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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Arial Black" data-source="post: 7170050" data-attributes="member: 6799649">Fair questions.The answer is easy though. First, the general rule is, "Each spell description in chapter 11 begins with a block of information, including the spell’s name, level, school of magic, casting time, range, components, and duration. The rest of a spell entry describes the spell’s effect".Second, 'specific beats general'. In this case, if the wording shows that a particular clause cannot be part of the 'spell effect', then it isn't; this is the 'specific' that beats the 'general' of the whole thing being the 'spell effect'.But it has to say so. It isn't about us picking and choosing what bits we want to define as the 'spell effect' this time and which bits we don't. It has to be stated in such a way that it literally cannot be the 'spell effect', without the spell being nonsense. If there are two ways to read a rule and one way means it cannot function then we must read it the other way.For booming blade/green-flame blade, these spells say, "As part of the action used to cast this spell, you must make a melee attack with a weapon against one creature within the spell's range, otherwise the spell fails". The cause of a spell (an action which is required for the spell to come into being) literally cannot be the effect a the (successfully cast) spell. Cause must come before effect. Therefore, this clause literally cannot be part of the 'spell effect', and this makes it a specific exception to the general rule that the whole description is the 'spell effect'.It's not the only thing like that. Targeting information and such-like are also things that enable the spell to be cast, rather than being the 'spell effect'. Saving throw information isn't directly a 'spell effect', but the result of that save (what happens if you save or fail) is part of the 'spell effect'.For booming blade, the 'spell effect' is that the target is sheathed in a sonic bubble. That bubble has certain qualities regarding what happens if you willing move through the bubble, and ALL of those qualities ARE the 'spell effect', including what happens in the world to cause the bubble to burst (trigger) and the consequence of the bubble bursting (thunder damage, spell ends early).Since the sonic bubble (and its qualities) ARE the 'spell effect', then you cannot have two of them on you at the same time re: Combining Magical Effects. Since you only have one bubble even if two spells are on you, there is no trigger for the second bubble to burst because there is no second bubble to burst!However, when the first spell ends (for whatever reason) then there is no longer anything preventing the second spell from applying, and so as soon as the first bubble goes away then the second spell forms a new bubble, and the qualities of that new bubble become relevant.</blockquote>

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