Author: Senile
Telekinetic is one of the feats introduced by Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything, and its impact is often overlooked. At first glance the feat seems uninteresting; just another half feat with a seemingly minor upside. In reality, the bonus action shove/pull ability it grants has major utility. It’s in fact as good as or better than the often praised spiritual weapon spell on a Cleric, while costing half an ASI instead of a 2nd level spell slot every combat.
A common sentiment when evaluating Telekinetic is that 5 feet of forced movement that offers a saving throw isn’t meaningfully impactful in combat even as a bonus action. It’s easy to look at the invisible, component-less mage hand portion of the feat and assume it’s primarily a roleplay feat, letting you do some sneaky stuff outside of combat in the right group. However, Telekinetic has a lot more combat utility than it appears to:
- It can be used as a bonus action Disengage, allowing you to shove your allies out of the reach of an enemy. Since this isn’t movement from your ally, it does not provoke opportunity attacks. You could even use it to shove an enemy away from you for the same effect, though that requires a failed Strength saving throw from the enemy.
- It can be used to shove enemies into dangerous areas. Whether this be natural terrain such as a chasm or artificial hazards such as a web spell cast by a friendly caster, it’s a phenomenally useful tool.
- You can break grapple or restrain effects from monsters (guaranteed success when shoving an ally), since the grappled condition requires the grappler to stay in reach of the creature it’s grappling, and many monsters have their restraints tied to a grapple. To directly quote the grappled condition: The condition also ends if an effect removes the grappled creature from the reach of the grappler or grappling effect, such as when a creature is hurled away by the thunderwave spell.Player's Handbook (p. 290)
- You can move enemies blocking specific areas or chokepoints, allowing free movement.
- You can move allies out of dangerous area effects, particularly ones you’re about to cast or those that activate at the start of a creature’s turn. For example, dragging a party member out of the edge of a cloudkill spell.
- Most importantly for this analysis, it can be used to push/pull enemies into spells such as spirit guardians, instantly forcing a save against the dragged creature. You can position yourself so that an enemy is at the outer edge of spirit guardians before pulling them in. This can allow a creature to take spirit guardians damage more than once in a round.
Understanding this interaction makes this feat particularly interesting for any Cleric. Spirit guardians is one of the most powerful tools a Cleric has from the moment they hit level 5, so a strong feature that comes with extra internal synergy is going to be a prime pick. We took this feat pretty early on in our Basic Build Series Cleric. Why? An often seen criticism is that Clerics natively have access to spiritual weapon, which competes with their bonus action and deals damage on an attack roll, instead of being contingent on the enemy failing the initial save, and allowing another save for half damage. However, is spiritual weapon actually better, and if it is, is it worth the spell slot cost? “Math is math” is one of our Core Tenets. Let’s find out!
In order to analyze this, we’re going to need some breakpoints for comparison, and have to make some assumptions. Since the earliest level you can get spirit guardians is level 5, we’re going to start there. Whether or not you should use spiritual weapon during levels 3 and 4 is also contested, but out of the scope of this discussion. Here are the parameters of our analysis:
- The Cleric has 18 Wisdom and Telekinetic, either from starting at 17 Wisdom and picking up Telekinetic at level 4, or starting as Custom Lineage with Telekinetic and picking up another feat at level 4.
- Around 800 different creatures ranging from Challenge Rating 0 to Challenge Rating 20 were compiled from official 5E sources, taking into account their save bonuses, AC, and whether or not they had Magic Resistance.
- Magic Resistance (if relevant) is applied to the creature’s save against spirit guardians, but not against the initial save from Telekinetic, as it doesn’t meet the Sage Advice Compendium definition of a “magical” effect (p. 20).
- For spirit guardians, radiant damage is assumed. Additionally, resistances, vulnerabilities and immunities are accounted for in the damage of both it and spiritual weapon. Notably, only actual resistances/immunities/vulnerabilities were included, not abilities that confer some other benefit when a creature is hit with a specific damage type, like the regeneration of vampires.
- For the creatures with Limited Magic Immunity, the damage of both are 0.
