Can Dispel Magic be used on the confusion caused by Yeenoghu's flail?

Question

During tonight's game, the party's wizard became confused because of a failed save against Yeenoghu's flail, which had the effect of:

The target must succeed on a DC17 Wisdom saving throw or be affected by the confusion spell until the start of Yeenoghu's next turn.

Dispel Magic says:

Choose one creature, object, or magical effect within range. Any spell of 3rd level or lower on the target ends. For each spell of 4th level or higher on the target, make an ability check using your spellcasting ability. The DC equals 10 + the spell's level. On a successful check, the spell ends.

With this in mind, I had the following question:

Is the confusion caused by Yeenoghu's flail a targetable magical effect for the purposes of Dispel Magic? Or does the wizard have to wait for this effect to expire in the normal fashion?

To clarify, I'm trying to determine if the magical effect on the Wizard can be removed without hitting the wizard as a creature with Dispel Magic. The latter has some pretty negative consequences for the wizard.

Answer 1

You can target and (probably) dispel this effect with Dispel Magic

First of all, the confusion effect of this attack is definitely magical, because it specifically produces the effect of a spell. This is precisely one of the criteria for determining if an effect is magical. Hence, it is definitely a valid target for Dispel Magic.

However, targeting the effect isn't very useful unless Dispel Magic can actually dispel the effect. The relevant limitation here is that as written, Dispel Magic can target any magical effect, but it only ends that effect if it is a spell effect. The effect in question specifically says that on a failed save, the target is "affected by the confusion spell". I would argue that this is explicit enough to actually qualify this as a spell effect that Dispel Magic can dispel.

Of course, the normal rules for dispelling spells apply: if Dispel Magic is cast at 3rd level, the caster must succeed on a DC 14 spellcasting ability check in order to dispel the effect, since Confusion is a 4th level spell.