I have a rules question regarding Mage Hand + Goodberry to restore 1 hit point to an unconscious party member.
Here's the scenario:
I'm a Level 1 Human Druid and I took the Telekinetic Feat, so I have the Mage Hand Cantrip. I casted Goodberry earlier in the day and handed a few of them out after our first combat of the day (our warlock almost died, so we took a short rest and he HD healed himself and then he went back up to full HP from Goodberries). Anywho, we got into our next combat with a Duergar and a Grey Ooze, but I still had 5 Goodberries left when this combat started. The Grey Ooze critically hit our Barbarian and dropped her unconscious, and she was 15 feet away from me. On the Cleric's turn, she used Spare the Dying cantrip to stabilize the Barbarian, but she was still unconscious. On my turn, I couldn't physically move over to the Barbarian without provoking an Opportunity Attack from the Duergar, so I used Mage Hand to telekinetically move a Goodberry 15ft and force-feed it to the unconscious Barbarian to give her 1 hit point. On the following round, the Duergar knocked our Cleric unconscious, so I did the same thing and force-fed a Goodberry to the Cleric to restore 1 hit point.
Our DM didn't have a problem with it, but I'm just making sure that this is all kosher per the rules (for future use).
It seems a little iffy to me. Was the mage hand already up? Otherwise, the first use of it, you’d need your action to cast mage hand. At that point, I’d allow your item interaction to put the berry in the hand. But then it says you use your action to control the hand. So, I’d have said you need another action to actually feed the barbarian, so you couldn’t do that until the next round. If, for some reason you hand an active mage hand already during the fight, I would have been fine with it. In the case of the cleric, where the hand was up already, I would have had no problem with it working.
But I can see reading it more liberally as your DM did. And allowing the same casting action to also be used for controlling it on round 1.
The Mage Hand was not already up. I casted it and moved the Goodberry to the Barbarian with the same 1 action.
Yeah, I don't think that's kosher. I'd definitely let you feed the goodberry as part of the "control the hand" action the spell provides, but casting it is one action and controlling it is a second action. You can't do both without something like the fighter's action surge.
The ability to feed someone a goodberry is not mentioned in RAW, but is a pretty common house rule that has been endorsed by devs.
The described effect is beyond the capabilities of mage hand, because it takes two actions to actually do anything with a mage hand (one action to cast it, a second to use it), though I wouldn't be surprised if most DMs ignore or haven't noticed that rule and permit you to use the mage hand on the turn you cast it (I don't recall the player I had who took the spell ever using it in combat, but I suspect I would have let him use it the same turn he cast it).
Yeah, I would agree that it should take 1 action to cast, and then 1 action to manipulate+move 30ft the following round.
Since it's a 1-minute duration Cantrip that can be constantly re-casted, couldn't I just walk around with Mage Hand active all the time? For example, could I just say "every 30 seconds while we walk around, I re-cast Mage Hand." And then if we get into combat, it should be active for at least 5 rounds. That could work right?
Hey all,
I have a rules question regarding Mage Hand + Goodberry to restore 1 hit point to an unconscious party member.
Here's the scenario:
I'm a Level 1 Human Druid and I took the Telekinetic Feat, so I have the Mage Hand Cantrip. I casted Goodberry earlier in the day and handed a few of them out after our first combat of the day (our warlock almost died, so we took a short rest and he HD healed himself and then he went back up to full HP from Goodberries). Anywho, we got into our next combat with a Duergar and a Grey Ooze, but I still had 5 Goodberries left when this combat started. The Grey Ooze critically hit our Barbarian and dropped her unconscious, and she was 15 feet away from me. On the Cleric's turn, she used Spare the Dying cantrip to stabilize the Barbarian, but she was still unconscious. On my turn, I couldn't physically move over to the Barbarian without provoking an Opportunity Attack from the Duergar, so I used Mage Hand to telekinetically move a Goodberry 15ft and force-feed it to the unconscious Barbarian to give her 1 hit point. On the following round, the Duergar knocked our Cleric unconscious, so I did the same thing and force-fed a Goodberry to the Cleric to restore 1 hit point.
Our DM didn't have a problem with it, but I'm just making sure that this is all kosher per the rules (for future use).
It seems a little iffy to me. Was the mage hand already up? Otherwise, the first use of it, you’d need your action to cast mage hand. At that point, I’d allow your item interaction to put the berry in the hand. But then it says you use your action to control the hand. So, I’d have said you need another action to actually feed the barbarian, so you couldn’t do that until the next round.
If, for some reason you hand an active mage hand already during the fight, I would have been fine with it.
In the case of the cleric, where the hand was up already, I would have had no problem with it working.
But I can see reading it more liberally as your DM did. And allowing the same casting action to also be used for controlling it on round 1.
The Mage Hand was not already up. I casted it and moved the Goodberry to the Barbarian with the same 1 action.
Yeah, I don't think that's kosher. I'd definitely let you feed the goodberry as part of the "control the hand" action the spell provides, but casting it is one action and controlling it is a second action. You can't do both without something like the fighter's action surge.
The ability to feed someone a goodberry is not mentioned in RAW, but is a pretty common house rule that has been endorsed by devs.
The described effect is beyond the capabilities of mage hand, because it takes two actions to actually do anything with a mage hand (one action to cast it, a second to use it), though I wouldn't be surprised if most DMs ignore or haven't noticed that rule and permit you to use the mage hand on the turn you cast it (I don't recall the player I had who took the spell ever using it in combat, but I suspect I would have let him use it the same turn he cast it).
Yeah, I would agree that it should take 1 action to cast, and then 1 action to manipulate+move 30ft the following round.
Since it's a 1-minute duration Cantrip that can be constantly re-casted, couldn't I just walk around with Mage Hand active all the time? For example, could I just say "every 30 seconds while we walk around, I re-cast Mage Hand." And then if we get into combat, it should be active for at least 5 rounds. That could work right?
Isn't mentioned in the spell itself?
"A creature can use its action to eat one berry. "
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
Sorry I was unclear, I meant to say that it would NOT be possible for an unconscious person to consume the berry.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
An action is used to cast mage hand,
An action is used to control a mage hand,
An action is used to feed a goodberry
As you can see it's not kosher to accomplish all 3 with a single action.