So, I was really excited to pick up Shadow of Moil when I hit Warlock level 7. Unfortunately it didn't turn out the way I was hoping in tonight's game. Bear in mind this is an AL game so everything should be adhering to RAW.
On my first turn in combat, I cast Shadow of Moil and ran into the middle of a pack of baddies, hoping to draw their attention from the group and let them attack me at disadvantage. I used my bonus action to ignite my Flame Tongue Greatsword in preparation to use my next turn and so the surrounding enemies would not be in total darkness. DM states that either I am obscured or that the weapon's effect is creating light, but both can't be true simultaneously. I tried to argue the language of the spell but the DM shuts me down and we settled on only the obscurement effect as that was more important to me. As action continues he states that the enemies in the spell's secondary effect area cannot be seen, even by creatures that have darkvision, which means nobody's getting any attacks on them that aren't at disadvantage. This further ticks me off as I would have ended my movement differently if I had anticipated that. When it got to the enemies' turn, they weren't even at disadvantage to hit me either, but I found out later that's because they had tremorsense (no harm no foul there).
By my reading of the spell, here's what I think he got wrong, but I'm hoping others can either confirm or educate me on what I've missed:
He treated an area of darkness created by the spell the same as that created by the spell Darkness. I don't believe the two are equal, as the Darkness spell specifically states that creatures with darkvision cannot see through it. Shadow of Moil makes no such claims.
He said that if the spell obscures my character's person, it obscures the entire area. There is nothing in the spell description that says it obscures an area beyond the character's body.
He did not allow the Flame Tongue Greatsword, which gives off bright light, to continue to give off dim light as per the spell description. His explanation was that if my sword is visible, I could not be obscured.
Here's where I think it's murky. Every other spell or effect that I can find that states it creates a heavily obscured effect does so within an area. He may have been relying on his experience with such spells in the past and concluded that because it uses the same effect and has a radius for its secondary effect (dimming lights) that Shadow of Moil must operate the same way. That's the logical presumption I'm making anyway.
On a side note, we actually had a druid who cast a spell later on in the evening that obscured an area, and the DM treated that (I believe incorrectly) in a similar manner. The creatures inside the obscured area were treated as blind to those outside the area and vice versa. No checks were made by anyone inside the area attempting to see someone else inside the area, so no idea how he would have ruled that. This is the full rule on heavily obscured:
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.
RAW, the creatures inside the obscured area should have been able to see out. I raise this point to make sure I already have an argument prepared if he tells me at the next session that Shadow of Moil is going to make me effectively blind... Sorry for any bitterness that comes across in this post; I just feel like the DM is making a lot of superficial judgement calls here that detract from the value of the spell as I intended to use it. Thanks in advance for any help you can give in either direction.
The way the spell is written seems easy to get confused by.
The first sentence describes one effect. The second sentence describes a second effect, which by strict reading of the text is separate, but it looks like it is elaborating upon the first effect or at least related to it because 'it gets darker around you' (the second effect paraphrased) is a reasonable explanation for 'nobody can see you properly' (the first effect paraphrased).
It's also inconsistent with how becoming heavily obscured usually works - and while I think it is a deliberate inconsistency and I would rule accordingly, other DMs may prefer to force the spell to be consistent for the sake of consistency.
Seems likely that someone will need to make an official AL guideline for how to handle this spell, or it's effects will differ from table to table within the AL by a significantly larger degree than most other spells.
The way I read it is not too complicated, but it's my way - it's nowhere near AL standards. :p
1. It treats you as heavily obscured. It doesn't obscure the area around you, so it effectively turns you invisible in a way that See Invisibility doesn't see you. You can use this to Hide, obviously, but just standing around doesn't cause others to fail to notice you're there - you're obviously in the midst of the mass of shadows. They just have the usual traits of having an invisible opponent (disadvantage on attacks against you, etc.)
