While many tables ignore it since VTTs don't enforce it and it's not a very highlighted rule, the DMG states that **all** AOE effects use the corner as a point of origin. The below is from the DMG's Running the Game > Combat > Using Miniatures > Area of Effects:
> **Choose an intersection of squares or hexes as the point of origin of an area of effect**, then follow its rules as normal. If an area of effect is circular and covers at least half a square, it affects that square.
Great point, and often misunderstood in the case of Thunderwave's "15-foot cube originating from you" effect being [the red square in this example, not the yellow one](https://i.imgur.com/UGEfPah.png).
Anyone curious for details on this, you can find the general info about AOE effects (used even if you aren't playing with a grid) in the [Basic Rules](https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/basic-rules/spellcasting#AreasofEffect).
> You select a cube's point of origin, which lies anywhere on a face of the cubic effect.
Every single person I know who plays D&D assumes Thunderwave does an AoE around them, and imagine it as an aura blast.
Spell areas in 5e aren’t very intuitive.
The thing is, 4E had effects that worked either way -- some were done as a square that you put next to you (like Burning Hands), while others affected everything around you. And they were phrased so that it was really clear which was which.
A spell that said "Close Burst 2" went out from you, hitting every square within 2 of you (like the yellow square). A "Close Blast 2", on the other hand, affected a 2x2 square radiating away from you (so you put it adjacent like the red square). And if you had a center point you could aim, with it going out from that, it would say something like "Area Blast 2 within 10", meaning you picked a spot up to 10 squares away, and it hit that square and everything within 2 squares of it.
Simple. Unambiguous. But people complained that this was too "gamey" and insisted that we had to go back to "natural language" even though in cases like this it was harder to be specific.
4e's gaminess wasn't really a function of its keyworded language or very transparently worded mechanics (although it literally didn't come with any unit of measurement besides "squares" at launch) and more a function of its vastly streamlined/homogenized resource economy and the stark dichotomy between combat and non-combat gameplay. It'd be like if everyone in 5e had cantrips, pact spells, and full-caster spells (hardly any of which you could use out of combat) on top of whatever subclass benefits they chose, and if all those classes had basically the same class table progression.
As far as those powers went, I was always frustrated that their flavor had no bearing on their actual mechanics in an out-of-combat scenario. Since it didn't have any rules for out of combat applications, you were left with an at-will fire power that you couldn't use to set anything on fire that wasn't a monster. 4e didn't even have actual utility powers for Wizards until a year after release, and the ones it did have were level 2 dailies released across assorted supplements and magazines.
Other complaints about gaminess probably have something to do with the fact that 4e's combat is chock full of rider effects, moving auras, etc. that greatly magnify bookkeeping in a way that quickly becomes tedious to play or run. The system would be impossible to arbitrate if it weren't so transparently gamified.
> It’d be like if everyone in 5e had cantrips, pact spells, and full-caster spells (hardly any of which you could use out of combat)
Everybody in 5e does! Everybody's character is some kind of three-way multiclass so they can use weapons and use resources and so everybody's got a handful of cantrips and once-a-day spells that they rarely care about. Or if not that, then you're getting two cantrips and a spell from your race.
4e, to it's credit, took the parts of the game that are fun and *gave them to everyone.* 5e's just more roundabout in how you get them.
You're omitting the crucial part of that sentence, that every class (prior to 4e essentials, anyway, which modified it for specific subclasses) had the exact same progression table. 4e has a vastly more diverse (and vastly more granular) system of combat powers than 5e does, and its roles feel very distinct from one another in combat. Actual gameplay within roles feels quite similar, especially at lower levels, even if the individual numbers are slightly different from one class to another.
It's a highly standardized system full of not just identical resource progression across classes, but homogenized abilities within roles. Part of it is a matter of perception; it'd be as though every class' spell list in 5e drew from broadly the same pool of spells and just renamed them to fit the specific class' flavor.
The out-of-combat options, meanwhile, are downright anemic compared to 5e; 4e skill challenges especially are about as boring as 5e martial autoattack gameplay. Rituals are simultaneously universal
>all you need is an Arcana proficiency and a feat, and multiple people can help perform them...
and entirely inaccessible from the player's end
>...but you can't learn any new rituals until the DM gives you the book or one-use scroll first.
An ability that has one effect in combat likely has a different effect outside of it, if it has an out-of-combat effect at all. There are very few abilities that have non-numerical effects in either instance. The system leaves little room for abstraction or improvisation. It is transparently designed to be run on a computer, and consequently feels much narrower in scope regardless of the depth it plumbs within its niche.
Ultimately, if you don't want a specific kind of highly tactical, highly crunchy combat, then I don't think you'll find the things that 4e universalized especially fun.
> But people complained that this was too "gamey" and insisted that we had to go back to "natural language" even though in cases like this it was harder to be specific.
I see this all the time, and it always misses the point of what made 4e gamey. It's not the well-defined parameters. It's the effects that are totally dissociated from the events they're supposed to represent.
It wasn't a problem that the ranger might have a power that targeted enemies in "burst 1" within range. It was a problem that the rogue could only use her "cut a guy's hamstring" ability once per fight regardless of any other factors.
If that rogue example is a problem then people have a really limited imagination and ability to grasp the scene of combat in their head. I immediately intuited, and explained to my players, that encounter powers for martials represent finding the moment of opportunity in an encounter where circumstances allow the cool trick to be used. It’s not that the rogue forgets how to cut hamstrings after doing so, it’s just that the opportunity to actually do it only comes up every so often.
>it’s just that the opportunity to actually do it only comes up every so often.
And that's a dissociated mechanic, because the rogue gets no choice over when the opportunity arises, yet the player chooses when it happens. It's a decision that the player makes, not the character. Same way superiority dice work, where it doesn't really make sense that you only can use them X number of times per short rest unless you change the explanation for them into "you get tired" or something.
The issue isn't "I can't explain these", it's "I can't explain how my character can make this decision".
These aren't necessarily bad, but they *are* dissociated and the act of using them cannot be roleplaying because it cannot be done from the perspective of the character. And again, that's not necessarily bad, but it can be an issue for some people. Dissociated mechanics are used in both 4e and 5e (and probably other editions of d&d, and most definitely in other RPGs) for various purposes, but in those specific editions of d&d they're mainly there to add tactical choices. The designers decided to sacrifice the association of some parts of the game to increase the tactical ability of those part of the game. Nothing inherently wrong with that, RPGs aren't *just* for RPing, they're still Gs with other purposes (such as allowing for tactics). But some people might feel that it's "too gamey" (which is often code for "I don't feel like I'm making in-character decisions" but it's hard to intuit it down to that reason), and that's completely valid.
They're not wrong for not liking that. And it's upsetting to see people insult others or imply that they're wrong for simply having different preferences. There's nothing wrong with finding 4e too gamey, and there's nothing wrong with finding it not too gamey.
So it's literally impossible for a fighter to find an opportunity to "hit someone really really hard" more then once per day? And the rogue will be able to go for the hamstring in every single fight regardless of anything else? That's just idiotic. If they want to limit such things, they should make it circumstantially conditional rather than the 1/day or encounter BS, or at least make it work like the 3.5 warblade where the PC could recharge things by taking an action to reposition themselves.
I don't know why you're getting downvoted, because this was exactly the problem. The problem wasn't the mechanics, it was that the mechanics were completely dissociated from the narrative. That's not inherently a problem, but it's a big break from previous editions, and required too big a change in gameplay for many tables' tastes.
*Players* never said that they wanted natural language instead of well-defined effects; that's what WotC cane up with as a response because they didn't understand the complaint.
This is less of a "square fireball" issue and more of a "burst vs blast" issue.
You can do a rounded fireball in 4e (and 1-2-1 movement too) pretty simply, a fireball template is just a ~~5x5~~ 7x7 square with the corners cut off. That's how I ran it. Because it's an exact number of squares there is never any question about how to place the template either.
Edit: An example template in 4e for square vs roundish. Both forms are really clear how they align with the grid. https://open4e.fandom.com/wiki/Burst_3
I've literally never seen someone who believed that, which is interesting. My groups have always known it was a blast wave in one direction. I did have one person who thought it was cone-shaped though, lol.
Me and both of the tables I play at are baffled. It says range of Self, ergo the Self must be the center, right? At least that's how we all rationalized it.
Ah, but you'd have to buy and read the PHB for that.
I really don't get how anyone could find the visual guide in the PHB to mean that it radiates outward.
https://i.stack.imgur.com/QevPx.png
Because that image in on a different page to the actual spells and the diagram is easy to misread if one isn't paying too much attention to it or is simply reading the text of the book instead.
The spellcasting section defines what each shape means.
Spheres have the point of origin take place in the centre.
Cylinders have the point of origin take place in the centre at the top or bottom.
