Major Image Buys a Turn
Major Image (D&D 5e, 3rd-level illusion) conjures a 20-foot cube of image, sound, smell, and temperature within 120 feet, lasting up to 10 minutes on concentration. Most players spend it on set dressing. The mechanically interesting part is buried in the interaction: physical contact with the illusion, or a successful Intelligence (Investigation) check to study it, reveals the fake.
That check is the whole point. A creature that wants to be sure of what it sees has to spend its action investigating. An illusory wall, chasm, or wall of flame across a corridor does not need to hold up under scrutiny. It only needs to make the target hesitate and confirm, which costs that target its turn. One 3rd-level slot, one enemy removed from the round, no attack roll or save on your end.
The failure mode is timing. You are concentrating on nothing physical, so the illusion collapses the moment your concentration does. Cast it before you take a hit, not after, and keep yourself out of the line of fire while it works.
At the table: Drop a 20-foot wall of illusory fire across the enemy caster’s only path forward. To advance, it either eats the imaginary damage or burns its action on an Investigation check. Either way, that’s a turn you took.
Related
- Spells Are Verbs, Not Damage Rolls
- Monster Tactic: The Statblock Is Not the Fight
- Making an Attack Is Not the Attack Action
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