Can you use Wish to allow yourself to cast Wish without risks?

Question

In D&D, wish is an extremely powerfull spell, but it also comes with its risks:

The stress of casting this spell to produce any effect other than duplicating another spell weakens you. After enduring that stress, each time you cast a spell until you finish a long rest, you take 1d10 necrotic damage per level of that spell. This damage can't be reduced or prevented in any way. In addition, your Strength drops to 3, if it isn't 3 or lower already, for 2d4 days. For each of those days that you spend resting and doing nothing more than light activity, your remaining recovery time decreases by 2 days. Finally, there is a 33 percent chance that you are unable to cast wish ever again if you suffer this stress.

This consequence ensures that the players can't exploit this spell, at least, not too much. But, since the spell wish basically allows us to do almost anything, is there any reason that prevents a player from doing something like this:

I wish to be able to cast wish, without ever suffering stress from it.

Now, apart from rule 0, is there any written rule preventing this? Or is it technically allowed?

Answer 1

The consequences of the wording of a wish are, as you note, entirely at the whim of a DM. No one can answer how any particular DM will rule, so keep in mind that any answer is on shaky ground, subjectively.

A DM could rule that you are granted this ability by virtue of being unable to cast Wish for anything but spell duplication, for example.

However, the wish you specify will have to be cast before it takes effect, and you could almost certainly undergo stress from it, with the potential of it being permanent.

Answer 2

Let's split this question in two:

Can I wish "to be able to cast Wish, without ever suffering Stress from it."?

Yes, you can wish anything you like.

Will this wish be granted? If yes, how will this wish be granted?

That's up to the DM. The main point here is that this is not even about Rule 0, this is explicitly how Wish itself is written. I.e., this is the RAW answer.

State your wish to the DM as precisely as possible. The DM has great latitude in ruling what occurs in such an instance, the greater the wish, the greater the likelihood that something goes wrong. This spell might simply fail, the effect you desire might only be partly achieved, or you might suffer some unforeseen consequence as a result of how you worded the wish.

As other answers mentioned, possible outcomes (Note: all of these are backed up by the above rule) are:

• It doesn't work at all.
• You can only cast Wish to duplicate other spells, therefore still being able to cast Wish and never suffering stress from it. (Note: this outcome can be prevented with a different wording, like "I wish I can cast Wish, without any restriction and without ever suffering stress from it".)
• I disagree that you could lose the ability to cast Wish, since your Wish explicitly states that you want to be able to cast it.
• Even if you can cast Wish without stress, you would still take the damage from it, since it explicitly states that the damage can't be reduced or prevented by any means. This last point makes the RAI a little awkward, since you can prevent the stress, but can't prevent the damage from the stress.

Answer 3

Well you would suffer the stress from casting it at least once, so the damage could be done.

Consider also:

You might be able to achieve something beyond the scope of the above examples. State your wish to the DM as precisely as possible. The DM has great latitude in ruling what occurs in such an instance, the greater the wish, the greater the likelihood that something goes wrong. This spell might simply fail, the effect you desire might only be partly achieved, or you might suffer some unforeseen consequence as a result of how you worded the wish.

Your DM may find that your request is beyond what can be achieved and outright refuse it.

Answer 4

The answer would appear to be in the description

This damage can't be reduced or prevented in any way

Though arguably that might just apply to the "1d10 necrotic damage". If I were the GM though, I'd think about extending it to applying to the rest too.

Answer 5

Like with a Genie or Trickster, the results of a Wish are entirely up to the DM via example below:

DM response:

You now have a magical fishing rod, that’s indestructible, grants you tool proficiency: Fishing Rod, with expertise in “Fishing”, that has a lure with the word “wish” on it which is enchanted with True Strike.

DM makes a secret Zocchihedron roll:

As you revel in your new founded ability to cast Wish without risk, you now feel a strong weakness come upon you as if your strength has been drained from you.

You can no longer cast that particular 9th level spell again.