(draft) Being Useful: A Guide to Spellcasting

[jmax]

As a follow-up to my post a few weeks ago, I wrote a handbook on spellcasting in general.

Being Useful: A Guide to Spellcasting (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1tHs5OdG1xzZ6yHi2sqVHcjnuyXZdlMFDbHvZiYbosA8/edit?usp=sharing)

I expect a lot of content to be controversial due to differing opinions on strategy and tactics, but the idea here is to provide a boost to people who aren't otherwise well-versed in D&D 3.5 spellcasting rather than create any hard and fast rules.

This is a work in progress. I think the most glaring deficiency is that it skews heavily toward primary casters - support and gish casters probably need more love. It also probably needs separate example ratings for primary, support, and gish casters in the example evaluations.

I think the part I'm most proud of is the part on Cone area effects.

For feedback, I'm looking for gaps and deficiencies rather than arguments over which philosophy is right or whether I've rated your favorite spell appropriately. For spell ratings in particular, remember that the point is the process of evaluating a spell rather than the end result - I fully expect there will be disagreement with some of my actual conclusions, but they're only examples.

(You may notice that some of the example evaluations aren't filled in yet. I haven't prioritized finishing those because they take a fair amount of time - I've spent far more time on those than I have on writing the meat of the guidebook.)

[lylsyly]

Great Guide. I absopositilutely love the way you are grading the spells.In my experience most folks that jump into playing a full caster don't consider the roles they can or should fill any better than they consider their spell selection. Of course there are plenty of players that do consider both things but they tend to be the players that think only by playing a full caster are you playing what D&D was meant to be.

[jmax]

Great Guide. I absopositilutely love the way you are grading the spells.

Thanks! I tried to come up with a fairly thorough way to capture the different ways to evaluate spells, and I thought I did a good job with it - but since mostly I was teasing out a formula to match my instinctive process, it's good to hear that it's useful for people other than me.

Is there anything you think is missing or not presented well?


In my experience most folks that jump into playing a full caster don't consider the roles they can or should fill any better than they consider their spell selection.

I think a lot of it boils down to the complexity. It's probably a lot easier if you stick to Core, but once you throw in all the splatbooks, there are literally thousands of choices, and it's much easier to pick a full list of spells that are never quite right for your circumstances - sometimes even if you pick only spells that everyone consistently recommends as being awesome.

Also, one thing I noticed going through spells to pick examples for low/mid/high levels in good/medium/bad groupings was that there are relatively few Core spells that are absolutely terrible. The splatbooks add a lot of things that sound cool but are incredibly situational, with some of those situations being vanishingly rare.

Roles-wise I mostly cribbed from Treantmonklvl20 and LogicNinja - I should probably add additional credit for them in the foreword. I did tweak their wisdom a fair bit, though.


Of course there are plenty of players that do consider both things but they tend to be the players that think only by playing a full caster are you playing what D&D was meant to be.

I think there are some people for whom evaluating complex scenarios with multiple variables comes easy - and a lot of them are on these boards. If you're really good at that, playing a full caster is awesome, and for some it's probably legit boring to play a character who only has a handful of different actions they can take in most situations. But there are also plenty of people who want to play a wizard (or any other caster, primary or otherwise) and just have fun even if it's not instinctive for them, and I haven't seen a whole lot of resources for people in that group - which is unfortunate, because it's really easy to play a spellcaster in ways that are completely ineffective. It's less rough for divine casters, since they can change everything out on a daily basis - but for a sorcerer or bard, it's brutal, and for a wizard, it's at least expensive and time-consuming.

[Fero]

This is an amazing guide. From a preliminary revoew,m y comments thus far are:

1- the guide is intimidating in scope as you are tackling all spellcasting classes and styles. I wonder if you could break class specific discussions into seperate linked books so the reader can read the general guide followed by the guide for the class that are most interested in.

2- I find newer players often identify a few spells as being good for the level and then never revisit the issue. However, what spell is good for the level depends on what level the question is being asked. For example, Nerve Skitter is a poor choice at level 1 but very useful at level 12. As such, I think a discussion of revisiting spell selection every few levels could be useful (maybe you already did and I missed it).

Great job!

[lylsyly]

Thanks! I tried to come up with a fairly thorough way to capture the different ways to evaluate spells, and I thought I did a good job with it - but since mostly I was teasing out a formula to match my instinctive process, it's good to hear that it's useful for people other than me.

Is there anything you think is missing or not presented well?

I can see where you have room to expand and that's a good thing. I've read treantmonk and logicnija's guide, wasn't really impressed by the as miusch as this one. Basically they just say THESE are the spells you have without really getting into the why.


