Spell Suggestions

[zoobob9]

We're starting a new campaign, and I designed my new wizard recently. I had an idea what spells I wanted, so I drafted a list, gone over it again, and im looking for suggestions for which ones to keep and which ones to change.

I'm a 3rd level evoker, banned schools are enchantment and necromancy.

0- All are known.
1- magic weapon?, burning hands, true strike?, mage armor?, enlarge person?
2- flaming sphere, scorching ray, invisibility?, spider climb?, bulls strength?

the question marked ones are ones i would like to change possibly.

[Zaq]

What books are available?

Who else is in your group?

How optimized is your group?

How married are you to being an evoker? (Expect a lot of people to try to dissuade you from it.)

More info would help, but those questions are pretty critical before we even start.

[zoobob9]

Player's handbooks 1 and 2, unearthed arcana, complete warrior and complete adventurer; a druid and 3 unknown people, one of whom may be a knight or paladin, another may be a dragon shaman; Im not sure given the previous answer; i either wanted to be an evoker or transmuter, but im not 100 percent set on either.

other, possibly useful information: i have 19 hitpoints, 14 str and dex, and will be using the longsword/longbow a moderate amount.

[Zaq]

Evocation is a pretty bad specialization. It's workable (even an Evoker is still, when you get right down to it, a Wizard, and is therefore capable of being one of the strongest members of the party), but it's one of the weakest specializations. (Conjuration is usually hailed as the best, followed by transmutation. Let's face it, most problems can be solved by either "making things" or "changing things.") In fact, a lot of people (myself included) recommend evocation as a banned school . . . most of its tricks can be replicated or surpassed by other schools.

Regardless, though, I'll assume that you actually like evocation spells. You should still take a bunch of the low-level staples (Grease, Glitterdust, and Web are three fantastic conjuration spells, all of which will stay useful for quite some time to come). Pyrotechnics is a fun transmutation spell; it takes some finesse to use it properly, but it can do some nasty things. If you insist on keeping evocation around, some of the best 1st- and 2nd-level evocation spells from your allowed sources are Gust of Wind, Shatter, Seeking Ray, Tenser's Floating Disk, and I guess Scorching Ray or Bigby's Tripping Hand or something like that. (Man, evocation really sucks at low levels, huh? I'd never really noticed just how bad it is before, say, 4ths hit the table. Your small source list kind of exacerbates it, of course.)

So yeah. You're kind of stuck if you really want to be an evoker. I guess just load up on spells from other schools and use your bonus slot on the few halfway decent spells evocation has to offer.

(Yes, I'm aware that my tone has changed a little bit over the course of this post. That's because it's really sinking in just how uninspiring evocation really is when you're at such a low level and don't have the Spell Compendium. At least at higher levels you get a few fun wall-type spells.)

[Amiria]

(Focus on) Evocation and/or Transmutation with Enchantment and Necromancy as prohibited schools ? I like it. :smallsmile:

I'm a specialist Transmuter with Enchantment and Necromancy as prohibited schools and I also like blasting things with Evocation. My two required Spell Focuses for Archmage are Evocation and Transmutation.

I recommend Transmuter over Evoker, but at higher levels the choice of being an Evoker isn't such a big disadvantage. The first level core evocation spells do pityful damage, especially Magic Missile at low caster level. Still, I recommend that spell over Burning Hands or Shocking Grasp.

My views on blasting / direct damage comes from my adventuring experience. I went from Lvl 3 to Lvl 18 in very small group, just me and my best friend, an elven Rogue/Abjurer (also Enchantment and Necromancy as prohibited schools). We rarely had fighter-types around that would kill monsters incapacitated by save-or-suck spells. We had to reduce their hit points ourselves.

Whether you go Evocation or Transmutation, for spells I recommend

1- Colour Spray (Ill), Featherfall (Trn), Identify (Div), Mage Armor (Cnj), Magic Missile (Evc)

2- Alter Self (Trn), Flaming Sphere (Evc), Glitterdust (Cnj), Mirror Image (Ill), Web (Cnj)

[Darwin]

Pick your blasty spells, blast, and you will still outperform your fellow players. If you're playing with Knights and Paladins you'll never have to worry about optimization. Pick whatever's fun and enjoy a chance to "not" play a focused specialist :smallamused:

[faceroll]

Pick your blasty spells, blast, and you will still outperform your fellow players. If you're playing with Knights and Paladins you'll never have to worry about optimization. Pick whatever's fun and enjoy a chance to "not" play a focused specialist :smallamused:

Unoptimized blasting will definitely underperform in the current group. Sudden Maximized Sudden Empowered Scorching Rays could do some clutch damage, once per day.

Arcane Thesis could bump up the damage on scorching ray.

Other than that, damage will be meh given that you can only do it a handful of times per day.

[Darwin]

Unoptimized blasting will definitely underperform in the current group. Sudden Maximized Sudden Empowered Scorching Rays could do some clutch damage, once per day.

Arcane Thesis could bump up the damage on scorching ray.

Other than that, damage will be meh given that you can only do it a handful of times per day.

If the entire group plays at a degree of optimization where one would expect to "use the longsword/longbow a moderate amount." as a wizard, I think we can safely assume a vanilla scorching ray/fireball will perform just fine without any metamagic needed.