You entwine magic with your voice, causing your taunts and jibes to physically harm your enemies. You can attack with your words once when you finish Casting the Spell, and can repeat the attack once on each of your subsequent turns by taking a single action, which has the attack, concentrate, and linguistic traits. After your third attack total, the spell ends.
Since the spell doesn't have an initial target, is the auditory trait only asking the caster be able to speak? The attack targets don't have to hear you or the spell?
As I understand it, casting the spell is a temporary buff that gives you access to a unique attack. However, the attacks themselves, both the one you can use for free after casting the spell and the two you can use on subsequent turns with one action, don't have the auditory trait. I just need to satisfy the attack, concentrate, and linguistic traits to attack a target with it.
So versus a group of common-speaking enemies that have been deafened, can my common-speaking character cast Biting Words and use it to attack those enemies successfully?
Since the spell doesn't have an initial target, is the auditory trait only asking the caster be able to speak? The attack targets don't have to hear you or the spell?
Of course they do. When you use Biting Words on a creature, this creature is a target of Biting Words and you apply all the rules about targeting (being able to see it, having line of effect to it, and traits like Linguistic and Auditory).
Any time you perform a direct effect on something it becomes a target of what you are doing.
Your interpretation of biting words providing a "buff" is incorrect.
The whole thing is a spell effect, it simply has a duration that isn't instantaneous. Biting words requires the target to hear, and understand the language you speak.
You're magically infusing your words to cause harm, but if the enemy doesn't understand that you're making fun of them it tends to make such words fall on figuratively deaf ears.
So are the repeat attacks having no auditory trait an oversight? It feels odd if only the first attack has it.
I feel like all the traits of the spell should apply to the repeat attacks too but then I’m a bit confused why it would point out the traits for them as separate. The concentrate trait makes sense but don’t the attack and linguistic traits seem redundant?
So are the repeat attacks having no auditory trait an oversight? It feels odd if only the first attack has it.
I feel like all the traits of the spell should apply to the repeat attacks too but then I’m a bit confused why it would point out the traits for them as separate. The concentrate trait makes sense but don’t the attack and linguistic traits seem redundant?
I don't understand well why they haven't repeated the same traits on the subsequent attacks. Anyway, Linguistic is the most limiting trait. It's true that without Auditory you could use Telepathy, but I don't know of any easy way to get it.
So are the repeat attacks having no auditory trait an oversight? It feels odd if only the first attack has it.
I feel like all the traits of the spell should apply to the repeat attacks too but then I’m a bit confused why it would point out the traits for them as separate. The concentrate trait makes sense but don’t the attack and linguistic traits seem redundant?
In my opinion yes.
I suppose if you had telepathy I might allow you to use the attacks without the enemy being able to hear...but it's a very unlikely set of circumstances that would lead to it.
You would need to be in a place where you can speak and it makes noise because the spell has the auditory trait. But the enemy would need to be unable to hear you (deaf would be the only cause that isn't environmental that I'm aware of) and you would need to share a language the enemy can understand and have telepathy. The linguistic trait requires the enemy understand your words, which I suppose doesn't absolutely require hearing them but would at least require telepathy.
Ultimately, I think the spells description should have simply included the auditory trait on the subsequent attacks and consider it an omission.
To be honest the traits on the spell are kind of a mess in the first place because it has sonic trait which means the spell needs to be able to make sound but doesn't need to be heard (I'm paraphrasing) so it can't work in vacuum. But it also has the auditory trait, meaning it needs to be heard. To me that's redundant, as if the spell doesn't make sound it can't be heard and thus fails the auditory requirement.
Auditory is more restrictive than sonic. And linguistic means the spell must be understood. And ignoring telepathy (and maybe lip reading), linguistic is more restrictive than auditory because it must be heard to be understood.
Perhaps, with that sort of logic the writer neglected to add the other traits to the subsequent attacks.
Auditory is more restrictive than sonic. And linguistic means the spell must be understood. And ignoring telepathy (and maybe lip reading), linguistic is more restrictive than auditory because it must be heard to be understood.
Outside Telepathy and sign language, Linguistic is more restrictive than Auditory.
But Sonic is different from Auditory as it means it deals Sonic damage. Sonic and Auditory are not linked together. You can have the Sonic Trait without Auditory and the Auditory Trait without Sonic.Someone immune to Sonic wouldn't take the damage of a spell with the Sonic trait but still the other effects if it also has the Auditory Trait.
