Bigby's Hand

[Baybans]

Good Evening,

Just need clarification on Bigby's Hand. It's the bonus part. Once the Mage has cast it the next round as a bonus attack I read it as he can move it and then as an action he tells the hand what he wants it to do. The players have disagreed and are saying it is a kin to Mage Hand but mage hand is controlled by an action.

Bottom line after the mage has cast it and he is into the second round, can he use an action and if he can what can he do? And then use the bonus attack to move and then attack with Bigbys Hand?

Kind Regards

[Griogre]

Assuming D&D 5E. It costs one action to cast the spell. It takes one bonus action to get it to do something once it exists (including on the first round), ie move and attack.

So after the first round it moves and attacks using just a bonus action presuming the caster maintains concentration.

[Baybans]

Ok, thanks for the info, yes it is 5E and as the GM not the reply I wanted but the rules are the rules. I'll just have to beef up the Monsters....

[Griogre]

It is concentration based, keep that in mind, and a 5th level spell. If the party is only 9th-10th it should make a big difference but it's still just one fight. Keep in mind a party is supposed to get through six fights in an adventuring day. Spellcasters get overpowered if you are not making them stretch their resources over that number of fights since the spell slots per day is tuned to that number of encounters.

I'm currently running two 5E groups of characters, one's at 15th, and one's 16th and while Bigby's Hand is still a good spell only one group's wizard uses it regularly and for them it's no better than a fighter. That wizard values it for blocking, tieing down one monster, while doing damage.

Unless a caster is very careful or invested in concentration, its fairly rare for them to get more than 4-5 rounds out of a concentration spell (ie one fight). I do have a cleric in one group who is fully invested in concentration and has a displacer cloak who uses spirit guardians which is a 10 minute spell. In a dungeon, he will usually get through 2 sometimes 3 encounters with the spell - but that is his whole character concept.

[Baybans]

Thanks Griogre, that is really helpful. The dungeon I'm running has seven levels with seven keys that open the final dungeon. I'm allowing them two short rests in each dungeon and one long rest at the end. As I'm new-ish to 5E I'm still learning the GM ropes. I'll keep what you have said in mind as at present the mage is trying to keep the powerful spells for the end bosses. I've had to tweak things as I go to ensure it's not too easy and also not too hard.

But I digress, thanks again for the info, I'm sure my next post will be about Swashbucklers and sneak attack....