I think a lot of it boils down to the complexity. It's probably a lot easier if you stick to Core, but once you throw in all the splatbooks, there are literally thousands of choices, and it's much easier to pick a full list of spells that are never quite right for your circumstances - sometimes even if you pick only spells that everyone consistently recommends as being awesome.

Also, one thing I noticed going through spells to pick examples for low/mid/high levels in good/medium/bad groupings was that there are relatively few Core spells that are absolutely terrible. The splatbooks add a lot of things that sound cool but are incredibly situational, with some of those situations being vanishingly rare.

Roles-wise I mostly cribbed from Treantmonklvl20 and LogicNinja - I should probably add additional credit for them in the foreword. I did tweak their wisdom a fair bit, though.



I think there are some people for whom evaluating complex scenarios with multiple variables comes easy - and a lot of them are on these boards. If you're really good at that, playing a full caster is awesome, and for some it's probably legit boring to play a character who only has a handful of different actions they can take in most situations. But there are also plenty of people who want to play a wizard (or any other caster, primary or otherwise) and just have fun even if it's not instinctive for them, and I haven't seen a whole lot of resources for people in that group - which is unfortunate, because it's really easy to play a spellcaster in ways that are completely ineffective. It's less rough for divine casters, since they can change everything out on a daily basis - but for a sorcerer or bard, it's brutal, and for a wizard, it's at least expensive and time-consuming.

Yes, playing the more complex classes (don't forget to throw Druid in there) does come easier for some. I've just always had heartburn with people that think the ONLY way to play is to play a fully optimized T1 caster. Seriously, why don't we call it Druids & Dragons and eliminate everything else?

Every comment I make on this board is also colored by the way we play at our table. There are 7 of us and myself and 2 others have been together since I got OD&D for my 16th birthday. No such thing as class skills or alignment and an ability score generation method that usually puts 32 point buy to shame (32 PB is the back up in case you are unhappy with your rolls and want to scrap it). Usually play gestalt games with a HARD ban on anything setting speciifc.

I've been given infractions for arguing with folks that think if they can't play an Incantatrix then they don't want to play at all.

[Quertus]

Seriously, why don't we call it Druids & Dragons and eliminate everything else?

Because Dragons are suboptimal for their ECL?

[noob]

Because Dragons are suboptimal for their ECL?

Yes, get bards: they are superior at the same ecl.

[spectralphoenix]

Nice guide! A few comments I came up with while reading -

You mention that some DMs allow 1 round casting times to just use your whole round instead of waiting until the next round. If they don't though, in addition to the disadvantage that the spell takes longer to get off, you might also mention that the spell becomes much easier for the bad guys to disrupt, because they can attack you during their turn instead of needing to ready an action or somehow follow your 5 ft step.

Contingency - feels like it deserves more discussion, or perhaps even a section of its own. Maybe there's a guide somewhere you could link to if that would dilute things too much?

Scorching Ray - Maybe a note on Arcane Trickster/Unseen Seer using this with Sneak Attack? That is a pretty specific case, it might be outside the scope of the guide.

Slay Living - inconsistently refers to the touch attack as melee and ranged.

[Troacctid]

I probably have some notes for you, but have you read my warmage handbook yet? Particularly the Introduction, and the Spells section?


Scorching Ray - Maybe a note on Arcane Trickster/Unseen Seer using this with Sneak Attack? That is a pretty specific case, it might be outside the scope of the guide.
It's not a particularly great spell for sneak attacking, since the weaponlike spell rules only allow you to add sneak attack (or Ranged Spell Specialization, or Knowledge Devotion, or any kind of extra damage) to the first attack. (See Complete Arcane.) I mean, obviously doing 17d6 damage is better than doing 12d6 damage, I guess. But sneak attack doesn't really improve it any more than it would improve any other ray spell.

[jmax]

This is an amazing guide.

Great job!

Nice guide!
Thanks!


1- the guide is intimidating in scope as you are tackling all spellcasting classes and styles. I wonder if you could break class specific discussions into seperate linked books so the reader can read the general guide followed by the guide for the class that are most interested in.

I thought about breaking it up, but I decided against doing so because too much of the content is common across multiple classes and even spellcaster roles. However, I could break off the example evaluations into their own document as an appendix - that would (correctly) show the handbook itself as about 30 pages rather than 60+.


