[RPG] limit to the number of Unseen Servants I can have

dnd-5espells

I didn't see an answer to this question after a brief search, so I wanted to ask here.

I got in to an argument with my DM tonight. I assume, from the way unseen servant is worded, that I can have as many as I can cast. E.g. every 10 minutes I can summon another one (as a ritual) and just go to town with them.

The DM focused on the wording of the spell, where it says:

This spell creates AN invisible, mindless, shapeless force

and interpreted this as meaning I could only have 1. I assumed this meant that the spell could only create one at a time, but each casting could create another one.

So, who's right? Based on a lot of what I've read online, it is assumed that people can cast many of these to have fun with them. Does this come down to grammar? Is there some rule that makes this official one way or another?

Best Answer

You can have as many as you can cast

Unseen Servant has no concentration requirement, and no stipulation you can only have one servant at most.

Compare that with Minor Illusion, which explicitly says you can only have one effect up:

The illusion also ends if you dismiss it as an action or cast this spell again.

Or Simulacrum, which removes the previous clone if it's cast again:

If you cast this spell again, any currently active duplicates you created with this spell are instantly destroyed.

Or Control Flames or Prestidigitation, which puts a limit on the number of effects it can have at a time:

If you cast this spell multiple times, you can have up to three of its non-instantaneous effects active at a time, and you can dismiss such an effect as an action.

Unseen Servant does not have a clause like this written in it. If the designers wanted you to have at most one servant at a time, they would explicitly say so, in the way they wrote those limits on the other above-mentioned spells.

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