Quote Originally Posted by RSP View Post
Are you thinking of this line?

“Spells such as burning hands and cone of cold cover an area, allowing them to affect multiple creatures at once.”

This line says nothing of “Range: Self (30’ cone) changing the “self” rule. It certainly does completely contradict it, but it at no point provides alternate definitions like you suggest.

I’m not saying don’t play it as you described it, I’m just saying using “Self” as “only effects the caster” is clearly an oft broken rule for plenty of spells, most of which do the opposite of that (they only effect other creatures)”

And the above quoted rule doesn’t give an alternate definition, it just uses two “Self” spells as examples of spells that affect multiple targets (again, going against the “Self” definition).

But the non-compliance with that rule isn’t just those spells: neither Eyebite nor Detect Thoughts have ranges following Self, just “Self”, yet clearly target creatures other than the caster (as described in their descriptions).
This why I kind of harp on RAG ("Rules as Guidelines") over RAW ("Rules as Written"). The rules are not written to clarity level of law, much less computer code, there are inconsistencies, unclear rules, and outright errors. Every range self spell mentioned in this thread so far (and other I have looked at) all have the theme of empowering the caster to do something. That something may effect other targets (and this is called out in () in some range self spells like Eyebite). But, the consistent thing is they all affect the caster initially empowering them to do something. That's also what they can be dispelled when the caster is targeted.