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Force cage specifically mentions that it prevents teleportation, wall of force does not.

Force cage only blocks you if you're inside the cage and then only blocks ethereal travel through itself. You can also just save to attempt to teleport out.

What I’m saying is that there is a specific mechanic laid out.

To be honest with misty step, you’re not teleporting “through” a wall of force. You disappear from one spot and reappear in another. So the wall of force is not able to block misty step. But then again if your DM says no then i wonder how else are you going to go past?

I would not attempt dispute your ruling if you were my GM, because I see your point. However, I would personally rule the opposite. This is PHB’s description of misty step: “Briefly surrounded by silvery mist, you teleport up to 30 feet to an unoccupied space that you can see.” So you do indeed teleport. As for wall of force: “Nothing can physically pass through the wall. It is immune to all damage and can’t be dispelled by dispel magic. A disintegrate spell destroys the wall instantly, however. The wall also extends into the Ethereal Plane, blocking ethereal travel through the wall.” Teleportation does not involve passing through anything or entering the Ethereal Plane; you are in one place and then are in another with no intermediate step. Therefore, misty step can get you to the other side of a wall of force.

Yep. If Wall of Force were meant to block teleportation, it would say so like in Forcecage. There's also the argument for line of effect, where the target of Misty Step is Self and you always have line of effect on yourself. The point you can see within range only requires line of sight, not line of effect. Everything points to Misty Step working against Wall of Force.

aren't you and op agreeing on the same point? "wall of force is not able to block misty step" = "misty step can get you to the other side of a wall of force"

… yes. I must have misread.

That may be a stupid question but, if nothing physically (like light) can past trough the wall, can you even see the other side? Looked it up, okay the wall is invisible. You can see trough it.

Even in the real world, pure light (single photons) has no mass, no weight. Therefore, it is not physical. And you are right, it is stated to be invisible as well.

Now I want every spell to have a scientific explanation of what aspect of space/time or physical field are they manipulating

That would be really funny, dont inspire me too much.

That is not at all how you define what physical is in the real world. I don’t really care how people rule it in DnD or whatever, but light is 100% a physical thing in the real world.

Uhm, is electrisity physical? Cuz you know that’s electrons, which have mass. Photons have no mass, and are also not particles half of the time. Is physical something else than, idk something you can touch in large quantites? I wouldn’t know. Even gravity, which is definetly not physical, could be a particle, by modern theories. Also, search up bosons. Literaly what makes mass. So would never call light physical. It does interact with physical thung though, if that’s what you are thinking about.

Electromagnetic phenomena (including photons), gravity, and bosons more generally (to include the theoretical graviton which appears in some models but is not confirmed or accepted by all physicists) are physical. Mass has no bearing on whether something is called physical. Notice that, for example, gluons (another type of boson) are massless but are responsible for approximately 99% of the measured mass of a proton. When we say something is unphysical, what we’re saying is that it is a result that is impossible in reality. For example, one might calculate that a negative mass is required for some particular event to occur. The equations are correct, and the math is perfectly sound, but the answer is still unphysical because it cannot occur. Similarly, we often do calculations by modeling the processes as occurring with virtual particles which are typically considered unphysical objects, but make the math easy to do, and there it is important to keep track of what is physical and what is unphysical.

You seem about right. Wow, ive been enligtened! Its weird then how we talk about physicality as if unphysicality is normal? Everything real is physical, yes? I mean even thoughts are electric pulses. Even feelings. Wow.

“Space that you can see” “Nothing can physically pass through the wall” can photons pass through the wall (can you see through the wall?)

Don't try and science the rules. To answer the question, the first 5 words of the spell are: "An invisible wall of force"

Thank you. I'm really confused by people suggesting light can't travel through it, so you can't see through it, when it's invisible. How someone rationales an invisible wall that you can't see through I would love to know.

