Sleep, not so useful?

[Kaeso]

Around these part sleep (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/sleep.htm) is considered a "silver bullet" spell during low levels. Proper usage of this spell will end combat instantly, if not make it stupidly easy. I am, however, getting some doubts about its potential as a combat ender, specifically because of this phrase in the description.


Slapping or wounding awakens an affected creature

This means that any kind of damage, physical or magical, undoes the effects of the spell, right? Doesn't that mean you at best gain a free, easy attack against your foe? It still sounds useful, but by no means as a combat ender.

[mistformsquirrl]

Remember two things:

1) At low levels most things have low enough HP that that one attack is often enough to kill them. So if the enemy fails its saving throw it's easily possible to dispatch several creatures without ever having them attack back.

2) There's Coup de Grace -

From the SRD:

"As a full-round action, you can use a melee weapon to deliver a coup de grace to a helpless opponent. You can also use a bow or crossbow, provided you are adjacent to the target.

You automatically hit and score a critical hit. If the defender survives the damage, he must make a Fortitude save (DC 10 + damage dealt) or die. A rogue also gets her extra sneak attack damage against a helpless opponent when delivering a coup de grace.

Delivering a coup de grace provokes attacks of opportunity from threatening opponents.

You can’t deliver a coup de grace against a creature that is immune to critical hits. You can deliver a coup de grace against a creature with total concealment, but doing this requires two consecutive full-round actions (one to "find" the creature once you’ve determined what square it’s in, and one to deliver the coup de grace)."

Which again given the low HP at low levels is going to kill most things you'd face without difficulty.

That's not to say Sleep (or any spell) is foolproof... but it is pretty crazy powerful all things considered.

[Douglas]

Yes, you only get one free attack. But that one free attack can be a coup de grace (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/combatModifiers.htm#coupdeGrace). This can easily force a DC 30 or higher save or die even at very low levels, and that's if the target has enough hit points to survive the damage in the first place.

Oh, and even if they do survive, they're prone and they dropped anything they were holding (like, say, their weapons).

[Agincourt]

I think it's not particularly useful, but for a different reason. It's the 1 round casting time that limits its usefulness.

First, that means the enemy has a full round of actions to try and disrupt the caster. Second, that means the enemy is unlikely to be clustered together any more. And third, Sleep can affect your allies, so if the enemy isn't clustered, it's harder to target.

[Studoku]

You can Coup de Grace them. At low levels, an auto-crit from a fighter should be enough to drop anything that's affected by it without them getting a chance to make the fort save.

Depending on your DMs interpretation, you may also be able to tie the target up without waking them. At the very least, you can take away their weapon so there's not much they can do when they do wake up.

[Psyren]

It's also useful because many wizards are elves, who are immune to magical sleep. So you center the spell on yourself and bam, snoozing goblins/lizardfolk/orcs etc. Then your ranger buddies run around and slit throats; the wood is safe once again.

[Agincourt]

It's also useful because many wizards are elves, who are immune to magical sleep. So you center the spell on yourself and bam, snoozing goblins/lizardfolk/orcs etc. Then your ranger buddies run around and slit throats; the wood is safe once again.

If the goblins/lizardfolk/orcs are within 10 feet of you, and your allies are not, why haven't the goblins/lizardfolk/orcs taken you down while you spent 1 round casting a spell?

[nedz]

It's a level 1 mass save or (probably) die spell — what is not so useful about that ?

That said it's a poor choice for a Sorcerer since you will want to swap it out the first chance you get due to the 4 HD limit — and there maybe other spells you would prefer to swap out instead.

[Psyren]

If the goblins/lizardfolk/orcs are within 10 feet of you, and your allies are not, why haven't the goblins/lizardfolk/orcs taken you down while you spent 1 round casting a spell?

The allies were elves too in my example. You see this a lot in FR novels with low-level elf settlements, e.g. Silver Shadows or Sylvan Shadows. This allows even low level elf wizards to help with the war effort.

Agreed on it not being a good choice for sorcerers.

[Answerer]

Eh, for a Sorcerer 1, you'll almost certainly be unable to get out of taking Sorcerer 4 anyway, so by the time sleep (or color spray) becomes useless, you can just swap it. Definitely don't take both, though.

[Shining Wrath]

The good thing about Sleep is that it doesn't hurt your friends. Drop it right on the melee, wake up your friends, and then have your biggest hitter perform coup de grace on each enemy in turn, while the rest of you stand poised to finish anyone who survives the big smack. That way the full round casting time doesn't matter so long as the enemy don't have sufficient Spellcraft to realize you're casting.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

The good thing about Sleep is that it doesn't hurt your friends. Drop it right on the melee, wake up your friends, and then have your biggest hitter perform coup de grace on each enemy in turn, while the rest of you stand poised to finish anyone who survives the big smack. That way the full round casting time doesn't matter so long as the enemy don't have sufficient Spellcraft to realize you're casting.
That's kinda hilarious.

