School Specialization Ranking/Tiering

[liquidformat]

So I was thinking of making a game where all casters were either Archivists or Wizards; beyond that all Archivists/Wizards must choose a school of magic to specialize in and would be Focused Specialists. The idea being that each caster is born with affinities to certain types of magic and no caster is capable of across all schools. In this case for Archivists would only have access to spells on the cleric spell list and domain lists. For spells exclusive to Druid/Paladin/Ranger and so forth they would specifically have to hunt those spells down.
This idea got me thinking in this situation how would the different Schools be tiered/ranked compared to each other?

[Rebel7284]

I think rating all the school in general is difficult as
- Their utility often changes depending on the type of campaigns and encounters you have
- Some scale differently with either mostly having better low level spells vs. better high level spells

With that said, I usually see the following tier list for schools (from better to worse)
Tier 1: Transmutation, Conjuration
Tier 2: Necromancy*, Abjuration, Illusion
Tier 3: Evocation, Enchantment

* Necromancy starts of a little weak but evil characters have a bit more flexibility with it and some of the late game spells are incredible.

Divination is a strange one since depending on the campaign and the DM it can be either mostly useless or completely essential/broken.

[loky1109]

Look at 3.0 school spec, there are all clear.

[liquidformat]

Look at 3.0 school spec, there are all clear.



Abjuration: To become an abjurer, a wizard must select a prohibited school or schools from the following choices: (1) either Conjuration, Enchantment, Evocation, Illusion, or Transmutation; or (2) both Divination and Necromancy.
Conjuration: To become a conjurer, a wizard must select a prohibited school or schools from one of the following choices: (1) Evocation; (2) any two of the following three schools: Abjuration, Enchantment, and Illusion; (3) Transmutation, or (4) any three schools.
Divination: To become a diviner, a wizard must select any other single school as a prohibited school.
Enchantment: To become an enchanter, a wizard must select a prohibited school or schools from the following choices: (1) either Abjuration, Conjuration, Evocation, Illusion, or Transmutation; or (2) both Divination and Necromancy.
Evocation: To become an evoker, a wizard must select a prohibited school or schools from one of the following choices: (1) Conjuration; (2) any two of the following three schools: Abjuration, Enchantment, and Illusion; (3) Transmutation; or (4) any three schools.
Illusion: To become an illusionist, a wizard must select a prohibited school or schools from the following choices: (1) either Abjuration, Conjuration, Enchantment, Evocation, or Transmutation; or (2) both Divination and Necromancy.
Necromancy: To become a necromancer, a wizard must select any other single school as a prohibited school.
Transmutation: To become a transmuter, a wizard must select a prohibited school or schools from one of the following choices: (1) Conjuration; (2) Evocation; (2) any two of the following three schools: Abjuration, Enchantment, and Illusion; or (4) any three schools.
Universal: Not a school, but a category for spells all wizards can learn. A wizard cannot select universal as a specialty school or as a school to which she does not have access.

Oh yes that is so clear...

[loky1109]

Oh yes that is so clear...
Well, it's some complicated, but you easy can see what schools are rated higher.
1 - Conjuration, Evocation and Transmutation.
2 - other but Divination and Necromancy.
3 - Divination and Necromancy.

[pabelfly]

I'm interested to see where this ends up.

Abjuration
2 – Rebel 7284, Loky 1109

Divination
3 – Rebel7284

Conjuration
1 – Rebel 7284, Loky 1109

Enchantment
2 – Loky 1109
3 – Rebel 7284

Average - 2.5

Evocation
1 – Loky 1109
3 – Rebel 7284

Average - 2

lllusion
2 – Rebel 7284, Loky 1109

Necromancy
2 – Rebel 7284
3 – Loky 1109

Average - 2.5

Transmutation
1 – Rebel 7284, Loky 1109

[Biggus]

I think rating all the school in general is difficult as
- Their utility often changes depending on the type of campaigns and encounters you have
- Some scale differently with either mostly having better low level spells vs. better high level spells

With that said, I usually see the following tier list for schools (from better to worse)
Tier 1: Transmutation, Conjuration
Tier 2: Necromancy*, Abjuration, Illusion
Tier 3: Evocation, Enchantment

* Necromancy starts of a little weak but evil characters have a bit more flexibility with it and some of the late game spells are incredible.


This is broadly what I've seen before, but there's more agreement about some of the schools than others. Transmutation, Conjuration, Abjuration and Evocation are usually as above, but many people drop Necromancy to tier 3, and some people love Enchantment for all the save-or-suck spells. Illusion is also a little controversial, I think partly because it requires more skill as a player to use well than most other schools.

[RandomPeasant]

School specialization contains a number of related concepts, all of which should really be considered separately. Regular specialization is, to a large degree, not particularly specialized. Plenty of Wizards will happen to have one Conjuration or Necromancy or Illusion spell at each level of their standard and to not have any Abjuration or Evocation or Enchantment spells they need to cast, and in those circumstances specialization is completely free. Focused specialization, on the other hand, means losing out on power outside your specialty, and is therefore viable for a smaller set of schools. And whether a school can be prohibited has more to do with whether it has something you can't do without than it does the school's average power level. What follows is my general thoughts on the subject, which are somewhat broader than what OP is really asking for.

Abjuration is not really a great school for a Wizard. There are a number of abjurations that are useful and important (like magic circle or dispel magic), but the Cleric generally gets them, and Clerics learn spells for free and get to wear full plate. Specializing is a bad idea. You certainly can get by with Abjuration as a prohibited school, provided you have a Cleric for dispelling, but it's not really necessary as there are enough schools you'd rather ban. Also if you prohibit it you can't be an Incantatrix.

Conjuration is the most reliably-powerful school. It has good combat spells at every level, while Transmutation is somewhat lackluster at low levels. It also has utility spells and the game-breaking planar binding line. Becoming a specialist or even a focused specialist is completely justifiable, and you should never ban the school.

Divination has a lot of very useful utility spells, but is basically a dead letter in combat. Seriously, your only offensive spell is unluck. As such, becoming a specialist diviner is fine, as you can find a use for one casting of detect thoughts or greater scrying (and so on) each day, and you even get one less banned school. But being a focused specialist diviner is a terrible idea, since at that point you're losing combat spells relative to a baseline Wizard. Also, if your DM lets you take Spontaneous Divination, you should never be a Diviner, because Spontaneous Divination lets you cash in whatever spells you prepared instead of divinations for whatever divinations you wanted. Divination, of course, cannot be prohibited.

Enchantment gets a bad rap because people are used to having mindblank or protection from evil up on themselves and being de facto immune to most of its tricks. But the reality is that most monsters don't have those things, so Enchantment is quite powerful in practice. Especially since it gets one of the most powerful 1st level offensive spells (sleep). I think specializing in Enchantment is a completely defensible choice. Now, to be fair to the critics, I think banning Enchantment is an equally defensible choice, as its claims to fame are "SoDs that target Will" (which Illusion has plenty of), "spells that break the game if your DM doesn't stop you" (which many schools have plenty of), and "minionmancy" (which Conjuration and Necromancy have plenty of), so you don't lose anything irreplaceable by giving it up. I would not recommend being a Focused Specialist Enchanter. If you want to spend all day casting Enchantments, just be a Beguiler, which is better at doing that anyway.

