New Wizard. Specialization

[LadyLexi]

My campaign just ended and a new one is starting, I'm going to be the party Wizard (Starting lv 1) and I am thinking about specializing. I just look at the Spell compendium and go... How can I decide.

The realities: I'm going to be playing CE. I want to keep Abjuration and Transmutation.

I am considering Evocation (for damage) or Abjuration as a specialty and I know I sort of want to keep Necromancy(Undead) and Conjuration(Greater Mage Armor, Shield). What is good to lose?

Is it worth it to drop Illusion and Enchantment? If I need to drop a third for Master Specialist... What is reasonable to lose?

[eggs]

When in doubt, go diviner, drop evocation and occasionally catch yourself forgetting you'd banned any spells at all.

[Craft (Cheese)]

First question is, how high of levels do you expect this campaign to go? Building and playing a 10th level wizard is a very different beast from building/playing a Wizard who will never go higher than level 3. Furthermore, what type of character you want to play is very important: Wizards can excel at basically any role in the party that you want if you build them for it.

By general consensus, the overall best schools to specialize in are Divination, Conjuration, and Transmutation. (Abjuration and Illusion are also great depending on what Prestige Classes you plan to get into.) The overall least useful schools are Evocation (redundant with Conjuration and Illusion), Enchantment (depending on what type of campaign you're playing, everything you have to deal with might just be flat-out immune to everything this school can do), and Necromancy (Level Drain is great, but not that great; Everything else is redundant with other schools).

Note that Divination's usefulness is DM-dependent: Divinations basically give you whatever information the DM decides to tell you, which may or may not be useful.

[LadyLexi]

I don't seeing this getting to lv 10. We played the last one for like 3 months before dying at lv 5. On the off chance it does go on I'd like to be able to sustain my usefulness.

I will be picking up reactive counterspell (or whatever it is that lets me do it without readying) as a measure against higher level casters.

I will be picking up Spontaneous Divination at lv 5, and my DM ruled that it applies to all divination spells, not just the ones I have in my spellbook(even divine or otherwise). Which I am fond of.

Illusions... are bad from my experience excepting the few defensive spells, especially against undead. I want to be able to splash damage and a bit of party assistance.

Prestige class wise I have no idea where I am going other than I won't really be picking up metamagic unless I have to, too many other feats I want.

[Craft (Cheese)]

Illusions... are bad from my experience excepting the few defensive spells, especially against undead. I want to be able to splash damage and a bit of party assistance.

The open-ended illusions are alright, though they suffer from the same problem as Divination and the better Enchantment spells where they basically do whatever the DM says they do. If your DM's the type to have the monsters just ignore the illusions and keep doing whatever they would be doing otherwise, Illusion becomes significantly less useful.

However, the real reason Illusion is such a great school is Shadow Evocation and Shadow Conjuration. You can use them to duplicate any Evocation/Conjuration effect as partially real. The Shadowcrafter Mage class lets you make them over 100% real.

[LadyLexi]

Yeah, I've been aware of the Shadowcrafter Mage but I don't see the campaign going long enough for me to get full power from that sort of build.

I don't know if this DM would ignore the illusions or not. I also have very little experience with illusions and I'm not sure I would do a good job.

[eggynack]

At lower levels, conjuration is the dominant school to specialize in over transmutation. Enchantment wasn't on your list of things to keep, and is always a good choice to drop. Evocation and necromancy are the other weakest schools, so it might be a good idea to drop one of those. Illusion is ok to drop, but silent image, invisibility and mirror image are invaluable spells, and it'll hurt to lose them.

[LadyLexi]

Maybe I just don't understand, because a lot of things (Wizards Handbook, ect.) say that Evocation is bad. As far as I can tell its the school of damage spells and where Fireball likes to hang out.

Conjuration seems to offer some spells, but does it really replace the area attacks from Evocation?

[Arcanist]

Maybe I just don't understand, because a lot of things (Wizards Handbook, ect.) say that Evocation is bad. As far as I can tell its the school of damage spells and where Fireball likes to hang out.

Conjuration seems to offer some spells, but does it really replace the area attacks from Evocation?

IMO Divination is the best school of magic and with just 3 feats you can make it entirely irrelevant that you just lost a school of magic :smalltongue:

[planswalker]

Maybe I just don't understand, because a lot of things (Wizards Handbook, ect.) say that Evocation is bad. As far as I can tell its the school of damage spells and where Fireball likes to hang out.

Conjuration seems to offer some spells, but does it really replace the area attacks from Evocation?

because dealing damage is about the weakest thing a wizard can do...

with all the "save or die", "save or lose", and "save or suck" spells out there, a turn spent casting an evocation is likely a turn spent dragging out combat 1 turn longer than necessary.

and that's not getting into the battlefield control. Plus, there are a LOT of spells out there that deal damage which aren't evocation. If they aren't the 100% most efficient ones out there, the damage will always be a side-effect, with the primary effect being the reason you cast the spell. Just pick up a single reserve feat and heighten spell to pop a lesser orb in one of your highest-level slots, and you'll be able to do all the damage you really need. (read: cleanup after your good spells rendered the fight irrelevant)

Buffing yourself and others is almost always a much more efficient way to pump out the damage.

[Craft (Cheese)]

Or starting at level 7, polymorph yourself into a Hydra and deal much more efficient damage than you ever could with evocation without basing your entire build around multiplying damage with Twin Spell and the like.

I'm not sure what the best option would be at level 1 if you wanna play a combat wizard though. Maybe summons?

[LadyLexi]

I suppose I just worry that without being able to deal damage I end up as a drain on the party. A lot of other save or ___ spells seem frustrating when enemies almost always make their saves.

Maybe I just don't know what spells are best, is there anything out there that highlights the best spells at each level?

[Balmas]

This (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=394) post contains a dissection of each spell, and why it is good or bad.

[Aricandor]

The key about saves is picking the right spells for the right times. Reflex spells generally don't work against rogues and anything of Small size and smaller, Will spells won't against clerics, Fortitude spells won't against anything of Large size or bigger (yeah, it's a generalization but you get the idea), nothing works against dragons...


As for some good spells for the early levels
Level 1: Sleep, Colour Spray, Grease, Ray of Enfeeblement if you're feeling lucky, Benign Transposition, Silent Image if you're creative enough and your DM isn't a jerk, Enlarge Person, Mage Armour (not on you though, on the fighter) and Cause Fear (good effect even on a save!) are solid picks and most of them are core. If you absolutely have to do damage, Magic Missile is passable, but only because of the guaranteed hit and how nothing resists force damage.

Level 2: Glitterdust, Web, Minor Image (again, if you are clever and DM is not mean), Scare, Invisibility (Again, not on yourself but on people with sneak attack; really good defence if you don't cast directly offensive spells though), Alter Self (be careful though, this one can get books thrown at your head 'cause of the possible shenanigans), Touch of Idiocy if you're feeling really brave and all the stat spells until people start getting items are good stuff.
Again if you absolutely need damage, Scorching Ray starts out above 1d6/level but demands a decent Dex and Acid Arrow is a passable 4d4 over two rounds when you get it but is contingent on only your ranged touch roll. Both have iffy scaling and are extremely easily defeated by resistances, however.

Generally buff spells are the easiest way to make your party happy with your contribution while also avoiding mean DMs that fudge monster saves.

[Craft (Cheese)]

I suppose I just worry that without being able to deal damage I end up as a drain on the party. A lot of other save or ___ spells seem frustrating when enemies almost always make their saves.

Maybe I just don't know what spells are best, is there anything out there that highlights the best spells at each level?

Logic Ninja's classic Wizard guidebook (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=104002). However, the guide is written from the perspective of being effective at buffing yourself and allies/debuffing enemies, as this is generally the best way for a wizard to go in combat. It also makes assumptions about the makeup of your party (e.g., that you'll have a cleric and a main damage-dealing character aside from your wizard). If you don't want to focus on buffs or control, the guide won't be as useful (though it's still pretty good).

The best spells to use also depends on your party makeup: If you don't have a rogue, Knock becomes a higher priority.

To summarize though, here's his list of "best" Level 1 spells from Core:


Level 1:
-Alarm: utility, and kind of a defensive buff--it keeps you from getting eaten by a moose while asleep.
-Protection from X: defensive buff--the +2 AC/saves vs. X is nice, but the real kicker is the fact that it supresses all charms and compulsions. Very useful for low-will-save types.
-Shield: defensive buff. Gives you +4 AC. The goodness is obvious.
-Grease: battlefield control that can even be save-or-lose. Note that it forces balance checks, and creatures who don't have 5 ranks in balance are flat-footed while making balance checks... which means the party rogue can sneak attack away.
-Mage Armor: defensive buff, so you're not TOTALLY squishy. Hours duration, as much AS as a chain shirt. What mage doesn't take it?
-Mount: utility. Situational--sometimes, you need a horse to get somewhere quickly. The real use of Mount, though, is to combine it with Disguise Self and Magic Aura, get rid of the mount's magic aura, disguise yourself as someone else... and sell the horse to someone.
-Identify: utility, needed to identify magic lewts.
-True Strike: Offensive buff for when your touch-attack spells are having trouble hitting.
-Charm Person: Utility/Offensive: it makes people your friends. That's all sorts of useful.
-Sleep: Save-or-Lose. Sleep is the low-level "win spell"; even a cleric with 18 WIS only has a +6 will save at level 1, and with 18 INT you can have a DC 15 Sleep, 16 with focuses. That's a pretty solid chance of a failed save. With a 10-WIS fighter or rogue, it's a great chance.
-Color Spray: Save-or-Lose. Similar to sleep, but it keeps being good for a lot longer. At levels 1-3ish Sleep is better because Color Spray is short-range and thus more likely to get you poked with a pointy stick.
-Silent Image: Utility. It's an illusion. Use your creativity.
-Ray of Enfeeblement: No save. Heavy strength drain can make a fighter useless--he suddenly can't move in his heavy armor! It's always good for dropping people's AB and damage, too. No save, like most ray spells; hitting with the ranged touch can occasionally be an issue.
-Enlarge Person: a great low-level buff. Give your fighter reach and a strength bonus.