2- I find newer players often identify a few spells as being good for the level and then never revisit the issue. However, what spell is good for the level depends on what level the question is being asked. For example, Nerve Skitter is a poor choice at level 1 but very useful at level 12. As such, I think a discussion of revisiting spell selection every few levels could be useful (maybe you already did and I missed it).
Good point. I have "career scaling" as a feature for evaluating spells, but I don't think I explained how I came up with what I put there, and I don't like how I have that done now anyway. A section on career progression in general would be worthwhile, and then I could change the example evaluations to reflect that. There will be a little complexity I have to manage for spells that are available to both primary and tertiary (i.e. gish) casters since their careers look very different, but I'll figure something out.


I can see where you have room to expand and that's a good thing. I've read treantmonk and logicnija's guide, wasn't really impressed by the as miusch as this one. Basically they just say THESE are the spells you have without really getting into the why.
Yeah, that was a big part of why I wanted to write this. Their guides have some really good fundamentals (many of which I obviously cribbed from), but I felt like they focused mostly on short-term tactics and not long-term strategy. In particular, there has been a big gap between the general handbooks and the specific builds.


Yes, playing the more complex classes (don't forget to throw Druid in there) does come easier for some. I've just always had heartburn with people that think the ONLY way to play is to play a fully optimized T1 caster. Seriously, why don't we call it Druids & Dragons and eliminate everything else?

One thing I decided I want to add is a block on how to pick which spellcasting class (or even type of spellcasting class) to play.

Druids are my personal favorite. I originally wanted to play a wizard in my first game, but the DM's wife grabbed that role first. Nothing else looked terribly interesting... except the druid, who I realized would perfectly fit Listens-to-Wind from the Dresden Files books. I didn't realize at the time it was the munchkin class, but that turned out to be a good fit.

The thing that's great about playing stock druids is that nearly all of their character choices can be changed at basically any time. Spells? New list every day. Animal companion? 24-hour turnaround to swap out. Buyer's remorse on your magic items? You can probably find someone to trade with to avoid losing half your wealth on the spread between buy and sell prices. The only thing you can't change out easily are your feats, and aside from Natural Spell at 6th level, they barely matter on Core-only druids and are just icing on the cake when supplemental material is allowed. That flexibility actually makes them very friendly to new players despite the complexity.


You mention that some DMs allow 1 round casting times to just use your whole round instead of waiting until the next round. If they don't though, in addition to the disadvantage that the spell takes longer to get off, you might also mention that the spell becomes much easier for the bad guys to disrupt, because they can attack you during their turn instead of needing to ready an action or somehow follow your 5 ft step.

Ooh, that's a good point, and it leads naturally to an even better one - I have exactly nothing talking about Concentration and how to deal with being threatened in combat. I'll fix both of those.


Contingency - feels like it deserves more discussion, or perhaps even a section of its own. Maybe there's a guide somewhere you could link to if that would dilute things too much?

Yeah, I think I'd rather link to a handbook for that one than go into tremendous detail. I could maybe add a section on spells meriting their own guides and then link to what's available for them. I've already done that for Shapechange since I have a 100-page dissertation on that (see my signature for the link).



Scorching Ray - Maybe a note on Arcane Trickster/Unseen Seer using this with Sneak Attack? That is a pretty specific case, it might be outside the scope of the guide.

I think I do need more about Arcane Tricksters and other arcane gish builds. The problem is that I actually know very little about any of them except the Duskblade. However, I agree with Troacctid on scorching ray specifically.

That said, ray spells in general probably deserve a little more attention specifically because of Split Ray metamagic.


Slay Living - inconsistently refers to the touch attack as melee and ranged.

Oops. I'll make a note to fix that. Thanks!


have you read my warmage handbook yet? Particularly the Introduction, and the Spells section?

I have not, and that's a weakness I'm specifically aware of. I think I even have "[read up on Warmages]" and "[read up on warlocks]" as specific placeholders, so I'll definitely check out your handbook. Do you have a warlock guide you recommend? Or for Arcane Tricksters and similar gish flavors?


Lots of good feedback here. I've made some notes and will get some updates done when I have time.

[Anthrowhale]

For gishes, Arcane Spellsurge, Surge of Fortune, and Sense Weakness come to mind.

[Troacctid]

I have not, and that's a weakness I'm specifically aware of. I think I even have "[read up on Warmages]" and "[read up on warlocks]" as specific placeholders, so I'll definitely check out your handbook. Do you have a warlock guide you recommend? Or for Arcane Tricksters and similar gish flavors?
What a coincidence, I happen to have a warlock handbook as well. 😉

Check my signature for both links.


Full-round spells eat almost your whole turn, including your opportunity for movement. They had better do something really good. Some DMs will let these take effect at the end of your current turn, but officially they actually take effect at the start of your next turn.
I've never heard of DMs allowing this, only DMs not knowing about this. I don't think there's any reason to mention a hypothetical houserule here; just say it straight.

