Casting Spiritual Weapon with a 3rd level slot

[Yora]

It very much seems to me like there is a typo with this spell, otherwise I can make no sense of it:

"When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 3rd level or higher, the damage increases by 1d8 for every two slot levels above the 2nd."

Do you get any benefit from casting it with a 3rd level slot?

[fbelanger]

Being able to cast it is a benefit!

[Greywander]

Indeed, if you're out of 2nd level slots, it might be worth it to burn a 3rd level slot just to cast the spell.

Remember that Spiritual Weapon uses your bonus action, not your action, so a damage boost is worth a lot more since your bonus action has less competition.

[Torpin]

no, nor do you get extra benefit of a 5 7 or 9th spell when compared to a 4th 6th and 8th slot respectively

[Chronos]

Why would this be a typo? Just because you can do something, doesn't mean that there must be some reason why you'd want to.

[BarneyBent]

Getting 1d8 for every spell level would be insane. On average you’re probably attacking 3-4 times with SW per combat. Thats 3-4d8 per spell level. Compare that to other spells that normally scale 1 dice per level and you can see why they dropped it down.

[thoroughlyS]

After skimming a list of spells that scale using higher level slots, it is odd that it says "spell slot of 3rd level or higher". The best comparison I could find was flame blade, which has the same scaling pattern but says "spell slot of 4th level or higher". This leads me to believe that in an earlier draft it scale at each level of slot. As it stands now, you do not receive any additional benefit by using a 3rd-level slot. Pretty quirky, though...

[Aquillion]

Indeed, if you're out of 2nd level slots, it might be worth it to burn a 3rd level slot just to cast the spell.You don't need special wording to do that, though; you can always burn a higher-level slot on any spell if you want to:


When a character casts a spell, he or she expends a slot of that spell's level or higher, effectively "filling" a slot with the spell. You can think of a spell slot as a groove of a certain size--small for a 1st-level slot, larger for a spell of higher level. A 1st-level spell fits into a slot of any size, but a 9th-level spell fits only in a 9th-level slot. So when Umara casts magic missile, a 1st-level spell, she spends one of her four 1st-level slots and has three remaining.

[Greywander]

You don't need special wording to do that, though; you can always burn a higher-level slot on any spell if you want to:
This wasn't the question, though. The question was, "Is there ever a reason to cast Spiritual Weapon using a 3rd level slot?" The answer is, "Yes, if you don't have any 2nd level slots and just really need to cast it." The "special wording" you are referring to was only the catalyst for the question, not the question itself. And yeah, this works for any spell.

[Pex]

The inefficiency stings, but if you have to do it you do it. Personally I don't see why you wouldn't just cast a 3rd level spell if it's a choice between that and Spiritual Weapon. (Other low level spells can be worth casting at 3rd level.) They have more impact. I wouldn't even use a 4th level slot to cast the spell, though I have seen others do it. It's a great spell, but I don't see a need to cast it at higher level.

[Dalebert]

My first thought was "harder to dispel or counter" before I realized it's still automatic success at third level.

[Mitsu]

I also think that it was supposed to scale with each level, which would imo be fine. From 5th level slot it would deal like 4d8 dmg? Bigby's Hand is 5th level spell and it deals EXACTLY 4d8 dmg so it would be the same so I don't see any unbalance here. And Bigby scales with each level.

I personally rule that Spiritual Weapon scale with each level and it never broke anything. If anything it made this spell still viable in higher levels intead of being dropped.

[Willie the Duck]

It very much seems to me like there is a typo with this spell, otherwise I can make no sense of it:

"When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 3rd level or higher, the damage increases by 1d8 for every two slot levels above the 2nd."


The best comparison I could find was flame blade, which has the same scaling pattern but says "spell slot of 4th level or higher". This leads me to believe that in an earlier draft it scale at each level of slot.

Honestly speaking, the verbiage works fine as is -- you get a benefit of an increase per two slots-levels above a certain level, so one slot-level is a bonus of zero. If the book were 100% consistent in this regard, I would just assume that the writer's style bible included an entry along the lines of:
"Spell, level X --
, Duration, Level, Material, Name, Range, School, Target]
[Description].
At Higher Levels: When you cast this spell using a spell slot of X+1[nd, rd, or th] level or higher, the [description of benefit]."
And not worried about it.

The quirky thing is that they [I]weren't consistent. I don't know if that's because they were just sloppy; or if spiritual weapon might have started out getting a bonus dice with each spell slot level, playtesting revealed that too powerful, and everything got fixed except the level listed in the first clause.

[Aquillion]

I also think that it was supposed to scale with each level, which would imo be fine. From 5th level slot it would deal like 4d8 dmg? Bigby's Hand is 5th level spell and it deals EXACTLY 4d8 dmg so it would be the same so I don't see any unbalance here. And Bigby scales with each level.

I personally rule that Spiritual Weapon scale with each level and it never broke anything. If anything it made this spell still viable in higher levels intead of being dropped.
Bigby's Hand requires concentration, which is a huge deal. Spiritual Weapon absolutely should not be as good as it.

(Bigby's Hand is also a top-tier wizard spell, and wizards generally get better damage - clerics get better class features, better HD, better weapon / armor proficiencies, and so on; the fact that spells like Bigby's Hand are better than comparable Cleric spells is the whole reason to play a wizard. But clerics can bend this restriction sometimes; the concentration issue is more important. That one absolutely can't be bent by anyone - concentration spells are always supposed to be much, much more powerful than comparable non-concentration ones, since you only get to have one up at once.)

