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How is the food and water from Create Food and Water presented?

Role-playing Games Asked on October 30, 2021

The spell create food and water says:

You create 45 pounds of food and 30 gallons of water on the ground or in containers within range, enough to sustain up to fifteen humanoids or five steeds for 24 hours. The food is bland but nourishing, and spoils if uneaten after 24 hours. The water is clean and doesn’t go bad.

When you cast this spell, how is the food and water presented? What I mean is, surely it doesn’t just dump food and water all over the floor (the water at least wouldn’t be of any use to anyone then), so does it come with plates and barrels (30 gallons is a lot of water, surely it would need large containers)? Do you have to put out plates and barrels first and then when you cast it the food and water fills the plates/barrels? How exactly does this work, or is that simply up to the DM to decide?

4 Answers

BYOC

Bring Your Own Container

The spell “create[s] ... food and ... water ... on the ground or in containers” - it doesn’t create containers. If you provide the containers it will fill them, if not, you lick it off the ground.

Answered by Dale M on October 30, 2021

Given that the spell description states that it may create the food and water within containers, it is implied that the caster has some control over where exactly it is created, so that they can choose to put it in containers (and, if enough containers are nearby, which containers) rather than on the ground.

The spell description does not say that it creates containers (only food and water), so any containers must already exist, unless the GM allows some of the food to be of a type and shape such that it would be useful as a container itself.

Answered by Dave Sherohman on October 30, 2021

It is the GM's decision

The spell is unclear on what exactly is presented except that it is water (which can be used for usual purposes) and food which helps if someone's hungry but is not very appealing otherwise. The expression "on the ground or in containers" indicates that there are options on where the food / water gets created but it does not indicate that any containers are provided (vide supra)

Therefore, the GM has to decide what it is like. Then again, when a presentation is chosen within the constraints of the description, usually nothing game-breaking will happen, so letting the caster decide is another possibility.

Food does not absolutely need a container

It seems reasonable to rule that the food takes a form which does not need a container if none is there. E.g., ingots of goo containing nutrients fits the description given. So do survival energy bars (without packaging, contrary to real life).

Neither does water, since it's magic

Since it is magic, you can totally rule that the water takes the form of blocks or ingots that can be carried around like the ingots of goo, until someone decides to drink it or pour it somewhere.

The spell says nothing about creating containers

Since the spell description says nothing about providing containers and since they are not absolutely needed, it seems reasonable to rule there are none. Then again, providing decaying containers ("bio-degradable") seems reasonable as well. Another possibility is to provide containers which can be eaten. In that case, the container would be part of the food. This is the principle of an ice cream waffle, for example.

Answered by Anagkai on October 30, 2021

The spell doesn't say

So that means it's up to the players and the DM to figure out how they want to run it.

You could take a comedic approach, or you could just say that the spell makes temporary containers and the same food appears every time, or you could say that it requires containers or it will dump the contents on the floor otherwise.

Given that this isn't meant to be a combat thing, the rules are relatively silent on the matter (as they are with many things not directly combat related) so you'll have to fill in the blanks.

Answered by Erik on October 30, 2021

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