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<blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 9438222" data-attributes="member: 6790260">I was simply responding to the example as given by Lanefan, where he hoped for a target that was moving at considerable speed--specifically with the intent of harming the rider when they dismounted.Okay! Some of these are much better. &quot;Surrender&quot; still seems to me pretty verboten, since the spell only works for six seconds. &quot;Lie&quot; is more than a bit risky. Just because someone tells a lie, doesn't mean the exact opposite of what they said is true, unless you have very carefully worded your questions--creative, perhaps, but not nearly as useful as you might think. &quot;Breathe&quot; is too non-specific; unless the dragon literally can't reach anyone, that could instead draw the breath to you (since, per the rules, movement can be freely blended with actions).And that last one already would have failed anyway, so...not really a useful example of a better command?So I'll grant Daydream as a clearly useful thing to do, and Lie as a risky but potentially useful thing. The others either don't work (Surrender/Regurgitate) or are much too specific (Swim/Breathe). Which...again, is sort of the point I was making. People frequently see more creativity in the 5.0 wording than is actually there, because they ignore the &quot;not harmful&quot; limitation, or the language limitation, or expect rather a lot out of Even with Swim, for example, I could easily see a 5.0 DM saying, &quot;He attempts to start swimming, but since he isn't in water right now, nothing happens.&quot; Which would be effectively equivalent to just telling the target to &quot;wait.&quot; The caster assumed--and, IMO, the DM very generously granted--that &quot;Swim&quot; would entail the additional idea, &quot;get to a place where you can swim&quot;. That's something that could easily result in a multi-minute back-and-forth between a DM and player because the player believes command carries those extra implications and the DM doesn't.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="EzekielRaiden, post: 9438222, member: 6790260"] I was simply responding to the example as given by Lanefan, where he hoped for a target that was moving at considerable speed--specifically with the intent of harming the rider when they dismounted. Okay! Some of these are much better. "Surrender" still seems to me pretty verboten, since the spell only works for [I]six seconds[/I]. "Lie" is more than a bit risky. Just because someone tells a lie, doesn't mean the exact opposite of what they said is true, unless you have [B][I]very[/I][/B] carefully worded your questions--creative, perhaps, but not nearly as useful as you might think. "Breathe" is too non-specific; unless the dragon literally can't reach anyone, that could instead draw the breath to you (since, per the rules, movement can be freely blended with actions). And that last one already would have failed anyway, so...not really a useful example of a better command? So I'll grant Daydream as a clearly useful thing to do, and Lie as a risky but potentially useful thing. The others either don't work (Surrender/Regurgitate) or are much too specific (Swim/Breathe). Which...again, is sort of the point I was making. People frequently see more creativity in the 5.0 wording than is actually there, because they ignore the "not harmful" limitation, or the language limitation, or expect [I]rather a lot[/I] out of Even with Swim, for example, I could [I]easily[/I] see a 5.0 DM saying, "He attempts to start swimming, but since he isn't in water right now, nothing happens." Which would be effectively equivalent to just telling the target to "wait." The caster assumed--and, IMO, the DM [I]very[/I] generously granted--that "Swim" would entail the additional idea, "[I]get to a place[/I] where you can swim". That's something that could easily result in a multi-minute back-and-forth between a DM and player because the player believes [I]command[/I] carries those extra implications and the DM doesn't. [/QUOTE]

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