The rules distinguish between a casting time of 1 round and a casting time of a full-round action. Maybe talk about that distinction instead.


Saving Throw

Your basic saving throws are Fortortitude, Reflex, and Will.
There's a typo for ya. Also, nearby, you have spell resistance on there twice.


Save-or-lose is actually more flexible than save-or-die because you can use it to take prisoners.
I think it really depends on the spell. Fear makes enemies run away at top speed, for example, which is not really conducive to capturing them.


There are a few specific exceptions:

1. The Heal spell is extremely potent. It fixes a massive amount of damage and cures a boggling number of negative conditions. This spell is worth using in combat because its effect is worth the action cost—even factoring in what your enemies are likely to do to your buddy over the course of the next round.
The same is true of the more potent members of the cure line, albeit to a lesser extent. Experienced players often underestimate how much those spells heal you compared to a typical enemy's damage output, especially if you're healing a tank that the enemies had to work real hard to damage in the first place. It's not something you'll want to do in every fight, but there are absolutely situations where in-combat healing is the action economy a cleric or favored soul needs when the combat is a couple rounds in and a buff spell won't get as much mileage. (And if you spec your build for healing, it obviously becomes better as well.)


There are two spells, Revivify and Last Breath, that bring back a dead buddy without them taking any level loss—but you have to cast them within one round of death. For these, you’re taking two calculated risks. First, you’re gambling on whether giving up your turn is going to result in you or more of your buddies dying and/or losing the combat or failing your objective. Second, they come back with very low hit points, so a vindictive enemy might just kill them again, in which case you’re out both your turn and the expensive material components.
You can also just cast a gentle repose spell in the moment to extend the timer, and then revivify later at your leisure. Get the former in a scroll and you won't have to prepare either of 'em.


Summoning is a special form of battlefield control that gives you minions you can control. A summoned (or called or created) creature endures through the whole combat (except at very low levels), can be repositioned when needed, can damage your enemies, can absorb damage that your less disposable friends would otherwise take, and can add an obstacle to the battlefield that your enemies have to go around. Any of those things is a win, and summons can give you all of them at once.
Most summons take a full round to summon, which is a big drawback as it means they don't actually appear until the following turn. If you can speed up the casting time somehow, having them arrive immediately, then that's a huge advantage. Ways to do this include but are not limited to Rapid Spell, Quicken Spell, Golden Desert Honey, Robe of Mysterious Conjuration, that one variant conjurer ability, Chronocharm of the Uncaring Archmage, Circlet of Rapid Casting, and the contingent summon ability of the thaumaturgist.


The classic example of a spell with too many rolls is Disintegrate. First, you roll to hit. Then you may have to roll to beat spell resistance. Then your target rolls a saving throw. Then you roll damage—and while it’s a lot of damage dice, if you don’t actually drop the target to 0 hp or less, they’re still in the fight. Even if you have an 80% chance of success on each of those four rolls (counting enough-damage-to-drop as a single roll), you only have a 41% chance of bringing down your target.
Disintegrate is actually still really good though because it's a double threat. It completely deletes most physical obstacles. It's like the sorcerer's passwall.


Fighters, barbarians, paladins, monks, and (starting at mid levels) druids make good tanks.
Who builds a barbarian as a tank? Traditionally, they sacrifice defense for offense, e.g. with rage, which gives +4 Strength and -2 AC. I guess you theoretically could, but I've never seen it. Monks definitely do not make good tanks. You can take monk right off that list. Put cleric on instead. Clerics are great at tanking.


Rogues, sorcerers, druids, and certain ranger builds make good glass cannons, as do many specific builds of fighters, barbarians, paladins, and monks.
Monks don't really make good glass cannons either.


Note: The terms “God” and “Batman” refer to two separate styles of filling the same role. “God” implies changing reality to suit the party’s needs—generally with battlefield control, buffing, and debuffing. “Batman” is a jack-of-all-trades capable of producing whatever effect is needed at any given time—but not as potent at any of them as “God” is with specialties.
This is just another way of saying "support". It seems to me like a very nebulous distinction. Why not borrow the 4e roles of Leader and Controller? Or at least change "God" (a terrible, non-descriptive name) to "Controller," and change "Batman" to "Toolbox" (and relegate him to the non-combat section where he belongs).


Grinding

This is direct damage, also known as blasting. It does bring your enemies ever closer to death and defeat, but it doesn’t actually do anything to impede them on the way there. A primary caster dealing direct damage should either be outright neutralizing a large number of weak enemies or dropping a massive pile of damage on a single strong enemy. In general, physical combat is far more effective at direct damage than spellcasting—except for taking out mobs of mooks.
Why would you call it "grinding," implying a slow and steady battle of attrition, when it's often the second-fastest way of finishing an encounter (after save-or-lose)? If anything, battlefield control should be the grinding category, because it slows enemies down so that you can gradually grind them down over time.

