Some aid with the Aid spell

[sithlordnergal]

So I had an interesting thing happen during my last session that I was DMing. The party healer cast a 3rd level Aid on the party, then before the first casting of Aid ended they recast Aid at the 4th level. I was looking for a bit of insight of how that works, specifically how much HP the party gains to their current HP. My reading of the spell would only give the party +5 to their current and max HP, where as my players read it as their max HP increases by 5, but their current HP increases by 15.

Now, the reason I only think their HP increases by 5 is due to the wording of Aid. It says "Each target's hit point maximum and current Hit Points increase by 5 for the Duration.", which is different from something like Healing Word, Heal, or Cure Wounds, all of which read "A creature of your choice that you can see within range regains Hit Points." The fact that Aid doesn't state you're regaining hit points says to me that you aren't actually healing, instead its just giving you a a bonus to your current HP. That would mean it falls under the rules for combining magical effects, where only the strongest/most recent version of the spell would take effect.

Another reason I feel like it'd only give you 5 more HP instead of the full amount is because if it does heal you for the full amount of whatever level you cast it at, it becomes the strongest healing spell in the game outside of Heal and Mass Heal. Consider that Mass Cure Wounds is a 5th level spell that heals 6 creatures for 3d8+Casting Mod. With a 20 in your Casting stat, that's an average of 18.5 hp, and a max of 29. If Aid does heal you for the full amount of whatever level you cast it at, even if you already have Aid up, then a 5th level Aid can heal 3 people for 25 HP.

Now, I eventually gave in and let the party heal the 15 HP from the 4th level Aid, mostly because I had nearly just killed the Ranger via massive damage with some really deadly poison, but I did it with the caveat that I'd look into this. So what are your guy's thoughts on this? Would the party gain 15 to their current HP via a 4th level Aid, even if they have a 2nd level Aid on them? Or would they just gain 5 HP?

[PhantomSoul]

For ease of reference:

Arn
2nd-level abjuration
Casting Time: 1 action
Range: 30 feet
Components: V, S, M (a tiny strip of white cloth)
Duration: 8 hours
Your spell bolsters your allies with toughness and
resolve. Choose up to three creatures within range.
Each target's hit point maximum and current hit points
increase by 5 for the duration.
At Higher Levels. When you cast this spell using
a spell slot of 3rd level or higher, a target's hit points
increase by an additional 5 for each slot level above 2nd.


I've always read it as you getting +5*(slot-1) to both current and maximum hit points, so if you have 15/40 you end up with 20/45 after a second-level casting or 25/50 after a third-level casting, but you lose those additional hit points AND maximum hit points when the spell ends (so -5 and -10, respectively).

Moving on to casting it again, you only get hit points (current or maximum) if the second casting becomes the strongest one, otherwise there would be no effect. So in the 15/40 cast above, having a third-level casting put on you while a second-level casting is active would only take your 20/45 to 25/50, assuming no other damage has been taken.

(Whether you have the previous casting end not quite simultaneously with the next casting might be up to you; if you do it simultaneously it's fine, but if that person who had 15/40 has been reduced to 5/45 while the first casting is active and then receives a second casting, they would go from 5/45 to 0/40 [spell ending] before going to 10/50, which could trigger any effects or consequences of being reduced to 0 HP. For simplicity, I'd just treat them as simultaneous unless the group had opinions during a quick chat and vote.)

[Keravath]

The text of Aid is the following:

"Aid
Your spell bolsters your allies with toughness and resolve. Choose up to three creatures within range. Each target's hit point maximum and current hit points increase by 5 for the duration.
At Higher Levels. When you cast this spell using a spell slot of 3rd level or higher, a target's hit points increase by an additional 5 for each slot level above 2nd"

Two spells of the same name don't stack so only the highest level takes precedence.

In this case, a 4th level AID spell increases both the maximum AND current hit points by 15 because that is what the spell says it does.

If a character had 30 hit points maximum unaffected by AID it would go up to 45 and so would their current hit points. If they happened to be at 20 out of 30 hit points then the maximum would go to 45 and the current would go to 35 since BOTH maximum and current hit points are increased by the AID spell.

P.S. As to what happens when the spell ends, the increase to the hit point maximum would certainly be lost. Whether the current hit points also lose the increase if they are below the revised hit point maximum could be less clear - it would depend on whether the DM rules the increase to current hit points counts as "healing" or some sort of "temporary healing" which can be subsequently lost when the spell ends.

Either way, the spell would restore 15 hit points of damage when cast but whether that would just bump the current hit points by 5 (since you have to take away the 10 from the 3rd level aid and replace them with the 15 from the fourth level aid) or by 15 would entirely depend on whether the DM decides the increase to current hit points is an instantaneous effect like healing or an effect tied to the on-going spell.

There is a Mike Mearls comment out there that the current hit points wouldn't drop when Aid or Hero's Feast ends but that is just another DMs opinion on how they would run it.

Personally, I probably would not drop the current hit points when the Aid spell ends either (just imagine the party finishing a hard combat, everyone has less than 10 hit points, pulling it out by the skin of their teeth, grinning at each other, then they all drop dead because Aid ends and their hit points all go to zero).

[sithlordnergal]

That's what I thought too, cause you're not regaining HP.