With all of this in mind, the average damage output of both spiritual weapon and a Telekinetic pull into spirit guardians for each individual creature was calculated. Once that was done, the data for both the number of creatures each option did better against and the total average damage output was compiled. Since there was a wide range of creatures, these were further broken down into individual Challenge Ratings, to get a better idea of what kind of monsters Telekinetic and spiritual weapon did better against. Below are the results:
On average, Telekinetic is (marginally) superior in raw output, both in total count of creatures and the average. Something that’s immediately apparent, however, is that Telekinetic’s effectiveness skews towards lower CRs. It tends to be better against everything CR5 and below, and is almost equal to spiritual weapon against CRs 6 and 7. As a result, Telekinetic tends to be pretty effective against the creatures you’re most likely to fight at this level, even by simply looking at it from a raw damage output angle. There’s also a few more things to keep in mind:
- Telekinetic can consistently be used on the first turn. Since it isn’t casting a spell, it can be used on the same turn you cast spirit guardians, unlike spiritual weapon. This means that even when their average damage seems quite close, the reality is that Telekinetic starts out a full turn ahead. This is especially true when you consider that most fights aren’t that long. It also means that it won’t block casting an action spell on your second turn; for example, you might want to command on the turn after you cast spirit guardians. In that case, you’d have to choose between that and setting up spiritual weapon, while Telekinetic has no such conflict.
- Once you have the feat, Telekinetic can be used every turn at no resource cost, whereas spiritual weapon costs a 2nd level slot each combat.
- While Telekinetic can sometimes run into issues with positioning to drag an enemy into your radius, spiritual weapon has similar issues with its 20 movement speed making it impossible to chase down fleeing or mobile enemies.
Overall, the numbers are pretty close at this point, and it’s easy to draw the conclusion that Telekinetic falls off based on the higher CR results. However, that’s not the case, since Telekinetic scales excellently when upcasting spirit guardians. Let’s look at the same math, but with a 4th level spirit guardians cast instead:
By even upcasting it a single level, Telekinetic starts outperforming spiritual weapon. It’s hard to believe the results were even close before, given that the only change was a single d8. At this point, the only enemies that suffer more damage from spiritual weapon are ones with such high Strength saves, that failing the initial Telekinetic pull save is almost or completely impossible. To further drive the point home, let’s compare a level 9 Cleric. We’re assuming 20 Wisdom, and will show the math for both 4th and 5th level spirit guardians:
At this point, it’s not even close anymore. Even if we throw spiritual weapon a bone by upcasting it to 4th level (which is typically considered to be a waste of resources), Telekinetic is still an overall winner when 5th level spirit guardians is involved:
Telekinetic is an excellent feat. Since all that spiritual weapon does is damage, a purely numerical analysis is already stacked in its favor. During play, there are bound to be instances where you need to use specific bonus actions from your subclass features, or drop a healing word to revive an ally, making spiritual weapon even less efficient from a spell slot perspective. We’ve already mentioned the timing issue where Telekinetic will have an extra round of damage versus spiritual weapon in most fights. Besides that, shoving someone into spirit guardians is far from the best thing you can do with Telekinetic, as breaking a dangerous grapple or placing your ally in favorable positions can save valuable resources or free up a whole action from your allies.
The analysis here shows how superior Telekinetic frequently is to spiritual weapon in damage, while not costing you a single additional spell slot, but none of these numbers properly quantify all of the other things the feat can do. It’s easy to dismiss tiny forced movement effects like this, but there are a lot of powerful area abilities that people do not want to be dragged into. This article only covers spirit guardians, since it’s an incredibly common and powerful option and has an easy point of comparison for damage analysis. Many other spells are also highly synergistic with the feat, so it can be a lot of fun to pair up with another spellcaster’s nastiest spells too. If you get a bit more creative with how you use it and what you combine it with, it can do much more than squeeze out a bit of extra damage. It does cost a feat, we’re not suggesting Telekinetic is free, but what you get out of that feat is a pretty huge upgrade for your bonus action!
Nice analysis! One question though:
“Telekinetic can consistently be used on the first turn. Since it isn’t casting a spell, it can be used on the same turn you cast spirit guardians, unlike spiritual weapon.”
What do you mean by the that part?
Part of the casting of spiritual weapon is an attack on the same turn that you cast the spell, right?
Also: Telekinetic is great if you have a melee-based caster who takes Booming Blade. Although the Crusher feat is likely superior because there is no contest for the pushback. You hit, they move. (Provided the DM doesn’t meta- too much, any melee-focused monster or player will move to get back into melee with you at least 1-2 times before they “learn” what to do. But push them into Spiritual Guardians and they have a choice to make!)
You can attack the same round you conjure the spiritual weapon but you are using your Bonus Action to cast a spell. This means the only spell you could cast with your Action is a cantrip, leaving you unable to cast spirit guardians. So on round one, you can either cast spirit guardians or spiritual weapon, but not both.
This is a strong analysis, and an excellent example of why (since recently discovering it) TableTopBuilds is rapidly becoming my favorite source for 5e optimization.