Also, a lot of the best blasting spells are double threats that also clonk the enemy with a save-or-suck. Wings of flurry in particular is one of the best spells on the entire sorcerer list, and orb of fire is one of the best single-target blasting spells; both of them deal competitive damage and cause the target(s) to skip a turn on a failed save.

Blasting is the category of spell that scales best with metamagic, and it's not particularly close. It's also worth noting that it tends to be better for spontaneous casters than it is for prepared casters, partly because it's difficult to predict in advance how many slots you'll need to spend on it, and partly because it stacks well with itself, so if you're doing it, you'll naturally want to do it multiple times.


Support Caster

Support casters fall in the middle. They often cast spells every round, but their spells are almost exclusively focused on either making their party more effective or hindering (often subtly) the enemy. That’s not actually a bad thing—it just isn’t flashy. Support casters can significantly amplify a party’s effectiveness, and they’re quite a bit easier to play than primary casters.
And by the way, mobility spells and antimagic spells really ought to have their own category. Movement is a huge part of what support casters do. Dimension door alone is one of the best utility spells in the game, and effects like fly and teleport are iconic as well. Meanwhile, dispelling and otherwise countering other spellcasters/spell effects is really important in this edition, enough so to deserve a little emphasis, IMO.


Bard

A bard is, by default, a support caster—even if Bardic Music isn’t technically spellcasting, it fills the same role. However, it is possible to build a bard who functions as a competent gish.
It's actually really hard to build an effective gish bard. If this guide is aimed at newbies, I would skip over that recommendation entirely, for their own good. They should just stick to a mix of buffing, debuffing, dispelling, utility, mobility, intelligence, and gambling. (And also skills.)


Cleric

Clerics are interesting. Mechanically, they are primary (i.e. full) casters, but their spell list favors support casting more than flashy, direct stuff. They can fill the primary caster role quite competently, but they fit more naturally as support casters. However, they also work fairly well as gishes—clerics have enough self-buffs to make themselves fairly formidable in direct combat, and they can wear good armor (or, even better at mid-high levels, a Monk’s Belt).
A cleric's domains can have a big impact on their role. Anything you want to do, there's probably a domain that can allow a cleric to do it.


When your wizard first gets Fireball at 3rd level, it’s dealing an average of 10.5 damage, or 5.25 on a successful save, and burns your most potent spell slot.
That...is not quite right.


Never completely skip your standard action. If you feel that you have nothing meaningful to contribute in a given circumstance, do one of the following:
This would be a good place to mention reserve feats. Especially for the newbie reader! They're like training wheels for spell slot management.


Move Actions

Move actions can be used for actual movement, retrieving items, or redirecting ongoing spells. In general, it’s mostly primary casters who are using spells that allow and make sense for redirection, but some support spells do fit in there. This is the action you’re most likely to waste if you’re already positioned where you want to be. Don’t sweat it too much.
For spontaneous casters, move actions are also used to apply metamagic to standard action spells, turning them into a full-round action.


Swift Actions

Don’t overlook swift actions. They’re very valuable—but how you deploy them depends greatly on your spellcasting role. Keep in mind that you can use a swift action right before doing a full-round spellcast.
In a game that includes MIC, activating a magic item will probably be the most common way for characters of all stripes to use their swift action. There are a buttload of powerful items in that book that cost a swift. See the useful items spreadsheet in my signature for some examples.


Does Produce Flame truly excel? Honestly? No, not really. But it’s the best I could come up with, and I do like it much better than its nearest contenders. This spell lets you conjure a ball of flames that you can throw 120 feet as a ranged touch attack for relatively minor damage—which isn’t all that great, except you effectively get one shot per level, which makes this spell pretty good bang-for-buck from a resources perspective.
You just spent a whole paragraph or more excoriating the entire concept of single-target standard-action buff spells and then you turn around and pick one as an example of a "great" spell? Weird flex, but okay. Me, I personally think produce flame is pretty bad. Chill touch would probably be my pick for best 1st level damage spell.


Sleep is amazingly powerful at 1st-level, and it’s the first true save-or-lose spell available—and it can hit multiple targets. The enormously limiting factor is that it can’t affect anything with more than 4 hit dice.
Don't forget the casting time. That 1-round delay can be a bummer sometimes. I usually prefer color spray for that reason.


