D&D 5E Natural Attacks

[Fenris-77]

Ahhh ... the musty comforting smell of actual textual analysis. Thanks for that, a little trip down memory lane.

 

[Iry]

Iry, so by taking your argument to the outer limits of the absurd, we arrive to were we currently are....Magic Weapon effects any “nonmagical weapons”.

It's an unnecessary contortion, because someone could just say "these spells work on whatever the gods decide they work on." Which is... always thematic but incredibly hard to arbitrate from one table to the next. The easiest thing to do is just let anything count as a weapon except Unarmed Strikes, and quibble about Improvised vs Simple vs Martial.

If someone wants to cast Magic Weapon on the ripped off arm of a goblin? Sure! That's incredibly cool, and rulings to the contrary add unnecessary complexity with no notable increase of fun.

 

[Todd Roybark]

That is fair, Iry. The precise wording that Jeremy Crawford wanted is :

You touch a * simple, martial, or Improvised weapon* Until the spell ends, that weapon becomes a magic weapon with a +1 bonus to Attack rolls and Damage Rolls.

At Higher Levels: When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 4th Levelor higher, the bonus increases to +2. When you use a spell slot of 6th level or higher, the bonus increases to +3.

My example of using “manufactured” as a clear sign of designer intent, is just as muddled as the current verbiage we have

 

[Sacrosanct]

The game is full of rules that require faith without necessarily adhering to suspension of disbelief. Hit points anyone?

Fact is, it's the rule. Fact is, change it at your table if you don't like it. But to say it strains the faith is simply wrong. Or rediculously selective.

And yes, it is fundamentally flawed to look at how a rule is written for a completely different game and base 5e's assumptions on that. 5e is a separate game and rules need to viewed through a 5e lens

 

[Paul Farquhar]

If I was aware, I wouldn't have asked. So... how are they weaker then?

Most obviously, wildshaped druids (moon druids below level 6) can't damage creatures immune to non-magic weapons.

Which forces the player to use different tactics, and thus I consider it a "win".

Compare how you play without the benefits to how much more you would get if you use them.

I see no benefit.

While I can understand the need for logic (gameworld or otherwise), casting Magic Weapon on a wolf's teeth is close enough to a "dagger or knife" for instance, a person's fist and arm is basically a "club", etc. In a world of magic, seeing a "power of the glow" for such spells and effects is fine by me.

I consider "living" "non-living" and "undead" as fundamentally different from the point of view of magic.

But where do the teeth end and the body begin? They are part of the body, so the spell would affect the whole of the body, which would make the whole body the magic weapon, perhaps to be wielded by a giant using it as a club.

The 3rd edition magic fang spell dealt with this issue - you cast it on the creature, and all the creature's natural weapons benefit from the spell (but the creature itself is not a magic weapon if a giant swings it).

YMMV of course.

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This is the kind of silliness I would rather keep out of my games. I would rather it looked more like Game of Thrones and less like a cheesy 1970s martial arts movie.

 

[Hriston]

Nice necro!

I think the issue stems from the different ways the word weapon is used in the rules. Not all of them refer to “actual weapons”!

1. As a noun, weapon can mean one of three things:

• In its unmodified form, or as part of martial weapon, melee weapon, ranged weapon, simple weapon, with any of the weapon properties used as adjectives, or simply actual weapon, weapon refers to an item manufactured for the purpose of doing harm.
• Improvised weapon refers to an item that isn’t manufactured for the purpose of doing harm. One of the pitfalls here is that an actual weapon can be used as an improvised weapon if it’s used in a way other than that for which it was intended. This doesn’t make it an improvised weapon. It’s just being used “as” one.
• Natural weapon refers to a creature’s natural defenses, such as its claws, teeth, etc.

2. As an adjective, weapon is used to modify the noun attack. In this context, weapon means “non-spell”. Simple to remember: Does your attack come from a spell? If not, then it’s a “weapon attack”. This meaning has absolutely nothing to do with any of the noun usages above.