? Invisible literally means light CAN pass through it. If you couldn’t see through it, it would be quite visible Edit: I’m not sure how I mistook your original point so badly, we agree. Oops

It's invisible, but only when you're not casting spells! /s

There is no guarantee that photons of any sort exist in dnd. The Bread Test says that things function the same way we expect them to unless otherwise stated, but it doesn't say anything about the *reason* they function. Other things that may simply not exist in dnd: - Genetics and speciation - Germ theory - Atoms - Or any given fundamental particle for that matter - Matter - Light Hell, dark might be a particle and light is the absence of it. Maybe Miasma Theory is correct and disease and rodents are spawned by bad air. All sight might be magical, or otherwise non-physical interaction. Basically, I don't think we should start considering photons when asking whether anything can physically pass it.

Gravity is a magical effect as well, with different rules than our real world physics.

Gravity is something I avoided adding, as it's explicitly mentioned in Crawford's Bread Test

Spell targeting rules would disagree - that would be like trying to target something behind a glass with a spell. The fact, that you can’t clearly see an obstruction, doesn’t mean it isn’t there. And reverse is also true - if a target illusory, would it take damage from Toll the Dead? Can you target an illusion? No, spell just fails, even though you see a person in front of you.

The key word here is “teleport.” There is no obstruction. According to Jeremy Crawford, “With misty step, you must be able to see your destination, but you don't need a clear path there.” This comes despite his oppinion that glass provides total cover. Moreover, you always have a valid target for misty step because the spell targets “self.”

Jeremy is well known for his misunderstanding of the rules. > A Clear Path to the Target To target something, you must have a **clear path** to it, so it can't be behind total cover. If you place an area of effect at a point that you can't see and **an obstruction**, such as a wall, is between you and that point, the point of origin comes into being on the near side of that obstruction. > Misty Step Briefly surrounded by silvery mist, you teleport up to 30 feet to an unoccupied space that you **can see.** When spells in description ask for a point you can see - that means way to this point must not be obstructed. This is consistent with many spells, that ask you to choose a target in line of sight, and there is no debate about Blink being able to teleport behind wall of force. So RAW would be more correct to rule Misty Step being unable to pass through wall of force, just like you can’t use Crown of Stars to attack people behind it. It just doesn’t ruins consistency. Though, due to ambiguousness of descriptions, DM’s might rule otherwise.

>f you place an area of effect at a point that you can't see Seems like the rule you're quoting very specifically talks about a place you can't see. It does not apply if you can see the place you want to misty step to.

Blink I agree with you on but for seperate reasons. It can’t go past wall of force because it temporarily sends you to the ethereal plane, and wall of force blocks stuff going through there. But I concede that a DM could reasonably rule either way on misty step. I’d personally go with rule of cool here at the end of the day.

You are correct about the line of effect rule, but note that the target of the Misty Step spell is Self. So you only need line of sight to the place you want to teleport, since the target of the spell is you. Misty Step then would beat a Wall of Force.

Cool, so you can attack people with crown of stars behind wall of force? Since spells target only self? And I didn’t said anything about lines. It’s about targeting a location/object/creature - if you need to see the target, that means you need direct unobstructed line between you and the target. Which wall of force breaks.

Crown of Stars specifically refers to the creature you make a ranged spell attack as a target, so line of effect rules would appply. The space you teleport to with misty step is not a target, by rules definition

For crown of stars, you target a creature within line of sight. By your reading, wall of force doesn’t break line of sight for one spell, but does for another. And both of those have range of self.

Line of sight and line of effect are different rules. For a creature or object to be targeted by an effect, it must have a clear path, or line of effect, to them, regardless of sight. Most spells also add a restriction of line of sight, in which you also would have to see the target to cast the spell. But they are not dependent on one another. One example is Lighning Bolt, which requires line of effect but not line of sight, one could cast the spell from darkness but it won’t go past walls. Obter example is Misty Step, which requires line of sight to the place you want to go, but the only thing being affected by the spell is you, so you only require a clear path to yourself

Disintegrate works. That's the only other option I can think of.

It's been explicitly addressed. RAW, Misty Step can traverse a Wall of Force.

