D&D 5E Sleep is not a save-or-die spell (minor rant)

[CapnZapp]

a save-or-die spell (or save-or-lose, if you prefer) can take down a target regardless of how many hit points it has

That is not how I define this class of effect. Your refutation of my statement is therefore irrelevant.

 

[Sacrosanct]

No, it doesn't. It does the exact opposite of bypassing hit points. Your hit points are the gatekeeper determining whether the spell can affect you or not. If you have 41 or more, the spell slams into your hit points like hitting a brick wall.

As I said before, the point is that a save-or-die spell (or save-or-lose, if you prefer) can take down a target regardless of how many hit points it has. Sleep does not do this.

Yeah, the number of hit points is pretty key in the equation of success or failure. That's not what I'd call bypassing them. In fact, by the literal definition, that's the opposite of bypassing them as you say. But i kinda get where he is coming from too. It doesn't affect hit points, but that's different than bypassing them.

 

[CapnZapp]

The problem with abilities that bypass hitpoints are that:

1. You are playing a different game than everyone else at the table. If you are doing "Int" damage while everyone else is doing HP damage, then your damage and their damage don't interact. Whoever gets their total to 0 first wins and the other damage might as well not exist.

2. "Tough" monsters can be taken out easily by targeting their lowest pool that you can damage. Monster has 400 hitpoints? No problem, their Int is 3, so your spell that lowers Int by 1d6 is much more powerful than doing HP damage.

Sleep has neither of these problems. Their hitpoint pool matters when determining if the spell succeeds. If your allies reduce the enemy's hitpoints then it increases the chance of your Sleep spell working. Tough monsters aren't immediately defeated by a sleep spells since they won't be affected at all.

Sleep doesn't have any of the problems of those older spells.

It is true 5th edition sleep is designed to minimize the classic issues with save or suck spells.

This does not change the fact that the spell technically still bypasses hit points, and I therefore classify it as such.

Look, Sleep does not actually cause 5d8 damage. If it did it would be overpowered for its level.

It is precisely because it plays "a different game than everyone else" it can be allowed to affect so many hit points.

However. That Sleep is saddled with so many checks and balances that it barely exceeds a regular area damage spell, and the fact that it operates only so near zero hp that most often it only affects creatures that would go down with a good whack anyway doesn't change the spell's fundamental nature, that of bypassing damage.

It might be a nitpick, it might be a theoretical exercise, but it's still important to recognize Sleep for the save or die it is.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

It might be a nitpick, it might be a theoretical exercise, but it's still important to recognize Sleep for the save or die it is.

I'm just not sure what benefit you get from classifying it that way. The reason people refer to the class of "save or die" spells or "save or suck" spells at all is because of the two problems I mentioned. It sucks as a DM when a big, powerful monster gets taken down by one spell without having to do any damage to it at all. It sucks for a PC to have the same thing happen to them. Completely healthy to dead or at least incapacitated with one spell and one die roll can suck. Well, unless the creature was really weak to begin with. It doesn't matter if your "Finger of Death" or whatever kills someone outright if they only have 4 hitpoints and would have died to any weapon attack against them. Since, at that point, the spell is effectively doing 4 points of damage and is the same as a magic missile.

"Save or Die" is a category of spells that says "I don't care how many hit points you have....you die(or you are so incapacitated or debuffed that you might as well be dead since you can no longer effectively fight back)".

This spell doesn't have that problem at all. Classifying it as a "save or die" spell implies it does have that problem....since that's the only thing that "save or die" spells have in common. Otherwise every spells that doesn't do actual damage should be classified as "save or die".

 

[Dausuul]

It might be a nitpick, it might be a theoretical exercise, but it's still important to recognize Sleep for the save or die it is.

So your definition of "save-or-die" is that it disables the target in a way other than actual hit point damage? I mean, yeah, by that definition, I guess sleep qualifies. However, I don't see any reason to adopt that definition. We already have names for non-damage disabling effects; we call them "debuffs" or "status effects," which sleep unquestionably is.

The strictest definition of "save-or-die" would be a spell that literally kills you on a failed save. More loosely, one can expand the concept to spells that are functionally similar, such as banishment.

However, sleep is not functionally similar to save-or-die. The situations where sleep shines (several weak enemies) are exactly opposite to when save-or-die is at its best (powerful foes). Sleep works in conjunction with the party's damage dealers; if the fighter and the paladin have whittled down the monsters to half hit points, sleep will affect twice as many targets. Save-or-die spells work on a separate track and are best used on enemies that haven't been injured at all.

Just as banishment is effectively but not literally save-or-die, sleep is effectively but not literally direct damage. It buys a higher raw damage value (5d8) by accepting a bunch of restrictions and limitations.

 

[Lanefan]

I'm just not sure what benefit you get from classifying it that way. The reason people refer to the class of "save or die" spells or "save or suck" spells at all is because of the two problems I mentioned. It sucks as a DM when a big, powerful monster gets taken down by one spell without having to do any damage to it at all. It sucks for a PC to have the same thing happen to them. Completely healthy to dead or at least incapacitated with one spell and one die roll can suck.

And then the question becomes one of whether this is OK or not; personally I don't mind it as funnelling everything into pure h.p. damage gets kinda same-y.

"Save or Die" is a category of spells that says "I don't care how many hit points you have....you die(or you are so incapacitated or debuffed that you might as well be dead since you can no longer effectively fight back)".

Agreed. Save-or-die doesn't necessarily mean the spell itself is gonna kill you, but that you're gonna be dead before the spell ends if you blow this save. (Hold Person has a long and infamous history in our crew for just this)

This spell doesn't have that problem at all. Classifying it as a "save or die" spell implies it does have that problem....since that's the only thing that "save or die" spells have in common. Otherwise every spells that doesn't do actual damage should be classified as "save or die".

Well, not really. Every offensive spell, perhaps; but Cat's Grace and Reflecting Pool don't exactly fill me with fear of death if I don't resist.

Lan-"What's the duration on Hold Person? For this guy's purposes, the rest of his life."-efan

 

[mellored]

This does not change the fact that the spell technically still bypasses hit points, and I therefore classify it as such.

If it is ineffective against a creature with 1000 hit point, it doesn't bypass them.

Also, there is no save.

 

[Huntsman57]

That would be a house-rule though, since a Bonus Action can only be used for actions that explicitly use a Bonus Action; if you don't have such an action available, then you can't take a Bonus Action. RAW it would be a Standard Action, but even then, there are times in which it might make sense.

Yea, it's an action, not a bonus action. It's a handy 1st level spell, particularly since there's no save, even if all you did was basically waste the action of two enemies for 1 round. Of course there's always a chance that one of the other enemies doesn't use it's action to wake the target up, or one of your companions is in position to deal the killing blow. That's particularly useful in my game where coup de grace rules still aren't a thing of the past. Take that carebear 5E.

 

[CapnZapp]

If it is ineffective against a creature with 1000 hit point, it doesn't bypass them.

Also, there is no save.

No, but if it is effective against a creature with 20 hit point, it does bypass them.

Also, whether there's an actual save or not remains irrelevant.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Also, whether there's an actual save or not remains irrelevant.

so...your argument is that for the phrase "save or die", the actual save part is irrelevant?

Okay....