I'm playing a wizard and am now at level 8. I have access to the secret chest spell but can't come close to affording the component cost. If my entire party of four chipped in all our gold we might be able to afford the components. Am I missing something or is this supposed to be too expensive for my level 8 wizard?
DMG starting wealth for higher level characters has you able to afford it at maybe level 11. As to whether it's "supposed" to be too expensive, that depends on the campaign your DM is running.
Personally I've never seen the draw of that spell, At All. The replica becomes worth 5000GP + the value of the contents, effectively, and thus is incredibly dangerous to carry around, at least as dangerous as carrying around the actual stuff, as it has no special protection against damage. It only holds 3 ft x 2 ft x 2 ft, which is WAY less than a Bag of Holding, which is valued at up to 500GP, and which even then is arguably not worth it.
If you need to smuggle something in or out of somewhere, I'd encourage you to read the description of Polymorph more closely. If you need to carry a bunch of heavy stuff, Tenser's Floating Disc and / or Phantom Steed have you covered. Need to temporarily stow something away? Rope trick has you covered. Seriously, what circumstances are supposed to make this spell better than just having a large bag and having a reasonably strong party member carry it?
That being said, two things to keep in mind are 1) It's a one time expense, if you for some reason absolutely love and want the spell, as long as you summon the chest, then dismiss the spell, and then recast it, at a minimum every 60 days. 2) At 5th level spells you get Teleportation Circle, which will give you on demand access to an entire freaking vault you build somewhere with your party, rendering this spell wholly moot, so I wouldn't worry too much about it, and 3) Because the spell absolutely sucks as written, your DM may be open to buffing it by reducing the required material cost of the chest. Shoot, the chest you shove into an extradimensional space could be worth 50GP, I still wouldn't personally do it as one freak accident destroying the replica loses me all the contents contained therein, so I'd talk with him and see where his head is at with it.
Main Advantage is that it is not on this plane. Put stuff in there that you need to make it hard to find by divination, too dangerous to carry, etc.
And only you can call it back. After 60 days, it is lost forever. Good when you need to keep something away from the bad guys...
Indeed, you can make it 'hard to find by divination', as most of the time they'll not know Why the divination magic failed, but I DO want to point out two things:
1) It's not actually lost forever, or even hidden, or *anything* per RAW. I know, I know, it's 'irrevocably lost', but it's not on a demiplane which ceases to exist. It's on the Ethereal plane, specifically. The Ethereal plane can be gotten into, temporarily or permanently, and can be searched just like any other plane. If a creature finds out it's on the Ethereal Plane (such as with a Legend Lore spell, for example), nothing prevents them searching for it there, and eventually finding it. It's like the objects jettisoned into the Astral Plane when multiple extradimensional spaces interact- sure, they're lost to *you*, but nothing prevents the denizens of the plane in question from literally stumbling upon the item in question. If it's that dangerous, I can't see that as a good thing.
2) If you need to protect against scrying, a simple non-detection spell is absolutely foolproof, divination isn't that hard to protect against in 5e, and 3x per day non-detection actually protects against Legend Lore, unlike being on a different plane.
As a note about this spell. It is NOT lost after 60 days. You have to recast it every 59 days in order to keep the chest from disappearing, but that is simple enough.
As long as you recast the spell every 59 days there is no problem.
Legend Lore only applies to things of legendary importance, so the spell is of no use if that variable doesn't apply. Furthermore, although this is up to the DM, I may have found a Dragon Mask and hid it in my secret chest for later use, but that hardly constitutes "lore", especially if I don't tell anybody about it unless you are going to be very loose with your definition of lore.
Legend Lore only applies to things of legendary importance, so the spell is of no use if that variable doesn't apply. Furthermore, although this is up to the DM, I may have found a Dragon Mask and hid it in my secret chest for later use, but that hardly constitutes "lore", especially if I don't tell anybody about it unless you are going to be very loose with your definition of lore.
I once had 3 of dragon masks in my chest!!!!
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
--
DM -- Elanon -- Homebrew world
Gronn -- Tiefling Warlock -- Amarath
Slim -- Halfling Cleric -- CoS (future Lord of Waterdeep 😁)
How much coinage could you put in the chest?? because while a bag of holding is technically bigger it has a 500lb hard limit while the chest does not. so for dragon hordes if done right you couldnt make away with the dragons treasure with just a bag of holding and normal bags even if the party has 2 bags of holding which is pretty rare you cant make off with the entire dragons horde. hence the secrete chest. it doesnt have a hard pound limit and can hold 12 cubic feet of coins. as long as the gains are over 5k gold(needed for the spell) its worth doing its on another plane of existance so very hard to get and its essentially safe since only you can summon it back. sure you might have to get creative with hiding the small replica but you can put it in the bag of holding if you needed or a haver pouch. i just wish i was good at math to see how much coinage you could actually fit in a secrete chest
A lot of coins, gold and platinum are dense. In a campaign, I used Fabricate to make the chest out of the coins as raw material (had appropriate skills) and then stuffed the rest of the treasure in it. I think it worked out to 1/2" walls of gold.