Let me be clear that the only reason I rate Firestorm this high is the shaping of a very large area. The damage is lackluster, and fire resistance is common at high levels. However, spells that give you this kind of precision are rare, and that precision means you can safely deploy it in any combat. Even then, it only barely makes the Great list.
I find your choices of great blasting spells very puzzling.


This spell is odd in that it grants repeat attacks but has no expiration. That’s about the only good thing about it. You have to get right up in your enemy’s face, it deals negligible damage with a given attack, and while it has a debuff rider, it’s too minor to be meaningful.
Not if you spend your spell slots at the end of the day metamagicking it up to the gills with effects like Fell Drain and Forceful Spell so that you have effectively unlimited terrifying touch debuffs. And that's not even the RAW for chill touch. Rules Compendium changed the rules so that every attack is made all at once as part of the standard action casting. That means it's pretty much just straight up 1d6/level uncapped that ignores energy resistance and also deals some amount of Strength damage. Chill touch is legitimately overpowered.


This spell is a joke. Literally. It’s a long-running gag, and that’s about all it’s good for unless you like murdering hapless, innocent peasants. It only deals 6d6 damage (99% chance of <30 damage), which won’t bring down a level-appropriate target. You’re relying on luck to hit the right person or even not hit the wrong person.
The traditional use for explosive runes is to put a bunch of them on the same object, toss it at an enemy, and then intentionally flub an area dispel to set them all off at once. Or, as I like to put it, "We have fire seeds at home."

It's tricky because IIRC you auto-pass dispel checks against your own spells, which means you typically need someone else to pull an alley-oop.

[TheTeaMustFlow]

Full-round spells eat almost your whole turn, including your opportunity for movement. They had better do something really good. Some DMs will let these take effect at the end of your current turn, but officially they actually take effect at the start of your next turn.

I do not think this is quite correct - there is a distinction between spells with a casting time of 1 round (which, as you describe, take effect on the beginning of your next turn), and those with a casting time of a full-round action (which take up your entire turn including movement, but activate immediately.)

The chief example of the latter are metamagic'd spells used by spontaneous casters, but IIRC there are a few non-core examples of spells with specifically a full-round action casting time.

[Telonius]

I would probably modify the "Defenses against spells" section. For Immunities, it seems like you're talking mostly about immunity due to type or other natural immunities. I'd add an "Other Spells and abilities" subsection to the "Defenses against spells" section. This could cover things like counterspelling (an active defense) but also more passive things like Death Ward, the Shield spell (for magic missiles), magic items that grant protections or immunities, or even the Flame's Blessing stance from ToB. That kind of defense is trickier to know about ahead of time than immunities based on type. You know just by looking at a Frost Giant that you shouldn't bother casting Cone of Cold. You won't necessarily know that he's a Swordsage with 19 ranks in Tumble, and will laugh at your Fireball.

[Tohron]

I think the listing of Explosive Runes as poor doesn't account for the normal use case: stockpiling a whole bunch of them out-of-combat for use against a nasty threat. The most abusive use is throwing a ball of them into a bunch of enemies, then using Dispel Magic (and auto-failing the roll) to set them all off.

[Troacctid]

I think the listing of Explosive Runes as poor doesn't account for the normal use case: stockpiling a whole bunch of them out-of-combat for use against a nasty threat. The most abusive use is throwing a ball of them into a bunch of enemies, then using Dispel Magic (and auto-failing the roll) to set them all off.
You can auto-succeed on dispelling your own spells, but I don't believe you can auto-fail. Best you can do is deliberately downcast the dispel at a lower caster level. If your dispel is 10 CL lower than your runes, then you auto-fail and kaboom.

[noob]

You can auto-succeed on dispelling your own spells, but I don't believe you can auto-fail. Best you can do is deliberately downcast the dispel at a lower caster level. If your dispel is 10 CL lower than your runes, then you auto-fail and kaboom.

There is a way to reduce the needed difference to 1: there is a feat that allows you to take 10 on a cl check.
Since you can downcast a spell down to a cl equal to the one required to unlock the spell you can reduce the cl of dispel magic to 5(6 if sorcerer), combined with that feat it means you can autofail at dispelling as early as level 6 if wizard or 7 if sorcerer, it however costs a feat that is highly situational (only useful against weak spell resistance, dispel low cl spells and for that specific trick)

[jmax]

Lots of good feedback here. I've taken some notes for changes - once I've had some time to make tweaks, I'll come back and respond to them. Meanwhile, feel free to keep digging.

[cython]

Fantastic Guide...

a minor issue that I spotted

a Fireball at a caster level 5 does 17.5 = 5x3.5 damage, not 10.5...

[jmax]

a Fireball at a caster level 5 does 17.5 = 5x3.5 damage, not 10.5...