Evocation, on the other hand, absolutely deserves its poor reputation. Banning Evocation is fine, unless you are in a game that is at the level of optimization where contingency is vital (though even then, greater shadow evocation, Craft Contingency, and Shadowcraft Mage are all options). Do not specialize in Evocation. Becoming a Focused Specialist in Evocation is better than being a Warmage, but that's mostly because a Focused Specialist Evoker has a greater ability to pretend he did not make a deep commitment to the worst school in the game.

Illusion is quite similar to Enchantment. You have a bunch of spells that target Will, some abusable stuff that is dependent on your DM (silent image varies wildly depending on how your DM interprets disbelief), some game-breaking spells, and a few things that are pretty hard counters to what you want to do. Generally I would consider it the lower-variance option of the two, as an Illusionist who doesn't get to abuse silent image has more to fall back on than an Enchanter who consistently faces enemies immune to mind-effecting, but until you get simularcum and ice assassin none of your tricks are as impressive as charm/dominate abuse. Illusion also allows you to mitigate what impact banning Evocation does have. As a rule of thumb, I would generally avoid banning both Illusion and Enchantment, but if you really want dominate person, banning Illusion is fine.

Necromancy is an interesting school. It does an extremely broad variety of things, second only to Conjuration. You could plausibly make a Wizard who casts only Necromancy spells and be fine (outside of some struggles at very low levels -- cause fear is no color spray), but you could equally plausibly discard the school entirely and not miss much (astral projection is certainly abusable, but it's a rare game where you can't hit the acceptable power ceiling with ice assassin instead). As such, I think this school is acceptable to either specialize or ban. Being a Focused Specialist falls into a similar trap as Enchantment and Illusion: if you just want to do Necromancy, why not play a Dread Necromancer? There are certainly answers to that question (e.g. Uttercold Assault builds), but a lot of them tend away from Focused Specialization in the first place).

Transmutation is the biggest school in the game. It is also the school with the most crap in the game. Seriously, extend tentacles is a real transmutation and its effect is to give you 5ft more reach if you already have tentacles. It is the same level as alter self. Which brings me to the elephant in the room, and the reason Transmutation is not a write-off: Transmutation has some of the most broken spells in the game. alter self, polymorph, polymorph any object, and shapechange smash the game into small pieces without even trying, and are enough that Transmutation hits "never ban" status easily. There are also a long tail of random spells that you might want (did you know that time magic, weather magic, and telekinesis all fall under Transmutation for some reason?) to discourage you from banning Transmutation even if you're not planning on using the shape-changing magic. I do put it slightly behind Conjuration, because it has a sparser selection at low levels and so much of its power is tied up in spells that tend to cause massive rules arguments, but it is very good and a specialist or Focused Specialist Transmuter is not at all a bad choice.

It's also worth mentioning Elven Generalist and Domain Specialist, which are positioned as alternatives to specialization. Setting aside the question of whether you can combine them, I view a potential tradeoff as essentially being between a real generalist and a specialist who isn't willing to lose schools. Domain Specialist is the latter, giving you (provided you pick a good domain like Conjuration) a list of spells that is defensible at every level, though not generally ideal, and locking you into spells that won't be appropriate for every circumstance. You would, for instance, much rather your 5th level spell slot be teleport than wall of stone on days when your party is travelling. Elven Generalist sacrifices the less valuable lower-level spell slots in exchange for getting to prepare whatever you want, which will tend to be more powerful in the sorts of campaigns where you care enough about having access to every single spell that you aren't willing to ban anything.

Generally speaking, I would say that you should be a Conjurer, Enchanter, Illusionist, Necromancer, or Transmuter, and that you should ban Evocation and Enchantment or Illusion to do so. If you want to be a Focused Specialist you should probably be a Conjurer or Transmuter, and your third prohibited school should probably be Necromancy, but there are defensible arguments for Abjuration or whichever of Enchantment and Illusion you didn't ban. There are, of course, plenty of exceptions, but that would be my rule of thumb.

[Thunder999]

Conjuration and Transmutation are definitely tier 1, they both do almost everything and they have most of the best and important spells, there's strong spells at every spell level.

The bottom tier is equally easy, Enchantment (a few nice buffs, but mostly just will save or lose, mind affecting spells, foiled by immunity or a simple Protection From [Alignment], and Evocation, it's got some nice force effects (wall of force, forcecage) and contingency, but is mostly redundant damage and perhaps most damningly, Shadow Evocation lets you still get the few essentials after banning it.

I suppose the rest go in the middle, they don't necessarily have a must have spell at every level for those extra slots, but aren't bad either..
Abjuration is odd, there's really not many good ones, but the best ones are things every party needs to have like Dispels, Protection from [Alignment], energy resistance/immunity.
Necromancy starts off unimpressive, but animate dead is solid minionmancy and eventually it's got some real power houses like Magic Jar, Astral Projections,
Divination has good spells, but not enough of them and is defintiely not a school I'd ever suggest for a focused specialist, there's just not enough good divinations to fill all those slots every day.
Illusions has a lot of good defensive buffs, some control, the potent Shadow X spells and in general would be a contender for top tier if True seeing didn't switch off 90% of the school

[Maat Mons]

I think there should be two tier lists. One list ranking schools by how good an idea it is to specialize in them. And one list ranking schools by how bad an idea it is to ban them.

Edit: For the houserule of Archivists specializing, if we look just at spells from the Cleric, Druid, Paladin, and Ranger lists, which should be the most readily available, each school makes up the following portion of total number of spells:

Abjuration: 12%
Conjuration: 19%
Divination: 8%
Enchantment: 5%
Evocation: 13%
Illusion: 2%
Necromancy: 10%
Transmutation: 31%

So I guess if you’re going to try to make an Archivist enchanter or illusionist, you’re going to have to go dumpster diving through domains and obscure spell lists.

[RandomPeasant]

Enchantment (a few nice buffs, but mostly just will save or lose, mind affecting spells, foiled by immunity or a simple Protection From [Alignment],

This is exactly what I mean about people blithely dismissing Enchantment. Yes, protection from good stops your mind control. Do you know how many monsters actually have protection from good? Of the roughly 50 at CR 7 (when the Wizard gets charm monster), there is one that has protection from good by default (the young red dragon), and that's only because I went out and checked the sample stat block in Draconomicon. There are about a half-dozen immunities, and another half-dozen creatures (mostly dragons) that could have protection from good or some equivalent. These are not, actually, common abilities. Even if you assume that your DM really will just ignore all the things that aren't immune to Enchantment, the value proposition here is "for one spell per day I can make my DM ignore 75% of the Monster Manual", which is not at all a bad deal.


Necromancy starts off unimpressive, but animate dead is solid minionmancy and eventually it's got some real power houses like Magic Jar, Astral Projections,

Low level Necromancy is behind Conjuration, but honestly outside of alter self it's pretty comparable to Transmutation.


Illusions has a lot of good defensive buffs, some control, the potent Shadow X spells and in general would be a contender for top tier if True seeing didn't switch off 90% of the school

This time I would like you to do the research and figure out what percentage of monsters that actually exist at any particular level have a specific 5th-7th level spell. My intuition is that it is not "most of them" and that having even half of your spells have this particular weakness is actually fine, but perhaps this time I'm wrong.


