Dancing Blade

You telekinetically animate a melee weapon (either one you are holding or an unattended weapon within 5 feet of you). The weapon flies to a creature you choose within range and attacks automatically, then continues to orbit or follow the target as long as the spell persists.

• When you cast the spell, the weapon immediately makes a melee spell attack against your chosen target. On a hit, it deals damage as though wielded by you (i.e. use the weapon’s normal damage dice plus your spellcasting ability modifier).

• While the spell continues, at the start of each of your turns, the animated weapon can either:
    • Strike: attack the same target (makes one melee spell attack), or
    • Redirect: change its target to another creature within 30 feet, then fly to that target (no attack this turn).

• The weapon remains within 5 feet of its target (i.e. it does not hover far off) and moves to maintain that distance.

• The weapon’s attack rolls count as part of your spell attacks (i.e. use your spell attack modifiers) and do not provoke opportunity attacks when moving.

• If the weapon is disarmed, its magic persists; it will fly back to you (or stay hovering) and can resume action on your turn.

At Higher Levels: When you cast Dancing Blade using a 4th-level or higher slot, increase the damage by 1d6 for each slot level above 3rd (i.e. base +1d6 for 4th, +2d6 for 5th, etc.).

At 5th-level and higher, you may choose to have the weapon Guard instead of Strike: when it does so, it grants a +2 bonus to AC to the creature it's following until the start of your next turn, instead of making an attack.