D&D 5E RAW: Using Purify Food and Drink to cure a party member?

[Mad_Jack]

I'd let it work with the requirement that the caster must then immediately consume the target as part of the spell - not just taking a single bite out of them, but eating at least half of them. Well, maybe a quarter or at least a significant portion if I wanted it to be a continuing joke...

"The lizardman druid casts Purify Food and Water on you, then proceeds to bite off your infected arm..."

 

[Cadence]

100% this. If a person wants to cast Lesser Restoration, they should prepare that spell instead. The Rule of Cool is not a reason to get two spells for the price of one, or a second level spell out of a first level spell.

One exception to the no two spells for one that I make is that I will always and forever house rule Greater Restoration to also allow an option to do something on the Lesser Restoration list too. It seems absurd to me that it won't.

 

[Kurotowa]

One exception to the no two spells for one that I make is that I will always and forever house rule Greater Restoration to also allow an option to do something on the Lesser Restoration list too. It seems absurd to me that it won't.

Right, and that gets back to the test I proposed. Greater Restoration subbing for Lesser Restoration is doing something a lower level spell could do, not a higher. Which makes a world of difference. Also they're almost always both spells available to the same class, which covers the niche protection thing.

If players want to blow high level resources for lower level effects for something that's still within their class's purview, that gets the most leeway for bending the rules a little.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

What if the spellcaster is a "reborn"? The lineage from Ravenloft 5e.

Eating live animals - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Other point is to use low-level magic to help or accelerate ordinary healing/recovery.

In a fantasy world pharmacists could try (low-level) magic to craft better medicines.

Spellcasters illithid could use it at living sentient beings, but then a possibility is the living being isn't healed at all, but the eater will not suffer infection or intoxication.

* If the drunkenness is intoxication due to alcohol... can you be drunk by "purified" alcoholic drinks?

 

[Kurotowa]

Also, if we want to split hairs, poisoned is not the same as poisonous. Like, there are lots of animals that are poisonous as a self-defense mechanism, and they're not dying from it. Similarly venomous animals kill their prey by poisoning it, and then safely eat it after it dies. Just because a creature is rendered safe to eat, it doesn't mean it's cured of its ailments or going to live longer.

Not that I'd deny the request on those grounds, because that engages with it as a legitimate ask and encourages future rules lawyering. But as a theoretical matter, safe to eat isn't the same as being cured.

 

[Incenjucar]

They're cured in the way one cures a ham.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

One exception to the no two spells for one that I make is that I will always and forever house rule Greater Restoration to also allow an option to do something on the Lesser Restoration list too. It seems absurd to me that it won't.

What's interesting is that Greater Restoration can remove one curse, same as the 3rd level Remove Curse, only that spell removes all curses in effect on a target.

 

[tomBitonti]

A great thought for all those PCs who are, in fact, berries, I suppose. And never mind that berries that are naturally poisonous are usually in the "not food" column.

Overall, 5e is intentionally written in natural language, and is not really meant to be parsed in details of definition. Seeking definition-based corner cases and loopholes is not really in the spirit of the thing.

This seems like a solidly "rulings over rules" situation.

I don't disagree. I'd go with a "does a usual person consider it food" test.

The spell is a good example of inherent ambiguity. "Food", "creature", "poisoned", and "diseased" are highly dependent on the caster to provide meaning. Chickens and cows are creatures, not food -- until they are slaughtered. A lobster, however, might be both creature and food. Certainly raw oysters are both creatures and food.

Doesn't the spell get a lot of use in hostile locations, e.g., planes of hell, as a way of purifying inherently poisonous food and water?

Frivolous side question: If cast on normal wine or beer, does it remove (or convert) the alcohol? Maybe Dwarfs call the spell "The Great Bringer of Ruin".

TomB

 

[Lanefan]

I was just going to say the same thing. It makes the food safe for consumption; a vampire could cast the purify spell on their next victim and drink the blood just fine. Nothing says the target doesn't stay poisoned.

Er...aren't vampires, being undead, immune to poison anyway?

 

[Lanefan]

Frivolous side question: If cast on normal wine or beer, does it remove (or convert) the alcohol?

I'd have it that it would treat the liquid as impure water, and purify it. Result: a container of pure clear water.