2. It causes the area around you to darken. This affects any light, including magical light, since there's no specific clause to it like there is in Darkness. Similarly, it doesn't affect Darkvision. As such, the light from a magic weapon does get dimmer. It also does give your location away, but that wasn't a concern to begin with (see point number 1). You're still magically concealed. And people still know where you are (in the midst of the roiling shadows with the glowing sword). This only becomes problematic if you were trying to Hide, presumably.
I agree with Onyx and I find the spell description pretty clear too. It expressively states that it causes you (the caster) to be heavily obscured to others. It does not have the effect that any other creatures are obcured too, so the caster sees others (they are not obscured).
Also as Onyx points out the dimming effect does not distinguish between natural and magical light and just because the caster carries a light does not change the fact that he is (heavily) obscured. As the spell only dims light and does not "create" darkness like the darkness spell does, "normal" nightvision should pierce the dimmed area. It does not help to pierce the obscurement.
I agree on all points. Shadow of Moil does what it says, no more and no less. It obscures only the caster, has nothing to do with the Darkness spell, and any light sources you're carrying should've continued to emit dim light. (The natural counter to "well, if the sword is visible you'd be visible" is to say the sword isn't visible, but the light still shines through to the surrounding area.)
Heavy obscurement isn't symmetrical unless something says it is. If two people are in a pitch-black room and person A is under a spotlight, B can see A but A can't see B.
Your DM may have made a hasty ruling for the sake of keeping the game going. Quickly coming up with a ruling that's good enough is often better than breaking out the rulebooks and having a 5 minute pause in the action.
Perhaps a slightly different take. Here is the text of the spell for reference.
SHADOW of M0IL. "Flame-like shadows wreathe your body until the spell ends, causing you to become heavily obscured to others. The shadows turn dim light within 10 feet of you into darkness, and bright light in the same area to dim light. Until the spell ends, you have resistance to radiant damage. In addition, whenever a creature within 10 feet of you hits you with an attack, the shadows lash out at that creature, dealing it 2d8 necrotic damage."
1) The caster is wreathed in shadows and the text specifically states you are heavily obscured to others but not the reverse.
Players handbook p 183
"A creature in a heavily obscured area effectively suffers from the blinded condition."
From the players handbook errata: Vision and Light (p. 183).
"A heavily obscured area doesn’t blind you, but you are effectively blinded when you try to see something obscured by it."
When you try to see into or out of a heavily obscured area both characters are considered blinded relative to each other perhaps depending on the type of the obscurement. This spell specifically only says that the caster is heavily obscured to others (thus they are considered blinded when attacking the character) but the character is not heavily obscured themselves so they do not suffer the reverse.
Reciprocity may also depend on the kind of obscurement. If one character is in the light and the other in darkness then the one in darkness can see the one in the light. On the other hand, if darkness is replaced by a fog cloud then neither the character in the fog cloud nor the one outside the fog cloud should be able to see each other.
2) The character is wreathed in shadows that heavily obscure the character from the perspective of anyone outside. I think this would include any light sources being held by the character, they would also be heavily obscured and thus the flame tongue sword would not shed visible light in this case.
3) Based on the wording, I don't think the spell causes magical darkness. The darkness spell specifically references magical darkness while Shadow of Moil simply says that dim light becomes dark and bright light becomes dim. Thus, there is no justification for stating that darkvision would not work in the 10 feet of shadows caused by Shadows of Moil.
The DM should read the Blur spell since Shadows of Moil is effectively just replicating a blur spell with some added environmental darkening effects and a damage effect against opponents that hit you.
3) Based on the wording, I don't think the spell causes magical darkness. The darkness spell specifically references magical darkness while Shadow of Moil simply says that dim light becomes dark and bright light becomes dim. Thus, there is no justification for stating that darkvision would not work in the 10 feet of shadows caused by Shadows of Moil.
Any effects a spell creates are magical by definition. Darkvision doesn't care whether darkness is magical or not; blocking darkvision is a specific property of the Darkness spell.
1)...When you try to see into or out of a heavily obscured area both characters are considered blinded relative to each other perhaps depending on the type of the obscurement...
