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View Full Version : Specializing Schools are they a waste?



DementedFellow
2009-09-27, 10:43 PM
Why would anyone want to ban a whole school of magic when a generalist can learn and write down every wiz scroll down they can find into their spellbook?

Do the benefits outweigh the potential nerfing?

Since wizards are the typical "i win" button, wouldn't it make more sense to know as many spells as possible?

Dixieboy
2009-09-27, 10:49 PM
Seeing as some schools are capable of emulating the good spells from other schools all schools are not strictly neccasary.

Furthermore the idea of learning every single spell is simply unfeasable (I believe that's how you spell it, damn IE and it's lack of a spell checker)

And not having to rest every 2 hours is purdy nice.

sentaku
2009-09-27, 10:53 PM
No, because specializing gives you more spells you can prepare in a day. Thus you have more "i wins" available for you. and being prepared is the role of batman.

Indoran
2009-09-27, 10:56 PM
Not neccesarily, much has been written about this topic...

Some defend that specializing doesn't entail an actual loss. In my case I think losing some schools doesnt really harm my playstyle much.

Normally I ban Evocation and Enchantment. In that particular case for blasting I still have conjuration, for save or die and save or suck there are still plenty of options in transmutation.

Lately I designed a Focused Specialist which also bans Necromancy. that was maybe a tougher choice than the first two (I love the "hold" chain of spells in Enchantment, but... it's the smallest school, evocation... I will only miss some force effects)

I would only say... you don't need every single spell in your spell book... and just choosing some varied spells to have flexibility doesnt require access to all the schools.

Sinfire Titan
2009-09-27, 11:00 PM
TreantMonkLVL20 did a wonderful thread regarding this very topic on 339. (http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/19864630/Focused_Specialist_is_better_than_you_think)

That thread convinced me to use Focused Specialist over Generalist, despite my own math proving that a Generalist can get by on spells/day just fine. I'm not gonna say no to 50% more spells!

Keld Denar
2009-09-27, 11:02 PM
Yea, take a gander over at the Evocation = suck threat going on.

Basically, some schools are more powerful than others...

Evocation and Enchantment are typically 2 that are most easily compensated for or livable without.

Conjouration and Transmutation are both AMAZING schools, to the point where there are TONS of useful spells to learn at each level.

So yea...you lose a little versatility, but you gain more daily endurance. The versatility hit isn't THAT great if you plan smartly, and the extra spells/day are AWESOME.

That said, if you are an Elf, you can get the Elven Generalist sub level in Races of the Wild which is pretty much the best of both worlds. An extra spell slot of the highest level you can cast AND you don't have to ban anyone.

Sinfire Titan
2009-09-27, 11:11 PM
That said, if you are an Elf, you can get the Elven Generalist sub level in Races of the Wild which is pretty much the best of both worlds. An extra spell slot of the highest level you can cast AND you don't have to ban anyone.

I think the key phrase there is: If you are an Elf. I, for one, will never play an Elf. Even one of the 30 subraces. I avoid it at all possible costs. The hit to Con just doesn't want to agree with my stomach.


Others may be more willing, but I say never play an Elf if you can avoid it.

msully4321
2009-09-27, 11:21 PM
I think the key phrase there is: If you are an Elf. I, for one, will never play an Elf. Even one of the 30 subraces. I avoid it at all possible costs. The hit to Con just doesn't want to agree with my stomach.


Others may be more willing, but I say never play an Elf if you can avoid it.

There are Elf subraces that don't take a Con hit (like Desert Elf). Also, for a wizard, I'd say the +2 Int from Gray Elf in addition to Elven Generalist would certainly be worth the Con hit.

Keld Denar
2009-09-27, 11:21 PM
Eh, Grey Elf is pretty common for the +2 Int. Especially in low point buy scenarios, when getting an 18 starting ability is REALLY expensive, you can buy a 16 (modified to 18) instead and dump 4 of those 6 points into buying a 16 Con (modified to 14) as well, and having 2 left to put into Dex or something. Sure, you won't have a 20 Int, but even a 100 Int doesn't help you if your current HP total is negative.

28 PB is rough to get an 18 casting stat without completely dumping EVERYTHING else, and 25 is even rougher!

But yea, I'd rather have the feat anyway...

Dixieboy
2009-09-27, 11:23 PM
Also I'd much rather worry about not getting hit than what happens when you do.