[LadyLexi]

I know the PHB spells pretty well but the link is pretty helpful. Thanks.

[AWiz_Abroad]

Welcome to the wonders of low level wizardry, where one hit will kill you. . . .

My .02 cents worth is that until you hit lvl 7 and get your 4th lvl of spells, Conjuration ala battlefield control, summons, and the orb line is the school to focus on. Afterwards is when transmutation comes online If your DM will allow it, Conjuration's got the best ACF with abrupt jaunt.

As far as some of the less common spells go, I really REALLY like Benign Transposition. (Spell Compendium I think?)

I normally ban Enchantment and Necromancy. I enjoy blasting, and the random utility spells out of Evocation too much

As far as AOE conjuration. . . I believe hail of stone is a conjuration spell, and what I normally toss in as my AOE effect if I'm out of fireballs

[LadyLexi]

There is a feat to get spells from a Prohibited school, isn't there?

[Arcanist]

Welcome to the wonders of low level wizardry, where one hit will kill you a Cat (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/cat.htm) can kill you. . . .

Fixed that for you :smallwink:


My .02 cents worth is that until you hit lvl 7 and get your 4th lvl of spells, Conjuration ala battlefield control, summons, and the orb line is the school to focus on. Afterwards is when transmutation comes online If your DM will allow it, Conjuration's got the best ACF with abrupt jaunt.

Yeah and if you specialize in Conjuration you don't very well need to invest that much in blasting since for the most part you can pretty much summon something to accomplish your job for you. Transmutation, Necromancy, and Conjuration are a good school line for BFC.

A
as far as some of the less common spells go, I really REALLY like Benign Transposition. (Spell Compendium I think?)

Quite right, very good BFC spell. I find it funny to switch the enemy caster with your damage dealer (not Glass Cannon) and then have your party slaughter the little bugger before he can pull something off... :smallamused: Never got to do that in a game before (pesky will saves and all)...


I normally ban Enchantment and Necromancy. I enjoy blasting, and the random utility spells out of Evocation too much

If you are specializing in Conjuration its actually alright to ban Evocations for the orb series... VERY good spell line :smallamused:


As far as AOE conjuration. . . I believe hail of stone is a conjuration spell, and what I normally toss in as my AOE effect if I'm out of fireballs

I prefer Acid Fog and Incendiary Cloud. Sculpt Spell, Invisible Spell, Chain spell, and Repeat Spell are friken hilarious for summoning monsters. :smallbiggrin:


There is a feat to get spells from a Prohibited school, isn't there?

In Lost Empires of Faerun there are 3 feats (Spell Reprieve, Item Reprieve and Arcane Transfiguration) by taking all 3 you gain access to 1 school of magic that you have banned. Unfortunately you can only take Arcane Transfiguration once so you can't just take Spell/Item Reprieve and then Arcane Transfiguration 3 times and be a Focused Specialist (Or a regular specialist Red Wizard) :smalltongue:

[AWiz_Abroad]

I am going to put it out there, and my DM would hit me with a DMG for suggesting it, but the Domain Wizard out of Unearthed Arcana is pretty awesome, and doesn't require a downside.

Arcanist, thanks for the assistance, I agree it's alright to ban Evocation, I just had a fire schtick going with my battlefield controller, so I kept it. Evocation can be easily compensated for with the spells Arcanist mentions.

[dextercorvia]

The trick to Save or X spells, is you have to know what save to target. That said, if you know you will be facing a lot of undead, definitely drop Enchantment. After that, I look at the needs of the part to determine which of Evocation, Necromancy, and Abjuration to ban. They each hurt some, but you would have plenty of options with just Transmutation and Conjuration.

Remember, your job is to remove obstacles, solve problems, and be a team player. Likely the other 3 members of your team can deal plenty of damage. That niche is covered. You need to be able to handle things they can't, or make them more effective at what they do. There are times that I keep Evocation, because it is fun.

[LadyLexi]

Dex, the only problem is the DM kinda adapts to whatever we aren't good at. If we don't tend to fight well against a particular type of monster or situation, we will likely see more of it. If I build to kick Undead butt then I won't ever see them again.

I've been looking through spells and it would really hurt to lose Enchantment's Ray of Idiocy and Dominate Person, and Necromancy's various draining rays and Animate Dead

If I get rid of Evocation, which is more favorable to also lose: Necromancy or Enchantment? I think I will be going Conjuration specialist now as it looks like I can do a little bit of all the things I want with it. It has damage spells, and a cone attack, it has summon undead and it has an amazing alternative feature where I can teleport 10' as an immediate action (which sounds amazing).

[Mnemnosyne]

The thing with being a well-built wizard is that you're good at defeating everything as long as you have the spells in your spellbook to prepare for the situation.

I personally hate losing Enchantment because it makes it difficult to take the Mindbender dip at level 6 for Mindsight, which I try not to go without on any character that can possibly qualify. Necromancy sucks to lose too, though. Plus I also like the dominate line and a few other very nice enchantment spells. I've sometimes considered the Arcane Transfiguration route so I can ban less schools, but to be honest, it's not needed. You could ban every school except Conjuration and Transmutation and still be an effective wizard.

I think I would probably ban Necromancy in your situation. Nice spells that suck to lose, but I can't think of any necromancy spell that is as must-have as some of the ones from enchantment, at least for my particular way of playing.

[Thrice Dead Cat]

Dex, the only problem is the DM kinda adapts to whatever we aren't good at. If we don't tend to fight well against a particular type of monster or situation, we will likely see more of it. If I build to kick Undead butt then I won't ever see them again.

Seeing this, your best bet is to specialize in conjuration, ditching enchantment. Enchantment anything means you can't deal with undead or constructs. Evocation (save contingency) is all blasts, which conjuration can cover via Orb of X or summon monster X.

With necromancy, you have more options with undead, even if constructs still pose an issue for you.

[Suddo]

Just go Elven Generalist, Race of Wild Elf Alternate Class Feature, especially if you can get Grey Elf as a race.

[Hiro Protagonest]

For offensive wizard builds, Conjuration is better than Evocation.

1) Orb of X deals with damage
2) Multi-summoning creatures with Augment Summoning is decent for area damage
3) Web, Grease, Solid Fog, Stinking Cloud, Evard's Black Tentacles, Sleet Storm... all great area battlefield control. Sleet Storm isn't quite as good as the others, due to no ranged attacks from obscured vision, but it's still good if you're dealing with waves of mooks and want to slow them down so the cleric can heal up any damage (note that this is for really tough fights only: normally the cleric should just cast a Shield Other on the rogue and a Protection from Alignment on the fighter, or vice versa, then cast a Summon Monster or two, then just hang back and be an archer to conserve spell slots, ideally using Divine Metamagic: Persist on Divine Power to be a better archer. Unless he has Righteous Wrath of the Faithful, then he casts that too).

And then Illusion

1) For your weak point of no Save or X targeting Will, you have Illusion. Color Spray or Hypnotic Pattern at lower levels, and Rainbow Pattern at the upper end of this particular game.
2) It has buffs on par with Transmutation. Blur, Invisibility, Displacement, Greater Invisibility. For yourself, Mirror Image. Greater Invisibility is also great to cast on yourself.

[Lactantius]

LadyLexi,
just don't listen to those assumptions which say that evocation is a bad school.

Really, the thing is:
Playgrounders assume that damage is a thing others should do, not you (the wizard).

I disagree strongly, regarding both; the fluff and the crunch aspect.

Fluffwise, I like to blast things. It's an archetypical thinh wizard just should be able to do: magic missiles, fireballs, lightning bolts.
Besides those archetypical, flashy spells, you still have a lot of very strong and useful evocations distributed among all spell levels.

Low Level (1-5) gives you the already mentioned flashy spells plus scorching ray, gust of wind (very useful spell against chargers or gaseous/foggy spells), you have shatter (which is also very open-ended and therefore very useful) and don't forget a staple spell like light or even daylight (vs. light-sensitive creatures).
You can carry all the loot outta the dungeon with Tensers Disc. A bag of holding of HHH won't be in the party's reach yet (too expensive).

At Mid-Level (6-10), we have a decent damage spell with ice storm. Playgrounders tend to forget the fact that ice storm lasts 2 rounds, is partially difficult to resist (bludgeoning), reduces the movement (so that the targets WILL stay 2 rounds in the storm, after all) and most important: it is a cylindric spell effect. This last advantage cost one paty wizard his life in a round I DM'ed (the party wizard was flying in the air, found himself secure enough, what is true - normally).
Well, besides ice storm, we have the resilient sphere. A wonderful spell for which you will find no substitute. Remember the force effect. Force effects are fixed to the evocation school. Only the orc of force is an exception.
Anyways, the sphere is a spell you can use to
a) save your dying comrade
b) encapsule fleeing enemies
c) lock-down a dangerous enemy (and divine & conquer the battlefield).

What else do we get?
Wall of Force is the best way to cast a wall, especially if you want to block all sort of effects. Wall of Stone is good too, but is serves another purpose. So, again, don't listen to those who say you can substutite the wall of force with a wall of stone. Sometimes you can, sometimes not.

