Wind Walk: Walk Like the Wind

Usable By: Druid

Spell Level: 6

School: Transmutation

Casting Time: 1 minute

Range: 30 feet

Duration: 8 hours

Components: V, S, M (Fire and holy water)

You and up to ten willing creatures you can see within range assume a gaseous form for the duration, appearing as wisps of cloud. While in this cloud form, a creature has a flying speed of 300 feet and has resistance to damage from nonmagical weapons. The only actions a creature can take in this form are the Dash action or to revert to its normal form. Reverting takes 1 minute, during which time a creature is incapacitated and can’t move. Until the spell ends, a creature can revert to cloud form, which also requires the 1-minute transformation.

If a creature is in cloud form and flying when the effect ends, the creature descends 60 feet per round for 1 minute until it lands, which it does safely. If it can’t land after 1 minute, the creature falls the remaining distance.

Review by Sam West, Twitter: @CrierKobold

Exploration in D&D has always been tricky; navigating the logistics of three-dimensional space within the theater of the mind leads to a ton of awkward hurdles and missed details that can make the experience clunky, to say the least. What I love about Wind Walk is it cleanly and easily opens up world exploration to three dimensional space in a way that makes everything easy; you become a cloud. It's basically a spectator mode or flight cheat that gives you the power to go where you want, when you want.

Wind Walk isn’t going to work everywhere. Groups focused on drama and intrigue likely would only find uses for it scaling buildings and overhearing secrets; there are no shortage of spells that offer that. Combat heavy groups favoring encounter dynamics can’t really incorporate Wind Walk into battle, making it only really useful as an easy means of scaling progressively more dangerous environments quickly and safely. In the rare group dedicated to exploration, though, Wind Walk can be the perfect tool to open up exploration from linear grid-following map exploration to three dimensional extraplanar magical shenanigans.

This is the kind of spell you build in as a foundational element to a campaign or campaign arch. An adventure spanning the Plane of Air, Mt. Celestia, and Sigil, the City of Doors can be truly one of a kind experiences when done with Wind Walk. This specific setting isn’t going to be for most, but it's an experience I’d recommend trying. Exploring the remains of a long dead djinn’s palace by floating through the suspended pillars and following air streams from section to section can be a standout moment of awe at the table you’ll be thinking about for years.

This can even act as a scalar improvement to other travel through the area; progressing from land based travel to air ship to Wind Walk can progressively and naturally open up more of the world to a group, and expand out explorable space organically.

Outside of this exploration campaign specific niche, Wind Walk is another Fly. It solves some problems a ton of other spells solve in a similar way, and isn’t often going to be worth the slot. What Wind Walk offers is a unique setting experience that probably would have fit better in a supplemental book than in the PHB.

5e Spells

Wind Walk: Walk Like the Wind