PDA

View Full Version : Player Help Best Cantrips and Spells when dipping Wizard?



KOLE
2019-04-27, 01:01 PM
Hey playground,

I've built a fun character concept. The character emphasizes luck and rerolls, the idea is a Halfling who starts two levels Wizard for portent and goes Wild Sorcerer form there for Bend Luck and Tides of Chaos. It's certainly not the most optimized build of all time, I get that, but its mostly for the character and reroll shenanigans. Pointbuy stats after Lightfoot racial bonuses: 8/14/14/14/8/16.

I'm trying to pick my Wizard spells for level 1 and 2. Altogether that's 8 spells guaranteed without copying spell scrolls and the like. My spell save DC and and attack will be okay with +2 for the first two levels, but my ASIs are going to be dedicated to Charisma since this is just a dip for the Sorcerer, so INT will be 14 for the entire characters life. I'm trying to pick Wizard Spells that will always be relevant to have. I'll still be able to prepare 4 spells for my entire career, and I want them to be useful.

For cantrips I'm taking Prestidigitation, Dancing Lights and Chill Touch. I wish I could avoid having a damage cantrip, so I could keep my three Wizards cantrips always relevant for the campaign, but getting through those first two levels without one seems like a tall order. I picked two good utilities to last me all campaign. Chill Touch is a niche cantrip, but when it regen enemies come up it will be good to have around, even if it has a lower attack bonus. Any other ideas for cantrip choice?

When building my spell list I wanted to include as many rituals as possible, but quickly decided this wouldn't work well. There's 8 first level rituals total for the Wizard, and most of them are too niche to have on the spell list. So I've decided to skip them entirely and dedicate my gold to picking them up in downtime. So, excluding rituals, these are all the 1st level Wizard spells I see being relevant all campaign long for a dip:


Absorb Elements
Color Spray
Disguise Self
Expeditious Retreat
False Life
Feather Fall
Fog Cloud
Jump
Longstrider
Mage Armor
Magic Missile
Protection From Good & Evil
Shield
Silent Image
Sleep


15 Total spells. We have to trim this list down to 8. At some point, I hope to copy all 15 of these + all 8 rituals into my spell book later in the campaign, but after we pick 8, all our gold/downtime is going to be dedicated to getting the rituals, so 7 of these spells aren't going to be in the book for a long time. All of these were picked because they don't involve attack rolls or saving throws- which is why I think they'll remain relevant. So now our task is to pick 8 to get us through our first two levels. So far, I've decided on these:



Absorb Elements
Feather Fall
Mage Armor
Magic Missile
Shield
Sleep


Do you agree with these, and what two should I pick up for my Level 2 spells?

CTurbo
2019-04-27, 03:30 PM
For cantrips I would take-
Minor Illusion. One of the best cantrips in the game
Light. You don't have darkvision
Shocking Grasp. Enemy can't take reaction after hit so you can walk away

I pretty much agree with your level 1 choices and the rituals are easy to get.

You won't get 2nd level Wizard spells taking just 2 levels.

KOLE
2019-04-27, 03:38 PM
For cantrips I would take-
Minor Illusion. One of the best cantrips in the game
Light. You don't have darkvision
Shocking Grasp. Enemy can't take reaction after hit so you can walk away

You won't get 2nd level Wizard spells taking just 2 levels.

I meant what spells should I pick at level 2- not what second level spells to pick. Honestly, they should just call them spell TIERS to cut down on the confusion.

Minor Illusion is good and I may take it later, but I prefer Prestidigitation for fun and utility. Dancing Lights has seen more mileage at my table than Light as Dim Light is enough to not get disadvantage on attacks.

I like Shocking Grasp- but its touch range only. My little Halfling is gonna be squishy, I'd rather not get that close. Thanks for your suggestions, nonetheless!

Lyracian
2019-04-27, 03:52 PM
My one suggestion would be to take level 1 as Sorcerer to get the better attack cantrip then take Wizard levels. You could even delay the second Wiz Level if you wanted metamagic first.

Wizard spells look about right. I would add Find Familier and Detect Magic.

Sleep gets quickly overshadowed; I might take it as a Sorcerer spell and then trade it out at higher levels.