Official SAGE ADVICE Compendium, Spell Lists, & Errata

WotC has just posted three useful documents. The first is a compendium of Jeremy Crawford's Sage Advice questions and answers; the second is a compilation of spells plus new versions of the class spell lists; and the third is the latest version of the Player's Handbook errata document. "Like any heavily used system, the D&D rules undergo ongoing analysis, and occasionally, we like to pause and provide new resources for their current state."

You can find the three documents here.

• Sage Advice Compendium (version 1.0) (4 pages) "The PDF not only collects Sage Advice questions to date, but also lists the sources of the game’s official rules. Even better, we’ll expand that document every time we publish Sage Advice (the questions at the end of this column are also included). The PDF will effectively become the FAQ for the game."
• D&D Spell Lists (version 1.0) (10 pages) "The PDF also includes new versions of the class spell lists, which tell you each spell’s school of magic and whether a spell is a ritual."
• Player's Handbook Errata (version 1.1) (1 page) "The eagle-eyed Sam Simpson, a member of our customer service team, noticed that the document released on June 10 missed a few details that appear in the third printing of the Player’s Handbook. As a result, we’ve updated the document to version 1.1 to be truly comprehensive."

 

[Abciximab]

How is the issue with contagion - as in, does the disease kick in straight away or only after the third failed save - not a matter of them simply forgetting to tell us something?

I'm not so sure ...

Surprised it's not in there, he did address it on twitter. I think the tweet was on the 30th of May, too late for the PDF?

Jeremy Crawford [MENTION=4036]Jeremy[/MENTION]ECrawford
The effects of the contagion spell's disease are meant to activate after three failed saving throws. https://twitter.com/SirJosh94/status/603461998769086464 …

 

[Lucas Yew]

Now if they only could fix that size/ToC problem for the basic rules...

 

[pukunui]

Surprised it's not in there, he did address it on twitter. I think the tweet was on the 30th of May, too late for the PDF?

Jeremy Crawford [MENTION=4036]Jeremy[/MENTION]ECrawford
The effects of the contagion spell's disease are meant to activate after three failed saving throws. https://twitter.com/SirJosh94/status/603461998769086464 …

I missed that tweet. I don't understand why that doesn't count as errata.

 

[Yaarel]

Unfortunately, the ‘Evocation’ school lacks coherence. It is a random mishmash of themes that range from Fireball to Wall of Stone to Heal to Telepathy to almost anything.

It helps to focus the category of Evocation, so players can use it as a tool to define their character concepts.

Since Evocation already has the bulk of the elemental spells (Air, Water, Fire, Earth), it becomes useful to define evocation as elemental magic.

Even while D&D 5e is in its formative period, the elemental themes are already prominent, because of the Elemental Evil setting. This setting adds even more spells that are specific to elementalism. It helps to have a ‘school’ that is a place to put and find these elemental themes.

Evocation being a school of elemental magic, an Evoker is someone who specializes in evoking the mystical properties inherent in each element: Air, Water, Fire, Earth.

 

[Yaarel]

Abjuration works better as a spell descriptor, analogous to the ‘Mind-Affecting’ descriptor. It works less well as a school.

The Abjuration school is also incoherent, less meaningful and less useful.

For example, why would the Prismatic Wall be abjuration, but the Wall of Stone be evocation?

Every spell in the Abjuration seems to belong to one of the other schools.

Also add the ‘Abjuration’ descriptor to healing spells, in the sense of restoring health and ‘expelling’ wounds.

 

[Jester David]

How is the issue with contagion - as in, does the disease kick in straight away or only after the third failed save - not a matter of them simply forgetting to tell us something?

I'm not so sure ...

Wow, that is embarrassing. A pretty major oversight for a major and professional publisher.

 

[Remathilis]

Unfortunately, the ‘Evocation’ school lacks coherence. It is a random mishmash of themes that range from Fireball to Wall of Stone to Heal to Telepathy to almost anything.

It helps to focus the category of Evocation, so players can use it as a tool to define their character concepts.

Which is a funny reversal, since in 3.5 it was conjuration that had no focus (conjuration controlled summoning, teleporting, healing, and even later energy attacks; orb or force was Conjuration?!?). Now, Evocation is the catch-all.

 

[Dire Bare]

Wow, that is embarrassing. A pretty major oversight for a major and professional publisher.

From reading the linked "I don't know . . ." thread, it seems like this isn't even an error, just a change in formatting. Even if it is a new typo . . . there has never been, nor will there ever be, a book published without typos. The idea that the latest "errated" PHB printing still has old typos and/or introduces new ones is not embarrassing nor unprofessional in any way . . . it certainly doesn't bother me.

 

[Jester David]

From reading the linked "I don't know . . ." thread, it seems like this isn't even an error, just a change in formatting. Even if it is a new typo . . . there has never been, nor will there ever be, a book published without typos. The idea that the latest "errated" PHB printing still has old typos and/or introduces new ones is not embarrassing nor unprofessional in any way . . . it certainly doesn't bother me.

Yeah, upon rereading it doesn't sound that bad. I must have misread the first time.

 

[Noaharkwv]

The ritual list has the spell levels messed up.