Your article ends on a really improtant note, that the Telekinetic feat is not free. Spiritual Weapon costs a 2nd level slot, while Telekinetic costs a feat. I does not, however, touch on opportunity cost. And the opportunity cost of taking Telekinetic is usually “not taking Fey Touched.”
Telekinetic is an “upgrade” to your Bonus Action, according to this article, taking a mediocre Bonus Action and making it a great one. But is it stronger to instead keep the mediocre Bonus Action while also handing out Gift of Alacrity to multiple party members, and getting to Misty Step your swirling Spirit Guardians vortex into *just* the right spot?
I don’t have a definite answer or anything, but it’s important to discuss the broader build implications of choices like this, especially when the spell-slot “cost” of Spiritual Weapon is such a big part of the article’s valuation criteria.
Keep up the grea work!
Great points.
I think my own analysis would be that Gift of Alacrity may very well be given out by someone else (likely via Rest Casting). If not, then it is definitely a strong contender.
Misty Step vs Telekinetic? Situational, however, the vast majority of the time I would prefer Telekinetic, since this allows for a leveled spell to be cast, while Misty Step does not. If we wish to just put maximum distance between ourself and a target, then Misty Step wins – although by how much depends on the terrain. If the desire is just to get out of melee range (and/or grapple), then Telekinetic wins in my opinion.
For Spirit Guardians, being able to get an extra ‘turn’ of damage on a target with Telekinetic is often going to be superior in my opinion to being potentially in a somewhat better position (especially at the cost of a level 2 spell slot). If moving a greater distance means extra targets then it may be preferable to have Misty Step – however, even then, I often don’t wish to be out ahead of the rest of the team and would rather the enemy come to me (while being whittled down trying to do so).
I also love a tempest cleric with BB, Telekinetic and a lightning dragon hoard weapon or the staff of thunder and lightning.
So many pushes, pulls and rootings in spiritual guardians that you might sick and if you ever manage to deal a BB crit with your lightning weapon you can maximize nearly the whole thing.
Pity that this build is so MAD
Great article, I definetely have way more respect for Telekinetic, now.
I do also have a dumb question, though. How does the shove help to hurt the monster with spirit guardians? SG can only hurt a creature once per turn, so if you can reach the monster, the shove shouldn’t make a difference, as the shove won’t trigger the damage an additional time. And, obviously, a monster takes the damage when it starts its turn inside the area of effect, but having telekinetic doesn’t change that, does it?
So, having telekinetic wouldn’t change the number of times a monster takes damage from spirit guardians, unless you manage to pull one into your zone, as it’s literally 5 feet too far away, which is definetely a great ability to have.
I feel like “This can allow a creature to take spirit guardians damage more than once in a round.” is a misleading way to put it, then, so I’m assuming I missed something.
I’d love to get some clarification on that, even though this article is like a year old. Sorry
So, the trick with pulling enemies into your zone: The spell area moves with you. It’s usually pretty easy to set it up so that you walk backwards a bit, then attempt to pull an enemy into the spirit guardians they’re no longer standing in.
This means you can pull them in (so they take the damage on your turn), and then also have them start their turn in the spirit guardians, so they take damage on their turn. Spirit guardians is limited to once per turn, not once per round!
Telekinectic is a good feat, haven’t tried it out, but often recommend it to my players, but as what was pointed out by a previous commenter that the opportunity cost of telekinectic are higher than spiritual weapon because of the feat required, also should be noted that telekinectic seems to be stronger with static AOE spells of which spirit gaudians is not, you can just move the effect around as you move around, clerics don’t have great area of effect spells so telekinectic is probably less useful overall and as the previous commenter mentioned in regards to fey touched that gift of alacrity(which can only be possible in many campaigns through a feat) could likely be cast by someone else, what if other characters have the telekinectic feat then the utility would diminish, spiritual weapon is really overrated that 20ft movement really limits it, but by that measure it also synergizes well with spitiual weapon, it also allows for more focused fire which is nice. Please nobody ever upcast spiritual weapon.
In Tabletop Builds own build guide to the divine soul sorcerer, the Custom Lineage version and the Hobgoblin version either don’t take telekinetic in the former or don’t take it until level 16 in the latter, in these builds the discussion point seems to be between spiritual weapon vs. 1 of your spells know &1 2nd level slot. These builds seem to suggest that spiritual weapon is not worth a selection as one of your spells known, even as lower level slots become less valuable as character level progresses and your bonus action does not seemed to be monopolized for 80-100% of these builds levels. Even though spirit guardians features prominently in both these builds and would from the above article seem to be a good candidate for combining with this spell, why is this the case?