We reach Contingency soon (at level 11, if your campaign goes THAT far) and we can use the bigby-spells.
Believe me, those hands are a great asset to shut down a single threat.
Playgrounder may disagree and refer to area-lock-downs like solid fog or evars tentacles.
But again, it depends.
For example, if you encounter large, strong monsters like dragons, fiends, ogres, giants and so on, you are on the safe side with bigby.
Evards and Fogs won'T help much against single, large monsters since those are a) too strong (high STR, high grapple) and will escape the tentacles or they have SLAs or other escape mechanisms to get outta the fog (fiends use teleports, dragons can cast spells or fly etc).

Besides the PHB, you have many more evocations in the SpC, PH2 or CM.
Some examples:
persistant blade, force ladder, blacklight, manyjaws, chain missile, explosive cascade, defenestrating sphere, mass fire shield, prismatic ray and so on.

But the most important thing you should consider:

banning evocation is a TRAP!

Why so?

Easy answer: OPs argue that you can substitute the whole evocation spell with one spell (shadow evocation).
That is true, and it is not.

The drawback of doing so it to pay a very, very high tax to afford this luxury. Wanna dupliate a fireball effect? Sure, pay a tax +2 spell levels (5th level spell slot vs 3rd level spell slot).
With the 5th level spell slot, I prefer to cast the fireball empowered, which is also a +2 adjustment.
Plus, you are totally screwed if you want to use save-DC-relevant spells like fireball because of all those quasi-real-another-save-stuff.

Playgrounders would argue AGAIN that a wizard should not use damage spells.
Now, we come to the crunch point.

I have witnesses so many sessions where the damage dealt by a wizard was totally necessary and helped the party alot.
There are so many cases in which a wizard should be able to blast stuff away. I don't tell you to blast like a russian artillery, but I recommend that you keep up some blasting spells - just in case of.
Well, here some cases which actually really happened (and are more worthy than all those theoretical assumptions flying around on the forums):

1) The party's damage dealers cannot deal damage or cannot deal enough damage.
Reasons why this is so:
a) the fighter went down/got tripped/got sundered/got disarmed/got a dispelled magic weapon vs a creature with DR 5/magic (which happens more often than you think).
If the fighter went down, he won't be able to cause damage. So, your cast haste spell is nullified (or, at least, reduced in its impact).
Remember that if you read another of those unspeakable haste-vs-fireball-comparions. A real good wizard memorizes both spells.
b) there are too many grunts around. Casting a fireball can take out multiple grunts at once (kobolds, goblins, skeletons etc). Or, if they are a bit stronger (take orcs, gnolls, draconians, humanoids etc), they are down to ~50% hp.
Don't listen to those who tell you stuff about fire resistance, reflex save and SR. Truth is: most enemies don't have resistances and reflex is most time poorer than fortitude or will.
2) The party is split. Should not happen, but believe me: it happens.
IMHO, a wizard should work without depending on those fighter dudes. It is good to have them around, but you are a wizard! You should be able to defend yourself without being addicted to the melee's!
So, you need damage spells to show those commoners what they are facing at.
Sure, in the typical party mode, you can let the fighter dish the damage. But it is not wrong to keep some damage spells on reserve - just in case of.
3) Special Encounters:
even at low levels, special encounters can make the normal damage dealer worthless. Take ghosts, shadows or other incorporeals. Magic Missile will prevail against those mundane swords.
Take lycanthropes with DR/silver. A simple were-rat can have this and make an encounter more difficult if you stick to weapons-only.
Take zombies or skeletons. Both have a good DR.

Magic damage - be it force damage or energy damage - will prevail.


Lastly, you WILL lose the best defence spell in the game - contingency.
Our shadow-evocation-friends will get them too: at level 15!
The gap between 11 and 15 is huge - too huge for me. 90% of all campaigns I played ended up before reaching level 15. So, you wouldn't habe used contingency at all.
Some would bring in the feat craft contingent spell to circumvent this problem. Again, no solution. This feat is made for NPCs if you take a look at the XP- and gold-costs you must pay for each and every spell. Not managable at all.

Orbs are another argument, yeah. Truth is: orbs should be evocations. But besided that failed design, orbs are single-target-only with a hefty price tag (level 4). I prefer scorching rays or area damages.
The only real useful orb is the orb of force. But that's just because it has a better damage-ratio than its counterparts, force missile and chain missile.
Again, a design failure: force-effects are evocation ONLY.



Conclusion:

If you have fun with flashy evoc spells, then keep 'em!
Mechanically, you are on a strong side, especially if you advane slowly in levels and cannot plan with high-level-substitution stuff.
I would recommend to ban necromancy and/or enchantment.
If you play a diviner, you must only ban one school. This depends - again - on your taste.
Do you like to enchant other persons? Does your campaign includes many humanoids (take a city adventure)? Then, enchantment is good to keep.
Do you like a creepy style? Do you like to weaken/hex your opponents? Then, keep necromancy.

If you want to ban both schools, you could even go for a focused specialist (diviner). He loses only 2 schools and gets a good amount of bonus spells.


My 2c.

[planswalker]

um... our point was that you can deal damage just fine without evocation, and that damage dealing was just about the last priority for a wizard. Yeah, you can conjure up some hypothetical situations in your head where you think damage dealing is the best thing a wizard can do.

Doesn't change what good advice for optimizing a wizard is. You do have a point though about how, if someone has fun doing something, that's what they should do. Thing is, check the OP. He was asking advice for what to specialize in and what to drop. He never said that he was a big fan of evocation. We're saying that conjuration can do all the damage dealing you need plus a crapton more. The shadow evocations are NOT what I've been saying can replace them.

um... contingency??? That's your answer for why evocation rocks? The OP said that he doubts the campaign will even reach lvl 10, much less higher. Probably should focus on things before that level, as by the time you've reached lvl 6 spells, if your wizard isn't breaking the world wide open, it's because you've chosen not to, not because a wizard can't.

[Hiro Protagonest]

Evocation isn't bad. It's merely subpar. And for a wizard, "subpar" can still be good. But you have to jump through some metamagic hoops to get there, and your main strength doesn't lie in that. Blasting should augment your powers, not be the focus. Solid Fog is really only good for slinging buffs and debuffs without blasties. Conjuration has blasties, but Evocation is also okay if you have a free slot for a Fireball, but not one for an Orb of Fire.

Evocation's strength also lies in its scattering of BFC. The Bigby spells basically put a better grappler/bullrusher on the field, there are a few Wall spells in it, and there's the moderately expensive but awesome Force Cage (make sure they can't teleport first. Dimensional Anchor should do that).

So Evocation is a good school. Personally, it goes on my list above Necromancy and below Illusion. But it's not a good school to specialize.

[NeoSeraphi]

First of all, I'm going to address a major point from the OP that I don't think anyone's addressed yet: You do not need to ban a third school in order to qualify for the Master Specialist prestige class. The example NPC in the class has the Focused Specialist ACF from the same book, which does require a third class banned, but Master Specialist itself does not.

Secondly, the shield spell is Abjuration, not Conjuration. Just so you know.

Now, most importantly of all: What is your Intelligence score? Have you rolled or bought your stats yet? Everyone here is assuming you're going to start with 16-18 Int, when for all we know you're rolling and you could have as low as a 13 in Intelligence.

If your Intelligence score is 14 or lower, save or sucks is not for you. Your DCs will not be reliable without heavy feat investment. At that point, it would be better to go for single target blasting (which uses ranged touches and does not allow saves, examples would be magic missile [except it auto-hits], scorching ray and acid arrow).

If you do have a decent Intelligence score, you can throw in some cool save-or-lose spells like color spray, though from what you're saying, I would personally advise you to ban Illusion and Enchantment as your schools.

The Illusion school is fairly terrible if your DM is not willing to work with you on it. That strips most of your options away from the image line, leaving you with the crappy Shadow Evocation/Conjuration spells and the invisibility/mirror image spells. Those are good, but they're certainly not worth keeping a school for.

Enchantment is save-or-x, all of it. If your Intelligence score is low, it's a worthless school. If your DM likes undead, it's a worthless school. Just don't bother with it. Too many "ifs" about this one.

Now for your specialization. If your Intelligence score is below 15, you should consider Evocation or Transmutation as your school. Evocation will let you blast more, Transmutation will let you buff more. Both contribute to your damage output without allowing saves. If your Intelligence score is at least 15, Conjuration will probably help you more in the long run.

If your Dexterity score is 12 or less and your Intelligence score is 14 or less, you'll be forced into a strictly defensive/buff role, but that's okay. Load up on the magic missiles for when you need to deal damage and just protect yourself and your party the rest of the time. I suggest Abjuration as your school of choice if this is the case.

[LadyLexi]

Ah, Yes I should have specified. My starting Int is 20 and my Dex is 16. It was a 28 point buy. I have a 6 charisma (usually my favorite stat) as a trade off. Due to spellcasting protege I effectively have a 22 starting Int for the purposes of saves and bonus spells. Maybe not the best feat choice but it seemed useful.

Conjuration seems like a fitting a little of everything school. The only thing I do know about the campaign is that that the "civilized" races (humanoids) number in the less than 10,000 range across the larger area we are starting in.

Abjuration was never an option to drop, I don't really see why someone would want to drop anti-caster stuff unless the party had two wizards and the other one was going Abjuration specialist.

