What to use against high touch AC enemies?

[Frosty]

Assuming that I've banned Enchantment, Necromancy, and Evocation, if I'm a metamagic-heavy blaster and I run into things with high touch AC, what should I do? Waste actions for True Strike or go for area spells with reflex saves instead? Let allies take care of it?

[Azerian Kelimon]

Use those no save, no damage spells you were saving for this instance. I choose you SolidFogchu!

[Frosty]

Solid Fog doesn't kill the opponent though, although it does hamper it a lot.

[Azerian Kelimon]

That's where you summon a monster that can cast magic missile or something like that (Hellooooooooo, Avorals!), and let them do the dirty job. Remeber this: While specializing is nice, you must always have something that will work anytime, anyway, no matter what. Solid Fog is one of those spells, hence I list it here.

[dman11235]

Don't have a low attack modifier.

Also, grabbing True Strike isn't a bad idea, since doing half as much damage is better than doing no damage, which is what you'll be doing if you don't use TS and if you use AoE reflex saves. Typically, high touch AC characters also have evasion.

And also still, no touch attack spells like the Phantasmal line are really good in this instance, or AoE non-reflex saves. You could also find ways to lower their AC, with debuffs. And buffs are also a good alternative. Find a back up style, and go with it.

[Reltzik]

Also an option, go for debuff spells that ruin their touch AC. Odds are that if they've got a high touch AC, they've got good dex and thus a high ref save. To name a few low-level options, foes like these are the perfect target for hold person, Blindness, or Color Spray. Each of these spells can ruin a low-level opponent's touch AC and render them completely helpless, without giving them a doomed-to-pass reflex save. Scale up as appropriate. Magic Missile might always hit, but it only has an instantaneous effect. A save-or-suck is a gift which keep on giving. (Just don't give them the receipt, or they'll try to return it.)

Edit: Oops, just saw banned necro, ench and evoc. So Blindness and Hold Person are out. out. Also consider at low level Summon Swarm and Glitterdust (for the blindness).

[Person_Man]

Go Invisible and them Summon a lot. Invisibility is only dispelled if you attack (or if someone else dispels it). Every round your enemy will be fighting an additional 1d4+1 additional creatures. Your enemy will quickly be boxed in and spammed to death.

[Frosty]

isn't Magic Missile Evocation? (I forgot for the moment)

Summoning is indeed an option...but I'll have to have prepared summoning spells. Bah. I wish I can spontaneously cast summong monster :p

Since I banned 3 schools mentioned in the OP, at high levels, what are some good save or sucks that target Will save? And what are good Fort save save or sucks? I think we may be starting at level 13.

[Azerian Kelimon]

Good will save or sucks: Easy. Slow.

Fort: Fingah o' Death fo ya!

Also, consider getting Otiluke's telekinetic sphere, which is goddanged useful.

[Kioran]

isn't Magic Missile Evocation? (I forgot for the moment)

Summoning is indeed an option...but I'll have to have prepared summoning spells. Bah. I wish I can spontaneously cast summong monster :p

Since I banned 3 schools mentioned in the OP, at high levels, what are some good save or sucks that target Will save? And what are good Fort save save or sucks? I think we may be starting at level 13.

Ooh, the cruel rewards of twinkage gone bad....unfortunately not bad enough, since these are useful core spells:

Baleful Polymorph (cheese?)
Cloudkill (Con Damage in the least - effective)
Shadow Evocation (obviously)
Flesh to Stone
Maze (for dumb monsters like animals)
Shapechange (and clobber it yourself. Cheese.)

[Frosty]

Good will save or sucks: Easy. Slow.

Fort: Fingah o' Death fo ya!

Also, consider getting Otiluke's telekinetic sphere, which is goddanged useful.

I like Finger of Death. But is it also touch attack?

Otiluke's is great...but it's evocation.

Slow is terrific.

[Azerian Kelimon]

Hmm... can you use Greater teleport to get someone to a Volcano? Pity it's touch, but that would be an excellent way of PWNing someone. Power Word Blind is an excellent no save, no touch spell, BTW, and waves of exhaustion and reverse gravity can be truly devastating.

