New Spells: Swordmage Aeromancies
This content can now be found at its most updated version in The Elements and Beyond, a free 246-page compendium that you can download right here, filled with 23 subclasses, 8 spellcasting feats, 134 spells, 213 spell variants, 85 monsters, 30 magic items, 4 races plus 12 new subraces each with racial feats, and even more goodies for both players and DMs!
“You think you’re out of my reach over there? I can cut your throat with the wind itself.”
Links: PDF | D&D Beyond: Cyclone Strike, Gale Weapons
Art Credit: https://www.deviantart.com/angevere/art/Whirlwind-800552480
If you believe in the internet gaming mantra of “spin to win,” you might be doing flips over today’s previews — especially if you like gishes, melee rangers, eldritch knights, and swordmages! Between whirlwind attacks, spinning projectiles, and air pressure slashes, you’ll have the 2nd-level options you need to blow away your foes!
Cyclone Strike combines some of the wind-based effects of spells like warding wind, gust of wind, or sandstorm with a whirlwind-attack that even has synergy with two-weapon fighting, for those dual-wielding rangers and bladesingers out there. The slicing (or crushing) wind trails off the weapons, extending the reach of smaller weapons out to 10 feet for the attacks! This is a great response to not just a barrage of arrows or a burning battlefield, but it also helps counter cloud-based spells like stinking cloud, fog cloud, and even incendiary cloud.
Then there’s Gale Weapons, a spell that packs those force-strikes and air-slashes into a weapon buff. Though it offers similar benefits to magic weapon, this spell has some key tradeoffs. You can’t use it to boost other people’s weapons because you must hold them for it to function, and you don’t get a bonus to attack, only to damage. On the other hand, you can affect two weapons instead of one, making this spell much more enticing for dual-wielders who may normally struggle to enchant both their weapons as easily as a gish with a single greatsword or sword-and-shield does.
The mechanics of gale weapons’s air slashes and spinning projectiles are also used in the nonmagical wind-based fighter subclass appearing in the same compendium! We went through a lot of different iterations over the years on how to do weapon-based force strikes like the ones used for the melee attack benefit. The language used for the melee attack cleanly enables force-strike-style attacks to be made at range that still allow the wielder to modify the attack with Superiority Dice, Channel Divinity uses, Paladin Smites, and more. (Note that if you must decide between treating the melee attack as a melee weapon attack or ranged spell attack because a specific mechanic is mutually exclusive, err on the side of the ranged spell attack.)
Of course, it almost goes without saying that these two wind-based spells are both appearing on the spell list for the Aeromancer feat, meaning that they count as aeromancies (air, wind, and sound spells) in addition to transmutations. These spells both benefit from the bonuses provided by the feat (which will appear in the compendium The Elements & Beyond), including the slightly increased damage and the boost to mobility.
Don’t miss The Elements & Beyond when it releases (for free!) and you’ll get your first look at the magic item Whirlwind Weapon, which uses both of these spells to boost the weapon attacks of its wielder!
Links: PDF | D&D Beyond: Cyclone Strike, Gale Weapons