[Chronos]

And Bigby's Hand is a higher-level spell, and higher-level spells are supposed to be better than upcast lower-level spells. I mean, compare a 3rd-level Burning Hands to a Fireball.

[Willie the Duck]

I also think that it was supposed to scale with each level, which would imo be fine. From 5th level slot it would deal like 4d8 dmg? Bigby's Hand is 5th level spell and it deals EXACTLY 4d8 dmg so it would be the same so I don't see any unbalance here. And Bigby scales with each level.

Bigby's hand starts at 5th level, takes a non-bonus action to cast, requires concentration (!), can be attacked and destroyed, has many other features, and is a spell for a different class (the balance between which is of significant discussion, but that clerics get more constrained direct damage overall is part of their balancing). Using the two as direct comparators is iffy at best.

Edit: ninja'd

[Mitsu]

Bigby's hand starts at 5th level, takes a non-bonus action to cast, requires concentration (!), can be attacked and destroyed, has many other features, and is a spell for a different class (the balance between which is of significant discussion, but that clerics get more constrained direct damage overall is part of their balancing). Using the two as direct comparators is iffy at best.

Edit: ninja'd

I understand but it really doesn't matter. 5e is not balanced at all so making a medicore spell a good one is not a problem.

Also Bigby is Wizard exclusive spell, and they are already too strong. Making Spiritual Blade better I also buffed clerics, bard and divine sorcerers. Also for Conquest Paladins it stays viable longer.

Each to his own but I didn't change balance at all when we look at bigger picture.

[Chronos]

So making a spell better (in a multitude of ways) than one that's already too strong doesn't upset balance?

[Aquillion]

I understand but it really doesn't matter. 5e is not balanced at all so making a medicore spell a good one is not a problem.

Also Bigby is Wizard exclusive spell, and they are already too strong. Making Spiritual Blade better I also buffed clerics, bard and divine sorcerers. Also for Conquest Paladins it stays viable longer.

Each to his own but I didn't change balance at all when we look at bigger picture.
Spiritual Weapon is by no means a mediocre spell, even at high levels. You are completely ignoring the importance of concentration. For someone who wasn't planning on using their bonus action for anything else, it's a large amount of nearly free damage throughout the fight.

Maybe your group didn't aggressively break it (presumably because their characters weren't optimized that much, so giving them so much damage so cheaply didn't unbalance the game.) But, for example... a Bard could take Spiritual Weapon, plus Animate Objects (it continues to follow an attack order until given another one), and do over 80 damage a round at level 10.

For comparison, typical reasonably-optimized fighter-type builds (using GWM or Sharpshooter) don't do that kind of damage until around level 18... and fighters are supposed to have the best sustained DBR in 5e.

Again, if it works at your table, it's fine, but just taking a non-concentration spell and making it as strong as a concentration one inherently breaks a fundamental assumption of the game.

Also, wizards aren't weak, but most people who weigh the classes call them the weakest full casters. Admittedly, this is partially "weak at low levels, stronger at higher-level ones", but I would generally argue that Clerics are stronger than Wizards outside of perhaps the very highest levels; and Paladins and Bards are both also extremely high-power classes. Buffing three of the best classes in the game because you feel wizards are too powerful makes no sense.

Finally, it's not just about balancing classes against each other (although I strenuously disagree with your assertion that wizards are stronger than clerics). Different classes have their different areas of expertise. Wizards are decent at doing damage with spells (although Sorcerers are much better in terms of burst damage.) Clerics are more support, utility, and tactical casters. Bards, too - they can use Magical Secrets to bend this, but giving Clerics such a powerful damage option, or intentionally giving Bards an overpowered Magical Secrets pick that turns them into top-tier damage dealers, is overpowered because you're giving one class the ability to do everything perfectly.

ie. your proposed version of Spiritual Weapon would be broken for anyone, but it would be a bit less broken as a Sorcerer / Wizard spell because it would be something they can already do. Saying "Clerics and Bards need to be as good at doing damage as Sorcerers or Fighters" is game-breaking when those classes still have their powerful class features, vital utility magic, and all the other advantages that wizards don't get.

[Mitsu]

snip

I fully respect what you said and your points are of course valid and correct. However as this is my houserule- of course it won't work as RAW. I just find 5E unbalanced enough that such small tweaks don't matter too much. Maybe if you play with hard-core munchkins exploiting every bit of additional power. Then I would reconsider buffing anything. But in normal casual gameplay- nah :). One of my players wanted to be that holy battle cleric with singature spiritual weapon around him hitting enemies and we were disspointed in it's scalling and slot cost so I changed that. Nothing broke in the game with it. And our party bard didn't took it because they try to not duplicate each other so everyone feel unique and he preffered to steal different spells. Not everyone try to be best damage dealers. We had Sorcadin for it ;)

As you said- it works at my table. But I still think it scales badly in RAW.

[Chronos]

The attitude of "The game's so unbalanced that it won't matter if I make it even more unbalanced" is exactly how things get unbalanced in the first place. And Spiritual Hammer would be a good spell even if it didn't scale at all.

[Aquillion]

The attitude of "The game's so unbalanced that it won't matter if I make it even more unbalanced" is exactly how things get unbalanced in the first place. And Spiritual Hammer would be a good spell even if it didn't scale at all.Eh. I think it's an unbalanced choice, but the reality is that "balance things for general use" is orders of magnitude harder than "balance things for just my table." If whoever's casting Spiritual Weapon is eg. not doing much else powerful otherwise with their main actions and is essentially relying on Spiritual Weapon to be their entire contribution to combat, it's much less powerful.

If it works at their table then it's not a problem for them. I would just be cautious about recommending that other people do the same thing.