Ultimate Guide to Spirit Guardians in D&D 5e!
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On Dungeons and Daddies Normal Oak mostly uses Spirit Guardians as cheerleaders
Jokes on you, Pack Tactics! I pick Shield for my Cleric, and Spirit Guardians for my Wizard! >:D
....Just... don't ask me how... >.>
Thanks for another incredible sponsored spot! Loved the deep dive into Spirit Guardians here! I have one player that LOVES it...
in your example the enemy was in your spirit guardians when your turn started, you moved back and then pulled them into spirit guardian again for damage. Does that work? seeing spirit guardians says when they enter the area for the first time in a turn but since they are in the area when your turn started does it still count as the "first time" when you pull them in with telekinetic?
Newbie player here, just wanna say thanks to your video on how to melee I learned the importance of dodging when needed and I'm so happy that my first instinct upon reading Spirit Guardians was "ok so this does damage and all I need to do is dodge" thanks to your previous video!
You can also use this spell to find anyone invisible nearby. Just cast Spirit Guardians and run around the room.
It doesn't work if you move into their space, they've gotta get pushed into you or start their turn in it. You can try to get lucky though.
This does work in baldurs gate 3 though since it works by running into creature spaces
It wouldn't make them visible though
@@smallquant7650 depends on how they have invisibility. If it's a spell, then they might break concentration
In the game I'm running, one of my players accidentally found out he could use Zone of Truth as a radar. They were questioning an NPC and their paladin cast ZoT. I had to take a look at the spell description because it has a condition where you know if a creature passed or failed the save. So you know how many creatures are in the AOE. The room was full of shadows, waiting to ambush the party. He basically knew how many were in the room before initiative started.
@@BlueFoxXT incorrect the wording of the spell is "when the creature enters the area for the first time on a turn or starts its turn there" meaning it takes damage everytime it first enters the area also meaning the more movement speed you have access to the more theoretical damage you could deal say you're dealing with a mass amount of enemies for example if you have access to find greater steed and summon a pegasus which has a 90ft flying speed and dash for 180ft you could hit pretty much anyone on a combat map if you have the room for it
one thing to note about spirit guardians. Make DOUBLY SURE you specify to NOT attack some characters you see, you can end up killing people you REALLY didn't mean to kill. Just an air of caution as nothing is quite as traumatizing as entering a building to save the hostages only to have your spirits tear half of them apart...
You have to declare who's immune when you cast it, unfortunately, so you better be able to see all the hostages when you pop this or there are going to be some "acceptable losses"
That is actually an important part of this spell, and often handwaved and ruled as it doesn't affect friendly creatures. Any creature you couldn't see during the casting of the spell is going to be affected by it, even your friendly rogue that was hiding behind total cover or your invisible wizard party member.
Poor little Timmy who hid in the closet in the boss room and now runs to the benevolent cleric hero he sees, happy to finally be saved...
@@derToblin You can dismiss concentration spells freely.
Fuze moment
Spirit Guardians is the spell that makes cleric worth playing. Though Light and Twilight are pretty crazy even without it. Just be real careful you can see all friendly targets when you cast it. It's the one thing that balances the spell. It will damage anything in range that you didn't both SEE and DESIGNATE as safe when you cast it. So if you charge into a building blind with it, any innocents, pets, the birds on the roof... even an aquarium full of fish? It's all getting roasted.
Metamagic Adept: Careful Spell gives you two casts of Careful Spirit Guardians if you will frequently be in situations where you have to fight enemies amongst friendlies or bystanders.
Clerics get typecast as healers when they pretty much all make natural single-class gishes.
Arcana clerics can get Booming Blade and Green-Flame Blade at level 1 and add their WIS to cantrip damage at level 8, along with the normal cantrip damage scaling.
Tempest clerics can absolutely shred even without multiclassing and has no reason to fear melee range.
War clerics, too.
Nature clerics can dump STR and DEX with Shillelagh and Heavy Armor, and at later levels add 1d8 or 2d8 elemental damage of your choice to those attacks.
And _every_ cleric can do Spirit Guardians plus Sanctuary and Dodge or Dash to absolute melt enemies while their attacks bounce off.
Not to mention all the other things Clerics get, like the best out-of-combat cantrip in the game, the best saving throw proficiency, and the ability to change prepared spells at a long rest.
People should not be sleeping on clerics - and they're even stronger in BG3, despite being the least used class.
@@alistairbolden6340 My friend, you need to read Twilight Cleric. lol It blows Forge out of the water. Don't get me wrong, Forge is pretty cool, but a 5% extra chance they miss one player isn't quite worth massive temp HP on everyone, every turn, practically all the time. They boost initiative to help ensure you land a turn one control spell, can out-range anyone's dark vision, and fly.
I think what's a sign of a very powerful/good spell is it demands a different response from the dm. Like spirit guardians means melee just can't engage the cleric. Otherwise they will get melted. Where there are notorious "polymorph" like spells that just flat end a massive single threat in a combat encounter, this type of spell invalidates an encounter with mostly melee and little to no ranged options. The best thing a melee group could do would be to run away so spirit guardians just wears off. Some creatures aren't smart enough to do that, or the situation doesn't allow for retreat so they just get to eat all that damage.
I don't think this really invalidates encounters like save or suck spells do. The damage is good, but against single bosses it won't do much, since it's not that high individually. Furthermore, the enemy can still act and engage with other people. Now, compare that with Polymorph, which just... shuts them down for 1h, no questions asked. If the game had more spells like Spirit Guardians and less Polymorph, it would be in a better state.
(Side note: polymorph is particularly stupid in that it also requires a wisdom save instead of a CON save despite directly affecting the targets' physical form, and it doubles down as a support spell because you can target allies with it too. It used to be two different spells in the past, AFAIK. It's a silly one in 5E.)