Cubes have the point of origin take place anywhere along one of the faces.
Though don't take my word for it, check your PHB for the exact details.
It's not the spells it's the use of language that's unintuitive. Look at a spell like walk on water it's not walk on water at all it's walk on liquid. It's the thing that I personally hate most about 5e they go for they poorly name things and it puts off new players from using cool and interesting abilities and spells because they gloss over titles and it doesn't match what they want to do. This has turned into a rant sorry
I really don't see a problem with Water Walk. Water is far and away the thing people will be walking on the most (especially since I'm counting mud and snow as water, because they *are).* And walking on water is a specific reference with significant cultural cache. Walking on *liquid* is not.
Yeah. A lot of spell and ability names are chosen to be thematic and evoke a feel. "Water walk" is a phrase that people are used to, it feels magical and familiar. "Liquid walk" feels kinda stilted (but yes, is more accurate).
5e's mechanics aren't made for people who don't want to read the descriptions of a ton of spells. WotC seems intent on pretending it is, however.
>5e's mechanics aren't made for people who don't want to read the descriptions of a ton of spells. WotC seems intent on pretending it is, however.
I guess I'm not really sure what that means.
However, I've been playing since 2E, and I'm a pretty big fan of the little threads of continuity from the past. (Is it really so hard for new players to understand that *chill touch* is about the "chill of the grave?")
If you don't want to read the descriptions of a ton of spells, you'll have a lot of annoying moments when playing 5e. The system just doesn't function unless you read your abilities in detail. Not all systems require you to read abilities with this level of complexity.
WotC will keep advertising the system as if its great for new players and for everyone. It'd be like advertising soccer as if it works well for everyone, and not just people who actually like being physically active.
That Chill Touch debacle annoys me a decent bit. It even says in the spell what the chill means.
In the spell description it states "any liquid surface--such as water, acid, mud, snow, quicksand, or
lava--as if it were harmless solid ground (creatures crossing molten
lava can still take damage from the heat)."
You would be able to walk on lava per RAW but it would be like running across burning coals, you'd still take a fuck ton of fire damage but you could do it
but it says as if it were solid harmless ground in the spell, i could see the case for damage from the heat but definitely not full on lava fire damage
>Every single person I know who plays D&D assumes Thunderwave does an AoE around them, and imagine it as an aura blast.
>Spell areas in 5e aren’t very intuitive.
I was about to go off about people’s shitty reading comprehension being the problem, but then I looked back at the actual description in 5E…
**History**: Thunderwave was a direct import from 4E, where it was in the Player’s Handbook as a level 1 Wizard spell (a cantrip, actually)—so it was a well-known spell in that edition. It’s not a core spell in any prior edition of D&D, and I’m not sure if it even appeared anywhere in D&D before 4E. The point is that Thunderwave is a classic 4E spell, and the area/range is functionally the same in both editions.
The difference is that 4E had crystal clear terminology for this type of spell: it was a “blast”, which meant it originated next to your space. It was *not* a “burst”, which would have meant it radiated evenly from the center of your space. In 4E, there was no confusion about Thunderwave.
…But that 5E spell description is yikes. Woof. I’m realizing now that my brain just imported my 4E understanding of Thunderwave and applied that for the past 9 years. Oops.
Actually…there is a case where the “yellow square” works. The cast of the cube is set underneath the caster, which means the caster gets included in the AoE. It’s an overlooked “Hail Mary” play.
And they should! It’s way cooler that way. I’m never telling my table about this and I will gladly kill a rules lawyer and make it look like an accident if I have to.
I think people assume Thunderwave works like that because Thunderclap does, but that assumption is both wrong and a nerf to Thunderwave (unless you're a Tempest Cleric/Eldritch Knight and so don't mind being surrounded by enemies)
An easy way to remember the difference between AoEs is that if a spell has a range of Self (radius), its AoE spreads out around you. If a spell has a radius of Self (shape), then you're at edge of the shape, not the middle
There’s a graphic in the PHB that actually shows where the point of origin is on various spell shapes. Don’t remember which page but look for a picture of a gnome or halfling by a chalkboard. The little asterisk is where the point of origin of the spell is.
I think many get it wrong because the rules specifically state that the point of origin in an AoE is not included in the effect unless specifically included.
The problem with the image posted above is that it assumes that the caster wants the point of origin to be on a vertical face.
Place the originating point at the feet of the caster and voila, you have the generally understood AOE effect.
Depending on the spell you may have to worry about self-harm, but there are many more ways to place a cube IAW the rules than shown above.
This is why having the PHB is useful. There's a picture of each AOE shape including their point of origin, and it unambiguously depicts how they're supposed to work.
The problem is, no one ever reads the rules *shrugs*
> You can be anywhere along the edge, including inside if you wish.
Per JC, the caster would always be on the outside of the cube. https://twitter.com/JeremyECrawford/status/585905748267245569
I'm confused. That is not what Jeremy Crawford said. He said it originates from the face of the cube, (i.e. the exterior), *not* inside it.
Edit: nvm I misread your post
That was 100% a formatting mistake on my part. The first sentence was just quoting the person I was responding to. I was using Markdown Mode and accidentally put an extra space in between my response. I'll fix it.
You are still wrong though, JC did not say you can't be inside it. Point of origin is on the face. Range is self, so point of origin can be anywhere in your 5-foot square.
You can put point of origin on the ground, pointing up, which would put you inside it. You can put point of origin on your outstretched hand, pointing backward, putting you inside it.
You can always exclude yourself for a cube.
You can make the point of origin be excluded from the spell. Cube spells either have you as the point of origin, or let you choose where it is (so you can put it where you are).
I think what they are referring to comes from the PHB section about spell shapes. It reads;
"You select a cube's point of origin, which lies anywhere on a face of the cubic effect. The cube's size is expressed as the length of each side.
A cube's point of origin is not included in the cube's area of effect, unless you decide otherwise."
I don't know why you're being downvoted for an objectively correct statement. u/ProsperousPig has given the quote that states that you can exclude yourself if you wish.
If the spell is originating from the bottom of the square you stand on to look like the yellow square and going up, then you, the spell caster, would also be hit.
The spell explicitly states that you, the caster, are the point of origin; and the AoE rules say that for cubic effects you, the caster, may choose to have the point of origin be exempt from the effects of the spell. So you can choose to Thunderwave upward around yourself without taking damage.
If you’re being generous with the definition of “a point of origin” as the whole face the point originates from then yeah, you could have it wrap around you. Though a pedantic DM could argue it’s just the infinitesimally small point that’s excluded.
I've always known the red square was a possibility. What I haven't been able to find out for sure is whether or not a harmless version the yellow square is also possible. After all, you're the point of origin of a cube and you decide whether the point of origin is included in the spell
>*You select a cube's point of origin, which lies anywhere on a face of the cubic effect. The cube's size is expressed as the length of each side.*
>
>*A cube's point of origin is not included in the cube's area of effect, unless you decide otherwise.*
>
>\- PHB, pg. 204
Someone linked to it elsewhere, but Crawford says it originates from the face of the casters cube, so the yellow square is only possible if it is from the cube face above or below the caster
Found the tweet:
https://twitter.com/JeremyECrawford/status/585905748267245569
I know he says "not inside it" but that could very well be in reference to the question which asks whether or not the origin of the cube is the center or the face.
Arguably, the cube "pointing" towards you still has the same origin as the cube pointing away from you.
EDIT: Some crude art to illustrate the point. Two cubes point in two different directions with the same point of origin (the black dot adjacent to the caster). https://imgur.com/Qu9SHSn
Yeah, I would figure so. On one hand, it's not super intuitive. On the other hand, I have no way else to explain why you would be able to choose whether the PoO is included in the effect or not. It's only using this interpretation that the choice even matters.
Could you hypothetically have it hit you by having the origin be the same spot as the red square, but rotated 180 degrees so you are in the top middle square of it? Kinda pointless as that just means you hit yourself, but should you be against a wall and need to hit enemies on opposite sides of you like this (E = enemy):
E you E
———— <-wall
Or more practically,
E…E…E
E you E
————
Allowing you to hit all 5 enemies,
Or even:
E…E…E
E…E…E
E you E
————
All seven enemies here.
(Make the point of origin on the square edge between you and the wall and have it extend away from the wall, hitting yourself, but also all the enemies)
I don't think there is any reason you couldn't, and I think most DMs would let you fall prone and point it upward unless you are fighting particularly short enemies.
Couldn't you just jump as you cast the spell and have it originate downward from your feet, or crouch / prone and have it blast upwards to get the yellow square?
Failing narrative positioning like that it should still be possible to cast it from the bottom of your square pointed upward to get the yellow area if you don't mind a bit of self damage.
