Gaming Staple: Sleep Spell Part 2

Last night was game night and I was talking with the uber goobs about the sleep.  I crunch some numbers. 

With 5th edition based on hit points.  It's current write up knocks out 5d8 hit points worth of enemies.  I'll use the goblin as the standard enemy.  I check the goblin stats in the Starter Set and they have 7hp.  So an average roll for the spell would be 22 to 23 hit points affected.  So in 5e a mage can put to sleep an average of 3 goblins. 

In older editions the standard sleep spell could take out 4d4 creature with 1 hit die or less.  Goblins average less than a hit die in older versions.  So the mage would average 10 goblins a Sleep spell. 

So the Sleep spell in 5e has been nerfed a bit.  I don't mind the change.  I always thought Sleep was overpowering to begin with.  I like the 5e version because its not overpowering at low levels and doesn't become completely useless at high levels.

JDJarvis brings up an interesting situation. 
What interests me in that notation is if the HP limits for spell effects are meant to be the targets usual healthy HP score or the current score. If the current score it opens a host of tactics that were otherwise completely absent, hitting a troll a couple times and casting sleep on it is now valid (but does it wake up when it regenerates above the HP limit of the spell?).

I think I would run with current hit points.  The party manages to whittle down a giant to 10 hit points and the mage hit it with a sleep, I say good on them.  Maybe the next giant will get to make meat soup.

How would you guys rule it?

Taking a Look at One of the Staples of D&D

One of the things I do is take a look at staples that are in every edition and played a lot.  In this case, I looked at the Sleep spell.

Most versions of the sleep spell effect Hit Dice of the creature.  There is usually some scale of the number of creatures effected.  This time around, 5th edition has taken the sleep spell and made it based on Hit Points. 

My first reaction was neutral.  I thought, okay, a little change up.  But still a bit of a token one.  But what I liked is the spell progressively gets more powerful with the mage.  In past editions it was the big bomb spell at lower levels and discarded soon after.  So the increase of hit points it effects as the character increases in level will make it a viable spell long term.

Since I'm on lunch break, I don't have any numbers.  I'll check back when I get home and do some calculations to compare version.

So this staple of the game, for me, has been improved.

Numbers later.

Sleep Spell Chart

This is the kind of crap I do instead of working on one of my projects. I am looking up a stat for this or that or some critter and I wonder what it looks like in one of the other gaming systems. And off I go. Twenty books spread across my desk, this time all opened to the Sleep spell, and now I can't even find my keyboard.

I picked the Sleep spell this time because it is the quintessential 1st level spell. No mage leaves home without it. And for a 1st level spell it is by far the most powerful. Magic Missile wounds one, maybe you get a kill if you run into a sickly kobold. Read Magic I always had a problem with since I am playing a mage should I not have been trained in the oogly googly language of magic? Charm Person is a great one, but again it affects a single target. And if the target makes his or her saving throw you are stuck there with nothing but a stubby dagger in your hand. Has shouting "Stop, or I'll kill you with my darts!" ever been effective? Hold Portal, is handy, but a chair or a lock can do the same. Needing to cast Shield would mean I am getting attacked. Why aren't my meat shields doing their job? Then you have a handful of useful utility spells like Light, Read Languages, Identify, and Unseen Servant are all useful, but not worth taking up a spell slot during the exploration of the Spastic Lizardmen Temple of Unseen Smells.

Sleep can single handedly take out a small army of critters and all of a sudden that stubby little dagger of yours becomes the most powerful weapon in existence to those taking a snooze.

So this is where my time goes. I spent going through as many system books as I could find and comparing the differences of the Sleep spell. One thing they all seem to agree on is Sleep is a 1st level spell. So here is a table of the basic information. I guess the one thing that always bothered me about the Sleep spell was no saving throw. Systems seem to be split on this one. Anyways, this is how I spent my Sunday afternoon. It is now Monday morning and I have finally put back my books so I could write this. Click on it to make it larger.