D&D 5E Dnd's Most Deadly Spell - MAGIC MISSILE!

[J.Quondam]

But once we throw in the much more complicated to model issue of how fast a Greatwyrm could down various numbers of Wizards the calculations all become much harder. In any case I think a Greatwyrm trying to solo Hogwarts would quickly regret it.

Despite that, I would totally watch the movie!

 

[Joshua Randall]

This is the kind of quality analysis that the internet was made for!

 

[AtomicPope]

In a high level D&D campaign I played in our Paladin caused the DM all kinds of headaches. When you traipse around with a 23 AC while the rest of the party is lower than 20, the DM gets a little sick of your crap. During one of the adventures we confronted coven of hags who were terrorizing the town with Weather Control, Devils and sea monsters. The Paladin is hacking through the Devils like butta. When he got to the hags they fly up into the air cackling. Me and the druid were busy with the sea monsters. The Paladin was confident his ridiculous saves would be enough. Then the 4th and 5th level Magic Missiles started flying. Every round a ridiculous volley of Magic Missiles was fired, tallying around 40-75 hit points of damage! I was the only one with the Shield spell who was no where near them on the battle mat.

Don't mess with Magic Missile. It'll get ya!

 

[MarkB]

Despite that, I would totally watch the movie!

Harry Potter and the Aspect of Tiamat.

 

[Garthanos]

We took it a lot in 2nd ed to shut down enemy casters, due to the initiative structure. Basically every action would be declared at the start of the round, and initiative was rolled each round. Higher level spells (in general) took longer to cast. If you took damage before your turn, the spell was ruined.
eir spell (unless they had shield).

quick rule for 5e: spells trigger opportunity attacks and if such an attack is successful then make a concentration check or the spell doesn't work if you roll 1 the spell is lost. (if the spell does work the target has advantage on their saves)

 

[Jfdlsjfd]

Am I some 007 badass? As much as I'd love to believe that the case, I'm a 40 year old code monkey who sits behind a desk all day (although at the time this happened I was in my 30s). Realistically, I'm an average joe. I believe that if I can be scratched dozens of times without being significantly worse for wear, any average person could.

The scratches were misses. Your AC is probably 12 (cloth armor, plus you hopped several time on a foot without falling, so you DEX is higher than average, unless you're trained in Acrobatics, which isn't given by the Computer Scientist background -- I assume you're a human). According to your description, the cat was trying to attack the other Cat (AC 12) from which you provided cover (+2). Using the DMG's optional friendly fire rules, the cover (you) is hit only when the hit is turned into a miss due to cover. The attacking cat was out of reach of the other cat and could'nt damage him, but you could still be hit 10% of the time. Assuming the fight lasted less than 40 rounds on average, you still had 1 HP left, and so you were 100% operational and a full night of rest was enough to heal you completely. Had the fight lasted one minute more, you'd have keeled over. You were close!

The rules are 100% realistic. Look at otters. They are a threat to people apparently ‘I thought I was going to die’: otters attack British man in Singapore park and yet, cats are routinely killing otters. As a piece of concording evidence, "A 2011 analysis by researchers from the Oceanographic Environmental Research Society found that 39 wild otter attacks had been reported since 1875, with most of them occurring in the past 20 years." That's logical: otters started becoming a threat with the release of the 3rd edition, when reality shifted to accomodate the new ruleset.

Count your blessings for surviving your encounter with a cat. On the minus side, you apparently couldn't get any XP for defeating it.

On average it requires 274 individual magic missiles to down a Chromatic Greatwyrm and 290 to down a Metallic Greatwyrm. Focusing on the Chomatic this could be achieved by 46 1st level Wizards using both their spell slots,

Before, I was imagining a dragon attack as Smaug thrashing Lake Town. Now, I imagine a walled city with a horn signalling air intrusion and the 46 1st-level wizard conscripted into AA service to chant "magic missile" and the sorcerers at the other side of the city chanting "distant magic missile". Or, even worse, 46 commoners using a wand of magic missile (total investment 23,000 gp). Much cheaper and more efficient than the highly qualified manpower or archers. Thank your for ruining my childhood memories!

If all 46 of them were 1st level spellcasters, they'd reach 3rd level after activating their wand and butchering the air threat. That's how you forge heroes these days... After that I guess they are given a Shielding brooch and sent to keep in check the warlords outfitting mercenaries with wands of magic missles and extract ransom from villages.

 

[S'mon]

If you have the formula any PC with cash can load up with a bandolier of Uncommon magic missile wands for automatic 9d4+4 damage/round, 8d4+4 if you don't like the 1 in 20 burnout chance.