Keld Denar
2009-09-27, 11:37 PM
Eh, Con is your best defense, after spells. 2 points of Con gives you 1 HP/level. 2 Dex gives you 5% chance of not getting hit. Past about level 6 though, that +1 AC is gonna mean VERY little, while those 6+ hp probably will.

Really, as a wizard, your best defense is to NOT get attacked at all, but thats not always as easy in EVERY situation. Con protects you against nearly every cause of death. Dex doesn't. All Dex really does mid-game is allow you to hit better with Rays...which isn't terribly hard to begin with.

sambo.
2009-09-28, 12:25 AM
personally, i can't see the point of losing a whole school for the, to my mind, pretty meagre benefits of specialisation.

especially since i can carry a lot of scrolls.

quick_comment
2009-09-28, 12:27 AM
personally, i can't see the point of losing a whole school for the, to my mind, pretty meagre benefits of specialisation.

especially since i can carry a lot of scrolls.

Because you lose nothing by banning enchantment and evocation.

Mongoose87
2009-09-28, 12:30 AM
personally, i can't see the point of losing a whole school for the, to my mind, pretty meagre benefits of specialisation.

especially since i can carry a lot of scrolls.

The ability to spend that scroll money on an INT booster, giving you even more spells per day, AND a DC boost.

sonofzeal
2009-09-28, 12:32 AM
personally, i can't see the point of losing a whole school for the, to my mind, pretty meagre benefits of specialisation.

especially since i can carry a lot of scrolls.
The practical versitility of being able to cast more of your top level spells is worth more than the theoretical versitility of having more spells you could potentially learn, especially since the number of spells out there vastly dwarfs your gold for buying scrolls anyway, so you'll end up with just as many spells known either way. You'll miss out on the occasional good one, but that's a minor drop compared to being able to toss out top-level spells in every single encounter.

quick_comment
2009-09-28, 12:34 AM
Also, abrupt jaunt or master abjurer > the entire school of enchantment by itself. I would ban enchantment just to get abrupt jaunt

quillbreaker
2009-09-28, 12:38 AM
Wizards have so many IWin buttons that you really can give up nearly half of them and get by fine.

Foryn Gilnith
2009-09-28, 06:21 AM
Can a Dragonborn Gray Elf qualify for Elven Generalist? If so, that would be a nice trade. +2 Int, -2 Str, Elven Generalist.

Sinfire Titan
2009-09-28, 09:09 AM
Can a Dragonborn Gray Elf qualify for Elven Generalist? If so, that would be a nice trade. +2 Int, -2 Str, Elven Generalist.

Yes, they can. They still count as an Elf for that purpose. Races of the Dragon explicitly says this.


personally, i can't see the point of losing a whole school for the, to my mind, pretty meagre benefits of specialisation.

especially since i can carry a lot of scrolls.

Scrolls are ineffective. TreantMonkLVL 20 went into great detail on this in his thread (above)..


First Reality: Every time your wizard uses a Scroll, Wand or Staff - he's made himself less powerful forever.

No kidding. Now in perspective - casting a spell off a 1st level wand or scroll is almost non-existant in terms of cost - the higher the spell level - the greater the cost to you.

Look at it this way. Lets say you get pretty much average loot. According to the DMG you can expect your 9th level wizard to have somewhere near 36,000 gp.

So lets say your Generalist wizard decides to pick up a few scrolls to make up the difference in castings/day against a focused specialist:

He goes on a 4 day adventure - the cost of the scrolls: 19,000 gp. So you just blew over half your loot.

Where would the Focused Specialist be? If you said 19,000 gp richer - you would be correct.

Guess what happens with the next 4 day adventure? How about the next? Pretty soon the scrolls are unaffordable. Even if you are scribing your own (lets not even get into XP loss with that)

The problem with this fix is that it works in short term - but it's just not sustainable.

What about Pearls of Power? Just 2 of each level you can cast would make up the difference, and they recharge daily. The cost? 110,000 gp.

No kidding - 110,000 gp! This fix would be sustainable if it was affordable in the first place - it's not. Not even close.


Scrolls are not a good alternative to specialization. Especially because you can't craft them with higher save DCs for the spells that have them. It's a waste of money and XP to use Scribe Scroll to cover for being a Generalist.

Lycanthromancer
2009-09-28, 09:41 AM
I would actually consider becoming a specialist diviner, and dump evocation (assuming I'd ever consider playing a wizard ever, at all).

