Wizard Help! (Note: Will make optimizers cry)

[VirOath]

We have a 15th level campaign building up, and a friend of mine is going to be playing a Wizard. Specialist. Evoker, with the Master Specialist PrC... A No Save Ray Charles build.

So, I've already pointed to Elemental Substitution, Spilt Ray, Twin Spell, and some other metamagic feats to help, as well as getting the most use out of the fact that he won't be allowing Saves for his spells.

Can anyone provide any other suggestions, or spells to use? And he has banned Illusion, Enchantment, and Conjuration.

And yes, he does want to keep it this way, it fits the fluff for his character, I know it's a lacking choice compared to what he can be.

Spells, feats, combos are all welcome. No PrCs please.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

There's ways to boost the damage from Evocation. Generally, you want Arcane Thesis(some spell with no doce/level limit), Energy Substitution(either Fire or Ice, not the element of your thesis), Searing Spell or the frost equivalent(whichever you have Sub for), Energy Admixture, Empower Spell, Quicken Spell, and the various traits to boost your CL of that one spell. If you're going pure metamagic, you'll also want Easy Metamagic and a bunch of +0 metamagics. The real question is how many feats does he have availible, and what other spells he wants.

Does he really need to be Focused Specialist? At the least, see if he can switch to banning Enchant, Necro, and Abjuration. Conj has the best spell list in the game, and Illusion is the only thing that will keep him alive against some enemies.

[BobVosh]

Does he really need to be Focused Specialist? At the least, see if he can switch to banning Enchant, Necro, and Abjuration. Conj has the best spell list in the game, and Illusion is the only thing that will keep him alive against some enemies.

And yes, he does want to keep it this way, it fits the fluff for his character, I know it's a lacking choice compared to what he can be.

Sounds pretty much so.

Well. Arcane thesis, split ray, twin spell, easy metamagic, quicken, empower, maximize and any suddens for such as well.

Basically thats all I can suggest as you don't want PrCs/school ban suggestions.

A blaster mage without the orb spells. How quaint.

[lsfreak]

I'd second reconsidering banned Conj, at the least. If he's afraid it doesn't fit in, point out the damaging Conj spells - Walls of Fire/Magma, Orb spells, summoning elementals, etc.

Other than that, Arcane Thesis with lots of metamagic. Metamagic School Focus (evocation) and Residual Metamagic from Complete Mage as well, and possibly one of the damaging reserve feats for when it's not worth using a spell slot.

Grab eternal wands or runestaves to expand his spell list a bit, they'd at least allow things like Mirror Image if he really needs it. And they can just me more damage spells; eternal wands with Residual Metamagic are no long utter suck for damage/saves.

[VirOath]

Hrm, good suggestions. It's because his character concept is based off of Richard (LFGcomic), I tried to push him away from banning Conjuration (But for some stupid reason, CM gives it as a commonly given up school by Evokers... Silly Wizards...), and due to it being an evil campaign, it offers more from Necromancy.

But since I'll be playing a Warlock build, and we will have an evil cleric NPC (Which honestly has me a bit worried, I'm looking at forking out the coin for an Eternal Wand of Heal...) I don't think Abjuration would be a big loss for the group.

Just one question, I've been looking but I can't find Easy Metamagic...

[Yuki Akuma]

I'd second reconsidering banned Conj, at the least. If he's afraid it doesn't fit in, point out the damaging Conj spells - Walls of Fire/Magma, Orb spells, summoning elementals, etc.

Other than that, Arcane Thesis with lots of metamagic. Metamagic School Focus (evocation) and Residual Metamagic from Complete Mage as well, and possibly one of the damaging reserve feats for when it's not worth using a spell slot.

Grab eternal wands or runestaves to expand his spell list a bit, they'd at least allow things like Mirror Image if he really needs it. And they can just me more damage spells; eternal wands with Residual Metamagic are no long utter suck for damage/saves.

Specialist wizards can't use wands, staves or scrolls of spells from their barred school. Those spells aren't on their spell list at all.

[ZeroNumerous]

Specialist wizards can't use wands, staves or scrolls of spells from their barred school. Those spells aren't on their spell list at all.

