Divine Smite question.

[Lax]

Hey everyone.

So I've tested this multiple times just to see if my eyes aren't playing tricks on me, but I've noticed that divine smite doesn't cost a spell slot if you miss the attack. it only uses up a spell slot if the attack lands. Is this supposed to be happening? Or is that a feature for paladins?

[Hobocop]

Sounds about right.

That applies to all of the bonus action smite spells as well. They're only discharged once you land a successful hit.

[brendan_in_china]

Yep, this is something new from Larian/One D&D. Dunno if it'll make the final cut. Seems okay though.

[Haven]

Originally posted by brendan_in_china:

Yep, this is something new from Larian/One D&D. Dunno if it'll make the final cut. Seems okay though.

thy work like that in 5e. You choose after hitting if you want to use divine smite or not and for the spells, they are applied to you and only expended when you actually hit. Not really a OneD&D thing.

[brendan_in_china]

Ah sorry, thought we were talking about the smite spells. Yes, for divine smite feature, it's working as intended.

[Aldain]

Oh, they don't discharge until they land?

...That makes them so much better than I thought.

[Lax]

Originally posted by Aldain:

Oh, they don't discharge until they land?

...That makes them so much better than I thought.

indeed. I honestly thought that it was a bug at first. Now I don't feel nearly as bashful about selecting my attacks that exhaust spell slots with the Pally.

Smite away.

[WeenerTuck813]

It’s actually employed in a fashion that weakens it.

In table top you get to roll and see if you roll a crit or not before choosing to smite

[Haven]

Originally posted by Lax:

Originally posted by Aldain:

Oh, they don't discharge until they land?

...That makes them so much better than I thought.

indeed. I honestly thought that it was a bug at first. Now I don't feel nearly as bashful about selecting my attacks that exhaust spell slots with the Pally.

Smite away.

honestly, the implementation of the smite spells was troublesome for me. I would go to activate one and end up with my character swinging their sword at an empty space and wasting their action. Would love if Larian could look into the analytics of how often others do similar and then correct the spell behavior. Ideally, it'd be like the PnP here you use your bonus to activate the spell and then make an attack as normal with it activating the first tmie you hit. Currently it tries to use your bonus action and attack the same time you activate it.

[Revener]

Originally posted by Haven923:

Originally posted by Lax:

indeed. I honestly thought that it was a bug at first. Now I don't feel nearly as bashful about selecting my attacks that exhaust spell slots with the Pally.

Smite away.

honestly, the implementation of the smite spells was troublesome for me. I would go to activate one and end up with my character swinging their sword at an empty space and wasting their action. Would love if Larian could look into the analytics of how often others do similar and then correct the spell behavior. Ideally, it'd be like the PnP here you use your bonus to activate the spell and then make an attack as normal with it activating the first tmie you hit. Currently it tries to use your bonus action and attack the same time you activate it.

You can set it to activate when you hit.

Swinging in empty space and wasting an action is really annoying, have done it a few times. Would be nice if they fixed that.

[KOHb]

https://roll20.net/compendium/dnd5e/Paladin

Divine Smite

Starting at 2nd Level, when you hit a creature with a melee weapon Attack, you can expend one spell slot to deal radiant damage to the target, in addition to the weapon's damage. The extra damage is 2d8 for a 1st-level spell slot, plus 1d8 for each Spell Level higher than 1st, to a maximum of 5d8. The damage increases by 1d8 if the target is an Undead or a fiend.

So you declare DS usage only if you land a hit.

Or
https://explorednd.com/gameplay/divine-smite-5e-guide

• It is damage that you can add AFTER a confirmed hit 
• Does 2d8 Radiant damage normally
• Consumes Spell slots 
• Increases damage based on the level of the spell slot
• Does bonus damage on Fiends and Undead
So, you can use it when you see a critical hit or when the DM says you land a blow. It lets you keep the spell slot if you miss it and is a huge source of extra damage. 

[Screwit102]

The rules in 5E state that when a paladin makes an attack, they can choose to expend a spell slot to smite. So you would roll your attack, and then choose to smite. Usually players will wait to smite until they have rolled a Critical. The fact that they would not expend the spell slot if the attack misses, makes sense to me since they don't ask if you would like to smite after the attack roll has Hit. However, if we make it to higher levels it must be known that only spell slots of up to 5th level can be expended to smite.

[Yojo0o]

Originally posted by Screwit102:

The rules in 5E state that when a paladin makes an attack, they can choose to expend a spell slot to smite. So you would roll your attack, and then choose to smite. Usually players will wait to smite until they have rolled a Critical. The fact that they would not expend the spell slot if the attack misses, makes sense to me since they don't ask if you would like to smite after the attack roll has Hit. However, if we make it to higher levels it must be known that only spell slots of up to 5th level can be expended to smite.

You can smite with higher-level spell slots, they just don't scale beyond what a fifth level slot gives you. Paladins ordinarily don't get higher level slots than fifth anyway, of course.

[spamfilter32]

Originally posted by WeenerTuck813:

It’s actually employed in a fashion that weakens it.

In table top you get to roll and see if you roll a crit or not before choosing to smite

You can actually do that. Go to the reaction system and select "ask on crit" and when ever you roll a crit it will pause and ask if you want to smite.