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Message: <blockquote data-quote="VorpalStare" data-source="post: 2359704" data-attributes="member: 31325">First of all, let me reiterate that my previous post proposed not a house rule, but an explanation of how the spell might work that is consistent with the effects in the spell description and the RAW, and that can reasonably motivate house rules that do not (I believe) create any unintended consequences. I'm sure there are other equally plausible explanations that explain how this spell achieves its effects, and everyone is free to come up with whatever works in their campaign. I spent some time fleshing out the obvious consequences of my explanation, mostly to allow other readers to make their own decisions about its validity. Regarding FoM being effective against Bull Rush and Trip Attempts:  You are correct, of course, in that the spell description does not explicitly state that it is effective against these kinds of attacks. It also does not explicitly state that it would help someone immersed in quicksand, but I think most DM's would probably rule that being submersed in quicksand is enough like being submersed in water that the spell would be effective in allowing the subject to move freely.  Grabbing is simply a prerequisite for holding. You are correct that the FoM spell does not prevent the initial touch attack from succeeding, but it does prevent someone from gaining a hold of the spell recipient. My view is that Bull Rush and Trip attacks cannot normally succeed without gaining a hold on the target. Otherwise, there is no way to push, pull, or otherwise manipulate the target in order to force them into another square or to fall prone. How do you describe these attacks to your players? I posted a couple of exceptions to the normal situation just to show that this is not absolute. Actually, I think these exceptions favor the players and are things that creative players are far more likely to come up with than any monsters they face. If I explained to you as a player that I ruled that FoM prevented you from gaining a hold on someone and that you needed to to grab hold of an oppenent to use Bull Rush or Trip. Wouldn't you think about how to do these things without grabbing your opponent if that was important to you?  I think you're extrapolating my statement to far. I only said these maneuvers share similar game mechanics, not that they are otherwise equivalent. The whole point is that big and strong creatures are inherently good at all three maneuvers (regardless of feat selection), and that all the maneuvers involve grabbing the target somehow. It doesn't make sense to design the spell to protect against grapples, and yet have it be easily circumvented by other maneuvers that are part of the same package (of being a big and strong creature), that also involve being grabbed. For example, I wouldn't cast FoM to protect myself from a Pixie's grapple, but I might well do so against a Fire Giant. That same Fire Giant is also going to be very good at Bull Rushing or Tripping me. This is a reasonable interpretation of the spell's capabilities and is the only effective spell at it's level (that I can think of right now) that provides protection from being pushed around or forced to the ground by such a creature. Thanks for your input! <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />  BTW, may I ask what, exactly, is depicted in your avatar? Is that an Illithid driving a car?<img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f631.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":eek:" title="Eek!    :eek:"  data-smilie="9"data-shortname=":eek:" /></blockquote>

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