Grabbing a bunch of extra spell slots for spells that I'd always prepare anyway, so that I could figure out which I Win buttons would be most useful each day? Ysplz.

I don't much care for evocation. Every other school is better than it is, really, since it's so replaceable.

Killer Angel
2009-09-28, 09:42 AM
Because you lose nothing by banning enchantment and evocation.

While I agree that is better to specialize (diviner, tnx), i think that sometimes it depends on the campaign.
example: if you start ad 8° lev., growing up, when you became 11°, it's very annoying to wait 4 other levels to learn greater shadow evocation to duplicate the useful Contingency... 'specially if the module stops at 15°-16° lev.

Kurald Galain
2009-09-28, 09:43 AM
Do the benefits outweigh the potential nerfing?
Yes, by far. You get a significant boost to spells per day (moreso if focused specialist). And no, it won't give you "that one uberspell" from every single school, but that doesn't actually diminish your power in the least.

Bagelz
2009-09-28, 10:02 AM
An extra highest level spell almost always is better than not being able to cast an evocation spell (note that if you didnot get rid of illusion you can cast shadow evocation and greater shadowevocation if you need it).

I have even made diviners (who only give up one school). because between meta-magic truestrikes (for use on rays) and trueseeing / see invis are always something you want prepared even if you don't use them. (guns don't kill superpeople, batmen kill superpeople).

the only thing evocation is good for is AOE on a large group of monsters who normally don't pose a threat. It speeds up weenie combat but loses to ongoing effects from conjuration, negatives from necromancy, and IWIN buttons from transmutations against the Big Baddies. I could go on about all the schools of magic but this isn't the thread for it.

quick_comment
2009-09-28, 10:18 AM
While I agree that is better to specialize (diviner, tnx), i think that sometimes it depends on the campaign.
example: if you start ad 8° lev., growing up, when you became 11°, it's very annoying to wait 4 other levels to learn greater shadow evocation to duplicate the useful Contingency... 'specially if the module stops at 15°-16° lev.

Craft contingent spell

Kaiyanwang
2009-09-28, 10:40 AM
Craft contingent spell

So? Shouldn't you be able to cast the spell you make contingent?

jiriku
2009-09-28, 10:59 AM
In one of my present games, I play a 11th level necromancer/red wizard. Even though I have no access to enchantment or evocation, and no illusion spells above 3rd level, I'm still very happy with the character. I always have enough spell slots for a whole day's worth of encounters, and with all the splatbooks to refer to, I have plenty of spell choices for every occasion.

I only struggle against constructs and undead, as they're immune to many of my spells, but frankly those enemy types would also be immune to most of the spells in my banned schools too.

Flickerdart
2009-09-28, 11:07 AM
So? Shouldn't you be able to cast the spell you make contingent?
Yes, but Evocation has no spells you'd want to make Contingent, save for perhaps Wall of Force. You don't need Contingency itself to Craft Contingent Spell.

Killer Angel
2009-09-29, 01:38 AM
Craft contingent spell

...which is not always available, due to Core only campaign or banning.
That said, I agree that to specialize is almost always better, but sometimes can be a hard choice.

Myrmex
2009-09-29, 01:41 AM
Eh, Con is your best defense, after spells. 2 points of Con gives you 1 HP/level. 2 Dex gives you 5% chance of not getting hit. Past about level 6 though, that +1 AC is gonna mean VERY little, while those 6+ hp probably will.

Really, as a wizard, your best defense is to NOT get attacked at all, but thats not always as easy in EVERY situation. Con protects you against nearly every cause of death. Dex doesn't. All Dex really does mid-game is allow you to hit better with Rays...which isn't terribly hard to begin with.

Dex & Con both help you from being taken down with a Finger of Death or what-have-you, as well.

Sinfire Titan
2009-09-29, 09:00 AM
Dex & Con both help you from being taken down with a Finger of Death or what-have-you, as well.

Finger of Death isn't a Ray. Or a touch spell. It's a targeted spell. Only Con helps protect you from it.

Myrmex
2009-09-29, 12:42 PM
Finger of Death isn't a Ray. Or a touch spell. It's a targeted spell. Only Con helps protect you from it.

Oh. Must have changed from 3.0 to 3.5. But you got what I meant, right? Right!?

