Cutting Words

Cutting Words is a reaction available to the College of Lore bards. It allows them to distract and confuse their foes, potentially causing attacks to miss, or ability checks or saving throws to fail.

Description

Use your wit to distract a creature and sap its confidence. It receives a -1d6 penalty to Attack roll, Ability check, or Saving throw.

Properties

Cost

 Reaction +  Bardic Inspiration

Details

 Range: 18 m / 60 ft

At higher levels

• At bard level 5, the penalty increases to -1d8.
• At bard level 10, the penalty increases to -1d10.

Technical details

UIDs

Target_CuttingWords

Ability triggered by the reaction

Interrupt_CuttingWords

Reaction which triggers the ability

Spell flags

HasVerbalComponent, IsHarmful

How to learn

Classes:

• Class level 3: College of Lore (via  Cutting Words)

Notes

• Unlike in D&D 5th Edition rules, Cutting Words cannot be applied to damage rolls. However, it can be applied to saving throws (which is normally available only to Eloquence Bards).
• In most cases using this action causes the caster to make a verbal quip or insult the target, drawing on the same pool of dialogue options as  Vicious Mockery. These remarks are fully voice acted, including for characters who do not normally have access to the action.

Bugs

• Cutting Words may target friendly characters whose failed rolls prompted the effect, as opposed to the enemy character who rolled a save.
• Despite being flagged with HasVerbalComponent, Cutting Words may be used even while silenced.
• Cutting Words is missing the potency of the bardic dice in its description when displayed in the combat log.