@@limaTheNoob But here's the thing: Polymorph doesn't change DM strategy that much, at most adding Legendary Resistances, a few weak meatshields or something of the sort to TARGETEDLY invalidate THAT spell.
If a spell is so broken that the DM needs to target it specifically, rather than offering more strategic complexity, it's a bad spell (for game and for player growth).
If a spell shuffles the playing field, but isn't a "End-All-Be-All" Ultimate Spell of Ultimate BSery, then it isn't auto-disqualified from running for "Good Spell Award".
PS: This is the Ultimate Spell (of Ultimate BSery)
Good Spells, Bad Spells and Fireballs (as far as Darkvision can see)
And only one will be nerfed
I wonder which it will be
This is the Ultimate Spell (of Ultimate BSery) 😂😂😂😅😅
@agilemind6241
Clerics also tend to be very tanky, so even trying to focus down the Cleric means melee monsters are eating that damage and getting cooked from the rest of the party.
@@joshuagreen8995 yes. They get proficiency in medium armor and shields at minimum, aren't expected to be sneaky so they can go for half plate + shield, and their Ability Scores can focus around just Wisdom and Constitution, allowing HP comparable to most martials, and above some of them.
Not to forget that Con might even be a higher priority to the Cleric than Wisdom, since it translates into higher chance of Concentration Save Success, and that many subclasses get Heavy Armor proficiency right at level 1.
Their (the monsters') best bet is likely to try to gain distance at all costs, attack from range or with environmental effects the best they can, and flee if nothing works. Party should still get EXP from the encounter, if that is used, but that opens opportunities for future encounters or ambushes, for players to highlight their "stance" (merciful/merciless, compassionate/bloodthirsty, pragmatic/idealistic/murderous and so on)
This spell is so broken in BG3. Shadowheart absolutely melts enemies with it! The best part is, with bonus action shoves even martial characters get a chance to join in the fun!
Yeah, it's a little OP in BG3.
Doesn't it get weakened a bit by not having the Dodge Action in that game?
@@desercitusabsolutely, and the area of effect is much smaller than in 5e. It’s a lot more balanced. There’s counterplay to it rather than it being a win button
Blade Ward. Not as good, but also lasts 2 turns. Imo an acceptable alternative. @@desercitus
@@7isAnOddNumber and only triggers once per round (during the caster turn)
We had a (non-lethal) tournament arc in our campaign and I got matched up against the paladin in our party. With War Caster, he was unable to Smite me even once because I kept making my Concentration saves to his weaker ranged attacks, and of course Spirit Dodging is incredibly OP against martial PCs.
My first experience with Spirit Guardians was when a fellow player who was also playing a cleric in our party suggested we both cast it and we turned our enemies to dust is the SG blender that ensued. That forever cemented it in my mind as a must have option from there on out.
As a note, the two effects won't stack. c.f. "Combining Magical Effects."
I'd argue there's some overlap. Like if a wizard casted fireball followed immediately by the sorc casting it would it only be casted once. There's no on going duration like say polymorph.
@@DeadpoolAliwell that's a completely different situation since instantaneous spells never overlap unless someone held their action to cast at the same time as someone else someone would only be effected once because of it it's like being hit with a vial of acid vs falling into a pit of acid both situations would only deal 2d6 acid damage because the vat isn't making the acid stronger it's just guaranteeing the damage (however as a dm I would say that two fireballs at the same time would count for a second save if an enemy previously passed but that's just leniency)
@@lucasramey6427it's not leniency to let 2 fireballs hit and have 2 saves.
That's how the rules work.
The reason you can't stack spirit guardians is because the wording on spirit guardians doesn't allow it.
There's specific triggers. "If it starts it's turn there or moves into it for the first time it takes damage..
BG3 really opened my eyes to this spell since i never played a class that had it
Shadowheart once again proving she's a reliable companion.
The BG3 version is heavily nerfed but its still good from what I've heard. I haven't looked into it yet.
@@PackTactics side note, Chromatic Orb got sidegraded in BG3. yes, you lose 1d8 damage, but there's now a small AoE to it. it's definitely no fireball, but toss it into a narrow corridor filled with hostile creatures and watch as you hit one or two extra targets for the price of one level 1 spell slot.
Same. I feel dumb now because I definitely passed over this spell in the past.
My first time encountering a 20 ac forge cleric with spirit guardians as a DM left me shaken.
Best damage spell in game imo.
More synergy vids of this?
Im currently playing a rune knight with access to this for bigger spirit guardians range. The sorc will then cast enlarge on me so i become huge. 45x45' cube (sphere) of death
Also def think could use mention is how the half speed stacks with other debuffs like difficult terrain and stuff like plant growth (nature cleric). Standing on the outside of the web spell just cripples the enemies from getting near you or out!
"DMs hate this trick" *casts spirit guardians*
Optimal Strategy: *Avoid Melee*
Fun Strategy: *_RIP AND TEAR_*
I love this spell, but I think it is amazing on a divine soul sorcerer
agreed, Divine Soul Sorcerer has the power of two whole spell lists at his arsenal and you can do some WHACKY shit with them.
Indeed. My divine soul sorcerer Aasimar boy is: strong. I love me a double spell list
I wonder how much work this spell does with Distant Spell, I'm gonna go try that thanks for the new build idea
@@greyscaleadaven You won't be able to use this spell with Distant Spell. Distant Spell requires a range of 5 feet or greater, while Spirit Guardians has a range of self
@@k-p116 Yeah I went and double checked bc I wanted to be sure and after sifting through all that text surely enough it's one of the only types of spells excluded (and probably for good reason lmao) thanks for the clarification though
Build idea: Use Magical Secrets to take this on a Bard, then reflavor the Dodge-action to dancing. Now you're skipping through the battlefield as spectral, fey creatures whirl around you, elegantly avoiding attacks with your awesome dance-moves. And the enemies? Your back-up dancers will deal with them...