So I guess if youÂ’re going to try to make an Archivist enchanter or illusionist, youÂ’re going to have to go dumpster diving through domains and obscure spell lists.

Percentages isn't really a great measure, because different schools are different amounts of bloated. Transmutation has a crapton of different effects, but the vast majority of them are fiddly little things you don't really care about. Enchantment, on the other hand, doesn't have a lot of spells, but the Archivist gets the ones you need (that is: the charm and dominate lines).

[Rebel7284]

I think a lot of the disagreement here is what I alluded to, which is scaling. Immunity to mind affecting and at-will true seeing are fairly common at CR20+, which makes those schools scale poorly into the later levels, while Mirror Image/Charm Person are great early on.

[Anthrowhale]

...

That's great explanation of the schools.

You may want to add discussion about Abyssal Specialist as well as it's another option. You only lose only one not-divination school. Initially it looks underwhelming: [evil], [chaotic], [compulsion], [darkness], and [fear] spells. But there are a good number of enchantment spells covered, and there are several techniques for making spells count as [evil] or [chaotic].

Also, w.r.t. offensive divination spells, there is Hunter's Eye if you can manage to get it on list.

[Maat Mons]

Erm, Archivists have access to Dominate Person because of Domination domain and Divine Bard. I said enchantment-focused Archivists would need to search through domains and the spell lists of non-core classes. Dominate Person doesn’t seem to disprove my point.

[Temotei]

I think it's always funny to see people say true seeing makes illusions bad and in the same breath say dispel magic is mandatory. How many monsters have true seeing that can't be dispelled even temporarily to make your illusions function in a pinch?

That said, it's hard to rank schools by themselves. Conjuration starts really strong and stays strong for most of the game, but I wouldn't say its 9th-level spells are even close to Transmutation's options at 9ths. But 9th-level spells are only a small portion of spells that usually come late in gameplay, if at all, so whether that's worth rating differently is kind of up to the game.

And you can say things like that for every school to varying degrees. On top of that, you have what others have talked about--a specialist doesn't have to prepare exclusively from their favored school. That's a big deal.

[RandomPeasant]

I think a lot of the disagreement here is what I alluded to, which is scaling. Immunity to mind affecting and at-will true seeing are fairly common at CR20+, which makes those schools scale poorly into the later levels, while Mirror Image/Charm Person are great early on.

I mean, I would say that "this option might not be as good in Epic level play" is not something that typically ranks very highly in our assessment of options.


Also, w.r.t. offensive divination spells, there is Hunter's Eye if you can manage to get it on list.

I was gesturing to "directly offensive' there. There are a number of divinations that do something in combat (true strike and true casting, for instance). But as far as I'm aware, unluck is the only one you cast on an enemy.


Erm, Archivists have access to Dominate Person because of Domination domain and Divine Bard. I said enchantment-focused Archivists would need to search through domains and the spell lists of non-core classes. Dominate Person doesn’t seem to disprove my point.

But it'd be the same percentage if they weren't. The point is that the argument is bad and the number of spells in a school doesn't matter much. Enchantment is smaller for the Wizard too.


That said, it's hard to rank schools by themselves. Conjuration starts really strong and stays strong for most of the game, but I wouldn't say its 9th-level spells are even close to Transmutation's options at 9ths. But 9th-level spells are only a small portion of spells that usually come late in gameplay, if at all, so whether that's worth rating differently is kind of up to the game.

Conjuration has gate, which is somewhere between the second and fourth best core 9th level spell (the competitors being shapechange, astral projection, and wish). It does fall some when you start adding ice assassin and the like into the mix, but honestly so does shapechange.


And you can say things like that for every school to varying degrees. On top of that, you have what others have talked about--a specialist doesn't have to prepare exclusively from their favored school. That's a big deal.

I think people implicitly assume that a regular specialist has to do a lot more specializing than they actually do. If you are an 8th level specialist Wizard, you have four 4th level spell slots (assuming your INT is somewhere between 18 and 25). If you use those slots to prepare polymorph, evard's black tentacles, enervation, and charm monster, I don't think anyone would be jumping down your throat about your spell selection, and that's a valid Transmuter, Conjurer, Necromancer, or Enchanter. It's not really until you become a Focused Specialist that your specialist school matters, and as such I don't see much value in trying to go beyond a binary yes/no when recommending choices for normal specialization.

[Bavarian itP]

I'm interested to see where this ends up.

Abjuration
2 – Rebel 7284, Loky 1109

Divination
3 – Rebel7284

Conjuration
1 – Rebel 7284, Loky 1109

Enchantment
2 – Loky 1109
3 – Rebel 7284

Average - 2.5

Evocation
1 – Loky 1109
3 – Rebel 7284

Average - 2

lllusion
2 – Rebel 7284, Loky 1109

Necromancy
2 – Rebel 7284
3 – Loky 1109

Average - 2.5

Transmutation
1 – Rebel 7284, Loky 1109

I think you misunderstand Loky's comment. He meant to say how Designers of 3.0 rated the schools, not his own opinion.

[Troacctid]

For me, I would rank enchantment the lowest because I think it has the least variation and the least flexibility. It's almost entirely comprised of mind-affecting spells that force some number of opponents to make a Will save, then afflict them with something debilitating on a failure or do nothing at all to them on a success. (Usually SR: Yes as well.) The only core Sor/Wiz spells that break this mold are the heroism line, which is admittedly great, and all those power word variants, which really just subs an HP threshold for a Will save. Aside from that, the exact effects differ, but the school as a whole is ultimately a two-trick pony, and its main trick is super duper easy to counter. You don't even need immunity; all you really need is a good Will save. And because most other schools have their own save-or-lose effects in various stripes, even if they tend to come later in the game and the end result is not quite as dramatic as taking control of the enemy's actions, enchantment is very skippable, IMO.

I would rank conjuration the highest because even in core, it just has the most diverse and flexible array of effects while also including several of the game's most powerful spells, both in and out of combat, across low, high, and mid levels. It also includes lots of spells that bypass both spell resistance and saving throws and sometimes even antimagic fields, making the school very difficult to counteract. I don't actually think that it's the best school to have as a specialty, but I do feel strongly that it is the worst school to ban.

The best school for a core wizard to have as a specialty is divination and it's really not close at all, even though the school itself doesn't seem like much on its own. The reason for this should be pretty obvious: you have access to a whole extra school of magic. That means in your opportunity cost calculus, you can basically think of the divination school as packaged together with an entire other school's worth of spells you would have otherwise banned. It's like two schools for the price of one. Hard to beat.

[Anthrowhale]

The best school for a core wizard to have as a specialty is divination and it's really not close at all, even though the school itself doesn't seem like much on its own. The reason for this should be pretty obvious: you have access to a whole extra school of magic. That means in your opportunity cost calculus, you can basically think of the divination school as packaged together with an entire other school's worth of spells you would have otherwise banned. It's like two schools for the price of one. Hard to beat.

Abyssal specialist may not beat, but perhaps it ties in this regard. The spontaneous divination ACF may be a tie-breaker here.