[NeoSeraphi]

With 20 Int and 16 Dex, I suggest Specialist Conjurer with Enchantment and Illusion banned. You can fill up your slots with Conjuration, Transmutation, and Evocation spells, holding on to the Abjuration and Necromancy for when it's necessary and getting Spontaneous Divination to cover your bases.

[planswalker]

yeah, that sounds like a solid plan to me given your stated interests and your starting int. If you've got a 20 int, flaunt it. Save or X spells are your friends.

[LadyLexi]

A lot of people were saying to pitch Evocation. Is it better than Enchantment or Illusion? Normally I'd just kinda go with whatever, but this DM is pretty brutal when it comes to enemies.

Actually, maybe I'll end up banning all three through Incantrix. It seems like it might be more useful to go the Incantrix path... Unless there is a PrC that works better for Conjuration.

[planswalker]

overall, I say that evocation is one of the safest to lose. It has nothing that another school can't cover for.

[Sudain]

Woot - thank you NeoSeraphi for some useful points.

With Cha that low you should be aware of touch of idiocy and the necromancy spell that lets you do touch spells at range. And hope it doesn't get maximized.

From personal expereince I would say by all means go master specialist and ban a 3rd school. I went that route(specialized conjur droping illusion, necromancy and enchantment). I had 1 issue - finding time in the day to cast all the spells I wanted to.

I acutally would suggest keeping evocation. You have a smattering of CC spells, and blasty spells that come early and often, and are almost universally applicable. If you DM is harsh with the monsters reducing them to 0 could be of more help than drawing the combat. As we all know anything more than 0 hp means ready for more action(and more incoming damage or nastiness). Just depends on the situation - like any and all wizard spells.

[Thrice Dead Cat]

Overall, there are three and only three spells from evocation that I would ever miss. By level, they are

Streamers (3rd) (Some FR book) - So good it's one of the few spells banned by Doc Roc's Test of Spite
Defenestrating Sphere (4th) (CA/SpC)- One of evocation's few battlefield control spells, and a great one at that
Contingency (6th) (core/srd)- Waiting for Greater Shadow Evocation hurts, but it's there.

Everything else is either damage (orb of X) or doable elsewhere (wall of force vs wall of stone) and so on.

[Wonton]

Haven't read all the responses, but let me just add my 2 cents: Play whatever you have the most fun doing.

Mechanically, as people on this board will tell you, Evocation is the school that can pretty much every one of its spells replaced by another school's. If you want to be even more powerful, play a Focused Specialist (Conjuration), using the alternate class feature on page 34 of Complete Mage. It's actually insane how many spells this will allow you to prepare - the moment you gain a new spell level, you'll have access to 1 general slot (assuming you have enough Int to gain the bonus spell slot) and 3 special slots restricted to your school. Although that seems very limiting, Conjuration is by far the broadest school and you will still be able to do nearly anything - check out this (http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/19863086/The_Conjurers_Handbook) and this (http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/19869058/Treantmonks_guide_to_Conjuration:_Gods_tools) thread for some examples of really good Conjuration spells for each spell level.

But, at the end of the day, if you feel that's too cheesy, if you feel it won't work in your campaign, if you feel that you'll overshadow other players, or if you just don't find it as fun - play whatever you want. You should never play something just because someone told you that it's the 'best' option.

[LadyLexi]

Wonton, I usually do. I have a lot of fun with characters that sometimes make no sense or are sub-par for the team. I like social bards who don't even own weapons and couldn't care less about spells. I like Unarmed Warblades who pick up Improved Unarmed and Superior Unarmed and run around in a monk's outfit for silliness and lolz.

But this DM has harsh death rules, attacks unconscious characters when others are still standing and is totally cool with sending things that are CR 3 times party level. We ended our last campaign with a TPK in a fight we couldn't even deal a point of damage in.

Optimization is mandatory because fights scale off of the highest level player and when you die you lose a level for your next character too.

[Sudain]

Wow... okay when you said HARSH you meant it.

I'm not a pinacle of optimization but if you can invest in some mobilty and abuse range if you can. Phantom steed was a good friend for me.

It may be worthwhile to build a balanced spell list ahead of time. If you like I can pull up my spell list I used. I focused on being able to function fully at 130+ feet for any given combat(Battle field control specialist). Only inside buildings where I couldn't I was forced into range.

As a side note: thank you for being responsive - it helps a ton. :)

[LadyLexi]

I'd appreciate that, I'm sort of floating in a sea of choices and narrowing down exactly what I want to do is difficult. Particularly because I worry about being effectively useless if the wrong kind of situation appears because it will appear a lot afterwards.

The only upside to this is that I get to gripe to my fellow players and for some reason that works as a bond between us. Also I get to play D&D, wonderful D&D.

[Mordy]

Alas, as implied to above with some points regarding Evocation spells, many spells are highly dependent on the situation you find yourself in... and you'll be preparing your spells for the day in advance.

Playing with a harsh DM, and without stepping into the realm of meta-gaming, I'd say lets look at something you can certainly know in advance - your fellow party members.

Do we know yet what they'll be playing?

Also, another vote for conjuration specialist - abrupt jaunt* is brokenly useful for saving your bacon, and might be entirely appropriate for dealing with vicious DMs.

*Alternate class feature from PHB2. For a less broken variant, we house-ruled it into a swift action.

[Wonton]

But this DM has harsh death rules, attacks unconscious characters when others are still standing and is totally cool with sending things that are CR 3 times party level. We ended our last campaign with a TPK in a fight we couldn't even deal a point of damage in.

Optimization is mandatory because fights scale off of the highest level player and when you die you lose a level for your next character too.

In that case, do lots of preparation for fights - divinations when possible, at low levels you might just have to resort to scouting. Have lots of "contingency" spells prepared (I don't actually mean the spell Contingency, just ones that can save you from bad situations). I highly recommend some of the Immediate-action spells in the PHB2. Alter Fortune (Sor/Wiz 3) has an XP cost, but it's better than having someone fail a saving throw and die, or having that Ogre crit with his Huge x3 greataxe. Energy Aegis (Sor/Wiz 3) can grant a target resistance 20 to any energy type - the difference between getting killed by something and being badly wounded.

Try to kill/disable as many enemies as possible in the first round of combat - I like opening up with Stinking Cloud or Black Tentacles. Use Bracers of Arcane Freedom and a Ring of Silent Spells so you can cast without verbal and somatic components when needed. A Benign Transposition (Sor/Wiz 1, SpC) will get you out of most grapples. Make sure everyone in the party gets a Healing Belt.

Basically - if your DM is being brutal, counter it by being prepared, having a back-up plan, and then having a back-up plan for that back-up plan. Keep in mind that you can actually cast spells of much higher level from a scroll, as long as you succeed on a caster level check (DC = 1 + scroll's CL). Even, say, a level 3 wizard can spend 1125g on a scroll of Teleport, and she would only need to beat DC 10 with her CL check to successfully bail her party out of a TPK.

Edit: I forgot the Heart of Water and Heart of Earth spells from Complete Mage. They are fantastic buffs that can also be discharged into Freedom of movement and Stoneskin respectively, as a Swift action. I think it's fairly obvious how useful that can be in the right situations.

[LadyLexi]

Abrupt jaunt is definitely part of my plans, as is Spontaneous Divination. Benign Transposition might come into play.

The other party members at talking one Druid (doesn't know where he wants to go), and possibly a swashbuckler or rogue. Not a lot to work with but I should be able to push the Druid to hold the line while the swashbuckler enjoys a few buffs from me. Any of that is up in the air to sudden change.

[Sudain]

Blarg, I can't find my old data so I'll just have to re-create it here. Expect this post to update as update it. Done updating.

You have front-liners - that's good. Let them you know you need them to hold the line for you - that will help them understand where you are coming from.

-=-=- Build -=-=-
This build is designed to function at 120+ feet and expects you to be mobile where ever possible. Being in melee range is death. Being within 60 feet is bad. Being in archery range is still uncomfortable. Working out at such a distance you can easily be separated from the party so you need to take that into account in your actions. Sometimes you can't be so far out - that's fine as well. Just be smart about where you stand.

Pros: This is a master of battle field control so you will be able to lockdown pretty much anything. This also ignores most saves outright. All of these are core spells.

Cons: Your spells couldn't hurt anything if you wanted to. You have a high mod so.... this build ignores that as well.

Feats
No feats needed though several will go nicely with the build. Some that play well though. Collegiate Wizard(Complete Arcane 181) is HIGHLY suggested as this is a spell-heavy build. Mix and match for flavor.

Chain Spell(Complete Arcane)
Delay Spell(Complete Arcane)
Sudden Widen(Complete Arcane)
I'm sure there are more; I just don't feel like looking any up.

ACFs
Dedicated Sepcalist(loose a 3rd school for a 2nd spell slot) helped a ton on this.

Aburpt jaunt(PHB2) is also nice.

Prestige Classes
I went Ultimate Magus with Beguiler as a support. Warblade (spontaneous evocation I think?) would work as well. Or master specialist. Most anything works with this. :)

Spells
I had the ratios worked out at some point but this is like 50% Battle field control, 35% Utility/Buff, and 15% awesome(stuff that made me cackle). I'll leave it up to you to figure out which ones are which... :) Mix and match as needed.

I got a ton of 'cloud' and wall spells. That way the party knew they could count on me to always either restrict vision or movement. Each one did something different as a rider effect but they were always a cloud or movement restricting. Giving them that consistency enabled us to work well. The rest enabled me to solve problems thrown at me by the GM. Not consistently; but he didn't consistently throw me the same problems either.

