This is an article in the continuing series, “Fun with Magic”, where I examine spells from the D20 System Reference Document, which corresponds to spells from the Player’s Handbook v. 3.5. These spells are in almost every campaign and form the foundation of spells used in Yön. Each article demonstrates strengths and weaknesses of a particular spell and some unique applications for each, to the limit of the author’s imagination, such as it is.
Animate Plants
Transmutation
Level: Drd 7, Plant 7
Components: V
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Close (25 ft. + 5 ft./2 levels)
Targets: One Large plant per three caster levels or all plants within range; see text
Duration: 1 round/level or 1 hour/level; see text
Saving Throw: None
Spell Resistance: No
You imbue inanimate plants with mobility and a semblance of life. Each animated plant then immediately attacks whomever or whatever you initially designate as though it were an animated object of the appropriate size category. You may animate one Large or smaller plant, or an equivalent number of larger plants, per three caster levels. A Huge plant counts as two Large or smaller plants, a Gargantuan plant as four, and a Colossal plant as eight. You can change the designated target or targets as a move action, as if directing an active spell.
Use the statistics for animated objects, except that plants smaller than Large usually don’t have hardness.
Animate plants cannot affect plant creatures, nor does it affect nonliving vegetable material.
Entangle: Alternatively, you may imbue all plants within range with a degree of mobility, which allows them to entwine around creatures in the area. This usage of the spell duplicates the effect of an entangle spell. Spell resistance does not keep creatures from being entangled. This effect lasts 1 hour per caster level.
Call the trees to fight for you—the bigger, the better. Realize they won’t move very fast, so they may not be able to catch the faster foes.
Animated trees can do more than fight: they can live heavy loads, and they are usually pretty tall, so they can get you up on top of things or provide a mobile firing platform for the archers and spell casters in your party that keeps them out of melee.
The second use of the spell shouldn’t be overlooked: an entangle spell with a DC six higher than normal with no spell resistance allowed can be great for pinning large groups of foes that would normally ignore the 1st-level entangle spell. This version of the spell lasts a long time, too: at least 13 hours, and you can’t dismiss it, so be careful how you use it.