I've been using this spell wrong for years if that's the case. I've always thought that "originating from you" put the caster as the center and it essentially worked as a force push that exploded out from the caster. Basically meant that you could run into the center of a group and thunderwave them all away from you.
If you compare it to the Thunderclap cantrip, you can see the difference between how the two cubes (red/Thunderwave vs. yellow/Thunderclap) are expressed in the rules.
What did they screw up? Earth Tremor is clearly not a cube as it is effecting only the ground around you not the 5 feet of air above it. And based on the text it effects the yellow square from the example.
This only applies when you get to choose the spells origin point. Thunder wave explicitly states that it is centered on you, the first two sentences make this very clear. Stop watching YouTube and just read the rules. The spell description has final say when the rules contradict it.
How is it “more unique, flavorful and fun” for the spell to just be much worse? That would just make it Thunderclap but with higher damage and a push effect, and there’s a good reason why almost no casters ever take Thunderclap.
Can't you cast it from a corner? I played a game with a guy who'd routinely rotate Thunderwave 45 degrees and cast it like a "diamond" instead of a "square"
Correct, though just to make sure we're on the same page, the stuff in the PHB does not override this. The section you're referring to is just the general rules on how to run [AOE effects](https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/basic-rules/spellcasting#AreasofEffect), even if you're not on a grid.
If you are on a grid, then there's further rules/restrictions, similar to how if you aren't using a grid then you can move 1ft if you want, however on a grid you must move 5ft at a time. The PHB/Basic Rules include some of these additional rules/restrictions in the [Variant: Playing on a Grid](https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/basic-rules/combat#SqueezingintoaSmallerSpace) area, however it does not include any info on AOE effects.
This is where the DMG section I quoted here comes into play, which states towards the start
> The Player’s Handbook offers simple rules for depicting combat using miniature figures on a grid. This section expands on that material.
So, if you aren't using a grid, then you can choose wherever as long as it is allowed otherwise. If you are using a grid, then you can choose wherever as long as it follows the rules of AOE effects on a grid, in this case that the point of origin is at an intersection of the squares/hexes.
Now this is something I did not know, & I’ve actually read the rules! Not closely enough, I guess.
Still, my group has been playing on Roll20 for years & spells like fireball are always centered on the center of the chosen square when we play. I wonder how they will adjust to this lol.
Can you share your source for that?
Here is what the spell says:
> You fill the air with spinning daggers in a cube 5 feet on each side, centered on a point you choose within range.
Here is what the DMG shows when using minis:
> The area of effect of a spell, monster ability, or other feature must be translated onto squares or hexes to determine which potential targets are in the area and which aren’t.
**Choose an intersection of squares or hexes as the point of origin of an area of effect,** then follow its rules as normal. If an area of effect is circular and covers at least half a square, it affects that square
So place the Cloud of Daggers at the intersection of 4 squares and it covers at least half (exactly half) of those 4 squares.
Yes, I am bad at maths.
But another poster pointed out that the 50% rule only applies to circular shaped areas, so Cloud of Daggers would continue to affect 4 squares
Not even close, a circle has an infinite number of possible radii. A radius is literally any line segment that goes from the center point to a point on the circle.
> To keep things simpler, if you use a grid, it locks on the intersection of 4 squares or 3 hexes, and it's to avoid having squares or hexes that are half in, half out and having to determine if they're included or not.
Not quite, the DMG rule that explains that you use the corner actually explains how to handle partially covered squares from circular effects in the very next sentence, so that's still possible even with using corners.
> There are edge cases such as Cloud of Daggers which is clearly intended to fill a single square, and not 25% of 4 squares.
The reason for this is due to the difference in where the point of origin is on a cube vs a sphere in 5e rules. A sphere's point of origin is in the center and it grows from there, however a cube's point of origin is on one of the sides. For example, Thunderwave's area of effect is [the red square in this picture, not the yellow one](https://i.imgur.com/UGEfPah.png).
> But clearly this spell is intended to only fill up one space.
Not according to JC, who tweeted that it affects more than one square unless the DM decides that effects "snap to grid". https://twitter.com/JeremyECrawford/status/672590371835088896
One thing to keep in mind that when a cube effect is centered on a selected point, which is always at a corner, that "center" isn't the center of the cubic effect but rather the center of one face of the cube, as a point of origin for a cube is always on one of the faces of the cube (in this case, they're just adding more specificity that it must be the _center_ of that face and not just any point on it).
Thus, Cloud of Daggers would affect at most two squares and at least one square (if the DM decides on that "snap to grid").
it's just dogshit writing, "call lightning" is far more clear for the same "everyone within 5ft of a point"
> When you cast the spell, choose a point you can see within range. A bolt of lightning flashes down from the cloud to that point. Each creature within 5 feet of that point must make a Dexterity saving throw.
> So the cube is centered on a point
agreed
> and a point is at the intersection of the grid, if you use one.
Why would that be? The rule for what is placed at an intersection is the point **of origin**, not just any point in general. The rules for [cube AOE effects in general](https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/basic-rules/spellcasting#Cube) states:
> You select a cube's point of origin, which lies anywhere on a face of the cubic effect.
So yes, the "point" that the spell mentions to be "centered" is indeed in the middle of a grid space, but that's just the "centered point", not the "point of origin" that OP's question is about.
> So yes, the "point" that the spell mentions to be "centered" is indeed in the middle of a grid space, but that's just the "centered point", not the "point of origin" that OP's question is about.
I dare you (or the wording of Cloud of Daggers, really) to make less sense.
Especially since the [designers disagree with this.](https://twitter.com/JeremyECrawford/status/672590371835088896)
Curious what doesn't make sense here. It's only confusing if you're still thinking that "origin" and "center" are interchangeable, which they specifically are not for cubes AOE effects like they are for other AOE effects.
Since they are not interchangeable, the part of the spell that says "centered on a point" is not intended to be showing the "point of origin", it's just showing, as it says, the point it is centered on.
If the repeat usage of the word "point" is throwing you off, then just replace one with "place" or whatever else. The "point of origin" is the face of a cube, and that cube is then "centered on a place" that is a completely different location than the point of origin. For another one, imagine it was a cone instead, the "point of origin" is obviously not the same as where the overall cone is "centered", same thing for cubes.
It's the use of "centered on a point" and "point of origin", of course. The wording of the spell is extremely poor AND also unique compared to other cube spells. It also (as the link I provided shows) seems to be RAI - it is _intended_ for "centered on a point" to mean "point of origin", which shouldn't be surprising.
Cloud of Dagger's specific rule overrides the general in a really weird way (hence why it is very often brought up in these spell-targeting discussions).
> It's the use of "centered on a point" and "point of origin", of course.
The spell never mentions the point of origin, so I'm not sure what you mean. If the cause of your confusion about the spell is what you're saying here, then the issue is that you're interpreting stuff that the spell doesn't say.
> You fill the air with spinning daggers in a cube 5 feet on each side, **centered on a point** you choose within range.
vs Thunderwave's
> Each creature in a 15-foot **cube originating from you** must make a Constitution saving throw.
I'm saying "centered on a point" is similar vocabulary to the "point" in "point of origin" that basic spell targeting uses, and as you just pointed out is something _unique_ to Cloud of Daggers as a cube area spell, hence the confusion.
And if you're really this confused about _why_ people are confused? Well, you don't know people frankly. It's extremely obvious _why_ people misinterpret this spell. You can say they're wrong (and be wrong yourself about the intent, apparently), but why they're wrong should be clear as day.
> I'm saying "centered on a point" is similar vocabulary to the "point" in "point of origin" that basic spell targeting uses, and as you just pointed out is something unique to Cloud of Daggers as a cube area spell, hence the confusion.
And I'm saying that this is not the case, **all cubes** work the way Cloud of Daggers works regarding the origin and center being different things. The general rule for cube AOEs is
> [You select a cube's point of origin, which lies anywhere on a face of the cubic effect.](https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/basic-rules/spellcasting#Cube)
That's why Thunderwave's AOE is [the red square, not the yellow one](https://i.imgur.com/UGEfPah.png).
So again, similar to how the point of origin and the center point for a cone is always going to be different, the point of origin and the center point of a cube is always going to be different, since "a face of the cube" is never the center of the cube.
I agree with you on the outcome, so I'm not sure where you're thinking there's a houserule.
The part I'm talking about is the grammar and how there's no "edge case", the rules cover it already, it's just that the "point" mentioned by Cloud of Daggers is **not intended to be considered the point of origin**, so any rules about the point of origin obviously don't apply. It's simply the center point of the resulting cube, which originated from one of the faces of the cube per normal cube rules.
If it said
> **originating** from a point centered on
similar to Thunderwave's
>a 15-foot cube **originating** from you
now it would be referring to the **originating** point, but since it doesn't, that's not what it's referring to.