Sinfire Titan
2009-09-29, 01:13 PM
Oh. Must have changed from 3.0 to 3.5. But you got what I meant, right? Right!?

Dex can be a caster's Dump Stat too. Con, no one dumps. At least, no one in 3.5. 3.0 Druids dumped that too.

sambo.
2009-09-29, 10:07 PM
Scrolls are not a good alternative to specialization. Especially because you can't craft them with higher save DCs for the spells that have them. It's a waste of money and XP to use Scribe Scroll to cover for being a Generalist.

scrolls are great for those handy utility spells that you don't want to burn spell slots to memorise.

Lycanthromancer
2009-09-29, 10:12 PM
Dex can be a caster's Dump Stat too. Con, no one dumps. At least, no one in 3.5. 3.0 Druids dumped that too.My kobold factotum used Con as his dump stat.

Of course, he was starting out as a necropolitan, so...

Also, find a way to make UMD a class skill and get a Cha bump or three; you may have a banned school or two (or three), but you can still cast using scrolls, wands, and staves.

GoodbyeSoberDay
2009-09-29, 10:35 PM
A domain wizard with elven generalist sub levels conjures his cake and eats it too.

Then again I've never seen a game with both of those things allowed.

nightwyrm
2009-09-29, 11:19 PM
A wizard can restrict himself to using only the conjuration and transmutation schools and still be more powerful than 90% of the classes.

Tyndmyr
2009-09-29, 11:22 PM
Hey, even just being a domain wizard is pretty good. Essentially it has almost all the goodies of a specialist wizard, while no downsides at all. The only thing it misses vs a specialist wizard is that the specialized list is prepicked, instead of chosen from a domain yourself.

Compared against a standard, unspecialized wizard...it's strictly better.

GoodbyeSoberDay
2009-09-29, 11:40 PM
Hey, even just being a domain wizard is pretty good. Essentially it has almost all the goodies of a specialist wizard, while no downsides at all. The only thing it misses vs a specialist wizard is that the specialized list is prepicked, instead of chosen from a domain yourself.

Compared against a standard, unspecialized wizard...it's strictly better.Domain Wizard reminds me of Lightning Warrior. "But, you can't specialize!"

Kurald Galain
2009-09-30, 03:24 AM
Hey, even just being a domain wizard is pretty good. Essentially it has almost all the goodies of a specialist wizard, while no downsides at all.

You can't enter the Master Specialist PrC, though. Also, the spell lists for most domains are somewhat lacklustre compared to the Transmutation or Conjuration schools...

Tyndmyr
2009-09-30, 07:16 AM
True...but having two more schools is pretty huge. Im using this build for an incantatrix in a RL game cause frankly, master specialist doesn't offer them much, and banning a total of three classes hurts a bit. This way, I lose only enchantment.

The one domain(nature?) allows you a variety of spells from other classes spell lists, though. That's a relatively rare trick, and kind of a cool one.

Talya
2009-09-30, 07:27 AM
The fact that enchantment is so easily bannable (and lets face it, it really is) irritates me. I love the flavor, the otherworldly enchantress who's very voice causes your mind to cloud over...but it works better for sorcerers or beguilers than wizards anyway, flavorwise, so I suppose...

Shadow Evocation makes evocation the obvious choice. (Shadow conjuration does NOT do the same, even for killer gnomes, unless you really want to walk everywhere.)

Sinfire Titan
2009-09-30, 08:53 AM
scrolls are great for those handy utility spells that you don't want to burn spell slots to memorise.

I prefer Uncanny Forethought. It's like having a scroll for every spell you can put in one of your spellbooks, only better because they all take a Full round action to cast (even Genesis!).

Kylarra
2009-09-30, 09:02 AM
You can't enter the Master Specialist PrC, though. Also, the spell lists for most domains are somewhat lacklustre compared to the Transmutation or Conjuration schools...Well there is the transmutation domain too, but agreed that most are rather meh.

Tyndmyr
2009-09-30, 10:05 AM
Situationally, I'll specialize instead of going domain wizard.

However, I see no reason to not specialize and not utilize domain wizard.

Cyclocone
2009-09-30, 10:28 AM
Trans. domain is nice and Conj. is ok too. But I always thought Storm looked like fun, and Battle has Time Sto(m)p... hmm.

What if you're going Archmage? it wouldn't matter much what domain you have, if you're dumping domain slots for high arcana.
Assuming the DM allows that ofcourse.