Minor Conjuration vs. Illusory Reality

[robbie374]

What are the pros and cons of Minor Conjuration and Illusory Reality, and which is better in which circumstances?

[Coidzor]

Illusory Reality is great if you have days between adventuring where you can burn through your higher level spell slots because during Downtime an Illusionist can make and stockpile a bunch of permanent Major Images and then use Malleable Illusion to make them into whatever you want to make real.

[Contrast]

Illusory Reality is great if you have days between adventuring where you can burn through your higher level spell slots because during Downtime an Illusionist can make and stockpile a bunch of permanent Major Images and then use Malleable Illusion to make them into whatever you want to make real.

I note the success of this trick depends on how your DM rules on moving the illusions - if they say you can create an illusion of a tattoo or something and it'll stay there as you move about its insane, if they say a single Major Image takes your action every turn to move (which is what the rules say) or it stays put then its less useful (though you can still deck your home out in illusions which is cool).

As for minor conjuration vs illusory reality. Minor Conjuration has the edge from levels 2-13 by dint of illusory reality being a level 14 ability...

Minor Conjuration is fun and characterful replacement for mundane equipment. Illusory reality is incredibly useful in combat and non-combat situations and probably the most powerful use of a level 1 spell slot when combined with silent image. Assuming you have spell slots left and are level 14+ illusory reality is better. Minor Conjuration has some niche abilities by having a longer duration but the limitations on what you can create with it really restricts how powerful it can be.

[Dalebert]

Illusory Reality is far superior, but of course it should be for a 14th level feature vs a 2nd level feature.

The range is pretty good on Major Image. It's pretty viable to keep two illusions with you. You're presumably not using your actions for much when just traveling. Every now and then as the illusion is lagging behind, *POP* and now it's the range of the spell up the path.

And they're reusable. Illusory reality says one object (not even necessarily the whole illusion) becomes real for a minute. Doesn't say the illusion goes away. It just goes back to being illusory, or presumably vanishes if it was just part of the illusion. Either way, your illusion is intact.

[JackPhoenix]

Note that you can trigger Illusory reality "when you cast the spell", not a week later, so you'll have to burn slots to use the trick. Even if you rule that the "when you cast the spell" clause means it works only on your spells, not that it must be used the same turn when you cast the spell, there's RAI: http://www.sageadvice.eu/2015/07/17/illusory-reality-2/

[newbie]

Illusory Reality:
"You can do this on your turn as a bonus action while the spell is ongoing"

[Coidzor]

Note that you can trigger Illusory reality "when you cast the spell", not a week later, so you'll have to burn slots to use the trick. Even if you rule that the "when you cast the spell" clause means it works only on your spells, not that it must be used the same turn when you cast the spell, there's RAI: http://www.sageadvice.eu/2015/07/17/illusory-reality-2/

What is in that tweet that supports the claim that the rules were intended that you had to make and commit to the decision to use Illusory Reality only on the round that the spell was cast and only use that ability on the round that the spell was cast?

All that tweet says is that you can't use Illusory Reality multiple times per spell?

[Dalebert]

As newbie just pointed out, the ability specifically says you can use it at any time during the duration of the spell.


All that tweet says is that you can't use Illusory Reality multiple times per spell?

Yeah, but that really needs to be errata-ed because it's not at all clear or even implied by the description which reads as the illusion being reusable. I do think such a limitation would be very reasonable on an extremely powerful ability and it's still arguably the best wizard archetype feature available. You can still use a 1st level slot to have nigh insurmountable crowd control for a minute with no save. A Silent Image is almost as good as Wall of Stone, better in some cases ala the adamantine box around the demon lord who can only teleport if he can see where he's going. Yep, I was the lucky DM for that one. *facepalm*

[JackPhoenix]

What is in that tweet that supports the claim that the rules were intended that you had to make and commit to the decision to use Illusory Reality only on the round that the spell was cast and only use that ability on the round that the spell was cast?

All that tweet says is that you can't use Illusory Reality multiple times per spell?

Exactly. The rules aren't perfectly clear if you must use Illusory Reality when you cast the spell, as I've noted in my post. Even if you rule that you don't, you can still use it only once per spell per RAI, so the trick with permanent illusions doesn't really work.

[Dalebert]

Exactly. The rules aren't perfectly clear if you must use Illusory Reality when you cast the spell...

:smallconfused:
Exsqueeze me? I can't imagine how they could make it much clearer than this.
http://i.imgur.com/klvhKsL.png

[JackPhoenix]

:smallconfused:
Exsqueeze me? I can't imagine how they could make it much clearer than this.
http://i.imgur.com/klvhKsL.png

If they removed the "When you cast the spell" or changed it "Once per spell" or something like that. "When you cast the spell" isn't the same as "Anytime during the spell's duration"

[robbie374]

If they removed the "When you cast the spell" or changed it "Once per spell" or something like that. "When you cast the spell" isn't the same as "Anytime during the spell's duration"

"When you cast an illusion spell...choose one object...and make that object real."
"You can do this on your turn as a bonus action while the spell is ongoing."

I think we need to compare this to Malleable Illusions, about which there seems to be no controversy:

"When you cast an illusion spell...you can use your action to change the nature of that illusion."

I don't know why they wrote an overly-verbose description for Illusory Reality, but it says effectively the same thing, with the only difference being the use of a bonus action rather than an action. Both say "When you cast", and neither would be sensibly limited to only at the moment of casting. Both require a later action or bonus action after the initial casting action. If either can be done multiple times during the duration of the spell "while the spell is ongoing", both can be.

Jeremy Crawford made it clear that Illusory Reality requires the use of only one object. However, that one object can be made real as many times as the illusion can be malleable.

Can the real object be changed/remade with Malleable Illusion?

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Both Minor Conjuration and Illusory Reality raise questions about taking or dealing damage, and the latter forbids to "directly harm anyone". I was reading the EE guide the other day and noticed the following under the Mold Earth cantrip:

"If you target an area of loose earth, you can instantaneously excavate it, move it along the ground, and deposit it up to 5 feet away. This movement doesn’t have enough force to cause damage."

Shape Water has similar wording.

Causing damage is then very distinct from drastically changing the landscape, possibly making terrain difficult, blocking things, digging, causing a sudden change in water current that could easily have adverse effects on someone in the water, etc.

How this is different from "directly harming anyone" is less clear. If you created a cage around a flying dragon which would naturally plummet toward the ground, is that direct harm?

Are there other examples of similar wording about "harm"?

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Furthermore, if a creature discerns the illusion as being illusory, and then the illusion is changed with Malleable Illusion, is that creature deceived again, or do they know forever? Especially, if the illusion was hidden from that creature's sight prior to the Malleable change, what is the impact?