Dancing Lights: Glow and Behold
Usable By: Artificer, Bard, Sorcerer, Wizard
Spell Level: 0 (Cantrip)
School: Evocation
Casting Time: 1 Action
Range: 120 feet
Duration: Concentration up to 1 minute
Components: V, S, M (a bit of phosphorus or wychwood, or a glowworm)
You create up to four torch--‐‑sized lights within range, making them appear as torches, lanterns, or glowing orbs that hover in the air for the duration. You can also combine the four lights into one glowing vaguely humanoid form of Medium size. Whichever form you choose, each light sheds dim light in a 10-foot radius.
As a bonus action on your turn, you can move the lights up to 60 feet to a new spot within range. A light must be within 20 feet of another light created by this spell, and a light winks out if it exceeds the spell’s range.
Review by Sam West, Twitter: @CrierKobold
The Light cantrips in 5th edition are really awkward to justify putting on a character sheet to me. If you’re getting them for free they can be fairly convenient to have (if you’re playing a Drow, for example), but when compared against other cantrips the utility of them mirrors a few torches and a tinderbox. You don’t really ever NEED these cantrips. That being said, if you have Dancing Lights or like the aesthetic of it, it melds the worlds of Light cantrips with that of the cosmetic cantrips like Druidcraft and Thaumaturgy.
At its best, Dancing Lights lights up three twenty foot areas around a dark room somewhere deep in a dungeon for a single action. Oftentimes this isn’t going to be worth an action, especially in initiative, but in some rare cases you’ll find creatures using darkness to weaponize special abilities that are majorly hindered. Most games won’t ever see an encounter like this. Outside of that, they are thematic ways to light the darkness with dim light in a wide area.
If you’re going for the fey trickster or otherworldly horror caster feel, the vaguely humanoid form can help satisfy some of those thematic looks you’re looking for. It isn’t particularly applicable, but will occasionally offer silly moments mimicking an NPC or unnerving a camp of bandits from a distance. It creatively could offer a form of distraction, which can have some value. Minor Illusion is probably better at doing these things, but Dancing Lights comes with torch-like utility as well.
Again, Dancing Lights will never be NECESSARY. Its utility is kind of capped at that of mundane adventuring equipment. Dimly lit areas are considered lightly obscured, remember, so you’ll still have disadvantage on Perception checks in the area, but a lot of the time that isn’t going to be majorly impactful. It can be a cute little convenient spell that both is your means of seeing in complete darkness while offering some magical fantasies to facilitate some character narratives. If you ever need to concentrate on something else, though, be ready to actually have other light sources or darkvision at the ready.
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