Thank you for your information video
I didn't ask how big the room was. I said, "I upcast Spirit Guardians."
but spirit guardians doesn't have friendly fire so there's no issue casting it on your party in a small room.
It's not just that. "When you cast this spell, you can designate any number of creatures you can see to be unaffected by it."
If you can't see them (Darkness, invisibility, cover), you can't specify them. If the party is split and they aren't there, RAW you can't specify them. If they bring in a non-hostile you haven't met and didn't designate, it hits them too.
Also, if an enemy tries to surrender on their turn, they have to survive another saving throw first unless you release concentration first.
I prefer Spirit Guardians to Fireball in almost any situation, but it's good to know the details. I've played at several tables where friendly fire could/should have occurred.
You post this the same day my DM announced a surprise level 16 one-shot for my birthday, and right when I decided to play a Cleric. Coincidence? I think not! Thank you for the super informative vid! I will make you proud, Kobold!
my favorite spell in the game, the reason to play cleric, and I agree, if someone doesn't know how powerful it is their opinions on Cleric are automatically disregarded. it's like asking someone why "polearm master" is good and then they don't mention GWM. great litmus test for someone's skill level
I thought people combine Polearm Master with Sentinel
I think the question should be "Why people use Two Handed Weapons when you can use Shields to get AC" when GWM is a thing
Or "Why people doesnt Dual Wield Melee as a Ranger for Hunters Mark" when Crossbow Expert and Sharpshooter is a thing and it does better WITHOUT Hunters Mark, even in BG3 where Dual Wielding Crossbow replace Crossbow Expert entirely
To be fair, polearm master + dueling is surprisingly close to Pam + gwm damage, and lets you do stuff like buff charisma with your ASIs if you are playing a paladin.
@@RenoKyrie GWM is great but Rapier + Shield is also incredibly good. DEX builds gives better AC, INITIATIVE, DEX ST, better stealth and Ranged weapon damage. For roughly 500gp less.
Especially initiatiative is incredibly underrated.
Been using your videos as Baldur's Gate guides. They are excellent. Except your other Spirit Guardians one, apparently.
Theres a lot of spells in 5e that are really strong but bad in BG3. Like sleep and hypnotic pattern are bad in BG3. Cloud of daggers is a bad spell in 5e but it's pretty strong in BG3.
As for Spirit Guardians, it works differently in BG3.
@@PackTacticsI'd argue cloud of daggers is less bad more alright on its own and just needs a good situation to be good say for example in a door dodging situation right in front of the door or if you have a grappler in your party you two could synergize together to both drag enemies through the daggers and also keep them there grappled and prone so they can't move out of the daggers even if they break grapple because they started their turn with 0 movement due to grapple so they can't even get up from prone ready to be regrappled next grappler turn
Deja Vu 2 electric Boogaloo
Thanks for the guide :)
If you are using Sage Advice as a reference, it's important to note that walking the AoE into enemies with Spirit Guardians up doesn't cause damage to them because it counts as the spell area moving. Spirit Guardians will only deal damage if an enemy willingly moves into the area, is forced in, or the start their turn there. Don't ask me why this is the case, it just simply is according to Sage Advice's clarification on Moonbeam (which uses the same wording).
At least they take the damage at the start of their turn so you might finish them before the can perform an actuon
coming from MTG it makes perfect sense, the spell is entering the creatures area and the damage happens when the creature enters the spells area, totally different. Side note if any of yall want to get rid of a rules lawyer just introduce them to Azurios MTG, then they can go play solitare and have a great time
When the spell does it's effect when cast, it says so in the spell description. Use Grease for example: "When the grease *appears*, each creature standing in its area must succeed on a Dexterity saving throw (...) A creature that enters the area or ends its turn there must also succeed on a Dexterity saving throw".
Compare it to Evard's Black Tentacles, "When a creature enters the affected area for the first time on a turn or starts its turn there, the creature must succeed on a Dexterity saving throw".
To be honest, for balance reasons this is probably a good thing.
A 3 level upcast by just waking a bit on your turn is a bit much.
Pushing 1 target in is fine. Always being able to push all of them? Not so much.
I mean that's more so because in moonbeam's case the aoe might as well be teleporting to a new location it isn't being dragged across an area just casting light in a different location and not in the previous location while in SG's case it is in fact moving with you rather than appearing in a different location
I use this spell all the time. My Forge cleric turns this spell on and runs into groups of enemies like a locomotive 🚂
Dude, same
I love this spell, but could only use it once so far. Thanks for the video
It's super effective in BG3. I'm running a tempest cleric/evoker wizard. One part has a fair amount of lightning resistant enemies and myself and shadowheart have trivialized a few fights just having spirit guardians up on both of them. Really hope you do some BG3 content!!
This spell alone is why Twilight Cleric goes from "maybe slightly too good" to "default kill most encounters." Within one level of getting this spell, a mono-class Twilight Cleric can just fly 15ft above the enemies, and then also has an action free to do whatever is needed of the Cleric. Admittedly, any flying race can kinda do this already (and with more class flexibility in Tier 1 and early Tier 2), but the rest of the Twilight Cleric features make it a really strong option.
(Bonus points if you're Medium and have a Small sized Daolock in the party who you can grapple and fly up with while they cast Spike Growth. Just mince anyone who even tries to get close while the Daolock rubs them across a holy cheese grater.)
They don't need to be small size as medium you can grapple medium creatures just make sure you don't get knocked prone because then both of you plummet
I love this spell. It’s pretty much the only thing I do in combat. Only exception is if I have to dash to reach an enemy, I use moonbeam. I also take res con and rush to max my con so that I have better concentration checks. In my mind that is more important than a good wis.
Yup that's the secret!
Concentration is more important than the ability modifier!
