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:

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.

 
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.

Quote from Rheashka >>

I'm pretty sure this is a typographical error:

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.

 
It likely should read:  "If the target doesn’t know any languages or isn’t telepathic, you learn nothing."

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.

Quote from Brickhammer04 >>

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.

1. It nerfs it so you can't just abuse it as you're talking to their face without one of those many features. I'm assuming that learning their thoughts would grant you some bonus to the Influence action, though as far as I know that would be an adjudication, rather than written rule. And I don't think many people would take kindly to seeing you casting a spell on them at all, let alone one that reads their thoughts.

2. The ideal moment to cast this (without those features) would be when the target is looking in a direction other than yours, and is far enough and/or the crowd is loud enough to where if you state the verbal component you won't be heard, and you won't be noticed performing the somatic component. Unless you have the target at your mercy already that is likely the only realistic time you would want to cast it without being an "Invisible Detector" anyway.

Ah, the and/or conundrum. The great debate in seemingly all realms of law. 

Hey, can a spell casting focus cast this spell, or is one copper piece a component with a cost?

Quote from ILIKETOPLAYDANDDH >>

Hey, can a spell casting focus cast this spell, or is one copper piece a component with a cost?

A good question. It doesn't use the typical language for costly spell components — "worth at least X gp" — but it is, in itself, a piece of money, so I think it could go either way.

The specific component in this case is mostly a joke (i.e., "penny for your thoughts") and it's such a tiny amount of money that it doesn't really serve the purpose that most costly components serve (i.e., discouraging players from casting it constantly) so if I were DMing I would not have any problem with letting someone use a focus for it.

Yea, my DM just removes the component all together.