These spells scare me to death! Phantasmal force and phantasmal killer have scared plenty of my NPCs to death, anyway. These two spells are some of the more unusual illusion spells in the game, since they directly and aggressively assault the minds of other creatures, rather than creating a harmless, illusory sensation. These spells are a must-have for any illusionist wizard, but are also broadly available to many different classes and subclasses. They may seem sadistic, but characters who believe that evildoers deserve their comeuppance, or that the ends justify the means, will find a bevy of delightfully terrifying uses for these phantasmagorical spells.
What do the Phantasmal Spells Do?
There are two “phantasmal” spells in D&D: phantasmal force and phantasmal killer. In past editions of D&D, there were many other phantasmal spells too, such as phantasmal thief, phantasmal injury, and phantasmal strangler. While these other spells haven’t been updated to D&D’s current edition, all phantasmal spells have something in common: they create an illusion so realistic and frightful that the target believes it is capable of being harmed by it.
Phantasmal force is the weaker of the two spells; a 2nd-level illusion spell available to bards, sorcerers, wizards, Arcane Trickster rogues, and warlocks of the Archfey and the Great Old One. Simply, this spell allows you to craft an illusory object perceivable only by the target of the spell. As long as the spell lasts, the target interacts with the object as if it were real, and justifies away any event that would suggest it isn’t real. If the illusory object is harmful, it can harm the target—dealing psychic damage, of course.
Phantasmal killer is a deadly spell that not only debuffs a creature with the potent frightened condition, but also deals psychic damage each turn until the target makes a successful saving throw and ends the spell. If your party is able to impose disadvantage on that creature’s Wisdom saving throws, it might never be able to escape the nightmare you’ve woven for it!
Note that phantasmal killer has some slightly confusing wording. In the past, some people have posited that the ongoing damage occurs even if the target succeeds on the first saving throw and resists becoming frightened. To clear up any confusion, the spell ends if a creature succeeds on any of its saving throws, including the initial save. Jeremy Crawford has confirmed that this was how the spell functions by rules-as-written. If you’re willing to introduce a house-rule to your game, however, I would recommend removing the initial saving throw. This guarantees that the spell deals at least 4d10 damage and frightens the target for one turn. Otherwise, in my opinion, this spell is a bit too weak compared to other 4th-level spells.
Using Phantasmal Killer
Another major difference between phantasmal killer and other illusion spells is who decides what the illusion looks like. While phantasmal force and most other illusion spells allow you to craft a specific object, phantasmal killer allows you to “tap into the nightmares of a creature…and create an illusory manifestation of its deepest fears.”
Whenever I’ve played with this spell, this has meant that the exact form of the phantasm is either glossed over entirely, or determined by the Dungeon Master on the fly. That makes sense; the DM shouldn’t be expected to simply tell the caster the creature’s greatest fear, since that’s beyond the purview of the spell. And besides, it’s easier and quicker for the DM to simply come up with a scary thing like a dragon or a clown with a knife than for the DM to tell the caster the creature’s deepest fear, then wait for the caster to come up with something suitably scary.
That said, if you’re the DM and you do want to tell the caster the creature’s deepest fear and allow them to come up with a cool phantasm, you probably haven’t though too much about what any random hobgoblin’s greatest phobia is. If you can’t think of anything off the top of your head, here’s a random table of common phobias you can roll on to determine that creature’s fear.
1d12 |
Fear |
Illusory Image |
1 |
Arachnophobia; the fear of spiders |
A monstrous spider near the target |
2 |
Hemophobia; the fear of blood |
The target bleeding uncontrollably |
3 |
Lepidopterophobia; the fear of butterflies |
A swarm of countless butterflies flying at the target |
4 |
Pyrophobia; the fear of fire |
A ring of fire, slowly constricting around the target |
5 |
Thalassophobia; the fear of the sea |
A giant wave, engulfing the target |
6 |
Dracophobia; the fear of dragons |
A dragon flying high in the sky, shrieking and threatening to descend |
7 |
Claustrophobia; the fear of enclosed spaces |
A dome of transparent glass, slowly constricting around the target |
8 |
Cynophobia; the fear of dogs |
A massive black dog looms on the horizon, gazing ominously at the target |
9 |
Necrophobia; the fear of death |
The flesh of the target and all creatures it can see, rotting away |
10 |
Astraphobia; the fear of thunder and lightning |
A rumbling storm gathering and flashing in the distance |
11 |
Ornithophobia; the fear of birds |
An unusually large flock of birds alighting upon nearby trees and buildings |
12 |
Selenophobia; the fear of the moon |
The moon appearing bright and large in the sky, regardless of time of day |
Phantasmal Spells in Your Game
How do you use these aggressive illusions in your game? Do you have any great stories of terrifying a creature with phantasmal killer or tricking someone with phantasmal force? Tell your stories in the comments!
James Haeck is the lead writer for D&D Beyond, the co-author of Waterdeep: Dragon Heist and the Critical Role Tal'Dorei Campaign Setting, the DM of Worlds Apart, and a freelance writer for Wizards of the Coast, the D&D Adventurers League, and Kobold Press. He lives in Seattle, Washington with his partner Hannah and their sweet kitties Mei and Marzipan. You can usually find him wasting time on Twitter at @jamesjhaeck.
I'm not familiar with what those methods might be. Last week's spell (Contagion), obviously, but . . . are there a lot of other ways?
Sorcerer's Heightened spell metamagic(though sorcerers don't themselves get PK, you'll have to multiclass), bestow curse, and getting exhaustion to level 4(?) or higher with sickening radiance come to mind.
Personally, I like to use Phantasmal Force to mess with people's mind. I used it to make it look like there was a clone of one of my companion so that the enemy couldn't tell which one was the fake and which one was real. I've also used it in more passive aggressive ways like making an unwashable stain on the coat of a noble obsessed with cleanliness.
