it's not "a synonym for light". Even by the definition that directly relates to light, it's a description of how the light is transmitted -- it'd be a synonym for a word like 'glowing'. But there are also definitions of the word 'radiant' that have nothing to do with light at all
3) If we're getting into some kind of RAI discussion of how magical darkness is meant to impact radiant damage, you'll have to start explaining why you think darkness would block heat
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
An area is a specific thing defined in the rules, a spell either has an area or it doesn't; light is also a defined thing in the rules, and defined in terms of its area. Everything else is incidental; it has no explicit influence on the rules or how they interact.
Projectiles etc. can be glowing, audible etc., but what that actually means is entirely up to your DM as the rules don't explicitly define any of that beyond "roll Perception to see something maybe".
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.
It's a mistake to think that radiant damage is light-based. Yeah, radiant has a certain meaning in physics, but that meaning is very clearly not relevant here, because the rules say that "Radiant damage, dealt by a cleric’s flame strike spell or an angel’s smiting weapon, sears the flesh like fire and overloads the spirit with power." There's no physical explanation for "overloading the spirit with power." It's magic.
It doesn't have a defined area. But it does have an area. Your DM will make this call.
IDK, an arguement could be made for someone readying an action to dispel magic a spell being cast. More important even, guiding bolt isn't instantaneous. It has a duration of 1 round.
It does say something along those lines. Spells which create area of light are dispelled if those areas overlap with it.
The target of a guiding bold sheds dim light. This dim light is the stated cause for an ally having advantage to attack it.
If you allow guiding bolt to be unaffected by the darkness spell you reach an impossible scenario.
You will shoot a glowing bolt of light into an area of darkness and then strike a creature, lighting them up for all to see. But no one can see them because of the darkness. But the light you can and cant see gives advantage to your attack which is nullified by the disadvantage you have for not seeing them.
Someone we're both seeing and not seeing a target.
Something needs to give here.
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
thats....one of the many definitions there, your cherry picking to favor your argument
also while radiant may have a different meaning in other areas, we can only go by dnd standards which means, no, unless it emits actual light of its own in its description, its not affected by the darkness spell
I think you are attaching more importance to the phrase "area of light" than the rules do. Any light-creating spell of level 2 or lower that does not have a duration of instantaneous is fair game as long as that light overlaps with darkness. We know that guiding bolt creates dim light because the spell tells us it does.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
As written guiding bolt creates dim light glittering on the target, which provides no area of illumination even 1 foot radius to overlap with darkness.
Basically it's a light that doesn't illuminate.
It's not an area of light though; you might argue that magical darkness would supersede the dim light and thus guiding bolt wouldn't granted advantage if the target stays within the magical darkness, but I don't think there's an argument for it being dispelled. This would mean that the effect will persist, so if they left the area of darkness, or if you were able to see through it (devil's sight etc.), then you'd still get advantage as normal.
The dispelling effect definitely requires an explicit area of light, and guiding bolt doesn't produce one unlike say, faerie fire.
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.