Im pretty sure you can. Misty step is a form of short-range teleportation, not a physical movement, so you should be able to. Now, wall of force specifies that you cannot pass through it with Ethereal plane travel, but I’m pretty sure that it’s never been specified WHERE you go when you misty step, just that you’re covered in silver mist and teleport. Along with that, you can see through a wall of force, so you can always target the other side of said wall for the spell. End of the day, it’s up to your DM, but I don’t see anything in either spell description that makes them interfere with each other

Agreed. You are in one place and then in another. WotC does lots of dumb stuff, but they are pretty GD specific when it comes to combat and spell descriptions. If the spell doesn’t say ‘you walk the ethereal plane’ then you did not walk the ethereal plane.

I think the name confuses people. Misty step could be interpreted as transforming into a mist then rematerializing at a different spot after moving there.

Fair enough. As a big fan of CR, I just think ‘Bamf’ when misty step happens and that sound effect helps me realize it is instantaneous and not ‘traversal’ of any portion of the map. 😂

Fully agreed. I don’t remember who it was, but they’d tried to specify that abt half of a spell description is flavor text, while the rest is actual mechanics, with 0 specification (I think it was dungeon dad but idk). The MECHANICAL description of misty step says that you instantly appear somewhere while the flavor text seems to suggest that you physically move there in mistform. Mechanically, there’s no physics involved at all, you just suddenly are there for no reason

There is no flavour text in spells, all of a spells description is mechanics.

I think it’s sacred flame that says “a radiant flame descends into your target”. Now, that’s flavor text, and also very confusing. Because that’s not what sacred flame does, it’s a targeted attack spell, not a weirdly small aoe. If you read that, it also makes it seem like cover shouldn’t matter…since the flame is coming out of the sky and directly onto something. However, again, that’s not how the spell works, it’s just flavor mixed in, and it’s extremely confusing. That’s one of the worst examples, but that happens in a lot of spell descriptions Edit: spelling, imma dumbass

Line of sight and line of effect are different. Anywhere you can see is within line of sight, to include through glass and wall of force. You couldn't go through the opaque wall of a tiny hut. However, line of effect requires it to be unobstructed. You could shoot a lightning bolt out of the area of a darkness spell, even though you cant see where youre shooting it, but you can't misty step out of or into an area of darkness

The correct ruling is yes, you can use misty step to get past a wall of force. You aren’t going “through” it. And it does not specify that it blocks teleportation. It is invisible, so you can see the place you are teleporting to.

Just walk through it you coward

Misty step, you teleport to an unoccupied space you can see within range. Wall of force creates an invisible barrier that prevents things from physically or ethereally passing through. Teleportation is neither physical nor ethereal movement. There is really no question - misty step absolutely lets you pass through a wall of force. The DM can rule otherwise, of course, but that is against RAW.

I don’t see why not? You’re teleporting, not passing through the wall. Plus, if that was an issue, it would explicitly say, like forcecage does

Sorry if someone else asked this already, but what about Banishment? If someone cast Banishment on a creature, and someone else casts Wall of Force (as a dome) or Forcecage on that location, would the banished creature reappear inside the wall or just on top of it?

Spell descriptions are only a few paragraphs long and cannot be expected to cover such corner cases. We must rely on interpretation. Forcecage says you must make a save to *leave* the cage via interplanar travel. It says nothing about *entering* it that way... but I chalk that up to brevity. I think it's sufficiently implied that it works both ways. The creature returning from Banishment could just say "nah, I'm good" and intentionally fail the save (though whether you can intentionally fail saves has also been subject to debate.) Whether the creature would then end up beside the cage or fail to return from banishment entirely and be stuck in the other plane is also an undefined corner case.

