Do the Arcane Archer's Arcane Shots add to the damage of the arrow?

[Madd_Hattington]

This is what it says in Xanathar's:

"Once per turn when you fire an arrow from a shortbow or longbow as part of the Attack action,
you can apply one of your Arcane Shot options to that arrow. You decide to use the option when
the arrow hits a creature, unless the option doesn’t involve an attack roll. You have two uses of
this ability, and you regain all expended uses of it when you finish a short or long rest."


It states that you use the ability on hit and "Apply" the effect. So one could stand to argue it adds to the total damage but my DM senses tell me this is wrong. I'm not sure how to rule this since the Arcane Archer only gets 2 uses of this ability I do not want to gimp them on their 1 thing.

[daemonaetea]

So I'm having a bit of trouble following the situation here. Is the DM just not allowing you to do the extra damage at all? Or is he calculating this damage separately for some reason, perhaps for something like the DC of a Concentration check caused by being hit with it?

If it's the first, I honestly have no idea what to tell you. The ability should clearly trigger damage when you use it. If it's the second, I would ask if the DM is ruling this the same way he does Smite damage? That is similarly an ability which is triggered on a hit, at which point the player may choose to apply extra damage using a limited resource.

Or are you trying to ask something else?

[Lunali]

The effects are added to the damage of the arrow.

[Unoriginal]

The arrow still does its normal damages, on top of the Arcane Shot's effect.