[dman11235]

I forgot about the invisibility line. If they have high touch ACs, it's usually coupled with a low FF AC. At least a low FF touch AC. Usually. If you run into one of my monks you're screwed. And superior invis is greater invis but 10 min/ level and only true seeing can trump it (no invis purge or see invis! Or even blindsight.). Phantasmal Assailants (CMage) is an awesome spell. It's like any other phantasmal spell, but massive dex and wis damage on a failed fort save. It's fort half for the ability damage (8 points each!).

EDIT: Waves of Exhaustion is an evil, evil spell. No save you're exhausted. Yeah.

[Telonius]

If the enemy is humanoid, Enlarge Person (transmutation) will work on it. -2 Dex and -1 size penalty to AC, for a net of -2 AC.

[JWhitehead]

Balefull Polymorph maybe?
and while I remember, theres an evocation spell i love, I believe its PHB2 off the top of my head, 9th level fort save or die a la finger of death (secondary damage the same) but when they die their body explodes in a 20d6 fireball which acts as destruction on their ashes too. Very flashy :smallbiggrin:

failing that stick with bogging them down and summoning junk to hit them

failing that flee:smalltongue:

so sorry, I forgot you had banned evocation too
Did you perchance go focused specialist conjuration?

balefull polymorph and running still work though what else is transmutation for? :smalltongue:

[Frosty]

Power Words are all Enchantments I believe? Waves of Exh is Necromancy. Otherwise, good suggestion about picking up Superior Invis once I get hit the correct level.

Enlarge person...is ok, but it's also Touch.

[Azerian Kelimon]

Prismatic spray kills 'em good, of course. Disintegrate, munchkined for max damage = good, more or less a save or die.

[Iku Rex]

Enlarge person is Close range, but come on - that's just silly. No point in giving the enemy extra size, reach and strength.

Blink or greater invisibility should lower their AC more than enough.

[Frosty]

Disintegrate isn't Evoc? Wow. What school is it? Prismatic Spray is Illusion so that'll work...PHB spell?

[Nermy]

You can use Greater Shadow Evocation to cast Radiant Assault (15d6, will halves, plus possibility of stunning) from Spell Compendium. Unfortunately this allows them a will save for 60% damage AND a will save for half damage as per Radiant Assault.

If your opponents have low will saves this shouldn't matter too much though.

edit - p.s. Disintegrate requires a ranged touch attack.

[Azerian Kelimon]

Disintegrate is Tranmutation, I believe.

[Ponce]

Drop a Blood Star (Conj, SpC) first, targetting your opponent. Then follow up with a spell that has multiple instances of small amounts of damage in rapid succession. Usually Melf's is good and Magic Missile is even better. Every time they take damage, Blood Star forces a fort check or the target takes 1 con damage. The con damage then piles up, causing them to fail the save more often. With the right combo, you could knock someone's con straight to zero relatively easily. The combo always seemed really good to me, so there might be something I'm missing. Melf's and MM are infeasible given your situation, and I'm not sure what spell to replace them with.

[Azerian Kelimon]

Couldn't you use telekinesis?

[Ponce]

Couldn't you use telekinesis?

That could work. Quite well actually. Hopefully the abundance of attacks will let you overcome their AC a sufficient number of times. I guess you could also use Shadow Evocation for the magic missile, since the will save won't matter.

[Talya]

Disintegrate isn't Evoc?

Immaterial. Disintegrate requires a touch attack.

Transmutations are mostly Fort-save-or-lose.
Illusions will work on the will saves.

You're kinda stuck for reflex save spells, and you probably don't want to use them anyway.

[DrizztFan24]

I've banned Enchantment, Necromancy, and Evocation, I'm a metamagic-heavy blaster

Am I the only one who caught this?

What about something like phantasmal killers? they require will saves, and fighter types usually aren't "up to snuff" in that department if i recall correctly.

[Frosty]

Is Blood Star a high level spell?

Burning Blood would've been perfect, but I banned Necromancy.

Oh yeah, what flaws, if you could take 2, which you recommend for a wizard? Vulnerable for -1 AC probably. Then maybe the one that gives you -3 Ref saves?

