Master Necromancy: Desolation
PDF Link | D&D Beyond: Desolation, Kaleidoscopic Rays, Pyroclasm, Static Overload, Volatile Reaction
Art Credit: http://www.magali-villeneuve.com/?page_id=9
If finger of death isn’t enough targeted death and destruction for you, today’s spell and its variants might be exactly what you and your necromancer crave. This massive gathering of unwieldy dark magic will also satisfy those looking for a spell that they can “charge up” like certain famous energy attacks, but even charging the spell is dangerous to those around you! Beams of necrotic energy streak out at five targets each time, and you must choose five. If you don’t want to harm your allies, you may have to destroy some objects!
Desolation is the most potent necromancy in a lineage of similar spells: inflict wounds, blight, harm, and finger of death, all of which target a single creature and blast it with high necrotic damage, using either a Constitution saving throw or a spell attack. As a capstone spell in that design, it gains the advantage of being able to damage enemies in an area, but it remains far less destructive and easier to use in confined quarters than more-damaging 9th-level spells like meteor swarm or obliteration beam. There are a number of different ways to use desolation. You can cast the spell in combat and use the attack on the same turn, treating it as a super-potent version of inflict wounds and finger of death. You can hold onto the spell for multiple turns, charging it up, and choosing to either stay away and send the minor blasts at weaker foes, or to stay within close range of your menacing target (and risk the loss of concentration) to focus all the spell’s damage onto that enemy.
You can even use the spell out of combat. If you are ambushing a foe or expect a fight to begin soon, you can take the extreme risk of using a 9th-level spell slot and knowing that it could be entirely wasted, at the possible gain of extreme power in the first round of combat. Be warned that desolation is powerful magic and can be difficult to hide, especially when charging the spell may disintegrate a dozen nearby objects! Still, even its destructive capabilities can be targeted, and the spell can be used in or out of combat to strike objects themselves, disintegrating most materials nearly effortlessly, with no protection for magical objects. The spell uses the same syntax for damaging objects as meteor swarm. Some DMs may grant protection to worn and carried objects when using these spells, but others may not, as official rulings on the matter have been unclear.
This preview also features spell variants from The Impermissicon for desolation, including the 9th-level pyromancy pyroclasm, which appears on the Pyromancer spell list in the recently released compendium, The Elements & Beyond. Now that pyroclasm has been previewed, all the spells and spell variants from that compendium’s spell specialization lists that can’t be found in the compendium itself (because they’re found in another compendium) have been previewed. Those spells include aeromancies strangulate and veiled blade, the pyromancy blood to flame, with variants of blood to flame for each of the other three elements, and a fiery pyromancy variant of carnage blast called living bomb.
Also be sure to check out The Elements and Beyond! It’s entirely free and available right now! This 246 page compendium contains 23 subclasses, 8 spellcasting feats, 134 spells, 213 spell variants, 85 monsters, 30 magic items, 4 races plus 12 new subraces each with racial feats, and even more goodies for players and DMs!
PDF Link | D&D Beyond: Desolation, Kaleidoscopic Rays, Pyroclasm, Static Overload, Volatile Reaction