As can be seen in this thread, up until nearly three years ago I was under the impression that natural weapons were included under weapons, but it’s clear to me now that the intent is that natural weapons and improvised weapons are non-weapons.

 

[NotAYakk]

Nice necro!

I think the issue stems from the different ways the word weapon is used in the rules. Not all of them refer to “actual weapons”!

Yes, that is a good description of how the rules screwed up.

They used the same word to refer to distinct but hightly related concepts. Which leads to ridiculous results, like a natural weapon is not a weapon, but it makes weapon attacks.

For AL and other situations you are "stuck" with it.

Outside of AL, you either have that ridiculousness, or you examine what happens when you say "they intended it, but they naughty word up. What if we ignore intention?"

Ignoring their intention does not result in a naughty word up game. At worst you have to say that enchant weapon applies to a use of a weapon, as in you enchant the natural weapon used as a weapon, or the improvised weapon used as a weapon, not the object and all ways it can be used as a weapon, to get rid of the "swing the enchanted bear" case.

I mean, it is a very slight buff to druid wildshape and polymorph and beast companions and monks and such, and while not all of them need that buff, that buff is far far far from breaking the game.

And what we get out of it is that weapons are weapons. Which is naughty word nice.

 

[Hriston]

Yes, that is a good description of how the rules screwed up.

They used the same word to refer to distinct but hightly related concepts. Which leads to ridiculous results, like a natural weapon is not a weapon, but it makes weapon attacks.

For AL and other situations you are "stuck" with it.

Outside of AL, you either have that ridiculousness, or you examine what happens when you say "they intended it, but they ** up. What if we ignore intention?"

Ignoring their intention does not result in a ** up game. At worst you have to say that enchant weapon applies to a use of a weapon, as in you enchant the natural weapon used as a weapon, or the improvised weapon used as a weapon, not the object and all ways it can be used as a weapon, to get rid of the "swing the enchanted bear" case.

I mean, it is a very slight buff to druid wildshape and polymorph and beast companions and monks and such, and while not all of them need that buff, that buff is far far far from breaking the game.

And what we get out of it is that weapons are weapons. Which is *** nice.

I don’t get this perspective. IMO, comprehending intent should be the purpose of reading a document in the first place. If you can discern the intent, then why would you ignore it because, in your opinion, the writers “screwed up”? That seems completely backwards to me, but again that’s just my opinion.

 

[NotAYakk]

I don’t get this perspective. IMO, comprehending intent should be the purpose of reading a document in the first place. If you can discern the intent, then why would you ignore it because, in your opinion, the writers “screwed up”? That seems completely backwards to me, but again that’s just my opinion.

I only know intent from things they did not write in the document. But rather, what they (well, some of them) wrote elsewhere.

I dislike having to replace the words they say with words they did not say for their writing to make mean what they intended to say. This adds to cognative load. It also adds to the load for players: "Yes, it says natural weapon, but you cannot use that weapon targetting effect on it, because the writers meant something else, not what they wrote. Here is some documentation showing what they did mean. Here is a better word they should have used."

That is, honestly, naughty word.

A player who went and picked up the ability to cast magic weapon or whatever on unarmed strikes or natural weapons, then I as a DM says "no, the words are not what they meant, they meant this convoluted nonsense, so what you want to do doesn't work."

naughty word that noise.

So we take the words as written and interpret them in the obvious way, and examine if it causes a problem. It it doesn't cause a problem, naughty word their intent. Following their intent makes the game worse.

If it did cause a problem, then the cost of "words don't mean what they read like" could be valid, and designer intent is a good guide there. Or even if the words where ambiguous.

But this nonsense of melee weapon attacks vs attack with a melee weapon that doesn't even have significant balance impact is stupid. They intended A, they wrote B, they tweeted "we intended A" despite B not causing balance problems, just means they screwed up twice.

 

[Hriston]

Furthermore, if you are dissatisfied with the text because it doesn’t (in your opinion) effectively convey the intent, then the rational thing to do is to rewrite the text so that it does effectively convey the intent. Choosing instead to ignore the intent in favor of a strict reading of what you consider a faulty text would indicate to me that you just don’t like the intent.