Auditory is more restrictive than sonic. And linguistic means the spell must be understood. And ignoring telepathy (and maybe lip reading), linguistic is more restrictive than auditory because it must be heard to be understood.Outside Telepathy and sign language, Linguistic is more restrictive than Auditory.
But Sonic is different from Auditory as it means it deals Sonic damage. Sonic and Auditory are not linked together. You can have the Sonic Trait without Auditory and the Auditory Trait without Sonic.
Someone immune to Sonic wouldn't take the damage of a spell with the Sonic trait but still the other effects if it also has the Auditory Trait.
That's not completely correct, at least according to AoN.
An effect with the sonic trait functions only if it makes sound, meaning it has no effect in an area of silence or in a vacuum. This is different from an auditory spell, which is effective only if the target can hear it. A sonic effect might deal sonic damage. A creature with this trait has a magical connection to powerful sound.
It might deal sonic damage, but the important part is actually that it wont function in areas of silence or vacuum.
And a creature immune to sonic damage isn't necessarily immune to the effects of a spell with the sonic tag, they would only be immune to sonic damage caused by it.
And a creature immune to sonic damage
I don't think there's anything that limit Immunity to damage. A Mental immune creature will be immune both to Mental damage and Mental effects. A Sonic Immune creature is immune both to Sonic damage and Sonic effects.
That's not completely correct, at least according to AoN.
We can discuss on details. Still, there are lots of Auditory effects that are not Sonic ones. So Auditory is distinct from Sonic.
As such you can have a spell with a part of its effects dependent on its Sonic trait and another part on its Auditory trait and creatures facing different effects depending on their immunities/ability to hear.
Assuming leaving the Auditory trait out of the successive attacks isn't an oversight, I would flavor it as you say something once and then the jibe echoes in the enemy's head causing damage in future rounds.
But that's definitely not how it works because you can attack different creatures each time and it doesn't cause persistent damage.
The linguistic trait does most of the heavy lifting, but without the auditory trait it technically wouldn't require the enemy to hear the 2nd or 3rd attack but would require telepathy or lip reading for those attacks to be possible, and I doubt that was the intention because it doesn't make sense.
@SuperBidi, I agree that sonic and auditory are obviously different traits. I was trying to make an analogy that auditory is like a more restrictive version of sonic, because auditory requires noise be made and heard while sonic only requires noise be made. Does that make sense?
@SuperBidi, I agree that sonic and auditory are obviously different traits. I was trying to make an analogy that auditory is like a more restrictive version of sonic, because auditory requires noise be made and heard while sonic only requires noise be made. Does that make sense?
I think I see it differently. For me Auditory and Sonic are unrelated outside one thing: None of them work in an area of Silence.
But it's like the half full glass and the half empty glass, just a different way of looking at the same thing.
Don't forget areas of vacuum too! You can't have sound without a medium to transport it.
Don't forget areas of vacuum too! You can't have sound without a medium to transport it.
Yes, but you see what I mean. Both Sonic effects and Auditory ones are based on sound, but they are not affecting the target the same way. It's like Fire and Cold to me: They don't work in an area of constant temperature, still they differ a lot as to not be considered variations of the same thing.
I mean, I understand the difference.
A sonic effect could be something like a soundwave that pushes someone. It doesn't require the person hear or understand it to be effective.
An auditory effect is something that requires hearing, so not only does it need to make sound (similar to sonic) it needs to be heard by the target.
If a spell doesn't qualify for use due to the sonic trait, it's also going to fail for auditory because no sound can be generated to be heard. But an auditory trait spell will also fail if the target is deaf (maybe something else but I can't think of another way).
You can have effects that don't require the target to hear (sonic) but any auditory traits will also require that sound be produced, which is the main point of the sonic trait. Which is why I view it like I do.
If a spell doesn't qualify for use due to the sonic trait, it's also going to fail for auditory
Not really. If you have a protection or immunity against Sonic you will still be affected by Auditory.
If you are in an area of muffled sounds you will be immune to Sonic but not to Auditory.And so on.
They share a common way of being blocked by preventing sound entirely, but they then behave each their own way.
Immunity/protection to Sonic doesn't imply immunity/protection to Auditory that's why I disagree when you say that Auditory is a more restrictive version of Sonic.