Eternal wands don't care about that. They specify arcane spell casting ability. (Meaning a wizard can use an eternal wand of (bardic) cure light wounds.

EDIT: Too bad he's not a sorcerer. The Wingblast spell lacks a level cap, but it's a Sorcerer only spell.

[Belial_the_Leveler]

Scorching Ray: at 12d6 damage at lvl 2, it is the best spell for metamagic enhancement.
Fleshiver: 5th level necro, save or suck. If you do save, you still suck.
Ray of Light: 6th level evoc, no save, only suck (blindness)
Amber Sarcophagus: 7th level trans, no save, only suck (stasis for days)

[Keld Denar]

Possibly the best blasty Evocation for a wizard is the 7th level Radiant Assault from Spell Compendium. Its just like Fireball in most dimensions except better. The damage cap is raised to 15d6, the save is WILL based, meaning anyone with evasion can suck it (mettle is pretty uncommon), its FREAKIN LIGHT DAMAGE which is pretty much unresistable, and a failed save causes your foes to be STUNNED for 1d6+1 rounds. Stunned is possibly the 2nd worst status effect in the game, just behind Paralyzed as "you are boned, and there is nothing you can do about it".

The thing I find funniest about it, is that a LIGHT spell is one of the best save/suck spells that a Shadowcraft Mage can use with Shadow Illusion. Shadow light spell...ironic!

[Belial_the_Leveler]

Except that Light spells can never be replicated by shadow evocation or similar.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

Except that Light spells can never be replicated by shadow evocation or similar.

There's no mention of that in the spell description.

[The Glyphstone]

Indeed - you're confusing [Shadow] spells with the Shadow Weave Magic feat.

As for the OP....if he wants a Rayzard, try again to get him to unban Conjuration - the Orb of X spells are technically rays (ranged touch attacks) and are some of the best of such available in the game. You don't have to be a Cindy to be an optimized blaster wizard, but depriving yourself of easy no-save, no-SR ranged touches is unnecessary.

[Keld Denar]

As for the OP....if he wants a Rayzard, try again to get him to unban Conjuration - the Orb of X spells are technically rays (ranged touch attacks) and are some of the best of such available in the game. You don't have to be a Cindy to be an optimized blaster wizard, but depriving yourself of easy no-save, no-SR ranged touches is unnecessary.

Well, not quite. Rays mention "Ray" in the effect line. Orbs are not Rays. Rays are a specific subset of ranged touch attacks. Most of the time, this doesn't matter...unless you are applying Split Ray metamagic. You can NOT Split Ray an Orb, because technically, its not a Ray. If you want to double up, you need to Twin it, which is 2 levels more expensive. Split Ray is so cheap because it only applies to a small set of spells.

Also note that contrary to popular belief, Split Ray does not double the number of rays you get, but rather increases by 1. That has very little impact 9/10 times or more, but for Scorching Ray, it does matter. Compare a Split Ray Scorching Ray (4 rays, 4 dice each for 16d6) with an Empowered Scorching Ray (3 rays, 6 dice each for 18d6) and you actually lose about 7 damage per cast. For nearly all other rays (except maybe Enfeeblement, since it doesn't stack with itself), Split Ray is better than Empower.

[The Glyphstone]

Well, not quite. Rays mention "Ray" in the effect line. Orbs are not Rays. Rays are a specific subset of ranged touch attacks. Most of the time, this doesn't matter...unless you are applying Split Ray metamagic. You can NOT Split Ray an Orb, because technically, its not a Ray. If you want to double up, you need to Twin it, which is 2 levels more expensive. Split Ray is so cheap because it only applies to a small set of spells.

I stand corrected. Though, with the exception of Split Ray, most things that benefit a ray-focused wizard and things that benefit and Orb-focused wizard do overlap.

