Bless

1st-level enchantment · 1d4 roll, average 2.5

2.5 average roll · 1–4

Roll Bless

Press a roll button. The dice land here.

Spell details

Level
1st-level
School
Enchantment
Casting time
Action
Range
30 feet
Components
V, S, M (a Holy Symbol worth 5+ GP)
Duration
Concentration, up to 1 minute
Classes
Cleric, Paladin

Bless is worth a flat +2.5 to three people, on every roll that matters

At the table. Bless takes your action and your Concentration for up to a minute. Up to three creatures you choose within 30 feet add 1d4 to every attack roll and saving throw until it ends. The d4 averages 2.5, so each blessed roll is 12.5 percentage points more likely to succeed, as long as the roll needed isn't already a 2 or a 20.

What changed from 2014. Very little. In SRD 5.1 the target "can roll a d4"; in SRD 5.2.1 it simply adds 1d4. The material changed from holy water to a Holy Symbol worth 5+ GP.

How much it buys. We counted every d20 face against every d4 face for a fighter with +5 to hit:

Target AC Without Bless With Bless
13 65% 77.5%
15 55% 67.5%
18 40% 52.5%

A +2 save against DC 15 goes from 40% to 52.5%. With three allies making one attack each against AC 15, Bless adds about 0.375 hits a round, and that's before a single save it turns.

The choice that matters is who gets it. Pick the three people rolling the most dice: the fighter with two attacks, the rogue who needs to land one big hit, and whoever is most likely to face the dragon's breath or the mind-bending save. If you're a paladin, you can bless yourself.

The common mistake is casting it once the fight is already going well. Its value is in the first round, before the saves and the hits start deciding the fight. The other mistake is forgetting it's Concentration: one failed Constitution save after a hit and the whole party loses it.

The human angle. An extra die in your hand feels like more control than a flat +2 would, even though the maths is close. Ellen Langer showed people treat chance as controllable when the task has familiar skill cues, like choosing or handling the object themselves. Bless gives every player one more die to throw, and players like that more than they can quite justify.

Source: Langer, E. J. (1975). The illusion of control. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 32(2), 311–328. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.32.2.311

Bless damage by level

Cast atDiceAverageRange
1st slot2.51–4

The odds of 1d4

1: 25.00%2: 25.00%3: 25.00%4: 25.00%
1chance of each total for 1d44
TotalChance
2 or more75%
3 or more50%
4 or more25%

Rules text

You bless up to three creatures within range. Whenever a target makes an attack roll or a saving throw before the spell ends, the target adds to the attack roll or save.

At higher levels. You can target one additional creature for each spell slot level above 1.

This page includes material from the System Reference Document 5.2.1 (“SRD 5.2.1”) by Wizards of the Coast LLC, available at dndbeyond.com/srd. The SRD 5.2.1 is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The averages, odds and tables are ours.