[Thunder999]

Divinations's lowered cost is nice, but the benefit is also lower, because Spontaneous Divination exists and because the extra slots are much less potent, divination is a nice school, but it's not got the best combat options.

Plus, you can usually ditch two schools without feeling it.

Now 3 schools lost on focused specialist hurts more, but you really don't want that many divination slots so getting it for just 2 isn't worth it.

[Troacctid]

Abyssal specialist may not beat, but perhaps it ties in this regard. The spontaneous divination ACF may be a tie-breaker here.
Abyssal Specialist is IMO strictly better than Enchanter because all of the good enchantment spells have the compulsion tag, so it's like being an Enchanter but with only one banned school, and also you get a bunch of necromancy and summoning spells too, and you can do some cool combos with Aligned Spellcaster and/or Planar Wizard.


Divinations's lowered cost is nice, but the benefit is also lower, because Spontaneous Divination exists and because the extra slots are much less potent, divination is a nice school, but it's not got the best combat options.

Plus, you can usually ditch two schools without feeling it.

Now 3 schools lost on focused specialist hurts more, but you really don't want that many divination slots so getting it for just 2 isn't worth it.
If you want to maximize the potency of your specialist slots, you should be an Evoker. Because of how bursty evocation is, combined with how well damage effects stack with themselves to inflict additional debilitating conditions on enemies, evocation probably benefits more from having excess spell slots than any other school would.

[RandomPeasant]

For me, I would rank enchantment the lowest because I think it has the least variation and the least flexibility.

So I think you should sort out here whether you mean as a specialist or a Focused Specialist. Because if you mean "as a specialist", this complaint just doesn't matter at all. Preparing one sleep or rebuke or freezing glance or dominate monster to go with your other spells is totally fine. Conversely, if you are talking about Focused Specialists (which is fair, because that is what OP was asking about initially), you are flat wrong about Divination being an acceptable, let alone optimal, choice.


something debilitating on a failure

This is a good example of the other way people gloss over the things that make Enchantment good. Tagging someone with dominate person does not merely inflict "something debilitating" on them, it ~permanently turns them into an ally. That's an upside potential that is wildly higher than any other school.


all those power word variants, which really just subs an HP threshold for a Will save.

As opposed to the deep flexibility of fireball's dealing fire damage rather than lightning bolt's electricity damage.


And because most other schools have their own save-or-lose effects in various stripes, even if they tend to come later in the game and the end result is not quite as dramatic as taking control of the enemy's actions, enchantment is very skippable, IMO.

Any school is skippable if you're looking at it just in terms of combat spells. If you are preparing your loadout of 7th level offensive spells, it is entirely possible to get by without Conjuration's stun ray, Enchantment's final rebuke, Evocation's forcecage, Illusion's greater shadow conjuration, Necromancy's finger of death, or Transmutation's mass flesh to salt. Just as it is possible to justify using any particular one of those spells. What sets Enchantment apart, and what other schools cannot replicate, is access to combat spells that provide an advantage that lasts beyond the scope of a single combat. Yes, charm person or dominate monster are not uniquely better at winning any particular fight than the death spells in Conjuration or Necromancy at those same levels. But to focus on that is to entirely miss the point of what makes those spells unique and powerful.


Abyssal specialist may not beat, but perhaps it ties in this regard. The spontaneous divination ACF may be a tie-breaker here.

I'm not entirely convinced by Abyssal Specialist. It's good, but I think in many games the extra effort required to give it full flexibility may cost more than banning Evocation and Enchantment/Illusion rather than just one. The best specialist schools are Conjuration and Necromancy, and I think in most cases if you can't afford to ban two schools you probably can't afford to ban one.


Divinations's lowered cost is nice, but the benefit is also lower, because Spontaneous Divination exists and because the extra slots are much less potent, divination is a nice school, but it's not got the best combat options.

I think if you are allowed to take Spontaneous Divination it is always wrong to be a Diviner.


Now 3 schools lost on focused specialist hurts more, but you really don't want that many divination slots so getting it for just 2 isn't worth it.

The other issue is that as a Focused Specialist Diviner you are losing general-purpose spells for divination spells, and that means you are stuck trying to figure out how to handle combat encounters with divinations, which is extremely difficult to do. As a 3rd level FS Diviner you are looking at "offensive" options like "you can reroll one roll" or "you get a +1 bonus on one attack" for your 2nd level slots. That's just insultingly bad at a level where people normally get spells like web and glitterdust.


If you want to maximize the potency of your specialist slots, you should be an Evoker. Because of how bursty evocation is, combined with how well damage effects stack with themselves to inflict additional debilitating conditions on enemies, evocation probably benefits more from having excess spell slots than any other school would.

This is like the worst advice I have ever heard. You will never have enough spell slots to make up for how much worse turning spell slots into damage is than other strategies for dealing damage. Just have some allies and make them wail on dudes. Being very modestly proficient as a Conjurer, Enchanter, or Necromancer makes you better at dealing damage than anything but a highly optimized Evoker.

[Anthrowhale]

Yes, charm person or dominate monster are not uniquely better at winning any particular fight than the death spells in Conjuration or Necromancy at those same levels. But to focus on that is to entirely miss the point of what makes those spells unique and powerful.

Note that Mother Cyst is a single feat which gives you earlier stronger effects than Dominate Person (Necrotic Domination) and Dominate Monster (Necrotic Tumor). It's not talked about much since it's not core, but necromancy (or abyssal specialist for that matter) makes both the living and the dead into minions with one feat.


I'm not entirely convinced by Abyssal Specialist. It's good, but I think in many games the extra effort required to give it full flexibility may cost more than banning Evocation and Enchantment/Illusion rather than just one. The best specialist schools are Conjuration and Necromancy, and I think in most cases if you can't afford to ban two schools you probably can't afford to ban one.

Personally, I find Necromancy a bit underwhelming, particularly at low levels.


This is like the worst advice I have ever heard. You will never have enough spell slots to make up for how much worse turning spell slots into damage is than other strategies for dealing damage. Just have some allies and make them wail on dudes. Being very modestly proficient as a Conjurer, Enchanter, or Necromancer makes you better at dealing damage than anything but a highly optimized Evoker.
I've seen making things dead fast through damage be a viable strategy. However, Conjurers seem to do it better than Evokers due to the SR:No Save:No spells. A focused specialist conjurer would have the raw number of spell slots to rival a sorcerer and would benefit from earlier access to spells at each level.

[Troacctid]

So I think you should sort out here whether you mean as a specialist or a Focused Specialist. Because if you mean "as a specialist", this complaint just doesn't matter at all. Preparing one sleep or rebuke or freezing glance or dominate monster to go with your other spells is totally fine. Conversely, if you are talking about Focused Specialists (which is fair, because that is what OP was asking about initially), you are flat wrong about Divination being an acceptable, let alone optimal, choice.
You're right. When I wrote it, I was thinking in terms of schools to ban, not schools to be the specialty. Thanks for pointing that out! The framing matters a lot in this discussion. "Best school to normal-specialize in," "Best school to focus-specialize in," "Best school to UA-specialize in," "Best school to master-specialize in," and "Best school to ban" can and should result in different rankings, IMO.

