You activate one of the effects below. Until the spell ends, you can activate either effect as a Magic action on your later turns.
Sense Thoughts. You sense the presence of thoughts within 30 feet of yourself that belong to creatures that know languages or are telepathic. You don’t read the thoughts, but you know that a thinking creature is present.
The spell is blocked by 1 foot of stone, dirt, or wood; 1 inch of metal; or a thin sheet of lead.
Read Thoughts. Target one creature you can see within 30 feet of yourself or one creature within 30 feet of yourself that you detected with the Sense Thoughts option. You learn what is most on the target’s mind right now. If the target doesn’t know any languages and isn’t telepathic, you learn nothing.
As a Magic action on your next turn, you can try to probe deeper into the target’s mind. If you probe deeper, the target makes a Wisdom saving throw. On a failed save, you discern the target’s reasoning, emotions, and something that looms large in its mind (such as a worry, love, or hate). On a successful save, the spell ends. Either way, the target knows that you are probing into its mind, and until you shift your attention away from the target’s mind, the target can take an action on its turn to make an Intelligence (Arcana) check against your spell save DC, ending the spell on a success.
* - (1 Copper Piece)
A copper for your thoughts.
Came here to say this. Was beaten.
I love reading the material components and trying to figure out the thing it comes from. In this case, 'a penny for your thoughts' is the single copper piece, obviously, or how a fleece of wool for an illusion spell is like 'pulling the wool over their eyes'. Nice little touch the designers give, much appreciated.
Question on the Read thoughts action in particular this line. "If the target doesn’t know any languages and isn’t telepathic, you learn nothing." If the target does know a language and isn't telepathic, would you still learn something? The way its written to me implies that they need to know a language (which makes sense) but also need to be telepathic. Is that the correct understanding?
The line you quoted is saying a creature that has no language and isn't a telepath can not convey any meaningful thoughts. Under the rules of telepathy (pg. 376 PHB), it states "the contacted creature doesn't need to share a language with the telepath to understand this communication, but the contacted creature must be able to understand at least one language or be telepathic itself to understand."
With Detect Thoughts, you can understand:
- a creature that isn't telepathic but knows at least one language
- a creature that is telepathic but does not know any language
- a creature that is telepathic and knows at least one language
At least that is my understanding!
That's what I think it would have been as well. But just the way it's worded made it seem like they had to be both. Speak a language and be telepathic. I don't think I would have had this issue if it was and/or. But I'll play it the same way that you've got down.
I'm pretty sure this is a typographical error:
It likely should read: "If the target doesn’t know any languages or isn’t telepathic, you learn nothing."
I think it's meant to say "and" because that means the creature either needs to be telepathic or understand a language to have it's mind read.
No, "and" is the correct word there. The spell doesn't work on a creature that both doesn't know any languages and isn't telepathic.
Changing it to "or" would mean that it would only ever work on a creature that was already telepathic, which would make the spell mostly useless.
I still believe that this spell having obvious material, somatic, and verbal components is a really weird choice. Like, the point if the spell is obviously to covertly read someone's mind, but RAW that's impossible without the telepathic feat or one of the many features that you cast it without components.