I also had some spells that were purely for 'in-town' use when you had days downtime. You'll also note I didn't mark level 9 spells. You should know what you need/want by then. If you get that far.

-=-=- Specialist Spells -=-=-
I dropped Illusion, Enchantment and Necromancy and focused in Conjuration.

1) Grease, Unseen Servent
2) Fog Cloud, Web
3) Phantom Steed, Sleet Storm
4) Solid Fog, Black Tentacles
5) Cloudkill, Wall of Stone
6) Acid Fog, Wall of Iron
7) Phase Door, Teleport Object
8) Maze, Incendiary Cloud


-=-=- Spells -=-=-
*Change as needed - I defualted to the first one in the (spell/spell2)* format.


1) Alarm, Enlarge Person, Detect Secret Doors, Magic Missile, Mage Armor, Summon Monster I

2) (Protection from Arrows/Resist Energy)*, (Detect Thoughts/Locate Object)* , Gust of Wind, Pyrotechnics, (See Invisibility/Glitterdust)*.

** Rope Trick is missing here. I instead opted for Secure Shelter later on.

3) Stinking Cloud , Explosive Runes, Arcane Sight, Wind Wall, Shrink Item.
In town spells: Magic Circle against Evil/Good/Chaos/Law.

** You'll note dispel magic, Haste, and Fly are missing here. Conscious choices I made for my play style.

4) Secure Shelter , (Arcane Eye/Scrying)*, Resilient Sphere, Wall of Ice, Globe of Invulnerability, Lesser.
In town spells: Remove Curse, Detect Scrying

** Stoneskin - make them pitch in for the material component. I skipped this as my group wouldn't. The globe doesn't move with you so it's for when you need to make a stand or protect someone.

5) Dismissal, (Prying Eyes/Contact Other Plane)*, Wall of Force, Baleful Polymorph, Interposing Hand.
In town Spell: Break Enchantment.

** Dismissal will be useful if you use planar binding more than a little.
** Just be careful with Contact other plane. Awesome spell but could bite you.

6) Dispel Magic, Greater , True Seeing, Repulsion, Disintegrate.
In Town Spells: Planar Binding, Contingency
** Planar Binding - see if you can get party members to help debuff with this one. Include rather than exclude them. :)

7) Spell Turning, Prismatic Spray, Reverse Gravity, Grasping Hand.
In Town Spells: Control Weather

** I skipped teleport again. As a courtesy to my DM.

8) Prismatic Wall, (Mind Blank/Discern Location)*, Polymorph Any Object, Clenched Fist.
In town Spell: Planar Binding, Greater and Moment of Prescience

** Maze is used for close-range self defense. It may or may not last long; but it's a no save kiss-off spell.
** Incendiary cloud's benefit lies NOT in it's damage - that's just a rider effect. It's in that you can move the cloud again and again and again. By now your DM will have figured out(Just move the monsters out!). The low damage also means you can be in it and be okay.

[Aron Times]

Something tells me that all the optimization in the world will not help you at all with this kind of DM. First, he/she doesn't seem to get that the DM is not supposed to compete against the players, but act as a storyteller and arbitrator for the game. Your comment about your last game ending at level 5 gives off the impression that your DM likes to kill off his players for a power trip, and the comment about finishing off unconscious players and penalizing players a level for their replacement character basically confirms it.

My advice is to look for another DM. No game is better than a bad game, in my opinion.

[Thrice Dead Cat]

While it won't help immediately, both Last Breath and Revivify (SpC) act as reviving spells without the level lose. The former is on the druid list and runs the same risks as reincarnate while revivify is raise dead+.

Other than that, Abrupt Jaunt is your best bet. Just hold onto your immediate actions like a paranoid maniac and a lot of praying. Actual build depends on how you want to wizard.

[The Frank One]

Do not ban enchantment, focus on it. I have played a NE Enchanter from 1 to 15, master specialist and mindbender allow you to charm enemies in combat at level 4 (character level 7) without the penalty and give you telepathy (if you pick up social proficiency mindbender skill prereqs are easy)

Everyone dumps on enchantment but it is the most fun school if you are evil. Your character has little qualms about pushing others around and enchantment magic lets you do that. Undead are obnoxious as an enchanter but you have other party members so just buff them when you fight undead. If you keep necromancy you can pick up greater disrupt undead which is 1d8/lvl ranged touch attack so you'll at least be able to put pretty good damage out in those fights.

The suggestions are good from an optimizing standpoint but enchantment is just so much fun to give up as a CE character, and honestly from level 1 - 10, mind blank and immunity to mind effecting is not that common outside of undeads. Master Specialist will give you greater spell focus for free, plus a 20 int, you're golden. you can even get in a couple levels of fatespinner going up to 10. That build is chock full of fun, and I promise you, is more than functional in a game from 1-10 with an 18 int to start.

Enchantment spells, if you put enough into boosting the DCs, rock. If I were you I would drop illusion and evocation. Necromancy can really mess with undead and offsets the enchantment and illusion tends to be save based in a lot of ways and you will have more than enough of those effects.

If you go for something else, that's fine, but CE enchanter would be extremely fun and allows you to avoid encounters pretty well when used wisely, which can be nice sometimes.

Also, have you considered talking to your dm? If he constantly builds encounters around what will kill you isn't the end result eventually going to be a TPK every time?

[LadyLexi]

I think the DM has more of a "why wouldn't you know the answer/how to do this?" kind of attitude and wants us to develop mind reading.

I would love to play an enchanter because its absolutely amazing fun, just like throwing a fireball into a crowded bar is a lot of fun. They just are more limited than I'm allowed to be at this point in time. I'm going to have to survive, which is going to be brutal and I feel as though Conjurer will give me that more than other groups. Also those charisma checks suck with my -1 mod.

I want to play because I need my gaming fix. The game has up points too but I'm focusing on the bad in order to try to protect against it.

Thanks to everyone for all the ideas, I think I'll be able to put together something that will hold up to the shaky waters of low level.

[ryu]

Also that druid needs to take ALL the natural spell. Kinda obvious, but if that isn't happening in this situation something is horribly wrong.

[AWiz_Abroad]

I think the DM has more of a "why wouldn't you know the answer/how to do this?" kind of attitude and wants us to develop mind reading.

I would love to play an enchanter because its absolutely amazing fun, just like throwing a fireball into a crowded bar is a lot of fun. They just are more limited than I'm allowed to be at this point in time. I'm going to have to survive, which is going to be brutal and I feel as though Conjurer will give me that more than other groups. Also those charisma checks suck with my -1 mod.

I want to play because I need my gaming fix. The game has up points too but I'm focusing on the bad in order to try to protect against it.

Thanks to everyone for all the ideas, I think I'll be able to put together something that will hold up to the shaky waters of low level.

If you want, post the build. With that fantastic INT score, you'll be a wizard to be feared (assuming you don't die from a house cat) :smallcool:

[Eldariel]

Conjuration covers all 3 saves early on; Glitterdust is Will, Web is Reflex and Stinking Cloud is Fortitute. Complement with Illusion/Enchantment/Transmutation for Will (Pyrotechnics, Color Spray, Sleep). Other good save-or-Xs come later for other saves. Note that Glitterdust (and a handful of other key Will-save spells) affect mind-affecting immune opponents such as Undead. This is absolutely crucial for covering everything, alongside key buffs (Enlarge Person, Invisibility, Alter Self, etc. are always useful).

Note that mindless creatures (Golems, Undead, etc.) should have no ways of telling illusions from reality; as such, illusionary cages, walls, etc. should be 100% efficient in completely disabling them depending on how they're programmed.

Later on stuff like Disintegrate & Polymorph Any Object allows attacking Fort-saves of Fort-save immune targets (and Plane Shift is a non-mind affecting Will save-or-die when used with planes like Positive Energy Plane; Magic Jar to a degree too), and you get a good variety of spells for each save and ways to disable enemies for a time being without saves (Walls & al.) and good Rays that don't offer saves (earliest is the mentioned Ray of Enfeeblement; complete with carrying capacity it can be a brutal debuff and it's naturally brutal for melee monsters).


I strongly suggest Conjuration focus just for Abrupt Jaunt; helps you stay alive. You can pick up Familiar at level 3 with Obtain Familiar-feat; they're fairly observant, and useful especially later on (Improved Familiars get some nice spell-like and Pseudodragons have Telepathy, and you can Imbue Familiar with Spell Ability on level 9 to effectively cast extra spells).


Knowledge-skills give you in-character information on the weaknesses of anything you fight (you'd need to max out Arcane, The Planes, Local, Nature, Religion and Dungeoneering for 100% coverage but missing a point here or there isn't the end of the world; Concentration and Spellcraft should be maxed first though of course, and Tumble isn't bad either, put what remains in Knowledges and take at least 1 in all since you have massive Int). This is very key especially if you're not sure how to fight something OOC. Prepare a good split of spells, leave one slot or so open for repreparing (15 mins), and with your massive save DCs focus on Save-or-X effects.

Oh, and learn stuff like True Casting and Assay Resistance to deal with spell resistance; many of the good spells do allow spell resistance so it's worth being able to pierce it.

And yeah, Alchemist's Fires, Crossbows and such are plenty of damage early on. Later on...well, others will help but if you need to, you either have to focus a ton of feats on optimizing impossible-to-resist damage spells to do a lot of damage or use auxillary tools like physical violence combined with Polymorph and buffs or planar calling spell or flat Orbs.

[Wonton]

Note that mindless creatures (Golems, Undead, etc.) should have no ways of telling illusions from reality; as such, illusionary cages, walls, etc. should be 100% efficient in completely disabling them depending on how they're programmed.

