Stop casting Spiritual Weapon
Spiritual Weapon is one of the most iconic Cleric spells in D&D 5e. But does it live up to its reputation as a potent and versatile offensive spell? Not at all.
Underwhelming damage
Spiritual Weapon, cast at 2nd level, deals 5.1 damage per round, and for every two levels it’s upcast, it does 3.15 more. Regardless of level, this is an insignificant amount of damage, barely enough to even scratch a monster.
Additionally, spells that deal damage over time are far inferior to spells that deal all their damage at once, since the latter kill enemies much faster.
Alternative spells
Clerics can make very good use of their second-level spell slots, but not by using Spiritual Weapon. Rather, a Cleric could upcast Bless to massively boost party damage and save protection, or perhaps to cast Aid, bringing up to 3 allies back from being downed, and granting all of them a significant chunk of hit points to boot.
Positioning
And yet, the biggest drawback of Spiritual Weapon is not the paltry damage, nor the wealth of better options to spend your slots on - it’s the fact that Spiritual Weapon is simply really bad at hitting enemies.
With a 20ft movement speed and no ability to make opportunity attacks, over 91% of enemies can escape Spiritual Weapon by simply walking away from it. Of the rest, the overwhelming majority can spend a single action Dashing and never have to worry about the weapon again.
Bonus action conflict
It bears mentioning that the Telekinetic feat, one of the most popular and potent feats for Clerics, also consumes your bonus action every round. Spiritual Weapon, which also requires a bonus action every round, is a strictly inferior alternative that reduces your effectiveness.
Why is Spiritual Weapon considered strong?
Spending your actions doing something fundamentally feels good, in the same way that not spending them feels bad. Spiritual Weapon offers a simple and out-of-the-box way to deal damage using Cleric’s often-underutilized bonus action, which can seem good at first. However, on closer inspection, this is a significant resource investment for a very poor return.