Yeah, I goofed and originally did by spell level (3rd) instead of caster level. Then I forgot to change the damage averages. I've fixed that, but I still need to adjust for the Fighter being 5th level instead of 3rd. Thanks for pointing that out.

[Seward]

Just a comment on spontaneous casting.

Later D&D adds "Fixed List" spontaneous casting, of which the most effective are the Beguiler, Dread Necromancer and Warmage, whose lists have a lot of redundant spells but also some oddball spells you'd probably never pick as a sorcerer OR wizard - as where they shine is so unusual that only a fixed list person will ever have it when that comes up (like Ottiluke's Freezing Sphere used in the "Freeze a lake with an action" mode). A wizard who is very completionist might have it in his spellbook but won't prepare it, and barring odd feats that let you spont cast from your spellbook (a Pathfinder Bonded item does it best, the 3.5 way takes an extra action) it won't be there at crunch time.

That plays pretty differently from a sorcerer/favored soul/Pathfinder Oracle's limited spells known. However on that topic I want to add something. You don't pick only general purpose spells. You pick spells that support your playstyle (or in my case "theme", I tend to always skin such characters around a type of magic, like I'd build a superhero, and fill in any gaps with consumables for situations where the theme just doesn't help). So you get good general spells yes, something for offense, defense, buffing, movment, but how it expresses depends on your spells. A weather themed sorcerer might take sleet storm, a fire themed sorcerer might take pyrotechnics, both can put out fires or blind enemies or block line of sight but they do it differently.

This can lead to spells that seem marginal, or narrowly focused taken for thematic reasons but also turn out to be chosen in battle or in out-of-combat play surprisingly often when you can spam them whenever they are helpful, or can routinely keep them up all day via repeated castings, or use on everybody.

===========
Something else to consider. D&D is a resource game, but prep casting vs spont casting express differently.

A prepared caster loses an "option" every time a spell is cast. If you only prepared one fireball, you use it and you get no more fireballs that day, unless you lower your flexibility and prepare it multiple times. That also has an opportunity cost. Furthermore any bad pick for the day is like not having the spell slot. This is another advantage of Cleric or Druid. In addition to getting to prepare from their entire spell list, they can spontaneously cast a cure or nature's ally using up any bad choics they made that day. Picking spells to prepare needs you to predict the next day well, and you often won't have enough information, so "Standard spell mix" choices are common (eg, travel mix, shopping/downtime day mix, high intensity combat expected mix), then tweaked a bit due to any info you might have. Stressing about spell picks every night in actual play is a great way to bog down the game for your friends at the table and reduce your own fun. It isn't for everybody.

The upside of a prepared caster is that it is fairly immune to bad "level up" choices. Most power is in the spell list and you can fix a weak character by picking better spells tomorrow.

A spont caster limits her choices at level-up. While better in play for a less experienced player (who only has to understand how spells she picked work in the game) such a less experienced player should get help when leveling the character with each new spell picked. My approach was to ask myself (or anybody asking my advice) "what did I wish I could do and could not" in recent play, and picking a spell that fit my theme which would prove helpful. If I'm losing actions from injuries, invest in a defensive or mobility spell. If my damage spell isn't doing enough, look for metamagic or maybe another spell, perhaps swapping out a lower level one in that role. If enemy resistances are a problem, pick something helpful for when my spells can't land (buff spells are especially good for this, but you could go with a SR=no or different energy type or something). If line of sight blocking is cramping my style, pick an AOE spell (or an obstacle-remover like disintegrate). You get the idea.

If you really pick a lot of useless spells, you can end up with a really bad character that isn't easy to fix. But a lot of obvious choices are decent, spont caster classes tend to lack the attractive traps that some other classes have (like doing a low strength monk, or a ranged-sneak-attack based archer)

Once you choose your spells though, the only time casting a spell limits future options is burning out your highest tier spell slots. If those run low you "ration" by using lower level spells, usually saving that last top tier slot for an emergency.

[jmax]

Just a comment on spontaneous casting.

Later D&D adds "Fixed List" spontaneous casting, of which the most effective are the Beguiler, Dread Necromancer and Warmage, whose lists have a lot of redundant spells but also some oddball spells you'd probably never pick as a sorcerer OR wizard - as where they shine is so unusual that only a fixed list person will ever have it when that comes up (like Ottiluke's Freezing Sphere used in the "Freeze a lake with an action" mode). A wizard who is very completionist might have it in his spellbook but won't prepare it, and barring odd feats that let you spont cast from your spellbook (a Pathfinder Bonded item does it best, the 3.5 way takes an extra action) it won't be there at crunch time.