I'm not sure the rules work that way. :smallconfused: Can you find me the part that says that mindless creatures don't get a save against Illusion spells?

[Arcanist]

I'm not sure the rules work that way. :smallconfused: Can you find me the part that says that mindless creatures don't get a save against Illusion spells?

He's half right. being mindless:


No Intelligence score, and immunity to all mind-affecting effects (charms, compulsions, phantasms, patterns, and morale effects).

So they are immune to MOST illusion spells and MOST enchantment spells. The reason they don't get a save is because most DMs don't make you roll for something you are immune to...

[Eldariel]

I'm not sure the rules work that way. :smallconfused: Can you find me the part that says that mindless creatures don't get a save against Illusion spells?

It's mostly logic; say a golem encounters an imaginary wall. It has some means to sense things; it senses the other walls around it too since it doesn't walk at them. Therefore it can sense the illusion just the same. Now, since it probably has a programming along the lines of "kill intruders" or "stop anybody from entering room X" (unless there's a person present to command the Golem, they'll just keep executing the last command they were given; same applies to most mindless undead), it will attack people but if it cannot detect the people it will stop attacking.

You only get a save vs. illusion if you interact with the illusion so unless the Golem actually tries to touch the wall (since it has no ways to tell an illusionary wall from any other wall, this only occurs if it touches every other wall too outside generally-too-complex programming), it won't get a save. Since Illusion (Figments) are not Mind-Affecting, even if it does interact it still needs to pass the save and many mindless creatures have poor Will-saves.


It's not a catch-all; all mindless creatures aren't going to be helpless against all Illusions (they're much less efficient against instinctual creatures than programmed creatures and of course, if the programmed creature has a commander present they're going to be vastly less efficient) but generally Illusions are more efficient against less intelligent creatures when deployed in a smart manner.

That said, they can be very efficient even against intelligent creatures if deployed well, so... Some of the higher level variants can even screw people over even if they know it's an illusion; +4 bonus does not guarantee success and with a fail you just won't be able to internalize the image is not real even though you consciously might know it.

[planswalker]

mindless creatures are NOT immune to illusion (glamer) spells, such as major image. Being mindless, they should never think to test for illusions if their senses tell them "wall".

[Eldariel]

mindless creatures are NOT immune to illusion (glamer) spells, such as major image. Being mindless, they should never think to test for illusions if their senses tell them "wall".

We're mostly talking about Figments here though. That said, Glamers aren't mind-affecting either; only Patterns and Phantasms are IIRC.

[planswalker]

granted, just wanted to point out that it could work with some illusion spells.

[Lactantius]

um... our point was that you can deal damage just fine without evocation, and that damage dealing was just about the last priority for a wizard. Yeah, you can conjure up some hypothetical situations in your head where you think damage dealing is the best thing a wizard can do.

Doesn't change what good advice for optimizing a wizard is. You do have a point though about how, if someone has fun doing something, that's what they should do. Thing is, check the OP. He was asking advice for what to specialize in and what to drop. He never said that he was a big fan of evocation. We're saying that conjuration can do all the damage dealing you need plus a crapton more. The shadow evocations are NOT what I've been saying can replace them.

um... contingency??? That's your answer for why evocation rocks? The OP said that he doubts the campaign will even reach lvl 10, much less higher. Probably should focus on things before that level, as by the time you've reached lvl 6 spells, if your wizard isn't breaking the world wide open, it's because you've chosen not to, not because a wizard can't.

Discussing about specializing is also discussing about what school to ban.
And since evocation is always the #1 school considered to forgive, I made my point just to show what you really lose if you give up evocation.

I refer to the common fallacy which constittutes that you could do all the evocation tricks by using
a) shadow evocations and
b) damage spells of the conjuration school.

Both assumptions are argueable, but they are not set in stone.
a) requires a bad action economy since you trade in a slot 5 to get a slot 1-4-effect. Same goes with slot 8 to emulate slot 5-7-effect.
It is better just to memorize the real evocation in the first place. Or pump up your versatility with spontaenous tools (runestaves, uncanny forethought, spellpool) or extra-slot tools (wands, scrolls).
I have mentioned contingency justbecause to show that the evocation-fallacy is still active at mid-high-level-play (not only in the OP's range of level 1-10).

b) is all about orbs.
Now, we could again argue that the design wasvery, very bad and that a common sense group should adjust the rules accordingly (thus, should put the orb spells to the evocation school since it IS an evocative effect, not merely a conjuration).
Anyways, even if you stick to orbs as written, it is not yet a no-brainer. The opportunity costs are high: spell level 4 is on of the most important spell levels, especially if the campaign ends at level 10.
I prefer greater invisibility, greater mirror image, enervation, heart of earth/stoneskin, dimensional anchor, lesser globe, arcane eye, solid fog and evards. Even for those spells, there is not enough room for all of them.
Now, with evocation, you can outsource the damage-line to spell level 2 (scroching ray), 1 (magic missile) and 3 (fireball).
Plus, you are not restricted to single-target.
A fireball can be very devastating if you hit 3+ enemies.

Oh, and I did not invent some theoretical situations as you just said here:


conjure up some hypothetical situations in your head where you think damage dealing is the best thing a wizard can do.

The situations I mentioned are very real and based on real game experiences as player and as DM.
They are more valuable than most theoretical thoughts in the forums since they deal with the "real thing."
I mentioned situations. Well, those situations are what comes up. I could go further and say that you even keep up the wizard's strength (versatility) if you have the spells on reserve which could deal with all those situations.

I mean, hey, how unlikely is it that the fighter goes down or gets disabled?
How unlikely is it that the party is split or that a wizard must make damage on his own?

[planswalker]

actually, no, I never said that conjuration replaces evocation. I said
you can deal damage just fine without evocation,

in fact, these spells are all not evocation and can contribute to damage dealing:

1: summon monster (and other summon spells) and the lesser orbs. summoning a monster increases the total damage output on the field. True, it's by less than a mage hand on the first round, but it'll also stick around dealing its attack or full attack damage every round. Lesser orbs also are good enough for 1st level slots. In fact, they cap out at 5d8 damage, not bad at all for a 1st level slot. Outside of conjuration in early levels before better spells come along, such effects as sleep and color spray make combat damage irrelevant, as you can easily coup de grace a sleeping opponent. Keep an orb around in case people are immune to sleep and you're good to go. Also backbiter and spirit worm. The latter is con damage, a very nice grab at 1st, as its hp reduction can't be healed through simple healing spells.
2: summon monster (again), melf's acid arrow, ice knife, bonefiddle, whirling blade
at this level, you start getting nice damage sources from a variety of schools, most with nifty bonus effects. At this level, I've excluded things which aren't actually damaging things, as the list would get bogged down considerably by the number of spells out there that are better than dealing damage. Granted, none of the ones listed deal as much damage in 1 round as a scorching ray to a single target, but bonefiddle deals more cumulative damage and ice knife also does dex damage, and still damages even on a miss. Whilring blade also has the potential to do quite a bit more than scorching ray in the right situation. Granted, no one of these spells is superior to scorching ray in every way, but evocation is far from irreplaceable at this level.
3: explosive runes, vampiric touch, eradicate earth, acid breath, greater disrupt undead
at this level, I've skimmed off those that have significant effects besides damage. Granted, two of these are situational, but against their intended types, they're superior to evocations for raw damage. Oh, and acid breath is just as good as fireball for raw damage, although cones are inferior to long-range bursts in battlefield tactics when the arena is wide open. Oh, and explosive runes actually outperforms fireball for a level, provided you can activate it (not hard if you're creative). Not that explosive runes is being used to its fullest if used this way.
4: you know what, you're right. There are so many other 4th level spells I'd rather cast than something that deals damage, I don't care at all about the damage-dealing selections at this level.
5: shadow evocations is not efficient at raw action economy, no. But it is one of the most versatile spells out there. It emulates ANY level 1-4 evocation spell. You could even build around it if you want, that's supported.

however, I'll exclude it from my considerations:
Blight, reciprocal gyre, arc of lightning, vitrolic sphere, earth reaver
I'll grant you that for damage-dealing options, nothing at 5th is really gonna replace a 5th level evocation. In fact, if you're restricted to phb-only spells, you might feel the pinch on this one, as you don't have a good option, blight being only against a rare creature type. Of course, you can always just enlarge a 3rd level spell. In fact, until you reach the damage dice cap for a 3rd level spell, an enlarged 3rd level spell will outperform an equivalent 5th level damage dealer for raw damage in exchange for a -2 to dc.

6: if you're really wanting to deal damage at this level of spells, it better be disintegrate.

but, other options:
empowered orbs or other 4th level spells are viable here for the same reason as empowered 3rd at 5th. Moreso with the orbs.
acid fog, tunnel swallow, wall of gears, acid storm, fleshshiver

several good, tasty options here, some with really nifty flavors.

7: I highly doubt there's a lot of people by this point who can honestly say that dealing damage is your primary goal at this level, but that doesn't mean you don't have options here:

greater shadow conjuration is the only core option, so you will feel the hurt here if you want to deal damage and are restricted to core. Of course, I'm still looking at disintegrate and wondering why you'd bother at this level, unless you metamagic disintegrate with a +1 level thing.

outside core, you have avasculate that takes off half hp from a healthy opponent and stuns them if they fail a save. It's really only a 1st round option, but it's a good one. I'd recommend following up that in the next round with an empowered 5th level damage dealer or a lvl 6 disintegrate.

8: there are few damage-dealing options here, but then, evocation only gives you two here (polar ray and greater shout).