<cast Sleep>

<slap slap slap> WAKE UP, FIGHTER!

<point> KILL THEM!

[Agincourt]

It only takes one made save for this tactic to backfire into a TPK.

[Cog]

It only takes one made save for this tactic to backfire into a TPK.
One made save if you're fighting a solo? Sure, it'll happen sometimes, but if so it hasn't made the fight any worse than the Barbarian rolling a 1 on his attack. One made save when you're fighting a squad? Then you've begun to divide the enemy, and you're learning the fine art of battlefield control.

[Answerer]

I think he's specifically referring to the case where you have some friendly-fire going on and were relying on your ability to wake up the Fighter. Won't work very well if one of the enemy is still up...

Though a TPK seems unlikely. Sleep finishes just as your turn comes up, which means you get to act immediately after putting everything to sleep. That should give you time to wake up, say, the Fighter.

[Agincourt]

Answerer is correct. If an orc makes his save and you've just put your own guys asleep, you've just shifted the action economy out of your favor.

[tadkins]

Sleep is my bane. In the current game I'm playing, my low level gnome illusionist can't seem to put anyone to sleep. In the four or so times I've used the spell, the enemy has made their saves each time. It's not that she's bad at casting the spell (even has Spell Focus: Enchantment), just that they've made good rolls each time.

It sucks. xD

[Invader]

It's one of those spells that's level of usefulness depends entirely on how well the monsters make their saves. Manage to put one of five to six monsters to sleep, not that great use of a turn. Manage to put four to sleep out of that same five to six and you just basically just won the encounter for your group.

I'd say the real question is, is it worth taking at low levels when is actually effective or are there more reliable spells you could be using instead.

[Psyren]

It's unlikely you'll catch the entire party AND all the enemies in a 10ft. burst. That's small enough so you can position it and miss the party entirely while still catching more than one enemy.

Even if you don't sleep all of them, that's fine; having half the enemy team burn their standard actions to wake the other half is like Mass Daze out of a level 1 slot.

[erikun]

Every time I've seen Sleep used, the enemies immediately go about waking up their allies. There are one or two times they don't, such as when they're abandoning them, but they almost virtually always do.

As such, Sleep tends to be a one-round delay for just about all opponents but not handy for much else. Maybe trying to incapacitate a lone opponent, but Charm Person almost always works better there.

[tiercel]

I guess I've always just preferred color spray: standard action casting time, having 5+ HD doesn't make targets immune, just lowers its effect, and there's no HD cap on number of creatures it can affect in one go.

Yes, your squishy mage doesn't really want to be that close, but at levels 1-3 chances are you're going to have bad guys in your face sometimes anyway, especially on a standard dungeon crawl.

You might as well have one "awesome at low level" spell if you're just going to replace it via spontaneous caster class feature or by using a different spell in your spellbook; if nothing else, magic missile isn't all that interesting when you are only slinging a single d4+1.

[Hanuman]

It's a disengage spell mainly, it solves combat because if you got jumped by 5 guys with knives IRL having a spell to put them to sleep would be good enough, in fact slipping them into manacles would be preferable to a lot of real people who don't put a sword through people that threaten them.

[Saph]

I think it's not particularly useful, but for a different reason. It's the 1 round casting time that limits its usefulness.

First, that means the enemy has a full round of actions to try and disrupt the caster. Second, that means the enemy is unlikely to be clustered together any more. And third, Sleep can affect your allies, so if the enemy isn't clustered, it's harder to target.

This is the big problem with the spell in my experience. Casting anything with a 1-round casting time is like hanging a flashing sign over your head saying "HEY, YOU GUYS! I'M CASTING A REALLY POWERFUL DANGEROUS SPELL! YOU SHOULD PROBABLY DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT BEFORE I FINISH!"

[ericgrau]

At a level when swords have a good chance of 1 shotting foes and tend to come with better AC & HP, it's not spectacular. But it is very good and perhaps the best option you have. Some go with color spray instead because of sleep's long casting time, but color spray has the drawback of limited range which also puts a low level mage in big danger. Sleep lets you cast from way in the back where foes may not be able to reach you even after a full round (nor shoot you due to cover). Or they must face an attack of opportunity at a level when that means instant death. No other level 1 spell can keep up with an area save-or-lose at early levels, so both spells are your best choices. You don't switch over to other level 1 spells until foes hit 5 HD making sleep useless or color spray weak.

In 3.0 standard action sleep was the best level 1 spell by a good margin; it needed the nerf pretty bad. If you truly want to be safe then I suppose you can't cast either sleep nor color spray and must pick a medium or long range spell that let's you move away + standard action it. But those spell options aren't nearly as effective at levels 1-3.

[ArcturusV]

True, when they changed Sleep to a 1 round cast, that was a huge nerf on it. But it's still handy, particularly as an Ambush Winner.