That plays pretty differently from a sorcerer/favored soul/Pathfinder Oracle's limited spells known. However on that topic I want to add something. You don't pick only general purpose spells. You pick spells that support your playstyle (or in my case "theme", I tend to always skin such characters around a type of magic, like I'd build a superhero, and fill in any gaps with consumables for situations where the theme just doesn't help). So you get good general spells yes, something for offense, defense, buffing, movment, but how it expresses depends on your spells. A weather themed sorcerer might take sleet storm, a fire themed sorcerer might take pyrotechnics, both can put out fires or blind enemies or block line of sight but they do it differently.

This can lead to spells that seem marginal, or narrowly focused taken for thematic reasons but also turn out to be chosen in battle or in out-of-combat play surprisingly often when you can spam them whenever they are helpful, or can routinely keep them up all day via repeated castings, or use on everybody.

===========
Something else to consider. D&D is a resource game, but prep casting vs spont casting express differently.

A prepared caster loses an "option" every time a spell is cast. If you only prepared one fireball, you use it and you get no more fireballs that day, unless you lower your flexibility and prepare it multiple times. That also has an opportunity cost. Furthermore any bad pick for the day is like not having the spell slot. This is another advantage of Cleric or Druid. In addition to getting to prepare from their entire spell list, they can spontaneously cast a cure or nature's ally using up any bad choics they made that day. Picking spells to prepare needs you to predict the next day well, and you often won't have enough information, so "Standard spell mix" choices are common (eg, travel mix, shopping/downtime day mix, high intensity combat expected mix), then tweaked a bit due to any info you might have. Stressing about spell picks every night in actual play is a great way to bog down the game for your friends at the table and reduce your own fun. It isn't for everybody.

The upside of a prepared caster is that it is fairly immune to bad "level up" choices. Most power is in the spell list and you can fix a weak character by picking better spells tomorrow.

A spont caster limits her choices at level-up. While better in play for a less experienced player (who only has to understand how spells she picked work in the game) such a less experienced player should get help when leveling the character with each new spell picked. My approach was to ask myself (or anybody asking my advice) "what did I wish I could do and could not" in recent play, and picking a spell that fit my theme which would prove helpful. If I'm losing actions from injuries, invest in a defensive or mobility spell. If my damage spell isn't doing enough, look for metamagic or maybe another spell, perhaps swapping out a lower level one in that role. If enemy resistances are a problem, pick something helpful for when my spells can't land (buff spells are especially good for this, but you could go with a SR=no or different energy type or something). If line of sight blocking is cramping my style, pick an AOE spell (or an obstacle-remover like disintegrate). You get the idea.

If you really pick a lot of useless spells, you can end up with a really bad character that isn't easy to fix. But a lot of obvious choices are decent, spont caster classes tend to lack the attractive traps that some other classes have (like doing a low strength monk, or a ranged-sneak-attack based archer)

Once you choose your spells though, the only time casting a spell limits future options is burning out your highest tier spell slots. If those run low you "ration" by using lower level spells, usually saving that last top tier slot for an emergency.

Excellent points. I need to get ready for work, but I'll add these to my notes tonight for later incorporation. Thank you!

[Kalkra]

The Take A Step Back section looks to have been the victim of some copying and pasting and not checking to make sure that the sentences are complete after. Also, the paragraph about Wrack should have a period at the end. (I wouldn't normally point that out, but while I'm mentioning the other stuff I may as well.)

[jmax]

The Take A Step Back section looks to have been the victim of some copying and pasting and not checking to make sure that the sentences are complete after. Also, the paragraph about Wrack should have a period at the end. (I wouldn't normally point that out, but while I'm mentioning the other stuff I may as well.)

Whoops, I had some half-written stuff that I deleted in markup mode but didn't actually commit. Fixed. Thanks.

[RexDart]

Catching up on this. Noticed a couple things:

Delay Death
First sentence: "Even if in-combat healing didn’t already mostly suck, Delay Spell would make it mostly obsolete."

I assume you meant to reference Delay Death here and not Delay Spell (a metamagic feat.)


Tenser's Floating Disc
This is more of a quibble, but I think "terrain a horse can manage" is more common in dungeons than you imply - e.g., perilous rope bridges across deep chasms, climbing into and out of the chasm because the perilous rope bridge was destroyed, etc.

[Endarire]

jmax published a new guide for casters! Alleluia! (This guide should be linked in your signature.)

Having played Baldur's Gate, I found an easy way to conceptualize each spell preparation/casting is as a button. "Push a button" to cast a spell then something happens. Spellcasting and full casting on their own simply allow you to use them, and you're expected to use them well if your side is to win.