At the end of the spell Incendiary Cloud it states that "The cloud moves 10 feet directly away from you in a direction that you choose at the start of each of your turns." This seems contradictory to me? Other cloud spells, such as Cloudkill simply say the Cloud moves away from you.
Is this an error, and it should be one or the other? (Moves away from you or moves in a direction you choose?)
Or does this mean you can move it in any direction so long as it isn't towards you, for example if you were to the South of it you could move it West, Northwest, North, Northeast or East? This would appear to be the case if it didn't have the "directly" in there, but that seems disambiguous.
That is a very ambiguous wording of the spell. Directly would be the exact opposite direction, not one of three possible directions.
To be honest the "directly" here is implying a "direct path" - as in, not turning around . Moving away requires that the relative distance between the object and you is increased. Now, if the cloud was directly in front of you (and we'll keep in saying it's north of you) and is within 5 ft. If the cloud moved East or West, it's not moved away, it's relative distance remains the same. So, that means to satisfy the condition of moving away and increasing the relative distance from you it must move North, North-East or North-West because only those directions actually result in the relative distance between you and the cloud increasing. The "directly" is more to say it moves the full 10 ft in that direction as opposed to moving 5 ft North then moving North-East another 5 ft. Or, in other words, it moves in a straight line.
You actually get more choices because our examples are simplified to 2D movement when you actually get 3D movement: you can move the cloud upwards if you wanted, just as long as it moves in a straight line ("directly") and only in a way the increases the distance between you and it ("away").
Yes I think that more or less covers it. Thanks for the input Cyb3rM1nd. Just another case of 5e's oversimplified wording being a bit confusing lol.
It certainly is advantageous to be able to move it up or down, as opposed to a spell like Cloudkill that can only travel along the ground. I can see this spell doing some serious damage to an airship in an Eberron campaign.
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At the end of the spell Incendiary Cloud it states that "The cloud moves 10 feet directly away from you in a direction that you choose at the start of each of your turns."
This seems contradictory to me? Other cloud spells, such as Cloudkill simply say the Cloud moves away from you.
Is this an error, and it should be one or the other? (Moves away from you or moves in a direction you choose?)
Or does this mean you can move it in any direction so long as it isn't towards you, for example if you were to the South of it you could move it West, Northwest, North, Northeast or East? This would appear to be the case if it didn't have the "directly" in there, but that seems disambiguous.
If you were to the south of it then "directly away" would be North-West, North or North-East and you get to choose which.
You can argue that since Incendiary Cloud is a higher level spell and greater magic it gives you a bit more control than the lower Cloudkill.
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That is a very ambiguous wording of the spell. Directly would be the exact opposite direction, not one of three possible directions.
To be honest the "directly" here is implying a "direct path" - as in, not turning around . Moving away requires that the relative distance between the object and you is increased. Now, if the cloud was directly in front of you (and we'll keep in saying it's north of you) and is within 5 ft. If the cloud moved East or West, it's not moved away, it's relative distance remains the same. So, that means to satisfy the condition of moving away and increasing the relative distance from you it must move North, North-East or North-West because only those directions actually result in the relative distance between you and the cloud increasing. The "directly" is more to say it moves the full 10 ft in that direction as opposed to moving 5 ft North then moving North-East another 5 ft. Or, in other words, it moves in a straight line.
You actually get more choices because our examples are simplified to 2D movement when you actually get 3D movement: you can move the cloud upwards if you wanted, just as long as it moves in a straight line ("directly") and only in a way the increases the distance between you and it ("away").
My Homebrew: Races | Subclasses | Backgrounds | Spells | Magic Items | Feats
Need help with Homebrew? Check out this FAQ/Guide thread by IamSposta
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Yes I think that more or less covers it. Thanks for the input Cyb3rM1nd.
Just another case of 5e's oversimplified wording being a bit confusing lol.
It certainly is advantageous to be able to move it up or down, as opposed to a spell like Cloudkill that can only travel along the ground.
I can see this spell doing some serious damage to an airship in an Eberron campaign.