In case you don't want some really powerful effects, though, you can do:

greater shadow evocation, horrid wilting, avascular mass, and flensing.

GSE, of course, is most people's poster child. The others also have good strengths to them, and I'm looking at an empowered disintegrate and drooling here.

Assuming I don't want to do something fun and useful with an 8th level slot like a quickened polymorph before wading into combat, superior invisibility, polymorph any object, mass charm monster, maze, mind blank, etc etc...

9: If you REALLY wanna throw souped-up fireballs around while everyone else is playing rocket tag and "save or die" roulette, you have:

shades, sphere of ultimate destruction, and transmute rock to lava.

yeah, I'll admit I'm not feeling any of those ones. Of course, neither do I like meteor swarm for this level. Not when wish, imprisonment, gate, shapechange, and a host of other options are out there.



damage dealing was just about the last priority for a wizard

I'd like to point out that yes, evocation does have the fists. They're good single-target lockdown, I won't debate. But evocation does not have an exclusive hold on single-target lockdown, nor the best. If you'd like I'll post another level-by-level list of the other schools that can do single-target lockdown. I'll even analyze the merits of trying to use those fists versus equal-level lockdowns against red dragons of appropriate cr if you'd like.

to illustrate my point, allow me to look at your proposed scenarios where you'd want to deal damage in detail:


There are so many cases in which a wizard should be able to blast stuff away. I don't tell you to blast like a russian artillery, but I recommend that you keep up some blasting spells - just in case of.

I agree with you in principle here, and that's why I've outlined quite a few options that will work in a pinch so long as you're not primary-blasting. Like you said, don't blast like a Russian artillery squad.

1a) if your fighter's down (and he actually matters, assuming you're talking about base class fighter :smalltongue:), summon a creature to distract the opponent long enough for him to stand up/get healed/draw his backup weapon. Benign transposition him with yourself since you have good enough defensive buffs up to protect yourself for a round or two while the above happens. Put the opponent to sleep so it can't harm anyone while someone who still has a weapon coup de grace's it. Dealing damage isn't necessarily the best or even a good option in this scenario compared to other things you could be doing. If he's all the way to dead and revivify isn't an option, hopefully he died only after wearing out your opponent significantly enough that the rest of the party can take it down without too much trouble. If it drops the party fighter early on, you might be screwed, damage spells or no. If not, I'd much rather give it a "save or lose" chance, muddy up its battlefield control so we can drag the fighter's corpse away and raise him, ready to try again later, just simply escape and have the player roll up a new character, or probably something else I can't think of at 3:30 am.

and if it's close enough that one good stiff hit from a damaging spell will finish it, you don't need evocation to do that. At. All.

1b) You're right, don't listen about fire resistance, reflex saves, or sr. Instead, listen to them talk about putting them to sleep, immobilizing them and picking them off at range, putting up walls between you and them, making their attacks so weak they'll never hit anyone, paralysis, etc etc. If you're taking off opponents in 1 shot with a fireball, odds are you could sit on your ass and let the party fighter solo the encounter unless he's really that useless. Even if he's not that good but you don't want to call him useless, things that are one-shotted by a fireball are also likely to have a crappy save you can exploit to overwhelm them.

2) You could deal damage in battle, or you could charm your opponents so you have new allies, dimension door away and scry to find your friends to reunite the party (provided the split is involuntary), transmute yourself into a warmachine that would make the absent party fighter jealous, and do all sorts of other tricks. Yes, you should be able to handle yourself solo. No, damage-dealing spells are not the only way (or even likely a good way) to ensure that.

3) There are spells that can handle the special encounters without you having to use evocation. Anti-undead spells will work wonders against incorporeal undead, you can enchant the party fighter and his gear to be able to overcome the dr of the wererat, you can just plain buff yourself to overcome that dr, you could save or lose/die against that wererat, zombies and skeletons should be either turned or anti-undead spells used on them. I won't say that there ISN'T a scenario where you won't want to unleash a few blasts at your opponent, true. But I am having a hard time coming up with a scenario where I'd rather use an evocation than something else.

a note on contingency: it's available as a metamagic feat for +1 level. Crafting a contingent spell lets you substitute gp and a little xp for that one. Not as smoothly, no, but it isn't GONE without evocation. Certain builds might even just be able to UMD scrolls of contingency. I also contest your claim of it being the single best defensive spell in the game. Improved invisibility, blur, polymorph, and prismatic sphere. Explain to me how contingent spell is better than those four and I'll give your position on it being "best" some thought.

I know and recognize that you've made other points in your post where you defend evocation as a good option and dealing damage as something not superfluous, but my post is already very lengthy. If you'd like, tell me which of those points you believe are strongest and I'll analyze them.

[Mordy]

More random thoughts...

1. Prohibited schools. This really kinda depends on what spells you like to play with (it may be useful to play a generalist for a first-time wizard, just to get familiar with the various spells out there). Personally, I don't like to give up necromancy - false life (with a duration of hours/level) is a great way to improve all-day survivability, while (empowered) ray of enfeeblement + ray of exhaustion is an awesome combo for BBEGs.

2. Enlarge person. As flexible of a spell as this may be, it just doesn't seem to be that useful for typical swash/rogues or druids.

3. Summons. If the druid would prefer to spend actions casting spells, summons may be a good complement to provide flanking opportunities for the swash/rogue (not to mention extra combatants, or even just placeholders for benign transposition). It may even be worthwhile to take the alternate class feature rapid summoning (Unearthed Arcana) instead of abrupt jaunt.

4. Prestige. Master Specialist (Complete Mage) is a decent prestige class for any specialist that can be entered by 4th level, though it costs a feat for spell focus. That said, that spell focus (conjuration) is a good choice even if you never make it past level 3, what with grease, glitterdust, web....

5. Crafting feats. Scribe scroll is a convenient and cheap way to keep important utility spells at hand. Craft wand is where I tend to keep my magic missiles / lesser orbs, for any instance where it's just not worth using one of my prepared spells.

[Acanous]

Against the scenerio you described, with the stats you've shown, I'd definately go Conjuration (with abrupt Jaunt) and ban Evocation and Enchantment.

The reasons why are that Enchantment is all mind-affecting. If your DM is the sort to target your weaknesses, you'll be fighting a lot of plants, undead, and constructs if you were to go Enchantment.
Evocation is a friendly school. It does exactly what it says on the tin; every spel is simple and easy to use. The problems with Evocation are twofold:
One: Evocation is neutered by SR
and
Two: Evocation, like Enchantment, has a lack of "Save AND suck" spells.

Now, most evocation area spells have "Reflex for half". That does something on a miss, yes, but against a DM like this, I'd suspect Rings of Evasion would become commonplace. Also, spell resistance.

Conjuration, Transmutation, and Illusion have something for you, in every possible situation. Conjuration gets entirely around SR, so your "Save and suck" spells are truly going to botch entire encounters. Transmutation is consistantly useful and plays well with others. Illusion is a highly versitile school which contains sprinklings of other schools, making it a good grab-all.

Also, illusion gets the earliest save or die, Phantasmal Killer, which oddly enough has the Fear tag but not the Mind Effect tag. So if things are immune to mind efecting, but not to fear? They can die to this.

Anyhow, Necromancy is decent like Conjuration, but more specificly tied to drain and undead. If you want to have some fairly early level permanent minions, Necromancy does it. With your good dex, the rays work too. High int makes Bestow Curse hard to save against, and a 50% chance of derping every round, permanently, is very, very good- despite being a touch spell (Take obtain familiar [Hummingbird], have it deliver the touch)

Divination can't be banned and is far too useful to ever ban even if it could be, and Abjuration starts out OK and gets freaking ridiculous later, when you're casting things from partially-inside your own prismatic wall.

In short, Evocation is a lot of fun, but in this case, ban it and Enchantment, take Conjuration.
If you choose to go Focused Specialist, I'd reccomend dropping Necromancy as well, as it adds the fewest options to your repitoire.
Go Master Specialist for the rapid summoning later.
If you Prestige again into Red wizard (Unlikely but possible) at 14, go ahead and drop Abjuration. Red Wizards can still use spell completion items and cast known spells of that school, they just get no new ones, which would limit you to 7th level abjurations- plenty high enough.
That'd leave you with Conjuration, Transmutation, Illusion and Divination. Which are all you should ever need, anyhow.

[planswalker]

unfortunately for your phantasmal killer:


Phantasmal Killer
Illusion (Phantasm) [Fear, Mind-Affecting]
Level: Sor/Wiz 4
Components: V, S
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Medium (100 ft. + 10 ft./level)
Target: One living creature
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: Will disbelief (if interacted
with), then Fortitude partial;
see text
Spell Resistance: Yes

[Eldariel]

Really, the thing is:
Playgrounders assume that damage is a thing others should do, not you (the wizard).

This is simply to let others contribute too. Don't do everything yourself; it's no fun for others to just stand by and watch.


Fluffwise, I like to blast things. It's an archetypical thinh wizard just should be able to do: magic missiles, fireballs, lightning bolts.
Besides those archetypical, flashy spells, you still have a lot of very strong and useful evocations distributed among all spell levels.

Archetypal for one type of Wizards; Evokers. Like to blast things, that's cool. The point is simply that giving up Evocation gives up less than any other school sans perhaps Enchantment.


Low Level (1-5) gives you the already mentioned flashy spells plus scorching ray, gust of wind (very useful spell against chargers or gaseous/foggy spells), you have shatter (which is also very open-ended and therefore very useful) and don't forget a staple spell like light or even daylight (vs. light-sensitive creatures).
You can carry all the loot outta the dungeon with Tensers Disc. A bag of holding of HHH won't be in the party's reach yet (too expensive).

