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Message: <blockquote data-quote="ECMO3" data-source="post: 9863526" data-attributes="member: 7030563">I would rule that is not the "fastest available means" moreover you would not tell me anything if you failed the save, I would tell you where you are going.  I don't believe the being that failed the save has any agency here.So this relies on an alternative and admittedly ambiguous definition of the sentence and phrasing.the wording is:".. moving away from you by the fastest available means."The spell clearly requires this.  If you interpret the term "fastest" as a magnitude which only applies to the means then it is simply the fastest speed you can obtain regardless of direction and the direction can be any that is away.  If you interpret it as a vector quantity measured in a specific direction, which is certainly what is intended IMO, then spiraling around is not the "fastest" unless there is something that restricts you from moving away in a linear fashion.To illustrate this if we are in NYC and I say to get in your car and drive to LA by the "fastest available means" you could take that to mean drive your car as fast as it will possibly go but not necessarily in the direction that gets you closest to LA, or you could take it to mean drive it in the manner and route that gets you to LA the fastest.  Your interpretation is consistent with the former, mine is consistent with the latter.Moving as fast as possible in a fashion that also moves you some amount further away is not the same moving away as fast as possible and I think the spell requires the latter.So suffice it to say I think this interpretation could be a RAW interpretation, but I do not agree with it and it is not the only possible one.I will also add that accepting that definition here could also affect other spells including Fear, Dissonant Whispers and Compulsion.I think the specific hypotheticals we are talking about now are strawmen that I have never seen in play, which were originally proposed by people who's real purpose is to present an argument to weaken the spell in highly situational circumstances that do rarely occur (i.e. running across lava or off of a cliff).I think the designers did not intend to have people use the spell to find a secret door or difficult terrain and I've never seen that done.  If the invisible wall situation happened in my game I probably would not even remember it or this thread.  But I think the designers very much do intend to have people run across lava or off a cliff if these are the fastest means and they even changed the specifics and took out wording regarding self harm to facilitate exactly that.If you accept that, then the rest of the hypothetical examples I commented on are just consistent application of the mechanics to satisfy those hypothetical strawmen.No.</blockquote>

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