D&D 5E Does Rope Trick Heal?

[Blue]

I would say "You're welcome.", but Catnap utterly fails to meet my criteria. It provides exactly 0 direct healing, making it NOT a healing spell under my criteria.

First, this isn't the criteria you originally wrote. I'll get back to that.

Second, this one is easily proven wrong. Goodberry provides healing, heck it even benefits from a life cleric that someone else was putting forth as a criteria. But the spell doesn't directly heal you at all. I don't target you witgh Goodberry and you regain HPs. So we know what you just wrote is not a valid criteria of judging if a spell heals.

Anyway, let's return to the original criteria since that's what I responded to:

If you have to engage something other than the spell in order to heal, that spell does not heal you and is not a healing spell.

From Catnap:

"[the] target gains the benefit of a short rest"

It doesn't "enable you to take a short rest", it gives you the benefits of it. Among the benefits of a short rest is healing.

Do you need to engage in anything else? Nope. Great, Catnap does provide healing.

 

[Azzy]

I feel ashamed for even reading this thread.

Pedants will be pedants. *shakes head*

 

[Maxperson]

First, this isn't the criteria you originally wrote. I'll get back to that.

Second, this one is easily proven wrong. Goodberry provides healing, heck it even benefits from a life cleric that someone else was putting forth as a criteria. But the spell doesn't directly heal you at all. I don't target you witgh Goodberry and you regain HPs. So we know what you just wrote is not a valid criteria of judging if a spell heals.

Anyway, let's return to the original criteria since that's what I responded to:



From Catnap:

"[the] target gains the benefit of a short rest"

It doesn't "enable you to take a short rest", it gives you the benefits of it. Among the benefits of a short rest is healing.

Do you need to engage in anything else? Nope. Great, Catnap does provide healing.

And with that quote of mine you do in fact show me saying the exact same thing. The bolded portion of the Catnap spell above shows that you do in fact have to engage something else in order to heal, as the benefits of a short rest don't heal you. They simply allow other methods of healing to be used.

 

[Bacon Bits]

"Healing spell" is a loaded term, making this an extremely poor question. As a result, from the first page of this thread I'm willing to bet it's as long as it is because people want to argue the semantics.

Is it a recovery spell? Yes, in that it's primary purpose from a game design perspective is to give the party time to short rest by hiding perfectly for an hour.

Is it a healing spell? No, because it does not, in-and-of-itself, recover any hit points or remove any negative conditions or effects. That's what the term "healing spell" has connoted for about 30 years, if not longer.

 

[Blue]

And with that quote of mine you do in fact show me saying the exact same thing. The bolded portion of the Catnap spell above shows that you do in fact have to engage something else in order to heal, as the benefits of a short rest don't heal you. They simply allow other methods of healing to be used.

That argument is like saying that Longstrider doesn't let you move further. Yes, you could cast Longstrinder and never take the move action. But any reasonable use of it you move further.

Same for Catnap - if you need healing, had Catnap cast on you, you could decide not to spend any HD. But any reasonable use would have it be done.

Oh, and Goodberry isn't a healing spell because nothing forces anyone to eat the berries. But again, any reasonable use of the spell...

I understand your point, you don't need to reiterate it. I think we will just have to agree to disagree.

 

[Maxperson]

That argument is like saying that Longstrider doesn't let you move further. Yes, you could cast Longstrinder and never take the move action. But any reasonable use of it you move further.

Dude. Longstrider DIRECTLY adds to move speed. Catnap DOES NOT directly add to healing in any way. What's so difficult to understand about what I am saying.

Same for Catnap - if you need healing, had Catnap cast on you, you could decide not to spend any HD. But any reasonable use would have it be done.

Wait. You're actually saying that using it to restore combat skills that require a short rest is not a reasonable use of the spell? That the only reasonable use is healing?

 

[Kobold Stew]

The question is not if it's a healing spell. It asks if it heals.

"Unless the rules explicitly expand, narrow, or completely redefine a word, that word retains the meaning it has in idiomatic English." (source)

The Catnap spell from Xanathar's gives people a short rest if they are uninterrupted for 10 minutes. Do you heal? You definitely can. It is a healing spell that Life clerics would add to? No.

*You* can heal; the spell doesn't heal you. You are correct.

So we can see spells that can enable healing without being spells that heal. So life cleric adding or not isn't a valid criteria to use.

And if the thread asked, "Does Rope Trick enable healing?" there would be a different answer.

If your interpretation depends on a meaningful semantic distinction is between "spells that heal" and "healing spells", then I'm unable to give you a reassuring answer.

Or an answer that reassures.

 

[cbwjm]

Rope trick isn't a healing spell. Just because you can use it for a short rest allowing you to spend hit dice doesn't mean it is a healing spell, after all, it does nothing if you don't have the hit dice to spend. It's a great spell, just not a healing spell.

 

[Gladius Legis]

Walking doesn't require a check, either, and that resets the clock. It doesn't take a whole heck of a lot to be more strenuous than eating and drinking. That said, I think the intent was to give a 1 hour short rest, so I wouldn't gimp the players on the technicality that James Grover pointed out.

How much walking, how fast, and where? Walking at a typical traveling pace on a road is one thing. Walking around a campsite or your house is not what anyone reasonable would rule as "strenuous."

 

[Mouseferatu]

At the end of any year but this one, I would refuse to believe this thread even exists.

For 2018, though? This just feels like a natural result.