My Thoughts On The Spell Compendium Book

[Bartmanhomer]

I download the Spell Compendium Book and I must say this book got everything to expand my wizard spells. This book is awesome and broken. (What I meant by broken is that the spells are very powerful.) This is one of the best spellbooks in D&D 3.5. So what does anyone else think of the Spell Compendium. Like it, hate it or meh? :biggrin:

[heavyfuel]

Its spells aren't any more broken than the spells found in the Player's Handbook. Name a single 3rd level spell in SpC that's better than Fly, or a single 9th level spell better than Shapechange, for example.

So yeah, SpC didn't make your Wizard strong. Spells - as a whole category - made your Wizard strong.

Overall I like SpC. It helps Paladins and Rangers far more than it helps high tier classes. Some spells that I think are too strong (the Orb spells, for example) get nerfed, and that's it.

[Crichton]

I agree with heavyfuel. The spells in the Compendium aren't (as a whole) any stronger or weaker, better or worse, than the ones in the PHB. If anything, many of the versions that exist in the Spell Compendium have been tweaked from whichever book they were originally published in to be more balanced than the originals.

[Bartmanhomer]

Its spells aren't any more broken than the spells found in the Player's Handbook. Name a single 3rd level spell in SPC that's better than Fly, or a single 9th level spell better than Shapechange, for example.

So yeah, SPC didn't make your Wizard strong. Spells - as a whole category - made your Wizard strong.

Overall I like SPC. It helps Paladins and Rangers far more than it helps high tier classes. Some spells that I think are too strong (the Orb spells, for example) get nerfed, and that's it.


I agree with heavy fuel. The spells in the Compendium aren't (as a whole) any stronger or weaker, better or worse than the ones in the PHB. If anything, many of the versions that exist in the Spell Compendium have been tweaked from whichever book they were originally published in to be more balanced than the originals.
Yeah, but all the expanded spells are very cool. Oh yeah, I forgot to rate this book: I'll give it 5 out of 5 stars for a perfect D&D 3.5 book. :biggrin:

[Crichton]

I don't know that I'd go as far as saying all of them are cool, but yes, I agree that it's a good book and a good expansion to the caster's potential repertoire.

[Bartmanhomer]

I don't know that I'd go as far as saying all of them are cool, but yes, I agree that it's a good book and a good expansion to the caster's potential repertoire.

I understand but this book is helping me choose to get spells for my character. I will recommend anyone D&D player to read this book. :wink:

[Biggus]

Yeah, basically what Heavyfuel said. There are a handful of broken spells in there (Greater Consumptive Field and Wraithstrike come to mind) but that's true of pretty much any D&D book which has a lot of spells in it. There are more really broken ones in the PHB than the SpC.

There are some spells which combine with others a bit too well: for example, a Cleric who has Superior Resistance, Conviction and Recitation active (and Hand of Divinity too, if you really want to go OTT) is effectively immune to anything which allows a saving throw except on a natural 1. If they have the Pride domain (also in SpC) they can get their chance of failing a save down to 1/400 unless the DC is astronomical.

In some ways, the SpC makes things more balanced. Spells like Ray Deflection and Forceward provide effective protection against attack types which are otherwise very difficult to defend against, and as Crichton says, many of the spells which were originally printed elsewhere are more balanced here.

So on the whole I think it's a good book, it's one of the ones I use the most in fact. You just have to keep your eyes out for the few spells which are badly written, either like the overpowered ones I mentioned above, or those like Girallon's Blessing which seem to contradict themselves and require DM adjudication.

[NigelWalmsley]

Name a single 3rd level spell in SpC that's better than Fly

I agree with your overall point, but this is a bad example. Fly is not that great of a 3rd level spell, and plenty of the spells in the Spell Compendium are better. Stinking Cloud is a better example of a top-tier 3rd level spell in core.

[Segev]

I agree with your overall point, but this is a bad example. Fly is not that great of a 3rd level spell, and plenty of the spells in the Spell Compendium are better. Stinking Cloud is a better example of a top-tier 3rd level spell in core.