[Azerian Kelimon]

Nah. Take murky eyed, which only makes blindfighting harder, and is pretty much not a penalty.

[Frosty]

Am I the only one who caught this?

What about something like phantasmal killers? they require will saves, and fighter types usually aren't "up to snuff" in that department if i recall correctly.

But Fighters do have high Fort saves, and Phantasmal killers allow both. the question is what kinda saves will the enemy have if they already possess good touch AC. What monsters have good touch AC? Nymphs I think but we probably won't be fighting them. Enemy Monks or swordsages definitely.

[Frosty]

Nah. Take murky eyed, which only makes blindfighting harder, and is pretty much not a penalty.

But if they have Blur of Displacement and I'm trying to hit them with a ranged touch attack, that means I'll have a high chance of missing, since I roll miss chance twice right?

[Chronicled]

Did I see that someone wanted spontaneous summons? Here you go! http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/specialistWizardVariants.htm#conjurerVariants

Probably won't be what you're looking for, but the more you know...

[Chronos]

What monsters have good touch AC?Will-o-wisps, but those present an entirely different set of difficulties for casters. Air subtype creatures in general tend to have high dex.


Solid Fog doesn't kill the opponent though, although it does hamper it a lot.Which is, of course, what Acid Fog is for. And you can also combine either Solid or Acid Fog with other lingering effects that your opponent won't be able to easily escape from, like Cloudkill, Stinking Cloud, and at higher levels Incendiary Fog (all Conjuration). If you want to make it even harder to get out of, you can throw down a Web, too: Sure, it's a Reflex save, and high touch AC usually means good Ref saves, too, but even if they save, it's still very hard to move when Webbed.

Sometimes it seems like there are only two schools of magic, Conjuration and Everything Else. And Conjuration is the larger of the two.

[Frosty]

Heh. Makes one wonder why Varsuuvius banned Conjuration.

[Chronicled]

Besides, you don't have to singlehandedly kill the enemy. You could slow them, and haste your party, then stand by and laugh as your force-multiplied party tears the enemies apart. Or have a wand of Benign Transposition and move your party around so that they're able to full attack each turn (against your enemies' single attacks).

[Frosty]

*gasp* You mean in Incantator can't do it all? :smallwink:

Just kidding. Of course I'll let my coho...I mean teammates handle some of it too.

[Quellian-dyrae]

What about good ol' Black Tentacles? There's a pretty reasonable chance that creatures with high touch ACs will have sub-par Strength and probably be medium size or smaller.

And once they're grappled, they lose Dex to AC.

[Chronicled]

*gasp* You mean in Incantator can't do it all? :smallwink:

Just kidding. Of course I'll let my coho...I mean teammates handle some of it too.

If you name your wizard Incantator, I will laugh ever so hard.

[Frosty]

Hah. Better than Evoker McBlasty I guess :smalltongue:

[Chronos]

What about good ol' Black Tentacles? There's a pretty reasonable chance that creatures with high touch ACs will have sub-par Strength and probably be medium size or smaller.On the other hand, they may well have good Escape Artist checks.

And of course, by level 13, Freedom of Movement and incorporeal enemies will not be all that uncommon, which would also severely limit Solid Fog and Web.

[Chronicled]

Hah. Better than Conjurer McBlasty I guess :smalltongue:

Fixed that for you :smallwink:. If I saw a kid named Evoker McBlasty on the playground at wizard school, I'd have to beat him up on general principles. Conjurer [any last name, really] is the one that you give your lunch money to, as insurance for the future. Even if he doesn't ask for it.

[Frosty]

You know, if I take Reach spell, I can turn a normal Touch range spell into a ranged spell. What cool Touch range spells would work well?

[leperkhaun]

Get a 1,2,3 a day true strike item.

[Frosty]

Actually not needed. Sure Strike is a 2nd level divination spell (which i can spontaneously cast) with a casting time of a swift action. It adds +1 attack bonus for every 3 Caster level.

[Ponce]

Is Blood Star a high level spell?
Blood Star is 4th level.

[Frosty]

Meh. Probably still a bit overkill. I mean, few things can survive twinned energy admixtured empowered Orbs anyways :smallbiggrin: