D&D 5E Breaking Invisibility: Attack, Cast, Maintain

[merwins]

So, interesting thought about Invisibility, the spell.

You can cast it on yourself or someone else, and it ends if the target attacks or casts a spell.

But there's nothing that says that the you can't maintain a spell and stay invisible.

Of course, the caster can't maintain more than one spell at a time. But this seems to be a perfectly viable scenario:

PC1 casts Moonbeam (substitute any concentration spell here)).
PC2 casts Invisibility on PC1.
As long as PC2 maintains concentration, PC1 stays invisible, even if PC1 moves Moonbeam around and causes damage.

Moving Moonbeam is not an attack action. Technically it's not casting a spell.

As long as PC1 doesn't cast another spell or formally attack, they can continue to wreak havoc while invisible.

Maybe this is obvious or already covered somewhere?

 

[mellored]

It works. But moon beam is pretty obvious. Try call lightning.
Even then, your not getting much use from the invisibility.

Also, you can do similar with sanctuary.

 

[jaelis]

It's fine. It is taking up PC 1's concentration slot, that is a fair price.

 

[Warmaster Horus]

Yeah, it's viable. But it locks down the concentration of two casters to do so, so a niche capability, IMHO.

 

[Oofta]

It depends on your DM. While there is no "attack action" with a moonbeam, I rule that any action intended to cause harm is an attack. I've never seen this particular combo pulled (I don't think it's particularly practical) but it stops the discussion of an invisible person intentionally setting off a trap that will harm others and so on. D&D 5E is not written as a technical document and uses casual language, so I use common definitions not game definitions.

Different DMs will rule differently of course.

 

[merwins]

Different DMs will rule differently of course.

Agreed. There's some possibility of conflict between RAW and RAI here.

The advantage for the PC group in this scenario is that attacking any of the visible characters will not disrupt PC1's "attack." Unless you have some area of effect attack that catches PC1 and breaks their concentration, PC1's spell will continue for at least one extra round after PC2 drops.

 

[Sorcerers Apprentice]

Even if you're invisible, I don't think you'll be able to hide if you have a big honking beam of light shining out of your hand. So any enemy will know the moonbeamer's position and will be able to attack them with disadvantage.

Disadvantage is hardly uncommon in 5e, so I don't think this tactic is going to be game-breaking in any way, or even particularly strong except in certain circumstances.

 

[merwins]

Even if you're invisible, I don't think you'll be able to hide if you have a big honking beam of light shining out of your hand. So any enemy will know the moonbeamer's position and will be able to attack them with disadvantage.

Disadvantage is hardly uncommon in 5e, so I don't think this tactic is going to be game-breaking in any way, or even particularly strong except in certain circumstances.

Moonbeam is from the sky, not from the hand. And while it does take an action to move, several other concentration spells use other types of actions to manipulate ongoing effects.

Depending on PC1's capabilities, they can both Hide and manipulate an ongoing effect. It might not be particularly broken, but most combatants might not be expecting such a tactic either.