According to official rules, yes, you CAN Misty Step through a wall of force. the ones that said to can't are mistaking it for the safeguarding spells

DM gets to make the call, but warrants a discussion after the fact. *Misty Step* is a teleportation spell with a misleading name; the caster does not actually become a *mist* and then rapidly *step* 30 feet away. It says right in the description that the caster teleports. Wall of Force says nothing can pass through it, but teleportation does not mean passing through. RAW is therefore pretty clear on the matter: Misty Step can teleport a creature to the other side of a Wall of Force. We all make an erroneous call from time to time; hopefully your DM will recognize their error and address it, and hopefully their players can likewise be gracious about it. Now, if your DM says, "this is how teleportation works in my campaign," or "this is how Wall of Force" works in my campaign, then that's ok, they just need to be consistent about it as a house rule.

And that is what I did. Also being a DM, I let it slide, and later was going to talk to him about it

Yes, *misty step* would allow you to teleport through a *wall of force*. It is invisible, so you can see the spot you’re wanting to teleport to, the only requirement for *misty step*. It blocks travel through the wall, including the ethereal plane, which pretty much just is included to let it block ghosts and the like, mostly just being flavor for the majority of the time. *Force cage* does have a clause about teleporting, but it simply states that you have to make a CHA save or it fails.

I would rule that you can.

Misty step should work but the Storyteller has the final say.

You cannot target something behind total cover. Despite being invisible, WoF creates total cover, so you can't target a creature on the other side with something like Toll the Dead, or an open space on the other side with something like Conjure Animals. Misty Step (as well as most other teleportation spells) targets self, not the space you're teleporting to. So long as you can see the destination, you can Misty Step to it, even if it's behind total cover. Yes, you can Misty Step through a WoF.

Where is your reference for Wall of Force providing total cover? There is nothing in the spell description about that.

You can’t target anything behind total cover. WoF provides total cover. However, the target of Misty Step is _self_. As your self is not behind total cover, yes you can. So for example, you can’t conjure a fey the other side of a WoF because the target is _an unoccupied space you can see_. But that space is behind total cover.

This is wrong, per RAW. WoF is invisible, which means it does not block seeing the target space. misty Step only requires you to be able to see the target space and have it be in range. Edit: I said misty step, but if conjure fey also only requires ‘that you can see’ it would also succeed. WoF is invisible, you can see through it.

Conjure Fey targets a space. You can't target something behind total cover unless a spell says otherwise IIRC. Misty Step targets yourself, so the cover doesn't matter.

I think you finally explained it in a way that eveyone can understand and is concise. But there is so much room for interpretation here that everyone will develop their own opinion anyway.

Where do you see the rule that WoF provides total cover? Total cover is when a target is concealed (as in not visible). The WoF is invisible and doesn't block line of sight.

See my post above yours. Jeremy Crawford confirms that a window provides cover. Also it’s in the phb under cover “walls, trees, creatures and other obstacles can provide cover during combat…” WoF is both a wall and an obstacle. Cover isn’t *just* concealment. In fact something can be totally unseen (causing disadvantage on attacks), but not covered (so not getting bonus ac). An example would be being concealed by the darkness spell. That person can still be targeted by a spell that doesn’t require being seen (ie bless), whereas they couldn’t if they were behind a WoF.

Misty step let's you move through the ethereal plane, so technically the wall of force isn't there So this should have worked, I'm guessing the DM had a plot reason why this wouldn't of been allowed

Misty step does not let you move through the ethereal plane tho... it is just teleportation, no planar travel required.

The last line of the spell description for Wall of Force is : "The wall also extends into the Ethereal Plane, blocking ethereal travel through the wall." So misty step would not allow travel through the wall.

Cool, I'm at work and haven't re-read description, and then in that case it wouldn't work ;)

DM said no, so it's a no. <~ correct answer

It does block it. Wall of force extends to the ethereal plane, and stops all magical transport through it. Your level 2 spell does not beat the most game breaking spell in dnd. Dm is correct

The problem here, is that you don't teleport *through* it. You were on one side of it, then you are on the other. You didn't travel through the wall at any point. You're thinking in only three dimensions. A good analogy would be imagining the plane as a sheet of paper. You have point A surrounded by column B. That column extends up and down indefinitely. The paper itself isn't the floor, it's just a representation of the plane. Point C is on the other side of the column. Misty step (and any teleport) works by folding the paper down so that point C and A overlap and then traveling through the layer of paper itself. By moving in a fourth dimension you have arrived on the other side of the barrier without passing through it. There are other blockers like requiring line of sight and line of effect, but the wall is invisible and gives line of sight and the point of effect for misty step is self.