Enchanter is actually pretty decent for UA-specializing, IMO, since a cohort has so many advantages over a familiar, but I maintain that it is basically strictly worse than Abyssal for focused specialists and non-ACF specialists. Abyssal includes compulsions, and I can't think of any good enchantment spells that aren't compulsions except for charm person, and charm person is outclassed pretty quickly by suggestion a few levels later.


This is a good example of the other way people gloss over the things that make Enchantment good. Tagging someone with dominate person does not merely inflict "something debilitating" on them, it ~permanently turns them into an ally. That's an upside potential that is wildly higher than any other school.
Well, yes, I did mention the upside is more dramatic, and having minions is powerful. But it's also a playstyle that can be logistically annoying in a lot of ways, and the notion of going beyond social nudges and tactical action economy into Actual Slavery is...uh...ethically fraught. Not something I would expect a heroic character (AKA most PCs) to be okay with. Plus, it's not like you can't just give people money if you want hirelings.


As opposed to the deep flexibility of fireball's dealing fire damage rather than lightning bolt's electricity damage.
Yes, actually, in the sense that you can spam it against almost any enemy and have it be relevant.


I'm not entirely convinced by Abyssal Specialist. It's good, but I think in many games the extra effort required to give it full flexibility may cost more than banning Evocation and Enchantment/Illusion rather than just one.
Like I said, it's basically giving you 90% of the enchantment school without any extra effort, so why not pick it (over enchantment)?


I think if you are allowed to take Spontaneous Divination it is always wrong to be a Diviner.
I think if you're allowed to be a Domain Wizard then it's usually wrong to be a Diviner, and I think Focused Diviner is more questionable than Regular Diviner (as you've touched on), but I don't really think Spontaneous Divination particularly matters either way. It's one of the best wizard bonus feats, but it's not like there's a shortage of good wizard bonus feats. If you're a Diviner and you think you have your divination bases covered with your bonus slot(s), then you can take Insightful Divination instead, which still kicks a lot of ass, and isn't really available to non-diviners. (I mean, it technically is, if you jump through some hoops, but let's be honest here.)


This is like the worst advice I have ever heard. You will never have enough spell slots to make up for how much worse turning spell slots into damage is than other strategies for dealing damage.
Sure you will! Direct damage scales really well with metamagic, so an Evoker has really impressive nova potential, but if you have extra spell slots, you can be casting those big spells multiple times per turn, for multiple turns per combat, for multiple combats per day. An evocation blaster and a conjuration blaster are really just two sides of the same coin—the Evoker has spectacular kabooms and a few good control spells, while the Conjurer has a spectacular control spells and a few good kabooms. ("Kabooms" here being a synecdoche for direct damage spells, natch.) And if you move outside of the core spell list, both schools get better at both things. It would basically be a wash if conjuration didn't also have, like, teleports and stuff. But then again, if you spend slots on that, you're not really doing the same job anymore, are you?

To be clear: evocation is not, in my opinion, the best school to specialize in, but it does have the highest delta between specialist and generalist. Blasting is very much a case of quantity having a quality all its own.

[RandomPeasant]

Note that Mother Cyst is a single feat which gives you earlier stronger effects than Dominate Person (Necrotic Domination) and Dominate Monster (Necrotic Tumor). It's not talked about much since it's not core, but necromancy (or abyssal specialist for that matter) makes both the living and the dead into minions with one feat.

Effects that are dependent on getting necrotic cyst off on the target. Cysts are fine for turning captured enemies, but that's much more comparable to planar binding than having a combat spell that does the job.


Personally, I find Necromancy a bit underwhelming, particularly at low levels.

Necromancy struggles a bit at low levels, particularly 1st, where you really want Illusion, Enchantment, or Conjuration. But even by 2nd level you have a reasonable variety of options from straight offense (ghoul touch) to silver bullet (command undead) to defensive buffs (false life). Once you get to 4th level it's pretty much smooth sailing, with multiple offensive options at every level even in Core. I would pick Conjuration over it if I was making a Focused Specialist, but it's close with Transmutation, particularly if your table is unfriendly to shape-changing spells.


I've seen making things dead fast through damage be a viable strategy. However, Conjurers seem to do it better than Evokers due to the SR:No Save:No spells. A focused specialist conjurer would have the raw number of spell slots to rival a sorcerer and would benefit from earlier access to spells at each level.

The problem with dealing damage as a Wizard basically comes down to opportunity cost.

On the one hand, there's all the resources you've invested into damage that didn't go into anything else. Can you Mailman up a pretty big burst with Arcane Thesis and Empower Spell and Maximize Spell and Split Ray and Easy Metamagic and so on? Sure. But you could also take those resources and put them into Heighten Spell and Signature Spell and Shadowcraft Mage. And that gets you a whole wide range of utility, and is no slouch offensively because your Shadow Illusion silent image takes a standard action to cast and is allowed to emulate "major creation for a whole bunch of lava right on top of that guy".

On the other hand, there are many classes that are perfectly capable of dealing large amounts of damage, and most of them do so without spending limited resources like a Wizard does. Whether that's a low-op Fighter, a mid-op Warblade, or a high-op CoDZilla, a martial can deal damage comparable to your blasting and can do it every round. And unlike you, those characters (generally, it's obviously dampened for CoDZilla) don't have access to the kinds of utility effects or non-damaging combat effects you do as a Wizard. Of course, it's not just a question of "you v other characters". You can, through the expedient of any number of well-known spells, provide your own DPSers that don't cost you any spell slots during the adventuring day.

On the gripping hand, there's also the consideration that blasting optimization (particularly Arcane Thesis) tends to encourage you to prepare the same, or very similar, spells over and over. This abandons your core strength as a Wizard, which is that you get to prepare a whole bunch of different spells. As a 7th level Conjurer you could prepare black tenacles (BFC), blast of flame (AoE damage), dimension door (operational mobility), orb of fire (blasting, with a rider), summon monster IV (utility, modest combat value), or wall of salt (free money). And that's just highlights, there's a whole long tail of stuff that's probably not worth mentioning but might come up. The value of being a Wizard is in having a deep, deep bag of tricks, not in having one trick you do really well.

And, yes, none of that is to say it is impossible to build a Wizard that blasts to a competent degree. But it's fundamentally the wrong way to approach being a Wizard.


I can't think of any good enchantment spells that aren't compulsions except for charm person, and charm person is outclassed pretty quickly by suggestion a few levels later.

charm monster is quite strong, as is mass charm monster. The charm spells are really an important part of your toolkit as an Enchanter, because they come online much earlier than dominate for a given type. frozen gaze is probably the single best Enchantment, and it's not a Compulsion either.


But it's also a playstyle that can be logistically annoying in a lot of ways, and the notion of going beyond social nudges and tactical action economy into Actual Slavery is...uh...ethically fraught.

In discussions of optimization, "annoying" is really much less important than "powerful". As far as the ethics of mind control, that strikes me as a fairly complicated question. Is it unethical to control the mind of something Evil? The Malconvoker certainly wouldn't say so. And, of course, with charm you can use Diplomacy to get them the rest of the way to ally, and that seems quite ethical to me. "I used magic to calm their hate, and they saw the reason of my words" is totally the sort of thing a hero does.


Yes, actually, in the sense that you can spam it against almost any enemy and have it be relevant.