I'm playing a wizard and am now at level 8. I have access to the secret chest spell but can't come close to affording the component cost. If my entire party of four chipped in all our gold we might be able to afford the components. Am I missing something or is this supposed to be too expensive for my level 8 wizard?
DMG starting wealth for higher level characters has you able to afford it at maybe level 11. As to whether it's "supposed" to be too expensive, that depends on the campaign your DM is running.
Personally I've never seen the draw of that spell, At All. The replica becomes worth 5000GP + the value of the contents, effectively, and thus is incredibly dangerous to carry around, at least as dangerous as carrying around the actual stuff, as it has no special protection against damage. It only holds 3 ft x 2 ft x 2 ft, which is WAY less than a Bag of Holding, which is valued at up to 500GP, and which even then is arguably not worth it.
If you need to smuggle something in or out of somewhere, I'd encourage you to read the description of Polymorph more closely. If you need to carry a bunch of heavy stuff, Tenser's Floating Disc and / or Phantom Steed have you covered. Need to temporarily stow something away? Rope trick has you covered. Seriously, what circumstances are supposed to make this spell better than just having a large bag and having a reasonably strong party member carry it?
That being said, two things to keep in mind are 1) It's a one time expense, if you for some reason absolutely love and want the spell, as long as you summon the chest, then dismiss the spell, and then recast it, at a minimum every 60 days. 2) At 5th level spells you get Teleportation Circle, which will give you on demand access to an entire freaking vault you build somewhere with your party, rendering this spell wholly moot, so I wouldn't worry too much about it, and 3) Because the spell absolutely sucks as written, your DM may be open to buffing it by reducing the required material cost of the chest. Shoot, the chest you shove into an extradimensional space could be worth 50GP, I still wouldn't personally do it as one freak accident destroying the replica loses me all the contents contained therein, so I'd talk with him and see where his head is at with it.
Good luck!
Main Advantage is that it is not on this plane. Put stuff in there that you need to make it hard to find by divination, too dangerous to carry, etc.
And only you can call it back. After 60 days, it is lost forever. Good when you need to keep something away from the bad guys...
--
DM -- Elanon -- Homebrew world
Gronn -- Tiefling Warlock -- Amarath
Slim -- Halfling Cleric -- CoS (future Lord of Waterdeep 😁)
Bran -- Human Wizard - RoT
Making D&D mistakes and having fun since 1977!
As a note about this spell. It is NOT lost after 60 days. You have to recast it every 59 days in order to keep the chest from disappearing, but that is simple enough.
As long as you recast the spell every 59 days there is no problem.
Legend Lore only applies to things of legendary importance, so the spell is of no use if that variable doesn't apply. Furthermore, although this is up to the DM, I may have found a Dragon Mask and hid it in my secret chest for later use, but that hardly constitutes "lore", especially if I don't tell anybody about it unless you are going to be very loose with your definition of lore.
I once had 3 of dragon masks in my chest!!!!
--
DM -- Elanon -- Homebrew world
Gronn -- Tiefling Warlock -- Amarath
Slim -- Halfling Cleric -- CoS (future Lord of Waterdeep 😁)
Bran -- Human Wizard - RoT
Making D&D mistakes and having fun since 1977!
How much coinage could you put in the chest?? because while a bag of holding is technically bigger it has a 500lb hard limit while the chest does not. so for dragon hordes if done right you couldnt make away with the dragons treasure with just a bag of holding and normal bags even if the party has 2 bags of holding which is pretty rare you cant make off with the entire dragons horde. hence the secrete chest. it doesnt have a hard pound limit and can hold 12 cubic feet of coins. as long as the gains are over 5k gold(needed for the spell) its worth doing its on another plane of existance so very hard to get and its essentially safe since only you can summon it back. sure you might have to get creative with hiding the small replica but you can put it in the bag of holding if you needed or a haver pouch. i just wish i was good at math to see how much coinage you could actually fit in a secrete chest
A lot of coins, gold and platinum are dense. In a campaign, I used Fabricate to make the chest out of the coins as raw material (had appropriate skills) and then stuffed the rest of the treasure in it. I think it worked out to 1/2" walls of gold.
I remember the days when a massive dragon lay atop its giant pile of coins, now its can the dragons hoard fit in a small box.
and Necromancy muahhahahah/