I pump con, take resilient con and warcaster and just chill. With prof in wisdom as well there's little to no way to shut down concentration. The next best thing imo is stars druid dragon form and just not roll period cuz your con save is auto 15-20. Meaning you need 30-40 dmg to even start rolling lol.
Of course when you got half damage on the best save to use against enemies in the game, Wisdom, you don't need to invest too far into it to do well when your main threat now is simply losing your concentration on the spell
I've used Spirt Guardians on all of my Clerics. Another option if running more of a support subclass without a higher AC, if your party has tanking front line fighters, barbarians or paladins, stand behind them with this active. It won't harm allies and the 15' range still gets enemies trapped inside it and you can cantrip spam to deal extra damage without the resource cost.
My favorite cleric spell! I cast it and then sing,"Walkin' After Midnight".
Spirit Guardians is amazing, it's an always-take when I cleric, absolutely disgusting spell, a proper crowd-pleaser and GM-infuriator. My Strixhaven warlock has it, too, and it's just not okay, I love it lol
Wish warlocks had better scaling spells usually because literally all the warlock exclusive spells don't upcast which is what warlocks are built mechanically around pre upcasted slots but no we gotta fight tooth and nail for good non save or suck spells to be relevant it's no wonder the darkness spell was so overused once warlocks got a hold of it you simply can't beat a 10 minute long aoe free advantage + disadvantage combo when right when you get it you can take a Invocation to be able to see through it, I'm glad you're enjoying the spell on your warlock it's very good on them thanks to short rest recharge for two free casts per hour
When we played our first 5E campaign many moons ago, the Dwarf Cleric cast this spell for the first time. We called it "The Disco Ball of Death!" *LOL*
This is one of my favorite spells, often when i am running as a DM i do change it so neutral casters to have force damage instead of radiant damage with this, but thats more because it feels more flavor accurate. (I have tested 1d4radiant, 1d4necrotic instead of 1d8 of one, and not sure which i like better) but no matter what this spell is totally amazing. What is really fun is when you build well for the ability for a familiar to have this spell on them as well haha, the damage stacks from multiple aoes. Talk about blender button haha.
Force damage buffs this spell even more though
@@NotRealAkira actually force damage does not boost it nearly as much as one would think. Radiant being the most common effect (two alignments) already buffs this more than the necrotic being both would. However, force is BARELY a buff from radiant, heck, if anything its more of a lateral shift. Magical B/P/S would be a much nastier buff to the balance. Magical B/P/S is basically not resisted or immunized against by anything in 5e that doesn’t have blanket magic mitigation. Its not like the old days where force was far less resisted than positive and negative. Plus, there is precedent for this, in the old world lores the higher entities that governed neutrality would use force to take on usurpers and hazards that came from either the good or the evil (or law/chaos but no powers assigned to those as so much) planes. Meanwhile each of those used their titular powers or radiant/necrotic). The half and half is a sort of side-grade as more smaller dice drastically reduces your chances at high numbers, but buffs your base and average. But either way it sort of works out. Otherwise you have to get into like D3s and/or D2s and stuff lol
@@ConnorSinclairCavin I meant compared to Necrotic, but fair enough
@@NotRealAkira yeah, necrotic was done a little bit more dirty than the other two. Generally i put all non-magical B/P/S as the “junk” category, all of the “elemental” damages (fire, cold, lightning, *thunder, acid, poison) together (*thunder is actually better than the others really… so sometimes i actually slid it up to the exotics group… but its a tough call) next is generally non-magical elemental damage, because there are a fair few ow the beings that resist /ignore magical sources that have no protection against non magical versions, tho some creatures do have the reverse, then you get Psychic, *thunder, necrotic, force, and radiant. With radiant and force being a bit better than the others. And above all the others is magical B/P/S. The only other type/higher thing would be either true damage (only referenced once so far in 5e and not yet stated on anything as far as i know), stat damage (very rare, but very nasty, luckily easy to get the spells to fix if you are past tier 1 play) and exhaustion damage… because… yeah, exhaustion damage is more than a tad scary to deal with.
I like how you explain spells, both the good and the bad. Have you considered taking each spellcasting class all the way to 20th level, concentrating on the spell selection at each level (with options) and why? This would help a lot of people.
Idk if it was just something my DM allowed but raw, as far as I can tell, you can use the Distant Spell metamagic from sorcs on it to make the radius 30ft
Could see this combining really good with effects that reduce speed, making its 1/2 speed control effect more emphasized. I'm thinking low resource cost abilities like fathomless warlock's tentacle thing, since its a bonus action to use which lets you dodge with your action, or double up the speed reduction with a Ray of Frost. Divine Soul sorcerer 5 / Fathomless Warlock 1 would work for this combo.
My favorite spell hands down. Its so hard to get around and I love using it with Telekinetic
Thanks from a noob DnD player who plays a light cleric, currently lvl 4 so almost there!
Says a lot that even the nerfed SG in BG3 is one of the strongest spells in the game.
How is it nerfed? You can literally run into enemies with it forcing them to take damage. If a wizard haste you you can run the entire map back and forth, bumping nullifying the biggest 5e weakness of the spell. It's actually stronger by far for this alone. Take 3 levels for thief rogue and you've got yourself 2 bonus action dashes, 2 action dashes and your base movement. There's no dodge in the game but you can blade Ward yourself every other round (it lasts 2 rounds) and alternate with dashing! That's 150 feet of movement! 175 if you go wood elf.
@@DeadpoolAliI don't think it can be triggered multiple times a round, and the radius is now 10ft.
Two things:
Open fields and ranged attacks. That's it. That's all it takes to neuter Spirit Guardians.
If you're out in the open - don't engage, throw weapons, melee enemies are fully capable of doing so. Or just..... run around a 15 foot radius, big deal, most creatures can do that by using 30 feet to move diagonally. If you have a ranged weapon - use that, attack the people behind Cleric. Cleric can't protect *them* and Dodging only works on self.