Why would you need to spam it? Being a specialist only asks that you prepare one spell from the school. Even if you're talking about a Focused Specialist, you are better off picking a school like Conjuration or Necromancy that allows you to prepare spells that act on multiple axes (or Transmutation, which has spells that are individually flexible). If you want to spam a bunch of spells that are alike, play a fixed-list caster. The benefit of being a Wizard is precisely that you don't have to do that.


I don't really think Spontaneous Divination particularly matters either way.

Spontaneous Divination is the single best thing a Wizard can do with their 5th level bonus feat, and it's not particularly close. As such, unless you are planning to bail out before you hit 5th level, or have some Diviner-related thing that's really important to you (and, honestly, if you're going that route consider that none of them are really as compelling as Abrupt Jaunt, so really it all washes out), the difference between "specialized in Divination" and "specialized in some other school" collapses to "one less banned school" versus "can use your bonus spell slots for spells that matter in combat". In the majority of games, the latter is just better. There certainly are some situations where you really do need access to every spell, but in those situations should just just be an Elven Generalist (or a Gnome Domain Wizard who does Shadowcraft Mage + Incantatrix to ban Evocation but-not-really).


Direct damage scales really well with metamagic

Direct damage scales really well with metamagic stacking and cost reduction. With regular metamagic it is decidedly less impressive. Adjusted for spell slots, a 10th level Wizard does about 20% more damage throwing around Empowered fireballs than regular fireballs. Worthless? Certainly not. But rather middling when you compare it to the difference between major image and dominate person or ray of exhaustion and wrack. Now, it's true that if you spend your resources pumping up your metamagic, you can nova pretty hard. But that leaves you a one-trick pony without the resources to diversify, and your one trick is "deal a lot of damage", a task which the party Fighter is perfectly capable of doing if called upon to do so.


for multiple turns per combat, for multiple combats per day

Let's not kid ourselves here. Each jump of specialization gets you one additional spell per level. You're not exactly turning yourself into a limitless font of arcane power. Without significant investment in metamagic, you're left dealing with the reality that successfully tagging someone with an Evocation leaves them "kinda burned" while doing the same with the other schools takes them out of the fight entirely. Going back to those CR 7 monsters I used when discussing charm monster, there is not one that goes down to a single orb of fire. There are more with enough HP to tank your entire complement of 4th level spells worth of orbs of fire (even as a Focused Specialist) that there are who are immune to mind-effecting spells or possessed of the capacity to know protection from good put together. If you find yourself throwing out two or three spells every combat to make up for how inefficient a source of damage blasting is, you will almost immediately find yourself falling behind the Wizard who prepared the death spells that are actually good and left the people with class features like Sneak Attack or Maneuvers to do damage because they're actually good at it.


To be clear: evocation is not, in my opinion, the best school to specialize in, but it does have the highest delta between specialist and generalist. Blasting is very much a case of quantity having a quality all its own.

Honestly even this is exactly backwards. There are plenty of cases where you can find a use for fireball. It has a really long range, and it does a reasonable amount of damage when graded against "random stuff". You will periodically find yourself in a situation where "blow up those dudes over there without them registering us as a threat" is useful, and fireball is great for that. But trying to make your career on fireballs is just less efficient than dropping haste on whatever you've got that passes for a martial and your party's biggest minions.

[liquidformat]

What sets Enchantment apart, and what other schools cannot replicate, is access to combat spells that provide an advantage that lasts beyond the scope of a single combat. Yes, charm person or dominate monster are not uniquely better at winning any particular fight than the death spells in Conjuration or Necromancy at those same levels. But to focus on that is to entirely miss the point of what makes those spells unique and powerful.
Planar Ally/Binding/Gate, Mother Cyst, and Create Undead/greater undead seem quite comparable to dominate. Sure those can't normally be used in the heat of battle but they are valid and viable options to increase your fighting potential over multiple fights.

[Troacctid]

Focused evokers are better damage-dealers than non-casters of the same optimization level are. They can keep pace in DPR while also packing greater overall utility. Yes, the lack of spontaneous casting hurts, and your early game is rough, but between the extra slots from specialization and the quicker spell progression, you shouldn't have any trouble keeping pace with a sorcerer, and you certainly shouldn't have trouble keeping pace with a fighter, ranger, or paladin who has to invest a much larger portion of their wealth and feat economy just to achieve similar damage output while standing adjacent to the enemy, moving no more than 5 feet per round, and being limited to a single target at a time, without the ability to audible to a wall of force when the need for it arises.

Dealing damage is a good combat strategy, which is why, for most classes, it's considered a strong optimization path. And wizards are good at it. They're good at pretty much everything. That's like the whole reason they're considered a top-tier class. One of the things I've learned by writing handbooks is that any class has the ability to choose between optimizing for damage and optimizing for utility, and wizard is no different in that regard. Yes, you need to spend build resources on it. You would also have to spend build resources if you wanted to have more spells in your utility belt, or a higher save DC for your enchantments, or augmentations to make your summons useful, or crafting feats to stretch your WBL, etc. Do you want damage or utility? Both are valid choices, but you have to choose.

[RandomPeasant]

Planar Ally/Binding/Gate, Mother Cyst, and Create Undead/greater undead seem quite comparable to dominate. Sure those can't normally be used in the heat of battle but they are valid and viable options to increase your fighting potential over multiple fights.

There are certainly other minionmancy spells. It is specifically the dual-use nature of Enchantment that is unique. You can think that's important or not, but to dismiss "now they are on your side" as "just a condition you inflict on a save" is just missing the point.


Focused evokers are better damage-dealers than non-casters of the same optimization level are.

No they aren't. Your basic TWF Rogue scales faster than basic blasting spells. If you pump in all the feats you need to hit the big damage numbers, you are directly competing with the Ubercharger who can deal comparable amounts of damage every round forever.


a fighter, ranger, or paladin who has to invest a much larger portion of their wealth and feat economy

That's the wrong way to look at it. The question isn't the absolute cost (if it were, we'd only be talking about CoDZillas as an alternative, or at least Warblades, and you look much worse there), the question is the opportunity cost. What is a Fighter spending their resources on that is a better way of solving problems than damage? If you have a Wizard and a Fighter, you would never in a million years say "the best way to make use of my resources is to have the Wizard focus on dealing damage and make the Fighter deal with utility".


while standing adjacent to the enemy, moving no more than 5 feet per round,

Yes, the Ubercharger, famously a build known for its inability to move large distances. Or the Cleric Archer, a build that absolutely needs to be adjacent to their opponent to work.


and being limited to a single target at a time, without the ability to audible to a wall of force when the need for it arises.

Both of these things are way easier for a Wizard to deal with if they do not specialize as a blaster.


Dealing damage is a good combat strategy, which is why, for most classes, it's considered a strong optimization path.

It's considered a good optimization path for most classes because they can't do anything else. How are you building your BFC Rogue? What SoD effects is your Swashbuckler giving up to do damage? What was the buffbot alternative for a Fighter? The answer, of course, is that you aren't doing any of those things because you can't, not because people have rationally looked at the options and decided that the Barbarian's AoE disables just don't measure up to a Rage-focused DPS build.


They're good at pretty much everything.

So why do you think it's a good idea to spend your resources on the one thing anyone can do?