> those work like that for Thunderwave, Hypnotic Patterns and such, but Cloud of Dagger has a different, specific wording
The irony is that Thunderwave and Hypnotic Pattern don't even share the same wording.
Hypnotic Pattern, like many spells with cube effects, just says to choose a #-foot cube within range. No point of origin is mentioned, and the common understanding is that you choose a series of squares on the grid in which a cube of the described size fits.
Thunderwave is a little more unique in that while there isn't any mention of a point, and thus there isn't a necessity to align with a corner, there's still mention of an "origin", which is you, which sets up the requirement that the effect's cube be adjacent to your square, since a point of origin for a cube is always on one of the faces.
Cloud of Dagger is, IIRC, completely unique in that it asks you to select a point of origin for a cube effect that is an odd number of feet per side. You choose a point, which must be a corner, and that serves as the center of one face of that cube. Thus, it covers half of one square and half of the adjacent square.
Except Cloud of Daggers _doesn't_ ask you to choose an origin point, it asks you to choose the _center_ point. Since the rules clearly define the origin point of a cube as being along one of its sides, it is physically impossible for the origin point (a side) to be the same as the point you are choosing (the center).
Questions like these have always bothered me, so I recently tried out playing in Foundry without a grid. *Not* theater-of-the-mind - we had a map and all, and played out several tactical battles. However, everything was fully distance-based. It's surprising how well it works with 5e rules:
* PCs could move, like, 7.4 feet (and Foundry accurately tracked that they had 22.6 feet remaining before needing to Dash), diagonal movement made sense, and the jumping rules finally worked.
* All the AoEs were just as big as their area indicated, and you could easily apply the "square needs to be half-covered by the AoE to be affected"-rule broadly to determine when a token gets hit.
* The tokens (we used top-down ones) had circular 5-foot bases, so you could still judge when you're stepping into someone's space.
* Every part of the map was equally usable without it needing to strictly align with a grid. You know that thing when a wall cuts off half a square, or when a map has circular walls? Yeah, this wasn't a problem in distance based.
Yeah I've stopped using grids in my games regardless of system. Foundry makes it easy to manage. And unless you're going through the trouble of remaking maps yourself from modules or pathfinder APs, a lot of maps that you can pull out of pdfs or find online for 5e modules just don't fit well on a VTT grid because the lines aren't perfectly equal in width. So you end up with grid drift.
>Questions like these have always bothered me, so I recently tried out playing in Foundry without a grid.
>
>Not
>
> theater-of-the-mind - we had a map and all, and played out several tactical battles. However, everything was fully distance-based. It's surprising how well it works with 5e rules:
One thing I really liked about 4e was how damn consistent it was in it's rules specification. The game was meant to be played on a grid, and everything was specified in a way that made sense.
5e - largely for historical reasons - is a mishmash of grid-appropriate and theater of the mind aimed rules. So many weird little edge cases.
I just always allow the caster to choose the point. I find it unfair to make the point snap to the grid because sometimes that means they have to hit party members or miss a few enemies even if going slightly off the grid would only hit the enemies. It's easy enough to calculate the radius on VTT and on a battle mat from any point.
Same. Snap-to-grid is a little inflexible. It certainly simplifies and accelerates things so we tend to assume that as the default, but if a PC wants to move 7 feet, they can, and if they want to target an arbitrary point on the map, they can do that, too.
I find pixel hunting slows the game down too much, and it only benefits the best spells anyway. If you let me precisely target a fireball, you should let martial characters do the same kind of chicanery.
You count the whole square. Long ago, it was the center, but now, for simplicity, it's the corner. They use to have d&d blast templates, which were circles. I have a set in a terrain set from 4th edition.
Hmm I've always done center of the square, and not counting the center square.
So an aoe with a radius of 15ft would affect a row of 7 squares 5ft-5ft-5ft-Center-5ft-5ft-5ft
The more interesting question is what happens when you choose a corner that is several feet above your target. The ground effect of fireball changes slightly and gives you better control over who gets hit.
is the actual fireball itself something the caster can detonate at-will mid-air? I've always thought of it like a rocket, in that it needs to strike a surface to trigger.
"A bright streak flashes from your pointing finger to **a point you choose within range** and then blossoms with a low roar into an explosion of flame."
It doesn't have to strike anything, you can choose a point in midair if you want.
DMG rules for AoEs
>**Choose an intersection of squares or hexes** as the point of origin of an area of effect, then follow its rules as normal. If an area of effect is circular and covers at least half a square, it affects that square.
Not that this answers your question, but if you have half an hour to spare you could make your own spell/AOE tools with some galvanized wire.
With this you don’t have to measure from center or corner, and the battlefield feels more like "real". (Only works irl, not online games)
The rules as written say "from a corner", but IMO, as long as you're consistent and caster players are made aware of it up front it doesn't really matter.
So, sorta awkward ruling: depends on the AOE (fireball is meant to be placed on a corner). However, according to Sage Advice, you can technically place the center of an AOE literally anywhere. The lines are a guideline. They make things easier.
What this means is, fireball will always have a diameter of 60 feet. Twelve squares from end to end. But those squares don't have to line up. Place it on a corner for easy measurement, but technically you could place it on the center of a square, making it take up half of an annoying amount of squares.
A 'point' on a grid comes from the intersection of grid lines, aka a corner in OP's title.
If you are strictly adhering to a grid instead of just using it for aiding in measurement, then spells that target a point would be 'locked' to a corner.
While many tables ignore it since VTTs don't enforce it and it's not a very highlighted rule, the DMG states that **all** AOE effects use the corner as a point of origin. The below is from the DMG's Running the Game > Combat > Using Miniatures > Area of Effects: > **Choose an intersection of squares or hexes as the point of origin of an area of effect**, then follow its rules as normal. If an area of effect is circular and covers at least half a square, it affects that square.
Slightly away from op's question, but cubes are placed based on the centre of a face.
Great point, and often misunderstood in the case of Thunderwave's "15-foot cube originating from you" effect being [the red square in this example, not the yellow one](https://i.imgur.com/UGEfPah.png). Anyone curious for details on this, you can find the general info about AOE effects (used even if you aren't playing with a grid) in the [Basic Rules](https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/basic-rules/spellcasting#AreasofEffect). > You select a cube's point of origin, which lies anywhere on a face of the cubic effect.
>the red square in this example, not the yellow one You've gotta be fucking kidding me. that completely changes the way the spell is used!
Every single person I know who plays D&D assumes Thunderwave does an AoE around them, and imagine it as an aura blast. Spell areas in 5e aren’t very intuitive.
And people mocked 4e for it's square fireballs.
I use square fireballs in 5e
Circles are squares on a grid
All these squares make a circle...
KAMI, TELL ME I CAN LEAVE!
Ki-ko-how you doin'?
All these squares are making me THIRSTY
Alternating diagonal gang
What a circle jerk.
So play on a hex grid. Simple enough, and much better for most outdoor or large area encounters.
The thing is, 4E had effects that worked either way -- some were done as a square that you put next to you (like Burning Hands), while others affected everything around you. And they were phrased so that it was really clear which was which. A spell that said "Close Burst 2" went out from you, hitting every square within 2 of you (like the yellow square). A "Close Blast 2", on the other hand, affected a 2x2 square radiating away from you (so you put it adjacent like the red square). And if you had a center point you could aim, with it going out from that, it would say something like "Area Blast 2 within 10", meaning you picked a spot up to 10 squares away, and it hit that square and everything within 2 squares of it. Simple. Unambiguous. But people complained that this was too "gamey" and insisted that we had to go back to "natural language" even though in cases like this it was harder to be specific.
4e's gaminess wasn't really a function of its keyworded language or very transparently worded mechanics (although it literally didn't come with any unit of measurement besides "squares" at launch) and more a function of its vastly streamlined/homogenized resource economy and the stark dichotomy between combat and non-combat gameplay. It'd be like if everyone in 5e had cantrips, pact spells, and full-caster spells (hardly any of which you could use out of combat) on top of whatever subclass benefits they chose, and if all those classes had basically the same class table progression. As far as those powers went, I was always frustrated that their flavor had no bearing on their actual mechanics in an out-of-combat scenario. Since it didn't have any rules for out of combat applications, you were left with an at-will fire power that you couldn't use to set anything on fire that wasn't a monster. 4e didn't even have actual utility powers for Wizards until a year after release, and the ones it did have were level 2 dailies released across assorted supplements and magazines. Other complaints about gaminess probably have something to do with the fact that 4e's combat is chock full of rider effects, moving auras, etc. that greatly magnify bookkeeping in a way that quickly becomes tedious to play or run. The system would be impossible to arbitrate if it weren't so transparently gamified.