It isn't nearly as strong unless you're fighting inside a cave/building against opponents with INT 5 or less
Never had the whole party drop prone at range before eh?
@@Autonym never had monsters being smarter than bricks use Hold Action to catch your party standing up from Prone to make ranged attacks of their own or using Dash to get in melee range so ranged PCs have to stand up and run away eh? Remember, Multiattack works on held Actions fully, so while you stand up you can get shot 2, 3 or potentially more times by just one enemy.
Not to mention enemies can do the exact same thing after they're done shooting - disadvantage doesn't stack and neuters any advantage the PCs might obtain so literally nothing changes if both sides do the same thing
I didn’t use the dodge action, but yeah. The moment I read the spell, I knew I needed to use that for my war domain cleric. Most of my kills were from this spell alone.
Goblin with a bonus action disengage action mesns you can back up and then move back towards the enemy.
I remember playing as a paladin in a group with a cleric and a bard and an artificer. The tactic was that the cleric (who was a fairy) cast spirit guardians and flew directly above my character whose aura increased their saving throws. And then the artificer would cast enlarge on the cleric to make the radius bigger. Then the bard would be directly behind me giving inspiration to the cleric to add to saving throws as well so we had a unit of death sphere where you had a beacon that slings guiding bolts, psychic mind blasts from the bard, and chromatic orbs from the artificer and if you got in close you were instantly exploded by a paladin smite. We cheesed Auril the Frostmaiden
Its safe to ban spirit gardians. If by some off chance you get two clerics in the party, its mandatory to run things resistance, and proficient in wisdom saves so they dont get melted in 2 rounds.or nerf it to 10 ft
This here is a big reason why I miss the Dodge action so much in Baldur's Gate 3 (I don't know why they didn't implement it in the game).
Balance
For anyone wondering, yes SG is still one of the best Cleric Spells in Baldur's Gate 3; However they did nerf it by only dealing the damage once per creature per roundn so you can't walk into a creature, walk away, then push them into it again
That alone is the same in 5e (haven't playes BG3 yet, myself, so I don't know if there is more to your statement). If you walk within range of someone, spirit guardians does not trigger, as they have not entered spirit guardians (entering something always requires the entity to be moving willingly or be moved by force, not someone else moving).
And they also nerfed the range, and the duration.
I used this spell to great effect all throughout Curse of Strahd, especially by dodging in the middle of narrow doorways to protect the squishier members of the party.
And now I use this strategy on a divine soul sorcerer
So, a peace cleric has Emboldening Bond, which can add a d4 to saves (and other things) once per turn. So, on the enemies turn, if they cast a save spell at me, is it better to use the d4 then to try and make the save for half damage, or is it better to use the d4 when making my con save to maintain concentration? They're both done on the same enemies turn so I can't do both. On the one hand taking half as much damage may make the save have a lower dc (especially for high potential damage spells like fireball), but on the other (assuming I can spare the hp, the d4 may matter more (for lower damage spells where the dc will be 10 regardless, or barely above). And to add more complication, damage is unpredictable. That fireball may do up to 48 damage (unlikely though it may be) but could also do as low as 8 (just as unlikely). At what level of damage would I want to switch tactics to passing the first save vs the second?
I'm using this on my Forge Cleric in Strom King's Thunder and damn this spell slices through goblins like butter
Pair it with wall of flame and you have the best map control. Place the wall at mid range so they have to run through it but then they hit guardians at close range. Then you just hope they don't have a ton of ranged ability.
Happy holy 🐊
In a relatively optimized party, which is a better use of concentration in your option, bless or spirit guardians?
Another fun thing you can do: If you ride a mount, you can safely dash into range of an enemy, trigger SG, do whatever action, move out of range. Another reason why mounts are so powerful
You missed one thing the cleric could walk back 1ft, forward 1ft (hitting the creature on the clerics turn as well) then back 6ft+ so the players can pull him in again etc
This video is one of the reasons why I wanted to play a Wisdome dumping Cleric. Well, I play a Charisma dumping Warforged Divine Soul Sorcerer instead in an upcoming campaign. I rolled a 6 on my lowest stat and could not bring myself to ignore my Wisdom save since I am planing to become a literal tank with a death aura and the other players are not optimizing nearly as much. I do not want to risk a TPK with a single domination effect.
My DM allowed me to ignore ability score requrements for multiclassing and the campaign starts at level 2. Plus I dipped Fighter at level 1 so I will not reach Spirit Guardiance any time soon, but even with Bless, Interception and Booming Blade, I will have loads of fun (Defence Fighting Style would be an optoin too but an AC of 19 and the ability to pick up War caster and the shield spell at character level 4, getting even more defence for myself has diminishing returns and being able to protect my allies is more valuable). If the campaign goes long enough, after Sorcerer level 5, I plan on multiclassing 2 levels of Necromancer Wizard for infinit healing from Spirit Guardians and Grim Harvest, 7 levels of Genie(Efriti) Warlock for Fire Shield and Elemental gift (manly for the concentration free flight) and (after a second level of Fighter for Action Surge for tail protection to get both big gun spells up in my first turn when getting surprised) finally 4 levels of Hunter Ranger (mainly for Hoard Breaker as - unlike Gloom Stalker's Dread Ambusher feature - Hoard Breker works with Booming Blade and Green Flame Blade).
Bar the too low Charisma score for multiclassing, I think this is a serious and fairly optimized build and apart from picking up Life Cleric for Life Berries, I don't see any more optimal choice for a frontliner with a damage aura. I could go for Fiend instead of Efriti and with a legal charisma score of 13 or higher, Dark One's Blessing would be a nice addition to the healing from Grim Harvest but in my case, I would have to dump either my Wisdome saves or my Dexterity. I quite like my high initiative and my stealth bonus of +5 before Pass Without Trace gets cast on me but most importantly, I know my DM knows the meme about high-AC characters and their inability to deal with Dex-saves.