[Troacctid]

Look, damage is the premier problem-solving method in the game. It works on everyone, it stacks with everything, and it only gets better as more party members pile it on.

And there's nothing wrong with non-casters going for utility instead of damage. I mean, first off, there's skill points. Absolutely nothing wrong with a paladin optimizing for social skills, or a rogue optimizing for stealth. Secondly, there's plenty of "support" strategies that can be great in combat even though they don't directly improve damage, like tripping, grappling, auras, ambush feats, various effects that inflict status conditions on a hit, etc. Totally valid. Thirdly, there are plenty of feats that can provide utility to just about anyone, from Mercantile Background to Arcane Schooling to Greater Dragonmark, and they will always be there to compete for your feat slots. Fourth, magic items should be a major part of your kit, and buying something like a thorn pouch or enveloping pit or even just eyes of the eagle instead of dumping all your gold into the Big Six is just a smart use of wealth. Finding the right balance between Cool Stuff and More Numbers is largely a matter of playstyle and personal taste. Fifth, prestige classes! Champion of Gwynharwyf isn't going to do much for your barbarian's damage, but it's still one of the best barbarian prestige classes in the game, maybe the best, because of the debuffs, defensive bonuses, and spellcasting utility that it offers. You're not going into it just for Smite Evil. There are similar examples for almost all the non-casting classes—your base class can usually lead into a more versatile, utility-centric build if that's what you want.

So yeah, just because the choices between damage and utility might not be baked directly into your basic class features doesn't mean you don't have to make them. And, like, evokers don't really have to give up that much utility to be good at damage! It's super easy for an evoker-with-just-[insert feat here]-and-nothing-else to outdamage your rogue-with-just-TWF-and-nothing-else, because the evoker's attacks are targeting touch or Reflex while the rogue has to roll to hit against armor with medium BAB; the evoker's attacks don't require any special circumstances while the rogue needs to line up a full attack while flanking or denying Dex to AC; and obviously, as soon as you have more than two enemies in a single fight, the comparison basically becomes a joke, because AoE. Meanwhile, as they scale up in level, the rogue's sneak attacks will become increasingly irrelevant as she fails to invest in the magic items she needs to keep up with monsters' defenses, while the wizard's combat capabilities naturally keep getting stronger as she learns higher-level spells.

[Anthrowhale]

W.r.t. Necrotic domination/Necrotic Tumor, the cost of not being able to employ them easily in combat is significantly remediated by being a stronger effect when it applies, and having them available either 2 or 4 full levels earlier.

W.r.t. the wizards-doing-damage debate, there's potentially a different 'right' answer between a party consisting of Rogue/Fighter/Cleric/Wizard and a party consisting of Druid/Wizard/Wizard/Wizard. A wizard using ranged damage spells could complement the Druid+AC frontliners in a fairly useful way and it's hard to argue that you are losing utility at a party level given the other wizards.

I'd still prefer conjuration for damage over evocation though. Evocation has an amazing number of flavors of damage, but Conjuration seems to have enough, ignores SR, and of course has many other uses.

[Troacctid]

W.r.t. Necrotic domination/Necrotic Tumor, the cost of not being able to employ them easily in combat is significantly remediated by being a stronger effect when it applies, and having them available either 2 or 4 full levels earlier.

W.r.t. the wizards-doing-damage debate, there's potentially a different 'right' answer between a party consisting of Rogue/Fighter/Cleric/Wizard and a party consisting of Druid/Wizard/Wizard/Wizard. A wizard using ranged damage spells could complement the Druid+AC frontliners in a fairly useful way and it's hard to argue that you are losing utility at a party level given the other wizards.
Agreed on both points.


I'd still prefer conjuration for damage over evocation though. Evocation has an amazing number of flavors of damage, but Conjuration seems to have enough, ignores SR, and of course has many other uses.
See, in core, it's not really close, because conjuration's damage-dealing options in core are just straight-up poopy. If you add Spell Compendium and other expanded sources, then conjuration gets access to some actual real damage spells and can be a legit contender...but evocation also gets access to some sweet utility spells that can provide things like flight and invisibility, and it upgrades a lot of its basic blasting package with better energy types, bigger damage, and/or bonus status effects, as well as its own SR: No spells like flaywind burst, hailstones, and flame sands.

[Anthrowhale]

See, in core, it's not really close, because conjuration's damage-dealing options in core are just straight-up poopy.

Sure, and I agree about both being upgraded out of core.


flaywind burst

10d6 Refl/2 + Fort or blown back/knocked/checked AoE is decent. Daltim's Fiery Tentacles feels a bit more potent as it has no save and lasts multiple rounds. Both spells are particularly harsh on smaller opponents.


hailstones

4x 5d6 cold damage on a ranged touch at 3rd level is quite potent. It looks like Melf's Unicorn Arrow (5x 1d8+8 on a touch + Bull Rush) does slightly less damage (70 vs. 62.5), perhaps made up by typeless vs. cold and the Bull Rush with a DC 29 strength check.


and flame sands.
There's a nice esoteric one (here (https://web.archive.org/web/20200203094753/http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/wn/20021120a)). 15d6 fire fort/2 for rounds/level as a touch attack or a situational 5' radius AoE. I don't think there's an equivalent from conjuration. Orbs deal 15d6 no save with a rider, so they are at least sometimes better on the first round.

[Troacctid]

10d6 Refl/2 + Fort or blown back/knocked/checked AoE is decent. Daltim's Fiery Tentacles feels a bit more potent as it has no save and lasts multiple rounds. Both spells are particularly harsh on smaller opponents.
The hidden upside is that there's an optional material component (aurial sapphire from CC) to make it a swift action casting for only 215 gp, which is a pretty sweet deal.

[RandomPeasant]

Look, damage is the premier problem-solving method in the game. It works on everyone, it stacks with everything, and it only gets better as more party members pile it on.

It's really impressive how comprehensively wrong that is. Damage is, of course, quite useless at solving many important problems like "how do we get to the next kingdom over" or "who murdered the High Priest" or "what do we do about Krusk being dead". Spells, on the other hand, solve all of those problems handily. The idea that "it only gets better" is just refusing to understand the concept of diminishing returns. A Flask Rogue or Ubercharger is quite capable of killing a level-appropriate enemy in one round's worth of attacks. Throwing on your orb of fire or even your Maximized Empowered orb of fire won't make that enemy any deader.


I mean, first off, there's skill points. Absolutely nothing wrong with a paladin optimizing for social skills, or a rogue optimizing for stealth.

Other than, you know, the existence of charm monster and greater invisibility.


Secondly, there's plenty of "support" strategies that can be great in combat even though they don't directly improve damage, like tripping, grappling, auras, ambush feats, various effects that inflict status conditions on a hit, etc. Totally valid.

I would love for you to show me the Tripstar build that is as close to acid fog as an Ubercharger is to a Mailman.


Thirdly, there are plenty of feats that can provide utility to just about anyone, from Mercantile Background to Arcane Schooling to Greater Dragonmark, and they will always be there to compete for your feat slots.

So the Wizard should invest their feat slots in not developing utility magic because other people can invest their feat slots in being a much worse version of that Wizard, if we happen to be playing in a specific setting?