2) The character is wreathed in shadows that heavily obscure the character from the perspective of anyone outside. I think this would include any light sources being held by the character, they would also be heavily obscured and thus the flame tongue sword would not shed visible light in this case.
Two points on the snippets I've included above:
1) Looking *out* from within an obscured area does not make you blinded, only looking *in* or looking *within*. If you are standing in darkness looking at someone standing next to a candle you are not blind. If you are by the candle looking at someone in the darkened corner then you are blinded to them. If you are both in the dark looking at eachother then you are both blinded.
2) Here I think you are assigning a mechanical effect to obscurement which is definitely not written. It specifies no relation between light and obscurement except that an area of darkness generally counts as an area of obscurement. If you imagine a fog, with someone carrying a torch. The torch still throws light, but the person remains obscured in the fog. The obscurement of the spell covers the caster, but we should not automatically try to impose our own understanding of photon physics on the effects of a spell. The light of the sword shines out of the magical shadow flame, but I still can't see the sword. If I encountered this situation in real life, the lighting effects are hardly the most worrying element...
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So, I was really excited to pick up Shadow of Moil when I hit Warlock level 7. Unfortunately it didn't turn out the way I was hoping in tonight's game. Bear in mind this is an AL game so everything should be adhering to RAW.
On my first turn in combat, I cast Shadow of Moil and ran into the middle of a pack of baddies, hoping to draw their attention from the group and let them attack me at disadvantage. I used my bonus action to ignite my Flame Tongue Greatsword in preparation to use my next turn and so the surrounding enemies would not be in total darkness. DM states that either I am obscured or that the weapon's effect is creating light, but both can't be true simultaneously. I tried to argue the language of the spell but the DM shuts me down and we settled on only the obscurement effect as that was more important to me. As action continues he states that the enemies in the spell's secondary effect area cannot be seen, even by creatures that have darkvision, which means nobody's getting any attacks on them that aren't at disadvantage. This further ticks me off as I would have ended my movement differently if I had anticipated that. When it got to the enemies' turn, they weren't even at disadvantage to hit me either, but I found out later that's because they had tremorsense (no harm no foul there).
By my reading of the spell, here's what I think he got wrong, but I'm hoping others can either confirm or educate me on what I've missed:
Here's where I think it's murky. Every other spell or effect that I can find that states it creates a heavily obscured effect does so within an area. He may have been relying on his experience with such spells in the past and concluded that because it uses the same effect and has a radius for its secondary effect (dimming lights) that Shadow of Moil must operate the same way. That's the logical presumption I'm making anyway.
On a side note, we actually had a druid who cast a spell later on in the evening that obscured an area, and the DM treated that (I believe incorrectly) in a similar manner. The creatures inside the obscured area were treated as blind to those outside the area and vice versa. No checks were made by anyone inside the area attempting to see someone else inside the area, so no idea how he would have ruled that. This is the full rule on heavily obscured:
RAW, the creatures inside the obscured area should have been able to see out. I raise this point to make sure I already have an argument prepared if he tells me at the next session that Shadow of Moil is going to make me effectively blind... Sorry for any bitterness that comes across in this post; I just feel like the DM is making a lot of superficial judgement calls here that detract from the value of the spell as I intended to use it. Thanks in advance for any help you can give in either direction.
The way the spell is written seems easy to get confused by.
The first sentence describes one effect. The second sentence describes a second effect, which by strict reading of the text is separate, but it looks like it is elaborating upon the first effect or at least related to it because 'it gets darker around you' (the second effect paraphrased) is a reasonable explanation for 'nobody can see you properly' (the first effect paraphrased).
It's also inconsistent with how becoming heavily obscured usually works - and while I think it is a deliberate inconsistency and I would rule accordingly, other DMs may prefer to force the spell to be consistent for the sake of consistency.
Seems likely that someone will need to make an official AL guideline for how to handle this spell, or it's effects will differ from table to table within the AL by a significantly larger degree than most other spells.