Depends entirely on your purpose. Stinking cloud is very good at crowd control, and thus quite handy in combat. Fly won't control entire crowds, but will trivialize entire encounters, combat and otherwise. Especially used on somebody with a spammable ranged attack, but in general, too. No more climbing, bridging chasms, worrying about ranged weapons against the flying enemy, or being subject to the threat of enemy attacks by melee monsters if you don't want to be.

[heavyfuel]

I agree with your overall point, but this is a bad example. Fly is not that great of a 3rd level spell, and plenty of the spells in the Spell Compendium are better. Stinking Cloud is a better example of a top-tier 3rd level spell in core.

I don't disagree that Stinking Cloud is an awesome combat spell, but Fly is awesome in and out of combat. There's just way too much utility to be had in having a fly speed (plus, it qualifies you for Fly-by Attack, which is extra awesome for casters)

Ninja-ed by Segev. I second every single word in that post

[Bartmanhomer]

True Strike and Glitterdust are very broken spells as well.

[Buufreak]

I don't disagree that Stinking Cloud is an awesome combat spell, but Fly is awesome in and out of combat. There's just way too much utility to be had in having a fly speed (plus, it qualifies you for Fly-by Attack, which is extra awesome for casters)

Ninja-ed by Segev. I second every single word in that post

Entirely this. I've built entire dungeons made of puzzle after puzzle, and a passive fly speed nullified at least half of them more often than not.

Shutting down opposition is one thing. Shutting down entire opportunities to be challenged is an entirely different ball park.

[NigelWalmsley]

Depends entirely on your purpose. Stinking cloud is very good at crowd control, and thus quite handy in combat. Fly won't control entire crowds, but will trivialize entire encounters, combat and otherwise. Especially used on somebody with a spammable ranged attack, but in general, too. No more climbing, bridging chasms, worrying about ranged weapons against the flying enemy, or being subject to the threat of enemy attacks by melee monsters if you don't want to be.

Fly trivializes the fairly narrow set of combat encounters where:

1. The enemy doesn't also fly.
2. The enemy's ranged attack is worse than yours, taking into account the enemy can use cover and you can't.
3. The enemy can't just go inside and wait until your spell wears off.
4. The rest of your party can successfully avoid the enemy while you kill them.

That's a lot of restrictions, and in practice most encounters at 5th level will hit at least one of them. Flight is good, but it's one of the things that gets overrated because it makes Fighters sad (Forcecage is another example). Against most threats, you just get shot because they have ranged attacks. There are some 5th level enemies you beat with Fly, but a lot you don't. Stinking Cloud gets much better coverage. Notably, Stinking Cloud is effective against casters, while Fly is generally not.

It's true that Fly has non-combat utility, but almost all of it gets covered by Levitate, which is a 2nd level spell. The good flight spells are the ones that you cast once and forget, but Fly doesn't even deliver that because it has a 1 minute/level duration.


Entirely this. I've built entire dungeons made of puzzle after puzzle, and a passive fly speed nullified at least half of them more often than not.

That 1 minute/level duration means Fly is emphatically not a passive fly speed, however. I agree that Overland Flight is good, but Fly isn't Overland Flight.

[NigelWalmsley]

By way of reference, let's look at the CR 5 monsters, and see which ones Fly actually shuts down:

Achaierai: Probably fails to 4. With Sprint can run down the rest of your party and kill them while you plink at it.
Adult Arrowhawk: Fails to 1 and 2.
Adult Tojanida: Oh, I forgot to mention one: there are some environments where Fly just doesn't do anything. Underwater is one of those.
Basilisk: You probably win here. That said, your land speed is faster than it, so you could kite it to death without Fly.
Bearded Devil: Probably fails to 4. Especially because ranged attacks are usually multiple low damage hits, so it's probably multi-counting its DR against your archer.
Black Dragon (also all other dragons): Ha.
Cloaker: Fails to 1.
Dire Lion: Fly is good here.
Djinni: Fails to 1.
Ettin Skeleton: Fly is good here.
Giant Constrictor Snake: Yep, you beat this.
Gibbering Mouther: Depends. If you can outrange its spittle, you probably win. If you can't, you probably lose. Once again, it's slow enough you can kite it on open ground without flight.
Greater Barghest: Depending on who you buff, Charm Monster has a decent chance of negating your action. DR punishes you here too, though it's more likely ranged attacks will beat DR/magic than DR/good or silver.
Green Hag: It can't really do anything to a flier. On the other hand, its at-will Invisibility does a damn good job of 3. It has more resources than you, so I think it probably comes out ahead if you're not attacking it directly.
Hieracosphinx: Fails to 1.
Huge Animated Object: It can't hit you directly, though if it's working off multiple legs or wheels it's fast enough to probably do 4, especially with hardness.
Huge Monstrous Spider: I expect you win here.
Large Air Elemental: Fails to 1.
Large Earth Elemental: Fails to 3.
Large Fire Elemental: Fails to 4.
Large Water Elemental: Fails on the same grounds as Adult Tojanida.
Manticore: Ha.
Mercane: It has Invisibility, so it's the same basic set up as the Green Hag. At least it only has three uses per day.
Mummy: Fly beats it, with the caveat about being slow enough to kite normally.
Nightmare: Fails to 1.
Ochre Jelly: Flight beats it, but again it's slow enough you can kite it without flight.
Orca: Underwater.
Phase Spider: It's an ambush predator. It ambushes you before you have cast flight, then ambushes your friends while you're flying.
Pixie: Fails to 1.
Rast: Fails to 1.
Ravid: Fails to 1.
Scrag: Underwater.
Shadow Mastiff: Flight is good here.
Six-Headed Hydra: I doubt a 5th level party can kill this without either getting up close or expending additional resources after Fly.
Spider Eater: Fails to 1.
Troll: You should win here.
Udoroot: I don't know enough Psionics to say, but given that it's base speed is 0, I doubt Fly letting you stay out of range is getting you a lot of value.
Unbodied: Fails to 1, also has some Psionics I can't evaluate.
Werebear: Fly is good here.
Weretiger: Fly is good here.
Winter Wolf: Fly is good here.
Wraith: Fails to 1.

Now, it's true that the tactical situation matters for a lot of those. You could potentially outfly a lot of the things that have a fly speed, and there are definitely circumstances where flying kiting is better than ground kiting. I was also playing kind of fast and lose with assessments for stuff that could kill your allies while you floated around. But the tactical situation can also screw Fly over. Any encounter where the enemy can retreat into a hallway makes your spell close to useless. Overall, when you look at the actual opposition 5th level characters can expect to face, there are relatively few situations where giving a single character short-duration flight is game-changing.

[heavyfuel]

By way of reference, let's look at the CR 5 monsters, and see which ones Fly actually shuts down:

You're forgetting every CR 5 NPC that doesn't have Fly (all of those that don't have a Wizard in with them) and aren't specialized in ranged combat.

Also not taking into account that against some creatures Fly is not good, but 100% necessary. That Black Dragon you mentioned is a hellish fight without flight. Int 10 and Wis 11 is more than enough to think "there's no way I'm getting anywhere close to that half-orc swinging an axe that's as big as me". No flight means you and your party are going to get breath weaponed to death over the span of a a minute or so, and good luck dealing with this guy with bows alone.

I get it, Fly isn't the best spell in the game, but hey, Stinking Cloud also has its weaknesses. And like it was said before, Fly allows for you to overcome non-combat situations whereas SC has absolutely zero use out of combat. Saying it's a bad example of a good spell just because there's one better spell for combat is pretty strange.

[JeromeKCog]

On the Fly discussion, I would argue that Fly and Stinking Cloud aren't directly comparable. Fly can be used both offensively (Cast it on the party beatstick and have them hit a priority target) and defensively in combat in addition to providing a lot of out of combat utility, it's flexible, it opens up new tactics, it's a good spell. Stinking Cloud can pretty much win encounters at Level 5 vs living opponents, it's also a good spell but for different reasons.

I'm a big fan of the Spell Compendium and whenever I get the chance to play a caster I usually spend a while leafing through it. It also contains one of my favourite spells of 3.5; Great Thunderclap. I can't say exactly why I like this spell but it's one that I've always really enjoyed using and enjoyed seeing other players use.

[NigelWalmsley]

You're forgetting every CR 5 NPC that doesn't have Fly (all of those that don't have a Wizard in with them) and aren't specialized in ranged combat.

