Chaosmancer
Legend
Personally I have no problem with how the damage triggered in the 2014 rules (although I thought the spell was somewhat overtuned). Creating an environmental hazard that individual enemies can be knocked into is indeed fun.
By contrast, the 2024 rules incentivize moving the Cleric rather than moving the enemies. That means optimal strategies for the spell involve trying to increase the distance the Cleric can travel on their turn, and again on everyone else's turns, which introduces a sliding scale of ridiculousness that wasn't present in the 2014 rules.
So no, I can't agree that this was always an issue. In the 2014 rules I could indeed approach Spirit Guardians as a tactical challenge, whereas in the 2024 rules my primary concern would be trying to gauge at what point efforts to move the Cleric farther and faster stop being creative and start being ridiculous.
And yet, if you don't decide to start dragging the cleric across the entire enemy group every turn, what it DOES do is allow for a scene where the cleric walks forward, and their divine power burns a path through their enemies. Instead of walking forward, stopping, and waiting.
It also allows the enemy to move out of the effect on their turn, giving them more tactical choices compared to before.
It is all give and take.