I mean at level 1, ambush scenario. Here's how the general options go:

A wizard might do something like burning hands or something if he's not optimized, and maybe singe the enemies for half their HP. Might color spray and get two enemies at once.

A rogue will sneak attack once, maybe twice if they win initiative and put down two enemies (Or one, or severely weaken two enemies).

A fighter type might get an Iajutsu Strike to kill a target, or something similar, but otherwise is worse than the rogue in an "Ambush".

Or a wizard, since it's an ambush and they control when combat starts, casts that spell before the enemy even knows they are in a fight, and thus are most likely clustered into the AoE anyway (Sitting around at a meal, marching order, etc), and ends the entire encounter.

It's not a midbattle spell. It's a negate the fact there even was a battle planned spell.

[Saph]

True, when they changed Sleep to a 1 round cast, that was a huge nerf on it. But it's still handy, particularly as an Ambush Winner.

Surprise round is one standard action. Sleep is a full-round. You start casting, the enemies get DC 0 Listen checks to hear you, and that probably kicks off the battle.

An ambush is probably the best time to use Sleep, just because it makes the 1-round cast much less crippling, but it's not a guaranteed win by any means.

[ericgrau]

I don't like speaking in absolutes because only sith speak in absolutes and the above is a prime example. Casting requires a strong voice, it makes obvious noise. Foes will hear you casting and respond, and not even after your full round action, but after your standard action surprise meaning the sleep does not activate until round 2. And it's unlikely that everyone will fail their save. Instead like I said you stay in back and it's unlikely that foes will be able to reach you without severe risk of dying to other attacks first, nor range attack you behind cover. The key is not to look for the ideal spell that always works but to recognize that there is no such thing, work around the drawbacks and look for the best option you have. Sleep is not perfect, but it is possibly the best, or else one of the best.

[ArcturusV]

I suppose it depends on where the DM starts the "Surprise Round". Generally I see it used in a context where the "Surprise Round" only happens when the enemy is actually under attack or aware of an attack coming.

So it'd be like:

Wizard: Starts casting sleep.

Midcasting they may detect it, or not, based on modifiers for situational things. Then a surprise round with a standard action during which you could finish up the casting or a surprise round triggered when the casting itself is complete. Since they couldn't make the checks until after you start casting, it makes sense that you are partially done with the spell by the time they detect it and the surprise round is triggered. I've seen it played out that way. Seen it not played out that way. Not entirely sure which is "Correct" necessarily. Think it's more of individual DM flavoring as I can see both working out from a logical standpoint on how Surprise and such works.

But yeah, still switching it to a whole round was a huge nerf. Still a useful spell and you get a lot of mileage out of it in my experience. Still kind of a no brainer to add to your spellbook at low levels in my experience.

[Waddacku]

Even if you only start casting in the surprise round, you should still finish casting on your initiative in the first actual round. Depending on the initiative rolls, it might mean they don't even get the chance to react, or they might all get an opportunity to stab you in the face before you finish. Wizards obviously want their Initiative as high as ever possible, especially at low levels.

But I can't see the casting taking until round 2.

[TheOOB]

A small point to op. A "Silver Bullet" tactic or ability is something that is extremely useful in a limited situation, such is how a silver bullet will kill a werewolf outright, but it pretty useless otherwise. Sleep on the other hand is often the only answer you need to low level encounters of any stripe.

Always remember the most valuable resource in D&D is actions. It's why 3.0 haste, celerity, and time stop are all very very powerful spells, and why heavy crossbows suck. No matter how powerful your character is, you only act once a turn under normal circumstances. Using a single action to deny multiple enemies their actions shifts the action economy severely in your teams favor, even ignoring the fact that the targets are now helpless(even if the coup de grace doesn't kill them, they are now wounded, prone, and next to one of your melee characters). And if one of their allies spends an action to wake them up, congrats, your spell just wasted another of your foes actions.

At second level, burning hands deals an average of around 5 damage to a group, while sleep can take an entire group out of the fight entirely.

[ericgrau]

Even if you only start casting in the surprise round, you should still finish casting on your initiative in the first actual round. Depending on the initiative rolls, it might mean they don't even get the chance to react, or they might all get an opportunity to stab you in the face before you finish. Wizards obviously want their Initiative as high as ever possible, especially at low levels.

But I can't see the casting taking until round 2.

The surprise round is a standard action. You cannot finish your full round action in the surprise round. You may, however, use 2 standard actions to complete a full round action.

Or most people won't attempt a full round action at all in the surprise round.

Ambush tactics will however work using the silent spell feat. It could be an awesome feat allowing an arbitrary number of prep rounds... if a lot of DMs weren't lazy/fearful and didn't make the number of prep rounds a fixed number regardless of stealth.

[Psyren]

A little-known or little-realized rule is that you don't have to target a spell until AFTER you finish casting it. So for all those folks who say that the enemy might be spread out or have changed positions since you started casting Sleep, it's still possible to aim it somewhere else and (potentially) catch more than one enemy.