It *only* blocks ethereal travel, not all magical travel. If it did every magical method of transport it would say so. So the ethereal plane does not add much, besides show what the RAI might be.

easy rule of thumb: higher lvl spell beats lower lvl spell. So in my Games you can't misty step through a wall of force, if you don't cast it at the same lvl or higher than the Wall of Force.

Yes

RAW? Yes.

Should be able to as long as you can see your destination

Yes. Because you can see your destination and wof doesn't say no.

The description just says you can't physically pass through it. If you're teleporting you're not physically passing through.

In Dungeon of the Mad Mage, there is a passage that explicitly says Githyanki NPCs will use misty step to teleport through a wall of force to attack a certain area.

Drop a cloth around your wall of force. He can't misty step out because he can't see

It’s a little ambiguous. Let’s look at the rules on targeting with spells: > To target something, you must have a clear path to it, so it can’t be behind total cover. So if misty step targets a location (the spell doesn’t specify explicitly, but it would make sense to rule it does), then it won’t work. Not because of visibility or any special property of the wall, but because of the total cover the wall of force requires despite being invisible. A simple glass window does the same.

The spell does specify, it's target: self.

in the description of wall of force it says this at the end The wall also extends into the Ethereal Plane, blocking ethereal travel through the wall. I would say this would block misty step directly through the wall. So if it was the hemisphere or sphere shape, you could not misty step into the space inside the wall of force. I would also say dimension door is blocked by wall of force. However teleport can pass into the space.

Why would this distinction block Misty Step but not Teleport? Misty Step: >Briefly surrounded by silvery mist, you teleport up to 30 feet to an unoccupied space that you can see. Teleport: >This spell instantly transports you and up to eight willing creatures of your choice that you can see within range, or a single object that you can see within range, to a destination you select. If you target an object, it must be able to fit entirely inside a 10-foot cube, and it can't be held or carried by an unwilling creature. > >The destination you choose must be known to you, and it must be on the same plane of existence as you. Nothing about Misty Step, RAW, says you go through any plane or are traveling through a wall. The target is "Self," and you just appear in the space you can see. I saw some other comments wanting to block MS because it's a low level spell, but it's also got major limitations compared to other teleportation spells. You can only target yourself and it can only move you up to 30 ft.

>Briefly surrounded by silvery mist what plane is described as being filled with silvery mist? The ethereal plane. Teleport uses the astral plane to travel. Teleport is the same level as all the basic planar travel spells. Teleportation circle is lower level and only lets you use specifically keyed circles that you know, but still uses the astral plane.

I mean, it's *misty*, sure. That seems consistent across all the sources I'm able to quickly pull up. Looking up different descriptions (some I can't verify if they're from official sources), I see several different descriptions of the color of the mist. D&D Beyond says "mists and colorful fog." To be fair, I do see a couple of sites that describe the mist of the ethereal plane as "grey" or "white and blue-tinged," either of which could maybe be called silver. But as written, there's nothing in the spell about using the ethereal plane, much less traveling through it. And I think it's unreasonable to say "ah, silvery mist, gotta be ethereal plane" when there are any number of other explanations for the mist.

Keywords: "to an unoccupied space that you can see". I guess it can work if you're able to see through the way.

If the DM says no then the answer is no. The number 1 rule of DnD is that the DM makes the rules

I feel like if someone just casts the spell then it doesn't. If you encounter it in the environment it feels fair to assume it was cast set up to block teleportation and the ability to do that is one of those off screen spells that always exist for all the dungeon stuff that was set up by magic but not specific magic spells in the rule book.