[Zergrusheddie]

Radiant Assault is a nice spell, though it is level 7. The Dazed for 1d6 rounds is a nice advantage of the spell as it can make a group of bad guys useless. Scorching Ray is a nice spell to focus on as it does decent damage, offers no saving throw, and is low level enough to add metamagic like Quicken, Maximize, or Energy Admixture. I must agree that banning Conjuration really hurts because you lose the Orb spells, some nasty Battlefield Control, and the always useful Teleport. Evokers can preform some nasty Scry and Die tactics because they can just pop in an begin blasting the enemies with Scorching Rays/Fireballs/Cones of Cold while flying out of reach.

I've played an Evoker Wizard before (he was basically Tim the Enchanter) but I ended up not being a Specialist. Losing entire spell trees is just a massive price to pay that could end up biting you when you need to be able to cast another spell. You may want to show him the Domain Wizard from the Alternative Class feature section of the SRD instead. It's a fixed list, but he doesn't lose any spells.

Best of luck
-Eddie

[Gorbash]

And he has banned Illusion, Enchantment, and Conjuration

I think I died a bit inside.

[Godskook]

Hrm, good suggestions. It's because his character concept is based off of Richard (LFGcomic), I tried to push him away from banning Conjuration (But for some stupid reason, CM gives it as a commonly given up school by Evokers... Silly Wizards...), and due to it being an evil campaign, it offers more from Necromancy.

Richard wouldn't ban conjuration, he'd ban abjuration. Seriously, does he look like the 'protection from x' type of guy? Richard doesn't believe in this wierd thing called 'defense', and would ban abjuration over conjuration any day of the week. Read through the battle between the gnomes and trolls. Richard is worthless against the troll shamans' wards. A caster with dispel magic prepared wouldn't have been(or known, for sorcerers).

[ShneekeyTheLost]

So he wants to be Richard, eh?

Actually, a better way would be Warlock with Hellrime and Hellfire invocations. You get unlimited blasting of fire or cold damage. Plus you are better at stabbing things than a Wizard.

Not only that, but as a bonus you get some pretty nasty stuff. Talk to him about Hellfire Warlock.

Failing that, take some Reserve feats. Fire Burst and Winter's Blast are your fire and cold based ones. Unlimited blastomancy in very small packages. But hey, it's at least unlimited blasty in fire and cold.

Piercing Evocation is going to be a must-have for him.

Metamagic School Focus (Evocation) will make buffing his elemental blasting easier

[VirOath]

He looked at the Warlock class first, to be honest, but was happier with Wizard in the end.

And I know, Conjuration banning doesn't fit the bill on my view of it, but what matter's is his view of it.

[ChaosDefender24]

Be shure to snag divine power with your extra Evocation spells from MS

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Be shure to snag divine power with your extra Evocation spells from MS

Since Divine Power is not an arcane spell, this is impossible.

[Godskook]

Since Divine Power is not an arcane spell, this is impossible.

Arcane disciple - War?

[Volkov]

What is this optimization? My wizard was lucky enough to roll all 18s for his stats.

[Elminster1]

No, if you want to be a blaster, go for Ultimate Magus, as it allows you to "blow" your spontaneous caster spell side to metamagic your perpared side. It requires you do pick up a spontaneous caster side. I reccomend Beguiler, because it's intelligence based, having synergy with wizard, and you get the extra skills for free and armored mage feat at entry into the class. Who casres about the spells, your using them as metamagic fuel for blasting anyway.

You also have Incantatrix, can make a nice blaster build. For the love of God though, use the Orb spell series. No save no SR. Best blast spells ever. Oh, and they are dual threat to boot.

Lastly, Frostburn has some nice blaster ideas. If you pick up Piercing Cold, all your cold based spells effect everything, eve things immune to cold based attacks. You have to be an Ice magic mania, but thats cool anyway. A Frostburn Cold killer would do scary amounts of unresistable damage, which is HUGE considering blasting tends to die to SR and resistance. This helps bypass one obstacle.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Arcane disciple - War?

He said "From MS", which, I assume, is from Master Specialist. Since it is not available to Master Specialist because it is not an arcane spell, I responded in the manner that I did.

Besides, if he is trying to emulate Richard from LFG comics, his Wisdom score is probably going to be Belkar-ish... that would be somewhere around 8 or so, therefore he wouldn't be able to cast it since it requres at least a 14 Wis to cast a 4th level spell through Arcane Disciple.