D&D 5E New Errata & Advice For D&D Issued

WotC has issued an update to the 'Sage Advice' compilation, including new errata documents and amendments to racial attributes.

Compendium: October 2020 | Sage Advice | Dungeons & Dragons

This Sage Advice Compendium includes updates to Curse of Strahd, Ghosts of Saltmarsh, Storm King’s Thunder, Tomb of Annihilation, and Volo’s Guide to Monsters.

dnd.wizards.com

"The PDF contains answers to a collection of new questions. To find the latest answers, search for “[New]” in the PDF.

The compendium includes links to new errata documents for Curse of Strahd, Ghosts of Saltmarsh, Storm King’s Thunder, Tomb of Annihilation, and Volo’s Guide to Monsters."

Racial attributes have been altered (thanks to @dave2008 for pointing that out).

 

[Wrathamon]

Don't mind the errata at all, but half the new rulings still drive me nuts.

When you dismiss the familiar you conjure with the find familiar spell to its pocket dimension, can it take any objects it’s wearing or carrying with it? No, the intent of find familiar is that any objects are left behind when the familiar vanishes. This intent will be reflected in future printings of the Player’s Handbook.

Why does this require a Sage Advice answer? Was this a major problem? Am I insane to think that this is the exact kind of thing that the DM and not WotC should answer?

Misty step doesn’t say the caster can bring worn or carried equipment with them. Are they intended to leave everything, including their clothes, behind? No, the caster’s worn and carried equipment are intended to go with them.

Some teleportation effects do specify that you teleport with your gear; such specification is an example of a rule being needlessly fastidious, since no teleportation effect in the game assumes that you teleport without your clothes, just as the general movement rules don’t assume that you drop everything when you walk.

See, you can be reasonable. I honestly just don't understand.

I actually like this sorta thing. One is they get a lot of players most likely finding strange situations where "items" can disappear w the familiar and are protected forever and that causes a lot of problems I'm guessing (and they got enough questions about it to answer) and now they are just clarifying that. Most likely this comes up a lot in AL play.

The other I think was great to point out in that some people just like to be rules lawyers and say your naked because other spells reference it and this doesnt so I think it was good to be point out in a stop being so literal and rai a bit more. Same with the line of sight being english and not a mechanic.

I still am baffled by held and don. I just thought don was them using a more descriptive word and not actually a mechanic.

 

[DND_Reborn]

These changes were made for absolutely the right reasons

I disagree but whatever.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

I disagree but whatever.

We can map it out!

A. Right changes, right reasons.

B. Right changes, wrong reasons.

C. Wrong changes, right reasons.

D. Wrong changes, wrong reasons.

E. All changes are a disease, a disease that spreads, melting the rules into an amoeboid mass. Slowly, a new set of rules will form where the old rules once lay; where the old rules can no longer contain the crustacean horror that have grown inside them.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

With the Ghosts of Saltmarsh errata, they've changed the sea lion to a CR 5 monstrosity (rather than a CR 1/2 beast) but haven't changed its description, which still suggests that it should just be a normal beast ("These large marine mammals live along coastal regions and around islands at sea").

Interesting also that, while the Curse of Strahd errata includes all the changes to the description of the Vistani, the Tomb of Annihilation errata does not include any of the changes made to the description of Chultans.

HAW! That's because those are TWO DIFFERNT THINGS. The CR 1/2 Beast is a real-world sealion. Just an animal (like a big seal) and the CR 5 Monstrosity is a greek-myth-inspired chimera-like Lion-Shark. Seems that the naming convention (which I personally have laughed about since 2e) has rightly caused some confusion.

 

[Bacon Bits]

Elemental weapon requites a 'weapon', Which an unarmed Strike is not.

Divine Smite requires a 'melee weapon attack' which an unarmed strike is.

There is a difference between a 'melee weapon attack' (which does not need a weapon) and 'an attack with a melee weapon' (which does require a weapon).

You missed the premise near the start of my post:

However, let's look at it from a game design perspective and not a "read the book back to me" perspective. Why might we want to make unarmed strikes not count as weapons?

The lion's share of my post doesn't care about what the book literally says. It cares about why you as a designer of the rules might decide to create the rule as Crawford has done. In other words, the premise is that all rules are still flexible and that any specific design should be a defensible choice. My point was that there isn't really any logic to denying unarmed strikes from actually just being a simple weapon. The only real weirdness is that it feels like the game should probably say somewhere -- probably the description for unarmed strikes and natural weapons -- that you're unarmed while only armed with unarmed strike, which sounds so self-evident that it sounds dumb when you read it. Still, the table could show it as having a Special property.

 

[Adamant]

You can look at it two ways.
1. Are you playing AL? If not you can ignore this because the DM of you game makes the final decision.
2. If you are the DM do you agree with this change if not you get to kick this to the curb.

As someone who actually plays AL nearly exclusively, this really doesn't change much. The key reason being that sage advice, even the compendium, isn't actually binding even in AL. The FAQ document calls it out as a resource, but then adds the disclaimer that the DM can utilize sage advice at their discretion.

 

[Weiley31]

I am completely okay with both Ranged and Denture Smites.

 

[Lefi2017]

So a lizard-man paladin could smite with their bite?

if zour plazing Al no!

If zou plaz with friends aslk zpour dDM he has the finall saz! He is the arbitor ofd the rull he can make it work Dm trups rulles and especiallz erata
WOTC arew not aboth DMs in hoem games

 

[TheSword]

Couldn’t have said it better myself. The

 

[Weiley31]

if zour plazing Al no!

If zou plaz with friends aslk zpour dDM he has the finall saz! He is the arbitor ofd the rull he can make it work Dm trups rulles and especiallz erata
WOTC arew not aboth DMs in hoem games

Translation: Sure bruh.