The_Gneech
Explorer
This came up in the game session last night and my Google Fu has not turned up a meaningful answer. So I'm tossing it out here for discussion.
Would hold person work on a vampire (or more specifically, a vampire spawn)? The text of the spell specifies a humanoid, so I took that to mean explicitly of the humanoid type. But then looking at hold monster, it says "a creature," and calls out specifically that it has no effect on undead (which hold person doesn't specify).
At the table as a "decide now and revisit later to keep the game moving" I ruled that the caster could try it but that the vampire would have advantage on its saving throw, as a compromise. The caster eventually decided to do something else instead anyway.
Upon further reflection, I think I was right in my initial decision that the text specifically employs the keyword "humanoid," while vampires are of the undead type, and so it wouldn't work (especially since hold monster, the bigger-better version, doesn't work on undead at all). But I'm interested in what anyone else might have to say before I make my final ruling.
-The Gneech
Would hold person work on a vampire (or more specifically, a vampire spawn)? The text of the spell specifies a humanoid, so I took that to mean explicitly of the humanoid type. But then looking at hold monster, it says "a creature," and calls out specifically that it has no effect on undead (which hold person doesn't specify).
At the table as a "decide now and revisit later to keep the game moving" I ruled that the caster could try it but that the vampire would have advantage on its saving throw, as a compromise. The caster eventually decided to do something else instead anyway.
Upon further reflection, I think I was right in my initial decision that the text specifically employs the keyword "humanoid," while vampires are of the undead type, and so it wouldn't work (especially since hold monster, the bigger-better version, doesn't work on undead at all). But I'm interested in what anyone else might have to say before I make my final ruling.
-The Gneech