Complete Guide to Blinding Spells in D&D 5e
by Sam West, Twitter:@CrierKobold
A brilliant flash of light to dazzle, a puff of smoke to block out the senses, plunging an area in complete and total darkness: all of these effects blind creatures, and lead to the easiest getaways in D&D.
The blinded condition in 5th edition imposes the following effects on the affected creature:
A binded creature can’t see and automatically fails any ability check that requires sight
Attack rolls against the creature have advantage, and the creature’s attack rolls have disadvantage.
Additionally, creatures in a heavily obscured area effectively suffer from the blinded condition when trying to see something within the area.
Below are the 5th edition spells that can produce the blinded condition (including heavy obscurity) for your consideration.
Blinded Condition Spells by Level
1st Level
2nd Level
3rd Level
Heavily Obscurity Spells by Level
1st Level
2nd Level
3rd Level
Blinding Spells by Class and Subclass
*Classes with a subclass in parentheses denotes the spell is obtained within that subclass of the main class
**Spells with TCoE denote being added to a classes spell list in Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything
Pyrotechnics
Blindness/Deafness
Nathair’s Mischief
Pyrotechnics
Stinking Cloud
Guards and Wards
Fog Cloud (Tempest)
Blindness/Deafness
Sleet Storm (Tempest)
Contagion
Hallow
Holy Weapon
Sunbeam
Divine Word
Sunburst
Holy Aura
Fog Cloud
Blindness/Deafness (Spores)
Darkness (Land, Swamp)
Dust Devil
Sleet Storm
Summon Fey
Contagion
Druid Grove
Sunburst
Storm of Vengeance
Blinding Smite
Darkness (Oathbreaker)
Contagion (Oathbreaker)
Holy Weapon
Fog Cloud
Summon Fey
Color Spray
Fog Cloud
Blindness/Deafness
Darkness
Dust Devil
Nathair’s Mischief
Pyrotechnics
Sleet Storm
Stinking Cloud
Wall of Light
Sunbeam
Prismatic Spray
Incendiary Cloud
Sunburst
Fog Cloud (Genie)
Blindness/Deafness (Fiend, Undying, Undead)
Darkness
Hunger of Hadar
Sleet Storm (Genie, Fathomless)
Summon Fey
Contagion (Undying)
Wall of Light
Hallow (Fiend)
Maddening Darkness
Wizard
Color Spray
Fog Cloud
Blindness/Deafness
Darkness
Dust Devil
Nathair’s Mischief
Pyrotechnics
Sleet Storm
Stinking Cloud
Summon Fey
Wall of Sand
Wall of Light
Guards and Wards
Sunbeam
Prismatic Spray
Dark Star
Incendiary Cloud
Maddening Darkness
Reality Break
Sunburst
Prismatic Wall
One more small rules note: the invisible condition invokes the blinded condition through the heavy obscurity rules, so any spell, such as Invisibility, Greater Invisibility, and Seeming, that make a creature invisible use the heavily obscured rules when attempting to hide, functionally treating creatures that attempt to see the hiding invisible creature as blinded to them specifically.
Top 10 Spells that Blind
So now you’ve got a complete set of all the spells that either can blind a creature directly, or have the ability to stick them in a zone of heavy obscurity to be blinded. Which of the bunch are worth their spell level?
Sunbeam: As far as raw, blinding potential goes, Sunbeam is top of its category. It's a repeatable blast of radiant lightning that can blind each and every time it connects with a floor of 3d8 damage and no blind. What’s more, where many spells offer immunity to a repeatable condition on a success, Sunbeam has no such clause. It hits lines of creatures every round should you want it, and if your end objective is to blind as many things as possible as often as possible, this is the complete blinding/damaging package wrapped up in a single 6th level spell package for you.
Holy Weapon: Holy Weapon might have the highest potential out of any spell on this top ten list, but its raw blinding potential is a bit smaller than the other top spots. Still, 2d8 bonus radiant damage that eventually will explode out in a sculpted 4d8 radiant blinding burst, which is just gravy. Being able to sculpt a one sided 30 ft. radius area of blind attached to damage after watching your fighter smack the crap out of baddies for an hour worth of encounters puts this spell near the top of the list for me.
Fog Cloud: Fog Cloud is the smoke grenade of D&D; an instant, cheap, billowing cloud of heavy obscurity. So many classes get access to this tool, making it a common occurrence in many games. Having a 40 ft. wide cloud of instantaneous cover on command at a space within 120 feet of you can lead Fog Cloud to finding a home in escape and infiltration plans. It's a tool that can assist in bailing from a fight you’re losing, or just disorient an incoming group long enough to lose them in a tight chase. This is a 1st level spell you can get mileage out of all throughout the game.
It get its spot of Darkness for its cost; Darkness is a more consistent and mobile form of the effect, but for just a 1st level spell, I’ll take Fog Cloud more often I think.
Darkness: Darkness is the opposite of a torch: an enveloping sphere of darkness that even creatures with darkness can’t see through. Need to blind drow or goblins? This will do the trick. A 2nd level spell is a relatively cheap cost, and with features like blindsight and Devil’s Sight, this can be made to be a one sided mass blind that travels with you. It isn’t outright the most powerful blinding effect, but can be an integral part to a lot of builds that care about magical darkness and having it where they need it.
Maddening Darkness: A 60 ft. radius area of 8d8 damaging darkness is what you’re getting for an 8th level slot with Maddening Darkness. It's a steep price for a solid effect. If you’ve been playing a Darkness based character, slinking in the shadows and using it to get the upper hand, capping it off with this giant devouring dark ability is a pretty satisfying finale to reach. 0
I tend to want my 8th level spells to do things my other spells can’t, and this doesn’t really add any new tools to the game, but it does provide a massive area of magical darkness with enough damage on it I’d be happy to take it on the right character, especially if I can keep things in it for more than two rounds.
Sleet Storm: Sleet Storm is a fairly iconic mass obscurity area that just shuts down a fight when cast. Heavy obscurity blinding creatures inside and out from what’s going on in there is pretty solid, especially on top of the slippery difficult terrain within that can drop moving creatures prone over and over again. In a pickle, Sleet Storm can give you a get out of jail free card while simultaneously giving you time to hide from whatever creatures you stick it on. It really isn’t that great outside of this specific use case, as if you just want the obscurity primarily you can get that effect a lot cheaper than this or in a better area. If you’re planning on killing the creatures within the area, Fireball is the exact same level, hits a similar area, and actually pushes your team towards winning the fight with massive damage. Still, Sleet Storm is excellent at performing a specific job, that job being stopping threats in their tracks and giving you enough time to lose them.
Wall of Light: If you love wall spells, but really wish they blinded things to, boy do I have a deal for you! Wall of Fire meets Sunbeam in this hybrid wall effect Wall of Light, giving you a consumable wall that blinds things that run through it, or blinds creatures you shoot as you break the wall down section by section.
Setting up a successful Wall of Light can be a bit tricky, but at minimum Wall of Light will likely give you a handful of saves. You definitely have to want to consume the wall for beams as your action, so if you’ve got other actions you’d rather do (which you often will), this spell is probably not for you. Otherwise, I’d recommend trying it out, especially if you’ve got a group who likes pushing enemies around or keeping them locked in place.
Sunburst: Sunburst takes the Fireball damage dice size and trades a d6 off the up-cast for a potential minute blind and a massive 60 ft. area, which is a fine tradeoff. An 8th level spell slot that competes with an up-cast 3rd level spell doesn’t get me super excited, but if I know a lot of these creatures won’t be dying to the damage, the blind can be a major reason to consider it. If you want a big, blinding blast, Sunburst is certainly that, and at minimum it’ll nuke a bunch of creatures in a huge area once a day. That’s a perfectly fine floor for an 8th level spell.
Hunger of Hadar: Hunger of Hadar is a spell I thematically adore; mechanically, to get the most out of it, you have to work pretty hard or rely on other players to help maintain it. A 20 ft. radius sphere of damaging darkness is pretty good. The problem is it's not particularly difficult to get out of, and with only 2d6 damage up front, you really want things within it to stay blinded and taking damage, especially when you start to compare it to its other 3rd level competition. If you’ve got a frontline that can grapple a creature, or have another caster that can lair difficult terrain under it, I think you can get a lot of mileage out of it at 5th and 6th level. Past that ditch it, as this is a warlock exclusive spell, and doesn’t scale with level for your pact magic feature.
Divine Word: Divine Word is… finicky. Against the right kinds of hordes of monsters, it can be a debilitating mass execution that stuns, blinds, and kills everything in sight. Against a handful of thicker baddies, though, it might have no relevant text. Especially because this list is focused around getting juice out of the blind condition, Divine Word makes the list because of its potential, but it won’t consistently be blinding as many creatures as you’d like.
How to Weaponize the Blinded Condition
Blinded creatures are susceptible to weapon attacks, and bad at making weapon attacks primarily. Additionally, any skill checks that they’d need to see to make fail, primarily empowering stealth checks made to hide yourself, others, or actions. This highlights blinds in two main environments: in combat debuffs, and out of combat stealth.
In Combat Debuffs
Blinds are at their best in combat when the creature blinded is based around attacking multiple times, or you’re part of a group that likes making lots of attack rolls. When all the attacks against the blinded creature are made with advantage, the more attacks you make, the more instances of advantage the blind condition has offered. When a creature makes more attacks with disadvantage because it has more attacks to make, the blinded condition is getting more benefits than it would on a creature making less attacks.
If you’re the fighter, ranger, paladin, or monk playing alongside somebody weaponizing heavy obscurity or mass area blinds, options like the Blind Fighting fighting style can be a major boon, as can access to darkvision or other forms of blindsight or truesight. Two creatures blinded are at parity; they attack with disadvantage, but have advantage making attacks against another blinded creature. If you can break this parity by removing the blinded condition for you, wether that is positioning so you’re not hit by the Sunbeam or just using darkvision in a dark cave against some creatures without darkvision, you’ll find the blinded condition is an easy way to get a massive advantage.
Even picking up Fog Cloud on a ranger or fighter with Blind Fighting can open up your own means of creating the blind and breaking parity with it on your own, no allied spellcasters required, giving you a short ranged tool to get advantage on your attack rolls against anything near you while imposing disadvantage on their attack rolls.
Out of Combat Stealth
The other major way to weaponize blinding creatures is when you need to hide, and need the creature to fail their perception check to find you. Some perception checks to locate a hidden creature can weaponize sounds and other forms of observation, but more often than not, heavily obscuring the observing creature's sight or blinding them outright with a blast of color from a Color Spray will be advantageous.
A cloud of Darkness or Fog Cloud placed over a crossroads can give you enough time to pick a path as part of a chase and lose your pursuer with them none the wiser to what direction you chose to go. If you need to swipe something, but can’t let the whole room know it was you who took the shiny bauble, a Blindness/Deafness discretely cast on the nearby guard can remove a witness with ease.
Because blinds tend to be short duration, you’ll want to act immediately when they come down, and have a way planned to safely navigate through them when applicable. If you stumble over yourself in your own Darkness trying to lose a bugbear chasing you, you’re going to have it rough when they stumble directly on top of you in said darkness.
Best Classes for Blinding
Let's say you want a character whose entire identity is debilitating enemies by denying them options to see; which classes are best suited for this objective? Below are my top four picks for classes that blind, and build ideas around what supplemental features help these classes stand out from the rest.
Clerics: Turn On the Lights
With the additions of Sunbeam and Sunburst from Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything to the cleric spell list alongside their other top tier spells like Holy Weapon and Divine Word, Clerics are easily set up to be some of the best blinders out there in the upper tiers. Early can be a bit of a struggle, with only Blindness/Deafness as a 2nd level option, but when you get to the upper tiers, you’ll find an abundance of powerful options at your disposal.
Tempest domain comes with some excellent obscuring options, too, that can be a direction to explore if you want better early tools to hamper vision. Light domain fits this fantasy perfectly, too, with a Warding Flare that doesn’t literally blind, but “dazzles” instead which can carry you for a while in the feeling of blasting light at enemies to disorient them.
If you want to blast things in the eyes with the power of the sun, Clerics are a pretty clear and easy option to go with. Early you might be a bit pressed for powerful options, but in the mid to upper tiers you’ll have no problem getting blinds off all the time.
Warlocks: Turn OFF The Lights
Devil’s Sight, a warlock invocation that lets you see in magical darkness, gives you a clear build around direction to go with to weaponize darkness in a powerful way. Sticking yourself in Darkness while firing out barrages of Eldritch Blasts with advantage can be crazy powerful.
Beyond this, you’ve got Maddening Darkness accessible to any warlock with Fog Cloud and Sleet Storm available to Genie warlocks and a few other decent options scattered among the subclasses. It's hard to build towards Hunger of Hadar given that you don’t really want to be casting it past 6th level with 4th level spell slots, but those abilities will work well with other area damaging spells you want to lock creatures into while you wait to get Maddening Darkness.
Wizards: It's a Rave (In Your Eyeballs)
If you just want the highest density of spells that say “blind” or “heavily obscured”, wizard will deliver. You’ve got a robust spell selection, agnostic of subclass, that can easily work with a variety of wizard schools. You get 7/10 of my top ten blinding spells alongside decent roleplayers like Nathair’s Mischief, Stinking Cloud, Wall of Sand, and Dark Star. You get the blinding lights of Sunburst and Sunbeam alongside the Maddening Darkness and regular Darkness. Want the more natural approach? You’ve got Fog Cloud and Stinking Cloud ready to go.
If you want to build your own fantasy for blinds, Wizard is an easy route to go that’ll offer you basically any option you’d want.
Sorcerers: Be The Best Blinder (Thanks, Metamagic!)
Sorcerers get less spells total than wizards, but in exchange get access to metamagic to empower their casts in some unique ways.
Careful Spell can sculpt creatures out of your Sunburst to let you selectively blind any creatures you’d like within its enormous area. Distant Spell can open up any of your blinds to affect creatures from massive distances, often without them being able to clearly see what’s blinding them before you cast the spell in the first place which can easily contribute to heists and infiltration missions. Heightened Spell can impose disadvantage on a creature affected by a blind save you’re making, which makes your blinds feel all that more consistent.
Subtle Spell stands out among the crowd, as when paired specifically with spells that create areas of heavy obscurity or try to blind creatures, if that cast is part of a plan to avoid detection, not displaying any means of casting is a massive boon. Twinned Spell can be similarly potent, as taking Blindness/Deafness and “upcasting it” for two sorcery points makes the spell hit so much harder.
Where they struggle is having a robust roster of spells at their disposal. If you know you want to sit down and shut down enemy senses, and you want to do it better than anyone else can with the given spell, sorcerer can be a great option to go with.
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