Activating magic items while grappling

[Barcode]

Heya,

A player disputed my ruling last night, and I promised to bring the matter up to y'all for arbitration.

Question: Can a character use a wand while grappled, if he has it in hand before the grapple is started, and the target is the grappler?

Since there is an explicit list of things that can be done while grappled, and activating a magic item is not one of them, I ruled no, but I have a doubt.

Two things at work in the argument:

a) You can attack your grappler with a light weapon (even a light mace?), indicating that there is some (considerable) freedom of movement when grappled, if you are not pinned.

b) Since you can cast spells (assuming you make a concentration check) with verbal components, presumably you can speak enough to utter a command word.

Combining these two, should you not be able to point a wand at the person grappling you and speak a command word?

It does bring up the cool cinematic element of two characters struggling over the wand. We hear the wand go off, and both characters get a shocked expression (who did it hit?). Then one face goes rigid (a wand of hold person). Music swells. Applause.

Your thoughts?

-B-

 

[guido1999]

I would let him do it. You can cast spells and use a light weapon while grappled. Also, I wouldn't even require a concentration check, since unlike spells, using a wand does not provoke an AOO.

To piggy pack on the subject, what if the character was pinned? Could he do the same thing?

 

[Pielorinho]

This came up in a game recently: a cultist wizard was popping off charges from a wand of fireballs at us when my tiger companion grappled him. The cultist, knowing he was screwed, decided to send one more fireball our way before he died.

The DM ruled that he could do so, and while I think technically the rules don't allow it, I think technically the rules are flawed in this respect. It's a perfectly fine action, IMO, even if it requires a teeny weeny house rule.

Daniel

 

[Grundle]

Strictly by the rules you cannot activate a magic item while grappled.

This just seems silly to me so I rule zero that.

How can one use a dagger, but be somehow unable to utter the command word for the wand already in your hand?! Preposterous I tell you!

 

[kreynolds]

Strictly by the rules you cannot activate a magic item while grappled.

Where does it state that?

 

[kreynolds]

Question: Can a character use a wand while grappled, if he has it in hand before the grapple is started, and the target is the grappler?

Yes. Activating a spell-trigger item (i.e. a wand) requires no gestures. It merely requires that the wand be held in hand and pointed in the general direction of the target.

Combining these two, should you not be able to point a wand at the person grappling you and speak a command word?

Technically, wands don't need a spoken word (unless this has been errated or addressed in the FAQ). The description of wands merely state holding it in hand and pointing.

 

[kreynolds]

To piggy pack on the subject, what if the character was pinned? Could he do the same thing?

I would rule "no" on the grounds that because the character is held immobile, he can't point the wand, which is required for activation.

 

[guido1999]

Technically, wands don't need a spoken word (unless this has been errated or addressed in the FAQ). The description of wands merely state holding it in hand and pointing.

I thought that as well, and originally ruled that wands could be used even under a silence effect, but then I read that spell trigger items require a command word and reversed my ruling.

They convieniently left out the command word part under the wand description.

 

[Pielorinho]

Where does it state that?

It's more that, under the grappling rules, they provide a list of possible actions a character may take while grappling, and activating a spell-trigger item isn't on the list.

A super-strict reading of the rules suggests that any action not on the list of actions allowed while grappling is not allowed. However, I think this is a case where common sense should win out: some actions (activating a cape of the mountebank) aren't on the list, but should almost certainly be allowed, whereas other actions (dancing the funky chicken) aren't on the list, but should almost certainly not be allowed. As a DM, I'd put using a wand in the "allowed" list, although I might have fun by ruling that an opposed grapple check can influence the wand's target.

Think of the fun of grappling the wizard who's been polymorphing everyone into frogs with his Wand of Polymorph. He cackles gleefully, pokes you in the chest with the wand, says, "Command word: Froggie!", and then you twist his arm around so that the wand is pointed at his own chest. "Oh, crap on a ribbit!" he'll shout.

Daniel

 

[Hypersmurf]

Re: Re: Activating magic items while grappling

Technically, wands don't need a spoken word (unless this has been errated or addressed in the FAQ).

Or DMG p175.

The SRD leaves out a crucial passage.


Wands are spell trigger items; spell trigger items require "a single word that must be spoken".

No wands in a Silence spell.

-Hyp.