While TempHP do not stack with more TempHP, they do stack nicely with raw HP healing, buffering any new incoming damage. In my case, Fiend would give me 1-4 Temorary HP and another way wo buff my concentration saves once per short rest while Efriti gives me extra damage on almost every attack, a once per day accessable bag of holding that also allows me to rest inside it and concentration free fight. Elemantal Gift will almost never come into play as I will have fire shiled active in pretty much every combat just one level after picking up Elemental Gift but one level of fire resistance is nothing to sneeze at and after that it becomes tail protection in case our camp gets attacked by an angry red dragon or something.
@PackTacktics I *do* miss "the old days" of spotlight videos like this one though I watch pretty much every single new one as well - including the BG3 ones that take forever and the OneD&D stuff that does not affect me since I am not planing to play the new edition/ errata.
I'm spotlighting Mirror image tomorrow actually! I hope you'll like it. Thank you very much for the comment!
@@PackTactics I did and while I did not have a particularly high opinion on the spell WOW did I still overestimated it. I went into more detail in my comment under that video but in a nutshell: Mirror Image is commonly misunderstood to redirect hits instead of attacks and even than, it is not *that* good, I think. I picked it up for my 20th level what-if build but I will go switch it out now - if only to cast Web with a -2 spellcasting ability modifier and against flying enemies so that web only last for a single round. That way, I at least have the chance to drop them from the sky instead of wasting my turn completely.
So what I'm hearing is my Kua-Toa Priest boss fight is going to be very tough... awesome
I have two spirit guardians builds:
1: trickery cleric with shield of faith, mirror image, and spirit guardians all running while you take the dodge action. Only spirit guardians is concentration here, so all these spells stack. I also recommend tortle for good natural armor, but dex and int saves are your weakness.
2: tempest cleric with sentinel and polearm master. It’s a nasty combo that lets you pin down enemies to ensure someone is taking that spirit guardians damage. You can also stack shield of faith like before, but don’t have access to mirror image. Polearm master also lets you bonk with your bonus action, so that’s why we don’t pick war domain.
Shilwd of faith is also concentration
@@mke3053 dang it, you right. Guess I got used to abusing it with paladin
So, spirit guardians plus thunder wave on tempest clerics make for amazing AOE damage, and if your DM lets you use fizbans version of dragon born you can use your breath weapon infinitely which is a constitution based 15 foot cone of up to 4d10 damage in any damage type of your choice with a dex save for half.
It's pb uses not infinite use but yes tempest clerics are great for battlefield control
hey, i wanted to ask if you (or someone else optimizing) has thoughts on wall spells, especially wall of fire
wall of fire says it makes a wall, but not necessarily a straight wall (like wall of stone that creates panels). So you can snake wall of fire down an alley, which deals a bunch of damage. also, it procs twice on it's starting turn, once with the save when you summon it and with NO SAVE when creature enter or starts it's turn in the wall area or the area of heat the wall creates. It's very powerful for me, but we're not very optimized, and wanted to know what other people think
Edit bc just thought about it, i'm not asking is it better than spirit guardians, bc i don't think it is. It feels more like a shaped fireball that can also do some control, than the constent dpr of spirit guardians. A comparaison can be made, but i don't think they fullfill the exact same role
Nothing stops you from having a diagonal/zigzag/curved wall of fire! (Other than maybe your DM)
It is a pretty good spell and is very, very fun with repelling blast. Especially the zigzag.
Just a note: the no save damage is on the end of turn, not start.
But kobold, how does overlapping spirit guardians work? There is a Divine Soul Sorcerer in the party, and a cleric. If we both have SH active, will a creature take damage from both at the start of their turn? I think it's clear they will not suffer from.halved movement speed twice since that's an effect (with a duration?)...but is damage an effect? Will they take damage from both our spirit guardians?
Additionally, does that change if one is a radiant damaging SG, and the other is a necrotic damaging SG?
you earned my sub!
Spirit Guardians is a really good spell, though I honestly prefer other ones and I think that it can be campaign and party dependant. My Dragonlance party has me as the only full caster in the party and most of them make a lot of use of attack rolls, so Bless is often the more pressing use of my concentration. We're playing Dragonlance where we constantly need to worry about the Death Throws from Draconians, so frequent Saving Throws are involved.
I'm also our Scout despite being the Cleric, as I'm an Aarakocra (who I have gone out of my way to avoid being broken with the fly speed) who can't wear heavy or medium armor and put my Dex really high, and got Stealth proficeny for backstory reasons. Our party lacks a Ranger or Rogue and most of the party has high Strength or mental stats, not Dex. I can't really stealth very well surrounded by spectral beasts (I'm the Cleric of Habbakuk, the God of Beasts).
A niche instance, yes, but I think there are times something else might be more optimal.
That said, the one time I have used it was during a battle with a very large horde of soldiers and their superiors, and it did really help in that scenerio due to volume of enemies.
This would be so good on a blade warlock
Aight, my next character takes 2 levels of stars druid for dragon form, casts spirit guardians and dodges with res con and war caster with a BA sanctuary, then ill go make some food while the rest of the team has fun :)
My favorite move was always to disengage, move away and laugh as they have to dash to get back to me. Works great as a tank Cleric in front of the squishies and getting in the way. Dodge is needed vs ranged foes though.
Be goblin or 2 level dip in rogue for bonus action disengage so you keep your action free for dodge (either that or multiclass into astral self monk for wis based grapple/prone checks to pin people stuck in your SG range to invalidate non reach weapon using martials while being able to dodge either as your bonus action or action that way incase you ever need either it's always an option)
Spiritual weapon in BG3 is fine. It has HP so it will be targeted by enemies.