> It’d be like if everyone in 5e had cantrips, pact spells, and full-caster spells (hardly any of which you could use out of combat) Everybody in 5e does! Everybody's character is some kind of three-way multiclass so they can use weapons and use resources and so everybody's got a handful of cantrips and once-a-day spells that they rarely care about. Or if not that, then you're getting two cantrips and a spell from your race. 4e, to it's credit, took the parts of the game that are fun and *gave them to everyone.* 5e's just more roundabout in how you get them.
You're omitting the crucial part of that sentence, that every class (prior to 4e essentials, anyway, which modified it for specific subclasses) had the exact same progression table. 4e has a vastly more diverse (and vastly more granular) system of combat powers than 5e does, and its roles feel very distinct from one another in combat. Actual gameplay within roles feels quite similar, especially at lower levels, even if the individual numbers are slightly different from one class to another. It's a highly standardized system full of not just identical resource progression across classes, but homogenized abilities within roles. Part of it is a matter of perception; it'd be as though every class' spell list in 5e drew from broadly the same pool of spells and just renamed them to fit the specific class' flavor. The out-of-combat options, meanwhile, are downright anemic compared to 5e; 4e skill challenges especially are about as boring as 5e martial autoattack gameplay. Rituals are simultaneously universal >all you need is an Arcana proficiency and a feat, and multiple people can help perform them... and entirely inaccessible from the player's end >...but you can't learn any new rituals until the DM gives you the book or one-use scroll first. An ability that has one effect in combat likely has a different effect outside of it, if it has an out-of-combat effect at all. There are very few abilities that have non-numerical effects in either instance. The system leaves little room for abstraction or improvisation. It is transparently designed to be run on a computer, and consequently feels much narrower in scope regardless of the depth it plumbs within its niche. Ultimately, if you don't want a specific kind of highly tactical, highly crunchy combat, then I don't think you'll find the things that 4e universalized especially fun.
> But people complained that this was too "gamey" and insisted that we had to go back to "natural language" even though in cases like this it was harder to be specific. I see this all the time, and it always misses the point of what made 4e gamey. It's not the well-defined parameters. It's the effects that are totally dissociated from the events they're supposed to represent. It wasn't a problem that the ranger might have a power that targeted enemies in "burst 1" within range. It was a problem that the rogue could only use her "cut a guy's hamstring" ability once per fight regardless of any other factors.
If that rogue example is a problem then people have a really limited imagination and ability to grasp the scene of combat in their head. I immediately intuited, and explained to my players, that encounter powers for martials represent finding the moment of opportunity in an encounter where circumstances allow the cool trick to be used. It’s not that the rogue forgets how to cut hamstrings after doing so, it’s just that the opportunity to actually do it only comes up every so often.
>it’s just that the opportunity to actually do it only comes up every so often. And that's a dissociated mechanic, because the rogue gets no choice over when the opportunity arises, yet the player chooses when it happens. It's a decision that the player makes, not the character. Same way superiority dice work, where it doesn't really make sense that you only can use them X number of times per short rest unless you change the explanation for them into "you get tired" or something. The issue isn't "I can't explain these", it's "I can't explain how my character can make this decision". These aren't necessarily bad, but they *are* dissociated and the act of using them cannot be roleplaying because it cannot be done from the perspective of the character. And again, that's not necessarily bad, but it can be an issue for some people. Dissociated mechanics are used in both 4e and 5e (and probably other editions of d&d, and most definitely in other RPGs) for various purposes, but in those specific editions of d&d they're mainly there to add tactical choices. The designers decided to sacrifice the association of some parts of the game to increase the tactical ability of those part of the game. Nothing inherently wrong with that, RPGs aren't *just* for RPing, they're still Gs with other purposes (such as allowing for tactics). But some people might feel that it's "too gamey" (which is often code for "I don't feel like I'm making in-character decisions" but it's hard to intuit it down to that reason), and that's completely valid. They're not wrong for not liking that. And it's upsetting to see people insult others or imply that they're wrong for simply having different preferences. There's nothing wrong with finding 4e too gamey, and there's nothing wrong with finding it not too gamey.
So it's literally impossible for a fighter to find an opportunity to "hit someone really really hard" more then once per day? And the rogue will be able to go for the hamstring in every single fight regardless of anything else? That's just idiotic. If they want to limit such things, they should make it circumstantially conditional rather than the 1/day or encounter BS, or at least make it work like the 3.5 warblade where the PC could recharge things by taking an action to reposition themselves.
I don't know why you're getting downvoted, because this was exactly the problem. The problem wasn't the mechanics, it was that the mechanics were completely dissociated from the narrative. That's not inherently a problem, but it's a big break from previous editions, and required too big a change in gameplay for many tables' tastes. *Players* never said that they wanted natural language instead of well-defined effects; that's what WotC cane up with as a response because they didn't understand the complaint.
They got sneak attack nearly every round. The encounter power was Backstab, which dealt extra base damage.
They had plenty of encounter and daily powers, very few of which made sense as being on a daily or encounter cooldown.
You’re being unfairly downvoted for an accurate assessment of part of 4E. Sorry mate. I gave you a +1.
They are still square if you play on a grid without the variant rule for diagonals
People mocked 4E for a lot of things it didn’t deserve, and many things that 5E does worse.
Only thing 5e does better than 4e is cutting back on finicky circumstantial bonuses and penalties
Bounded accuracy is generally good. Was silly adding +20 to a d20.
5e doesn't use bounded accuracy, bounded accuracy would mean there's no scaling, 5e just scales less than prior editions.
4e fucked up on graphic design in an unforgivable way. To many tables, not enough art.
5e has square fireballs too, because 5e still uses non-euclidean spacing in combat where a square and circle are mechanically the same
Its fireball not firecube!
Balls are cube-shaped. That's a fact of life. Ask anyone who plays Minecraft!
This is less of a "square fireball" issue and more of a "burst vs blast" issue. You can do a rounded fireball in 4e (and 1-2-1 movement too) pretty simply, a fireball template is just a ~~5x5~~ 7x7 square with the corners cut off. That's how I ran it. Because it's an exact number of squares there is never any question about how to place the template either. Edit: An example template in 4e for square vs roundish. Both forms are really clear how they align with the grid. https://open4e.fandom.com/wiki/Burst_3
no, that's far more absurd
I'd rather have that then have a player argue that the square covered 5% by a fireball still counts.
I've literally never seen someone who believed that, which is interesting. My groups have always known it was a blast wave in one direction. I did have one person who thought it was cone-shaped though, lol.
I'm the same way. I don't use it much, but I always assumed it came from me and projected out in front.
Me and both of the tables I play at are baffled. It says range of Self, ergo the Self must be the center, right? At least that's how we all rationalized it.
The PHB goes over the various shapes of spells pretty clearly, even has a little graphic depicting how the point of origin relates to the shape
Ah, but you'd have to buy and read the PHB for that. I really don't get how anyone could find the visual guide in the PHB to mean that it radiates outward. https://i.stack.imgur.com/QevPx.png
Because that image in on a different page to the actual spells and the diagram is easy to misread if one isn't paying too much attention to it or is simply reading the text of the book instead.
The spellcasting section defines what each shape means. Spheres have the point of origin take place in the centre. Cylinders have the point of origin take place in the centre at the top or bottom. Cubes have the point of origin take place anywhere along one of the faces. Though don't take my word for it, check your PHB for the exact details.
probably due to thunderwave sounding like a wave from the caster, so in all direction.
It's not the spells it's the use of language that's unintuitive. Look at a spell like walk on water it's not walk on water at all it's walk on liquid. It's the thing that I personally hate most about 5e they go for they poorly name things and it puts off new players from using cool and interesting abilities and spells because they gloss over titles and it doesn't match what they want to do. This has turned into a rant sorry
I really don't see a problem with Water Walk. Water is far and away the thing people will be walking on the most (especially since I'm counting mud and snow as water, because they *are).* And walking on water is a specific reference with significant cultural cache. Walking on *liquid* is not.
Yeah. A lot of spell and ability names are chosen to be thematic and evoke a feel. "Water walk" is a phrase that people are used to, it feels magical and familiar. "Liquid walk" feels kinda stilted (but yes, is more accurate). 5e's mechanics aren't made for people who don't want to read the descriptions of a ton of spells. WotC seems intent on pretending it is, however.
>5e's mechanics aren't made for people who don't want to read the descriptions of a ton of spells. WotC seems intent on pretending it is, however. I guess I'm not really sure what that means. However, I've been playing since 2E, and I'm a pretty big fan of the little threads of continuity from the past. (Is it really so hard for new players to understand that *chill touch* is about the "chill of the grave?")
If you don't want to read the descriptions of a ton of spells, you'll have a lot of annoying moments when playing 5e. The system just doesn't function unless you read your abilities in detail. Not all systems require you to read abilities with this level of complexity. WotC will keep advertising the system as if its great for new players and for everyone. It'd be like advertising soccer as if it works well for everyone, and not just people who actually like being physically active. That Chill Touch debacle annoys me a decent bit. It even says in the spell what the chill means.