I'm also omitting every CR 5 NPC that does have flight or does have good ranged attacks or does have asymmetrically good defenses against ranged attacks. And we're not even talking about encounters like "a bunch of Orcs" where Stinking Cloud is at its best. We could go back and forth forever arguing about what it makes sense to judge things against, but "the monsters you face at that level" seems like a pretty reasonable standard, and Fly doesn't come out very well there.


Also not taking into account that against some creatures Fly is not good, but 100% necessary. That Black Dragon you mentioned is a hellish fight without flight.

Fly is terrible against the Black Dragon. It can just leave, and then come back later when your spell has worn off and proceed to kite you to death then. Beating Dragons isn't trivial, but you are going to have a very hard time convincing me that "give one party member a fly speed that's slower than the dragon" is the way to do it. Fundamentally, you don't seem to understand that "Fly" and "Flight" are different things. Flight is a very powerful effect. Fly is a decent but not overwhelmingly good spell.


And like it was said before, Fly allows for you to overcome non-combat situations whereas SC has absolutely zero use out of combat. Saying it's a bad example of a good spell just because there's one better spell for combat is pretty strange.

And as I said, that utility is not all that much more than Levitate. The big utility of flight comes in when you can do it passively, which means effects like Overland Flight (which is a single spell slot that's good all day), not Fly. Now, I'm not saying Fly is a bad spell. But if your 5th level Wizard is picking Fly over Stinking Cloud, or Spell Compendium BFC spells, he is very likely to be making a mistake. Utility is valuable, but winning fights is more valuable, and the degree to which Stinking Cloud blows Fly out of the water there doesn't even merit talking about.

[liquidformat]

Overall I like SpC. It helps Paladins and Rangers far more than it helps high tier classes. Some spells that I think are too strong (the Orb spells, for example) get nerfed, and that's it.

Also assassins and blackguard! This book is one of the reasons assassin is a decent prc...

[Psyren]

The Fly vs. Stinking Cloud tangent feels off-topic.

Spell Compendium is good, not broken.

[Dimers]

I'm mildly disappointed by a lot of the Spell Compendium. Too much of it is so situational that in practice it would only get used on scrolls (if at all). A few spells are both interesting and good, and there are plenty I enjoy despite them being obviously low-potency. I adore rainbow blast and rainbow beam, for example.

What I value is drowned out by stuff like, I dunno, seven different protections from planar traits, thirteen summons, fifteen rays, a bazillion spells only one class can use ... And the editing is peppered with imperfections. So, I use the book, but it doesn't rank in my top five.

[tiercel]

The Fly vs. Stinking Cloud tangent feels off-topic.

Spell Compendium is good, not broken.

Pit fiend’s advocate: what makes Spell Compendium good also is what potentially makes it, in some sense, broken.

After all, one of the defining characteristics of the “tier” system is not just raw mechanical strength of any one spell or ability, but the range of options open to a class or build.

Thus, to say that “SC is not broken because no particular one/number of its spells are necessarily more powerful than Core spells” is to miss that “broken” could instead mean that Spell Compendium adds far more options to many casters than any one book could add to noncasters.

After all, given access to a Big Book of Martial Feats and PrCs, even a Fighter has a quite limited number of feats compared to the total spells known by most full casters, and Dark Chaos Shuffle shenanigans aside, generally few ways of being able to change those feats (or other class abilities) on a day-to-day basis.

But given Spell Compendium, many casters suddenly have far more immediately realizable options. Wizards may encounter or generally simply purchase new spells for their repertoire, and Clerics and Druids don’t even need to do that — they simply choose from among all available class spells for free (without having to spend any additional resources other than player “analysis paralysis” at the tabletop and potential exasperation on the part of DM/other players).

(One might counter by arguing this is a problem with the classes/spellcasting ability, rather than with SC per se, and while not entirely wrong, this argument glosses over the simple fact that SC—more than other books—does greatly add options and arguably, preferentially to those classes which already have the most options: a “rich get richer” problem.)