Magic Missile or Fireball won't deal enough damage to be worth preparing early on. Alchemist's Fire is a more powerful attack than Magic Missile. Tenser's Disc generally takes slots you can't afford at this point. Fireball is generally less powerful than an AOE disable like Glitterdust, Web or Stinking Cloud.

Wall of Force is the best way to cast a wall, especially if you want to block all sort of effects. Wall of Stone is good too, but is serves another purpose. So, again, don't listen to those who say you can substutite the wall of force with a wall of stone. Sometimes you can, sometimes not.

You can use Wall of Stone more or just as efficiently often enough; sure, you lose out on something by giving up Evocation but Evocation is the most replaceable of the schools.


We reach Contingency soon (at level 11, if your campaign goes THAT far) and we can use the bigby-spells.
Believe me, those hands are a great asset to shut down a single threat.
Playgrounder may disagree and refer to area-lock-downs like solid fog or evars tentacles.
But again, it depends.
For example, if you encounter large, strong monsters like dragons, fiends, ogres, giants and so on, you are on the safe side with bigby.
Evards and Fogs won'T help much against single, large monsters since those are a) too strong (high STR, high grapple) and will escape the tentacles or they have SLAs or other escape mechanisms to get outta the fog (fiends use teleports, dragons can cast spells or fly etc).

You can generally Will SoD Giant-types. Dragons are primary candidates for rayification and Walls (they tend to have horrible maneuverability) and Polymorphed things stuck at them or Planar Bound monsters.

Fiends have their own set of SoDs they're particularly vulnerable to (Dismissal-type effects; also classic SoDs like Baleful Polymorph and Disintegrate of course), which are often the preferable means of dealing with them


I have witnesses so many sessions where the damage dealt by a wizard was totally necessary and helped the party alot.
There are so many cases in which a wizard should be able to blast stuff away. I don't tell you to blast like a russian artillery, but I recommend that you keep up some blasting spells - just in case of.
Well, here some cases which actually really happened (and are more worthy than all those theoretical assumptions flying around on the forums):

1) The party's damage dealers cannot deal damage or cannot deal enough damage.
Reasons why this is so:
a) the fighter went down/got tripped/got sundered/got disarmed/got a dispelled magic weapon vs a creature with DR 5/magic (which happens more often than you think).
If the fighter went down, he won't be able to cause damage. So, your cast haste spell is nullified (or, at least, reduced in its impact).
Remember that if you read another of those unspeakable haste-vs-fireball-comparions. A real good wizard memorizes both spells.
b) there are too many grunts around. Casting a fireball can take out multiple grunts at once (kobolds, goblins, skeletons etc). Or, if they are a bit stronger (take orcs, gnolls, draconians, humanoids etc), they are down to ~50% hp.
Don't listen to those who tell you stuff about fire resistance, reflex save and SR. Truth is: most enemies don't have resistances and reflex is most time poorer than fortitude or will.
2) The party is split. Should not happen, but believe me: it happens.
IMHO, a wizard should work without depending on those fighter dudes. It is good to have them around, but you are a wizard! You should be able to defend yourself without being addicted to the melee's!
So, you need damage spells to show those commoners what they are facing at.
Sure, in the typical party mode, you can let the fighter dish the damage. But it is not wrong to keep some damage spells on reserve - just in case of.
3) Special Encounters:
even at low levels, special encounters can make the normal damage dealer worthless. Take ghosts, shadows or other incorporeals. Magic Missile will prevail against those mundane swords.
Take lycanthropes with DR/silver. A simple were-rat can have this and make an encounter more difficult if you stick to weapons-only.
Take zombies or skeletons. Both have a good DR.

Magic damage - be it force damage or energy damage - will prevail.

I've covered every single one of those situations without casting a single damage spell. Magic Weapon is generally far more efficient a solution to low level incorporeals than Magic Missile; guess how many Magic Missiles killing an Allip takes? Infinite, considering it heals up with every attack. And Shadows will incapacitate you before you get the chance.

Vs. Low Level Incorporeals, you have scrolls of Magic Weapon or even Ghost Touch available. Command Undead is another one.


Split party? Planar Bind something. Polymorph yourself. Throw Alchemist's Fire. When your enemy is unable to act meaningfully, you're in no hurry to kill them. The problem isn't that a Wizard banning Evocation can't deal damage; it's that we usually prefer not to since that's stepping on others' toes whose characters can only deal damage.


AOE disable deals with a horde just as well as an AOE damage spell, maybe even better. Besides, if you're immune to the horde's attacks, the horde doesn't very well matter, does it? In all those situations, a Wizard has a spell or a scroll that works better than or at least as well as a Fireball. Therefore Fireball is not a necessary part of your arsenal.



Lastly, you WILL lose the best defence spell in the game - contingency.
Our shadow-evocation-friends will get them too: at level 15!
The gap between 11 and 15 is huge - too huge for me. 90% of all campaigns I played ended up before reaching level 15. So, you wouldn't habe used contingency at all.
Some would bring in the feat craft contingent spell to circumvent this problem. Again, no solution. This feat is made for NPCs if you take a look at the XP- and gold-costs you must pay for each and every spell. Not managable at all.

XP is a river. You fall behind on XP, you'll get back up since you gain more XP per encounter when you're behind a level.


Orbs are another argument, yeah. Truth is: orbs should be evocations. But besided that failed design, orbs are single-target-only with a hefty price tag (level 4). I prefer scorching rays or area damages.
The only real useful orb is the orb of force. But that's just because it has a better damage-ratio than its counterparts, force missile and chain missile.
Again, a design failure: force-effects are evocation ONLY.

Generally you can do all the offense you need with Enervations, Save or Dies, Coup de Graces and company. It's simply a matter of knowing how to.

Simply put, Evocation is replaceable. You can deal damage without Evocation. You can battlefield control without evocation. You lose out on some specific options, that's true. But same goes for any other school. Evocation & Enchantment lose the least unique, desirable options. They offer some but giving them up hurts least when you want to specialize.

[Acanous]

unfortunately for your phantasmal killer:

Derp on my part. It's the [Death] tag it's missing. I blame lack of sleep.

Still, it's a SoD spell missing the death tag. Meaning Death Ward doesn't stop it.

Also that things immune to death effects, but not to mind effecting or fear effects would eat it from PK.
...one type of undead comes to mind...

edit: also, IMHO, Evocation could have been a subschool of Conjuration. Conj needs another subschool, Evo has *None*, and the two are pretty closely related, with one conjuring *Matter* and the other conjuring *Energy*.
We all know the relation of matter and energy, yes?

[planswalker]

my only objection to that is that then conjuration would be even MORE bloated.

[Slipperychicken]

Optimization is mandatory because fights scale off of the highest level player and when you die you lose a level for your next character too.

Some things other people mentioned already, but I feel could use elaboration:

Uncanny Forethought is a good way to deal with surprises. Just scribe a bunch of situational spells, then be able to pull them out when the time comes. Also lets you shorten casting times (any casting time for a UF'd spell can become a Full-Round action) whenever you can't wait. It does carry a -2 CL for non-mastered spells cast with the feat, but most of the time that won't matter.

Scrolls of low-level spells can increase your versatility. Keeping something like Shatter around can help (take out a lock or weapon no-problem). If another casting class gets a spell at a lower level, you can buy those at a reduced price. No Bard ever had to take Scribe Scroll: the rules say explicitly that someone other than the crafter can supply the needed spell.

Shrink Item (Sorc/Wiz 3) makes for some cool utility, and damage in a pinch, assuming you make it to level 5 this time. Get a big thing, then use it to block a hallway/doorway, crush someone, break things from above, sell a big expensive thing, etc. Just remember to ask your GM how much something weighs before you cast Shrink Item on it (My group still jokes about a magical 5x5ft rock that weighed only 500lb, because the GM didn't want me dealing too much damage with it).

+1 to Abrupt Jaunt. It can save you so much hp damage it's not even funny. Anything that keeps your scrawny neck out of the line of fire is good.

Sometimes mundane solutions are better: You won't need to cast Knock on a mundane door when your fighter buddies have a Portable Ram to bash it down, or if you can take out the hinges, or if you have a good Rogue. A grappling hook and Take 20 can scale a wall about as well as a Fly spell, albeit taking a minute or two.

Mount (SRD, Conjuration, Sorc/Wiz 1) summons a normal horse, and can be good for a quick escape, as well as blocking a passageway with a tasty/meaty horse for enemies to munch on. With your Move action remaining, you can mount it all in one round, and depending on how your DM rules the horses' actions, you might even get to Run it in the same round too. Once your CL is high enough (and/or you Extend it), it can serve as long-range transportation until you pick up Phantom Steed.

If spells per day are an issue, a Reserve Feat may be in order. Something like Fiery Burst or Invisible needle can let you "blast" all day, and will quickly do better damage than your Crossbow would. Fiery Burst is an AoE, so it will definitely do better damage against mobs, and bypasses normal Regeneration if that ever comes up.

I've heard Levitate (SRD, Sorc/Wiz 2) referred to as Immunity to Dire Bears, since you can quickly get out of someone's reach. Also lets you climb high, un-climbable walls. Remember the ability to push the levitated object/creature to move it horizontally, so you could probably use rope to bring it around like a balloon. If you get a platform-like object, you might be able to use it like an elevator. At the minimum CL, this thing can move you 600ft up or down, plus (1/2 your base speed)x30ft horizontally (450ft?) if you can maneuver yourself along a surface.