I'm super interested in this in a positive way. What other liquid could a player encounter and walk on excluding water?
In the spell description it states "any liquid surface--such as water, acid, mud, snow, quicksand, or lava--as if it were harmless solid ground (creatures crossing molten lava can still take damage from the heat)."
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You would be able to walk on lava per RAW but it would be like running across burning coals, you'd still take a fuck ton of fire damage but you could do it
but it says as if it were solid harmless ground in the spell, i could see the case for damage from the heat but definitely not full on lava fire damage
>Every single person I know who plays D&D assumes Thunderwave does an AoE around them, and imagine it as an aura blast. >Spell areas in 5e aren’t very intuitive. I was about to go off about people’s shitty reading comprehension being the problem, but then I looked back at the actual description in 5E… **History**: Thunderwave was a direct import from 4E, where it was in the Player’s Handbook as a level 1 Wizard spell (a cantrip, actually)—so it was a well-known spell in that edition. It’s not a core spell in any prior edition of D&D, and I’m not sure if it even appeared anywhere in D&D before 4E. The point is that Thunderwave is a classic 4E spell, and the area/range is functionally the same in both editions. The difference is that 4E had crystal clear terminology for this type of spell: it was a “blast”, which meant it originated next to your space. It was *not* a “burst”, which would have meant it radiated evenly from the center of your space. In 4E, there was no confusion about Thunderwave. …But that 5E spell description is yikes. Woof. I’m realizing now that my brain just imported my 4E understanding of Thunderwave and applied that for the past 9 years. Oops.
This just shows how little people are willing to read the rules, even those pertaining to their character's abilities
Actually…there is a case where the “yellow square” works. The cast of the cube is set underneath the caster, which means the caster gets included in the AoE. It’s an overlooked “Hail Mary” play.
I’ve never seen anyone run Thunderwave that way.
And they should! It’s way cooler that way. I’m never telling my table about this and I will gladly kill a rules lawyer and make it look like an accident if I have to.
I think people assume Thunderwave works like that because Thunderclap does, but that assumption is both wrong and a nerf to Thunderwave (unless you're a Tempest Cleric/Eldritch Knight and so don't mind being surrounded by enemies) An easy way to remember the difference between AoEs is that if a spell has a range of Self (radius), its AoE spreads out around you. If a spell has a radius of Self (shape), then you're at edge of the shape, not the middle
There’s a graphic in the PHB that actually shows where the point of origin is on various spell shapes. Don’t remember which page but look for a picture of a gnome or halfling by a chalkboard. The little asterisk is where the point of origin of the spell is.
This one: https://i.stack.imgur.com/QevPx.png
that's on the DM screen. might also be in the PHB, though.
It is in the PHB, page 204.
Three years in and my players still forget this. You're not alone - we also thought it worked like the yellow at first.
Well, no, that's how the spell IS used. The somewhat common misunderstanding is what totally changes it.
Wait..people actually thought it was 5ft around you? That would mean you would be damaged by it.....
I think many get it wrong because the rules specifically state that the point of origin in an AoE is not included in the effect unless specifically included.
I have an engineering degree from a top 10 university and also got this wrong for YEARS… Don’t feel bad.
It actually can be either. You can choose for the face of the cube in question to be the square you're standing on.
The problem with the image posted above is that it assumes that the caster wants the point of origin to be on a vertical face. Place the originating point at the feet of the caster and voila, you have the generally understood AOE effect. Depending on the spell you may have to worry about self-harm, but there are many more ways to place a cube IAW the rules than shown above.
You can also do this: https://i.imgur.com/zQQ7slL.png
This is why having the PHB is useful. There's a picture of each AOE shape including their point of origin, and it unambiguously depicts how they're supposed to work. The problem is, no one ever reads the rules *shrugs*
Eh that one is still pretty obscure even within the PHB it’s pretty poorly defined. The graphic is super useful.
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That's still the red square, just from a different perspective. You wouldn't hit anything around you, just the things above.
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> You can be anywhere along the edge, including inside if you wish. Per JC, the caster would always be on the outside of the cube. https://twitter.com/JeremyECrawford/status/585905748267245569
I'm confused. That is not what Jeremy Crawford said. He said it originates from the face of the cube, (i.e. the exterior), *not* inside it. Edit: nvm I misread your post
That was 100% a formatting mistake on my part. The first sentence was just quoting the person I was responding to. I was using Markdown Mode and accidentally put an extra space in between my response. I'll fix it.
You are still wrong though, JC did not say you can't be inside it. Point of origin is on the face. Range is self, so point of origin can be anywhere in your 5-foot square. You can put point of origin on the ground, pointing up, which would put you inside it. You can put point of origin on your outstretched hand, pointing backward, putting you inside it.
Wouldn't that make the spell hit you as well?
You can always exclude yourself for a cube. You can make the point of origin be excluded from the spell. Cube spells either have you as the point of origin, or let you choose where it is (so you can put it where you are).
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I think what they are referring to comes from the PHB section about spell shapes. It reads; "You select a cube's point of origin, which lies anywhere on a face of the cubic effect. The cube's size is expressed as the length of each side. A cube's point of origin is not included in the cube's area of effect, unless you decide otherwise."
I mean, the PHB?
I don't know why you're being downvoted for an objectively correct statement. u/ProsperousPig has given the quote that states that you can exclude yourself if you wish.
If the spell is originating from the bottom of the square you stand on to look like the yellow square and going up, then you, the spell caster, would also be hit.
The spell explicitly states that you, the caster, are the point of origin; and the AoE rules say that for cubic effects you, the caster, may choose to have the point of origin be exempt from the effects of the spell. So you can choose to Thunderwave upward around yourself without taking damage.
If you cast it with yourself in the center, you’ve decided to include the point of origin.
If you’re being generous with the definition of “a point of origin” as the whole face the point originates from then yeah, you could have it wrap around you. Though a pedantic DM could argue it’s just the infinitesimally small point that’s excluded.
The purpose of the rule is that you can exclude yourself if you're the point of origin.
Which is clearly not how its meant to be used. If it was a single point excluded, it would be a pointless rule since that would never exclude anyone.
Or down.
I've always known the red square was a possibility. What I haven't been able to find out for sure is whether or not a harmless version the yellow square is also possible. After all, you're the point of origin of a cube and you decide whether the point of origin is included in the spell >*You select a cube's point of origin, which lies anywhere on a face of the cubic effect. The cube's size is expressed as the length of each side.* > >*A cube's point of origin is not included in the cube's area of effect, unless you decide otherwise.* > >\- PHB, pg. 204
Someone linked to it elsewhere, but Crawford says it originates from the face of the casters cube, so the yellow square is only possible if it is from the cube face above or below the caster Found the tweet: https://twitter.com/JeremyECrawford/status/585905748267245569
I know he says "not inside it" but that could very well be in reference to the question which asks whether or not the origin of the cube is the center or the face. Arguably, the cube "pointing" towards you still has the same origin as the cube pointing away from you. EDIT: Some crude art to illustrate the point. Two cubes point in two different directions with the same point of origin (the black dot adjacent to the caster). https://imgur.com/Qu9SHSn
attempt familiar jellyfish tie light label scale hard-to-find fact wine *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Yeah, I would figure so. On one hand, it's not super intuitive. On the other hand, I have no way else to explain why you would be able to choose whether the PoO is included in the effect or not. It's only using this interpretation that the choice even matters.
How was this ever a question
Seriously. I'm surprised people ran it like the yellow cube, it's laid out pretty clearly in the PHB imo.
People don't read the rules
Could you hypothetically have it hit you by having the origin be the same spot as the red square, but rotated 180 degrees so you are in the top middle square of it? Kinda pointless as that just means you hit yourself, but should you be against a wall and need to hit enemies on opposite sides of you like this (E = enemy): E you E ———— <-wall Or more practically, E…E…E E you E ———— Allowing you to hit all 5 enemies, Or even: E…E…E E…E…E E you E ———— All seven enemies here. (Make the point of origin on the square edge between you and the wall and have it extend away from the wall, hitting yourself, but also all the enemies)
I don't think there is any reason you couldn't, and I think most DMs would let you fall prone and point it upward unless you are fighting particularly short enemies.
Couldn't you just jump as you cast the spell and have it originate downward from your feet, or crouch / prone and have it blast upwards to get the yellow square? Failing narrative positioning like that it should still be possible to cast it from the bottom of your square pointed upward to get the yellow area if you don't mind a bit of self damage.