The way I read it is not too complicated, but it's my way - it's nowhere near AL standards. :p
1. It treats you as heavily obscured. It doesn't obscure the area around you, so it effectively turns you invisible in a way that See Invisibility doesn't see you. You can use this to Hide, obviously, but just standing around doesn't cause others to fail to notice you're there - you're obviously in the midst of the mass of shadows. They just have the usual traits of having an invisible opponent (disadvantage on attacks against you, etc.)
2. It causes the area around you to darken. This affects any light, including magical light, since there's no specific clause to it like there is in Darkness. Similarly, it doesn't affect Darkvision. As such, the light from a magic weapon does get dimmer. It also does give your location away, but that wasn't a concern to begin with (see point number 1). You're still magically concealed. And people still know where you are (in the midst of the roiling shadows with the glowing sword). This only becomes problematic if you were trying to Hide, presumably.
I agree with Onyx and I find the spell description pretty clear too. It expressively states that it causes you (the caster) to be heavily obscured to others. It does not have the effect that any other creatures are obcured too, so the caster sees others (they are not obscured).
Also as Onyx points out the dimming effect does not distinguish between natural and magical light and just because the caster carries a light does not change the fact that he is (heavily) obscured. As the spell only dims light and does not "create" darkness like the darkness spell does, "normal" nightvision should pierce the dimmed area. It does not help to pierce the obscurement.
I agree on all points. Shadow of Moil does what it says, no more and no less. It obscures only the caster, has nothing to do with the Darkness spell, and any light sources you're carrying should've continued to emit dim light. (The natural counter to "well, if the sword is visible you'd be visible" is to say the sword isn't visible, but the light still shines through to the surrounding area.)
Heavy obscurement isn't symmetrical unless something says it is. If two people are in a pitch-black room and person A is under a spotlight, B can see A but A can't see B.
Your DM may have made a hasty ruling for the sake of keeping the game going. Quickly coming up with a ruling that's good enough is often better than breaking out the rulebooks and having a 5 minute pause in the action.
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Hi!
Perhaps a slightly different take. Here is the text of the spell for reference.
SHADOW of M0IL.
"Flame-like shadows wreathe your body until the spell ends, causing you to become heavily obscured to others. The shadows turn dim light within 10 feet of you into darkness, and bright light in the same area to dim light. Until the spell ends, you have resistance to radiant damage. In addition, whenever a creature within 10 feet of you hits you with an attack, the shadows lash out at that creature, dealing it 2d8 necrotic damage."
1) The caster is wreathed in shadows and the text specifically states you are heavily obscured to others but not the reverse.
Players handbook p 183
"A creature in a heavily obscured area effectively suffers from the blinded condition."
From the players handbook errata: Vision and Light (p. 183).
"A heavily obscured area doesn’t blind you, but you are effectively blinded when you try to see something obscured by it."
When you try to see into or out of a heavily obscured area both characters are considered blinded relative to each other perhaps depending on the type of the obscurement. This spell specifically only says that the caster is heavily obscured to others (thus they are considered blinded when attacking the character) but the character is not heavily obscured themselves so they do not suffer the reverse.
Reciprocity may also depend on the kind of obscurement. If one character is in the light and the other in darkness then the one in darkness can see the one in the light. On the other hand, if darkness is replaced by a fog cloud then neither the character in the fog cloud nor the one outside the fog cloud should be able to see each other.
2) The character is wreathed in shadows that heavily obscure the character from the perspective of anyone outside. I think this would include any light sources being held by the character, they would also be heavily obscured and thus the flame tongue sword would not shed visible light in this case.
3) Based on the wording, I don't think the spell causes magical darkness. The darkness spell specifically references magical darkness while Shadow of Moil simply says that dim light becomes dark and bright light becomes dim. Thus, there is no justification for stating that darkvision would not work in the 10 feet of shadows caused by Shadows of Moil.
The DM should read the Blur spell since Shadows of Moil is effectively just replicating a blur spell with some added environmental darkening effects and a damage effect against opponents that hit you.
Any effects a spell creates are magical by definition. Darkvision doesn't care whether darkness is magical or not; blocking darkvision is a specific property of the Darkness spell.
The Forum Infestation (TM)