I don't feel like it's ever needed though
Have you heard of this neat spell called plant growth?
I think the reason people don't appreciate Spirit Guardians more, is because its not upfront about its sheer power level. If it was instead called *"Unlimited Opportunity Attacks: The Spell"* and listed its features as:
1. Gives you unlimited Reactions for unlimited Opportunity Attacks.
2. Gives you 15 feet of range for your Opportunity Attacks, more than any melee weapon.
3. Does half damage on a miss.
4. Slows enemies within your reach even when you miss.
5. Triggers when enemies enter your reach instead of exit, allowing you to attack them more often (e.g. if someone tries to move past you, you get to attack them twice or even thrice, instead of only once as they exit your reach)
6. Can't be dodged through taking the Disengage Action
-then people would clearly see just how powerful it really is. (And this isn't even its full list of features! Spirit Guardians also does magical damage instead of regular nonmagical weapon damage, and as you point out, triggers off forced movement of the enemy in a way Opportunity Attacks don't, allowing for teamplay or just use of the Telekinetic ability)
Also: as this channel has pointed out before (and Tabletop Builds as well), the classic Tank archetype just doesn't exist in 5e... there's just no way to 'draw aggro' or otherwise force enemies to slow down and attack you. And even if you could, there's little you could do to keep them there, because Opportunity Attacks are so wimpy they're just not a real threat (swarms of weak enemies can afford to lose a single member to your one Reaction attack, while a single strong enemy can just eat the attack and keep chugging).
But Spirit Guardians absolutely fixes all that and allows people to play the classic Tank fantasy of soaking fire and protecting people. And I'm surprised more people don't recommend it when newcomers to the game want to play a Tank, and pick Barbarian or something 'cause that's intuitive and makes sense. Someone has to tell them "You absolutely *can* live the fantasy, it's just that this game treats Martials like a red-headed stepchild and Spellcasters like a fortunate son, so the Tanking ability is a spell rather than something actual warriors can do. Also, you want to be a caster anyways so you can pick up the Shield spell and be more armored up than the actual knights in shining armor. Welcome to D&D 5e."
(And yes, I do believe that the game should look back to 4e and return to treating martial maneuvers and abilities like spells with a different focus and coat of paint. Martials and magic will never be equals as long as Magic as defined as everything the Martials can't do, rather than "Martials and mages do things differently, but they both fundamentally *do* things. Not the same things, they're not identical, but both get to do things on a roughly comparable power level.")
I have to say one of our players who used to run a monk cleric pc was the bane of our dm who because of the sg spam.
Would you recommend casting Sanctuary on yourself after activating Spirit Guardians, to complement the dodge actions?
That doesn't work because of errata.
At which level should one stop using Spirit Guardians as the main spell, if ever?
any chance you could do a guide on magic jar?
That's a very big video and it will probably make people mad because I think double Magic jar is RAW.
Just draw 2 cards lol
@@PackTacticsJust curious. Do you believe in true polymorph being used with magic jar to take any creatures body to be RAW? I found this on DND Shorts and am looking for another's opinion.
be a drawf for drawven fortitude feat if you take the dogde action you heal i think 1d8 plus con have a bugbear with a reach weapon and sentineil and pole arm master having a possible reach of 20 feet because bugbears can be large or the bug bear just picks it up and moves it around out and in
It's when you dodge you can expend a hit dice to heal so yes for a cleric it's 1d8 for a divine sorcerer it's 1d6 for a crown paladin it's 1d10 probably best on a twilight cleric that way if an enemy manages to break past you temp hp (which also helps against concentration saves) you can then dodge to heal some of the damage back and then gain temp hp
Also bugbears are a Medium player race there are no large sized player race the closest is deuregar because they got a free cast of the enlarge half of enlarge reduce (and also for fun the farthest is fairy because they're small and can also innately cast enlarge reduce to be tiny size)
I think the main reason that fireball is a meme and this is not is because of the friendly fire
I just played a Peace Cleric in my latest campaign and indeed Spirit Guardians is good, I'd say even too good that it makes combat kinda boring, kinda like how a PAM GWM build is really good but also boring. At the very least we had a variety of encounters where Spirit Guardians was not the right spell, but I still felt that my decision tree has always been "is SG the appropriate spell for this encounter? If yes, cast, else, start thinking of something else."
Or perhaps it's just the lack of interesting combat spells for the Cleric. SG is so good compared to other Cleric spells that options are very limited, unlike a Wizard or even a Sorcerer where you have several options for good spells that you have a lot more variety in the spells you cast per encounter.
does sanctuary work with spirit guardian? if a friend uses sanctuary on you while you have spirit guardian you could be even safer since you will use dodge and justify better to be in melee
Due to errata no, the updated wording of the spell says Sanctuary ends whenever you deal damage in any way.
👍🏻
Thats so funny, its a bit weaker in bg3 but thats exactly how I've been using Shadowheart. Spirit guardians and warcaster.
I honestly think the sentence about when the damage is triggered should be errata, and instead state "on its turn" instead of "on a turn". The knock the enemy in and out of the area of effect on every player's turn part is just overkill for a spell that's already so powerful. My GM reads it as no more than one trigger per round and I'm still super happy with that as my group's cleric.
Honestly, I really like the combos it creates. Working with teammates is fun.
I don't pick up shield as wizard because I like to play in hard mode
for a light cleric with both fireball and spirit guardians, is there any case you rather use fireball?
I mean probably against enemies that are ranged attackers or farther away, also enemies you can sense have a low DEX vs WIS. like it would probably be better to use fireball against enemy spellcasters vs spirit guardians bc they tend to have high WIS saves but average to low DEX saves.
Fireball deals more damage quickly. If you think they're going to die to 8d6 or half, then use Fireball. If it'll take more than that to kill most of them, probably go with Spirit Guardians.
