D&D 5E Find the Path. What? Why is this a 6th level spell?

[Stalker0]

Just because it doesn’t have a gp value doesn’t mean it is substitutable.

A focus can substitute for generic items, but not a unique item, surely?

On the focus rules, they can substitute any item that doesn't have a GP cost. I would argue that the familiarity clause in the spell though reinforces that you basically need to have been at the location your going....scrying in itself is probably not going to cut it.

So I agree with CapnZapp that spells like this should be high level....but then they need to be high level in power to be worth the time...ESPECIALLY if this is going to use concentration.

So something where it lets you find the shortest path AND alerts you to ambushes (aka you can't be surprised) AND gives you a bonus on initiative.....then maybe we are talking something worthy of a 6th level slot.

So in summary....the spell should stay high level (we don't need PCs using these kind of plot twisting spells at low level)....but the spell needs to be buffed to be worthy of such a slot.

 

[TaranTheWanderer]

I don’t understand the logic of this. The item is very valuable to the caster as it provides a connection to the location. Just because it doesn’t have a gp value doesn’t mean it is substitutable.

A focus can substitute for generic items, but not a unique item, surely?

I agree. The material component specifies a specific item. It doesn’t matter if it had no gp value. Narratively, it could be incredibly difficult to find what you need if you’ve never been there. If you don’t have it, the spell fails. It seems weird If your spell component pouch just hapened to have the dirt from the ‘Hidden Temple of Nol Da’Ar’.

or

“Sure, I just happen to have a little piece of soil from Strahd’s coffin. That doesn’t cost anything so I must have it.”

 

[MarkB]

I don’t understand the logic of this. The item is very valuable to the caster as it provides a connection to the location. Just because it doesn’t have a gp value doesn’t mean it is substitutable.

A focus can substitute for generic items, but not a unique item, surely?

That's certainly a reasonable interpretation, and I wouldn't argue with a DM who ruled that way, but by RAW a focus can replace any material component that doesn't have a listed monetary value.

 

[TaranTheWanderer]

That's certainly a reasonable interpretation, and I wouldn't argue with a DM who ruled that way, but by RAW a focus can replace any material component that doesn't have a listed monetary value.

To me, that was always to make it easier to track material components and make the game less fiddly. This feels more like a story-oriented component.

 

[MarkB]

To me, that was always to make it easier to track material components and make the game less fiddly. This feels more like a story-oriented component.

Pretty much. The way I see it it's an area where a DM who doesn't want the spell to be a narrative stumbling block can enforce the requirement, whereas one who wants the spell to be more flexible can allow the requirement to be circumvented via the spell focus rules.

 

[Mort]

The "object from the place you wish to find" material component has no listed value, so by a strict reading of the rules it can be replaced with a spell focus.

That just leaves the "location you are familiar with" requirement. Using Scrying on a creature at the location you wish to find will allow you to observe the creature and its surroundings as though you were there, so that would make you familiar with the location.

While I think you are correct by RAW, I think a "strict" reading per RAI could easily rule, in many places, an object from the place I wish to find is unique enough to satisfy the "value" requirement.

Of course, then you're left with the spell being so DM dependent that it's near useless for anything actually difficult to find (the DM could provide a map or a guide as easily as an object) - which is the OPs point.

 

[MarkB]

While I think you are correct by RAW, I think a "strict" reading per RAI could easily rule, in many places, an object from the place I wish to find is unique enough to satisfy the "value" requirement.

Of course, then you're left with the spell being so DM dependent that it's near useless for anything actually difficult to find (the DM could provide a map or a guide as easily as an object) - which is the OPs point.

Plus, of course, even "an object from the location you wish to find" is seriously ambiguous and open to DM interpretation. What makes an object "from" somewhere? Does it need to have been there at least once? I.e. if you know Henchman A has been to visit the BBEG in his lair at some point, are his boots a valid object?

Or does it need to be an object that was kept in that location for awhile, like a vase that was on the shelf there until they redecorated?

Or, more stringent still, for an object to be "from" a location, does it need to have been manufactured there, or incorporate some physical material found there natively?

 

[Iry]

Mostly, it's useful for getting OUT of places that are confusing. Like Ariadne's String in the maze.
But it's really rare to know a place is confusing ahead of time, unless the DM outright mentions it.

 

[see]

This goes back to the discussion back in the original Pathfinder playtest that the version of the spell appearing in AD&D 1st/BECMI/AD&D 2nd/Rules Cyclopedia/D&D 3rd/D&D 3.5 (10 minutes/level, any destination) made it impossible for the game world to have any true "lost cities" or the like, which was seen as a worldbuilding issue.

PF1 accordingly nerfed it to only be able to head to "prominent" locations, whatever "prominent" meant. (And people talk about 5e "rulings not rules".)

Now, going back to the 0e version, in the 1975 Supplement I: Greyhawk, the spell worked as follows:

Find the Path: By means of this spell the fastest and safest way out of a trap, maze, or wilderness can be found. It will, for example, allow the user to free himself from a Maze spell in a single turn after employing the spell, and if a subsequent Maze was cast at him it would not have any effect. Duration: 6 turns plus the level of the Cleric, or 1 day outdoors.

The 5e version, as a practical matter, goes back to this first published version, because finding your way to a known location is effectively the way out of wherever you happen to be, with the advantage of solidly defining "out".

 

[CapnZapp]

Spells that wrench narrative control out of the GMs hands are very bad.

The archetypal nonsense is Detect Evil, which then required monsters to wear Hats of Nondetection, and so on in an entirely absurd spiral.

When it's so very unnecessary. Just don't have spells that can wreck a GMs story, unless gated behind a check or other requirement.

(If there's a check you have provided the GM with plausible denial, and/or you have introduced an element of uncertainty. In this case having a requirement of an item that comes from the place you're trying to find is immensely useful, because if the GM doesn't want you to bypass the challenge of finding the location through this spell, he will make sure you can't find such an item)

Tldr Designers have become much better at these things in the past forty years, even though D&D is still the chief culprit when it comes to enabling player-side entitlement.