This is actually what the spell is in its reality, not a damage dealer. The force spell is made to be creative with. Set up scenarios the person imagines that cause him pain and mess with his reality in some functional way.
I love playing Illusionists but kind of find these two hard to spend a slot on. I am down with casting a spell just to mess with an NPC but when it comes to doing damage they just are quite weak and limited compared to other on level choices. I mean given it is a single target PK pretty much needs a very powerful enemy who also has a terrible wis save or you have a good chance of wasting a level 4 slot and an action on nothing. If illusionists actually boosted their illusion spells, or were limited on what other spells they could learn then maybe, but that's not really the case. Your optional rule also makes it more appealing, but not so much as say a good old upleveled fireball, or an illusion with a cheaper slot.
My favourite "DM hates you" spells.
I have a ranger warlock; he'll either test you logic or your fighting prowess. So depending on the target, if they look battle hardened, he will purposefully expose himself, making sure all eyes on him. Upon doing so, he will turn invisible and hide.
Once he is convinced of this, he will cast PF on the target, make everyone believe he is attacking me.
It’s great as an illusion spell that messes with people’s heads. My party was facing a foe who had hired mercenaries, so I said, “I outbid you,” to our enemy, and made a Phantasmal Force illusion of the mercenary leader to attack him. He ended up fighting his own mercenaries, who just thought he went crazy.
Do you know if you are allowed to make things like chains and cages with phantasmal force? If so then it is to over powered. If they fail the saving throw you could could trap a small but powerful enemy with a 2nd level spell. They might not even think to investigate to try to escape the illusion.
I don't see anything in the description of Phantasmal Force which would stop you from creating chains and cages. However I would note that after failing the initial save the target can still make one or more Investigation checks to see through the illusion. Also, the 2nd level Suggestion spell can do pretty much the same thing ("Stay right there and don't move!").
I used a phantasmal force illusion of an enormous fishhook to fatally restrain an enormous shark, turning a deadly underwater encounter into a walk in the park (Because you know who's not gonna make a successful investigation check? a shark, that's who).
It was enormously powerful, but also enormously situational, and my DM went along with it, with the understanding that I wouldn't be ending very many future combats in this fashion :).
I love the stain idea! That’s awesome 8)
Phantasmal force isn't solid, if the target attempts to interact with it, they pass through it.
This means if the enemy you chain/cage tries to push on the bars and pull on the chains, they'll just go though them and be free.
Xanathar’s Guide To Everything features a spell that does what you're aiming for here called Mental Prison.
Phantasmal force is far better than phantasmal killer. It's questionable whether you can use it to create restraints, but you can certainly use it to inflict blindness, and it requires an Intelligence saving throw, which for many monsters is near-guaranteed failure. Worse still, there's no ongoing save, only a skill check (again, Int-based) that costs your action!
Blindness on a failed Int save, and it costs your action to attempt to end it, is a vicious debuff for 2nd level.
"If your party is able to impose disadvantage on that creature’s Wisdom saving throws..."
If you have a way to do this, please share. On second thought, please wait until I'm on the player side of the table again, then share. An effect that could impose ongoing disadvantage on Wisdom saves would be a win button.
This is accurate, however you can achieve the same thing with a different illusion. A moat of lava around the target for instance. The target can try to cross, but will take damage upon touching the lava. Do they continue and risk 1D6 for every step they take(they dont know it is 1D6 per round, they just know they got burned when they stepped onto the lava) or do they step back and try to figure out another way across. That would depend upon the enemy, but at a bare minimum it might slow them down for a round or while they try to cross, or back up and take a running jump or some other option.
And if the enemy is cowardly or otherwise risk averse (low HP, fire vulnerable, etc), they might just chose to not try until they absolutely have to, effectively trapping them.
We were being attacked by a succumbus and incumbus. They succumbus was flying up about 30 ft and my warforged bard, Music Box, cast phantasmal force on her. The illusion was she was wrapped in heavy barbed chains, which caused her wings to furl and made her fall. She took falling damage and phsychic damage from the barbs, was prone and incapacitated.
We were able to walk up her and poke her full off holes before she could make an INT save. Between that and the lousy rolls the DM was doing, neither one stood a chance.
The spell creates all the stimuli needed to make it believable. For the point you are trying to make with "they can push on the bars and pull on the chains" the spell says they will find some reason to explain it away.
Even in reality, humans can trick themselves into sensing something not there and even cause themselves harm because of it.
I like the Phantasmal Killer improvement suggestions. I created a revised version of the spell based on those suggestions (including the table of random phobias) for my group. I also took the opportunity to add the spell to the warlock's spell list as we have a warlock of the Fiend in our Out of the Abyss campaign and no wizard. Seems thematically fitting.
Thanks for the ideas.
"Enormously powerful and enormously situational" is the illusionist playstyle pretty much to a tee. Nothing polarizes a DM quite like a particularly clever illusionist. Phantasmal force is particularly evil and prone to fits of intense cleverness.
Once tried to Phantasmal Force a caltrop inside a hobgoblin warmaster's boot, hoping to cut his movement speed and make it impossible for him to keep chasing us. DM gave me the BIGGEST stink-eye and immediately ruled "illusion magic needs to be seen or heard to take effect - the target has to know the illusion is there before it can be tricked by it."
I agreed that was fair, he agreed to let me have the spell slot back since Mae would've known that. I decided on a ball and chain around the hobgoblin's ankle instead. It only bought us two rounds before he Investigated his way out of it, but that was enough.
I've been told since that an abundance of cleverness is not always a positive thing in a D&D game. Tee hee.
I always ask my DM's if an illusionist will be able to effect a game in that manner. That my creativity will be rewarded and not punished.