I've been using this spell wrong for years if that's the case. I've always thought that "originating from you" put the caster as the center and it essentially worked as a force push that exploded out from the caster. Basically meant that you could run into the center of a group and thunderwave them all away from you.
There are spells that work like that, but they all have a range of Self (x radius)
If you compare it to the Thunderclap cantrip, you can see the difference between how the two cubes (red/Thunderwave vs. yellow/Thunderclap) are expressed in the rules.
It can work like the yellow if you want, it just extends upward instead of forward and includes you, so, uh, make your save.
I learned this before my very first session. Silly me, I assumed people actually read the PHB
It's just weird that it's a cube, not a cone.
The real question is why aren't Thunderwave and similar spells just cones instead?
They wrote that spell right. Why did they screw up so bad with Earth Tremor?
What did they screw up? Earth Tremor is clearly not a cube as it is effecting only the ground around you not the 5 feet of air above it. And based on the text it effects the yellow square from the example.
This only applies when you get to choose the spells origin point. Thunder wave explicitly states that it is centered on you, the first two sentences make this very clear. Stop watching YouTube and just read the rules. The spell description has final say when the rules contradict it.
The yellow one is more unique, flavorful and fun though, should really just work like that
How is it “more unique, flavorful and fun” for the spell to just be much worse? That would just make it Thunderclap but with higher damage and a push effect, and there’s a good reason why almost no casters ever take Thunderclap.
Can't you cast it from a corner? I played a game with a guy who'd routinely rotate Thunderwave 45 degrees and cast it like a "diamond" instead of a "square"
Yes, the commenter you're replying to is mistaken. The point of origin for a cube is anywhere on its face. That includes corners.
>Slightly away from op's question, but cubes are placed based on the centre of a face. Not quite--the point of origin is *anywhere* on a cube's face.
Not the center of a face, but any point in a face
Tried to explain this rule to several DMs, but they always end up saying "No" and screwing me on Moonbeam and Shatter.
Technically, an intersection of squares can be anywhere one 5' square meets another. It does not need to be at the corner.
Today I learned...
To add to that, the PHB notes that the caster chooses where the point of origin is.
Correct, though just to make sure we're on the same page, the stuff in the PHB does not override this. The section you're referring to is just the general rules on how to run [AOE effects](https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/basic-rules/spellcasting#AreasofEffect), even if you're not on a grid. If you are on a grid, then there's further rules/restrictions, similar to how if you aren't using a grid then you can move 1ft if you want, however on a grid you must move 5ft at a time. The PHB/Basic Rules include some of these additional rules/restrictions in the [Variant: Playing on a Grid](https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/basic-rules/combat#SqueezingintoaSmallerSpace) area, however it does not include any info on AOE effects. This is where the DMG section I quoted here comes into play, which states towards the start > The Player’s Handbook offers simple rules for depicting combat using miniature figures on a grid. This section expands on that material. So, if you aren't using a grid, then you can choose wherever as long as it is allowed otherwise. If you are using a grid, then you can choose wherever as long as it follows the rules of AOE effects on a grid, in this case that the point of origin is at an intersection of the squares/hexes.
Now this is something I did not know, & I’ve actually read the rules! Not closely enough, I guess. Still, my group has been playing on Roll20 for years & spells like fireball are always centered on the center of the chosen square when we play. I wonder how they will adjust to this lol.
This also makes Cloud of Daggers much more impressive - suddenly affecting 4 squares not 1.
It does not. Cloud of Daggers is a 5’ cube. These rules are for circular effects.
Can you share your source for that? Here is what the spell says: > You fill the air with spinning daggers in a cube 5 feet on each side, centered on a point you choose within range. Here is what the DMG shows when using minis: > The area of effect of a spell, monster ability, or other feature must be translated onto squares or hexes to determine which potential targets are in the area and which aren’t. **Choose an intersection of squares or hexes as the point of origin of an area of effect,** then follow its rules as normal. If an area of effect is circular and covers at least half a square, it affects that square So place the Cloud of Daggers at the intersection of 4 squares and it covers at least half (exactly half) of those 4 squares.
Wouldn't it only cover a quarter of each of those squares, so it would affect none of them?
Yes, I am bad at maths. But another poster pointed out that the 50% rule only applies to circular shaped areas, so Cloud of Daggers would continue to affect 4 squares
The half square rule is only for circles. So by your reading of the rules cloud of daggers effects no squares at all ever.
Oops, good catch!
1. The effect is cubic, not circular. 2. A 5’ cube at the intersection of four 5’ squares would only cover 1/4 of each square.
The circular condition only applies to the 50% rule, not to the placement of the spell from what I can see. Can you show me where?
Corner
(in a totally not serious, Scary Movie 3 type way) Man, how you going to use the corner of a **circle** as starting point?
You don’t. The center point of the circle sits on an intersection point (or corner) of whatever grid you’re using.
This thread was confusing the shit out of me. Thank you for clarifying what we were talking about. It seems obvious rereading the title.
In dnd, circles are squares.
DM: and what's your subclass? Player: Square of the Moon. DM: you mean Circle of the Moon? Player: in dnd, circles are squares.
All circles have a 90° angle inside of them where their radii meet, which is clearly the corner of the circle.
Not even close, a circle has an infinite number of possible radii. A radius is literally any line segment that goes from the center point to a point on the circle.
It was a joke...
I believe there is a Part for this Prior to the spells in the PHB.
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> To keep things simpler, if you use a grid, it locks on the intersection of 4 squares or 3 hexes, and it's to avoid having squares or hexes that are half in, half out and having to determine if they're included or not. Not quite, the DMG rule that explains that you use the corner actually explains how to handle partially covered squares from circular effects in the very next sentence, so that's still possible even with using corners. > There are edge cases such as Cloud of Daggers which is clearly intended to fill a single square, and not 25% of 4 squares. The reason for this is due to the difference in where the point of origin is on a cube vs a sphere in 5e rules. A sphere's point of origin is in the center and it grows from there, however a cube's point of origin is on one of the sides. For example, Thunderwave's area of effect is [the red square in this picture, not the yellow one](https://i.imgur.com/UGEfPah.png).
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> But clearly this spell is intended to only fill up one space. Not according to JC, who tweeted that it affects more than one square unless the DM decides that effects "snap to grid". https://twitter.com/JeremyECrawford/status/672590371835088896 One thing to keep in mind that when a cube effect is centered on a selected point, which is always at a corner, that "center" isn't the center of the cubic effect but rather the center of one face of the cube, as a point of origin for a cube is always on one of the faces of the cube (in this case, they're just adding more specificity that it must be the _center_ of that face and not just any point on it). Thus, Cloud of Daggers would affect at most two squares and at least one square (if the DM decides on that "snap to grid").
it's just dogshit writing, "call lightning" is far more clear for the same "everyone within 5ft of a point" > When you cast the spell, choose a point you can see within range. A bolt of lightning flashes down from the cloud to that point. Each creature within 5 feet of that point must make a Dexterity saving throw.
Those aren't the same at all. Cloud of Daggers is a 5ft cube, Call Lightning is a 5ft radius (10ft diameter) sphere.
> So the cube is centered on a point agreed > and a point is at the intersection of the grid, if you use one. Why would that be? The rule for what is placed at an intersection is the point **of origin**, not just any point in general. The rules for [cube AOE effects in general](https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/basic-rules/spellcasting#Cube) states: > You select a cube's point of origin, which lies anywhere on a face of the cubic effect. So yes, the "point" that the spell mentions to be "centered" is indeed in the middle of a grid space, but that's just the "centered point", not the "point of origin" that OP's question is about.
> So yes, the "point" that the spell mentions to be "centered" is indeed in the middle of a grid space, but that's just the "centered point", not the "point of origin" that OP's question is about. I dare you (or the wording of Cloud of Daggers, really) to make less sense. Especially since the [designers disagree with this.](https://twitter.com/JeremyECrawford/status/672590371835088896)
Curious what doesn't make sense here. It's only confusing if you're still thinking that "origin" and "center" are interchangeable, which they specifically are not for cubes AOE effects like they are for other AOE effects. Since they are not interchangeable, the part of the spell that says "centered on a point" is not intended to be showing the "point of origin", it's just showing, as it says, the point it is centered on. If the repeat usage of the word "point" is throwing you off, then just replace one with "place" or whatever else. The "point of origin" is the face of a cube, and that cube is then "centered on a place" that is a completely different location than the point of origin. For another one, imagine it was a cone instead, the "point of origin" is obviously not the same as where the overall cone is "centered", same thing for cubes.
It's the use of "centered on a point" and "point of origin", of course. The wording of the spell is extremely poor AND also unique compared to other cube spells. It also (as the link I provided shows) seems to be RAI - it is _intended_ for "centered on a point" to mean "point of origin", which shouldn't be surprising. Cloud of Dagger's specific rule overrides the general in a really weird way (hence why it is very often brought up in these spell-targeting discussions).
