D&D 5E Bad Sage Advice?

[Ancalagon]

The ruling that turned me off SA permanently is that if someone dies and is transformed into an undead, and the undead is then destroyed and revivify cast on the remains... you bring back the undead. As an undead. Apparently this constitutes "returning to life."

If your body/soul has been tainted by undeath, revivify isn't going to be able to fix that. A more powerful spell is needed. I would rule that revivify would not work at all personally, but you can't use animate dead to circumvent the time limit on revivify.

Now if all of this happened within a minute? ... maybe? depends on the undead?

 

[Ancalagon]

I admit that the shield ruling just feels odd. It's like saying that because I have a +1 sword my attacks with a bow receive a +1. Or that because you have +1 leather armor in your backpack that the rogue no longer needs but are wearing normal plate that you still get the bonus to AC.

In any case, unless it states it specifically you don't get any benefit from an item unless you are using it in my campaign.

I have the same concern. It's... silly.

 

[Dausuul]

Crawford isn't always great at reading the rules his team wrote. His supposedly "strict RAW" interpretation often relies on zeroing in on one sentence or phrase and ignoring the surrounding context. If they must have a "strict RAW" column, I wish they would get someone who was better at reading and parsing rules to write it.

But, more than that, I don't think there is a lot of value to a "strict RAW" column for 5E in the first place. 5E just isn't built that way. What would be far more useful--and what Crawford is ideally positioned to provide--would be a RAI column: "Here is what we, the designers, had in mind when we wrote this rule." That would provide valuable perspective for the DM trying to make a ruling at the table.

 

[Krachek]

Sometime i think that the original DMG was written in old elvish and we got now a poor traduction.

 

[Ancalagon]

Crawford isn't always great at reading the rules his team wrote. His supposedly "strict RAW" interpretation often relies on zeroing in on one sentence or phrase and ignoring the surrounding context. If they must have a "strict RAW" column, I wish they would get someone who was better at reading and parsing rules to write it.

But, more than that, I don't think there is a lot of value to a "strict RAW" column for 5E in the first place. 5E just isn't built that way. What would be far more useful--and what Crawford is ideally positioned to provide--would be a RAI column: "Here is what we, the designers, had in mind when we wrote this rule." That would provide valuable perspective for the DM trying to make a ruling at the table.

Yes! I completely agree. RAI is much more useful than RAW

 

[Oofta]

The problem is the wording for armor and weapons is it specifies that the armor must be worn and the weapon must be used in the attack roll, etc. for them to gain the benefits. You can't just be "holding them" or whatever.

Magical shields is a horrible wording which led to this SA response, and the response should not be just a strict interpretation of the wording but instead reflect a change in the intent of the wording which most people see as the most logical--a shield must be equipped for you to gain the bonus from the magical aspect.

This is why it is silly to rule otherwise IMO. JC has the authority and power to make the intent change if that was the intent, but he didn't so obviously WotC (and JC I guess) has a silly intent with magical shields.

Yeah, the rules seem to be contradictory, and I guess it depends on your definition of "holding".

Wearing and Wielding Items​

Using a magic item’s properties might mean wearing or wielding it. A magic item meant to be worn must be donned in the intended fashion: boots go on the feet, gloves on the hands, hats and helmets on the head, and rings on the finger. Magic armor must be donned, a shield strapped to the arm, a cloak fastened about the shoulders. A weapon must be held in hand.​

​

I know what the rules say, it's the logical correlation I see. "Holding" a shield to me is the same as saying "strapped to the arm".

 

[DND_Reborn]

And if you think that he just organized and directed the development of D&D

Did I say that? No. I didn't. Of course he had huge design ideas (I hope???) as well as influence--I would expect him to. I am sure many of his ideas got "voted" down at times as well or he was convinced otherwise.

 

[DND_Reborn]

"Holding" a shield to me is the same as saying "strapped to the arm".

Yep. I just don't understand why JC would not correct the intent of the ruling in the DMG and tell the guy, "No, you gotta have the shield equipped." It is silly and contradicts other references, as you have so kindly pointed out.

 

[jasper]

Crawford is wrong so often they need to stop calling it "Sage" Advice....its just advice.

Hmmm I wonder what type of sage he been smoking. <innocent whistle>

 

[DEFCON 1]

Yep. I just don't understand why JC would not correct the intent of the ruling in the DMG and tell the guy, "No, you gotta have the shield equipped." It is silly and contradicts other references, as you have so kindly pointed out.

He doesn't do that, because that just opens up the floodgates for more and more uncreative players to just keep hounding him with "Okay, so the rules say this, but did you really mean this? Or can it instead mean this?" Everybody and their mother looking for him to rubberstamp their interpretation of how to play the game. He doesn't have time for that. None of us do.

If any of us don't like what Jeremy has to say... just stop reading the Errata and the Sage Advice and pretend like nothing was ever said. Everyone's problems get solved that way.