Spell Compendium, then, contributes toward “there’s a spell for that” unravelling of challenges with its greater options. More subtly, even if no particular SC spells may necessarily outclass Core ones— even if they are “only” comparable — cherry-picking the most generally powerful Core and SC spells is still more total power the most powerful Core spells alone; put another way, a DM trying to play game balance to the table has to consider/plan for (if not ban or “gentleman’s agreement”) more potentially problematic spells with SC in play, on top of the greater number of niche spells that, while perhaps not more generally powerful, may give spellcasters with wider spell access the ability to no-sell a wider array of specific scenarios.

Caveats to this argument:

Spell Compendium is hardly unique in this regard; collectively, any book containing additional spells adds to the issues above. However, SC has more added spells in one place than any other one book, and does not necessitate hunting down what source (even assuming all 1st party books are both allowed and available in a given game).

Additionally, a case can be made that SC significantly aids non-full-casters (notably, assassins, bards, rangers, paladins) proportionally more than it does full casters (who already have many strong options even without SC). In these cases, “broken” in the sense of “arguably superior to Core options” may hold but also be seen as a feature rather than a bug, since these classes arguably could use a boost.

———

All of this is not to say that SC isn’t a good or useful book, but the argument that it is in some sense “broken” in terms of what it adds to the game all by itself is arguably not entirely without merit.

[NigelWalmsley]

Adding more spells at a given power level does a lot less to break things than conventional wisdom indicates. It's true that Flashburst + Stinking Cloud is strictly more power than just Stinking Cloud, but not to a degree that is likely to cause problems, especially given that the really broken spells are already in Core (there's like one spell outside the PHB that's as good as Planar Binding, and it's just "Planar Binding but for different types").

[Quertus]

My opinion on Spell Compendium: we need 5 or 6 more books just like it. Spells should be so diverse, that 2 reasonably-optimized Sorcerers could line up, and not share a single spell between them. Players/GMs should submit their custom spells to Wizards, who should review them for balance, and publish them in a ~yearly compendium. Maybe 6e will see it happen.

[JNAProductions]

My opinion on Spell Compendium: we need 5 or 6 more books just like it. Spells should be so diverse, that 2 reasonably-optimized Sorcerers could line up, and not share a single spell between them. Players/GMs should submit their custom spells to Wizards, who should review them for balance, and publish them in a ~yearly compendium. Maybe 6e will see it happen.

And for martial characters?

[Quertus]

And for martial characters?

To be so awesome in core, that the casters never catch up?

Failing that? Well, I know how *I'd* do 6e, and (it would involve both simple and complex Martial characters, and then having the complex) Martial characters publishing their own fighting styles would certainly work in my vision, and parallel well with the yearly spell compendiums.

But, in 3e? I think I'd just ban Fighter, so that no one is accidentally useless, and allow people to homebrew their own "this is how I would like to contribute" martial classes. (Since I haven't gotten an answer I can understand from people who enjoy playing muggles, and there's at least 3 competing schools of thought, I feel that I'm not qualified to do the brew myself.)

[elonin]

By way of reference, let's look at the CR 5 monsters, and see which ones Fly actually shuts down:

Achaierai: Probably fails to 4. With Sprint can run down the rest of your party and kill them while you plink at it.
Adult Arrowhawk: Fails to 1 and 2.
Adult Tojanida: Oh, I forgot to mention one: there are some environments where Fly just doesn't do anything. Underwater is one of those.
Basilisk: You probably win here. That said, your land speed is faster than it, so you could kite it to death without Fly.
Bearded Devil: Probably fails to 4. Especially because ranged attacks are usually multiple low damage hits, so it's probably multi-counting its DR against your archer.
Black Dragon (also all other dragons): Ha.
Cloaker: Fails to 1.
Dire Lion: Fly is good here.
Djinni: Fails to 1.
Ettin Skeleton: Fly is good here.
Giant Constrictor Snake: Yep, you beat this.
Gibbering Mouther: Depends. If you can outrange its spittle, you probably win. If you can't, you probably lose. Once again, it's slow enough you can kite it on open ground without flight.
Greater Barghest: Depending on who you buff, Charm Monster has a decent chance of negating your action. DR punishes you here too, though it's more likely ranged attacks will beat DR/magic than DR/good or silver.
Green Hag: It can't really do anything to a flier. On the other hand, its at-will Invisibility does a damn good job of 3. It has more resources than you, so I think it probably comes out ahead if you're not attacking it directly.
Hieracosphinx: Fails to 1.
Huge Animated Object: It can't hit you directly, though if it's working off multiple legs or wheels it's fast enough to probably do 4, especially with hardness.
Huge Monstrous Spider: I expect you win here.
Large Air Elemental: Fails to 1.
Large Earth Elemental: Fails to 3.
Large Fire Elemental: Fails to 4.
Large Water Elemental: Fails on the same grounds as Adult Tojanida.
Manticore: Ha.
Mercane: It has Invisibility, so it's the same basic set up as the Green Hag. At least it only has three uses per day.
Mummy: Fly beats it, with the caveat about being slow enough to kite normally.
Nightmare: Fails to 1.
Ochre Jelly: Flight beats it, but again it's slow enough you can kite it without flight.
Orca: Underwater.
Phase Spider: It's an ambush predator. It ambushes you before you have cast flight, then ambushes your friends while you're flying.
Pixie: Fails to 1.
Rast: Fails to 1.
Ravid: Fails to 1.
Scrag: Underwater.
Shadow Mastiff: Flight is good here.
Six-Headed Hydra: I doubt a 5th level party can kill this without either getting up close or expending additional resources after Fly.
Spider Eater: Fails to 1.
Troll: You should win here.
Udoroot: I don't know enough Psionics to say, but given that it's base speed is 0, I doubt Fly letting you stay out of range is getting you a lot of value.
Unbodied: Fails to 1, also has some Psionics I can't evaluate.
Werebear: Fly is good here.
Weretiger: Fly is good here.
Winter Wolf: Fly is good here.
Wraith: Fails to 1.

Now, it's true that the tactical situation matters for a lot of those. You could potentially outfly a lot of the things that have a fly speed, and there are definitely circumstances where flying kiting is better than ground kiting. I was also playing kind of fast and lose with assessments for stuff that could kill your allies while you floated around. But the tactical situation can also screw Fly over. Any encounter where the enemy can retreat into a hallway makes your spell close to useless. Overall, when you look at the actual opposition 5th level characters can expect to face, there are relatively few situations where giving a single character short-duration flight is game-changing.

isn't it better to point out the number of enemies that can be bypassed often with fly?

[Biggus]

But, in 3e? I think I'd just ban Fighter, so that no one is accidentally useless

This seems like an odd solution, as a 1 or 2 level Fighter dip is a useful component of many martial and gish builds, and Monks are significantly worse than Fighters (in the last group I was a player in, the Fighter couldn't do anything but fight, but they did a respectable job of that: the Monk couldn't even hit anyone most of the time).

[Bartmanhomer]

How's fighter, monks and other martial class characters even relevant to what I'm talking about? :confused: Unless if you're talking about gish classes.

[Buufreak]

They are discussing how there should be more books like this, while also giving some large books giving martials options. That is their thoughts and opinions.

[Bartmanhomer]

They are discussing how there should be more books like this, while also giving some large books giving martials options. That is their thoughts and opinions.

Oh ok. I get it now. But there are more books such as the Complete Series. It has other options for other classes.

[NigelWalmsley]

This seems like an odd solution, as a 1 or 2 level Fighter dip is a useful component of many martial and gish builds, and Monks are significantly worse than Fighters (in the last group I was a player in, the Fighter couldn't do anything but fight, but they did a respectable job of that: the Monk couldn't even hit anyone most of the time).

The reason people dip Fighter is because the game doesn't give you enough feats. If a feat is going to be "+4 to tripping", you should get a feat every level without having to light your class features on fire.

But, yes, if you want people to not shoot themselves in the foot, you should also drop the Monk. And some non-core stuff, like the Truenamer. Though TBF, I could see the argument that the Monk is at least interesting, and you should try to fix it. The Fighter's claim to fame is getting something the game should just give you by default.

[Bartmanhomer]

I don't think they should drop the mundane martial class. Maybe the Tier 6 classes because they're NPC classes and I'm not sure anybody uses these classes for PC.