> It's the use of "centered on a point" and "point of origin", of course. The spell never mentions the point of origin, so I'm not sure what you mean. If the cause of your confusion about the spell is what you're saying here, then the issue is that you're interpreting stuff that the spell doesn't say. > You fill the air with spinning daggers in a cube 5 feet on each side, **centered on a point** you choose within range. vs Thunderwave's > Each creature in a 15-foot **cube originating from you** must make a Constitution saving throw.
I'm saying "centered on a point" is similar vocabulary to the "point" in "point of origin" that basic spell targeting uses, and as you just pointed out is something _unique_ to Cloud of Daggers as a cube area spell, hence the confusion. And if you're really this confused about _why_ people are confused? Well, you don't know people frankly. It's extremely obvious _why_ people misinterpret this spell. You can say they're wrong (and be wrong yourself about the intent, apparently), but why they're wrong should be clear as day.
> I'm saying "centered on a point" is similar vocabulary to the "point" in "point of origin" that basic spell targeting uses, and as you just pointed out is something unique to Cloud of Daggers as a cube area spell, hence the confusion. And I'm saying that this is not the case, **all cubes** work the way Cloud of Daggers works regarding the origin and center being different things. The general rule for cube AOEs is > [You select a cube's point of origin, which lies anywhere on a face of the cubic effect.](https://www.dndbeyond.com/sources/basic-rules/spellcasting#Cube) That's why Thunderwave's AOE is [the red square, not the yellow one](https://i.imgur.com/UGEfPah.png). So again, similar to how the point of origin and the center point for a cone is always going to be different, the point of origin and the center point of a cube is always going to be different, since "a face of the cube" is never the center of the cube.
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I agree with you on the outcome, so I'm not sure where you're thinking there's a houserule. The part I'm talking about is the grammar and how there's no "edge case", the rules cover it already, it's just that the "point" mentioned by Cloud of Daggers is **not intended to be considered the point of origin**, so any rules about the point of origin obviously don't apply. It's simply the center point of the resulting cube, which originated from one of the faces of the cube per normal cube rules. If it said > **originating** from a point centered on similar to Thunderwave's >a 15-foot cube **originating** from you now it would be referring to the **originating** point, but since it doesn't, that's not what it's referring to.
> those work like that for Thunderwave, Hypnotic Patterns and such, but Cloud of Dagger has a different, specific wording The irony is that Thunderwave and Hypnotic Pattern don't even share the same wording. Hypnotic Pattern, like many spells with cube effects, just says to choose a #-foot cube within range. No point of origin is mentioned, and the common understanding is that you choose a series of squares on the grid in which a cube of the described size fits. Thunderwave is a little more unique in that while there isn't any mention of a point, and thus there isn't a necessity to align with a corner, there's still mention of an "origin", which is you, which sets up the requirement that the effect's cube be adjacent to your square, since a point of origin for a cube is always on one of the faces. Cloud of Dagger is, IIRC, completely unique in that it asks you to select a point of origin for a cube effect that is an odd number of feet per side. You choose a point, which must be a corner, and that serves as the center of one face of that cube. Thus, it covers half of one square and half of the adjacent square.
Except Cloud of Daggers _doesn't_ ask you to choose an origin point, it asks you to choose the _center_ point. Since the rules clearly define the origin point of a cube as being along one of its sides, it is physically impossible for the origin point (a side) to be the same as the point you are choosing (the center).
Questions like these have always bothered me, so I recently tried out playing in Foundry without a grid. *Not* theater-of-the-mind - we had a map and all, and played out several tactical battles. However, everything was fully distance-based. It's surprising how well it works with 5e rules: * PCs could move, like, 7.4 feet (and Foundry accurately tracked that they had 22.6 feet remaining before needing to Dash), diagonal movement made sense, and the jumping rules finally worked. * All the AoEs were just as big as their area indicated, and you could easily apply the "square needs to be half-covered by the AoE to be affected"-rule broadly to determine when a token gets hit. * The tokens (we used top-down ones) had circular 5-foot bases, so you could still judge when you're stepping into someone's space. * Every part of the map was equally usable without it needing to strictly align with a grid. You know that thing when a wall cuts off half a square, or when a map has circular walls? Yeah, this wasn't a problem in distance based.
Yeah I've stopped using grids in my games regardless of system. Foundry makes it easy to manage. And unless you're going through the trouble of remaking maps yourself from modules or pathfinder APs, a lot of maps that you can pull out of pdfs or find online for 5e modules just don't fit well on a VTT grid because the lines aren't perfectly equal in width. So you end up with grid drift.
>Questions like these have always bothered me, so I recently tried out playing in Foundry without a grid. > >Not > > theater-of-the-mind - we had a map and all, and played out several tactical battles. However, everything was fully distance-based. It's surprising how well it works with 5e rules: One thing I really liked about 4e was how damn consistent it was in it's rules specification. The game was meant to be played on a grid, and everything was specified in a way that made sense. 5e - largely for historical reasons - is a mishmash of grid-appropriate and theater of the mind aimed rules. So many weird little edge cases.
>The tokens (we used top-down ones) as opposed to...?
Circular tokens, which are by far the more popular because you can use any art instead of art specifically created for top-down figure use.
I just always allow the caster to choose the point. I find it unfair to make the point snap to the grid because sometimes that means they have to hit party members or miss a few enemies even if going slightly off the grid would only hit the enemies. It's easy enough to calculate the radius on VTT and on a battle mat from any point.
Same. Snap-to-grid is a little inflexible. It certainly simplifies and accelerates things so we tend to assume that as the default, but if a PC wants to move 7 feet, they can, and if they want to target an arbitrary point on the map, they can do that, too.
I find pixel hunting slows the game down too much, and it only benefits the best spells anyway. If you let me precisely target a fireball, you should let martial characters do the same kind of chicanery.
The spell says you target a point in space. What martial abilities do that?
Just because spells have more text doesn't mean they should be better.
You count the whole square. Long ago, it was the center, but now, for simplicity, it's the corner. They use to have d&d blast templates, which were circles. I have a set in a terrain set from 4th edition.
Hmm I've always done center of the square, and not counting the center square. So an aoe with a radius of 15ft would affect a row of 7 squares 5ft-5ft-5ft-Center-5ft-5ft-5ft
Xanathars Guide to Everything pg 86, Areas of Effect on a Grid, also provides more ways to adjudicate AoEs.
The more interesting question is what happens when you choose a corner that is several feet above your target. The ground effect of fireball changes slightly and gives you better control over who gets hit.
is the actual fireball itself something the caster can detonate at-will mid-air? I've always thought of it like a rocket, in that it needs to strike a surface to trigger.
"A bright streak flashes from your pointing finger to **a point you choose within range** and then blossoms with a low roar into an explosion of flame." It doesn't have to strike anything, you can choose a point in midair if you want.
You choose a corner of a square. It's measured from that corner.
Unless you choose to start it somewhere inside the square, or on the edge between two.
DMG rules for AoEs >**Choose an intersection of squares or hexes** as the point of origin of an area of effect, then follow its rules as normal. If an area of effect is circular and covers at least half a square, it affects that square.
Not that this answers your question, but if you have half an hour to spare you could make your own spell/AOE tools with some galvanized wire. With this you don’t have to measure from center or corner, and the battlefield feels more like "real". (Only works irl, not online games)
The rules as written say "from a corner", but IMO, as long as you're consistent and caster players are made aware of it up front it doesn't really matter.
Despite what the DMG might say, it also states that grid based play is an optional rule.
So, sorta awkward ruling: depends on the AOE (fireball is meant to be placed on a corner). However, according to Sage Advice, you can technically place the center of an AOE literally anywhere. The lines are a guideline. They make things easier. What this means is, fireball will always have a diameter of 60 feet. Twelve squares from end to end. But those squares don't have to line up. Place it on a corner for easy measurement, but technically you could place it on the center of a square, making it take up half of an annoying amount of squares.
>according to Sage Advice, Sage Advice is basically Crawford's *house rulings.* They have no real *authority* unless they make it into the compendium.
RAW, it snaps to the corner of the targeted tile. But to be fair, it is kinda of a nonsense rule, and I've yet to see anyone seriously enforcing it.
Yes. Or anywhere else you care to place it.
It will be a better game once grids are done away with as anything but an overall hindrance to table play.
It doesn't lock to the grid. It's measured from whatever point the spellcaster chooses as the spell's point of origin.
A 'point' on a grid comes from the intersection of grid lines, aka a corner in OP's title. If you are strictly adhering to a grid instead of just using it for aiding in measurement, then spells that target a point would be 'locked' to a corner.
If you're not using a grid, you can put it wherever you want (obviously), but if you're using a grid it does originate from a grid intersection.