Green-Flame Blade = magic weapon?

[Clancey]

Building a High Elf Fighter and looking at the new Green-Flame Blade cantrip in the SCAG. The way I read it is that at this level it does no extra damage to the primary target, just the secondary. Does this count as a magic weapon for the Primary target for hitting targets immune to normal weapon damage?

 

[NotActuallyTim]

I'm pretty sure that GFB does fire damage, so I don't think it matters.

 

[Bob_no_Oni]

Not only does it do Fire damage, but it also uses the "Casting a Spell" action instead of using the "Attack" action. This means that it bypasses non-magical weapon resistance, along with not allowing an Extra Attack when you reach that level.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

The bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing damage from the weapon is not magical unless the weapon is otherwise magical (either because it's a magical item, o has been enchanted with a spell that explicitly allows it to treated as magical weapon, such as shilellagh or magic weapon).

So the fire damage is magical, but the weapon damage is normal (ie, non-magical in most cases).

 

[NotActuallyTim]

What even is weapon damage? Is that a rule or something from previous editions? Or is that just a leftover concept from forum discussions?

 

[CapnZapp]

Building a High Elf Fighter and looking at the new Green-Flame Blade cantrip in the SCAG. The way I read it is that at this level it does no extra damage to the primary target, just the secondary. Does this count as a magic weapon for the Primary target for hitting targets immune to normal weapon damage?

Nothing in the cantrip says the melee attack against the primary target is or becomes magical in any way.

If the weapon used is magical, the attack counts as magical. If not, not. The cantrip doesn't change this either way.

I'm pretty sure that GFB does fire damage, so I don't think it matters.

You are correct in that fire damage is completely separate from resistance to non-magical bludgeoning, piercing and slashing damage. To resist fire damage you need fire resistance, not "weapon resistance".

Not only does it do Fire damage, but it also uses the "Casting a Spell" action instead of using the "Attack" action. This means that it bypasses non-magical weapon resistance, along with not allowing an Extra Attack when you reach that level.

This is nonsense: there is no rules regarding resistance attached to the particular action used.

What matter is what kind of damage you do. If you do bludgeoning, piercing and slashing damage with a non-magical weapon your attack is resisted by monsters resistant to non-magical bludgeoning, piercing and slashing damage. If you do fire damage, such resistance is irrelevant even if you deliver the damage with a weapon. Instead the monster resist your damage if it possess fire resistance.

The bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing damage from the weapon is not magical unless the weapon is otherwise magical (either because it's a magical item, o has been enchanted with a spell that explicitly allows it to treated as magical weapon, such as shilellagh or magic weapon).

So the fire damage is magical, but the weapon damage is normal (ie, non-magical in most cases).

The fire damage is... fire damage. There is no need to differentiate fire damage from a torch or from lava from fire damage from a fireball or a flaming weapon - there are no monsters that are resistant to "non-magical fire" but not to "magical fire": either a monster is resistant to fire damage in general or not at all.

(What a monster can have, however, is magic resistance. This would grant advantage on the save against Fireball but not help at all against lava. But magic resistance would help equally against Lightning Bolt while not help against a punch in the face, so this has nothing to do with fire in particular)

What even is weapon damage? Is that a rule or something from previous editions? Or is that just a leftover concept from forum discussions?

I would suggest you treat it merely as a poster's shorthand for "bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing damage"... (You're welcome)

 

[Leatherhead]

What even is weapon damage? Is that a rule or something from previous editions? Or is that just a leftover concept from forum discussions?

It's a non-rules concept used to denote bludgeoning, piercing, and/or slashing damage that comes from a weapon attack. If you think that's a headache, just try and figure out what a "weapon attack" (an actual rules concept) is. The books don't use that phrase, but it's handy for discussing the damage reduction rules for creatures like Devils. Their official wording is "bludgeoning, piercing and slashing from nonmagical weapons that aren't silvered", which is just a pain to type out every time or parse in a casual message, so everyone just uses "weapon damage" instead. It's also worth noting that such a resistance won't save you from being bludgeoned by an avalanche, or the Ice Storm spell, because those aren't weapon attacks.

But as for Green-Flame Blade, it calls out specifically "the target suffers the attack's normal effects" which would seem to imply the weapon isn't made magical for this duration of the spell.

 

[Sage Genesis]

GFB doesn't turn the melee attack into fire damage. It's an otherwise perfectly normal attack which inflicts its normal effects, and some fire damage is dealt to a secondary character.
At higher levels some fire damage is also dealt to the main target but this is separate from the attack itself, which still deals normal slashing/piercing/bludgeoning damage.

The idea that a weapon attack bypasses nonmagical weapon damage resistance just because the attack was caused by a spell is completely unsupported by the rules.

...

Or at least, it used to be.

The new MM errata has clarified that all instances of "nonmagical weapon" resistance should instead read "nonmagical attack" resistance. And a magical attack it thereafter defines as:
"an attack delivered by a spell, a magic item, or another magical source"

The argument can be made that GFB delivers an attack by a spell. The action is spellcasting. The range is spell-determined instead of using weapon reach. The melee attack's results are defined/enhanced by the spell. They don't use the concept of a "spell attack" to explain what a magical attack might be but instead call it attacks delivered by spells, indicating that it might be broader.

One can counter that a swung sword is not really delivered by a spell but rather by the wielder, but any touch-range spell relies on the person doing the Bad Touch moves so that's not very persuasive.

Arguably Bob_nni is correct. But I'm not sure. For some reason the 5e errata documents tend to raise as many questions as they answer.

 

[Noctem]

Not only does it do Fire damage, but it also uses the "Casting a Spell" action instead of using the "Attack" action. This means that it bypasses non-magical weapon resistance, along with not allowing an Extra Attack when you reach that level.

AFAIK ignoring the fire damage bit since that doesn't matter, this is the correct answer.

EDIT: Also add in the recent errata as pointed out in the post above and you have your answer. You're casting a spell which grants you an attack. Per the errata that means the attack will bypass resistance and/or immunity to normal weapon damage.

 

[ryan92084]

Normally I'd say it was magical as

Regardless of damage type, the direct damage of a spell is magical.

but as correctly pointed out the description states "the target suffers the attack's normal effects". That heavily implies the weapon attack of GFB is an exception to the general rule. Therefore I'm going with no.