If there's a large group of low 5e enemies to the point where fireball will kill them in one turn, but spirit guardians won't, go with fireball.
Nother classic for good ol 5(Chees)e
Grater
Gator has little gator guardians :)
Does it work well in BG3 too?
Its nerfed but despite that its STILL super strong
Easily one of the best spells in the game!
Back Again
Worst encounter I ever designed was a gargoyle with spirit guardians. (Circle of dead stuff around a statue in a forest) It took out half the HP from my whole party lol
I do think wizards meant to say "when the creature enters the first time on ITS turn" so that way it has a chance to act before taking damage a second time. But alas the spell is pretty cool and allows for combos this way
If they did they wouldn't have included the first part of the conditions for taking damage as well have if they did they would have said so already yet they haven't
I have to say if players at my table started adopting this strategy to every single encounter. There would be an increase in enemies that are more efective at range and like kiting strategies themselves. It's just not fun if you don't need different strategies and adapt to new circumstances.
Spirit guardian with find greater steed?
So combining that with Frost bolt, does it go half to 15, then -10 down to 5? Or does it go -10 down to 20, then half to 10? Anyone clear on what the order of operations is there?
I believe the character who's turn it is chooses the order of operations
It's probably dependent on which happens first spirit guardians or ray of frost if for example you're a divine soul sorcerer and do the combo probably the half from SG then the -10 from RoF (also pretty decent build against melee enemies would be like a 2 level dip warlock for repelling blast the rest in divine soul sorcerer and cast spirit guardians that way once an enemy has the chance to finally get back up to you their base movement speed is cut in half and thus they've run out of movement right at the edge of the aoe stuck taking the sg damage ready for you to repeat the process)
Spirit Guardians, Merge with Stone, Sit underneath the martials.
My DM doesn't care if i have Spirit Guardian up. All the enemy come swarming the party anyways
The first time I used SG my DM did that. I did 107 damage in one round. At level 5. I never touched martial classes again.
I think people sleep on Spirit Guardians because you effectively have to be within 15 ft to use it and I guess people see the heavily armored cleric as someone who should avoid the front line. It's awesome because forced movement can repeat the damage multiple times in a round and you can also use it as a "keep away from me" spell. Plus I've learned to grab either the chill touch cantrip or something source of reliable radiant damage in case of vampires. Another nasty spell that I don't hear people talk a lot about is Sickening Radiance. Not centered on yourself and causes levels of exhaustion so if you can force enemies to stay in its AOE, they're cooked.
Sickening Radiance and Synaptic Static are amazing spells
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this spell is singlehandedly the reason why i refuse to believe any Sorcerer subclass can compete with Divine Soul Sorcerer without access to Cleric spells. this spell makes you the beyblade, the danger, the scariest motherfucker on the field. yes i do like tacking on Spiritual Weapon despite it being ass because it more or less compounds on the fact you are a goddamn beyblade. i'm not here to do things optimally, i'm here to do things in a more fun manner. but i cannot deny how fucking badass this one spell is. the only way to do it even scarier would be to make a Chromatic Dragonborn (Red) with Divine Soul Sorcerer and pack fireball or something that lets you cast fireball at yourself. pop the immunity, pull out spirit warriors, leave everything around you a trail of ashes.
If you're a dragonborn, you could just use your breath attack. Sapphire Dragonborn Tempest Cleric. Channel divinity + breath attack + Spirit Guardians. Your lightning or thunder damage is at max, no roll required.
@@greevar counterpoint, you get to spam fireballs on yourself with no consequence and incinerate foes with a beyblade of fiery radiant death.
it's not always about doing the meta. it's about making a statement of why Divine Soul Sorcerer is the best sorcerer option and no i will not be taking prisoners.
My DM runs big encounter rooms, like 200ft+ from starting position to finish, how exactly do I make use of spirit guardian???
3 levels of rune knight. Go large and cast SG. Have a wizard or sorc cast enlarge on you. You are now huge and take up 45'x45' 1/4th of that room now belongs to you. If you have any other casters have them put up other area denial stuff like web.
Oh and be a nature cleric so you can plant growth anything else in that room as well as have thorn whip.
Don't, but keep it prepared. You've tricked them into making melee enemies massively underpowered all of a sudden cause they are never going to be able to reach you.
This is the beauty of Spellcasters. You don't just need to rely on one great spell. Rely on all the great spells.
This spell combined with my twilight cleric makes me the strongest player on the board many times and I never even have to swing a weapon. If I add in spiritual weapon during harder combat I'm essentially an unstoppable killing force. We often play at 13.
You should try telekinetic!
It's does even more damage than spiritual weapon while you have spirit guardians up, and has great utility outside of that.
And best of all - it doesn't take any spellslots.
@@druidofnosleep1513 Hey thanks for the tip! I'm going to give it a try during my next game!
5:09 "When the creature enters the area for the first time on a turn or starts its turn there"
I read this spell as that the creature can only take Spirit Guardians damage once per turn.
Of course, that would be bad for teamplay, which is what D&D is supposed to be all about.
You set up a challenging terrain effect, your party spends actions throwing enemies into it.
They can in fact only take damage once per turn, barring exceptionally poor tactics on their part, but there are many turns in a round.
@@iranoutofideasforausernam1703 When I said once per turn, I meant once per combat turn. That would be bad though.
@@AvangionQ do you mean round?
@@pandanielxd Yes. Ah, that's my misread.
Will you please take a kobold gloomstalker into the gauntlet? Mike with CMCC builds.... I want to see what the master of Rangers can do.🤔
Its not a solo build and he wants me to do solo games.
You get a warrior and expert premade companions that you control.
I think a gloomstalker would function pretty well solo depending on how the DM handles the umbral sight and hiding etc. Kobolds features work better in a group I'll admit. But you can always cast Conjure animals 😊