Elemental Weapon: Add Some Flash to Your Slash

Usable By: Artificer, Druid, Paladin, Ranger

Spell Level: 3

School: Transmutation

Casting Time: 1 action

Range: Touch

Duration: Concentration, up to 1 hour

Components: V, S

A nonmagical weapon you touch becomes a magic weapon. Choose one of the following damage types: acid, cold, fire, lightning, or thunder. For the duration, the weapon has a +1 bonus to attack rolls and deals an extra 1d4 damage of the chosen type when it hits.

At Higher Levels. When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 5th or 6th level, the bonus to attack rolls increases to +2 and the extra damage increases to 2d4. When you use a spell slot of 7th level or higher, the bonus increases to +3 and the extra damage increases to 3d4.

Review by Sam West, Twitter: @CrierKobold

Flaming blades are about as classic fantasy as you can get. World of Warcraft graced the universe with far too many outrageous elemental weapons with wild designs portraying rays of ice, poison, acid, and wind alongside every blow. Elemental Weapon is D&D’s “catch all” for facilitating this fantasy, and does it in a way that I guess is acceptable, but I think you’ll struggle to find times you’d realistically want to cast it.

Magic Weapon gives a flat +1 to hit and damage; in a system where advantage is thrown around constantly while bards throw out inspiration for modifiers of up to +6 at first level, this can feel inconsequential. If the DM doesn’t go out of their way to tell you every time Magic Weapon turns a miss into a hit, it basically functions as a tool to get over specific monster resistances. That can be a fine place for a spell to exist, but largely to me feels like something an item should do.

Elemental Weapon stands above that a tad as it ups the damage from 1 to 1d4. This has two major impacts; the first is your average damage bump is substantially higher here per hit. The second: your crits double the dice rolled. This now makes the scaling feel loads better on multi-attack characters, as rolling more dice is a pretty awesome experience to have. Numerical improvement isn’t always the most exciting way to empower a spell, but does do something here that can work.

Even though it does outperform its 2nd level option in a meaningful way, using a 3rd level slot that requires the caster to maintain concentration can make it feel impossible to use, especially knowing you could have instead just cast Call Lightning and almost certainly dealt more total damage. The spell is quite a bit worse if you’re a melee character casting it on yourself as the concentration guts the duration to just a few rounds at its best. Imagine the scenario where you cast it prior to a fight, roll low initiative, get hit once, and immediately drop concentration. Even if you get three to four attacks in, you’ve functionally traded a 3rd level slot for 3d4-4d4 damage and +1 to those attacks. That certainly isn’t worth the slot.

Where it becomes “worth it” is around six attacks to me. +5% chance to hit six times adds up and comes with 6d4 bonus damage on top of the regular damage dice you’re rolling. Not great, still likely worse than just casting a 3rd level damage spell, but it might not cost you an action, and can stick around past that encounter. Some characters, namely longbow rangers, have a pretty easy time getting that out of it, and I’d say should give it a try.

If this were a 2nd level spell, I’d be a bit more in favor of it. 3rd is a lot to ask, especially with half casters. If you’re a ranger specifically looking to replace Hunter’s Mark, this is a meaningful upgrade. Otherwise, I’d steer clear of Elemental Weapon unless you really want to attempt to get that acid blade fantasy going without actual magic items.

5e Spells

Elemental Weapon: Add Some Flash to Your Slash