D&D 5E (2024) Using Action Surge to cast spells in 2024

[kermit4karate]

According to the rules they are different. Action Surge allows any action except the Magic Action. Casting the spell on your turn uses the Magic Action, thus is prevented. Taking the Ready Action to concentrate on a spell, then using your Reaction to cast the spell does not the Magic Action, and technically is allowed.

It's a gray enough area that I could easily see some DMs ruling that it's outside their interpretation of Rules As Intended, even if it is within Rules As Written. Personally I don't see a problem with it - you are giving up your Reaction and your Concentration, so you are still taking a somewhat hefty penalty.

If we let the players treat the rules as a game, looking for little loopholes to exploit, then the game suffers. It's the DM's responsibility to prevent the rules from becoming a game within the game.

 

[kermit4karate]

Right, so you can't Ready outside initiative. Now I don't know your opinion on the Action Surge to Ready a 1 action spell issue, but if you could Ready with Action Surge to cast a 1 action spell, why is it that outside combat you can only cast 1 action spells with the Magic action, but suddenly in combat you could completely omit using the Magic action and only cast with the Ready action?

This is why they created the role of DM -- so that players couldn't either intentionally or accidentally exploit the written rules.

The answer is "it's up to the DM."

 

[Charlaquin]

I consider it an important distinction, the Ready meta-action describes how to turn another action of your choice into your reaction.

I t doesn’t turn the Action into a Reaction, it gives you another way to use your Reaction. Specifically, to perform the chosen action in response to the specified trigger. I agree it’s an important distinction, and the way you’re interpreting it is not what the rules say.

That is all it does, it is not an action itself.

It is literally an action itself.

You could get rid of it and handle that case under each individual action and nothing would change.

You could write the rules that way, but the game designers did not. It is an action instead, and that carries with it certain rules considerations, one of them being the case we’re currently discussing. So I disagree that nothing would change; this thing we’re currently talking about would change.

This just puts the summary in one place instead of repeating it several times.

You wouldn’t have to repeat it several times. It could be written once, immediately after the list of actions, as a special way to perform any of those actions. But it isn’t, it’s written among them, as a unique action of its own.

no, by using the action of your choice, in this case the Magic action, and doing so on your turn already rather than waiting with that for your reaction to occur

That just isn’t what the text of the Ready Action says.

I quoted the text already, our disagreement is not resolved by that text, it is caused by it / how unclear it is

I don’t think it’s unclear at all, unless you insist on trying to read the Ready Action as secretly not an Action but a special way to use a different Action.

 

[Maxperson]

No, it says you choose a different action that you will take when the specified trigger occurs.

And then it goes on to make an exception for spells. No other attack type is spelled out as an exception like that. The Magic Action works as normal, except for the release that happens after the spell is 100% cast during the PC's turn.

 

[Charlaquin]

I grant you separate entry and rules, but those rules tell you to chose the other action you actually want to perform and a trigger to cause you to perform it.

Yes, and they also tell you to do that Action later, in response to the trigger, not immediately on your turn. If you did it immediately on your turn, the Ready Action wouldn’t be accomplishing anything. The entire point is to allow you to performance action at some other time when you wouldn’t otherwise be able to.

You can remove the Ready action and repeat the relevant part under any of the other actions and nothing changes, Ready just summarizes it in one spot.

You could write it that way, but the game designers didn’t, and so we must read it as its own Action, because it is.

 

[Charlaquin]

And then it goes on to make an exception for spells. No other attack type is spelled out as an exception like that. The Magic Action works as normal, except for the release that happens after the spell is 100% cast during the PC's turn.

It doesn’t say the Magic Action happens as normal, it says you cast the spell as normal. Casting the spell is part of the effect of the Ready Action when used to ready a spell, just as casting a spell is part of the effect of the Magic Action when used to cast a spell.

 

[kermit4karate]

You could write it that way, but the game designers didn’t, and so we must read it as its own Action, because it is.

That assumes the designers were infallible and there are no contradictions or poorly-worded rules.

They knew they weren't infallible...which is why they created the role of DM to interpret the rules and adjudicate decisions at each table.

 

[Charlaquin]

That assumes the designers were infallible and there are no contradictions or poorly-worded rules.

It assumes that they wrote the rules the way they did on purpose. If one believes them to have been written in error, or simply dislikes the way they were written, one is free to rule differently.

They knew they weren't infallible...which is why they created the role of DM to interpret the rules and adjudicate decisions at each table.

Absolutely. As I’ve said a few times now, this is us, as DMs, talking shop. A player who tried to use these arguments to say that the DM’s call on this matter was wrong and they should rule differently would be out of line. Equally so whether the DM’s call on this matter was a yes or a no.

 

[Teemu]

That, to me, would imply special permission to use Action Surge to cast a spell using the Magic Action and expending your Reaction, which would be much stronger than using Action Surge to Ready casting a spell, since it wouldn’t require concentration or specifying a trigger.

I don’t see any reason you wouldn’t be able to do those things.

Those items don't require casting a spell so they don't need Concentration or spending the resource as you take the Ready action. Thus, if you don't think the Ready action with Action Surge using those Magic action items is against the rules, why even have the limit in Action Surge? Just take the Ready action, say your trigger is the next combatant moves a muscle, and take your Reaction when the trigger occurs, completely bypassing the no Magic action limit on Action Surge. Doesn't that seem strange to you? Do you really think that's the intended way Action Surge is supposed to work with the Ready action?

 

[Mort]

To be clear, my interpretation is that you do still use a Magic Action when you Ready a spell. You just use it later, as a Reaction, instead of on your turn (since on your turn you’re using the Ready Action).

And that is what 100% loses me.

The text is "You cast the spell as normal," on your turn. Not you prepare to cast the spell or you ready to cast the spell. It says you actually cast the spell. You then hold the spell (using your concentration) and RELEASE (not cast) it with your reaction.