Parmandur
Book-Friend, he/him
Probably to subtly encourage selecting spells without a material component.
D&D 5E (2024) Eldritch Knight
- Thread starter Azzy
- Start date
Its mainly used in our campaigns to defang a spellcaster when they have been capture. Alright tie up teh wizard, remove his staff, that should keep him docile.
That kind of thing.
Zardnaar
Legend
Warcaster still doesn't fix the M part.
Your two handed sword isnt an arcane focus. Are you enforcing the M part?
Azzy
ᚳᚣᚾᛖᚹᚢᛚᚠ (He/Him)
How often does that happen?
well if the players are doing it well, not very often
Olgar Shiverstone
Legend
You know it's funny now that you mention it, I don't know that this has actually come up. The characters that were taking warcaster were either clerics n paladins, so I reasoned they could touch their focus with their weapon hand when they had warcaster (since they can do the somatics with it). The arcane martials that didn't take the feat just sheathed their weapons that turn and drew them the next, or they had pact weapon and called it to them with a BA; the ones that did take the feat never cast spells with material components.
I guess I'm not as much of a hardass as I thought, 'cuz I'd be tempted to say that if you take warcaster, as long as it's a non-costly component, you can go ahead and cast S+M with that weapon hand. Costly components though, sheathe/drop that weapon.
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Zardnaar
Legend
Yeah arcane focus doesn't help with casting shield.
Tessarael
Adventurer
War Caster does not permit someone using a weapon-and-shield or two-weapon fighting to use a material focus without sheathing or dropping a weapon. War Caster only allows you to cast spells with somatic components that do not have material components, while your hands are full.
This is a major problem with the 5E and D&D 2024 spell focus, material and somatic component rules. They are very complicated, with various exceptions. It is pretty clear that Eldritch Knight and Arcane Trickster need to be able to use a weapon as an arcane focus, if we want them to be able use spell casting while using weapon-and-shield or two-weapon fighting. If not, there's a tax of requiring a hand free, silliness with weapon sheathing-and-drawing between spell casting (good luck keeping track of that mid-combat as a DM!), or the requirement for something like Ruby of the War Mage with the cost of burning an attunement slot to be able to use your weapon as a spell casting focus.
Below is a summary of my understanding of the 5E rules on spell casting focii. It is long, because of how damn complicated the 5E and D&D 2024 rules are for this. Note that this was written for 5E, but I think it is valid for the D&D 2024 rules as well, as I haven't see any changes in the D&D 2024 rules for this.
What classes have what spell focus?
- 5E Arcane Trickster and Eldritch Knight do not have a spell focus, so that would need material components for spells that require them. In D&D 2024, they can use an arcane spell casting focus.
- Artificer uses thieve’s or artisan’s tools as a spell focus, but can also use any item bearing an infusion as spellcasting focus.
- This implies that an Artificer can select an infused item that they don’t need a free hand to hold as a focus.
- Armorer specialist can use their arcane armor as a spellcasting focus.
- Artillerist specialist can use their “arcane firearm”, a wand/staff/rod, as a spellcasting focus - see Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything (TCoE) page 18.
- Ranger also did not have a spell focus in the PHB, but TCoE page 57 has an optional rule that Ranger can use a druidic focus, and D&D 2024 Rangers use a druidic focus too.
- Bards use a musical instrument as a spellcasting focus, which they need a hand free to use.
- Bard’s College of Swords allows a simple or martial melee weapon to be used as a focus.
- Bloodhunter Order of the Profane Soul allows using a weapon with a crimson rite on it as a spellcasting focus.
- Cleric and Paladin use a divine focus, which can be a shield. (This encourages use of weapon-and-shield by these classes.)
- For deities that have a weapon as their holy symbol, we would allow the Cleric/Paladin to wield such a weapon and also use it as a divine focus.
- It should be recognizable as the holy symbol. For example, Tempus’ symbol is a flaming sword and Torm’s is a white gauntlet.
- For deities that have a weapon as their holy symbol, we would allow the Cleric/Paladin to wield such a weapon and also use it as a divine focus.
- Sorcerer, Warlock, and Wizard use an arcane focus. This can be a quarterstaff (5gp cost and 4 lb weight) for those who are melee inclined, otherwise they’ll need a free hand to hold that focus when spellcasting. (This encourages use of a quarterstaff by these classes, but noting that quarterstaff is not a finesse weapon and Strength would typically be a dump stat.)
- 5E Warlock’s Pact of the Blade with the Improved Pact Weapon allows any weapon you summon with your Pact of the Blade feature be used as a focus. This includes a ranged magic weapon, which has been transformed into a pact weapon. D&D 2024 allows your pact weapon to be used as your spellcasting focus.
- Ruby of the War Mage, a common magic item requiring attunement, see XGtE page 138 the D&D 2024 DMG, also permits a weapon to be used as a spellcasting focus. There’s also the Dark Shard Amulet and Hat of Wizardry in XGtE, which can both be used as a spellcasting focus for Warlocks and Wizards respectively, and they do also require attunement.
Spellcasting focus 5E rules
Spellcasting focuses must be held to be used
If your spellcasting focus is not a weapon or shield that you are holding:- You can use a weapon in one hand, or a two-handed weapon - temporarily holding it one-handed while spell casting.
- You cannot hold two weapons while spellcasting, you would need to sheathe or drop one.
- You cannot use weapon-and-shield, as donning/doffing a shield takes an action, you would need to sheathe or drop the weapon.
- Cleric or Paladin can use weapon-and-shield, but they cannot hold two weapons and use their holy symbol as a divine focus.
- Dual Wielder feat would also permit use of quarterstaff as both an arcane focus and a weapon in one hand, and another single-handed weapon in the other hand.
- War Caster feat allows you to perform somatic components when you have weapons or a a shield in one or both hands.
- This does not allow you to cast spells with material components or to use a focus instead of them.
- Handling a spell component or focus is part of casting the spell, so you do not need to use your free object interaction to do so, per Sage Advice.
Summary
- Two-handed and single one-handed weapon wielders have no issues spellcasting, as a two-handed weapon only needs to be used two-handed when attacking (PHB errata page 2).
- Two-weapon and weapon-and-shield users:
- No issues with somatic components if they have the War Caster feat.
- If the spell has somatic components and they don’t have the War Caster feat, or the spell has material components and a weapon/shield wielded is not their spellcasting focus, then they need a free hand to cast the spell.
- From the action economy perspective, they need to spend their one free object interaction/turn to stow their weapon before spellcasting, or draw their weapon afterwards.
- The Dual Wielder feat permits this twice on your turn, avoiding the case where you are left wielding a single weapon between turns.
- They will lose the benefits of the weapon when it is not wielded, e.g. no +1 AC from Dual Wielder for wielding a weapon in both hands.
- From the action economy perspective, they need to spend their one free object interaction/turn to stow their weapon before spellcasting, or draw their weapon afterwards.
- If the weapon or shield wielded is the spellcasting focus, no need to have a free hand providing the spell has both somatic and material components.
- If a spell has somatic components but no material components, then a free hand is required unless you have the War Caster feat.
Tessarael
Adventurer
This is not correct by the rules as written. You can use your material focus in hand (e.g., holy symbol emblazoned on your shield) to cast spells with S,M components. The only restriction is that you cannot cast spells with only a somatic S component without hands free. Again, it is one of the terribly complicated 5E and D&D 2024 rules on spell casting components.
Quoting from the D&D 2024 Player's Handbook page 237, "The spellcaster must have a hand free to access them [material compents or a spell casting focus], but it can be the same hand used to perform Somatic components, if any."
