[RPG] Does the Kenku racial curse prevent the Awakened Mind class feature and similar telepathy effects from helping them communicate

dnd-5ekenkutelepathywarlock

A Great Old One warlock is granted awakened mind at first level — a limited form of conversational telepathy that allows communication (with range limitations) with any being that can understand at least one language.

Kenku, however, are under a racial curse that prevents them from speaking except via mimicry of sounds they've heard in the past (as if a talking crow or myna had the intelligence to carry on a conversation with its mimicked words). Obviously, a Kenku could be a target of this ability from another being, because they understand speech — but could the Kenku reply other than by mimicry of words and phrases he'd heard? Beyond this, could a Kenku Great Old One warlock use this ability to carry out one-on-one conversation without having to dig through his memory for words or phrases that fit the need?

Note: most upvoted vs. accepted answer here; there seems to be some conflict yet on whether awakened mind is even two-way…

Best Answer

Replying to a Warlock

Awakened Mind has been clarified in Sage Advice (page 6) to apply only in one direction. A warlock talking to a Kenku using Awakened Mind doesn't allow the Kenku to reply except aloud using mimicry.

Does the warlock’s Awakened Mind feature allow two-way telepathic communication? The feature is intended to provide one-way communication. The warlock can use the feature to speak telepathically to a creature, but the feature doesn’t give that creature the ability to telepathically reply. In contrast, the telepathy ability that some monsters have (MM, 9) does make two-way communication possible.

A Kenku Warlock

A warlock Kenku should be able to use Awakened Mind to express ideas mind-to-mind that it can't physically say due to the curse, as the flavor text and stat block don't bar thinking in a language. It does bar "creative thought", but that is both more far more subjective (and impossible -- as communicating without words requires a fair bit of creativity). As there is nothing expressly forbidding it, I'd say it is perfectly within the rules, as they are currently written.

The person they are communicating with would have to reply aloud, as above.