Fourth, magic items should be a major part of your kit, and buying something like a thorn pouch or enveloping pit or even just eyes of the eagle instead of dumping all your gold into the Big Six is just a smart use of wealth.

I agree that it is often useful to buy utility items. You know what frees up a lot of money to buy utility items? Having a spellcaster who dedicates their spell slots to buffs that replace those items instead of fireballs.


spellcasting utility

I would love for you to explain why utility is suddenly better than damage when that utility is blood of the martyr or sword of conscience, but not when it is teleport and greater planar binding. It's just such a fascinatingly un-square circle.


It's super easy for an evoker-with-just-[insert feat here]-and-nothing-else to outdamage your rogue-with-just-TWF-and-nothing-else

A 10th level Wizard casting an Empowered fireball does an average of 52.5 damage with their action (and, no, it isn't unfair to assume you're only hitting a single target, the core single-target options don't have faster scaling). A 10th level Rogue chucking does the exact same amount of bonus damage from Sneak Attack, and they get to do that every round they qualify (it is not, in fact, very hard to qualify every round, nor is it any harder to ignore immunities than it is to get the orb of acid you will inevitably complain I am not calcing with).


because the evoker's attacks are targeting touch or Reflex while the rogue has to roll to hit against armor with medium BAB;

Does he now? (https://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Halfling_Hurler_(3.5e_Optimized_Character_Build))


obviously, as soon as you have more than two enemies in a single fight, the comparison basically becomes a joke, because AoE.

And it becomes equally a joke in the Rogue's favor when you have a lot of encounters. The Evoker's staying power is really nothing to brag about. You'll burn through half your slots chucking out Empowered fireballs to kill a party of Trolls, and they're not even well-optimized to bleed you for slots.


while the wizard's combat capabilities naturally keep getting stronger as she learns higher-level spells.

Or they would if she was learning from a school that defined "higher level" as something other than "different cap, same scaling". greater shout deals proportionately less damage than fireball did, because enemy HP scales faster than linearly. The Rogue scaling on attacks and Sneak Attack dice actually stands a chance of keeping up with that. The Evoker getting a d6 per level? Rather less so.


W.r.t. the wizards-doing-damage debate, there's potentially a different 'right' answer between a party consisting of Rogue/Fighter/Cleric/Wizard and a party consisting of Druid/Wizard/Wizard/Wizard. A wizard using ranged damage spells could complement the Druid+AC frontliners in a fairly useful way and it's hard to argue that you are losing utility at a party level given the other wizards.

I think as you add more casters the argument for direct damage gets even less compelling, because more casters means more minions, and that makes buffs (or, if you've optimized cooperatively, skeleton-based combined arms) far more effective. If you're tagging a healer Cleric, a dagger Rogue, and a Fighter with haste, you might actually be able to get fireball to deal more damage sometimes. If you're hitting your planar binding buddy, the Druid, the Druid's Animal Companion, the Necromancer's biggest skeletons, and the Enchanter's Hill Giants, fireball has a way harder time keeping up.

[Anthrowhale]

The hidden upside is that there's an optional material component (aurial sapphire from CC) to make it a swift action casting for only 215 gp, which is a pretty sweet deal.

Nice. It looks like the closest conjuration equivalents are Haboob (level 3, 5d4 Refl/2 or 5d4 for min/level in AoE) and Mudslide (level 6, 8d6+Burial Refl 3d6 AoE) as damaging easily quickened AoEs with some control effects. It's less initial damage although perhaps other effects are more persistent.

[Troacctid]

Other than, you know, the existence of charm monster and greater invisibility.

I would love for you to show me the Tripstar build that is as close to acid fog as an Ubercharger is to a Mailman.

So the Wizard should invest their feat slots in not developing utility magic because other people can invest their feat slots in being a much worse version of that Wizard, if we happen to be playing in a specific setting?

I would love for you to explain why utility is suddenly better than damage when that utility is blood of the martyr or sword of conscience, but not when it is teleport and greater planar binding. It's just such a fascinatingly un-square circle.

I agree that it is often useful to buy utility items. You know what frees up a lot of money to buy utility items? Having a spellcaster who dedicates their spell slots to buffs that replace those items instead of fireballs.
Hmm. I feel you must have misunderstood the point I was trying to make. I don't actually think that building for utility is inherently better or worse than building for damage output. I just think they're both valid optimization strategies.


A 10th level Wizard casting an Empowered fireball does an average of 52.5 damage with their action (and, no, it isn't unfair to assume you're only hitting a single target, the core single-target options don't have faster scaling). A 10th level Rogue chucking does the exact same amount of bonus damage from Sneak Attack, and they get to do that every round they qualify (it is not, in fact, very hard to qualify every round, nor is it any harder to ignore immunities than it is to get the orb of acid you will inevitably complain I am not calcing with).

Does he now? (https://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Halfling_Hurler_(3.5e_Optimized_Character_Build))

And it becomes equally a joke in the Rogue's favor when you have a lot of encounters. The Evoker's staying power is really nothing to brag about. You'll burn through half your slots chucking out Empowered fireballs to kill a party of Trolls, and they're not even well-optimized to bleed you for slots.
That math sounds pretty questionable to me if you're not adjusting for expected accuracy or average enemies per encounter. And that build sure looks like it spent a lot more than a single feat and nothing else—I see four feats and about 40k gp's worth of magic items over there (assuming Weapon Finesse is meant to be Quick Draw rather than an irrelevant melee feat, and that the haste item called for would be boots of speed), plus consumables expended on every attack. Is this really the best benchmark you've got? I'm happy to concede that a non-core rogue who spends four feat slots and 40k+ gold optimizing ranged sneak attacks will probably outdamage a core-only wizard who spends zero feat slots (Empower Spell is a wizard bonus feat) and zero gold optimizing single-target lightning bolts...most of the time...but honestly it feels a little embarrassing for the rogue that the contest still managed to be so close.


Or they would if she was learning from a school that defined "higher level" as something other than "different cap, same scaling". greater shout deals proportionately less damage than fireball did, because enemy HP scales faster than linearly. The Rogue scaling on attacks and Sneak Attack dice actually stands a chance of keeping up with that. The Evoker getting a d6 per level? Rather less so.
Surely you haven't forgotten that even a focused evoker has access to other spells besides fireball variants? Even discounting evocation's other, more varied spell effects, you still only have to ban three schools, not seven.

[Anthrowhale]

It's not clear to me that forcing wizards to do utility is fun for everyone who might want to play. I expect many people enjoy a bit of kaboom, so if someone wants to play an 'archer' role and happens to do it with a wizard that's ok. Maybe they should emphasize a bit with other players that they aren't going to play a typical utility wizard just to help set expectations about roles.

[liquidformat]

It's not clear to me that forcing wizards to do utility is fun for everyone who might want to play. I expect many people enjoy a bit of kaboom, so if someone wants to play an 'archer' role and happens to do it with a wizard that's ok. Maybe they should emphasize a bit with other players that they aren't going to play a typical utility wizard just to help set expectations about roles.

Yeah I had a lot of fun going Evoker/Mystic Ranger/Arcane Archer archer build with SotAO. Granted It would have been more optimized by going Conjurer (Abrupt Jaunt)/Mystic Ranger/Arcane Archer and keep Evocation as one my schools to choose from but still a lot of fun.