Sunburst: Radiant Fireball

Usable By: Cleric, Druid, Sorcerer, Wizard

Spell Level: 8

School: Evocation

Casting Time: 1 action

Range: 150 feet

Duration: Instantaneous

Components: V, S, M (Fire and a piece of sunstone)

Brilliant sunlight flashes in a 60-foot radius centered on a point you choose within range. Each creature in that light must make a Constitution saving throw. On a failed save, a creature takes 12d6 radiant damage and is blinded for 1 minute. On a successful save, it takes half as much damage and isn’t blinded by this spell. Undead and oozes have disadvantage on this saving throw. A creature blinded by this spell makes another Constitution saving throw at the end of each of its turns. On a successful save, it is no longer blinded. This spell dispels any darkness in its area that was created by a spell.

Review by Sam West, Twitter: @CrierKobold

Sunburst does a lot of things, but does each of them worse than competitive other options do. This spell is just another in the massive suite of area of effect d6 damaging spells, but with the upside of having a blind on it. For one less d6 damage than up-casting a 3rd level spell, you get a potential blind and a bit of extra area.

How good is the blinded condition, then? This will typically look like imposing disadvantage on attack rolls from the affected creatures while bolstering attack rolls against them for a round. What’s neat and somewhat useful here is this makes an area of effect spell function well against single entities with low Constitutions as well as bulk amounts of enemies of all sizes. It is slightly more flexible than either option normally would be, albeit at the massive cost of the effect being substantially worse than each other's respective top end. Dominate Monster gives you control over the target, a MASSIVE upgrade over a blind, and Incendiary Cloud does both more damage the round you cast it and sticks around for subsequent damage afterwards. If you’re considering casting it on one creature, Finger of Death is dealing nearly double the damage, and is a level lower. Sunbeam is two levels lower, offers you subsequent actions to hit more creatures and get more blinds, and while the initial damage is lower, it has even more flexible use cases. You can get all of the individual parts of Sunburst elsewhere better, just not specifically all of the parts combined.

Sunburst also suffers from most of the issues upper tier advantage/disadvantage effects suffer from in that it won’t meaningfully add anything to moments where you’d already have that condition. If you’ve got a Mastermind rogue helping every round to bolster single important attacks, or have any of the lower level effects like Darkness or Blindness/Deafness that provide the same disability, spending an 8th level slot for the end result is pretty bad. Faerie Fire is a 1st level spell that applies advantage to attacks against groups of creatures, and doesn’t grant them subsequent saves to end the effect early. Sunburst does decent enough damage, and has a potentially good effect in a vacuum, but its cost, I just don’t think it brings something unique enough to the table to justify it on your spell list.

If you’re in the market for a decent damage option that also has a free blind attached to it, Sunburst is that. It excels in the niche environment where you’re facing a large quantity of creatures with high hit points that you’d want to blind in a massive area. Fun fact, that is rare to non-existent in the game. By the time you’re getting 8th level slots, I’d recommend going for spells that solve problems you can’t already solve. Sunburst just doesn’t do that. You already have access to effects that can blind at lower level costs, and you likely have access to better damage spell options than this. If you want both still, this is it. Otherwise, try out something a lot less fair.

5e Spells

Sunburst: Radiant Fireball