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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Tzarevitch" data-source="post: 6402925" data-attributes="member: 1792">It isn't bad at very low levels. The damage is comparable to other low level spells on the first round and it isn't horrible on the following rounds, it's the limitations it imposes on the caster after the first round that make it poor. It severely restricts your actions and leaves you at way too close a range. After low levels it becomes pretty poor because the damage loss after first round and the action restrictions outweigh the damage output. You are burning 2 1st level spells and most of your actions to make this combo work. That really just doubles down on a suboptimal choice when you can cast from a safer range and minimize the likelihood of getting hit in return at no cost to you.  You usually want them to do it to someone else, that "someone" ideally being a fighter, barbarian or paladin (or some clerics), all of whom have bigger hit point pools and can mitigate or fix damage. That's why they have those abilities. How much intelligence do you think a creature needs to associate the "beam of crackling blue energy" pointing from the caster to it which is causing it pain? Real world animals know if a hunter shot at them, and that is less obvious than a crackling blue beam. Animals will do what they normally do; they'll either run for cover or attack what is attacking them (which they can easily find thanks to the blue beam pointing to the attacker). It isn't rocket science. An ooze or a non-intelligent undead might not figure it (or care) out but nearly everything else with a brain will and that is made easier by the blue beam leading them to you.  Why would you need a 5' tree? You are thinking of 4e. 5e is intentionally not that precise. The spell says it ends if the target is "ever outside the spell's range or if it has total cover from you." The PHB also says "[a] target has total cover if it is completely concealed by an obstacle." There is no requirement that your cover be 5' wide. The creature just has to pass briefly behind a tree wide enough to shield him from sight on his narrowest side. That's maybe 12' wide to be sure you are covered. 4e uses precise 5' squares and a more precise definition of cover. 5e doesn't, it just requires you find an object wide enough that you can't be seen.</blockquote>

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