Basically we’ve come to the realization that Spiritual Weapon is not only worse than Telekinetic, it’s also worse than simply not casting it and doing something more useful with the spell slot later. We’re working on an article to explain the mathematical foundatations of such an analysis, but basically it boils down to: Spiritual Weapon does too little damage, too late into the fight, in a too staggered manner; which makes its actual impact on the fight so low that you’re better off either casting a higher impact spell like Command earlier, or healing off the damage after the fight. To put it in a ballpark: Spiritual Weapon is about as effective as casting 2nd level Healing Word on a wounded, *conscious* ally (which is not very effective at all).
This was a nice read; thank you for doing the math!
One question I have is regarding the part about consistently using Telekinetic on the first round and Spiritual Weapon being one round slower. Doesn’t Spirit Guardians already proc on the first round when you cast it? How does Telekinetic add to it?
I guess I could imagine a scenario in which a creature is 5ft out of range of Spirit Guardians and so Telekinetic helps, but is that scenario assumed for the calculations?
Thank you
By RAW you can break grapples, but any DM wouldn’t be questioned if they roll a monster STR save to enable the TK to break the grapples. The monsters will not just free the grappled pc without try to resist the TK force, since TK don’t just teleporte the pc, it moves.
Spirit guardians doesn’t trigger a maximum of once per round, it triggers a maximum of once per turn. Telekinetic can trigger the damage on your turn, then they will also start their turn in the area to trigger it a second time.
Grappled: “The condition also ends if an effect removes the grappled creature from the reach of the grappler or grappling effect, such as when a creature is hurled away by the thunderwave spell.” Any forced movement effect will break a grapple if it moves your ally out of the creatures reach, and there is no additional save with telekinetic if you’re moving the ally. If the DM wanted one, I would ask how this is any different from other forced movement effects that would move the creature/break the grapple and also have no save, like repelling blast or crusher.
This question has been asked a couple of times but I feel I need another clarification (sorry for being dumb — I’m a newbie at this game). The text of spirit guardians is this:
“ when the creature enters the area for the first time on a turn or starts its turn there …”
My reading of “when the creature enters … on a turn …” is that it means *when a creature enters the area on its turn* (or starts its turn there) it takes the damage. So when you pull a creature into the area, you wait until it’s turn to apply the damage and the damage is applied once per round.
I can appreciate I’m interpreting “a turn” in this context in a particular way and that another person might quibble that the phrase “a turn” in that context means any turn, not the creature’s turn necessarily, and hence pulling a creature in on a caster’s turn causes one instance of damage and a second instance occurs later when it starts it’s turn there. However, it seems to me that my reading is also plausible.
From a “logical” standpoint (always dicey when talking about magic), it does not seem sensible to me that a creature that sits in the area from the end of one turn to the beginning of its next should take one instance of damage whereas a creature that leaves the area for a time (giving it a breather) and is pulled back in should take double damage.
Moreover, when weighing which reading is the right one, shouldn’t we err on the side of the more “balanced” reading, seeking the reading more in line with other spells? Doubling the damage would seem to put it out of wack with other spells of this level.
(My DM decided applying damage once per round was sensible. This seems fine with me. But I am curious what your thoughts are. And/or if there is something else I’m overlooking or misunderstanding.)
The Sage Advice Compendium has clarified this already, it even states they consider forced movement to trigger the effect to be ‘clever’ and ‘not an imbalance’. Like quite a lot of the SA clarifications, it’s essentially saying ‘it works exactly how the text says it does if you read it carefully’:
“When a creature enters the spell’s area” – The ‘creature enters’, so the creature must be the one moving (voluntarily or forced) to ‘enter’ the area, the spell area moving over the creature (like during casting/moving it around) is not a trigger here.
“for the first time on a turn or starts its turn there” – First time on ‘a turn’, not ‘a round’, not ‘it’s turn’. Every member of your party could trigger this damage on their turn, if they had a method of forced movement to cycle the creature in and out, and it can also trigger on the creature’s turn if they are hit with an opportunity attack after moving out that pushes them back in (like warcaster w/repelling blast, crusher, etc). So you can potentially do way more than double damage here.
so i dont have much experience using spirit guardians, or telekinetic for that matter, but i would assume, that to get enemies to the edge of your spirit guardians (so you can push them inside) you have to move away from them and incur an attack of opportunity, which does seem like a significant cost for the telekinetic+guardian spirit combo compared to spirit weapon.
The aura is 15 feet so if they’re in the space furthest away from you there’s still a 10 foot gap between you and them.